There was a type of pain Revan knew all too well.
The agony of a broken collarbone.
The ache of titanium screws holding his shoulder tendon in place beneath the skin.
And the pain of his father’s long, heavy silence every time Revan failed to be the perfect money-making machine.
But this afternoon, a new kind of pain burned his throat like battery acid.
It wasn’t in his shoulder.
It was in his chest.
And the cause was the soft laughter drifting from the barn office porch.
Revan stood in the shadows of stall number four, the saddle cloth in his hand frozen mid-motion.
His eyes narrowed, locking onto the scene across the dusty yard.
Alesya was sitting on a long wooden bench under the shade of a bougainvillea tree.
She had changed into a thin, sage-colored cotton t-shirt that hung loosely around the neck, revealing the delicate line of her collarbone with every movement.
Her brown hair had come undone from its braid, falling in waves around her petite shoulders.
And sitting far too close beside her was Declan Ashford.
Declan held a paper coffee cup, leaning toward Alesya, saying something that made the corners of her lips lift.
It wasn’t the stiff smile Alesya usually gave Revan.
It wasn’t the defensive smile of a doctor negotiating with her employer.
It was free laughter.
Pure.
Warm.
A sound Revan hadn’t heard from her since the day she first set foot on Blackstone Estate.
“Damn it,” Revan hissed under his breath.
His fingers gripped the saddle leather so hard the oil seeped onto his knuckles.
With Revan, every conversation was a battlefield.
Every glance was a power struggle.
Every touch had to be paid for with pain, sweat, and past wounds ripped open alive.
Yet with Declan—a man she’d only known for a few hours—Alesya laughed as if the world were a safe place.
Revan threw the saddle cloth onto a wooden crate with a rough jerk that made Phantom lift his head in surprise inside the stall.
He stepped out of the barn’s darkness, piercing through the harsh Florida midday sun.
His strides were long, heavy, and dangerous.
His boots crunched against the gravel with a rhythm that demanded attention.
Declan was the first to look up.
An annoyingly lazy smirk immediately spread across his handsome friend’s face.
“Ah, the king finally emerges from his cave,” Declan greeted cheerfully, raising his coffee cup.
“Dr.
Vargas just told me how people in Colombia train Paso Fino horses with rhythmic wood taps.
Far more civilized than your Roman military camp methods.”
Alesya turned.
The smile on her face vanished instantly, replaced by a mask of cold, controlled professionalism the moment her eyes collided with Revan’s gray ones.
That shift in expression felt like a physical slap to Revan’s face.
She closed herself off again.
Only for me.
“Break time ended ten minutes ago, Dr.
Vargas,” Revan’s voice cut through the air, cold and sharp as a scalpel.
Alesya raised her eyebrows slowly.
She didn’t rush to stand.
Her movements were calm, deliberately showing she couldn’t be intimidated by the man’s commanding tone.
“Phantom just finished lunch, Revan,” Alesya replied flatly.
“His digestive system needs at least forty-five minutes before we can perform a biomechanical evaluation on vertical obstacles.”
“I’m not talking about Phantom,” Revan cut in, his eyes shifting to Declan with a killing gaze.
“I’m talking about the arena.
Declan has a training schedule in Palm Beach at three o’clock.
And he’s wasting my time here.”
Declan laughed heartily, leaning back casually against the wooden bench.
“Come on, Rev.
I’m just enjoying a pleasant conversation with the only sane person on this property,” Declan teased, winking mischievously at Alesya.
“And honestly, Dr.
Vargas is far more interesting than your boring wooden obstacles.”
Revan’s jaw clenched so hard the muscle under his ear pulsed painfully.
A wild, primal urge surged in his blood to grab Declan by the collar, drag his friend out of the Blackstone Estate gates, and ensure no other man ever saw the curve of Alesya’s neck while she laughed.
“Declan,” Revan’s voice dropped to a low growl laden with deadly threat.
“Get off my ranch.
Now.”
Declan raised both hands, feigning shock, but his sharp eyes read every tension in Revan’s posture like an open book.
“Okay, okay.
Someone is suddenly very sensitive today,” Declan stood up, brushing off his jeans.
The blond man leaned slightly toward Alesya, took her right hand, and pressed a brief, elegant kiss to the back of her fingers.
A classic European playboy move.
Revan felt all the blood in his body boil to the breaking point.
His shoulder muscles tensed so hard his breath caught in his throat.
“Nice meeting you, Alesya,” Declan whispered with a soft accent.
“I’ll make sure to come back tomorrow to hear the rest of your story.”
Alesya smiled thinly… a polite smile that didn’t retract when her hand was kissed.
“Goodbye, Declan.”
After Declan walked away toward his car in the parking area, a hot, toxic silence instantly enveloped the barn office porch.
Alesya stood up, straightened her sage shirt, and turned to face Revan.
Her honey-brown eyes stared at the man with a stripping gaze.
“Do you have a problem today, Caldwell?”
“You’re too friendly with strangers,” Revan hissed, stepping forward until the distance between them was erased.
Alesya didn’t back down.
She looked up, challenging the darkness in the man’s eyes with a courage that nearly drove Revan insane.
“Declan isn’t a stranger.
He’s your friend.”
“He’s an Ashford,” Revan snapped back, his voice laced with poisonous bitterness.
“His family owns half the equestrian circuit on this continent.
He’s used to collecting beautiful women like he collects sports cars.
And you… you smiled at him as if you wanted to become one of his collections.”
Slap.
The words weren’t spoken with a hand, but the impact was the same.
Alesya’s face paled for a moment before pure anger burned across her beautiful features.
Her brown eyes ignited like a bonfire in the middle of the night.
“Watch your foul mouth, Revan,” Alesya whispered, her voice very quiet but vibrating with such dense anger that the air around them trembled.
“Just because you let yourself be bought by the Ashworth family and turned into a business pawn by your father, doesn’t mean everyone in this world has a price that can be negotiated!”
Alesya stepped one inch closer, crashing her moral dominance against the man’s chest.
“I am not one of your socialites.
I am not one of the women you can control regarding who I’m allowed to smile or laugh with!”
The woman’s words pierced straight into Revan’s deepest wound.
Revan grabbed Alesya’s wrist before she could turn away.
The touch was rough, hot, and desperate.
Revan pulled the woman close until Alesya’s petite body crashed against his broad chest.
The scent of lavender, angry sweat, and Alesya’s warm breath instantly flooded Revan’s senses, destroying the last remnants of his sanity.
“You are here to heal Phantom,” Revan whispered right in front of Alesya’s trembling lips.
His voice was hoarse and dangerous.
“Your focus is on me and my horse.
Not on other men wandering around my ranch.”
“Let go of me, Revan!”
“Tell me you understand, Alesya.”
“I don’t owe you any obedience outside of the medical contract!”
Alesya yanked her hand away with full force.
The sudden, hard rejection forced Revan to reflexively use his left hand to steady the woman’s shoulder so she wouldn’t fall off the porch steps.
CRACK.
A dull sound echoed from within Revan’s left shoulder joint.
Burning pain… like hot barbed wire being forcibly pulled through his deltoid muscle and titanium tendon… exploded instantly along his left arm.
Revan jerked violently.
His breath cut off in his throat.
The man stumbled back half a step, releasing Alesya instantly, and clutched his left shoulder with his right hand.
Revan’s face paled drastically, even his lips losing color.
Cold sweat flooded his forehead within seconds.
The anger in Alesya’s eyes extinguished instantly, replaced by clinical panic and pure fear.
“Revan!”
Alesya stepped forward without hesitation.
The woman forgot their entire argument, forgot her pride, and immediately slipped her body under Revan’s left arm to support the man’s weight.
“Sit,” Alesya commanded, her voice changing into an undeniable doctor’s authority.
Revan tried to resist, trying to straighten his proud back.
“I… I’m fine…”
“I said sit on that bench now, Revan Caldwell!” Alesya shouted, her voice cracking with anxiety.
Alesya forced the 188-centimeter-tall man to sit on the long wooden bench under the bougainvillea tree.
Without wasting a single second, Alesya knelt on the gravel between Revan’s thighs.
An incredibly intimate position.
Alesya raised both hands, slipping her warm, trembling fingers under the collar of Revan’s black shirt, palpating directly the skin of the man’s left shoulder, which was burning from acute muscle spasms.
“Ugh..” Revan hissed roughly, his head falling back against the wooden wall, his jaw clamped so tight his teeth ached.
“Your trapezius muscle is locking your neck nerve,” Alesya whispered, her voice panicked, her face only inches from Revan’s chest.
Alesya pressed her thumb into the trigger point near the man’s shoulder blade, massaging the inflamed tissue with a deep, strong, and desperate rhythm.
“You forced a rotational movement when your emotions were unstable,” Alesya scolded with a trembling voice, tears of frustration glistening in the corners of her eyes.
“You stupid bastard who doesn’t know how to take care of your own body!”
Revan opened his eyes slowly.
Through the fog of throbbing pain in his shoulder, what he saw was Alesya’s face, so close.
He could see beads of sweat on the woman’s forehead.
He could smell her messy hair, and feel Alesya’s hurried warm breath on his neck as her fingers continued to struggle to alleviate his pain.
This woman was scolding him.
This woman had hated him five minutes ago.
But now, Alesya was kneeling in the dirt between his legs, touching him with such desperate tenderness as if Revan’s pain were her own.
Revan raised his healthy right hand.
Not to push the woman away.
Revan’s rough fingers moved up slowly, touching the side of Alesya’s neck, caressing her trembling jawline with lethal gentleness.
Alesya froze under that touch.
The movement of her fingers on Revan’s shoulder slowed, but didn’t stop.
The woman’s honey-brown eyes looked up, locked tightly with Revan’s dark gray eyes, wet with unbearable intensity.
“Why do you care so much, Alesya?” Revan whispered hoarsely, his voice breaking with terrifying vulnerability.
“If I’m just the arrogant boss you hate… why are your hands trembling when you touch my wound?”
Alesya swallowed.
Her throat was choked by emotions too large to be expressed in words.
“Because I don’t let my patients die in front of me,” Alesya whispered with a barely audible voice.
“Liar,” Revan replied softly, his thumb stroking Alesya’s wet, slightly parted lower lip.
“You don’t look at your patients like this.”
The silence under the bougainvillea tree became so thick, so laden with intertwined passion and sorrow.
From afar, near the parking area, the sound of a car door closing echoed.
Declan Ashford stood beside his running car.
The man hadn’t left.
Declan stood frozen in the distance, staring straight at the barn porch, watching how Revan touched the Colombian veterinarian’s face, and how the woman knelt between Revan’s legs with such a naked gaze.
The relaxed smirk on Declan’s face slowly disappeared completely, replaced by a serious expression that was cold and filled with dangerous awareness.
Declan shook his head slowly, then stepped back toward the porch with deliberate steps so the gravel crunched loudly.
Alesya immediately snapped back to reality, pulling her hands from Revan’s shoulder and standing up lightning fast, panicking as she straightened her clothes.
Revan lowered his hand slowly, his eyes fixed on Declan, who now stood five meters in front of them.
Declan stared at Revan for a long time.
No jokes this time.
Declan’s blue eyes looked at his friend with a sharpness that stripped bare all the lies Revan had kept for so long.
“You need to cancel your engagement to Victoria right now, Revan,” Declan’s voice was cold, cutting through the air like a judge’s gavel.
Revan straightened his back, his eyes freezing.
“Watch your mouth, Declan.”
Declan stepped one pace closer, his eyes glancing toward the barn door where Alesya had just disappeared, then locking back onto Revan’s eyes.
“Don’t play blind in front of me, buddy,” Declan whispered sharply, his voice laden with a terrifying warning.
“You look at that vet as if she’s the only li
ving creature left in all of Florida.
And if Gerald Ashworth or your father saw what I just saw…”
Declan paused, a thin, bitter smirk etched on the corner of his lips.
“…they won’t just destroy your career, Revan.
They will ensure that woman never touches a horse again for the rest of her life.”