A Beautiful Lie

Part Twenty- two

The horses' galloping sound was evident when a dusk of dirt emerged in the air. They rode the big beast and have roamed the estate for a few hours now. Nicole turned around and watched Ethan's hair fly freely as the wind continued to blow in his face. He looked so sexy wearing those dark blue jeans and a plain white shirt. He also completed his looks with a leather jacket and a cowboy hat. This was a different version of his fashion sense but same as before she can't complain about how he could put an idea of a country cowboy into a real one, giving justice to her imagination. Ethan can pull off anything no matter what clothes he probably wears. She paused at the edge of a small hill, and she sniffed the cold air. It smells like trees and grass. It smells like earth. She exhaled.

Damien has shown them half of the property. The ranch has a variety of animals in its place and Nicole was amazed how organized they were in managing the farm. They have a variety of cows, poultry chickens, and domesticated swine.

Ethan halted as he breathed deeply right next to her. "You ride fast..." he commented while panting. He wiped off the sweat forming on his forehead.

She grinned at his remark. "Did I? I was not aware." she nonchalantly shrugged her shoulders.

Ethan's eyes narrowed and Nicole laughed.

"Well... if you must know, I used to ride horses when I was younger. My grandmother used to own a small farm in our hometown before and we have a variety of mares. Every time we visited her, she always encouraged me to go and ride Snow, our white stallion. That has been my entire childhood. I can probably say riding horses was second nature before, but it has been a while since I was able to do this, and having this experience again is undeniably nostalgic.

"That's impressive, no wonder you look so natural." He commented and Nicole blushed.

"Here we go again, my stupid heart is racing..." Nicole thought.

Ethan and his words, when will she get used to it?

After they momentarily rested, Ethan decided to explore more on the property.

"Are you ready to go?" he asked, making sure she was fine. Nicole nodded and followed Damien's and Ethan's track. They moved further into the woods and Damien carefully guided them through.

Nicole noticed that this was a different part of the estate and did not expect that there was more to see deep into this vast timberland, it seemed very secluded. There were dry twigs all over and the eerie silence resounded the scenic view. How many times has she watched thriller movies about murder and evil spirits lurking in the woodland? This could be another plot and either they are the main characters or the initial victims. She suddenly hit herself inwardly, the thought genuinely scared her, this is an unfamiliar territory after all.

They carefully followed the trail. Nicole was tempted to stop and ask Damien where they were heading but he maintained an earful distance from her. Ethan probably felt her discomfort and decided to go after her, changing the dynamics of their sequence earlier. Damien was ahead of them followed by Nicole and Ethan was just right behind her, she was making sure to be extra cautious when suddenly a painful shriek was heard, and a loud thud echoed into the air. An agonizing loud moan escaped from Ethan's mouth.

Nicole immediately turned around and saw Ethan being thrown away from his horse and his head was hit by a hard trunk. He was holding his right leg and his face showed a painful grimace. Nicole readily jumped off her horse and checked on Ethan's condition immediately. She assesses if any injury was brought from the fall, checking for any signs of trauma from his head. Concern was written all over her face as she attended to him. Nicole then confirmed that there was no sign of bleeding, but the obvious pain was from his right leg, she then carefully rolled his pants up and saw the swollen joints. It must have been twitched somewhere due to his unexpected fall.