CHAPTER 9 #2
Her voice had shrunk to a whisper as I told her she should go with him.
Then came the screaming, the pleading for me not to do this as her fingers dug into my arms like she could anchor herself to me.
But what haunted me most, what still jolted me awake in the dead of the night, was how the light in her eyes vanished when I finally said the words I knew would hurt her the most.
The ones I could never take back.
She’d left after that, my truck door slamming so hard I feared it would break. She ripped the necklace I’d given her the year before off her neck and threw it at me, the thin metal strawberry cutting me just below my jaw, before she ran into June’s house.
I had put my head down and worked this ranch until my hands bled and my muscles screamed. I had broken her that night, shattered everything between us. For years, the weight of what I’d done pressed down on me until I couldn’t breathe.
Back then I only had myself and Blaire to lose. Now there was Ruby, too, and she changed the equation entirely.
I yanked the wire tighter, arms burning, but I didn’t stop.
It didn’t matter how many times I ran it over in my mind, I couldn’t rationalize the decision, couldn’t make it sound noble instead of cowardly. I’d told myself I was protecting her, that I was saving my family, but it wasn’t enough.
I’d convinced myself if I worked hard and sacrificed for those I loved, it would all work out and I’d stop hearing the echo of her voice in my head.
But it never ended. I’d never stopped wanting her.
And no matter how much I tried, no matter how many seasons I pushed through, I couldn’t make myself want anything else.
Not for more than a night, anyway.
Ruby was a result of one of those nights, and even though Becca and I tried to make things work for the sake of my girl, I fucked that up, too.
Then I’d wake in the middle of the night with Blaire’s name half-whispered in my sleep, and Becca would be lying there, eyes open, staring at the ceiling.
She couldn’t stand living with a ghost, and hell, I couldn’t blame her.
After Becca walked out, I swore Ruby would never find a stranger in our home. No other woman would leave traces for my daughter to find. I’d keep my longing for Blaire locked away where it belonged—in the dark, where I faced it alone, night after night.
I’d nearly finished the run when my phone rang, vibrating so hard against my thigh it startled me. I fumbled my gloves off and yanked it loose, expecting McCoy or Hunter with an update about the eastern pasture.
Instead, it was Ruby’s elementary school.
My heart slammed against my ribs as I pressed the phone to my ear. The silence between my hello and their response stretched like the barbed wire in front of me, catching every terrible possibility.
“Hi, Mr. Calloway? It’s Suzie from Willow Grove Elementary. I’m sorry to bother you.”
“Is Ruby all right?” I asked.
“She’s fine,” she rushed to say. “Just feeling a little under the weather. She’s running a fever and said that her throat hurts. She’s resting in the nurse’s office, but she’s a little upset. I think she just wants her dad.”
“Tell her either I or her nana will be there as soon as we can.”
“Of course, Mr. Calloway. I’m going to go grab her a Popsicle while we wait.”
“Thank you.” I ended the call and looked over at the next section of fence that was still crushed to the ground, then back out at the cattle grazing nearby.
Fuck.
If I left it like this, we’d be chasing cattle for a week.
I tried Hunter first to have him come handle this fence, but his phone went straight to voice mail. I wasn’t surprised. He and McCoy were headed to the east side of our property when I left them early this morning, and there wasn’t cell service there for shit.
I quickly hung up and dialed my mom. She answered on the third ring.
“Hey, sweetheart.” Her voice was quiet.
“Hey, Mom.” I pulled off my hat and wiped at my forehead with my forearm. “The school called. Ruby’s running a fever. I’m stuck up at the north field, and Hunter’s out of reach. Any chance you can pick her up?”
She hesitated, which meant she couldn’t. “I took your dad to his appointment in town. We won’t make it back until three.” I could hear the disappointment in her voice. She didn’t want to let either of us down, and she never could. “I could leave your dad here, run and get her, and?—”
“Mom, stop. It’s okay.” I forced a lightness into my voice I didn’t really feel, caught between the broken fence, the scattered cattle, and my little girl asking for me.
My mother must have heard the strain beneath my words because she let out one of those sighs, the kind that said she knew I was drowning, but she didn’t know how to fix it.
“Call June,” she suggested. Her voice was brisk, falling into the rhythm of fixing that mothers were so good at.
“I will, but I’m going to go ahead and head that way.” I was already walking to Buck and running my hand down his neck. I’d leave the damn fence and get to Ruby, cattle be damned. That would be tomorrow’s problem.
“Okay, sweetheart. I can pick her up as soon as we’re back, and I’ll make her some soup.”
“Thanks, Mom.” I hung up before untying Buck’s lead rope and swinging myself up into the saddle.
I clicked on my phone, calling June’s number as I kicked into Buck’s sides, getting him to move while we waited for her to answer. I was about to hang up when she finally did.
“Hello.” Fuck, that wasn’t June.
“Uh, hi. Is June there?” Why the hell was I stumbling over my words?
“Hi,” Blaire said hesitantly, and I could hear her moving. “No. She went out to bingo and left her phone at the house. That has to be a safety issue for someone her age, right?” She chuckled.
I sat frozen with the phone pressed to my ear like a goddamn idiot, Buck shifting restlessly beneath me. Every emotion I’d spent the day sweating out rushed back in with the sound of her voice on the other line.
“Sorry,” I grunted. “I didn’t mean to bother you. I’ll?—”
“Is everything okay?” she interrupted, the warmth in her voice a sucker punch.
“Are you okay, Blaire?”
She sucked in a breath, and I imagined her narrowing her eyes and biting down on her bottom lip as her frustration with me grew. “You’re the one who called. What’s wrong? You sound off.”
God, I hated how easily she could hear it, how easily she could read me after all these years, even through a phone.
“Ruby’s sick. I was going to ask June to pick her up, but I’m already headed that way.”
“Oh. I— I can get her,” she said with a hesitation that made my chest ache, but her offer made me stop short.
“No, it’s fine. I’m out working, but I can get back to the big house in fifteen.” I hated how defeated I sounded. “I’ll call the school and?—”
“Let them know I’ll be there in ten minutes to pick her up.” There was a steadiness in her tone that reminded me so much of the old Blaire.
My pulse jumped, and I opened my mouth to object. I tried to picture Blaire stepping back into the halls of Willow Grove Elementary and walking out with my daughter.
“Blaire—”
“I’m not arguing about this, Colt. You need help. June’s not here, and I’m not leaving Ruby at school sick. I’m doing this for her, not you.” There was a pause, and I could practically see the stubborn lift of her chin I’d always admired and hated in equal measure.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said finally. There were rules to keep things safe for my girl. Blaire had only met my daughter at her best, but sick Ruby was different. She was needy and raw. Her brave face would be replaced with fever-flushed cheeks and trembling lips.
In one afternoon, Blaire would glimpse what I’d spent five years protecting.
She scoffed on the other end of the line. “Well, Colt, if my memory serves me, sometimes you don’t have the best ideas, and right now, I’m the only option you have.”
She was right.
I could either let her do this, or I’d be leaving twelve feet of fence down with cattle ready to wander.
Fatherhood was a constant tug-of-war with Ruby pulling one arm and this ranch yanking the other.
I’d inherited more responsibility than I thought I would at twenty-four, and it didn’t matter that I’d been pretty much running the ranch for the last five years. It didn’t get any easier.
Everyone was counting on me, and the thought of letting them down scared me to death.
My little girl most of all, especially after her mother left.
That was the thing no one told you when you became a parent.
The guilt was always beneath your skin, a raw nerve, always pulsing.
My muscles could ache from dawn to dusk, my clothes caked with mud, my hands crosshatched with barbed wire cuts, and I’d still saddle up tomorrow.
But the thought of Ruby needing me and not being able to give her everything cut me bone deep.
I’d convinced myself we were making it work. We had our sunrise pancake rituals, and she giggled when I tossed her onto her bed at night. Sunday dinners at my parents’ were her favorite, and she had two uncles who spoiled her rotten.
I’d hoped it would somehow patch the hole her mother left when she decided we weren’t enough. But sometimes, like now, when the world moved faster than my boots could, I’d catch that look in Ruby’s eyes, and I would hate myself for letting her down.
“Okay.” I nodded, even though Blaire couldn’t see me. “Thank you, Blaire.” The words were tight in my throat. “I owe you.”
The line went quiet for so long I checked my phone to see if she’d hung up, but then I heard the roar of her engine. “You don’t owe me anything, Colt.” She sounded tired. “Ruby and I will be fine. I’ll call you once I get her.”
She hung up, and I quickly called the school to let them know she was coming and that Blaire had my permission to get her.
I stared at the broken run of fence, jagged and useless like the promises I'd made to myself. Ruby came before everything, I knew that much. But I couldn’t ignore the way my chest had lightened at the sound of Blaire’s voice.
I wanted to keep her at a distance, needed to, and yet part of me wondered what it would be like if she slipped through the gaps I couldn’t seem to mend.