Chapter Four
~ Jojo ~
The air outside was sharper than I expected, tinged with wood smoke and the hint of frost lurking just behind the sun. I pulled my sleeves down and jogged to the barn, where Rawley already stood with a pair of battered field boots in his hands.
He tossed them to me—size ten, a little big, but they’d do. “Try these. Mud’s hell on sneakers this time of year.”
I slipped them on, trying to ignore the ghost memory of my dad doing the same thing, tossing me old work gloves or a bent hoe and telling me, “Don’t make a mess you can’t fix.”
Rawley waited, patient but never still, like his bones couldn’t quite believe he wasn’t on a clock somewhere. “You ready?” he asked.
I nodded, hugging my notebook close. “Which boundary first?”
He pointed east. “Pasture. Gonna have to cross the river. You good with water?”
I shrugged. “I can swim. Not afraid of mud, either.”
He cracked the smallest smile. “Good. Let’s go.”
We set off at a pace just shy of a jog, Rawley’s stride long and even, mine more like the quick footfalls of someone trying not to trip.
The land rolled in front of us, a tangle of winter grass and faded wildflowers, interrupted every few hundred yards by a fence post or a stand of aspen.
The fields looked wild, but in the way of something that remembered being loved once—a dog let off leash, not a feral coyote.
Rawley walked like he was still on patrol: eyes scanning, shoulders squared, each step calculated. Every so often, he’d pause and crouch to study a hoof-print or a downed wire, then motion me over with a quick tilt of his head.
“You see this?” he said, pointing to a cluster of small, deep impressions in the dirt.
I leaned in. “Deer?”
He nodded. “And something bigger.” He traced a boot-sized circle next to the tracks. “Bear, maybe. Probably black, but keep your eyes open.”
I was used to coyotes, the occasional badger, but not bears. I felt my skin prickle. Rawley watched me, measuring my reaction.
“You scared?”
I shook my head, even though I was. “No.”
He seemed to like that. “Stick close. They don’t bother you if you don’t bother them.”
We moved on. The fence line was a mess—sections sagging, wire rusted through, whole posts leaning at surrender angles. I jotted down notes, then sketched the boundaries as we walked, the map in my notebook growing with every step.
The land changed as we went. The high pasture flattened into a meadow, rimmed by chokecherry and birch. The ground was soft here, pocked with gopher holes and crisscrossed by old cow paths. Rawley stopped at a break in the fence and knelt, tugging at a piece of bent metal.
“Used to be cattle out here,” he said. “You ever work with livestock?”
“Not cattle,” I said, thinking of the goats I’d fed at a summer camp job when I was sixteen. “I always wanted to, though. My folks had chickens, but that’s about it.”
He eyed me, then went back to wrestling the wire. “You learn quick. That’s good.”
We crossed the open ground, then dipped into a stand of pines where the earth went dark and root-tangled. It was quieter here, the wind breaking up in the branches, the air thick with sap and decay.
I let myself fall a few steps behind, just to watch how Rawley moved through the trees. He was built for this—every motion direct, no wasted energy, like he could walk all day and never tire. I envied it, but more than that, I admired it.
After an hour, we reached the river: a narrow ribbon of clear water running fast over stones, banks scabbed with last year’s cattails and willow. The old fence stopped at the water’s edge, and Rawley scanned the other side, looking for a crossing.
“We’ll wade it,” he said. “It’s cold, but not deep. You good?”
I nodded, and he led the way, stepping into the current with no hesitation. The water bit through my boots, but I clenched my teeth and followed. By the time we climbed the far bank, my toes were numb, but the adrenaline masked most of it.
We took a break under a fallen log, and I dug out my thermos, pouring coffee into the lid. Rawley declined, but watched as I drank, his gaze never quite meeting mine, but always near.
I filled the silence with talk. “My grandpa’s farm was smaller than this—only fifteen acres, but it felt huge when I was a kid. He let me plant my own row of beans every year. Called it my ‘harvest share.’”
Rawley nodded, looking off toward the horizon. “You close with him?”
“Yeah. He died when I was twelve. After that, my folks sold the land. Said it was too much work for not enough money.” I sipped coffee, feeling my throat tighten. “They moved us to a subdivision. I didn’t fit in there.”
He grunted. “People like us don’t fit anywhere. Not unless we make the space ourselves.”
That caught me off guard. I glanced at him, but he was staring at the distant hills, eyes narrowed against the sun.
I shifted gears. “You ever run a place this big before?”
He shook his head. “No. I was always moving. SEALs, then security jobs. Never in one spot for more than a year. I figured I’d die in the sand or the jungle, not on a ranch in Montana.”
“Do you like it?”
He thought about it. “It’s honest work. No bullshit. The land gives back what you put in.”
I smiled. “I always thought so, too.”
We finished the coffee and got back to it. The walk back followed the river, the path muddy and slick. At one point, I slipped, boots skidding out from under me. I caught myself, but not before landing in a heap, knees and palms coated with black, peaty muck.
Rawley laughed, a rough bark that made the birds scatter. He offered me a hand, and I took it, his grip strong enough to lever me upright with one pull. The contact lingered for a beat longer than necessary, and my pulse went crazy.
He let go, then reached into his pocket and handed me a bandana. “Wipe off, city boy.”
I did, cheeks burning, but he just smirked and kept walking.
The land got rougher as we neared the north end of the property—hills steeper, brush thicker, ground studded with fallen branches and old, half-buried fence wire. I kept close, watching how Rawley picked his footing, how he scanned every rise and hollow as if expecting trouble.
“Did you grow up in Montana?” I asked, panting a little to keep up.
He shook his head. “Texas. Fort Worth. Family had money, but none of it ever felt real. I liked it better here.”
I tried to imagine him as a kid, probably the biggest and quietest kid in any room, never fitting the mold. “You ever miss it?”
“No,” he said, flat. “Nothing there worth missing.” He stopped at the crest of a hill, scanning the fields below. “You see that line of dark trees?”
I squinted, then nodded. “Yeah. Cottonwoods?”
“That’s the old property line. Used to be a creek there, but it dried up. If we ever put in irrigation, that’s where I’d run it.”
I fished my notebook out, made a note, then looked up. “How’d you know that?”
He tapped his temple. “Maps. Aerial photos. I read every inch of the deed before I came.”
We stood in silence, both breathing hard from the climb.
It happened then, as it always did: I said too much, or the wrong thing. I don’t even know what made me do it, except that the air was so clean, and Rawley was actually listening. I wanted to share the parts of myself that I usually kept locked away.
“I used to think if I worked hard enough, my parents would take me back. That I could prove I wasn’t a mistake.” My voice was small, but it carried. “But when they found out about me—being omega, being…” I let it trail off. “They just threw me out. Never called again.”
The silence stretched. I braced for the sneer, the pity, the polite “sorry” that never meant anything.
But Rawley just said, “Fuck them.”
I looked up, startled.
He was looking right at me, jaw clenched, eyes gone hard and bright. “You’re not a mistake. You work harder than anyone I’ve ever met. Anybody who can’t see that isn’t worth your time.”
I felt my throat go tight, chest filling with something hot and raw. I wanted to thank him, but the words stuck.
He must have seen the look on my face, because he stepped closer, voice low and rough as gravel. “You’re safe here, Jojo. Nobody’s going to hurt you on my watch.”
It hit me then, what he was really saying. Not just a promise of safety, but a claim, an oath. My pulse hammered in my ears. I felt my neck flush, the color creeping up to my cheeks, but I didn’t look away.
“Okay,” I managed.
He nodded once, satisfied, then turned to start back down the hill. I followed, my heart thudding, the weight of his words echoing inside me.
We made it back to the house at sundown, both mud-splattered and starving. I felt changed, like something had shifted in my bones. The old fear was still there, but now it had company—a new, dangerous hope that maybe, just maybe, I could have a place here.
And maybe, just maybe, I could have something more.
I peeled off my muddy boots at the porch and stepped inside. My my legs were jellied from chasing Rawley’s impossible stride all day, but it was a good kind of tired—the kind that meant you’d earned your dinner and then some.
I headed for the kitchen, where the old linoleum felt cool and forgiving under my sore feet.
I washed my hands, scrubbing hard at the creases of my palms, then surveyed the contents of the pantry with the scrutiny of a four-star chef.
There was some wilted kale, an onion, a sack of potatoes, and a stick of butter.
I could work with that.
I started the skillet, rolling butter around the pan until it foamed.
I peeled and cubed the potatoes, added them with a sizzle, and watched them go golden at the edges.
The scent lifted and wrapped around me, homey and rich, chased by the bite of raw onion and the sweet undernote of garlic I’d rescued from a back shelf.