4
A boot to the bottom of my sole jars me to consciousness.
“Wake the fuck up.”
My gaze shifts. Above me is a scowling older brother.
“Sleepin’ in ditches now?” Ford drawls. He wears his climbing gear. “Gotta be a new low.”
“Dick,” I mutter, pushing myself up. I rub my eyes then groan at the stiffness in my back. Using a fence post as a bed was a rookie mistake.
I’ve had a full day. Coaching at the rodeo camp then cleaning out the ditches that border Runaway Ranch. Taking a nap on the job seemed like damn fine idea, especially since I can sleep anywhere besides my own goddamn bed.
“Get your ass up,” Ford orders. He jerks his chin. “Bullshit Box. Now.”
I stand and grab the bag of trash. Side of the road litter from assholes just passing through.
I follow him across the ranch, wiping my sweaty palms on my blue jeans. The sun’s low in the sky, the air heavy with humidity. Ford walks at a crisp pace, not his usual lanky, carefree stride, telling me something’s off.
When we enter the Bullshit Box, a corrugated metal home we use as our business headquarters, I groan. Charlie and Davis are at their desks, swiveling their chairs toward me the second I step inside.
Ford hitches a thumb. “Just as we suspected. Sleepin’ on the job.”
“Check it out,” I tell Davis, depositing the bag of trash onto his desk. I rustle around and pull out an old Ouija board. “I was cleanin’ out the ditch and found this.”
One glance down and he’s swearing. “Get rid of it,” he orders.
I smirk. “We’ll see what happens.”
“No, there is no we’ll see what happens .” He sighs, exasperated. “What’d I tell you about bringing haunted objects into the workplace?”
Charlie rubs his beard. “Goddamn it, Wyatt, we lose all credibility when you do this.”
Davis gestures at the couch. “Sit.”
I eye him warily. “Why?”
“We need to talk,” Ford says, spinning around a chair and sitting.
I note the silent exchange of conversation between my twin brothers. Davis with his arms crossed, settling in to play bad cop, while Ford’s the picture of relaxation.
Shit. This is never a good sign.
“Sit,” Davis orders again.
On a grumble, I plop on the couch. “If this is about the possum, I…” I trail off, noticing the lack of beers, a stack of notecards, solemn faces. “What is this? Some kind of intervention?”
They all lean forward, eyes on me, and I tense.
Fuck . There’s nothing like your big brothers getting in touch with their emotional sides to really put a guy on edge.
I sigh. “Listen, I don’t need this. I’m not—”
“Okay,” Charlie finishes with an eyebrow raise.
I glare at him. “I’m—”
“Depressed,” Davis finishes
“An idiot,” supplies Ford.
I scowl. “Christ, can I get a word in?”
Ford tugs on his collar, ill at ease. “Kid, shut up and listen to us.”
I swing my head in Charlie’s direction for help. He’s always had my back. But instead of calling them off, he just sighs and settles back in his chair.
My eyes narrow. “Did your wives put you up to this?”
Davis clears his throat. “The wives have nothing to do with this.”
Liar.
Ford reaches for the stack of notecards, his big hands fumbling as he flips through them.
I laugh. “Christ. You made talking points. Y’all really are whipped.”
“This was Ruby’s idea,” Ford snaps, looking more desperate by the second.
“Leave my wife outta this,” Charlie growls.
I smirk, satisfied I have them arguing amongst themselves. As the third youngest, I learned the tactics to charm and argue my way out of sibling squabbles.
“Fuck this,” Ford swears, realizing what I’m doing. He drops the cards and looks to Davis. “D, I’m about ten seconds away from puttin’ this kid’s head through a wall.”
All my brothers appear equally unamused.
Davis pins me with a stern glare. “You know, you’d make it a hell of a lot easier if you shut up and listened to us.”
“It ain’t your job—”
“Yeah, it is,” Charlie cuts in. “We’re your big brothers.”
“Fine,” I mutter. “Say what you want to say.”
The faster they spill it, the sooner I can get the hell out of here.
On a big exhale, Charlie rubs his jaw. He looks at Davis and Ford and then at me. “You’ve changed,” he states bluntly.
The amusement I feel is immediately replaced with shame.
A faint glimmer of emotion slides across Davis’s hard face. “You’ve been avoidin’ us. The family. Stayin’ away.”
I stare at the toes of my boots. Maybe I have. Maybe all I’m doing these days is keeping my distance. Because sometimes it feels like I have too much to lose. Other times, all I feel is numb.
“You’re workin’ too much. You ain’t sleepin’.” Ford drags a hand through his shaggy dark-blond hair. “Think I’ve seen you crack a six-pack more than a smile these days.”
“What can I say? I’m thirsty.”
The joke doesn’t land. No one laughs.
“Wy, the road you’re headed on—I know it.” Ford eyes me warily. “You’re sleepin’ too little. Drinkin’ too much.”
I am. Because my liver can handle a lot more than my heart can.
“You ain’t rodeoin’ no more,” Ford goes on, “but I see you on those horses. A hundred miles per hour without breaking. You ain’t John Wayne, kid. It’s like you’re going through the motions.”
He’s right. I feel so hollow inside. This has been the worse year of my life. I don’t even know where to begin to piece my heart back together.
I lost her. The one woman who made me feel something real.
“You haven’t been the same, Wy,” Charlie says, pulling my attention “Not since Fallon left.”
Fallon.
Both Ford and Davis look relieved that someone’s finally said her name.
An awkward silence blankets the Bullshit Box.
My brothers know I have a history with Fallon—each of them to different extents. But no one knows the real truth.
“I miss her,” I croak. It’s the only thing I can say.
“We know,” Charlie gruffs.
Davis and Ford stare at me with sympathy.
“I see it, Wyatt,” Davis says. “You’re angry like I was when Koty left.” Rubbing his stubbled jaw, he shifts uncomfortably. “Have you and Fallon—”
“Yeah,” I say, getting ahead of it before he can ask. “We did.”
“Fuck.” Davis looks worried.
I rub my eyes. “Don’t say it, I already know.”
No daughters . Stede McGraw’s words of warning ring in my head as if he’s just said them aloud.
Stede and I stand in the pasture, baking under the hot August sun. “Son, looks like you and me oughta have a talk.”
“What about?”
“First…” His eyes follow Fallon, who smokes a cigarette on the deck of the lodge. In her other hand, she violently flicks a pocketknife back and forth. “You sure you’re ready to take that hellion on?”
No. Truth is, I only agreed to give her lessons to get close to Stede McGraw. Training a girl, let alone a sixteen-year-old hellraiser, cramped my style. But if it meant I could learn from the King of Cowboys, hell, sign me up.
I shrug. “Ain’t any wilder than a mustang.”
He chuckles. Then his weathered face grows serious, solemn. “Second…” He lifts a finger. “No daughters. I got two girls. One’s the sun and one’s the moon, and I don’t want you to collide with either of them.”
I keep an easy face, despite the fact that his words sting. “Ain’t interested.” Too young. Too scary. Buckle bunnies were more my speed. One and done.
He grins. “Then, hell, son, we’ll get along just fine.”
Then, because I’m a curious bastard, I ask, “You tell any of my other brothers that?”
Stede lifts a hand. “No insult. Just a talk. Cowboy to cowboy.”
I hear him loud and clear.
Not good enough. Not for a cowboy like me.
Because cowboys don’t keep the girl.
And I definitely didn’t keep Fallon.
The heart in my chest tightens painfully. “So? What’s your fuckin’ point?”
“Our fuckin’ point is,” Ford growls, “we let you sulk for long enough. It’s time to snap out of it.” He grins, the picture of innocence. “You need a slump buster to get you out of your funk.”
I bristle. Another woman? Fuck that.
“Fuck you,” I tell Ford, giving him what he wants. A reaction.
A muscle tics beneath Davis’s eye. “Our fuckin’ point is…we all fumbled it with Fallon. We should have—”
“Tied her to a fence until she saw common sense?” Charlie drawls.
“Something like that.” Regret creases Davis’s face. “I should have done something. She’s my sister-in-law. She’s my responsibility.”
I bristle. She’s my responsibility. But I grit my teeth and keep my fat mouth shut. Davis wants to play hero? That’s fine.
“The point is,” Charlie says, watching me carefully, “we’re all to blame. Not just you.”
“Something you want to say, kid?” Ford smirks, and I wonder who made him the damn expert in love. “You gone for the girl? Name on boots?”
“Asshole,” I mutter.
I say nothing, because there’s nothing to say. All of my brothers have had their secrets. So why shouldn’t I?
Watching me struggle for an answer, Ford laughs. “Well, while you’re busy lyin’ to us, maybe we got something that’ll help you.”
Charlie tosses an issue of Western Horseman across the table. “Open it.”
I do.
My eyes scan the article.
Competing in the Rock ’n Ride Rodeo, a new reality show competition, is Fallon McGraw. McGraw, who’s currently living at El Toro Ranch in Gila Gulch, Arizona…
My mouth goes dry. My heart hammers. “She’s in Arizona?”
“Looks like it,” Charlie says.
Vic LaVoie’s ranch.
“I don’t believe it,” I say, reading. Pride and dread hum beneath my skin. “The pompous prick did it. Pappy got her to the big leagues.”
If she wins this, the payout, the accolades, the fame could be huge.
Charlie chuckles. “Glad to hear that she’s still as impulsive and slightly insane as I remember.”
Davis’s deep voice rumbles. “Well?”
I shove up from the couch. There’s a buzz like neon in my head, my heart.
I can already feel her gravity pulling me in. My busted heart’s on a leash that’s still tied to Fallon McGraw.
I tear a hand through my hair. “Fuck it. I’m going.”
Charlie chuckles. “Hell, you ain’t gonna have all the fun.”
The offer startles me, but I grin at my brothers. “Then let’s fuckin’ go.”
Go get Fallon. Bring her home.
And then…
Tell her everything I’ve been wanting to say for the last four years.