12. Wade
WADE
The Bradshaw paperwork sprawled across my desk like a map of everything I needed to get done.
I'd been at it since seven that morning, signing off on mineral rights documentation and surveying reports.
The hum of the office air conditioning was the only sound besides the occasional creak of the building settling around me.
Callie just needed time. That's what I kept telling myself as I flipped through another page of dense legal text.
She'd see that I was trying, that I wanted to work this out.
I'd sent her messages since I left Jolene's door last night.
A lot of them, actually. Apologizing, asking her to talk to me, telling her I loved her, asking her to please just come home so we could figure this out together.
She hadn't answered a single one, but that was fine.
That was her taking the space she needed. She'd answer when she was ready.
I checked my phone again. Nothing.
Ten past four. The Bradshaw deal needed signatures by the thirty-first, and I still had to get everything finalized.
I still had to get back to the accountant about the tax implications on the western parcels.
Shelby's father was breathing down my neck about the environmental assessments, and the surveyor had flagged two sites that needed follow-up before we could move forward.
But I could handle it. I was good at this kind of thing. Breaking down complicated problems into manageable pieces and working through them one at a time. That's what I did.
I'd go see Callie this afternoon. Yeah. I checked the time again.
Around six, maybe. That'd give me time to finish reviewing the environmental assessments, make those calls, and send the updated notes to the surveyor.
Then I'd clean up, drive over to Jolene's place, and we'd talk.
Really talk this time, not like last night when she'd shut the door in my face after I'd tried to help.
My hand reached for the ring in my jacket pocket without thinking.
I'd been carrying it since I found it on my pillow last night.
The band was warm from being against my chest all day, and I turned it over once, feeling the smooth gold under my thumb, before shoving it deeper into the pocket.
She'd left it there for me to find. A message I still didn't understand.
The offer I'd made at Jolene's door last night had seemed reasonable. Money. Credit. I'd meant it. I'd give her whatever she needed. But when she asked me why I thought she'd left, I'd given her an answer.
She'd told me to leave. So I had.
I pulled the next file closer and tried to focus.
The western boundary survey. Shelby's family had oil under half their land, and getting the drilling rights sorted without tangling up the water access was like trying to untie a knot with one hand.
Three different parcels, two water sources, and a mineral rights agreement that dated back to the nineteen fifties. But I could do it. I'd done worse.
At four thirty I was still at my desk. The environmental assessment had flagged concerns about groundwater contamination risks if the drilling went ahead on the northwestern site, which meant another round of calls and probably another meeting with the state regulators.
I glanced at my phone again. Still nothing from Callie.
I could head out soon. Just needed to finish this section and send the notes off. Another twenty minutes, maybe thirty.
My coffee had gone cold. I drank it anyway.
The thing was, Callie was probably talking things through with Jolene right now.
That's what she did when she was upset. She'd go to her best friend, lay it all out, and Jolene would help her see that we could work through this.
We always worked through things. Ten years of marriage, and we'd never had a fight we couldn't resolve.
This was just another one of those. She needed time. I needed to give her that.
At five the office was quiet, and I was alone with the paperwork and the low buzz of the overhead lights. It was just me and the Bradshaw file and the stack of notes I still needed to review.
I told myself I'd wrap it up in another twenty minutes.
Just get through this next section, make sure the numbers lined up with what the accountant had projected, and then I'd go.
Callie wasn't going anywhere. She was at Jolene's, safe, probably having dinner or watching something on television.
She had time to think. That's what she needed.
I kept working.
At quarter to six I realized I hadn't eaten since breakfast. My stomach was a knot, but I wasn't hungry.
I was restless. On edge. I stood up from the desk, paced to the window, looked out at the ranch stretching into the distance.
The cattle were dark shapes against the grass, and the sky had started to turn that particular shade of gold it got in early March when the days were getting longer but the heat hadn't set in yet.
I should go. I should stop putting this off and just go see her.
But the Bradshaw file was still sitting on my desk, half-reviewed, and if I didn't finish it tonight I'd be behind tomorrow.
The thirty-first was coming faster than I wanted, and I couldn't afford to let this slip.
Shelby's father was counting on me. My mother was counting on me.
Hell, the whole deal was riding on me getting this right.
Callie would understand. She always understood.
I sat back down and pulled the file closer.
By the time I locked up the office, the sky outside had gone from gold to deep blue, and the first stars were starting to show.
I walked across the gravel lot toward the house, my boots crunching loud on the stones, and the air had cooled just enough to take the edge off the day.
I had my keys in one hand and Callie's ring in my jacket pocket, a small weight I'd gotten used to carrying.
The house was dark when I came in sight of it. No lights on in the kitchen, no glow from the living room windows. I stopped on the gravel and stood there a minute, just looking at the place Callie and I had lived in for ten years.
I let myself in, and the silence hit me like a wall. The door hadn't been locked.
Inside, I pulled off my jacket in the hall, moving the ring from its pocket to my jeans pocket, and loosening my tie.
The house was still except for the faint tick of the clock in the kitchen and the low hum of the refrigerator.
I needed a drink. Maybe something to eat, though I wasn't hungry.
Mostly I needed to sit down and figure out what the hell I was supposed to do next.
Go see her. Yeah. Before I got caught up in work again. I'd drive over to Jolene's, and this time I wouldn't bring up money or credit or any of that. I'd just ask her what she needed. What I could do to fix this.
I walked down the hall toward the bedroom, already thinking about pouring myself a whiskey and sitting down to go through my messages one more time in case she'd answered.
Shelby was on the bed.
The light from the window reached the bed.
She was lying on Callie's side, her blonde waves spread across the pillow, and she'd unbuttoned her white silk blouse just enough that I could see the edge of her bra.
She looked up at me when I stopped in the doorway, and her smile was slow and deliberate, like she'd been waiting for me and knew exactly what I'd do when I found her there.
"Hey, Wade."
I didn't move. My hand was still on the doorframe, and my brain was trying to catch up with what I was seeing. "What the hell are you doing here?"
"Waiting for you." She sat up, and her eyes moved around the room, taking everything in, then coming back to me. Her voice was soft when she spoke again, almost sympathetic. "I know Callie's gone, Wade. Everyone knows. The whole family's talking about it."
My jaw tightened, and I felt heat crawl up the back of my neck. I didn't want to have this conversation. Not with her, not with anyone. "You need to leave."
"Do I?" She slid off the bed and walked toward me, her bare feet silent on the floor, and I caught the scent of her perfume. Something floral and expensive and too damn sweet. "You're in this empty house all alone. You don't have to be."
She stopped close enough that I could feel the heat off her, and my pulse kicked up. Not because I wanted her there. Because I was pissed off that she'd come into my house, into my bedroom, and thought this was something I'd want. Thought this was something I'd even consider.
She reached up like she was going to touch my chest, and I caught her wrist before her hand made contact.
"Shelby." My voice came out rougher than I meant it to.
"I could stay," she said, and her voice had dropped lower, softer, like we were sharing a secret. Her fingers curled slightly against my grip. "We'd be good together. You know we would. Everyone knows it except you."
I let go of her wrist like it burned me and stepped back. Put space between us. My chest was tight, and I could feel my temper fraying at the edges. "No. You need to go. Now."
Her expression flickered. Just for a second I saw something sharp underneath the sympathy, something calculating and cold.
Then she smoothed it over and gave me a small, sad smile that didn't reach her eyes.
"You're upset. I understand. But Wade, you don't have to pretend with me.
I know what you need. I know what she couldn't give you. "
"You don't know a damn thing about what I need." The words came out hard and flat, and I didn't take them back. I didn't soften them. "Get out of my house."
She stood there another moment, weighing whether to push, whether to try one more time.
I saw her decide against it. She picked up her purse from the chair by the window and walked past me, close enough that her shoulder almost brushed mine.
She stopped in the doorway and looked back, and her smile was different now.
Knowing. Like she had all the time in the world.
"When you're ready to stop lying to yourself, you know where to find me."
I didn't answer. I just stood there and watched her walk down the hall, listened to her footsteps fade toward the front of the house, and then heard the door open and close.
Her car started outside a minute later, and the sound of it pulling away down the drive was the only noise in the house for a long time after.
I stood in the bedroom doorway and didn't move. Couldn't move.
The room smelled like Shelby's perfume now, and I hated it.
I hated that she'd been in here, on Callie's side of the bed, looking at everything like she was already planning what she'd change when she moved in.
I hated that she thought I'd want her here.
That she thought Callie leaving meant I'd just slide her into the empty space like one woman was the same as another.
God, what a mess.
I walked into the room and sat down on the edge of the bed, on my side, the same spot where I'd found Callie's ring last night. My hand went to my pocket automatically, and I pulled the ring out, holding it up in the dim light from the window.
It was small. Delicate. The gold caught the light and threw it back in small flashes. I'd put it on her finger ten years ago in a little chapel, and she'd worn it every day since. I'd never seen her without it. Not once in ten years. Until now.
I'd been so sure that giving her space would fix this.
That she'd take a few days at Jolene's, cool off, think things through, and then we'd sit down and talk it out like we always did.
We'd figure out what was wrong, what I needed to do differently, and we'd move past it.
That's how it worked. That's how it had always worked.
But she wasn't cooling off. She wasn't answering my messages. She'd left her wedding ring on my pillow like she was done with it, done with me, and I still didn't understand why.
And I'd planned to see her this afternoon.
I'd told myself I'd go to Jolene's around six, talk to her, figure this out.
But I'd gotten caught up in the Bradshaw deal and convinced myself she had time, that she needed the space, that it could wait another day.
Callie didn't know I'd meant to come. She had no way of knowing I hadn't.
I was an idiot.
The ring pressed into my palm, and I closed my fist around it. The metal was warm from being in my pocket all day, and it felt impossibly light for something that mattered this much.
I didn't know what I'd done wrong. I didn't know what she wanted from me that I wasn't already trying to give her. But sitting here in the dark, in a room that still smelled like another woman's perfume, with Callie's ring in my hand and her side of the bed empty, I knew one thing for sure.
I was afraid I'd lost her.