Chapter 32
maverick
Aria couldn’t think about the auction—not with the sheriff’s people crawling over Longhorn, not with Earl’s blood barely dry in the dirt.
She knew it needed to be done, knew what was at stake. But she was knee-deep in questions and grief, and I knew Hugh would’ve let her go if she asked.
But why should she, when she has me?
She didn’t ask me—she didn’t have to.
“I can go,” she whispers. “I should go.”
I gently took her hand. “You’ve already done everything you needed to do. I promised Earl I’d take care of things. Let me keep that promise.”
Looking back, my last conversation with Earl feels like a premonition. He didn’t just ask me to watch over her—he asked me to make sure she didn’t break.
“You sure?” she asks.
“Accepting help makes you strong, not weak,” I remind her.
I don’t want to leave her here, not with the mess of the bomb and Earl, but I’m going to trust that Hugh will do his job so I can do mine.
She nods slowly as if every movement is hard, her limbs are too heavy. I understand grief, the immensity of it. She has Nadine and Vera here, but I want her to have more people.
I call Joy, who adored her Mr. E. She says she’s on her way, and she’ll rally the troops and call Bree.
“How is she?” Joy asks as soon as she gets out of her Jeep.
“Destroyed.” I hug my sister. “You take care of her. I’ll go take care of her herd.”
As I leave, I see Joy and Aria hugging. It does my heart good to see them together. The two women in my life, getting along, being supportive. I am a lucky son of a bitch.
Tomas insists on joining us.
“He wanted me to make sure everything went well,” he says, valiantly fighting tears. “He wanted me to take care of Aria.”
“Yeah!” I pat his shoulder, and we get on with it, albeit a little later than we’d planned.
Tomas and Zane are in the rig behind, following close.
There’s no music, no small talk. Just the hum of tires and the constant awareness that Earl’s not with us.
I check my phone. No messages. I’m going to assume that means everything is fine at Longhorn or as fine as it can be, considering the circumstances.
Aria’s with Bree, Joy, Nadine, and Vera. She doesn’t need words from me right now. Just the space to breathe and grieve.
When we hit the fairgrounds, the noise slams into us like a wall—cattle bawling, auctioneers calling bids over the loudspeakers, and ranchers and buyers moving like ants across the packed dirt, their boots sending up clouds of dust.
Zane meets me at the gate, jaw tight. “They’re expecting us in Pen 8. They held our spot.”
I nod.
“You good?” he asks.
I’m still reeling from the events of this morning, still not all here. But I shrug. “Gotta get to work, yeah?”
“Yeah. Don’t got time to mourn Earl,” he tells me flatly.
“He was a cowboy; he’d be the first one to say the work needs to go on.” Tomas tips his hat.
We unload the cattle.
Tomas handles the gates, double-checks tags, and makes sure the stress levels are low.
These animals know her voice, her hand. I can tell they’re unsettled without her. Hell, I am, too.
But damn, they look good.
Glossy coats. Even muscle. Calm, alert eyes. All her doing.
The first bids start flying by midmorning. Zane runs point on paperwork. Tomas checks buyers for brand inspection.
I take the back rail and brace myself.
The auctioneer announces, “Lot 312—Longhorn cattle, prime Angus-cross, dryland finished, rotational grazed. Clean certs, bred right, quiet-handled—who’ll start me at fifteen hundred?”
The bids snap like firecrackers.
Fifteen. Seventeen. Eighteen.
They keep climbing.
People are paying attention. Not just because the cattle look good, but because everyone here’s heard what happened at Longhorn.
They know Earl’s name.
They know what Aria’s been up against.
And they respect grit when they see it.
I stay through every lot.
I send her updates, which she doesn’t read.
It’s fine. She’ll hear the good news when she’s ready.
When it’s over, Zane hands me the paperwork, numbers circled.
“Eighteen above average,” he says.
I smile. “We cleared enough to pay the IRS and keep the ranch running another season.”
“We?” he queries.
“We,” I assert, and then add, “Earl would’ve been proud.”
Any other day, we’d have hung around—grabbed a greasy lunch from the concession stand, parked ourselves by the back rail with beer in hand, and shot the shit with the other ranchers while the lots rolled through.
We’d trade jokes, place mock bets on which steer would go highest, and maybe even walk the pens and check the stock ourselves.
Zane would poke around looking for a sleeper lot, and I’d listen for the latest gossip—who’s breeding to whom, whose kid just landed a scholarship, which neighbor’s planning to sell before winter hits.
Auctions aren’t just business—they’re half-reunion, half-barometer for the whole damn state.
But today, I’ve got no stomach for small talk or handshakes.
I just want to get back to Aria. Back to Longhorn.
I want to make sure she’s okay. To hold the line like I promised Earl I would.
So, we load up and go home.
We pull into Wildflower Canyon after dark.
We first go to Kincaid Farms to drop off the rig and trailers.
“Why don’t you come and hang out at the bunkhouse at Kincaid Farms,” Zane suggests to Tomas. “We can go together to drop the trailer off at Del Rio’s place tomorrow.”
The young man looks at me, and I nod. “Don’t want you to be alone tonight, son.”
“Come on.” Zane slaps Tomas’s back. “We’ll drink some beer and tell stories about Earl.”
Tomas nods.
As I walk to my truck, he comes running. I turn to look at him.
“Thanks, Mav.”
“You did good today.”
Tomas smiles sadly. “Everythin’ I know, Earl taught me.”
“He did a good job with you. Now, you’re the ranch foreman at Longhorn, yeah? Aria’s gonna need you.”
He swallows. “You think I can do it?”
With help, yeah. But I don’t say that ‘cause he’ll have all the help and mentorship he needs from Zane and me. After all, Longhorn and Kincaid Farms were going to be one, just as their owners were.
“Absolutely.”
I want nothing more than to take a shower and crawl into bed with Aria. Hold her. Wash the day away.
I have two missed calls from Hugh, so on my way to Longhorn, I call him. “What?”
“Well, hello to you as well, asshole.”
I chuckle. “Give me a break, it’s been a long fuckin’ day.”
“No shit! Mine’s been fuckin’ sunflowers and daisies, what with one man dying of his own hand tryin’ to bomb Longhorn and another….” He trails off.
“Any news?”
“They picked up Wes Boone all the way in Sweetwater Junction,” Hugh says. “Sheriff down there called it in—caught him trying to hitch a ride out of state. We’re coordinating transport now, but I haven’t had eyes on him yet. Should have him back in custody here by morning.”
I want to demand that I be there when he interrogates Wes, but I don’t know what shape Aria is in, and my priority is her, not that weasel.
“Celine?”
He sucks in a breath. “We had someone talk to her in Aspen. Break the news to her. Wanted it done officially before the rumor mill started up.”
“And?”
“And…she’ll be here tomorrow morning, as well. As will Tate. I plan on talking to both of them, separately.”
“What about Hudson? Anything on the bomb?”
There’s a long exhale on Hugh’s end. “We’re still piecing it together.
The device was crude—homemade, rigged with a timer and a remote ignition.
Looked like it was meant to disable the barn, maybe scare you, not necessarily kill.
But it was amateur fuckin’ hour. It could’ve gone off early, could’ve taken out anyone nearby… maybe it did both with Hudson.”
“So, he died tryin’ to set it off.”
“Can’t say for sure. But we’re goin’ to know more about who built the damn thing once the state lab at Grand Junction runs chemical and forensic analysis, see if they can trace where the parts came from. Wires, the timer module, and even the casing. Might take a few days.”
I’m still having trouble with the idea of Hudson being so far gone that he wanted to blow the herd up. It sounds like his style. Sloppy and poorly timed, which got him killed. I don’t feel sorry for him, not one fucking bit. The sniveling prick got what he deserved.
“You call me and let me know how things go?”
“Of course, anything else I can do for you? Wash your car or—”
“You have a nice night, Hugh.” I hang up on him.
Nadine is on the porch when I get to Longhorn. “She’s out by the paddock. Hasn’t gone inside since sunset.”
“Joy still here?”
Nadine nods. “She’s sleeping in one of the guest rooms. Been crying all day. She was exhausted. Bree was here for a good part of the day and just went back.”
“How you doin’, Nadine?”
She lifts her shoulders in a helpless gesture. “Not good, Mav, but…life goes on, yeah?”
She’s lost two friends in a short time. First Rami and now Earl. It’s going to take a while even for the hard-as-nails Nadine to find her footing again—grief like that doesn’t just knock you down, it rearranges the ground you walk on.
I put a hand on her shoulder and squeeze.
“You go check on our girl,” Nadine says, her smile sad.
I head to the paddock.
I find her sitting on the bottom rung of the fence, wrapped in Earl’s jacket, knees pulled up to her chest.
Ah fuck!
I sit beside her. Neither of us speaks for a while.
Then I hand her the folded sales sheet.
She unfolds it with trembling fingers, eyes skimming the numbers. When she reaches the final tally, her breath catches.
“This…this is enough,” she whispers. “More than enough.”
“Y’all did this—you and Earl. Tomas, Nadine, Vera.”
“I didn’t go.” She stares out across the dark pasture. “I stayed here. What kind of rancher does that?”
“The kind who lost someone she loved.” I wrap an arm around her. “The kind that’s strong enough to know her team has her back.”
We sit there for a long while, just the two of us.
“Wanna go inside?” I ask her.
I peer into her eyes in the light of the moon. There’s sadness and grief, but also renewal—like something cracked open in her, and the light finally got in.
“Earl…he wasn’t scared of nothing.”
“He was one ornery son of a bitch,” I agree, the corner of my mouth tugging into something like a smile.
She leans her head against my shoulder, voice soft. “I remember him yelling at me when I was eight for feeding the calves too early. Said I was spoilin’ ‘em for life. But then I caught him sneaking apple slices to a gimpy steer like it was the most natural thing in the world.”
“Man had a bark like barbed wire and a heart like a hay bale—rough on the outside, soft if you knew where to look.”
She breathes out a quiet laugh, and it warms the space between us.
“I think he knew this place was gonna make it,” she whispers. “I think he believed in me before I did.”
I pull her in closer. Her hand finds mine, fingers lacing tight. And in the quiet, under that wide Colorado sky, we let Earl’s memory settle between us.
When we get back to the ranch house, Duke and Elena are waiting in the kitchen with Nadine. Vera has gone to be with her son, who is heartbroken that his surrogate grandpa has passed.
Everyone is feeling the loss of Earl. And interestingly, no one has mentioned Hudson.
“We’re so sorry.” Elena hugs Aria. “So, so sorry.”
Duke nods at me. “Didn’t get to catch up with you at Gunnison.”
“I wanted to get back to Aria.”
We sit around the table. Aria looks frail, as does Nadine.
“Any news from Celine?” Elena asks.
Aria shakes her head. “The sheriff said she’s been notified about Hudson’s…of him being gone.”
I grab her hand, squeeze.
“You made believers out of a lot of folks today,” Duke says. “Hell, Larry Welch bid on one of your yearlings and got him, too.”
Larry Welch is one of the most discerning ranchers in Colorado. He has a place up near Aspen. His interest is a stamp of approval.
Any other day, this would make Aria perk up. Today, she’s sitting slumped. I know she’s struggling with understanding the value of keeping the ranch if it brought about the death of Earl. There’s no way around grief and her feelings; she’ll have to go through them. She just won’t be doing it alone.
Elena and Duke look at one another for a small moment, and then Elena smiles. “We know you’re now going to rebuild bigger and better. So, we have something for you.”
Aria lifts her eyes, startled, as if the idea of being rewarded for hard work is foreign to her. In her mind, she only did what had to be done.
There’s a quiet selflessness in her, something rare and unwavering. But then again, Elena’s cut from the same cloth. So, when she turns to Aria, I’m not surprised by what she says.
“We have an offer,” Elena begins. “Two bred heifers. Wilder stock. Solid lines. We’ll let you have them at cost. No markup. Family-and-friends rate.”
Aria’s mouth parts, but no words come. Her eyes go glassy, her breath caught in her throat.
She gets it.
Elena’s not offering just two cows—it’s a future.
Wilder Ranch stock is premium, the kind of genetics people build herds around. Getting even one of those heifers without a ten-month waitlist and a hefty price tag is a feat. Getting two, bred and ready to calve in spring, with zero markup is not mere generosity. It’s respect.
It’s Elena seeing Aria—not just as a woman trying to hold a ranch together, not just my woman—but as one of us. A rancher worthy of help and investment.
I know Duke and Elena, the herd is prized, and they don’t give away that kind of bloodline unless it’s important. This is. It’s how they’re welcoming Aria into the fold.
Aria blinks, a tear slipping free.
She’s spent years feeling like she didn’t belong here, like every step she took was on borrowed ground. Now she has clear proof that she earned her place.
“I don’t know what to say,” she whispers.
“Say, yes,” Nadine growls, shaking her head, as much in awe as Aria at the generosity of the Wilders.
“And, say thank you, darlin’,” I instruct.
“Yes…and thank you.” Aria’s voice is raw. “I….” She looks at Elena and Duke. “But why?”
Duke glances at me, then back at Aria. “Because you earned it.”
Later, after they’ve gone and we’re in bed, lying side by side, our eyes meet each other.
“I love you,” she murmurs.
My heart gallops. I know she loves me, but hearing the words…well, that’s like the sun shining high after a storm.
“I love you.” It’s a promise.
“I don’t know how to do this yet,” she admits. “Not without Earl. Not with all the damage.”
“We’ll figure it out together.”
She smiles. “I’d like that.”