Chapter 9 #2
“Look, we’ve got ourselves a new short order cook,” Jake teased. “Sunny side up with a rasher of bacon, please.”
“What’s a rasher, Daddy?” Jeffrey demanded, dancing on the stepstool next to Declan. “Is it itchy?”
“It’s bacon.” Tansy said reverently, balancing her crutches under her armpits so she could clasp her hands together and smile up into the heavens. “It’s the food of the gods.”
Jeffrey’s little jaw dropped and he whispered intensely, “God eats bacon?”
Declan snickered as he flipped the bread in the pan. “Before you have fun answering that, can I offer you two sleeping beauties some breakfast?”
In the end, Declan fed the entire family including the two temporary ranch hands currently staying over at High Water.
Jake and Jeffrey got ready to head out to join Tansy’s dad, Malachi, for the trip to Calgary and the zoo.
Aiden decided at the last minute to tag along, and the three of them took off to town, a chorus of animal noises filling the air around them.
“I’m spending the day at Sasha’s,” Jinx announced, absently scratching Dixie between the eyes. “She’s training for her final competition, and I’m helping her with timing and moving props.”
“Be back in time for supper,” Petra reminded her. “I’m in the office most of the day, getting caught up on our accounts.”
“I’m going to be a woman of leisure,” Tansy informed them all, settling onto the couch. “Or start breakdance training. One of the two.”
Declan had smiled as he headed out to spend the morning with the hands in the animal shelter, enjoying the easy labour.
And now, hours later, Declan swayed lightly in the saddle as he rode. Even the clouds overhead seemed to move in time with Cobalt’s leisurely rhythm. No rush. No reason to hurry.
Cobalt dipped her head and tugged lazily at a strand of grass, chewing around the bit as she strolled forward a few more steps.
Declan laughed as he patted her withers softly. “You trying to say you plan to snack by the stream?”
She shook her head, nickering at his words, clearly content as she continued to pace the trail with no direction needed from him.
It wasn’t a spot he’d come to that often, but it was clearly one of her favorites. The instant he’d left the house after lunch and headed into the open fields, Cobalt had picked up her pace and unerringly selected the right route to end at the small oasis beside the meandering stream.
Never failed to give him a kick of pleasure that animals too had their preferences. Considering he liked to let them choose their path whenever he could, maybe he and Cobalt had been out to the spot more often than he realized.
It wasn’t that far from the High Water ranch house, but it was tucked into a tight little hollow, and now at the end of summer, everything was deep green and full of life.
A wind chime dangled from an extended aspen branch, far enough out over the water someone would’ve gotten wet putting it up. It hadn’t been him, but it could have been. Sadie loved wind chimes, and he could imagine himself putting them up to surprise her.
It was the kind of place she would’ve loved. Maybe that’s why even though she’d never been there, he felt her presence so strongly.
Which made it a great place to come when he needed to talk and think and kick his own butt.
Declan dropped the reins and loosened the cinch on Cobalt then found a spot to sit and relax. To spend an hour just being silent. No interruptions, no conversations, although he had to admit he was thoroughly enjoying the addition of five-year-old Jeffrey to the household.
He closed his eyes and let the sun fall on his face as the morning repeated itself through his mind.
Sleep might have caught him for a moment or two, and he stretched, batting away a leaf that had fallen from a tree overhead and brought him back to the here and now.
Rest done, time for the gut-spilling.
“The guy Jinx rescued a while back, Sadie? He’s grateful for the roof over his head and the chance to start over.
It’s hard to think ill of him, but at times, I’m not sure what to believe.
” He tossed the leaf toward the stream and watched it swirl in a small back eddy before gently floating away.
“If I go with my gut, which is what you’d tell me to do, I think Logan’s a good kid.
I just don’t know why it seems as if I’m still missing something. ”
He wasn’t usually the one who needed every answer. That was Jake’s job—planner, organizer, master of backup plans. Declan was okay with going with the flow, like the leaf currently headed out of sight to its next destination.
It knew it would be okay.
“High Water is a good idea and a good place. I believe that.” Declan leaned forward, hands clasped, elbows resting on his knees as he admired the grove. “Good people live here. And I’m working to convince Sydney to become more a part of it than she already is.”
It almost felt confessional. Sadie was dead, so she certainly didn’t run his life. He didn’t need her permission and he wasn’t really asking for it.
More like affirming what had gone before.
The connection between them and the lessons she’d taught him over the years they’d shared.
“Sydney’s got something big on her heart.
I can feel that too.” He laughed at himself.
“But I suppose this is one of those times you’d tell me to stop talking to the wrong person. ”
Which is what Sadie usually said while shaking a finger at him. Anytime he’d complained about someone in town ignoring the rules or not doing their job right.
He smiled at the memory.
Smiled bigger because the next image that arrived was even brighter and hotter. Sydney shaking a finger in his face.
Yeah, he definitely had a type.
Moving on was hard, but right.
“Definitely a few changes coming,” he said firmly. “Still think High Water was a good idea, Sadie, but we’re gonna need to tighten the reins a little.”
He leaned into the reclined angle of the bank. The grass beneath him was cool and refreshing, and water bubbled over rocks at the bend in the creek only a few meters away.
“You’d have seen this coming, I bet. You’d have warned me. Not that you would’ve warned me off, but you were good at seeing what might happen so we’d be ready for it.”
Except neither of them had seen her cancer coming. It was something that happened to other people. It was something that people got over.
Sometimes the memories filled him with frustration. But today, oddly, he had a sense of peace.
It wasn’t what they’d wanted. It wasn’t what anyone wanted, but Sadie had simultaneously fought and planned. When she died, Declan had found she’d gone through all her things and left notes and gifts for all her family and friends. He hadn’t known she was doing it.
Back in the here and now, Declan rose and headed for home. The quiet time had refreshed him, and he was ready for anything.
A few minutes later when Cobalt rounded the corner of the trail, finally rising out of the hollow, Declan’s phone pinged with far more dings and bells than should be legal.
“There are moments I envy past generations not having a beacon in their pocket.” Still, he tugged his phone free since Cobalt was doing the driving anyway.
He listened to both messages from Sydney, slightly bemused that he hadn’t heard the GPS alarm go off when she left town. Definitely no cell service in the hollow. He’d have to remember that.
The tone of her voice in the second message made him sit up a little straighter, though. Declan tapped his heels into Cobalt’s sides, hurrying her along a little.
If Sydney had headed to the ranch house, she was probably there by now. He tightened his grip on the saddle and kept Cobalt moving at a steady pace. Whatever Sydney wanted, he was grateful she’d been willing to tell him she was coming over. It was time for them to deal with the—
Shit.
He’d absently opened an unread message. Petra had sent one only a minutes ago, which was odd. She and Tansy both teased that he was the worst at responding and usually resorted to phoning. Either she was feeling chatty or hoping he’d heard from his brothers.
But the instant he clicked the link open, all amusement evaporated.
Blackbird. Barn.
That’s all the message said, but Petra knew exactly what that meant. It was a call for help and a warning not to arrive with guns blazing.
Whatever was happening at High Water, he needed to be there—now.