Chapter 10
The front lawn of the main house is nearly unrecognizable by lunchtime the next day.
Renata Caldwell, unsurprisingly, spares no expense when it comes to a party.
She goes full throttle. The hoedown theme isn’t subtle—there are picnic tables covered in checkered cloth, stacks of hay placed around the grounds for seating, and two large, rustic wooden bars that sit on either side of the lawn.
At the center is a large dance floor surrounded by a border of hay, and at the front of it, a massive stage decked out with streamers, balloons, and a giant banner that reads Happy Birthday, Clint! in colorful bubble letters.
Chores and ranch tasks seem to drag on endlessly that Saturday afternoon, with everyone gearing up to spend the entire evening partying.
Crew picks up on the antsy energy immediately and decides to be ornery about it, making sure no one is slacking or cutting corners.
Grace doesn’t get a visit from him until after lunch.
She hears him before she sees him—he’s hollering at Caleb, unsatisfied with his work fixing one of the stable doors that had come off the hinges.
“I’ve learned not to expect a whole hell of a lot from you, Caleb,” he barks, “but this really takes the cake.” The squeak of the door echoes through the stables out to the arena, followed by a thundering slam.
Grace grimaces. Crew’s voice is dripping with impatience as he asks, “Does that look fixed to you?”
“No, sir,” Caleb replies quickly. “I’ll try again.”
“You do that,” Crew says. Grace hears his boots thump against the dirt floor as he walks away, grumbling, “Y’all keep this shit up and you’ll work through the damn party.”
“Won’t happen again,” Caleb shouts.
Crew comes into view then, and he looks as distressed as he sounds, his mouth pinched like he’s been sucking on a lemon.
Grace stands with Waylon on the opposite side of the arena, watching him practically stomp toward the metal bars.
When Crew finally makes eye contact with her, his scowl softens by a fraction. “Hey,” he grunts.
Grace can’t help but smile. The more time she spends in his presence, particularly when he’s with the other hands, the more she understands how dramatic he can be. Grinning, she says, “Hi.”
He notices her smile and, because it’s just the kind of mood he’s in, his brow furrows. He seems annoyed that anyone in his vicinity could even appear to be happy. “What?” he barks.
“Nothing,” she says quickly, trying—failing—to force her mouth into a straight line.
She looks back to Waylon so she doesn’t have to maintain eye contact with Crew.
The silence between them stretches a little too long, and Crew’s nostrils are flaring, so in a bid to distract him, Grace asks, “How’s Cooper? ”
His mood doesn’t exactly do a one-eighty, but he at least seems to redirect his ire to his brother, the mention of whom makes him roll his eyes. “I told my mother he has exactly one more day of recovery and then I’m tossing his ass back into the bunkhouse.”
Grace chuckles. “That good, huh?”
“He got one of them to steal a whistle from the barn so he could beckon me,” Crew says flatly. “In my own house.”
“Well, I’m glad he’s taking advantage while he can,” Grace volleys back, knowing she’s teasing but unable to help herself.
He just looks so…tense. Like someone zapped all the water out of his body but left behind all the rigid bones.
He scoffs at her comment and kicks a cloud of dirt up with the toe of his boot.
Grace goes back to work with a cheeky smile on her face, turning her back to him.
She thinks he’s taken off to go shout at someone else when his voice surprises her.
He sounds slightly less pissed, even a little soft.
“He looks good in a saddle.” She turns to see him appraising Waylon, admiration and a hint of pride now colliding with his irritation.
His eyes drift to hers, and a tiny, almost imperceptible smile tugs at the corner of his ever-frowning lips.
“He does,” Grace agrees.
“So they made it official,” he says.
“Yep.” Grace scratches Waylon’s shoulder in the spot she knows he loves. “Guess y’all are stuck with me.”
Crew’s jaw flexes, almost like he’s actively trying not to let his smile take full form. “I’m glad.”
Her eyes flit to his and linger there. Still and steady. “Me too.”
Their quiet exchange is interrupted by what sounds like a metric ton of glass shattering, so loud it echoes all the way to the stables.
They both look over to the distant front lawn and see a van with its tailgate up, and a man standing at its edge with his head in his hands.
Milk crates are scattered in front of him, shards of glass spilling out of them onto the manicured lawn.
Crew mutters something under his breath, and it’s kind of remarkable how quickly the softness of his features turns rock-hard. His lips curl slightly, and it seems a million thoughts are currently racing through his brain, each one angrier than the next.
Grace clears her throat. “Everything okay with you?”
He glances at her out of the corner of his eye but doesn’t falter in his stoniness. “Fine,” he replies curtly. His chin drops to his chest, and he kicks the toe of his boot against the loose dirt. “Everyone seems to have forgotten this is a ranch, not an entertainment venue.”
She doesn’t get much out of him after that, though in fairness, she doesn’t really try.
Crew is wound too tightly to unspool today, and the last thing she wants is to accidentally push a button that sends him spiraling into raging oblivion.
He storms off a few minutes later toward some of the guys who are up on horses herding wandering cows.
Grace watches, amused, as she sees his hands start to gesture wildly.
Pierce and Alec immediately snap to attention, whatever joke they’d been bent over laughing at suddenly not very funny.
They sit up straighter, and Grace watches the smiles melt off their faces like butter on a hot pan.
They’ve seen this before, probably too many times to count.
Crew Caldwell is on the warpath, and he doesn’t give a single fuck about the destruction he leaves in his wake.
· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·
The bunkhouse reeks of cheap cologne. Forty stands behind an ironing board, carefully smoothing out the wrinkles on someone’s button-up shirt.
They’re all in various stages of dress, and everyone looks remarkably presentable, considering the state of them not even an hour ago.
Grace is sitting on her bunk, freshly showered hair tied back in a loose low ponytail, and her face scrubbed clean of all dirt and sweat.
She is patiently—anxiously—waiting for June to beckon her into the bathroom, where she will proceed to cover her in makeup, douse her in hair spray, and then dress her up like a perfect Southern bumpkin.
There are two reasons Grace agreed to this.
One, because June offered it, and it seemed like something Grace shouldn’t deny if she had any hopes of further strengthening their tentative bond.
And two, because in her twenty-five years of life, she’s never once had someone offer to do her makeup and hair.
Or lend her clothes. Growing up, she dressed herself in the mornings, brushed her own hair, and always opted for convenience over vanity.
A low bun with a plastic claw clip, secondhand jeans, and two-year-old tennis shoes from Payless. Function over fashion, even then.
Grace can see June through the slight crack of the bathroom door, leaning over the sink with a tube of lipstick in hand.
Already dressed with her hair looking lovely and effortless, she skillfully swipes the pigment over her lips, taking care to not color outside of the lines.
She claps her hands together once she’s satisfied, and then hollers, “All right, Grace. Your turn.”
· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·
It feels like she’s grown a new layer of skin.
An odd, nice-smelling, slightly tacky layer of skin that has concealed every one of her freckles.
June is hard at work, a small makeup brush between her teeth as she stands over Grace, brushing—blending?
—furiously at the shadow on her right eyelid.
Grace had been commanded to sit on the covered toilet and not move a single muscle unless told to, like when June made her smile with only her cheeks so she could apply an orangey-pink blush.
“You have good features,” June says, though it seems like it’s mostly to herself, more of an assessment than a compliment. “Shame you never show them off.”
Grace tries not to blink too rapidly as June closes in on the corner of her eye, the blending brush now pushing aggressively into her skin.
She can only imagine what she must look like right now, and some dark, insecure part of her has wondered more than once if June is setting her up again—if she’ll look in the mirror at the end of this makeover and look like a rodeo clown.
“Well,” Grace says, her head instinctually starting to lean away from June’s ministrations—which June does not allow, and promptly pulls her chin back into place.
Grunting, Grace adds, “It’s not like I have many opportunities.”
“Honey, you’re young, fit, and pretty,” June replies. She sounds tired as she says it, like it’s a fact that Grace should know. Like it’s a personal affront to womankind that she doesn’t take advantage of these assets. “You gotta make the opportunities.”
Grace gives her an unenthusiastic thumbs-up. “I’ll get right on that.”