9. Epilogue 1
Kayla
One year later.
The house has seventeen forks.
Ty will tell you we agreed to twelve, which is technically true.
The other five appeared over time. Two came from his mother after Thanksgiving because she decided our silverware situation was “concerning.” One showed up as a housewarming gift.
I found the last two in a shop in Missoula because they matched the originals and because I could.
Ty counted them last week, looked at me, then closed the drawer without saying a word.
I’ve lived in this house for thirteen months now, and it looks nothing like it did when I arrived.
There’s a real bookshelf in the living room that Ty built after I showed him one in a magazine. My books fill three shelves. His ranch manuals fill another. The bottom holds a basket of blankets because I am always cold and Ty is apparently immune to weather.
The mystery plant is still alive on the kitchen windowsill. My blue mug still sits beside his white one every morning.
And the Caldwell acreage is officially ours.
The closing happened almost a year ago. Four hundred acres, Elk Creek, windbreak and all.
The morning Ty signed the papers, he drove straight to the east fence line and stood there looking over the land for twenty minutes.
When I found him, he didn’t say anything.
He just put an arm around me, and we stood there together.
I still work at Wylde Mountain Lodge. Caroline promoted me to Events Coordinator six months ago, and I now run the corporate retreats, winter festival, and help lead the annual Fall Roundup.
Cash’s youth horsemanship program has twenty-two kids now.
I am good at my job. I love my job. And every decision I make about it is mine.
I come home every evening to a man who has never once tried to change that.
It’s Saturday and I’m at Wylde Mountain Ranch going over the final Roundup numbers with Caroline when she closes her laptop.
“My sister’s friend got in last night.”
I look up. “The painter?”
“Wren Donnelly. She’s here for a private commission and staying in the guest cabin for the week.”
“The one who does the horse portraits?”
“That’s her. She just got in last night. Come say hi.”
The guest cabin is small and clean, tucked against a stand of aspens at the south edge of the property.
A woman is on the porch arranging canvases against the railing.
She’s maybe mid-twenties, with light brown hair pulled up in a messy knot and paint already on her fingers.
She’s wearing overalls and a flannel shirt and she’s got freckles across her nose and she looks like a woman who finds the good in everything, including a cold November morning in rural Montana.
“Wren!” Caroline calls.
Wren looks up and her face breaks into a grin so wide and genuine that I like her immediately.
“Oh hey Caroline!” She turns and smiles. “This place is insane. I’ve been up since five staring at the mountains. I almost cried twice. The light out here is criminal.”
“Criminal good or criminal bad?”
“Criminal as in it should be illegal to have this much natural beauty concentrated in one valley. I’m going to run out of cadmium yellow by Tuesday.”
She turns to me. “Hi! I’m Wren. You must be Kayla. Caroline says you’re the reason the lodge events don’t end in chaos.”
“That’s generous. I’m the reason they end in organized chaos. She is the reason they happen at all.”
Wren laughs. I like her already.
“Do you need anything?” I ask. “Our place is twenty minutes away but I can bring supplies.”
“I’m good. The cabin is stocked, and I brought more paint than clothing.”
Sawyer Cross arrives at the ranch later that morning.
Everyone in the valley knows Sawyer. He’s the large-animal vet, which means every rancher within driving distance has his number.
He’s excellent with animals.
People are another story.
His white vet truck pulls up beside the barn, and Sawyer gets out wearing a canvas jacket, work boots, and the same expression he wears almost every time I see him: mildly irritated by the existence of other humans.
One of the ranch horses has a swollen hock, so he disappears into the barn with his medical bag.
Wren wanders in a few minutes later carrying a sketchbook.
She doesn’t notice Sawyer at first. She’s studying the stalls, the tack, the way the morning light comes through the barn doors.
“Excuse me,” Sawyer says from inside the stall. “You’re in my light.”
Wren stops.
She moves aside. “Sorry.”
Sawyer goes back to examining the horse.
Wren watches him. More specifically, she watches his hands.
Sawyer is crouched beside the mare, running his fingers carefully over the swollen joint. His whole expression changes when he’s working with an animal. The permanent scowl disappears. His movements are slow and precise.
Wren starts sketching. Fast. Her pencil moves across the page while Sawyer finishes examining the horse.
Then he stands. He notices the sketchbook. “What are you doing?”
“Sketching.”
“Me?”
“Your hands.”
Sawyer stares at her.
Wren smiles. “You have very interesting hands.”
I nearly choke.
Sawyer looks like no woman has ever said those words to him before. “I’m a vet,” he says. “Not a model.”
“I didn’t ask you to pose.”
His jaw tightens. “You should move. I need the tack room.”
“I’ll move.”
She doesn’t. She flips to a clean page instead.
Sawyer looks at her.
Wren smiles again.
He walks past her toward the tack room, close enough that she has to pull the sketchbook against her chest.
Wren watches him go. “What’s his name?” she asks.
“Sawyer Cross,” I say.
“Is he always like that?”
“Yes.”
She looks down at her sketch. “Hm.”
Sawyer returns with a wrap bandage and goes back to the horse. He doesn’t look at Wren again while he works.
Not until he’s leaving.
He packs his bag and walks toward the barn entrance. Past Wren again. This time she’s not in the way. She’s leaning against a stall door, completely out of his path.
He looks at her anyway.
Fast. A glance that lasts maybe half a second. His eyes move from her face to the sketchbook and back to the barn door. He doesn’t slow down. But he looked.
At the doorway, he pauses. His hand rests on the frame and from where I’m standing I can see the side of his face. His jaw is set and he is very deliberately not looking back at the woman with the sketchbook.
Then he walks to his truck and drives away.
I turn to Caroline. We look at each other.
“Well,” she says.
“Mm.”
“She told him he has interesting hands.”
“She did.”
“And he didn’t leave immediately.”
“He paused in the doorway.”
“I saw that.”
“Should we tell Wren that Sawyer is the grumpiest man in the valley?”
“I think she’ll figure it out.”
“Should we tell Sawyer that Wren is going to be here for at least a week?”
“Absolutely not.”
Caroline grins. I grin back.