Dallas
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
It’s been days.
Not the kind you can count cleanly. Not the kind marked by meals or sleep or anything that’s progress. Just days that bleed into one another, gray and heavy, stacked on top of each other as hay bales you don’t remember lifting but somehow still have to carry.
It would be easier if there was anything to hold on to.
One text, one missed call, one message to her mother or Charlotte.
But there’s nothing. No one’s heard her voice since the moment she stepped outside to wait for me, and that leaves three options that keep rotating in my head: she’s choosing silence, she’s being made to stay quiet… or she doesn’t have her phone at all.
But whatever the truth, the ranch keeps moving.
That’s the cruel part. Cows still need feeding. Fences still need checking. Paperwork still piles up on my desk as if the world didn’t crack open three days ago and swallow someone whole.
I’ve learned that life doesn’t pause for grief. It never has.
I’ve also learned grief doesn’t care if you’re busy.
It finds you anyway.
It shows up in the middle of a routine chore, when your hands are occupied, and your brain is unguarded.
It shows up when a song plays in the diner.
When a truck passes on the highway that looks like hers.
When you catch the faintest trace of vanilla and pine on the sleeve of your coat, and your chest caves in.
I’m standing in the office with a mug of coffee that’s gone cold, staring at the same spreadsheet for the fourth time without actually seeing it.
Numbers blur together. Dates refuse to make sense.
My eyes track across rows and columns because that’s what they’re supposed to do, but my mind is somewhere else. Always somewhere else.
Lila’s drawings are still pinned to the corkboard. Horses with impossible legs, a stick figure me holding her hand, a woman with yellow hair standing beside us. She drew that one after Christmas. Said it was “Faith when she comes back.”
I turn away before I can think too hard about it.
Because if I think too hard about it, I’ll think about the way Faith looked at Lila when she thought no one was watching. She could see a version of herself that belonged here. She wanted to believe she could be part of this life.
And then I’ll think about how quickly that was taken.
I tell myself not to go there. I tell myself it’ll kill me if I do.
So I focus on the spreadsheet.
I focus on the little mundane tasks that keep my hands busy and my mind from spiraling.
It works for about ten minutes.
Then my phone buzzes.
My heart jumps so hard it physically hurts, my body has been waiting for that vibration for three straight days, and it doesn’t know how to react anymore.
I snatch it up.
Not her.
Never her.
Not even a “she finally answered” from Caroline. Not even Charlotte saying she heard something. Just silence… so complete it feels less like a decision and more like someone took the choice away.
It’s just an email from the feed supplier. A text from Boone asking if I’ve signed the bank paperwork. A reminder about the school fundraiser.
I stare at the screen for a long beat, pulse still racing, then set it down because it burned me.
The crash after the hope is the worst part.
You think you’ve hit the bottom, then your brain gives you one bright, stupid second of possibility and rips it away again. It’s being hauled to the surface just to be shoved back under.
The phone buzzes again.
I ignore it.
If it’s important, they’ll call twice. If it’s Faith… she won’t.
That thought should be acceptance.
Instead, it’s drowning.
I pick up my pen and try to write something, anything, to prove I’m still functional. The ink makes a jagged line. My hand isn’t steady.
I clench my fist, flex my fingers, then force them to unclasp.
You’re not falling apart, I tell myself. You’re just tired.
But tired doesn’t explain the way my chest aches when I pass the coat closet and see the scarf Faith borrowed hanging there because no one has moved it.
Tired doesn’t explain the way my stomach turns when Lila asks, for the hundredth time, “Is Faith coming for dinner?” and I have to swallow down the sharp, ugly truth before I answer with something gentle.
Tired doesn’t explain the anger that keeps flashing hot and sudden in my gut, a flare in the dark.
Anger at Evan.
Anger at William Ross.
Anger at the police officer who told us to wait because “she’s an adult.”
Anger at myself for not seeing it sooner, not acting faster, not tearing apart the town stone by stone until I found her.
And then the other thing, worse than anger, slides in right behind it.
Fear.
What if she’s hurting?
What if she’s scared and alone and thinks we stopped looking?
What if she listened to my voicemail and still couldn’t call back?
What if she never even got to hear it?
I pick up my phone again before I can stop myself and open my last outgoing call list.
I dial.
Voicemail.
Again.
Every time it happens, it hits different.
A knock sounds at the door, sharp enough to yank me out of the spiral.
“Dallas?” Nash’s voice.
I don’t answer right away. I swallow. Clear my throat. “Yeah.”
The door opens anyway.
He barges in without knocking properly because Nash has never been good at barriers. But his usual swagger is gone. He’s trying to hold a live wire without getting shocked.
“You’re gonna hate me,” he says.
I don’t look up. “Then don’t say it.”
He hesitates. “Dallas—”
“Don’t,” I warn quietly.
He sighs and shuts the door behind him. I hear him pacing. Hear the scrape of his boots against the floor.
Nash doesn’t get nervous unless something’s really wrong.
“She’s listed on William Ross’s website,” he says finally. “Under staff.”
The words hit slow at first.
Then all at once.
The air seems to drain out of the room.
I close my eyes.
“Doing what?” I ask, already knowing the answer will hurt.
“Social media,” Nash says. “Communications. Branding. That kind of thing.”
Of course she is.
My mind flashes to Faith in my kitchen, laughing softly when I teased her about being the ranch’s social media manager. The way her eyes had brightened at the idea, not because she wanted work, but because she wanted purpose. Something that was hers. A life she chose.
And now her father has taken that too.
Turned it into a cage.
“That doesn’t mean anything,” I say automatically. “It could be bullshit. He could’ve put it up without—”
“Dallas,” Nash cuts in gently, and that’s when I know there’s more.
I open my eyes. Look at him.
He doesn’t meet my gaze.
“Evan’s been posting pictures,” he says. “Him and Faith. Old ones. Some new ones, I think. They’re dressed up. Smiling.”
My stomach drops hard enough that I have to grab the edge of the desk to keep myself grounded.
Heat floods my chest so fast it makes me dizzy.
“No,” I say, and it comes out as a warning. A plea. “No.”
Nash lifts his hands, palms out. “I didn’t… I’m not showing you.”
“Good.” My throat burns. “I don’t want to see it.”
I really don’t.
Because the pictures are a trap, no matter what.
If she looks sad, it’ll tear me apart.
If she looks happy, it’ll tear me apart in a different way.
Screens can lie. Photos can be staged. Smiles can be forced.
And I don’t trust anything that comes from them.
“She looks…” Nash trails off.
“Happy?” I finish bitterly.
He winces. “Like she wants people to think she is.”
That lands harder than anything else he’s said.
Because it’s familiar.
Because I’ve seen that smile before.
Not on Faith, she’s never been good at pretending for long, but on my mom sometimes, when she was holding it together for us after Dad died.
On Rose, when she was trying not to cry in front of Ellie.
On Boone, when he’s swallowing his own fear because he thinks being the oldest means he has to be unbreakable.
A performative smile.
A survival smile.
I feel ugly heat rise in my throat.
“Why are you doing this to me?” I whisper before I can stop myself.
Nash flinches. “Dallas—”
“I didn’t ask for updates,” I snap, then immediately regret the edge in my voice. “I didn’t ask for proof. I didn’t ask to see her life being paraded around like…”
A trophy.
A warning.
A message: We have her. Stop looking.
Nash doesn’t take offense. He just looks tired. “Boone’s been digging too. Clay, a little. I told them to stop, but—”
“They won’t,” I say quietly.
Because they love me.
Because they think if they just find the right detail, the right crack in the story, they can fix this.
Because that’s what McCoy men do. We fix things or die trying.
“I can’t stop them either,” Nash admits. “Every time someone finds something, they come running like it’s proof.”
“Proof of what?” I mutter.
Nash’s eyes flick up to mine, apology written all over his face. “That she left you. Or that she didn’t. Depending on the day.”
I scrub a hand over my face, pressing my palm hard against my eyes as if I can push the images out of my skull.
Because they’re already there.
Faith in a dress, standing beside Evan, smiling for the camera.
Faith typing away at a laptop in some sleek office with her father looming behind her.
Faith nodding and saying yes because saying no comes with consequences.
“Tell them to stop,” I say again, quieter this time. “Please.”
Nash nods once. “I’ll try.”
He leaves after that, closing the door behind him. He’s afraid a loud sound might shatter me.
Maybe he’s right.
Because as soon as he’s gone, the office feels too big and too small at the same time.
Too much empty air. Too much silence.
My phone sits on the desk, face up, stubbornly blank.
And suddenly the anger is gone. It’s replaced by something else, something heavy and nauseating.
Acceptance, trying to creep in. The kind that might as well be giving up.
When Belinda got sick, I learned how to shut down hope because hope makes you stupid. Hope makes you reckless. Hope makes you believe in outcomes you can’t control.
I learned how to prepare for the worst so it wouldn’t destroy me when it arrived.
That’s what my mind is trying to do now.
It’s trying to brace.
It’s trying to build walls.
It’s trying to tell me:
She’s not coming back. She chose that life. You were a mistake. Move on.
By the time dinner rolls around, I haven’t eaten all day.
Mom notices, of course.
She always does.
She’s at the stove when I come into the kitchen, Maggie McCoy in full matriarch mode, apron tied tight, sleeves rolled, feeding people because it’s the one thing she can control.
She looks at me once, and her face falls.
“Sit,” she says.
I don’t argue. I sit.
She sets a plate in front of me. Pot roast. Potatoes. Carrots. Comfort food designed to anchor you to the world.
I take a bite. It tastes of nothing.
Mom sits across from me, hands folded around her mug. She doesn’t push. Doesn’t fill the silence. She’s learned better than that.
Finally, I say it. The thing I’ve been circling for days.
“I think she’s not coming back.”
The words feel wrong in my mouth, like they belong to someone else’s story.
Mom’s lips press together. Her eyes shine, but she doesn’t look away. “Is that what you think… or what you’re telling yourself so you can survive it?”
I huff out a weak breath. “Both.”
She nods slowly. “Your brothers told me about the website.”
Of course they did.
“And the pictures,” I add.
Her jaw tightens. “I told them to stop digging.”
“They won’t,” I say again.
She reaches across the table and covers my hand with hers. Her palm is warm.
“You’ve lost before,” she says quietly. “I know what this is bringing up.”
My throat tightens.
Belinda’s name sits between us unspoken, heavy as a stone.
“I don’t know how to do this again,” I admit. “I don’t know how to let someone go when I don’t even know if they wanted to leave.”
Mom squeezes my hand. “Sometimes loving someone means accepting what you can’t change.”
“And if it’s not her choice?” I ask. “What if she’s stuck? What if she needs help and I’m just… giving up?”
Mom’s eyes soften painfully. “Dallas. You cannot save someone who hasn’t asked to be saved.”
“She did,” I whisper. “She asked me to come get her. She said…” I stop. Swallow hard. “She said she felt trapped.”
Mom’s grip tightens. “Then listen to me very carefully. If Faith asks for help again, clearly, directly, you go. Without hesitation. Without guilt.”
“And until then?”
Her gaze holds mine. “Until then, you live. You breathe. You don’t destroy yourself waiting.”
Tears burn behind my eyes. “I’m so tired of losing people.”
Mom stands, walks around the table, and pulls me into her arms without asking. I go stiff for half a second—grown men don’t cry in kitchens—but then I break anyway.
She holds me as she did when I was a kid. I’m still hers to protect.
“I know,” she murmurs into my hair. “I know.”
When she finally lets me go, my chest aches in a different way. Cleaner. Sad, but not as sharp.
“I think I have to move on,” I say quietly. “Or at least… stop hoping.”
Mom nods, even though it clearly hurts her to agree. “That doesn’t make you weak.”
“It feels like it does.”
She shakes her head. “It makes you human.”
I can’t chase ghosts.
But if Faith ever turns around, if she ever reaches back, I’ll be here.
I always will.