Chapter 26
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Tex
I didn’t mean to see it.
Last night, the storm woke me up. Not the thunder—that was just noise. It was the calves.
I could hear them from here, bawling in the north pasture, separated from their mothers. The sound cut through the rain, frantic and high-pitched.
I couldn’t sleep through that. No rancher can.
I swung my legs out of bed and went to the window. I wiped a circle in the fogged glass, squinting out into the deluge.
I expected to see a stray coyote or maybe a downed fence line.
I didn’t expect to see them.
Two shapes running through the sheets of rain, blurred by the water streaming down the pane. But I knew that gait. I knew the way he moved, shoulders hunched against the wind.
And I knew the flash of red hair, even wet and plastered to her head.
Billy and Sedona. Running together like they were being chased by the devil himself. Or running toward something.
They disappeared into the kitchen. The light flicked on, a yellow beacon in the gray dark. I stood there for a long time, my breath fogging the glass, my hand pressed flat against the cold surface.
I went back to bed. But I didn’t sleep.
Now, it’s morning. The sun is harsh, exposing every puddle and patch of mud. The ranch looks like a disaster zone. The CDC suits are back, walking around like ghosts in their plastic armor.
Nothing feels real.
I’m sitting on the porch steps, elbows on my knees, staring at the bunkhouse. I feel like I have a hangover, but I haven’t had a drink in days.
It’s the exhaustion. The worry.
And the smell.
I catch it every time the wind shifts. Drifting from the open windows of the bunkhouse, or maybe just carried on Sedona’s skin when she walked past us earlier.
Billy’s scent is all over her.
It’s not subtle. It’s a claim. A brand. Musk and pine and something sharp, like lightning.
It’s buried under the sickness clinging to her pores, but it’s there.
I scrub a hand over my face.
They hooked up.
My brother, who has spent five years pretending Sedona Archer didn’t exist, who has worn his anger like a second skin, fell into bed with her during a quarantine lockdown.
Fuck.
I want to be happy for him. I want to be relieved that the tension vibrating between them like a live wire has finally snapped. But all I feel is a hollow ache in my chest.
It’s a familiar pain. I’ve been living with it for years.
The screen door creaks behind me. I don’t turn around. I know who it is. The footsteps are quiet, measured.
Seth walks around the railing and sits down on the step next to me. He’s holding two mugs. Steam curls up into the cool air. He hands me one.
“Hot cocoa,” he says.
I take it. The ceramic is warm against my palms. “Thanks.”
We sit in silence for a minute, watching the CDC team haul a generator across the yard. The air smells like wet dirt and diesel fuel.
“How are you feeling?” Seth asks. He keeps his eyes on the horizon.
“Fine,” I say. “No fever. No chills. I feel normal.”
“That’s good.”
“How about you?”
“Same. Jasper is a little freaked out, but physically he’s okay.”
I take a sip of the cocoa. It’s rich, bittersweet. It settles warm in my stomach. I glance at Seth. He’s staring intently at the barn, his jaw tight.
“Where’s Clara?” I ask. “And Jasper?”
“Clara’s in the kitchen with Maggie, helping organize the medical supplies,” Seth says. “Jasper’s in the loft.”
We drink our cocoa. Seth sets his mug on the step between his boots. He turns to look at me. He studies my face, his eyes assessing.
“How are you doing?” he asks. His voice drops. “Really.”
I grip my mug tighter. “I told you. I’m fine.”
“I’m not talking about the parasite, Tex.”
I look away. I stare at the bunkhouse. The curtains are drawn.
“I’m okay,” I lie.
“Don’t bullshit me.” Seth shifts, turning his body toward me. “We all saw the way you looked at her yesterday. When she fainted. And we all saw the way you looked at Billy this morning.”
I sigh. I lean my head back, looking up at the overcast sky. “It’s nothing.”
“It’s not nothing.”
He’s persistent. He always has been.
Seth is the quiet one, the observer. He sees everything. He probably saw this coming before I even admitted it to myself.
I drop my head, staring at the mud on my boots.
“I like her,” I say. The words feel heavy, dragging out of me. “I always have. Since we were kids. Since before, well…any of this.”
Seth nods slowly. “I know.”
“She was the girl next door. The cute neighbor who climbed fences and helped birth calves.” I shake my head. “Then she grew up. And she left. And Billy got his heart broken. And I was just… there. Watching it happen.”
“Does Billy know?”
“I told him. He knows I care. He knows I’m protective.” I shrug. “But he doesn’t know the half of it. And he doesn’t need to. It doesn’t matter.”
“Why not?”
“Because she doesn’t belong to me,” I say simply. The truth tastes bitter, like unsweetened chocolate. “She never has. She’s Billy’s. She’s always been Billy’s. Even when she was in New York, even when she was gone, she was his. That doesn’t change just because I want it to.”
Seth is quiet for a long moment. He picks up his mug, swirling the liquid inside.
“You’re a good brother,” he says.
“I’m a dumbass,” I counter. “Pining after my brother’s girl. It’s a cliché. It’s pathetic.”
“It’s not pathetic. It’s human.”
I look at him. He’s not looking at me. He’s staring at the bunkhouse, too.
His expression is guarded. There’s a tension in his shoulders that I recognize. I’ve seen it in the mirror.
I frown, a thought nudging the back of my mind. It’s a suspicion I’ve had for years, one I’ve never dared to voice.
“Seth,” I say.
“Yeah?”
“Do you have feelings for Sedona?”
The question hangs in the air. It’s risky. It crosses a line we’ve never crossed.
Seth freezes. His hand stops halfway to his mouth. He stares straight ahead, his profile rigid.
I watch him. I see the war happening behind his eyes. The struggle to deny it, to keep the peace, to maintain the lie.
He’s the peacemaker. He doesn’t like conflict. He doesn’t like messy emotions.
But he doesn’t lie.
He sets the mug down. He exhales, a long, ragged breath that seems to deflate him.
“Yeah,” he says quietly. “I do.”
I stare at him. My shock is a physical thing, a jolt that runs through my limbs. I knew. Maybe deep down I always knew.
But hearing him say it out loud is different.
“You do?” I ask.
He nods. He runs a hand through his hair, ruffling the blond strands.
“I had a crush on her when we were younger,” he admits. “Who didn’t? She was beautiful. Smart. Funny. She could wrestle a calf. She was nothing like any of the other girls.”
He pauses. He looks down at his hands.
“But it didn’t go away,” he continues. “When she left… it just got worse. I worried about her. I wondered where she was. If she was happy. If she was safe.”
He looks at me then, and his eyes are vulnerable in a way I rarely see.
“I can’t shake it,” he says. “There’s just something about her. She gets under your skin, makes you want to be better. She makes you want to be the one who makes her smile.”
I’m speechless. I sit there, the cooling cocoa forgotten in my hands.
All this time, I thought I was alone in this. I thought I was the jealous brother, the one harboring a dirty secret. I thought I was betraying Billy by loving her.
But Seth does too.
“Holy shit,” I mutter.
Seth lets out a dry laugh. “Yeah. Holy shit.”
“Does Billy know?”
“No. And he doesn’t need to.” Seth’s voice hardens. “It doesn’t matter, Tex. Just like you said. She’s his. We respect that. We support that. We don’t tear the pack apart because we can’t have what we want.”
I nod slowly. It makes sense. It’s the code we live by. Pack comes first. Billy comes first.
But it sucks. It sucks knowing that two of us are nursing the same broken heart.
“I can’t believe this,” I say. “You, me… all this time.”
“We’re a mess,” Seth says. “A real fucking mess.”
He looks at me, and for a second, we aren’t brothers fighting for survival. We are just two men in love with a woman they can’t have.
There’s a solidarity in it. A shared pain.
“There’s something else,” Seth starts to say, but he hesitates. His brow furrows, like he’s trying to decide whether to speak.
“What?” I press. “What is it?”
He opens his mouth. Then snaps it shut.
My phone rings.
The sharp trill cuts through the moment. I jump, fumbling for the device in my back pocket. I pull it out.
The screen lights up with a name.
Joey.
My stomach drops.
“Shit,” I mutter.
“Answer it,” Seth says. His face wipes clean of the vulnerability, snapping back to neutral.
I swipe the green button and put the phone to my ear. “Hey, man.”
“Tex!” Joey’s voice booms through the speaker.
He sounds frantic. Pissed. “What the hell is going on? I turn on the TV and see the ranch on the news? Tripp Hollister is on the local station right now, announcing the rodeo might be postponed because of an ‘outbreak’ at the Carson ranch? An outbreak of what?”
I wince. I pull the phone away from my ear for a second. “Joey, calm down.”
“Calm down? I’m three hours away, and I’m getting calls from old high school buddies asking if I’m dead. Tell me what’s happening. Are you guys okay? Is it the cattle?”
“It’s contained,” I say. I try to keep my voice level. “We’re under quarantine. Some kind of parasite. The CDC is here.”
“The CDC?” he roars. “On our land? Who let them in?”
“Seth handled it. It’s protocol, Joey. We have to cooperate.”
There’s a pause on the line. I can hear Joey breathing, sharp and fast.
“Where’s Billy?” he asks. “I tried calling him. His phone goes straight to voicemail.”
I look at Seth. Seth looks back at me. His eyes are wide.
Billy’s with Sedona. In the bunkhouse. Probably holding her while she sweats through a fever. He’s finally letting himself be her Alpha again.
“He’s… resting,” I say.
“Resting?” Joey sounds incredulous. “Billy doesn’t rest during a crisis. He’s the foreman. Put him on the phone.”
“He can’t talk right now,” I say quickly. “He’s asleep. He was up all night with the cattle.”
I hate lying to Joey. But I can’t tell him. I can’t tell him that Sedona is here. I can’t tell him that she’s sick.
And I definitely can’t tell him that Billy is with her.
If Joey knew, he would lose his mind. He would demand to talk to Billy. He would demand to know why the hell the girl who broke his brother’s heart is back on the property. He would make a scene.
It’s better this way. Better for him to hear it from Billy. When things have calmed down. When Billy has his head on straight.
“Tell him to call me back,” Joey says. His voice is tight. “The minute he wakes up.”
“I will,” I promise.
“Are the cattle okay?” Joey asks. His voice drops, losing some of the anger, replaced by worry. “Have any of them succumbed?”
I think about the separated calves, the stressed mothers. I think about the virus we can’t see.
“No,” I say. “No deaths. Just a lot of stress. We’re managing.”
“Okay,” Joey breathes. “Okay. Look, I can be back by tonight. I can skip—”
“No,” I cut in. “Stay where you are. The quarantine is strict. No one in, no one out. You can’t get to us anyway.”
“I hate this,” Joey growls. “I hate being stuck out here while you guys are dealing with this.”
“We’ve got it handled,” I say. “Seth is on top of the paperwork.”
Joey grunts. “Fine. Call me if anything changes.”
“We will.”
“And Tex?”
“Yeah?”
“Watch your back. And watch Seth. Don’t let him take all the weight. You know how overwhelmed he gets. I wanted to call him, but I don’t want to stress him out more than he probably is.”
I want to tell him that Seth is seated right next to me, but I don’t. “I’ll tell him you checked in,” I say.
“Later.”
The line goes dead.
I lower the phone and take a deep breath.
Seth raises an eyebrow. “How mad is he?”
“Nine out of ten,” I say. “He saw the news. Tripp Hollister is already running his mouth about the rodeo.”
Seth sighs, rubbing his temples. “Of course he is. I’ll call Grant.”
“He wanted to talk to Billy.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That Billy was resting.”
Seth nods. “Good. He doesn’t need to know about… that. Not yet.”
I look toward the bunkhouse again. The curtains are still drawn.
“He’s going to find out eventually,” I say.
“I know,” Seth says. “But let’s get through today first. Let’s make sure the cattle don’t die. Let’s make sure Sedona doesn’t die.”
The bluntness of his words hits me.
Let’s make sure Sedona doesn’t die.
It’s a real possibility. The fever. The parasite. It’s targeting her. It’s tearing through her Omega biology.
And there isn’t a damn thing we can do about it.
I stand up. I brush off my jeans. The cocoa is cold. I set it on the railing.
“I’m going to check the south fence,” I say. “Storm might have knocked it loose.”
“I’ll come with you,” Seth says.
We walk down the porch steps together. The mud sucks at our boots. The morning sun is weak, struggling through the clouds.
We walk in silence, side by side. Brothers. Pack.
I think about Joey, three hours away, angry and helpless. I think about Billy, lying next to the woman he loves and hates in equal measure. I think about Seth, carrying a secret that mirrors my own.
And I think about her.
Sedona.
The girl who ruined us. The girl who saved us. The girl who has no idea that she holds the hearts of three brothers in her hands, and is crushing them all without even knowing it.
I kick a rock. It skids across the wet grass.
“He’d better not screw it up this time,” I mutter.
“Who?” Seth asks.
“Billy. With her. If he pushes her away again… if he hurts her again…”
“He won’t,” Seth says. “He can’t. He’s been in love with her since forever. He doesn’t know how to stop.”
“Neither do we,” I say quietly.
Seth stops walking. He looks at me. His face is grim, but there’s a faint, sad smile touching his lips.
“No,” he agrees. “Neither do we.”
We keep walking.