5. Delilah
— ? —
Delilah
The ranch has never felt less like home.
I stand frozen in my own doorway, crutches digging into my armpits, watching Aimie move through my kitchen like she’s lived here for years.
She’s stirring something on the stove. My stove. Using my wooden spoon, the one with the chipped handle from the time Lucas tried to make me breakfast and gave up on the oatmeal.
“Delilah! You’re finally back, and just in time for dinner.
” She turns with a smile that’s all brightness and no warmth, gesturing at the table like she’s welcoming me into her home instead of the other way around.
“Sit, sit. You shouldn’t be standing. I made my famous chili - Allana already ate. She loved it.”
She’s feeding my daughter now.
The words echo in my head as I force my body to move forward.
Each step on the crutches sends pain radiating up through my leg, but I barely feel it.
All I can focus on is the wrongness of this scene - the way she’s positioned herself at the center of my kitchen, the way she speaks about my daughter like they’re old friends, the way she’s wearing my goddamn shirt like it belongs to her.
“I told Rosa to take the evening off,” Aimie adds, still stirring, not even looking at me. “Poor thing works so hard. She deserves to rest, don’t you think? And I love cooking. It relaxes me.”
Rosa has worked for this family for nine years. She was here before Allana was born, before the rodeo existed, back when this house was just a dream Lucas and I used to talk about on long drives through the hill country. She doesn’t need Aimie’s permission to rest.
I lower myself into a chair because my leg is screaming and I don’t have the strength to fight. Not yet. Not until I understand what the hell is happening here.
The kitchen smells different. She’s rearranged things.
The spices are in the wrong place - alphabetized, I notice, instead of organized by frequency of use the way I’ve always kept them.
The coffee mugs are on the wrong shelf, too high for me to reach comfortably.
The fruit bowl has moved from the center of the table to the counter by the window.
Little changes. Little erasures.
“I borrowed one of your shirts, hope you don’t mind.
” Aimie tugs at the hem - my favorite blue flannel, the soft one I’ve had for years.
“Haven’t had time to run home for clothes - the training schedule is so intense.
” She laughs, light and easy like we’re girlfriends sharing clothes instead of whatever this is.
“Lucas is really pushing for me to be ready for the Houston event.”
The Houston event.
That was supposed to be mine.
I dig my nails into my palm under the table, letting the small pain center me.
The Houston Rodeo is the biggest event of the season.
I’ve been training for it since last spring.
Stella and I have run that arena in my dreams, visualizing every turn, every straightaway, every fraction of a second that separates a winner from everyone else.
And now Aimie is training for it. While I sit here with a shattered leg, watching her stir chili in my kitchen.
The front door opens. Heavy boots on hardwood.
“Hey, love. You’re finally back.”
Lucas walks in, hat in hand, looking tired.
There are shadows under his eyes that weren’t there before the accident, and his jaw is covered in stubble he usually keeps meticulously trimmed.
He crosses to me and drops a kiss on my forehead.
Perfunctory. Quick. The kind of kiss you give someone out of habit, not hunger.
He wasn’t there when I woke up. Wasn’t there when they discharged me. And now he’s kissing my forehead like nothing happened.
“How are you feeling?”
I want to scream at him. Want to demand to know where he’s been, why he left me alone, why there’s another woman in our kitchen wearing my clothes and cooking dinner like she’s the wife and I’m the guest.
Instead, I hear myself say: “Like I got thrown from a horse and replaced.”
He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even pause.
“I set Aimie up in the guest house at the back of the house while you were in the hospital,” he says, like he’s reporting the weather. “It’s right by the stables - perfect for early training. Made sense.”
Great. The guest house. She told me in the hospital. The one that is fifty feet from the stable and a two-minute walk from our front door.
“Right.” I adjust my crutches against the table, letting them clatter louder than necessary. “I would’ve tidied it up if I’d known we were having a… long-term visitor. You know, between the fall and the hospital.”
The silence stretches. Lucas’s jaw tightens almost imperceptibly - a tell I’ve learned to read over seven years of marriage. He doesn’t like my tone. He thinks I’m being difficult.
Good.
“Lucas said I could use the kitchen here whenever I needed,” Aimie adds, as if reading my thoughts. “I hope that’s okay?”
She’s asking. But she’s already here. Already stirring. Already wearing my shirt.
What am I supposed to say?
“It’s temporary,” Lucas adds, reaching for the newspaper like the conversation is already over. “Just until Houston.”
Temporary. The word hangs in the air like a lie that doesn’t know it’s a lie yet.
“Dinner’s ready!” Aimie announces, too bright, filling the silence like she’s afraid of what might grow in it. She sets the pot of chili on the table with a thud. “Lucas, I made extra. I know how hungry you get after evening rounds.”
She knows his schedule now. His appetite. His habits.
Lucas sits. Aimie serves him first - generous portion, perfect placement - and then turns to me with the serving spoon raised like a question.
“Delilah? Hungry?”
I look at the chili. I look at her in my shirt. I look at my husband, already eating, not looking at me.
“Starving,” I say. “Apparently I’ve missed a lot.”
Aimie’s hand hesitates over my plate. Just for a second. Then she serves me a portion that’s noticeably smaller than Lucas’s.
I pick up my fork. The chili tastes fine - good, even - but every bite feels like swallowing glass. I watch Aimie and Lucas eat, watch them exchange small comments about the training schedule, about Mr. Velez’s feedback, about which horses are performing well and which need more work.
They have a rhythm already. Shorthand. The kind of easy communication that comes from spending time together, from building something together.
The kind of communication Lucas and I used to have.
Rosa appears in the kitchen doorway. She’s still wearing her apron, which means she hasn’t left for the night despite what Aimie said about giving her time off. Her dark eyes sweep the scene - Aimie in my chair, my shirt, my kitchen - and her jaw tightens.
“Mrs. Delilah.” Her voice is carefully neutral. “It’s good to have you home. I’ve prepared the guest room for you, in case the stairs are too difficult with your leg.”
“The guest room?” My fork pauses halfway to my mouth. “Why would I sleep in the guest room?”
Rosa’s eyes flick to Lucas, then away. “I’m sorry Mrs. Delilah. I thought perhaps with the injury…”
“She can sleep in our room,” Lucas says, not looking up from his plate. “I’ll help her up the stairs.”
“The guest room might be easier,” Aimie offers, all fake helpfulness. “You shouldn’t strain yourself on the stairs. Not with that leg. And you’ll need to be close to the bathroom during the night, and the master suite-”
“I’ll sleep in my own bed.” My voice comes out harder than I intended. “In my own room. With my husband.”
The silence that follows is suffocating.
Aimie’s smile doesn’t waver, but something shifts behind her eyes. A flash of something cold. Something satisfied.
“Of course,” she says smoothly. “I just worry about you, that’s all. We all do.”
Rosa retreats to the kitchen, and I hear her start washing dishes that don’t need washing. Lucas finishes his dinner and excuses himself to check on something in the barn. And I’m left sitting across from Aimie, my leg throbbing, my heart pounding, wondering how my life fell apart like this.
“You know,” Aimie says, leaning back in her chair, “I really am glad you’re home. It’s been strange, being here without you. Like something was missing.”
I don’t respond. I don’t trust myself to.
“I know this must be hard for you.” Her voice softens, drips with sympathy so fake I can taste it. “Watching someone else step into your role. But it’s only temporary. Once you’re healed, everything will go back to normal.”
She stands, gathering plates, moving around the kitchen with the ease of familiarity. She knows where the dishes go now. Where the silverware lives. How to load the dishwasher the way I like it loaded.
Little things. Little invasions.
“I should get some rest,” I say, reaching for my crutches. “Long day.”
“Of course.” Aimie doesn’t offer to help me up, and I’m grateful for that small mercy. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Sleep well, Delilah.”
She says my name like she owns it.
I make my way out of the kitchen, through the living room, toward the stairs that suddenly look like Mount Everest. Every step is agony. Every movement reminds me of what I’ve lost - my strength, my mobility, my place in my own home.
Halfway up, I pause to catch my breath.
From below, I hear Aimie humming as she finishes the dishes. A song I don’t recognize. A sound that doesn’t belong in my house.
When I finally reach the bedroom, Lucas is already there, pulling off his boots.
“You okay?” he asks without looking up. “Need help with anything?”
I want to tell him everything. Want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him until he sees what I see - the way she’s worming her way into our life, the way she looks at him, the way she’s systematically erasing me from my own home.
But I’m so tired. So sore. So beaten down by pain and medication and five days of lying alone in a hospital room, surfacing each time to find my husband already gone.
“I’m fine,” I say. “Just tired.”
I crawl into bed, cast and all, and turn my back to him.
He doesn’t reach for me. Doesn’t pull me close. Doesn’t do any of the things he used to do when we were young and in love and every night ended tangled together.
He just turns off the light and lies there, breathing steadily, while I stare at the wall and wonder when we became strangers.