31. Scarlett
— ? —
Scarlett
The barn is going to be beautiful.
I can see it now, even though it’s just stakes and pink tape in the dirt. Beck has laid out the footprint behind the old barn at Lone Elm, and it’s bigger than I imagined, grander than I drew it three years ago on the back of a feed bill.
“You moved the line,” I say.
“It was off.” He’s standing next to me, surveying his work with the critical eye of a man who’s spent a week tearing something down and is ready to build it back up. “The original plan had the office facing east. But I thought you’d want to see the sunset.”
“I designed it to face east.”
“I know. I changed it.” He glances at me. “I can change it back.”
I look at the stakes, at the pink tape fluttering in the October breeze. The doors from Salt Fork are leaning against the fence. Massive, beautiful, made of wood that’s weathered a hundred west Texas summers. And on sawhorses nearby, one ridge beam with CORINA VELASQUEZ burned into the end grain.
My mother’s name. On wood that will hold up my roof.
“It should face west,” I say. “But I want sliding doors on the east side. So I can hear the creek.”
Beck pulls out a piece of paper. A feed bill, I realize, the same kind I used three years ago, and starts writing. “Sliding doors, east side, creek view. What else?”
“The office should be bigger. I need room for the breeding books and the sale records and-”
“And a couch,” he says. “For when Josie wants to visit.”
I look at him. He’s not smiling, exactly, but there’s something soft in his expression.
“And a couch,” I agree.
We walk the perimeter together, me pointing out changes, him writing them down. Ellis is here. He came back the week after Ferris, didn’t even ask about pay, just showed up with his tools and said “where do you want me.” He’s working on the foundation now, setting posts with Tripp’s help.
“The first post is crooked,” I say.
“I know.” Beck winces. “I set it myself. Before I knew what I was doing.”
“You could fix it.”
“I’m leaving it.” He tucks the feed bill into his pocket. “Reminder that I’m not good at this. That I need help.”
“That’s either very profound or very lazy.”
“Probably both.”
I laugh, and it feels good, natural. The way things used to feel before everything went wrong.
Beck reaches into his jacket and pulls out an envelope.
“What’s that?”
“A deed.” He holds it out to me. “Four hundred acres. The creek, the bottom ground, the old foreman’s house. Your name only.”
I stare at the envelope. “Beck-”
“Before you say no, just look at it.”
I take the envelope and open it. Read the words that make my eyes blur.
Four hundred acres. The creek where we used to walk when we were first married. The bottom ground where the best pastures are. The old foreman’s house where we had a night before the wedding, with bluebonnets in a mason jar.
My name. Only my name.
“I can’t accept this.”
“Why not? That foreman’s house was supposed to become our dream house.”
“Because I said no buying.” I hold the deed out to him. “I said no gifts, no gestures, no Cooper money bullshit. And this is-”
“This is insurance.” He doesn’t take the deed back. “This is four hundred acres that no one can ever take from you.” He pauses. “This is so what happened before can never happen again.”
I look at the deed. At my name in official print.
“Tokyo was an hour,” I say. “This is a deed. This is permanent.”
“That’s the point.” He steps closer, and I can feel the heat of him even through my jacket.
“I want you to have something that’s yours.
Really yours. Something that doesn’t depend on me or on the marriage or on anything except the fact that you deserve it.
I could die at this moment and you and Josie don’t have to worry about anything. ”
“Beck-”
“Take it.” His voice is rough. “Please. Let me give you this one thing.”
I look at the creek in the distance, the water that feeds every pen on this end of the ranch. I think about sitting at table nine while another woman took credit for my work. About a barn built so far away where I couldn’t see it.
I take the deed.
“This isn’t for me,” I say.
“What?”
“It’s not for me. It’s so no one can ever do that to me again.” I fold the deed and put it in my pocket.
“That’s exactly why I filed it.”
“This is the last thing you hand me that you paid for.” I look at him, steady and certain. “Do you understand? After this, we build everything together. Or we don’t build it at all.”
“I understand.”
“Good.” I turn back to the stakes. “Now tell me what you want.”
“What I want?”
“One thing.” I glance at him over my shoulder. “I keep asking and you keep telling me what you think I want to hear. So tell me one thing. Something real. Something just for you.”
He’s quiet for a long moment. The wind picks up, rustling the pink tape, carrying the smell of juniper and coming rain.
“Come find me at four,” he says finally.
“Four?”
“Every day. Whatever you’re doing, wherever I am, come find me at four.” His voice is rough. “That’s when I used to leave. Four o’clock, every day, that’s when I’d get in the helicopter and fly to Salt Fork. I want to replace that. I want four o’clock to mean something different.”
I turn to face him fully. He’s standing there with his hands in his pockets, looking almost shy, a word I never thought I’d use to describe Beck Cooper.
“Done,” I say.
“Done?”
“Four o’clock. Every day. I’ll be there.”
He stares at me like he can’t quite believe it. Like I’ve given him something impossible instead of something small.
“That’s it?” he asks. “You’re not going to argue, or set conditions, or- I mean you should say that I should be the one finding you.”
“No, that’s it. I like the challenge of finding you.” I close the distance between us, rise up on my toes, and kiss him. Just once, soft and quick. “Now get back to work. We have a barn to build.”
He’s smiling when I pull away.