Chapter 4
four
Sloane
The ranch is already awake when I slip into the office before sunrise, and my nerves are still buzzing from yesterday.
Still, I manage one small win. Convincing him to let me look at the water usage and land records. My guess is he doesn’t know much about them, which—petty or not—is an advantage I intend to use.
Ranch instinct is useful. Paper trails are lethal.
I make sure to get up early, before he has another chance to barge into my room like a drill sergeant with a personal vendetta. I head straight for the office.
I know he wasn’t exactly thrilled the last time he caught me buried in files, but he did say I could review them. And I don’t need his permission to examine documentation tied to what is very legally half mine.
The small lamp on the desk is the only light cutting through the dark office. The office has the kind of security you’d expect on a working ranch—habits, not alarms. The sun hasn’t risen yet.
I can hear the distant chatter of the hands starting their morning routines—boots on gravel, gates creaking, animals shifting. Whether Gage is out there barking orders or pretending I don’t exist, I don’t know.
Either way, my goals today don’t involve him.
I pull the same documents I was reviewing yesterday, the ones Gage interrupted before I could finish cross-checking them. As I scan the pages again, my attention catches on a set of clauses that don’t align with the water permit dates.
My eyes narrow.
“What?” I whisper to myself.
I move back to the filing cabinet, sliding out the financial records tied to the same period. I spread both sets across the desk, lining them up, side by side, running the dates again. Once. Twice.
“This doesn’t make sense,” I mutter, scrunching my nose.
All of it is wrong. Not messy. Not incomplete. Wrong.
The signatures tell the same story—Samuel Hollis. Every document bears his name. The man who somehow left me half a ranch I never asked for and a situation I can’t walk away from. But these numbers don’t match the permits.
The permits don’t match the land. And the land definitely doesn’t match the water allocation.
Does Gage even know about any of this?
The thought settles heavy in my chest as I stare down at the paperwork. Because if he doesn’t, that means someone made decisions without him. And if he does… then this mess goes deeper than I thought.
And whether Gage likes it or not, he needs to know.
The first day doesn’t go as planned—of course it doesn’t—but I refuse to take the blame. I try to keep the peace with Gage.
I try to show him I’m serious about making this work for the sake of the ranch. But effort doesn’t mean much when it’s one-sided.
I don’t like him. He doesn’t care for me. That much is painfully obvious.
But this place matters to him in a way I understand, even if he’d rather choke on dust than admit it. And if there’s a problem buried in these records, I owe it to him—and to the ranch itself—to say something.
I slide the documents into the front of the filing cabinet so they’re easy to find later, then close the drawer.
Before I leave, I slide the simple bolt into place on the inside of the office door—not to hide anything, but because I don’t trust what might disappear if I leave it unsecured.
Outside, the sky is still washed in deep navy, the kind that comes just before sunrise. The land is already alive. Men move with purpose.
Gates open and close. Animals shift and settle. In the distance, I spot Gage in the same pasture where we nearly tore each other apart yesterday.
Of course he’s there.
As I walk toward him, I rehearse the conversation in my head.
Best case, he listens. Takes this seriously. Tells me to handle it and lets me work.
If that happens, I lean into my strengths and prove I’m not the liability he’s convinced himself I am.
Worst case?
He shuts me down. Tells me to stay in my lane. Accuses me—again—of sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong.
My money’s on the second one.
I step through the gate and slide it shut behind me. When I turn around, I stop short.
Gage’s white shirt is lifted as he wipes sweat from his face, exposing a sharp line of muscle, a hint of a happy trail, and exactly the kind of distraction I do not need right now.
It’s unfair, really—how easily the male body can derail a woman’s train of thought.
I'm into that sort of thing. Just not with Gage. Definitely not on Gage.
I squeeze my eyes shut, take a grounding breath, and remind myself why I came over here in the first place. When I open them again, he’s pulling his shirt back down, already braced for a confrontation.
“Did you know there are permit issues?” I ask, getting straight to the point.
He sighs, like I’ve just asked him to explain quantum physics. “I see you’re snooping again.”
I scoff. “It isn’t snooping if you’re concerned about everything running smoothly.”
He chuckles, and there it is—that same condescending edge. “Right. And what do you know about running a ranch, Little Miss?”
He steps closer, invading my space, and irritation flares hot in my chest. I can’t believe I ever found him attractive. That illusion dies a fast, satisfying death.
“Running a ranch is more than barking orders, Gage,” I snap. “It’s about complying with laws and making sure you’re not getting screwed by the state or the county.”
He shrugs like I’ve just insulted his boots. “At Hollis Ranch, we run on instinct. Not bureaucracy.”
He circles past me, dismissing me entirely, and I stand there stunned.
Instinct?
If this man thinks permits and compliance are bureaucracy, he’s one bad audit away from losing everything—and he doesn’t even see it. This isn’t red tape. This is justification. Resource optimization. Protection.
I groan inwardly.
No. This is not how this is going to work. I am not going to sit back and let him bulldoze his way into a legal disaster just because he refuses to listen.
I’m going to the county commissioner’s office.
I retrieve the folder I prepared earlier and head for my car just as Gage exits the barn. He doesn’t ask where I’m going. Doesn’t ask if I’ll be back. Honestly, I doubt he cares—but his gaze follows me as I back out and disappear down the drive.
Fine. Let him stew.
I hit the road as daylight finally breaks, my focus narrowing to a single objective. Gage may not care now, but in six months, he’s going to wish he had listened.
Once I’m free of this place, once my hands are clean of it, he’s going to realize I wasn’t the enemy here.
I don’t know why I care this much. I should walk away. Let him handle it—or mishandle it—on his own.
But I can’t.
Every instinct I have tells me this place is worth protecting.
Downtown Bell River appears fifteen minutes later—not because of traffic, but because Hollis Ranch may as well be its own town.
It’s massive compared to everything else around it, and that alone makes me wonder just how much this ranch means to the community.
I didn’t know any of that when I arrived. I didn’t know the town. Didn’t know the history. I was too distracted by the fact that I’d inherited land from a man I’d never met.
Now, I’m starting to see what I missed.
The town is barely awake, storefronts dark and sidewalks empty, but one thing catches my eye. An elderly woman flips a sign from Closed to Open, apron tied at her waist.
Daisy’s Café.
My brain doesn’t so much suggest a detour as it demands one—loudly, with coffee incentives.
I turn the wheel.
I pull into one of the angled parking spots and step out of the car. Inside the café, it’s just the elderly woman, hands deep in dough, working with the kind of calm confidence that comes from decades of repetition.
I push the door open and a little bell jingles overhead.
She looks up immediately and smiles—warm, easy, unguarded. The kind of smile that settles something in my chest before I realize it’s been tight all morning.
She dusts the flour from her hands, and the scent of fresh bread and sugar wraps around me like a promise.
“Welcome,” she says. “Always nice to see a fresh face.”
I smile back. One thing about small towns—they know instantly when you don’t belong. And somehow, she doesn’t make it feel like a bad thing.
“What can I get you, honey?”
I sigh, the sound half relief, half surrender. “Coffee, please. Creamer and one sugar, if you have it.”
Her eyebrows lift, amused. “Fancy.”
“And a cheese Danish,” I add, eyeing the glass case like it might judge me if I don’t commit.
“Well, of course you can,” she says, already moving toward the coffee pot. “Make yourself comfortable. I’ll have it ready in a jiffy.”
I slide onto one of the stools at the counter, watching her work. Had I known this place existed when I first arrived, I might’ve hidden here instead of charging headfirst into conflict.
It’s cozy. Lived-in. Clearly the only café in town—and judging by the way she moves, the heart of it.
The bell jingles again, and she glances up just as a uniformed county sheriff steps inside.
“How’s it going, Daisy?” he asks, dropping into a chair at one of the tables like he’s done it a thousand times.
“Hanging in there, Tommy,” she replies easily. “The usual?”
He nods.
She sets my coffee in front of me before pouring his. “There you go, dear. Want me to warm up that Danish?”
“Yes, please,” I say, wrapping my hands around the mug and taking a sip.
I close my eyes in bliss. Perfect. Absolutely perfect.
No offense to Gage and his black-coffee-no-nonsense philosophy, but creamer makes life better. That’s just science.
She slides the plate toward me with a wink. “Good?”
I take a bite and hum. “Delicious. You’re a miracle worker.”
She studies me for a moment, something shifting behind her eyes. “You all right, hon?”
I pause. “Yeah. Why?”
“You just look like someone I knew once,” she says thoughtfully.
My spine straightens. At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if half this town knew my father better than I do.
“Who?” I ask carefully.