Sneak Peek #4
When I step back out, I’m fine.
I make sure of it.
The worst part isn’t the flash. It’s knowing it can happen at all. Knowing there are still cracks inside me that the wrong sound, the wrong light, the wrong person could slip through.
Ellery has always been the wrong person.
Not because she’s careless.
Because she knows me and I don’t know if I can survive her seeing all of it.
I’m halfway down the narrow corridor behind the chutes when someone says my name like they’ve already decided I owe them time.
“Colton.”
I don’t stop.
Footsteps hurry to catch up. Polite. Purposeful. The kind that belong to someone who thinks they’re being reasonable.
“Colton McAllister.”
I stop then. Slow. Deliberate. Turn just enough to see who’s decided now is the moment.
It’s Bill Hanley from First Prairie Bank. Mid-fifties. Windburned face. Clipboard tucked under his arm like a shield. He’s wearing a button-down with the sleeves rolled up too neatly, like he dressed for this.
Not here.
Not today.
“Good ride,” he says, voice pitched loud enough to carry. “Hell of a showing.”
My jaw tightens. “What do you need, Bill?”
He glances around, like he’s checking who might be listening, then keeps talking anyway. “Just wanted to catch you while you were in town. Things move fast, you know how it is.”
I do.
He flips his clipboard open, pages snapping in the air. “We missed the last payment on the ranch note. Not by much, but policy’s policy.”
Something hot and sharp flares behind my ribs.
“Now’s not the time,” I say quietly.
He winces, like that hadn’t occurred to him. “Well, I won’t keep you long. Just need to make sure you understand where we’re at.”
People pass at the mouth of the corridor—riders, crew, spectators drifting in close enough to hear a name, a word, a tone. The rodeo hum keeps going around us, oblivious.
Bill taps the paper with his pen. “You’re looking at a formal notice next month if we don’t see movement. Foreclosure clock starts then.”
Next month.
The words land like a slap.
I knew it was bad. I didn’t know he’d say it here. Out loud. Like we were discussing the weather.
“Seventy-two days,” he adds, helpfully. “That’s when it posts.”
I stare at him, the arena noise roaring back in my ears. “You’re really doing this right now?”
He shifts his weight, uncomfortable but determined. “I figured you’d rather hear it from me than get surprised.”
I laugh once. Short. Ugly. “At a rodeo.”
His mouth tightens. “I don’t set the rules.”
No. But he chose the moment.
Anger burns through me, clean and focused, the kind I can use if I don’t let it spill. I think of my mom at the ranch, of Luke keeping things running with baling wire and grit, of land my family’s held onto through droughts and deaths and wars.
Bill lowers his voice, finally. “There might be ways to slow things down. Leverage. Influence.”
I know what’s coming before he says it.
“The Shaws,” he adds. “They’ve got pull with the council. Deep pockets, too.”
Ellery’s face flashes in my mind, calm, controlled, already in the middle of this whether she wants to be or not.
My first instinct is rejection. Hard and immediate.
No.
But the word sticks and the truth settles in, heavy and undeniable.
The one person I don’t want involved is the one person who could help.
For the first time since I came home, I stop pretending avoidance is the same thing as control.
***
I stand there after Bill walks away, the clipboard’s echo still hanging in the air like an insult.
Seventy-two days.
The number repeats, steady and merciless. Long enough to hope. Short enough to choke.
My first instinct is still to shut it down. Lock it up. Handle it myself. That’s how I’ve always survived, by keeping my problems contained, my damage compartmentalized.
I can almost hear Luke’s voice in my head, practical and tight. We’ll figure it out. We always do.
But this is bigger than baling wire and stubbornness.
I resist the name for a breath, hope and pride warring, before it lands anyway.
The Shaws.
I picture Ellery again, the way she rode out of the arena like nothing in the world could knock her off balance. The way she looked at me across the dirt, like she saw the warning in my eyes and understood it without a word.
She doesn’t belong anywhere near this mess.
Which is exactly why she’s already in it.
I rake a hand through my hair and blow out a breath, staring down the corridor that leads back toward the arena. Toward the noise. Toward her.
Avoidance won’t save the ranch.
And it won’t save me.
I straighten, shoulders settling into place, decision clicking in with a familiar finality. The same feeling I used to get before missions—when the plan locked and there was no more room for doubt.
If the Shaws are leverage, then I’ll use it.
If Ellery Shaw is the key, then I’ll face her.
Not because I want to; because I have to.
I turn back toward the arena, jaw set, already bracing for the one complication I can’t calculate for.
The woman I never stopped wanting.
The one who could cost me everything.
Yes, let me get on that horse and READ!