Chapter 8
The guys file into the kitchen, faces dirty, clothes streaked with sweat and grime. They stop short in the doorway, nostrils flaring.
“What’s all this?” Sam asks, eyeing the bowls in the sink, the jars of spices lined up across the counter.
“Smells like a restaurant in here,” Malik says.
Flynn whistles, peering over my shoulder at the skillet. “No fucking way. Are those the good steaks?”
I grin. “Sit down, guys. Dinner’s almost ready.”
They exchange looks but do it. Chairs scrape against the floor as they pull up around the scarred wooden table in the center of the kitchen. Wade’s table. Covered in years of knife marks and coffee rings.
“Did Wade say you could use those?” Sam asks, still eyeing the steaks.
“He told me to make a proper meal. So I made a proper meal.”
“With his personal steaks.”
“He said the kitchen was mine.” I shrug. “Figured I should do it right.”
I carry the skillet to the table first, the steaks still sizzling in the cast iron.
Then the bowl of rice, the roasted carrots and onions, a pan of cornbread I threw together with this morning’s eggs.
One by one I set everything down until the table looks full.
Heaped. Festive, even. Like something from a commercial.
Even Rex leans forward to look at the spread and gives a small nod. Coming from him, that’s practically a standing ovation. Although the last standing ovation he gave me was a lot more hands-on. My face goes hot at the memory of that thick?—
That’s when the screen door opens.
Wade steps inside and takes off his hat, hanging it on the hook by the door.
His eyes move across the kitchen, over the mess on the counter and the guys around the table, before lingering on the platter of steaks.
He doesn’t say anything, and I hold my breath.
Did I overstep? Did I misinterpret him completely? I can feel the guys tensing up too.
He walks to the sink and washes his hands, dries them on the towel hanging from the oven handle, then pulls out his chair at the head of the table and sits.
“Smells good in here.”
The air comes back into my lungs all at once. I drop into the last empty chair, grinning like an idiot.
For a while, nobody talks. They’re too busy eating.
Forks scrape against plates, knives cut through steak, and the only sounds are chewing and the occasional grunt of approval.
Flynn finishes first and leans back in his chair, rubbing his stomach.
Malik goes for seconds on the carrots. Even Sam, who looked ready to bolt five minutes ago, is wiping up the last of his plate with a piece of cornbread.
Wade takes his time, cutting each piece of steak with the same patience he brings to everything else on this ranch. When he’s done, he wipes his mouth with a napkin, sets it beside his plate, folds his hands on the table, and looks around.
“Well,” he says. “That was one hell of a meal. You did good, Justin.”
I let out a slow breath.
“Alright.” He leans back. “Reason I wanted a proper meal on this table tonight is because what I’ve got to say is important. And men listen better when they’ve been fed right.” He looks around the table. “So. I’m gonna talk, and y’all are gonna listen.”
The table falls quiet.
“I’ve been runnin’ this ranch since before any of you could grow a beard.
Had crews come and go. Good ones. Bad ones.
Ones that tore each other apart before the summer was through.
” He runs his thumb along one of the knife marks in the table.
“This crew ain’t bad. Might even be one of the better ones. And I’d like to keep it that way.”
He looks at me first. Then Sam. Then Flynn.
“So let’s stop actin’ like I don’t know what goes on in that bunkhouse.”