Chapter 14
Vivi was twenty-six years old, and apparently one bad night away from building a blanket fort.
She sat cross-legged inside the questionable structure she'd wedged into a quiet corner of the barn, surrounded by two hay bales, an old horse blanket, and enough bad decisions to make the whole thing list slightly to the left.
Her temples throbbed from crying half the night, and her chest still ached from Boone’s sharp rejection of her bunkhouse idea.
He hadn't shown up at her room to drag her out of bed that morning, and the barn had been empty at their usual five o'clock meeting.
Part of her wanted to feel relieved—no shouting, no pots clanging, no scolding—but that thought quickly soured.
She'd tried to hold her chin high, but the sting of humiliation and the ache of being dismissed still sat heavy in her chest.
So she'd opened Glow Up.
Big mistake, because today’s exercise was to do something her ten-year-ols self would have loved. Ten-year-old Vivi, it turned out, wanted a fort.
Twenty-six-year-old Vivi wanted coffee and a new life, but nobody had asked her.
She leaned back against a hay bale and stared up at the horse blanket sagging overhead. It wasn't exactly the secret hideout she'd envisioned as a kid, but it had walls, a roof, and, most importantly, no Boone Callahan.
Vivi let her thoughts drift back to that summer she’d been ten—the year she’d decided she was going to build a secret hideout in the fire escape corner of their cramped Upper West Side apartment.
She'd spent days sketching blueprints in her notebook, scavenging discarded cardboard from the grocery store, and even convincing a few neighborhood kids to help.
When she proudly showed her plans to her dad—crayon-smudged, edges torn, but bursting with ambition—he didn't even glance up from his laptop.
"Sweetheart, that thing will collapse before you can even sit in it. Maybe don't bother," he said, tapping his pen against the desk.
She remembered the tight twist in her stomach, the way she'd nodded and laughed, pretending she wasn't crushed, as she tucked the sketch into her backpack. That was the first time she learned how to shrink herself and swallow her excitement before it showed.
Even now, years later, she could still feel that hollow ache. The sting of offering her best ideas and having them brushed aside.
Just like yesterday.
"What the hell is this?"
Boone's voice came from outside the fort.
Vivi closed her eyes. So much for no Boone Callahan.
"It's a fort."
There was a long pause. "You're hiding in a fort?"
"I'm healing in a fort. There's a difference."
The horse blanket lifted, and Boone's face appeared beneath it.
His eyes swept over the tiny space. "Move over."
"You will literally crush it."
"Move, Boots."
Before she could stop him, six-foot-three of stubborn cowboy ducked under the blanket and started forcing his way inside.
A hay bale shifted. The blanket dropped six inches. His shoulder knocked into hers, his knee landed somewhere between her legs, and suddenly there was Boone everywhere.
"This was designed for one person," she complained.
"No shit."
"This is exactly why you weren't invited."
He finally wedged himself beside her, knees practically to his chest, one massive shoulder taking up half the fort.
Vivi stared at him. Boone stared back. Then the blanket slipped off his head.
"This thing's a death trap," he said and just like that, ten-year-old Vivi wanted to kick him out.
“Why are you here, disrupting my time with Glow?”
“Glow?” he asked then held up a hand. “Neverminded, I don’t want to know. I’m here about last night.”
Vivi's wary eyes flicked up to him but softened at the sincerity in his eyes. "A lot happened last night. Can you be more specific?"
"I'm sorry for yelling at you," he said, removing his cowboy hat and balancing it on his bent knee. "I was harsh. And yes, I’m grumpy. I’m too busy keeping this place standing to have patience for anything else. But that doesn’t excuse me snapping at you. It’s a good idea and I shouldn't have spoken to you like that. "
Vivi exhaled, the tension in her shoulders softening slightly.
"Thanks. I appreciate that," she said—then paused. The words she'd been holding in all her life spilled out before she could stop them. "People have always underestimated me. My parents, my boyfriends—”
“Lewis?”
“Especially Lewis. I say yes to everything to try and make everyone happy, but I end up exhausted and overlooked. I just wanted to show you I could handle this. That I could contribute."
Boone's expression gentled in a way that caught her off guard. He wasn't frowning, or smirking, or guarded. He was listening—like really listening—and the intensity in his warm green eyes made her heart stutter.
"I'm sorry I put myself in that group," he said, finally, his voice rough and low, almost growling with that undercurrent of care. "It wasn't you—"
"Oh God," Vivi groaned. "If you're about to say 'it's not you, it's me,' don't you dare finish that sentence."
She'd heard it so many times it was practically tattooed on her forehead.
"But it was me." Before she could whack him on the head, he held up a hand.
"Let me explain. This land was left to my guardianship.
Not my brothers'. Mine. The idea of outsiders knowing I'm failing at my job is embarrassing.
The idea of strangers renting out my family's land like it's some kind of boutique vacation spot feels sacrilegious.
It's not just property. Every fence post, every pasture, every quiet corner holds my parents' voices. Their lessons and their pride.
"Letting someone treat it like a commodity, no matter how well-intentioned, makes my chest tighten and my stomach turn," he continued. "This isn't just about me. It's about them and about what they entrusted to me. I won't let it be cheapened."
Hearing Boone speak about the ranch like it was sacred—like every sunrise and pasture carried the weight of memory and legacy—had her rethinking their entire exchange yesterday.
Her chest tightened with empathy and guilt at the same time. Guilt for suggesting the bunkhouse idea in the first place. Empathy for the man who carried so much responsibility on his shoulders.
She wanted to tell him it was okay to let someone in, even on his own terms—even if it meant letting her help. But another part of her hesitated because she didn't want to be shot down again.
She also didn't want to be another person who added more problems to his carefully measured world—an outsider meddling in something that mattered more than anything else to him.
Every time she opened her mouth, she feared she'd say the wrong thing, push too hard, or remind him that she was a city girl who didn't belong.
And yet the urge to make a difference, to help lighten the load, was almost unbearable.
She wanted to help him lighten his load, even if it meant standing in the line of his disapproval.
She could see the struggle in his gaze, the tension in his shoulders and she knew that if she approached carefully, gently, maybe she could prove she was more than just another complication in his life.
"Don't think of it as cheapening your legacy," she said. "Think of it as sharing the beauty of this land. As for time? Your brothers want more than anything to be part of this place. It's their legacy too. They just don't know how to participate without stepping on your toes."
Boone's hands flexed at his sides until his knuckles when white. He stared at her for a long moment, as if weighing every word and the intentions behind each one. The early morning sunlight caught in his eyes, softening them just slightly—but the tension in his body didn't ease.
"I—" he started, then stopped and shook his head. "You make it sound so simple. They both have dreams they're working toward, and I don't want them to give those up."
"Isn't that their decision to make?"
He let the words hang between them, the tension easing slightly. "I'm not promising I won't grumble every step of the way, but maybe you're right. Maybe it's time to breathe a little life in here without losing what matters."
Boone sat down beside her. "Alright. If we're doing this, we do it right. No shortcuts, no half-measures. The bunkhouse gets fixed up, but we stick to the budget because there is no extra for mistakes and the outcome stays true to the land and to my family. If anyone fucks that up, I won’t just bellow, I will bite. "
Vivi's chest lifted with a rush of relief and excitement. "I can handle the planning and the design. I'll get supplies and organize the work. You won't have to do any more lifting than you want to."
He grunted. "You've got a plan for everything, don't you?"
"Only the important things."