CHAPTER 8
KENDRICK
“Hey! Kendrick!”
I sit straight up in my bed, sleep clinging to the edges of my mind and my vision. Did I really just hear that?
“Kendrick!”
This time I recognize Cliff’s voice. He sounds far away which has me scrambling out of bed and grabbing the jeans I kicked off earlier. The moment I burst through my door, I almost trip over my own feet as I scramble toward the top of the stairs.
Cliff comes into view standing at the bottom. Well, he’s not really standing. He’s darting toward the stairs and then back toward the door. When he looks up at me, relief covers his features for a split second before it hardens.
“Someone is cutting the fence,” he shouts before running out the door and toward the barn.
I practically vault down the stairs, barely getting my feet in my boots and my jacket off the hook before I’m slamming through the door. I’m right next to Cliff as we run away from the house.
It takes a few minutes before I see someone crouching near the ground on the opposite side of the fence. The moonlight glints off whatever he has in his hand. I sprint close enough and am able to see they’re wire cutters.
The guy looks up and freezes. Then he’s on the move. As he stands up, he drops the wire cutters and takes off. As I get closer, I consider using the post to climb over the fence, but the barbed wire has me thinking twice.
About the last thing on my to-do list is to get caught on barbed wire. Considering how shit my luck is when it comes to the fences around Watts Ranch, I’d probably snag my left nut. Talk about worst case scenario.
No thanks. I’ll pass on doing that to myself. I growl low in my chest when I hit the post at a full run, knowing he’s gotten away. For now.
“Damn it,” I grunt.
Cliff is panting next to me, and I glance at him hoping he’s not going to fucking collapse on me. If he drops, I’ll be fucked.
He glances my way and shakes his head. “I’m good. Just not as young as I used to be,” his words are labored, but he straightens up and gets himself under control.
We look at the damage to the fence and let out groans of annoyance.
Without a word, we turn and head back to the barn and gather everything we need to repair the damage.
As the sun starts to flirt with the night sky and the moon begins to fade, with a few flashlights we’ll be able to get it done now.
“There’s no point in wasting time,” Cliff justifies our decision not to go back to bed. As if I’m not standing right next to him and pitching in.
I know I won’t get back to sleep. Not when I’m hours away from going to pick Dad up to bring him back home. I’ve been thinking about it since the doctor agreed to Dad’s demands about leaving the hospital.
There’s no arguing with the man and I’m surprised the doctor didn’t give in days ago.
I would have about the third time I heard him ranting.
He would go on a whole tear and grumble, “I can’t keep sitting on my ass.
” He shook his head, the threat of brimstone hanging over everyone around him.
“They’ve trapped me in some fancy hospital while charging me for the privilege. I need to get back home.”
Dad got his way. Of course he did. The man has a knack for it and is too damn willful to accept anything else.
“How’d you know someone was fucking with the fence?”
I only ask the question when I can’t take not knowing anymore. Whoever it was, they weren’t familiar to me. But, then again, it’s not like I’m exactly in the loop when it comes to Seneca Falls.
“Dog,” Cliff grunts. “Woke me up out of a dead sleep and I realized something wasn’t right.”
I nod absently as we get back to work. The sunrise is starting to paint the sky while my back is coated in sweat, and I wish I had thought to grab a shirt or a pair of fucking socks.
“Didn’t recognize whoever it was,” Cliff tells me a while later, confirming my own thoughts even though I’m not working with as much information as the man by my side.
I look out toward the Conners ranch and give voice to the one thing I’ve been wondering since I got back to Seneca Falls.
“Could it be the Conners family? If they wanted to expand, this would be a good time. Maybe they’re trying to devalue the ranch through sabotage?
Then they would be able to come in and buy it for cheaper than its worth. ”
“Naw,” Cliff immediately pushes the thought away, “they wouldn’t do that.
” He glances over to their side of the fence.
The same side of the fence where the guy was standing.
The same direction he went running. “They’ve never mentioned wanting to buy Watts land.
” Cliff doesn’t sound as convinced all of a sudden.
“Ford Conners is like you, though,” he muses.
I grunt, “Like me? What the fuck does that mean?”
The corner of Cliff’s mouth twitches slightly. “I just mean he’s young and ambitious. He was raised on this land and has been bleeding for it from the time he took his first steps.” Cliff’s eyes, older than I remember them being, but no less wise, find mine. “Like you.”
His words hold a weight I’m not sure I can carry quite yet.
Not while Dad is still in the hospital. Not when the roots I thought had grown so deep might not be anchored into place the way they were supposed to be.
Dad could come home and then throw his weight and his anger around. He might insist I leave his land.
I might be a Watts, but I have no real claim to this place.
Not like Dad does.
If he wants me gone, really wants me gone, it will take a man equally stubborn to stand up to him. It’s a damn good thing I’m that man. Learned from the best.
I’m just not sure what the plan would be to get back in my dad’s good graces if he decides he liked seeing me going rather than coming. He’s never been one to forgive or forget.
“At least the dogs let us know what was going on and none of the cows were able to find the opening in the fence.” I huff out a breath and stretch my back as I stand and look back over to the Conners’ family land.
“If it was our neighbors, they could have had most of our herd on their land before we realized there was a breach in the fenceline. It would be smart.”
“Ford might be a lot of things, but he’s not a rustler.” Cliff sounds sure, but I’m not.
Who else would benefit from Watts Ranch failing? It has to be someone who wants to buy the land, and I’ve already asked Cliff and Dad about developers sniffing around. Both have denied it.
That doesn’t leave a lot of options, not in a town like Seneca Falls. If it’s not a developer looking to push out ranchers and bring in more tourism, then it has to be a rancher looking to expand their holdings.
Nothing else makes sense.
“If you say so,” I grumble the words and try to let go of the nagging feeling plaguing me.
As we finish the fence repair, the sunrise has faded into blue. I glance at my wrist before I remember I’m barely wearing any fucking clothing let alone am wearing my watch.
“Guess I might as well get cleaned up and head to the hospital. Knowing Dad, he’s ready to be discharged.”
Cliff barks out a laugh as he pulls the gloves from his hands.
He hits them against his jean covered leg before sticking them in his back pocket.
It’s a movement borne of years of working with his hands.
It’s things like that which fascinated me as a boy.
How Cliff and Dad could just work, their movements precise and effective.
I felt like I was all thumbs as they started showing me the ropes. It became easier, and having bigger hands helped with a shit ton of things. Then it became as natural as breathing. The same way it is for them.
When I take a deep breath, my lungs expand and take in the chilled early morning air. I turn my back on our neighbor’s land and focus on where my family has made a go of it for generations. When I’m here, I swear I can feel their hearts beating along with mine.
It’s ridiculous, I know, but that doesn’t make it any less true.
“I’ve missed this,” I admit more to myself than Cliff, but he steps up next to me all the same, his gaze fixed on the land stretching out before us. “It wasn’t the same in Reno.”
“I’m sure some things were better,” Cliff teases me, and I crack a smile. While he’s right, I’m not going to say it. Not when I have Eliza on my mind. He must be able to read the expression on my face because he turns serious as he hums. “You’re gone for that girl.”
When I turn toward him, I hold his gaze with my own, steady, and sure. “Eliza is mine and I’m not letting her go. Everyone in town can wag their tongues about it, I’m not walking away this time.”
Cliff lets out a low whistle before a look of pride blooms on his face. He reaches over and smacks my shoulder hard enough to send me stumbling if I wasn’t bracing for it.
“You better be good to her,” there’s a warning in his voice. “She’s a good girl. Too good for the likes of you.”
Even though he’s saying what I’m afraid everyone is going to think, something I know is already true, it doesn’t feel like condemnation coming from Cliff. I can’t think of a single person who would be good enough for a woman like Eliza.
I’m just smart enough not to let her get away.
“I’ll always make sure she knows what she means to me and what I feel for her.”
My words are a vow. In the space and time between night and day, ending and beginning, they bind themselves to my soul. It’s not a promise I’m making to Cliff, even though he’s here to witness it. My words are for Eliza, and I’ll ensure they stay true until my last breath.
“Good,” Cliff muses, “good.”
He lets out a long, heavy sigh, one which reminds me how Dad is not the only person who should be looking at the land from a rocker on the porch. Cliff should be right next to him, keeping time like a metronome for ranch life.
I can’t say it though because they’d give me a death glare and then work twice as hard just to prove me wrong. Ornery fucking assholes. The pair of them.
“Might as well get the day started,” Cliff says before tipping his head in my direction and heading back toward the barn. “No time like when the sun is up.”
His words float behind him. They’re the same words I’ve heard countless times while working this land.
I stand and dust my jeans off before looking one more time over the land the Conners family owns.
They’ve been working their slice of paradise just as long as my family has been working ours. The families were close in the past.
It was a friendship born of necessity and proximity, but it worked all the same.
I don’t know why but Fred Conners and my dad never really got along.
They were cordial, as most people are in Seneca Falls, but they sure as hell weren’t close.
There was a time or two growing up when I could have sworn that I saw outright hatred in their eyes when they looked at each other.
But nothing was ever said about it, and I was too far up my own ass to find out the details.
Ford is a few years older than me which made it easy for us to avoid each other. We didn’t run in the same circles, and he was already working his land when I was in high school. Just before graduation I remember Fred passed away and Ford was taking over completely.
I was at the funeral, my hat in my hands, but so was the entire town of Seneca Falls. The people here always like to come out for highs and lows of life. It can feel suffocating, at least it always did back then.
Once word gets out that Eliza is with me, I’m sure everyone will let their opinions be known. Just like Mrs. Riley the other day at the market.
They can say what they want about me; I can take it. But if they upset Eliza there will be hell to pay.
I turn my back on the fence line we’ve shared with the Conners family since we started working the land and hustle toward the house. Dad will be chomping at the bit to get home.
Maybe I’ll swing by the Sheriff’s office on the way to the hospital.
They should know about someone fucking with our fences.
Not that I think they’ll do anything. The Sheriff’s badge has always been more for show than law and order.
At least it was before I left and I can’t imagine it’s changed much in the last three years.
By the time I’m showered and dressed, the last thing I want to do is go to the hospital to pick up Dad. I wish I was going to see Eliza instead. But it’s too early to bother her and showing up at her door will only get people talking about us faster.
She doesn’t deserve the gossip which is about to follow her around. I’ll shield her from as much of it as I can, but whispers are loud when it’s an entire town doing it.