Chapter 7 Delaney
SEVEN
DELANEY
Old secrets in this town settle like sediment in the creek—out of sight, but still shaping how the water runs.
I spend most of the afternoon at Daddy’s desk, the big oak one in his office that smells like pencil shavings and lemon oil, flipping through file drawers that go back farther than I do.
Nash is out walking the north fence with Rafe, checking for more “accidents.” My job, apparently, is paperwork archaeology.
“Watch for anything that feels off,” Daddy said before he headed out again. “Old easements. Water rights. Loan notes. We’ve pissed off a lot of the right people over the years.”
He wasn’t wrong.
In the “COLEMAN RANCH — LEGAL” drawer there are thick envelopes from the drought year when the Keenes tried to divert our share of river water and the county court slapped them so hard they still flinch when they see a judge.
There are letters from small-time developers who sent glossy brochures and got dusty boots in response.
And then there’s a thin, crisp folder stamped with a name I’ve been trying not to think about:
STROUD HOLDINGS.
I open it.
Inside: a purchase offer for the north pasture from four years ago. Generous numbers. “Win-win language.” A hand-signed letter from Clay Stroud himself, promising jobs, infrastructure, and “a legacy your grandchildren will thank you for.”
At the bottom, in my father’s own handwriting, there’s a single word scrawled across the signature line:
NO.
I huff out a humorless breath.
Beneath that: a photocopy of a complaint filed by the Strouds about “unfair interference” in their development plan. Nothing came of it. The Colemans have land and history while the Strouds have money. Sometimes those things balance. Sometimes they don’t.
I flip further.
There’s a note from Daddy to himself, tucked in the back.
Keene + Stroud mtg @ county — water corridor? leverage?
No follow-up.
No resolution.
Just a question mark that feels louder than the words.
I close the file, put it at the top of the stack that I’m going to show Nash, and try not to let the weight of it sink too deep.
By the time dinner rolls around, my brain is a stew of what-ifs and oh-no’s. Mama serves chili like it’s armor, Josie and Gray swing by for exactly ten minutes of “just checking in,” and Nash sits at the table looking entirely too calm for a man who rearranged his bed to hear my door last night.
(I heard him. The scrape of wood. The way the house shifted around his instincts. My heart hasn’t decided what to do with that information yet.)
“Town’s buzzing,” Daddy says, lifting his spoon. “Apparently my daughter has a bodyguard boyfriend now.”
“He’s not—” I start.
Nash cuts in smoothly. “She’s stuck with me a little while, sir.”
My mother tries very hard not to smile into her cornbread.
After dinner, I start stacking bowls, ready to spend my Friday night elbow-deep in suds and old files.
“Laney,” Nash says, leaning against the counter like a problem in a worn t-shirt. “We should go out.”
My eyebrows try to climb off my face. “We what?”
“Eager Beaver.” He tips his chin toward town. “Line dancing. Cheap beer. People. You know, the whole ‘convince the locals we’re a thing’ package.”
“I hate the Eager Beaver.”
“You used to love it.”
“I loved leaving it at midnight in your truck.”
Mama chokes on a laugh.
Nash’s eyes crinkle. “Exactly,” he says. “People remember that. They’ll remember us now. Together.”
He’s not wrong.
I still hate it.
“You can stay home,” he adds, too casual. “Tell everybody you’re too chicken to two-step with me. I’ll do recon alone.”
My narrowed eyes say I see what he’s doing.
His mouth curves like, yeah, you caught me, but are you really going to let me show up at the Eager Beaver solo and let the rumor mill fill in the blanks?
I throw my dishtowel on the counter. “Fine. But if someone requests ‘Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy),’ I’m setting the jukebox on fire.”
“Deal,” he says, way too fast.
The Eager Beaver is exactly the same and completely different.
Same neon beer signs buzzing faintly. Same wooden dance floor polished by a thousand boots. Same bar where I had my first legal drink and my last illegal one. The air smells like spilled beer, perfume, and nostalgia.
Different me.
Different him.
The moment we step inside, the hum of conversation shifts. Heads turn. Music keeps pounding, but the air around us sharpens like we’re the interesting part of the show now.
Nash’s hand finds mine. He threads our fingers together like he’s been doing it every day for the last ten years. The contact is simple. My pulse is not.
“You okay?” he murmurs, low enough that it’s just for me.
“No.”
“Want to turn around?”
“Yes.”
“Gonna?”
“No.”
He squeezes.
We weave through the crowd. The small-town ecosystem rearranges itself around us: ranch hands nodding, old-timers watching like they’re grading us, girls from high school whispering behind their hands with faces that say thank God I left this town and eyes that say tell me everything.
At the bar, we run into the past in skinny jeans and a floral top.
“Delaney Coleman?” Brooke Jenkins blinks at me, then squeals. “Oh my God, you’re actually here.”
“Brooke,” I say, bracing myself. “You look great.”
She does—glowy and happy and three shots in.
She pins Nash next with a stare that could strip paint. “And you’re…”
“Nash,” he says, easy. “Hawthorne.”
Her eyes widen. “No. Way.”
Way.
“Y’all dating?” she blurts, because tact never really got a foothold in this zip code.
I open my mouth.
Nash beats me to it. “Yeah,” he says, no hesitation. “We are.”
The word lands inside my chest like a stone in deep water. The ripples keep going.
Brooke squeals again, clutching my forearm. “I knew it. We all knew it, back in high school, that you two were endgame. I owe Ariana twenty bucks.”
I groan internally. Ariana Allen has been betting on my love life since we were fifteen.
“Small towns,” I mutter as Brooke flits away to inform the rest of the bar.
“You wanted believable,” Nash says.
“I wanted subtle.”
“Wrong town for that.” He orders us drinks. I settle on a beer because anything stronger seems unwise. We claim a spot at the edge of the dance floor.
The DJ spins a fast line dance song and people flood the floor, bodies moving in synchronized chaos. The Eager Beaver is good for exactly two things—getting drunk and pretending your life is simple as long as your boots hit the right beat.
“You remember this one?” Nash asks, nodding at the dancers.
“Yes. I also remember you refusing to do it because you said choreography was ‘an affront to free will.’”
“It is.”
“And yet you make your bed like a military manual.”
“Structure in the bedroom. Anarchy on the dance floor.”
The words leave his mouth.
We both hear them at the same time.
My face heats.
His ears do, too.
“We are not acknowledging that sentence,” I say.
“Agreed,” he says immediately.
We drink. We watch people we used to know. Some of them have children now. Some of them have divorces. Some of them are exactly the same, just with more laugh lines.
It’s… a lot.
I’m halfway through my beer when the tempo shifts. The first notes of a slow song slide through the speakers, syrupy and familiar.
“Uh-uh,” I say. “Nope. Not happening.”
Nash sets his bottle down. “Laney.”
“No.”
“We kind of have to.”
“Why?”
“Because half this bar has been waiting ten years to see what we look like slow dancing.”
“Then let them wait twenty.”
His eyes soften, but there’s a stubborn glint there, too. “Come on,” he says, holding out his hand. “Duty calls.”
“This is not duty.”
“It is if it sells the story.”
The worst part is that he’s right. The second worst part is that I want to say yes.
“Don’t step on my boots,” I mutter, putting my hand in his.
He leads me onto the floor. Around us, couples sway—a mix of pressed-against-each-other and polite-hand-on-shoulder.
Nash pulls me in slow. Not too close. Close enough. One hand finds my waist, warm and firm through my shirt. The other holds my hand at chest level, fingers laced. He smells like soap and sweat and the faintest hint of smoke from the grill back at the ranch.
My body remembers this—this shape, this height, this way of fitting together. Even though we’ve never actually done this before.
We were supposed to.
Once.
At a school dance where things did not go according to plan.
My stomach flutters with the ghost of that night, but I shove it down. That story has teeth. I’m not ready to let it bite.
“You’re tense,” he murmurs, leaning in enough that his breath grazes my ear.
“I’m at the Eager Beaver slow dancing with my fake boyfriend in front of half the town. Why on earth would I be tense?”
His chest moves against mine in a low chuckle I feel more than hear. “Relax,” he says. “It’s just a song.”
“That’s the problem,” I whisper. “Songs end. Secrets don’t.”
His fingers tighten slightly at my waist. “We’ll handle the secrets.”
That “we” tugs at something tender.
We sway. The music settles into a rhythm and so do we. My body betrays me and slowly stops fighting. My cheek brushes his shoulder once when the crowd shifts and I forget to keep distance.
His thumb strokes the back of my hand, slow, absentminded. Each pass sends a little jolt up my arm. My heart is doing a tap dance in my ribcage and my brain has decided to observe instead of intervene.
“You’re doing that thing,” I say quietly.
“What thing?”
“Being gentle.”
His jaw works. “Would you prefer rough?”
I swallow.
He notices. His gaze drops to my mouth and back up again.
“This is dangerous,” I breathe.
“Dancing?”
“You.”
His lips tilt. “You always did have a flair for the dramatic.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.” He spins me in a lazy circle, not for show, just because he can. When he pulls me back in, our bodies align hip to hip. The world goes a little fuzzy at the edges.
“You ever think about it?” he asks softly. “Back then. If things had gone different.”
“Yes,” I say, too fast.