The real challenge is getting there. Calder took the truck, and I don’t have keys to any of the other vehicles on the property. I could walk, but it’s miles to town, and my hip isn’t ready for that kind of strain.
Which leaves one option.
I find Levi at the barn. Restocking shelves in the small building that serves as the ranch’s unofficial gathering place. He looks up when I walk in, surprise flicking across his face. I could look around, study the stalls, but I keep my eyes on his face.
“Well, look who’s up and moving around.” He sets down a bottle of something, horse shampoo maybe, and leans against a high-top table set nearby, that easy grin spreading across his features. “Calder know you’re out of bed?”
“Calder’s not here.”
“I noticed.” His eyebrows rise. “Hence my question.”
“I need a ride to town.”
Levi’s grin falters slightly. “Town? As in, Black Hollow Creek. Where people are. Where people will see you.”
“Yes.”
“Does my brother know about this little field trip?”
“No. And I’d prefer if he didn’t find out until it’s too late to stop me.”
Levi lets out a low whistle, shaking his head. “You’ve got guts, Saint. I’ll give you that. Calder’s going to lose his mind when he finds out. And he will find out. This is Black Hollow Creek. Someone’s going to see you and mention it, and then my brother’s going to come looking for whoever helped you escape his protective custody.”
“I’m not escaping anything. I just want to go to the church sale. For a few hours. You know, do normal people things.” My voice cracks slightly on the last words, betraying more than I intended.
Levi’s expression softens, and he studies me for a long moment, a decision forming behind his eyes. With a sigh, he reaches for his keys.
“You’re going to get me killed, you know that?”
Relief floods through me. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Thank me if we both survive Calder’s reaction.” He grabs his jacket and gestures toward the door. “Come on. Before I change my mind.”
The drive into town feels surreal. The last time I made this trip, I was newly married and terrified, trying to sell a lie to save my life. Now the landscape slides past the windows of Levi’s Jeep, familiar and foreign all at once.
“So,” Levi says, breaking the silence. “The church sale, huh? That’s what you’re risking my brother’s wrath for?”
“It’s a thing I used to do. Before.” I watch a hawk wheel overhead, dark against the pale sky. “I want to feel like myself again.”
“Heavy stuff for a Friday morning.”
“My life has been pretty heavy lately.”
He laughs, short and genuine. “Fair point.” He drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “Look, I get it. Being cooped up on the ranch isn’t exactly a party. My brother means well, but he’s got all the emotional intelligence of a fence post sometimes.”
“That’s not entirely fair.”
“Are you defending him?” Levi shoots me a look of genuine surprise. “After everything?”
I don’t have an answer for that. The truth is too complicated, too tangled up in moments of unexpected tenderness. So I just shrug and watch the town come into view.
Black Hollow Creek looks exactly the same. The false-front buildings, the cracked asphalt of Main Street, the creek glinting through cottonwoods in the distance. But as we pull up to the church, I feel the weight of invisible eyes. People on the sidewalk pause to stare. Curtains twitch in windows. The whole town knows who I am now. What I am. A Bishop.
“You sure about this?” Levi asks as he parks.
No. Not at all. But I nod anyway and push open the door.
The fellowship hall is exactly as I remember. Folding tables covered with mismatched tablecloths, boxes of donations waiting to be sorted, the smell of old books, and Mrs. Patterson’s famous cinnamon rolls. A cluster of women looks up as I enter, and the conversation dies so abruptly it might as well have been shot.
