She didn’t argue. She always felt safer with him near, anyway.
She hadn’t seen Justin in two days, and their text exchanges weren’t cutting it. She constantly felt like she was missing something, but could never figure out what. Such an odd feeling to have. It was confusing, and melancholy, and just weird. Except, this time, when she had it, she actuallywasmissing something. She remembered the hair ties she’d grabbed on her way out of Jensen’s Mercantile earlier that day. She’d opened the package and used one to pull her hair up on her drive home, but left them in the cup holder of the center console. She’d picked them up for the girls. They were always taking out their ponytails and leaving the ties in random places to get lost.
It was getting dark, so she slipped on her boots, sitting by the kitchen door, and trotted down the porch steps. As she approached her car, she noticed a single pink rose on the hood. It looked fresh, like it’d just been cut…but there was no one around. Maybe Justin was passing by and left it?
No, Justin wouldn’t do that.
She picked it up and touched the petals. Why did the hair on the back of her neck suddenly lift? Because it felt likehim.It felt like somethinghewould do. She made a mental note of where the girls were and accepted that they were safe up stairs in their room. Blythe opened the door to her Cutlass and snatched the hair ties with a quick grab, then slammed the door quickly before racing up the steps and locking the kitchen door behind her. Chris was already home, and they usually locked the doors by that hour, anyway.
She broke the flower in half and shoved it down in the trash can. Gathering every other piece of throwaway in the kitchen she could find, she smashed it on top so the rose was buried and she could forget that she’d ever seen it in the first place. Logically, it didn’t make sense that he would be in Montana, much less at Silo Springs. He didn’t know where she was, and Jenny wouldnever tell. There was no one else on earth who knew she’d even gone the thousand miles home.
Surely, it was just her intrusive thoughts and a coincidence. Maybe it wasn’t even real. Maybe she hadn’t seen anything at all.
Chris sauntered into the kitchen, and she barely noticed him get a snack out of the cupboard and start to tear the plastic. He popped open the microwave and turned to speak to her.
“Everything okay, Lythie girl? We’re going to do a movie and popcorn, if you’re not planning to do something else?”
Blythe took her boots off and sat them back where they’d been before she went to get the hair ties.
“Sounds great, what are we watching?”
His hammer hit the flat piece of steel with enough force that sparks flew from all sides. Molding the shoes for each individual horse and hoof took strength and time. Justin made each set of shoes by hand for each client. When he wasn’t trimming hooves and fitting shoes, he was making them in the shop he built next to his own barn. He took time out each week to run or lift weights, but what really released the endorphins was forging shoes—one by one, swinging his hammer. It felt better, sort of like a punching bag, but more Viking era, back when all men had were their axes.
He still hadn’t mentioned his conversation with Blythe to her uncle, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t eating him alive from the inside out.
He needed more time with her. They hadn’t had a serious conversation in days. The girls would be going back to school soon, and he was hopeful she would have more time to give once they did. Addie had mentioned that Blythe said she wasn’t going back to Chicago. Damn right, she wasn’t. If she felt bad stayingwith Chris and the girls, he would haul her tight little ass back to his place—permanently.
He only had a few more pieces to bend and mold around his anvil before he was finished. He was fitting shoes for the horses at Silo Springs again. It was a never-ending cycle and process. There were so many of them. He’d brought the shoes in standard shape that morning when he arrived at the ranch. Once he was able to compare shoe to hoof, he could alter them accordingly. He had everything he needed, including a portable forge in the back of his truck.
Blythe wanted to believe things weren’t as serious as they were, but only a man truly knew another man, and this fucking asshole was bad news. Justin lived through hell at the hand of an abusive father. He could see red flags walking a mile away.
“How’s it going?” Chris wasn’t old enough to actually be his father, but he was the closest thing he had to one, and the man he admired and looked up to the most. The bro hug was their usual greeting, and their bond was the best.
“I’ve got shoes for Doris, Delilah, and Fred. Is Blythe hanging around by chance?”
“You mean the woman you’re about to haul off and marry? Yeah, she’s out back with the girls.” Chris had a shit-eating grin plastered on his smug mug. He was a star student in wise-assery. If he didn’t tease you, he didn’t love you.
Justin knuckle-punched his shoulder, and Chris chuckled as he moved on to do whatever he needed to elsewhere. Justin started removing old shoes and prepping for new ones. There was a whole process to it—trimming, filing, polishing. You could do it fast and shitty, or you could do it quick and smart. Either way, you had to do it with some level of speed. Taking all day with these animals wasn’t an option.
He was a couple hours in and about to move onto Fred. He took Delilah’s foot off the stand and patted her neck gently, rubbing her nose with his opposite hand.
“I love how you treat them like people.” Blythe was walking into the barn, looking like a ray of sunshine with waves of red falling over her shoulders. The woman literally floated when she walked. How she didn’t recognize the undeniable beauty she was blew his mind.
“Hey, sugar…” His voice was low with a hint of playfulness lining his words. When she reached him, her arms came around his middle, wrapping him in a hug that felt like a cozy blanket.
“I’ve missed you,” she sighed as she relaxed into him.
“Blythe…” He had to do it, even if she didn’t like it. “We need to tell your uncle.”
She pulled away, and he saw her mulling it over. He didn’t need to clarify. She knew what he was referring to.
“I know the creep sent texts, but is there anything else I need to know about?”
She pulled her lip between her teeth before confessing. “When I walked out to get in my car yesterday, there was a rose lying on the hood. A random rose, no note. I looked around, but it was just me. There aren’t any roses planted around the ranch, and even when my mind suggested it might be from you, I knew you wouldn’t do it that way.” She put her hands in her pockets and looked over her shoulder. “When I was hiding in my apartment after Max blew up at me, he sent me roses—lots of them.”
Justin felt rage and fear engulf him all at once.
“Does he know about this place?” His hands came up to her face, holding each side. “What about your parents? Do they know where you’re at?”
