“Yeah,” he inhales roughly, his nostrils flaring. “I see it every once in a while when I come over that hill too, but it’s been better since we got rid of the pen.”
I’m not sure it’ll ever go away for me, but instead of admitting it, I give him a soft smile. “It is better since you did that. I’m sure it wasn’t easy to look at it every day.” Because he had. It’d still been up when I’d gone to college, and at least I’d been able to escape. Truett has never been able to do that. Within the blink of an eye, he became the owner of this ranch and my guardian. He’d gone from being a teenager, about to be twenty years old, to the person in charge of all of this.
We hit a rut in the gravel, and I reach up to brace myself against the roof. “What’s that over there?” I point to a new building behind the big house.
He grins widely. “That’s Jesse’s pride and joy. I’ll have to let him explain it to you.”
Jesse Nelson. God, I’d embarrassed myself with him the last time we saw one another. The thought of his name still brings heat to my face. “He’s still working here?” I ask, my voice an octave higher.
A chuckle works its way out of his chest. “Yeah, you didn’t think he was gonna go away just because you threw yourself at him, and he declined, did you?”
Teenage me had thought exactly that because she hadn’t been able to imagine a reality in which I’d have to face him again. “Of course not. I’m just glad he’s stayed loyal to you.” I cover up my true thoughts.
“I mean, where else is he gonna go? He and I were pushed into the same situation, and he has a family of five to feed.” Truett’s expression softens slightly. “Jesse’s been good to us, Aubs. Real good. When everything went to shit, he could’ve left for greener pastures, but he stayed. Helped me figure out how to run this place when I barely knew my ass from my elbow.”
The guilt hits me like a punch to the gut. While I was off in Chicago, playing dress-up in my corporate world, Jesse was here helping my brother keep our family legacy alive. His parents and ours died together, best friends to the bitter end. “I’m glad he stayed,” I say quietly, meaning it.
“He’s got his own place now, just past the ridge. Built it himself last year. But he’s here most days, dawn to dusk.” Truett glances at me sideways. “You two gonna be okay working together?”
Heat creeps up my neck. “Of course. We’re adults now.”
“Right.” The skepticism in his voice is thick as molasses.
The truck bounces over another rut, and suddenly we’re rounding the final bend. The big house comes into view, and my breath catches in my throat. It looks the same, but better—the wraparound porch has been painted a bright white, the red metal roof gleams, the sprawling oak tree out front, where I used to read for hours.
But it’s not the same. Not really. Because the last time I saw this house, I was eighteen and broken, clutching an acceptance letter to Northwestern like it was my lifeline. I’d stood onthat porch and sworn I’d never come back. Sworn I’d make something of myself in the big city and prove that I was more than just some ranch girl from South Dakota.
Look how that turned out.
Truett pulls up to the front of the house and kills the engine. For a moment, we just sit there in the sudden silence, dust settling around us like a shroud.
“You remember the night we got the call?” I ask quietly, my eyes fixed on the front door.
His hands tighten on the steering wheel. “Every damn day.”
I was fifteen. Truett was nineteen, home from his first semester at State, full of plans and dreams about expanding the ranch, maybe even starting his own breeding program. We’d been watching some stupid movie in the living room when the phone rang. I can still hear the sound of Truett’s voice changing, going from lazy and relaxed to sharp and focused in the span of a heartbeat.
“There’s been an accident,” he’d said after hanging up. “We need to get to the hospital.”
But by the time we got there, it was too late. A drunk driver had hit their truck head-on coming home from their date night in Rapid City. Mom died on impact. Dad held on for two hours, but his injuries were too severe.
I’d spent that night in the hospital, numb and disbelieving, while Truett handled everything. The paperwork, the phone calls, the decisions that suddenly became his to make. When we finally came home the next morning, the house felt different. Empty. Like all the warmth had been sucked out of it.
“I used to hate this place,” I admit, my voice barely above a whisper.
“I know.” Truett’s voice is rough. “Hell, I hated it too for a while. But it’s home, Aubree. It’s all we got left of them.”
Before I can respond, the front door opens and someone steps onto the porch. My heart nearly stops.
Jesse Nelson.
He’s not the lanky eighteen-year-old I remember. Seven years have filled him out in all the right places—broader shoulders, thicker arms, the kind of presence that commands attention without trying. His dark hair is longer now, curling slightly at the edges where it meets his collar, and there’s a beard covering his jaw that definitely wasn’t there when I left.
But his eyes are the same. That deep brown that always made me feel like he could see right through me.
“About time you got back,” he calls out, his voice carrying that familiar hint of amusement. “I was starting to think you’d gotten lost.”
Truett snorts. “Jesse, you remember my sister, Aubree.”
