I folded the notice carefully. The words had become a challenge, not just ink. They asked for a response. They demanded more than paperwork.
I felt the private pull—scent and forebearance and the weight of a promise I hadn’t given in a way the world would read—and I knew what had to happen next. When I stepped to the window to look down the lane, the porch light washed the papers in the truck’s reflection and something else—white, glossy, official—caught my eye across town.
On the bulletin board in the general store, under community notices and lost-dog flyers, a new sheet had been tacked up. A copy of the same final notice, stamped with the county seal.
Someone had posted it where the town could see.
My phone buzzed. An alert from the county website: “Foreclosure notice posted.”
My chest tightened. The legal slow burn had become public heat. The developer had moved his hand from shadow to page.
We’d bought time. Now someone had started the countdown.
9
NORA HAYES
The room erupts before I reach the door.
Voices collide like splintering wood. Someone shouts about contracts; someone else swears about children. Boots thud—too many—and under the noise a low, animal rumble presses against my teeth.
I swallow and trail behind Ethan.
He moves like he owns the air. Even under the judge's fluorescent lights, even in a room full of angry neighbors and suited lawyers, he smells like cedar smoke and rain and something older—him. The pull through my sternum is physical, a taut line I’ve learned to ignore. Today there’s work to do.
At the front, the developer’s attorney paces like a shark. Two men sit behind him in cheap leather jackets. They don’t belong in Willow Ridge. They’ve been following us in trucks with dark windows. Now they sit with palms flat on the table, thumbs drumming a slow menace that makes the sheriff shift in his seat.
Ethan plants himself by the counsel table. Miguel flanks him. Other men—farmers who’ve seen the ranch through winters worse than this—stand like a fence. The pack’s lean strength is obvious even to those who only know them as "Cole Ranch hands." They don’t growl. They don’t bare teeth. They stand.
The judge bangs his gavel and the room cuts. It doesn’t make the air any calmer.
“Ms. Hayes,” the clerk says, sliding a manila folder across the table like a challenge. “You know why we’re here.”
I do. The developer wants foreclosure. If the auction goes through, someone with more money and less heart will buy the land. If the land is sold, Jamie will be untethered—the county could use the child’s instability to justify decisions we can’t control. If we lose the ranch, we lose sanctuary. People who buy with bulldozers don’t ask how a grieving boy handles being moved from place to place.
I set my hands flat on the table and do the only thing I can. I say the truth.
“Jamie has been in my care for six months,” I say. My voice is steady; my knee is not. “He’s enrolled at Willow Ridge Elementary. His teacher, Ms. Patel, will attest to his attendance and progress. He has a therapist. He eats at Mrs. Cole’s table every morning. He sleeps in the guest room and has—” I swallow, the room’s attention pressing. “—a stable routine here.”
A murmur ripples. A seat scrapes. I watch a man in the back fold his arms like a barrier and then slowly uncross them. People remember kids who get steady care. People remember what home looks like.
The developer’s lawyer stands. “Objection. This is not evidence of legal guardianship. Ms. Hayes is not the child’s legal guardian. This hearing is about the landlord’s right to foreclose.”
“Is the foreclosure uncontested?” the judge asks. He looks tired, the way men who’ve seen fights like this do. He’s had too many people try to use children as leverage.
Ethan’s hand finds my lower back and steers me closer so I can feel him without spectacle. The press of him is warm. My fingers tighten on the folder. The bond hums when he touchesme—soft and settling—and for a sliver of a second I want to lean into him like into a windbreak. Not now, I tell myself.
I prepared pages: school records, medical forms, a typed letter from S. Calder, the social worker. After the bus-stop attack, he revised his recommendation from “open case” to “continued placement pending review.” He’d been cautious—worried about paperwork and background—but he’d also seen how Jamie calmed into routine. He’d filed a report. He’d updated his note. I slide the letter across to the clerk first.
“This is Mr. Calder’s updated note,” I say. “It recommends continued placement while a full review is scheduled. He advises the court to consider the child’s stability. He also notes evidence of third-party intimidation—burned notices, slashed personal items. That report is in the public file.”
The room tilts. The developer’s lawyer’s face tightens. The men behind him clench their fists. The judge rubs his temple.
“Your honor,” Ethan says. He always says less and means more. “We did not come here to hide anything. We’re asking for time. Time for the county to carry out the review Mr. Calder recommended without moving a child because someone is trying to make the child a political or financial weapon.”
A suit at the back laughs, letting it hang like a bad smell. “So you can stall a lawful foreclosure forever,” he sneers. “Cole Ranch has debts?—”
“—debts manufactured by intimidation,” Maeve Lang cuts in from the gallery. Her voice carries; she’s done her work. “There’s a process. An injunction is appropriate when there’s credible threat. County counsel has reviewed the timeline. A short stay won’t ruin anyone. It will allow the sheriff to investigate and the court to assess the child’s best interests.”
