The sudden silence that fills the truck is painful. It’s almost worse than having information about Rowe Carrigan shoved down my throat.
“If you’re going to be here, you aren’t going to be able to hide from what you left behind, Tilly.”
An hour.
That’s how long it took for me to regret coming back.
3
ROWE
I haven’t beena free man since the day I turned fifteen.
The moment I hopped onto one of the meanest stallions my father had ever accepted on our ranch, hell-bent on breaking the fucking thing, my life changed. Back then, we didn’t give a shit about patience when it came to an untrained horse. If it was brought to us with a habit of sending its riders flying, my father rode it until it didn’t have the strength to keep bucking, and only then would the real work start.
When I turned fifteen, he told me it was my turn. So, I listened and rode that fucking horse until I was so sore I couldn’t move for a week afterward. It wasunnaturalhow long I held on to it, though. That’s what everyone told me. I was a scrawny kid with no experience on an unbroken horse at the time, but that hadn’t mattered.
I was told to hold on and not let go, so I did just that.
My father never praised me for it, but he hadn’t scolded me either. In my naïve, desperate mind, that was more than enough. So, I did it again, and again, until I’d spent more time on theback of a horse than on my own two feet. I became the ranch’s top horse trainer and still carry that title to this day.
The ranch I grew up on became a prison after that. Maybe that’s why it didn’t faze me when I found myself in a real one. I’d only managed to trade one for another.
Staring out at the ranch as the sun begins rising behind the mountains eighteen years later, my opinion hasn’t changed. It’s so big we’ll never use the majority of the land, and if we did, I’d wish we hadn’t. I have the rest of my life to explore it, which feels more like a punishment than a reward. The whiskey in my coffee and bandage around my ribs help make that reality easier to accept.
It’s hot as hell for early June, and I know that’s got Dad all up in arms about having dry fields. I squint at the purple sunrise for a beat longer before turning and heading for my truck. Dropping my hat on the passenger seat, I start it up and take the paved road to the stables. It takes ten minutes to reach them—another stark reminder of how big this place is.
The main stable is so goddamn flashy that it should make the need for a second and third one minimal. Yet, there they are, hiding behind it with their doors closed. Huffing, I park the truck on the side of the road and hop out.
The Painted Sky logo is all over the place, marking the trucks, stables, saddles. If my parents could brand the hay in the stalls, they’d have done that too. I keep my eyes down as I fit my hat back on and join the old man smoking too close to the stable.
“It’s like you have a death wish,” I say, watching the ashes fall to the grass.
Otis glances at me, the corner of his wrinkled mouth lifting in a lazy smirk. “The wranglers are already out. Your old man tore through here looking for you a handful of minutes ago.”
“You lit that shit up the moment he left, then?”
“Damn right. What he doesn’t know, Rowe.”
I scoff. “Oh, he knows.”
“You might loosen up a bit if you take a puff.”
“I don’t smoke anymore.”
“Don’t gotta tell me that. I’m old, not blind,” he says, dropping the smoke and crushing it with the heel of his black boot. “We got a trailer coming in from over the mountains today.”
“Yeah, Dad mentioned it.”
“You gonna be here when we unload?”
“If I need to be.”
“I’d suggest hanging around.”
I tongue my cheek, nodding as I stare at the open stable door. “Diesel’s saddled?
“Watched Brock do it myself this time.”
