Thiswas why she shouldn’t be left alone with her thoughts.
Thiswas why she’d chosen to spend the next two months far from the world of country music…other than penning her final song.
Andthiswas why she needed to get the hell out of this house and onto the back of a horse where she could outrun the events of last night, the mistake of a deal she’d struck this morning, and the memory of a rainy Sunday morning when for a tiny fraction of a moment, she was a naïve twentyfive-year-old up-and-comer who thought she was in love.
***
Though Willow had only met Eli once, years ago, and had yet to meet Beth in person, the three had been in contact for the past couple weeks leading to her stay in Meadow Valley.
“All three horses are healthy and fit for riders,” Eli had told her. “Cirrus, the male, is a bit rambunctious. He likes to play. But once you get him going in the arena, he’s all business. Midnight is a mama’s girl. If it’s not Beth, she seems to prefer female riders, but once she trusts anyone—man or woman—she warms up pretty quickly. And then there’s Holiday, the newest member of the family. She was only meant to be a rehab after a ligament, but then again, so were the other two. Now I own three horses.”
Willow had laughed, falling a little bit in love with each horse as he described them. “And you and Beth are okay with me riding while you’re gone?”
“Of course,” Eli replied. “Your brother claims you’re a better rider than he is, and that’s reassurance enough for me.”
As she entered the barn now, she shook her head and laughed. Colt was always her biggest cheerleader. Not a day went by that she didn’t thank the universe for reuniting the two after years apart…and for finally giving her brother the happiness he deserved with Jenna and their ever-evolving foster family. Willow wrote songs about the elusiveness of love and the inevitability of heartbreak becausethat was all she knew. But her brother was proof that for at least some, love was more than a few chords on a guitar, several verses of lament, and a powerful—often angry—bridge she usually sang so hard it burned her throat.
Willow strode down the walkway lined with stalls, ready to see which horse she connected with best, when she stopped short, her breath caught in her throat.
Out of three stalls bearing three nameplates to identify each inhabitant, the door labeled MIDNIGHT hung wide open with no mare in sight.
She bolted out into the arena and found it empty save for fresh hoofprints in the dirt, which she followed to the far end where they abruptly stopped. She absently brushed her finger over a fresh-looking nick in the wood on the top of the fence.
“Shit!” she hissed, a splinter sliding beneath the skin of her index finger. Willow quickly pulled it out with her teeth and then stormed back to the barn where she found herself pacing for the second time today, this time between Cirrus and Holiday’s doors.
“Is this technicallyhisfamily’s ranch?” she asked the gelding and the mare. “Of course it is. But did he let his family know he was coming home to play house and upend my short reprieve between gigs?” She threw her arms in the air and glanced atHoliday’s dark eyes as she whinnied and nudged her tawny-brown nose in Willow’s direction. “No,” she told the mare. “No, he did not. And now he’s either off galivanting who knows where on Beth’s favorite horse or…” Theormade her stomach drop as if she’d just leaped off a cliff.
Or he chose the horse who doesn’t take kindly to male riders, and the mare decided to teach him a lesson about his poor judgment.
Willow glanced down at the tiny spot of blood on her finger where the splinter had been and swore again. She couldn’t believe what she was about to do, especially after striking a deal with Satan less than two hours before. She was going to gosaveAsh Murphy.
Holiday seemed to trust her off the bat, so as soon as Willow had her tacked and ready to go, she led the mare into the arena and walked her toward the place where Midnight’s hoofprints stopped.
Holiday marched in place and snorted, shaking her head back and forth.
“You want to go find them, girl?” Willow asked, patting Holiday’s withers and then stroking her nose. She was about to ask her horse if she thought she could make the jump when she noticed that only two sections of the fence to the left there was a latch, which meant a gate, which also meant that Midnight had not been led out of the arena. She’d taken off on her own.
The only thing that lay beyond the Murphy property in the direction they were facing was the woods.
How much trouble could one man get himself into in less than twenty-four hours? She guessed she was about to find out.
She led the trusting horse through the gate and closed it behind her, already sure that riding one of Beth and Eli’s horses off of the property was not what they’d had in mind when they entrusted their barn—and its inhabitants—to her. But Willow didn’t have a choice now, did she? She’d already made one inadvertent attempt on Ash Murphy’s life. If he ended up dead in the forest off the property whereshetemporarily lived and where a broken vase with her fingerprints all over it lay in the guesthouse trash, who would be person-of-interest number one?
So she hooked her boot in Holiday’s stirrup and hoisted herself into the saddle. She gave the mare a gentle nudge with her heels and a reluctant “Ya!” Then the two were off toward the forest where—so help her, god—Willow better not have to drag Ash’s corpse back to civilization.
***
“No!” Willow growled as she and Holiday came to a halt in a clearing. She dismounted from the horseand tied her off to a small tree, then pivoted back to where Ashton Murphy reclined against the trunk of a massive maple tree, boots crossed at the ankles, straw hat lowered over his eyes, and a black Friesian she assumed was Midnight grazing beside him, not tied to anything.
“NO!” she repeated, louder this time, but Ash barely stirred.
“You sure do like that word, don’t you?” he mumbled from where he lay. Then he tipped his hat up and dared to flash her the cocksure grin that stared out at his adoring fans from his carefully curated social media posts.Notthat she’d ever looked on purpose, but Willow couldn’t help what showed up in her feed.
She opened her mouth to respond but caught herself just as she was about to utter the exact word he expected to hear.No.
“I thought you were hurt. Or worse,” she admitted.
He straightened so he no longer looked half-asleep and crossed his arms. “And let me guess… You’re disappointed to find me alive and well.”
