Well, fine. If I can’t play football, I don’t want to play at anything—especially not pretending I give a damn about ranching. Let someone else play cowboy. I’m done.
FIVE
IZZY
IZZY:Are you sure Dylan’s a nice guy? All I’m seeing is a jerk who buys horse stock then disappears for a week!
FLIC:I didn’t say he wasn’t grumpy, but yeah, he’s one of the good guys. You could do a hell of a lot worse!!
IZZY:I’m working for the guy and that’s it. Grumpy assholes are not my type.
FLIC:I didn’t realize dried-up spinsters had a type!
IZZY:I’m not taking dating advice from a woman who knows every word to every Disney song in existence.
A week passes, and it does nothing to soften the annoyance simmering in my blood. If anything, it’s sharper.It’s a feeling that started the moment I heard that a drunk pro athlete—a jerk who crashes into women’s cars and drives off without an apology—bought my granddaddy’s horses. And I’m thrown in as part of the deal, like an afterthought.
I could throttle Bill if I didn’t love the stubborn old man so much. Deep down, I know he meant well. He was thinking of the horses. Thinking of me, too. Last week, I was out of work and heartbroken at the thought of leaving the horses I’ve given the last eight years of my life to.I was dreading taking the only option left—going back to the residential suburbia of my parents’ house in East Denver and living under their microscope again. At least now Bill has bought me a little more time to keep doing what I love. Six weeks to figure out a next step that doesn’t involve surrender.
Maybe I wouldn’t be this pissed if Dylan Sullivan had actually shown up to handle the mess he made. But no. In the week I’ve been here, all I’ve caught are brief glimpses of his hulking frame ducking out the back door and heading for his truck with the speed of a man who thinks he’s being chased. He’s been a total no-show.Just my type, I think bitterly, hauling myself out of my bed in the trailer I’ve called home for six years. Tugging on my jeans and a tank top, and braiding my hair back with quick, practiced fingers, I pull on my boots and blow out a sigh.
I can’t believe I kissed him. Or that he kissed me. Dylan is exactly the kind of man I promised myself I’d steer clear of: hot as sin but unreliable, emotionally unavailable, and absolutely wrong for me. The kind of man who never sticks around long enough to clean up his messes—just like Hooper, my first love. My first mistake.
From the moment Hooper and his parents moved down the street from us when I was sixteen, my heart was gone. He was stick-thin, long-haired, all charm and music and danger. I was lost and feeling like I didn’t belong. My parents banned me from seeing him more times than I could count. I snuck out just as many. Hooper was my everything. The boy I ran away with. The man I married in a secondhand white dress at a roadside churchon the outskirts of Nashville at eighteen, thinking I had it all, when really, I had nothing.
I shove the memory down where it belongs and stepout of my trailer to find the air is crisp and fresh, carrying the scent of grass, earth, and just a hint of horse sweat, reminding me of why I’m out of bed so early.
Maybe I also wouldn’t be so pissed at the situation I’ve found myself in if the ranch was in better shape. But this place hasn’t been used as a working ranch in two decades, and it shows.It took me the better part of a day just to move the old football equipment cluttering the barn, piling it all into the back stall because where else was I going to put it? The wood dividing the stalls in the barn is all rotten, the feed room is a disaster, and the water lines are temperamental at best.
Everywhere I turn, there’s more work to be done. Overgrown paddocks, and fence posts rotten straight through, looking just one gust of wind away from coming down. I haven’t had time to breathe, let alone admire the view of the tall spruce trees and the backdrop of the foothills cutting into the horizon. It’s the kind of view that begs for saddle leather and trail rides. But ranching waits for no man or woman. Especially a woman doing it all on her own…
My boots crunch across the gravel as I make my way to the barn. The early-morning birdcalls are the only sound in the still air, aside from the soft whickers of the horses waiting for breakfast.
A coolness lingers, but it won’t last. Another hot July day is coming, the kind that will have me sweating before I’m done with the morning feed. I check the horses first, running my hands over their soft coats and talking softly to each in turn. I’ll spend some extra time with Moonlight—our last pregnant mare of the season. Her due date is five weeks away.
Five weeks. The same length of time I have left here. Whatever happens, no way am I leaving Moonlight until I know she and her foal are in capable hands. The mare snorts softly as I approach, her dark eyes bright.
“Hey there, Moonlight,” I coo, brushing my hand along her flank. The first foal for any mare is always the hardest, but the vet has been checking in regularly and everything is running smoothly. “You’re gonna do great. Just hang in there.”
Moonlight nudges my arm, her head bobbing in the way that tells me she’s impatient.
“You wouldn’t happen to be hungry, would you?” I laugh as she scrapes a hoof against the ground.
“Never get between a pregnant mare and her breakfast, hey?” I rub her nose a final time before jogging to the feed bins and hauling a bucket back to the paddock for her. The tension in my chest loosens with every familiar task. Horses don’t judge. They don’t care about your baggage or mistakes. They just need you to show up and do the work. If only people were as simple.
I’m halfway to the barn to grab the feed for the stallions when the back door to the house swings open and Mama appears in her overalls, holding two mugs of coffee in her hands. She came to introduce herself on my first morning, with Jake’s dog, Buck, at her heels.
I’m Joanna Sullivan. Everyone calls me Mama. You strike me as someone who knows how to get things done. And if you’re the same granddaughter Bill used to talk about, who spent the summers on his ranch as a kid, then you’re more than capable of looking after yourself. But if there’s anything you need, you come find me. I’m usually in the kitchen, and the door’s always open.
Since then, Mama has brought me a coffee every morning. And no matter how furious I am with Dylan, Mama is a woman I really like. I have no idea how he came from her…
“Gonna be another hot one,” she calls.
“Sure is.” I smile, taking the mug. “Thank you.”
I close my eyes, drawing in a long breath of roasted beans before taking my first slow sip. Some days back in Shamrock, it could be past lunchtime before I got a chance to fix a coffee, and it usually wasn’t freshly ground or this delicious. “Have I mentioned how much I love this coffee?”
Mama smiles. “Every morning, but I never get tired of hearing it. No one else in the house appreciates it. They chug it like it’s gas station sludge.”
