“Are you going to be okay?” I ask Riley as I pull on my boots.
“I’ll take her to the hospital,” Wink assures me.
Riley nods. “Go after my sister,” she mutters to me. “We’ll meet you there.”
I take off, but I don’t catch Macey until she’s already crossed the street and has turned toward The Cowherd.
“Macey. Stop.” I use the only tone I know will slow her down, the one I reserve for moments like this.
Macey calls it my commanding voice, and even though I know she doesn’t want to, she stops running. She turns toward me, and the look on her face slays me.
The grief and guilt that she was out having fun while her father was, as usual, not behaving like a grown man should—she lets me see it all.
I approach her slowly like one would go up to a frightened animal.
Gripping her face in my hands, I say firmly, “Don’t shut me out. I know you just want to block out the world, but this is me. Let me in.”
Her breathing settles, and she stares up at me. Her eyes are filled with pain.
I pull her into my chest. “I’m not going anywhere. You know that.”
Her hands hold my t-shirt in a death grip. “I have to see him, and I need to check on my mother.”
“We’ll take my truck.”
She inches back so she can look at me. “Logan. You really don’t have to come…”
“I know that. I want to.”
We look at each other for a long moment. I see the instant that she cracks. Her whiskey eyes soften, and her mouth that’s set in a stubborn line, the kind of expression she only makes when she’s trying not to lose her shit—that disappears.
Her voice is shaky when she says, “Okay.”
17
Macey’s quiet for the first half of the drive down to San Antonio as she texts back and forth with her sister.
“I feel terrible that Mama couldn’t reach me,” she says. “My phone died, and I didn’t even know it.”
“It’s okay,” I say. “Mine died, too.”
She tugs at the cord currently charging her phone in my truck.
“I’m just not usually so irresponsible.”
“You’re never irresponsible,” I tell her. “If everyone was as responsible as you are, we’d all have a lot less to worry about.”
The hospital lobby is nearly empty when we arrive. We check in and make our way up to ICU.
Freedom, Ben, and Mrs. Henwood are sitting in the waiting area.
The three of them look up as we walk into the room. They all immediately stand and rush Macey.
“Mace, I’m so scared!”
“Daddy’s such an idiot—I know he didn’t realize where he was, but still— a bull?”
“Macey, the mayor’s going to shut down the saloon for sure now! However will we pay these medical bills?”
