‘If I sell it, Sawyer will demand his share—and that boy deserves nothing.And nothing is exactly what he got when I pulled the pin and shut down Dixby Downs.’
‘Do you have another overseer out there?A caretaker?A boundary rider or a bore runner—fixing fences and checking watering holes?’
Tilly shook her head.‘No.When I shut that station down, I made sure there was nothing left for Sawyer to come back to.No stock.No workers.And no reason to set foot on that land again.As far as I’m concerned, no one should be out there.’
Thirteen
The kitchen was quiet that same evening, with only the tick of the clock and the low hum of the ceiling fan for company.Fresh from the shower, Amara set the kettle to boil, reaching for the cocoa tucked on her shelf.If life at boarding school and police barracks had taught her anything, it was how to make the perfect hot chocolate in less-than-ideal conditions.
No fancy milk frothers.No stovetop heating.Just boiled water from the kettle.
The secret was getting the cocoa powder to dissolve properly—to get no powdery clumps, or a half-mixed sludge at the bottom—by stirring the mixture with water for that right consistency, and the milk for that perfect drinking temperature.The final touch, adding a square of real chocolate dropped in to melt slowly.A trick she’d learned after one too many bland, powdered disappointments.
It wasn’t fancy.But it was her way.
As she stirred the hot chocolate, its warm, rich aroma curled up around her, and her thoughts drifted back to Tilly’s words—the weight of old stories, lost legacies, and that cold case file of the missing overseer.
Normally, she’d let thoughts like that settle, let them twist into neat case notes in her mind, having gone over that case file while Porter was out on a call.But tonight, she didn’t want to be a cop.She didn’t want to over-analyse every detail—not after Porter’s lecture about her needing to lighten up.
She snorted, taking a sip from her mug.Lighten up?
No way was she letting Porter have the satisfaction of being right, even if he was infuriatingly good at getting under her skin, making her question things she’d always taken seriously.
Because he wasn’t wrong.The prick.
She could be… rigid.
A rule follower to the core.
Because rules stopped the chaos, and they helped protect her from the hurt.
Rules had their place.
Putting the milk back into the fridge, she closed the door and stared at the blank space.It had almost been a week since she’d found her Not-to-Love List staring back at her—complete with Porter’s cheeky edits.
Maybe it was time she turned the tables…
She grabbed a notepad from the bench and clicked open her pen and started scribbling:
THE NEW HOUSE RULES:
Rule #1: No stealing coffee or cocoa rations.(Porter, this means you.)
Seriously, the man had three different coffee varieties taking up bench space, next to the kettle.One of them was decaf—which was a crime in itself.Alongside them sat a line-up of protein shake powders, like he was preparing for a triathlon, not a long shift at the station.
His food was just as methodically arranged, the fridge a system of precision, with neatly stacked jars of overnight oats speckled with chia seeds.More jars with salads and sliced fruit, along with containers of pre-portioned meals—meat, rice, and vegetables—lined up like soldiers.The freezer held foil-wrapped meals, all labelled and ready to go, as if he only cooked once a week, prepping every meal into a perfect grab-and-go routine.
It was ingenious, really.An efficient system that obviously worked for his varying shifts.And Porter had already warned her about messing with his meal system.
At first, she thought he was joking.Now, having inspected the results, she understood.
Not that she was judging.
No, because judging him would mean admitting that Porter—laid-back, messy-uniform-wearing Porter—was actually just as much of a control freak in his own way, and that he was right—she judged.A lot.
But she wasn’t ready to admit that.
However, she was ready to try teasing him…
