The sunlight catches in her hair, turning it a warm chestnut I want to run my fingers through, even though I absolutely shouldn’t. My pulse ticks up, the heat climbing my neck as I tighten my grip on the porch rail.
Her blouse clings to her in a way that has no business being legal in this kind of heat. She's not trying to look good for me, hell, she probably didn’t think twice about what I’d think, but that only makes it worse.
I drag my gaze away and grip the paddock railing like it’s the only thing keeping me grounded. Because it is.
It’s not just that she’s pretty. She’s familiar. A wildfire memory come to life. And my body hasn’t gotten the memo that she’s trouble.
She bends over to talk to her daughter, and I look away fast, jaw tightening. No. Not going there. Not now. Maybe not ever.
She’s got big city all over her, but under that? There’s still the Avery I used to race on horseback, the one who beat every boy in the fourth-grade barrel run and then grinned like a devil when she saw my face.
That smile could still break a man. And I’m not in the mood to be broken.
But even as I think it, the past shoves its way in, uninvited and sharp around the edges.
The last time we spoke, it wasn’t quiet. Wasn’t calm. It was a back-alley kind of fight, words like fists, tempers like flint.
She’d come storming into the barn that day, her hair a mess from crying or fighting with her old man, never did find out which. Dust motes had danced in the slant of afternoon light through the high windows, the air thick with the scent of hay and horses.
The old red saddle pad had been half-fallen off its hook beside her when she stopped short in front of me.
“I’m leaving,” she’d said, breathless like the idea was both a threat and a lifeline.
I’d asked her why, my voice low and tight, already knowing the answer.
“This place isn’t mine,” she’d snapped, eyes glittering. “It never was. It was always about whathewanted, whatyouneeded. I was just the kid who couldn’t handle the ranch, remember? He didn’t ask me what I wanted, didn’t believe in me the way he believed in you. Not once…
Just handed over my future like it was part of the estate inventory, like I should be grateful for a legacy I never asked for. It’s his, it’s yours, it’s everyone else’s but mine.”
And I’d said the one thing I knew would hurt, “Then go. If you don’t belong here, don’t come back.”
The way her face had crumpled, I still see it in dreams sometimes. She turned without another word, boots crunching over hay, and vanished like the end of summer.
I didn’t chase her.
Maybe I should’ve. But I was eighteen, angry, and damn proud. Now I’m thirty-two and none of that’s changed, except the way my chest tightens every time I see her.
She left. And I stayed. I bled for this place. Earned every callus and scar. And now she’s back with keys to the kingdom and a smile like she’s not the ghost of everything I never said.
So yeah, maybe I’m bitter.
But I’ve earned the right to be.
And I’m not just going to stand by while she plays rancher for the summer and tears up everything I’ve built. She can keep her city shoes and her smartcomebacks. This place isn’t a playground. It’s blood and sweat and dirt, and she’s going to learn that the hard way.
First thing tomorrow, I’m loading her into the side-by-side and showing her just how deep in over her head she is. Cattle records, irrigation issues, busted fencing, a tractor that stalls if you even look at it wrong, I’ll bury her in it.
Let her see what it really means to run a ranch.
She wants to play cowboy? Fine. But I’ll be damned if she lasts longer than a month.
Because if she does, if she actually proves herself out here, then everything shifts. The hands might start respecting her. The town might rally behind her. Hell, I might start seeing her differently. And that scares me more than anything. Because this place has been mine in every way that matters… and I don’t know who I am if I’m not the one holding it together.
And if she does? Well… then I’ll have to come up with a new plan to make her quit.
Because if she doesn’t last the full year, if she walks away early, I get it all according to the paperwork. The ranch. The land. The legacy. Her father put it in black and white, right there in the will, like he knew thisshowdown was inevitable. Like he wanted to settle the score for good.
It should feel like a gift. But all I feel is hollow.
