I’ve racked my brain trying to figure out why he did it, why he’d bind us together like this, two people who couldn’t agree on what day it was, much less how to run a ranch. Part of me wonders if he thought forcing us to work side by side would finally make us see each other, or maybe even heal old wounds.
Or maybe he just didn’t trust either of us enough to carry this place on our own.
Maybe this was his way of giving us both one last shot, to prove ourselves. To him. To each other. To the damn dirt under our boots.
Truth is, Avery’s dad was more of a father to me than my own ever managed to be. Mine was a mean drunk with a meaner belt.
I still remember the first time her dad tossed me the keys to the feed truck like I actually belonged here. I was fourteen, nervous as hell, and he just grinned and said, “You break it, you fix it.” No yelling, no threats, just trust. That one moment stuck. Because when a man like him looked at you like you were worth betting on, you rose to meet it.
He gave me a future, and now, he’s made it dependent on the one person who walked away from both of us.
Thing is, I saw some of it. The way he looked past her ideas. The way he shut her down, always assuming she couldn’t hack it here. I hated it. Hated how it hollowed her out in ways I didn’t have the words to fix.
Watching her shrink under his expectations lit something in me I couldn’t explain back then, maybe because I knew exactly how it felt to be dismissed by your old man.
But I didn’t say anything. I just kept showing up. Kept learning the ropes while she drifted further from the place that should’ve felt like home.
But, starting tomorrow, the gloves come off.
Tonight, I’ll be up late reviewing fencing reports, stacking the task list with every backbreaking chore I can think of. I’ll even make sure the irrigation system 'accidentally' needs a reset, again. When the sun rises, she’s going to be knee-deep in ranch life, the kind that doesn’t care how polished your boots are or how quick your comebacks hit.
She wants to prove she belongs here? Then she’s going to earn every damn inch. I’ll assign her to muck stalls in the heat of the afternoon, have her fix the fence linewhere the snakes sun themselves, and conveniently forget to warn her about the bull that hates anything in nail polish.
I'll schedule early mornings and late nights, maybe throw in a surprise visit from the feed supplier who only talks in riddles and drives like he's in a demolition derby. She’ll be up to her eyes in mud, sweat, and manure before the weekend.
This isn’t personal, I tell myself.
Except, it kind of is. Because if she thinks she can waltz in here with her city smirk and erase all the years I spent building something real, she’s got another thing coming.
Let her try to impress the staff, charm the ranch hands, smile her way through a branding day. It won’t work.
At least, that’s what I keep telling myself.
But some stubborn part of me, buried deep under years of resentment and pride, almost wants her to succeed. I think about the way she used to brush dirt off her jeans with one hand and flip off the boys with the other, daring anyone to say she didn’t belong.
I remember her chasing a runaway calf barefoot across the pasture, wild and laughing, like the land answered only to her. That girl had grit. And maybe some part ofme wants to believe she still does. Maybe because he believed she could. Maybe because I remember the girl who used to ride circles around the rest of us, fearless and free.
And maybe… just maybe… I’m not ready to let go of that girl yet.
It’s not just a ranch.
It’smine. It's my hard work and years of experience that keep this place running.
I gave up college for this land, turned down job offers and spent more nights than I can count sleeping in the barn to make sure a calving heifer made it through the night. I missed birthdays, buried good horses, and weathered droughts with nothing but stubbornness and spit holding it all together.
And hell, if she plans to stick around, then she better be damn sure she is ready for war.
Chapter three
Mucking Through It
Avery
By 6 a.m., I already hate everything. My alarm screams from the nightstand, and I silence it with the same groan I used when Harper dared me to sign up for hot yoga last year.
Only this time, I’m not rolling out of a plush memory foam mattress to saunter into a boutique studio. I’m dragging myself out of a twin bed in a creaky ranch house that smells faintly of liniment and old cedar.
The air outside is still crisp, that dry Texas morning chill biting through my flimsy hoodie as I step onto the porch. The sky’s painted in watercolor shades, blush pinks bleeding into orange and gold, but all I can think about is how my boots feel like concrete on my feet.
