I take a drink of coffee, buy myself time. "I grew up on a cattle ranch outside White Sulphur Springs. Population maybe a thousand people."
"That sounds isolated."
"It was. Mountains in every direction, sky so big you could see forever." I can picture it now—the way sunrise painted the peaks gold, how winter storms rolled in from the north. "Winters were brutal, but summers were perfect."
"Do you miss it?"
"Sometimes." I think about the last time I was home. Suzy's funeral. Standing in the cemetery overlooking the valley. "But ranching wasn't my path."
"So you joined the Marines and became a professional problem solver."
That almost makes me smile. "Who told you that?"
"You did. Yesterday. You said you're a professional problem solver instead of a professional breaker of things."
"Good memory." I lean back. "Yeah. Enlisted right out of high school. Wanted to see the world beyond Montana."
"And did you?"
"Parts of it I wish I hadn't." The admission comes out before I can stop it. "Deployment shows you places. Doesn't mean they're worth seeing."
She's quiet for a moment, stirring her coffee. "Your sister. Claire. The Rhodes Scholar who came back to run the ranch."
"What about her?"
"Does she resent you for leaving?"
The question catches me off guard. "Why would she?"
"Because you got to leave and she came back. That's got to create some friction."
"Claire wanted to come back. She loved England, loved the work, but when our parents started getting older—" I pause. "She said the ranch was worth more than a career in academia."
"That's very noble."
"That's Claire. She sees what needs doing and does it." I take another drink. "Unlike me, who joined the Marines and stayed gone for a decade."
"You served your country. That's worth something."
"Doesn't help with ranch work."
"No," she agrees. "But it probably helps with protective details."
Our food arrives. The smell of the burger makes me realize I haven't eaten since breakfast. We eat in companionable silence for a while. I watch Gwen slowly relax—the tight set of her jaw eases, some of the exhaustion lines around her mouth soften.
When I look up, Gwen is watching me with an expression I can't read.
"What?"
"You don't talk much about yourself."
"Not much to tell."
"I doubt that." She sets down her spoon. "You lost your wife. That's—" She stops. "I'm doing it again. The awkward thing."
"What awkward thing?"
"Trying to have an emotional conversation and failing spectacularly." She picks up her grilled cheese, sets it down again. "You mentioned Suzy yesterday and I said I was bad at this kind of conversation. Now I'm proving it by bringing her up again like I have any idea what I'm doing."
