The world outside the windows was dark for the most part, but there’d be a little light in the east that would only grow.So it wasn’tinsane.
“I don’t know Jill as well as you do,” Landon began patiently.“But I doubt very much she’s up and ready for visitors at six in the morning.”
“We are.”
“We are ranchers.”
She knew he was right, and she’d figured she’d take a horse up to the cabin instead of her truck, take her time.Not arriverightat six.But she quite literally couldn’t focus on anything else for another day.
Maybe Jill wasn’t ready to talk about it, but they didn’t have to talk.Aly just had to check on everything and make sure JillandGlenda were okay.If they sent her away, she’d go, but that didn’t mean she shouldn’t reach out.
“Aly, you have left her messages and texts.She isn’t ready to talk, or she would have returned any of those.”
Aly really hated when Landon was reasonable.Couldn’t he support her being unreasonable even just once?“Noteveryonekeeps all their problems to themselves.”
“And noteveryoneneeds a sounding board.”
Aly huffed out a breath and glared at him, because he wasn’twrong, and that was so annoying.“I am worried about my friend.”
“I know.I’m not saying you don’t make your way up there at some point today.”
She raised an eyebrow at him.“You’re not?”
He sighed.“I’d like to, but what would be the point?You think it’s the right thing to do, so you’re going to do it.Fine enough.But at least let the woman sleep, Al.”
Aly sniffed, but before she could mount any more arguments, or just acquiesce that she was indeed being a little overzealous at this hour, she heard the muffled sound of a car door slamming.And then another.Then two more.
All thoughts of Jill left, because itwassix in the morning.Itwastoo early for anyone to be here at the ranch this early.
“Maybe it’s a hand,” Landon said, but he was moving toward the front door, and she knew he didn’t think that any more than she did.Because maybe one hand might drive up to the main house this early, but it wouldn’t account for all the door slams.
They both made it to the living room, but before they made it to the door, the knob turned.It had to be Cal—he was the only one with a key.
When he stepped inside, she was surprised to find him… rumpled.She almost worried he’d spent the night drinking.
“You look like you haven’t slept,” was all she could think to say.
“Yeah, I haven’t.Wehaven’t.”He gestured behind him.Not just Sam and Nate following him inside, but that Detective Hayes—who Aly couldn’t decide if she liked or not.
In this moment, she knew that all of them being here at six in the morning would make theliking or notirrelevant.
To give herself time to steel herself for whatever this was going to be, she took a step back toward the kitchen.“I’ll… put on some more coffee.”
*
Landon helped Alywith coffee and feeding people while Cal and Jake explained everything that had happened.
Sam didn’t say a word, and Nate didn’t take his arm off of her.
Landon had never been one for puzzles.He didn’t like things that didn’t add up.
Mr.Everly sending Cal and Jake on a wild goose chase to Kalispell and Sam stumbling on an apparent suicide didnotadd up.Threats against Cal and Jill’s unusual silence toward Aly seemingly unrelated, but…
No, he hated the way this all felt wrong.Like after Sandy, Dad’s girlfriend last year, had been murdered here on their property, and all the cracks with his father had begun to be visible.All the ways that everything they had grown up believing had crumbled.
Because they’d been missing something then—that his father was downright evil—which meant they were missing something now.
Landon could get lost in feeling sorry for himself about havingmoresecrets set to upend his life, but…
