This has to work. It has to.
Rhett reaches for my duffel bag, and I instinctively pull it closer to my chest. It's literally everything I own in the world: three changes of clothes, my father's old watch, a photo album, and the kitchen knife I've kept since I was a kid. The one that gave me this scar.
"I can carry it," I say quickly.
He drops his hand immediately, taking a step back. "Sure. Sorry. Truck's right here."
I follow him to an old Ford that's seen better days but looks well-maintained. The kind of truck that's meant for actual work, not for showing off. He opens the passenger door for me, and I climb in, clutching my bag on my lap like a security blanket.
The interior smells like coffee and something earthy—hay, maybe, or soil. There's a thermos in the cup holder and what looks like ranch paperwork scattered on the dashboard. Evidence of a real life, real work. Maybe he wasn't lying about the ranch part, at least.
Rhett gets in the driver's side, and the truck dips slightly under his weight. He starts the engine without looking at me, his jaw still tight with tension.
We pull out of the station in silence.
I stare out the window at Blackwater Falls as we drive through it. It's smaller than I imagined. One main street with a handful of businesses, a diner, a saloon, a general store. The kind of town that probably looks charming in movies but feels suffocating in real life. The kind of place where everyone knows everyone, where strangers stick out like sore thumbs.
Where I'm going to stick out like a sore thumb.
"Town's not much to look at," Rhett says, breaking the silence. "But it's got what you need. Sarah's saloon is the social hub. Murphy's Grill has the best burgers you'll ever eat, even if the place looks like a health code violation. There's a library, if you like reading. And the people are decent, mostly."
I nod, not trusting my voice. My hands are shaking slightly, so I press them flat against my thighs. What the hell am I doing here?
"The ranch is about fifteen minutes outside town," he continues, and I can tell he's trying to fill the awkward silence. "Two thousand acres. We run cattle, some horses. There are six of us who own it. Well, seven now with Sierra. She invested last year, helped us turn things around financially."
"That's a lot of people," I manage to say.
"Yeah." He glances at me quickly, then back at the road. "They're good guys. My brothers, basically. We all grew up together at the ranch. The previous owner, Frank, he took us in when we didn't have anywhere else to go."
There's something in his voice when he says Frank's name. Affection mixed with grief. I recognize it because it's the same tone I use when I talk about my father.
"He sounds like a good man," I say softly.
"He was the best." Rhett's hands tighten on the steering wheel. "He died two years ago. Left the ranch to all of us. It's been... we've been working hard to keep his legacy alive."
I want to ask more, but the way his jaw clenches tells me this isn't the time. Instead, I watch as we leave the town behind and the landscape opens up into rolling hills and endless sky. It's beautiful. My father would have loved this view.
He used to make me watch old westerns with him every Sunday. He'd point at the sweeping landscapes and say, "That's real America, Claire-bear. Wide open spaces where a person can breathe." I always thought he was being dramatic, stuck in his nostalgia for a time he'd never actually lived in.
But looking at this land, I think I finally understand what he meant.
"It's beautiful," I say, and I mean it.
Rhett's shoulders relax slightly. "Yeah. It is. Never gets old, no matter how many times I see it."
We lapse back into silence, but it feels slightly less suffocating than before. The truck eats up the miles, and I try to ignore the panic building in my chest. What if the other ranch owners hate me? What if they figure out I'm a mail order bride and judge Rhett for it? What if—
"They think you're a friend from my military days," Rhett says suddenly, as if reading my mind. "Going through a rough patch. I didn't... I didn't tell them the truth. About how we met."
"You lied to them?"
"I simplified." His voice is defensive now. "They don't need to know everything right away. Figured we'd get to know each other first, see if this is actually going to work before we tell people we met on a mail order bride website."
He's embarrassed. I can hear it in every word, see it in the way his shoulders hunch slightly. He's ashamed of me, of this situation, of the fact that he was desperate enough to hire a wife on the internet.
And honestly? I can't blame him. I'm ashamed too.
"Okay," I say quietly. "What's our story, then?"
