Knox nods slowly. “I am.”
“Then you should go,” she says. “We need the money. And you need to ride.”
“I don’t want to leave you here with this mess,” Knox says.
“I’m not alone,” she says. She looks at Boone. Then she looks at me. “I have you two. And Wellsy. And Pearl and Dot and the whole damn book club. We can handle a little sabotage.”
I feel a surge of pride so strong it makes my chest ache.
“Okay,” Knox says. “I’ll go. But I’m coming back.”
“We know,” I say.
Saramaria stands up. She puts her hands on her hips.
“So,” she says. “What’s the plan for today? We have a ranch to save and a conspiracy to expose. Let’s get to work.”
I look at Boone. He raises his coffee cup in a mock toast.
“To the ranch,” he says.
“To the ranch,” we all echo.
Saramaria
Idon’t know if it is the aftermath of the hoedown, or the way the dynamic has shifted between us, but being around them is becoming a physical struggle. Every time one of them walks into a room, my stomach knots itself into complicated twists.
It’s their hands.
I can’t stop thinking about their hands. I keep remembering Rhett’s fingers sliding inside me, offering relief that bordered on nirvana. Or the way Knox’s hand gripped my waist in the truck, rough and demanding. Or Boone’s hand on my belt, unclasping it with a single, decisive motion.
It has been two days since the party. Two days of tripled effort. With the fundraiser money and the money Knox sent, we went on a spending spree. Lumber, wire, paint. The ranch is currently a construction zone. We’re fixing the barn roof, reinforcing the fences, repairing the electrical grid that the storm tried to destroy.
I’m usually so exhausted by the time dinner is over that I curl up in my bed—my actual bed, back in my room—and pass out before my head even hits the pillow. It’s a good thing, becauseI know I caught something. My head feels like it’s stuffed with cotton, my bones ache, and my temper is hanging by a thread.
I am up on a ladder, painting the trim of the porch, when my phone buzzes in my pocket. I wipe my hands on a rag and check the screen.
Pearl.
“Hello?”
“Saramaria, sweetie,” Pearl’s voice comes through, bright and urgent. “Get in your truck. You need to get to The Salt Lick. Now.”
“What is it? Is it the sabotage? Did West find something new?”
“No, nothing like that,” she says. “Just get here. Trust me.”
I look down at my paint-splattered clothes. “I’m a mess, Pearl.”
“You’re fine. Go.”
I climb down the ladder. I find Rhett by the barn, tightening a bolt on a gate.
“I have to go to town,” I say. “Pearl needs me.”
He looks up, wiping grease from his hands. “Everything okay?”
“I think so,” I say. “I’ll be back in an hour.”
