I lock eyes with Tate, my hands braced on Sadie’s shoulders. “Watch her?” I ask, every part of me ready to go find Quinn. I know she’s here because she’s filming. This is her last required filming event for the documentary. I haven’t caught my breath, and I haven’t even fully realized my win,but I’m knocking my hat back and scanning the crowd nonetheless.
Pink boots catch my eye, and I see Quinn packing up her tripod, camera bag already slung across her back. My chest aches something fierce when I spot her, because I’ve been dying to see her all week.
She kept her promise, and kept things normal for Sadie, coming to the house for lunch every single day. I gave them privacy, and begged off, knowing full well that it would only hurt Quinn if I pressed her on their visits. I don’t want to hurt her anymore. I never wanted to hurt her in the first place.
All I want to do is make it right. Explain myself the way I should have done last week at the house. That was the time, and yet I fucked it all up. Same way I fucked up my life in the past.
“Quinn!” I holler, hands cupped to my mouth. She turns, but our eyes don’t lock, and she doesn’t scan the crowd twice. Instead, I push through, losing sight of her when a group of teenagers stumble out in front of me, engulfed in laughter.
“Landry Vaughn! There he is!”
“The champ!”
“My dad knows him!”
I cut through, nodding, looking for her.
But when the crowd breaks, she’s gone, and so is her tripod.
I make my way to the parking lot and spend ten minutes walking up and down the rows, but her car isn’t there. Mabel’s truck isn’t there. They’re gone.
She kept her word. She made a wonderful film about me. She stayed true to Sadie.
And what did I do?
Lie. And for what?
“Daddy!” Sadie runs up, linking her arms around my legs, Tate and the Colliers in tow.
“You did great, Landry,” Love beams, wrapping her arms gently around my neck. Alice and Petunia give me a bouquet of wildflowers they picked, and Tate claps his hand on my back. “I knew you would, you knew you would. Hell, look at us. A bunch of rodeo geniuses.”
We laugh, but my laughter is hollow and forced, and not because Tate’s joke wasn’t funny. But because I don’t think anything will ever be happy or funny again. Not until I tell her the truth and get her back.
Sixty-three. That’s how many times I called Quinn over the week. I switch on the twinkle lights in the editing nook I built for her and nudge the banister with my booted foot, making the swing sway. Nightfall is on the horizon, littering the distance with golds and purples so gorgeous that I feel my chest go tight.
I want to be here with her.
I want her.
I need her.
I love her.
Instead of calling her again, I call the person I’ve called twenty times in the last week, bless her soul. “Hi, Mabel,” I greet when she answers with a sigh.
“Hiya, honey. She ain’t ready to talk just yet,” she informs me, but that’s no surprise.
“I know. Just… making sure y’all got back safe today.”
Mabel sighs. “Oh, honey. I’m sorry you’re going through this. You know we’re here. Everyone’s safe.” She pauses. “Congratulations today. You looked great out there. You did everything you set out to do.”
I did, and yet I feel worse than when I started this. That big check with one hundred fifty thousand dollars made out to me, Landry Vaughn, is stuck to my fridge with a Popsicle stick magnet Sadie made last year. I’ll pay off my debts. Pay Tate back for all he’s done for free. I’ll get the ranch back on its feet.
I’ll save Sadie’s only home she’s ever known, and let her live and grow on the land that’s meant to be hers one day.
I did it.
And yet as Sadie joins me on the swing quietly, I close my eyes and fight the urge to cry.
