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I earned that.

I close my eyes and stay.

CHAPTER SIX

DECK

Five-twelve in the morning. My internal alarm hasn't changed in twenty years. What's changed is the warm body pressed against my chest, curly hair across my pillow, and a soft, steady breathing that's doing something to my ribcage I don't have a word for.

Poppy sleeps hard. Flat on her stomach, one arm dangling off the mattress, face mashed into the pillow. She stole the blanket sometime around three and wrapped herself in it so thoroughly that extracting myself takes the precision of a man defusing a wire.

My feet hit cold hardwood. The room is still dark, gray morning seeping through the curtains. Her clothes are on the floor. My thermal is draped over the footboard. The flannel is tangled in the sheets near her shoulder.

Normal routine: boots, coffee, barn, cattle, work until dark.

Nothing about this morning is normal.

In the kitchen, the coffee maker gurgles to life. Two mugs come down from the cabinet without thinking. I've been pulling one mug for five years. Two came down today because my hands know something my brain hasn't caught up to yet.

The north pasture needs checking. Two fence posts I noticed yesterday are leaning, which means the ground froze again overnight. The heifer with the bruised leg needs looking at. There's a delivery of feed coming at nine that I need to be here for.

All of that matters. All of that is the job. But my feet keep wanting to walk back down the hallway.

I lean against the counter, drink my coffee, stare at the wall.

She cooked in this kitchen yesterday. Set her laptop on my table. Sat in my mother's chair with her legs tucked under her. Ate my soup. Showed me photographs of my own farm that made me feel something I haven't felt since I was a kid walking these rows with my dad.

Then she was in my bed. Under me. Around me. Saying my name in a voice that stripped away every wall I've spent five years building.

My phone's on the counter. Before the coffee is half gone, I pick it up.

Me:

You up?

The response takes eight seconds.

Mom:

I've been up since 4. Your father snores like a diesel engine. What's wrong?

Me:

Nothing's wrong.

Mom:

You don't text me at 5am when nothing's wrong. Is it the cattle? The fence? Did Bucky get out again?

Me:

There's a woman here.

Silence. Then three dots. Then silence. Then three dots again.

Mom:

Deck Allen Connors. You call me right now.