“Did he mention that she’s got the biggest herd between here and Bismarck? Or that her father’s been bankrupting his competition for forty years?”
“Nope. Must’ve slipped his mind.”
Rawley waited, wanting me to fill the silence, but I didn’t. I just stared at the photo, the way Liam leaned away from Eleanor’s hand on his shoulder.
“Rumor is,” Rawley continued, “she didn’t take the broken engagement real well. There was a private investigator in Billings last week, paid cash for photos of the James family ranch and then skipped town.”
“Your guy?” I asked.
“Not mine. Not anyone’s we know.”
I set the paper down, careful to avoid the fresh coffee ring on the desk. “So what, you think she’s coming after the kid?”
He shrugged, but it was the kind of shrug that meant “yes, and also probably the house, the dog, and the air you breathe.”
I reached into my back pocket, pulled out the envelope with the photo of Liam and Emilio, and laid it next to the newsprint. The difference was night and day: in the engagement photo, Liam looked hunted; in mine, he looked tired but alive.
Rawley pointed at the envelope. “Can I?”
“Knock yourself out.”
He studied it for a long time, eyes narrow, then slid it back. “You still think you’re the best place for the baby?”
I didn’t answer right away. Instead I looked around the office, at the old hunting photos and the land deeds and the cracked leather of the chair Rawley’s granddad had probably died in.
I thought about what it meant to be hunted, to have someone with unlimited resources out for your hide, and to have the only thing between you and them be a man who once blew up his own car for insurance money.
“I’m not gonna let anyone take him,” I said, finally.
Rawley nodded, slow. “If she comes, she’ll bring backup. They won’t care about playing fair.”
I grinned, all teeth. “I don’t remember ever playing fair.”
He let himself smile, just a flash, and then it was gone. “Just so you know,” he said, “there’s people who’d be happy to see this ranch fail. We get mixed up in a high-profile custody thing, it’ll bring every camera and lawman in the state to our door.”
“Then I’ll keep my head down.”
He leaned back, the chair creaking. “That’s not really your style, Hoop.”
I picked up the engagement notice, held it to the lamp. You could see the ink from the other side of the page, a shadow that didn’t quite line up with the text on the front. I pressed it flat, then folded it and put it in my shirt pocket, right next to the photo of Liam and Emilio.
“You ever wish you could just burn all this?” I asked, gesturing at the office, the register, the whole brittle archive of ranch life.
Rawley thought about it, then shook his head. “Somebody has to remember. Otherwise you’re just the next set of bones in the field.”
I stood, chair scraping the floor. “You want me on shift tonight?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Take first watch. And keep the kid close. If they show, it’ll be at night.”
I started for the door, then stopped with my hand on the knob. “What happens if we find him?”
Rawley looked up, and for a second I saw a different man, one not made of steel and scar tissue, but something just as brittle. “Then you get to ask him yourself why he ran.”
I left, closing the door so soft it barely made a sound. The hallway outside was full of winter light, the kind that makesyou think for a second you could be anywhere, anyone, and the future might not be already written in black marker on the walls.
I walked past the kitchen, where Jojo was spoon-feeding his son Ethan a mash of something beige and nutritious. He looked up as I passed, and I gave him a thumbs up.
He grinned, bright as ever, and for a second I remembered what it felt like to be a normal person, in a normal world, where babies stayed where they were born and nobody had to bleed for the chance to keep them.
