THE GUARDIAN
She’s perfect.
I shouldn’t be surprised. We’ve been friends for almost two years now, so I know her pretty well. Still, I’m not naive enough to believe everything I see on the internet is real. People pretend to be something they’re not all the time. You think you’re bonding with a fellow Taylor Swift fan you can swap friendship bracelets with, but instead it’s a forty-seven year old geezer who wants you to send him topless photos.
Men are such a disappointment.
Deep, deep down, I was afraid she would be, too. Never meet your heroes, right? But Lennon isn’t my hero. She’s my friend.
But I’ve been fooled by people before. I’ve been hurt and betrayed by people who claimed to love me. Sometimes the loss still ached, deep and low in mybelly. The doctor said that wound had fully healed, and whatever pain I feel now, it’s all in my head. But when I look down at my body, the scar is still an angry red above my pubic hair. I know, deep in my bones, that the pain won’t heal until that scar is a pale silvery line.
I rub silicon gel across the six inch line the way Lennon told me to do before settling into my bed to watch my favorite TV show. Vitamin E oil doesn’t really work, apparently, and neither does cocoa butter, no matter what the influencers try to sell you. Lennon knows all kinds of stuff like that from working with makeup artists as a model. It’s one of the things I like about her, that she doesn’t gatekeep shit like that. She’s a girl’s girl. The older sister I never had.
And now she’s here. She’s really here. Maybe I should be surprised that this is all working out so perfectly—it’s not like anything else in my life has ever gone to plan—but I’m not. I feel peaceful. Like I’m finally on the right path. Everything is falling into place. Finally.
She’s so happy here. Iknewshe would be. It’s exhausting working the way she does, sharing so much of herself. All these men watching her videos, saying disgusting things to her, they don’t deserve her. They don’t understand her—and they’re dangerous. She doesn’t realize that, but I do. I know exactly what men are capable of, and I’m not going to let them hurt her.
Mercy River. It was the name that called me here twoyears ago, broken and desperate. This town and this ranch are my safe haven. She feels the same way. I know it.
Someday, when I tell her everything, she’ll thank me for being her guardian angel. The one person who truly saw her.
I settle back into my nest of pillows and blankets as the theme song plays. The four women embrace, comforting and protecting each other against the world.
That’s going to be us. Friends forever, long after the romantic relationships fade. We’re going to grow old together. Like soul mates.
6
JEREMIAH
Lennon Graves hadtrouble written all over her. Whether she wasintrouble or shewastrouble was yet to be determined, but I had a feeling I would soon find out.
She was in the goat yard with Seb. Randy and Michael, two guests who had already been with us for a of couple weeks, were also around. Randy, a white guy from Vermont, was active Army, on medical leave for the summer. Michael was a Black EMT from Atlanta. Both were wearing work boots with their jeans because it didn’t matter if they were from the city or country, the nature of military and first responder work had taught them the importance of appropriate footwear for thejob. Some of our guests came here in sneakers, but most wore boots of some kind.
Lennon was here in sandals. Fuckingsandals.
Holly came to stand next to me. Neither of us spoke as we watched the scene unfold. The ranch currently had seven goats—all rescues, all escape artists, and all extremely food-motivated. Goats were curious, intelligent animals and had a tendency to get into trouble when bored. A lot like Seb, actually, which was why he claimed them as his project. Right now, Seb was reconfiguring their obstacle course, and goddammit, he was handing Lennon a hammer.
I took an unconscious step forward like I intended to snatch it back.
Holly cackled. “Oh, this should be fun.”
“She’s going to break a toe,” I muttered. “I don’t like it.” Because I didn’t like the idea ofanyonegetting hurt on our watch, and that meant Lennon, too. NotespeciallyLennon. Her safety only felt more urgent because of those fucking sandals, that was all.
“Well, I don’t like it either. Any of it.” Holly kicked at a pebble with her ranch-appropriate cowboy boot. “There’s something not right about her, Jay. You know she’s not military. Why is she here?”
“She could be a first responder.”
Holly shot me anare you kidding me?look.
“Fine. I don’t know why she’s here.” And hell, thatbothered me. If she wasn’t military or a first responder, how had she even heard of Mercy River Ranch?
I watched Lennon nod at something Seb said and then carefully place a five-inch nail on a wooden beam. She glanced up at him for approval, and when he nodded, she tapped the head with the hammer in quick, light movements. Then she pulled her fingers away and used three hard strokes to send the nail the rest of the way home.
I let out a breath and rolled my shoulders down from my ears. But they tensed right back up again when Seb clapped her on the back, and she grinned at him. Something that felt like a growl rumbled through my chest, but I swallowed it down.
“Maybe Seb knows something,” Holly smirked.
I grunted. I didn’t like not knowing Lennon’s story, but somehow I hated the thought of her confiding in Seb even more. “Our guests’ reasons for being here are not our business unless they make it our business. You know that.”
