Icall Marcus back at six in the morning.
Laney is still on the porch when I make the call, which is deliberate. I want her to hear this. Not because I need a witness, not because I'm performing anything.
Because three days of distance taught me that the space between what I know and what she believes needs to be closed with actions rather than reassurances.
This is the first action.
Marcus picks up on the second ring.
"Beckett. You see the inquiry I forwarded?"
"I saw it."
"Weston Blackthorn. He's a legitimate buyer, well capitalized, knows the region. If you're open to a conversation I can—"
"I'm not," I say. "Tell him Silver Mesa isn't available. It won't be available. Not now, not in six months, not in five years." I pause. "Tell him to stop making inquiries through back channels about a ranch that isn't going anywhere and an operation that isn't changing hands."
A silence.
"That's clear," Marcus says.
"It's meant to be."
Another silence. Shorter. "You're happy out there."
It's not quite a question. Marcus has known me for fifteen years and he's hearing something in my voice that he hasn't heard in a long time. I know because I can hear it too.
"Yeah," I say. "I am. You should try it."
"Good." He says it simply, without his usual overlay of financial analysis. Just good. Like a friend rather than a partner. "I'll reach out to Blackthorn today."
We hang up.
I set the phone on the porch rail and look at Laney.
She's been looking at the ranch. Not at me. Giving me the call without making it an audience. She turns when she hears me set the phone down and her expression is carefully neutral in the way it gets when she's managing something large and not ready to show it.
"Done," I say.
She looks at the phone. Looks at me. "Just like that."
"Just like that."
She's quiet for a moment. "Beckett. That was a legitimate offer. You don't know what he was going to—"
"I know enough," I say. "I know what Weston Blackthorn has been doing since the day he first showed up at this ranch. I know what that inquiry was about and I know what it wasn't about." I hold her gaze. "Silver Mesa isn't for sale. That's not a financial decision. It's not a market decision. It's just true."
She looks at me for a long moment.
The morning is quiet around us, the ranch coming up into the early light the way it does, slow, unhurried, completely itself.
"He's not going to like that answer," she says.
"He doesn't have to like it."
"He might push."
"He can push all he wants." I pick up my coffee. "Silver Mesa has been here longer than Weston Blackthorn's opinion of it and it'll be here long after."
