We stand there for another long moment. The space between us feels different than it did an hour ago. Less like a standoff and more like two people who have just shown each other something real and are quietly figuring out what to do with that information.
Rowdy sighs again, dramatically.
"He really is useless," I say.
"Completely," Laney agrees.
It's the first thing we've fully agreed on.
It shouldn't feel like as much of a beginning as it does.
The rain eases up around six and Maisie appears in the barn doorway approximately four minutes later like she has been monitoring the weather radar personally and waiting for her window.
She is wearing her turquoise boots and carrying Rowdy's ball and has the expression of someone who has been inside all afternoon and has reached the absolute limit of her patience with that situation.
"Dad," she says. "Remy says there's a bar with live music and a mechanical bull and he said I can look at it but not ride it, which is honestly rude, and can we please go?"
She says all of this without stopping once for air.
I look at Laney.
Laney looks at Maisie with the expression of someone who knows exactly where this is going and has already made peace with it.
"Whiskey River," she says. "Wyatt Boone's place."
"Is it appropriate for an eight year old?"
"It's Silver Ridge. Half the town will be there. Jolene brings her grandkids on live music nights." She picks up her hat from the barn rail. "It's more of a community event than a bar."
"Remy sold it as a mechanical bull situation."
"Remy sells everything as a mechanical bull situation."
From somewhere outside Remy's voice carries across the yard. "I heard that and I stand by it."
Maisie bounces once on her boot heels. "So we're going?"
I look at my shirt, which is still damp from the earlier rain crossing and has acquired several new layers of barn dust and general ranch incident over the course of the afternoon. I look at Laney, who is somehow still put together despite the same afternoon I just survived.
"I need twenty minutes," I say.
Remy appears in the barn doorway beside Maisie, hat already on, looking like a man who has been ready for this for several hours. "We'll take my truck. Silas is meeting us there." He looks at my shirt. "Might want to make it thirty minutes, Money Bags."
Maisie thinks this is the funniest thing she has ever heard.
I make it twenty-five.
Whiskey River Bar and Grill sits at the edge of Main Street and announces itself with warm light and the sound of a live guitar that reaches the parking lot before you're even out of the truck. It's a big open space inside, worn wood floors and high ceilings.
Long tables fill most of the room and a bar runs the length of one wall. A small stage at the far end holds a three piece band working through something with a fiddle that makes the whole room feel like it's moving slightly.
It's absolutely packed.
Maisie stops just inside the door and stares with her mouth open like she's walked into something she didn't have words for yet.
Wyatt Boone spots us from behind the bar and raises a hand in greeting. He's a big easy presence, former rodeo cowboy with a wide smile and the comfortable authority of a man entirely at home in his own space.
"Laney," he calls over the noise. "You bring the new neighbor finally."
