Brody waited approximately two seconds. "Well?"
"John wanted to check in on us. Hank picked him up from the facility this morning. They're headed to the ranch."
Brody went quiet. He looked out the passenger window at the hills rolling past, golden and dry in the late summer light.
"His first time back," he said.
"Yeah." My hands tightened on the wheel. "First time in twenty-two years."
When we pulled up, Rhett was on the porch, sitting in one of the Adirondack chairs with a mug of coffee sitting on the arm.
He looked like he'd been there a while.
He looked like he hadn't slept.
"Hey," I said, climbing the porch steps. Brody was right behind me, his hand finding the small of my back without thought. "You good?"
Rhett's jaw worked once before he answered. "Yep."
He was not good.
I scanned the porch. The front door. The quiet that was too quiet for a ranch house, even on a Sunday.
"Where's Sassy?"
Rhett's eyes stayed fixed on some middle distance, passed the paddock, passed the barn, passed whatever he was actually looking at.
"Gone."
Brody's hand pressed harder against my back. "Whaddya mean, gone?"
"Left a note." Rhett took a slow sip of his coffee, like he needed the time to string together the words that might explain. "Said she was movin' to Bozeman for a while. Finish her last semester there."
The silence that followed was heavy enough to sit in.
I stared at Rhett. This man—this steady, dependable, unshakeable man—had cracks running through him this afternoon that he was holding together with nothing but caffeine and sheer cowboy stubbornness.
"That little shit," I said. "Tellin' me not to run when she was just about to."
Something flickered across Rhett's face. Not quite a smile. But close enough that I knew the words had landed where I'd aimed them—at the part of him that needed to know someone else was pissed about it, too.
He stood, draining the last of his coffee, and tipped his chin toward the drive. "Who's that?"
I turned. An old Chevy was making its way up the gravel road, moving at a pace that suggested the driver was either very cautious or very old.
"That's Hank," I said. "He's got my granddad with him."
Rhett looked at me. Then at Brody. Then back at me.
"Your granddad," he repeated.
"Yep."
Hank's truck rumbled to a stop in front of the house. The passenger door opened slowly, and my granddad eased himself out with careful, deliberate movements. He planted his boots on the gravel and stood there for a long moment, looking up at the house, the barn, the mountains behind them.
I watched him take it in—the place he'd built, the place he'd lost, the place that had kept going without him the way places do. His jaw was tight. His eyes were bright. He didn't say a word.
Hank appeared beside him, toothpick in the corner of his mouth, one hand hovering near John's elbow without quite touching it. Ready if needed. Not presuming.
