Page 192 of Ironwood Ranch Cowboys

Which means whatever happened was bad.

Really bad.

I kill the truck engine and sit there for half a second, watching her through the windshield.

The town moves around her as usual.

A couple tourists wandering past with shopping bags. Someone laughing outside Larsen’s. The bakery two doors down letting cinnamon and sugar drift.

I climb out and shut the door. “Hey, trouble.”

Annie jumps anyway.

Hell.

She turns fast, gray eyes wide and glass bright in a way that makes an ugliness move in my chest. “You stalking me now?”

The sarcasm lands thin. Frayed around the edges.

“I prefer the term emotionally invested cowboy. And no, I’ve just been to the store.”

That gets me the smallest exhale through her nose.

Tiny. But I’ll take it.

I walk closer slowly, same way I would with a spooked horse. Calm, easy, no sudden movements. “What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Mm.” I lean beside her against the railing. “You look like somebody just informed you tax fraud is contagious.”

That almost gets a smile.

Almost.

The creek rushes below us, loud from snowmelt, water breaking white against rocks. It smells damp and cold and faintly of coffee drifting out every time the café door opens behind us.

Annie stares straight ahead “She invited me to a meeting.”

I go still. “Who?”

She laughs once, brittle as cracked glass. “Guess.”

Well. Shit.

My jaw tightens before I can stop it. “Vivian?”

“And Tessa.”

That second name lands as a bruise.

I look at Annie fully now.

She’s pale beneath her freckles. Angry too, though; I can see it tucked under the adrenaline. That stubborn little spark she gets right before she decides fighting is preferable to retreat.

I like that about her more every day.

“What did they say?”