Page 104 of Thaw My Heart

I hold her face in my hands, shaking my head. Condensation from my breath lingers in the air around us. “This weather is unsafe, and I need you to look after Cole.” Her safety is too important. Who knows how long it will take to locate the herd? It could take the rest of the day, maybe even all night, and the weather conditions are too dangerous.

I need her to be somewhere safe and warm.

She bites her lip, glancing at Cole. “What’s wrong with him?”

A part of me wants to deflect, to save her from worrying, but she was going to find out eventually, and I want to be honest with her. No more hiding the truth. “He has lung cancer.”

“What?” she gasps.

With the storm, Blake and Cole are getting too far away, disappearing in the snow-covered wilds. If she doesn’t start riding now, she’ll lose their trail. “Look, I need you to go. We’ll talk later.”

“Kit—”

My lips press against hers, lingering. “I’ll find you.”

Her arms wrap around me, grabbing the collar of my coat to pull me closer. “You better,” she says against my lips before stepping back to mount on Sugar. Taking off quickly after Cole and Blake.

I hop on Smoke, watching her ride so beautifully in the powder. Another picture I’d love to frame. When she catches up with them, disappearing over the ridge, I take off.

It takes me about twenty minutes to reach the cabin, a security outpost barely visible through the snowy haze. The motion lights go off as I approach.

A man exits the cabin with a rifle in his hand, shining a flashlight on me. “Oh, Kit. It’s just you.”

“Hey, Logan,” I greet after dismounting Smoke. Logan is roughly the same age as me, with brown hair that nearly reaches his shoulders. “I need to borrow a truck to take to town.”

He glances at the old Chevy sitting next to the outpost. “I don’t think it’ll make it that far in this.”

The tires look well-worn, and there’s a big crack in the windshield, but I don’t have a choice. “I have to try.”

Logan nods. “I’ll get the keys.”

Moments later, he returns, placing the keys in my hands. “Would you look after Smoke? Take him back to the ranch when the weather clears?”

He tips his cowboy hat. “Sure thing. I’ll put him in the barn with mine. Good luck out there,” with that, Logan takes Smoke’s reins and heads off towards the small barn.

The old Chevy takes a moment to fire up, but once it does, the engine roars to life. Should be decent enough to make it into town.

Or so I thought. About halfway, the truck slows to a crawl, deciding to die on the side of the road. Nothing surrounds me but tall pine trees, wrapping me in darkness. The branches are heavy with snow and ice, wilted from the storm. Cell reception is shoddy at best, even with the old trick of pointing my phone towards the sky.

I pace around the road, barely able to see three feet in front of me, trying to find the service zone.

But after ten minutes of trying, my fingers are numb, and I still can’t get a single goddamn bar. “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I mutter, kicking the truck tires. Of course, the truck had to break down in the middle of the dead zone.

I hop back into the truck, rubbing my frozen hands together. Clouds of condensation wrap around me, but at least it’s slightly warmer inside the truck.

My head rests against the back of the seat, running through a list of options. There’s nowhere close enough that I could walk to, and not a single car passes me by. No one is out risking the snowstorm, because no one in Montana is as big of an idiot as me. I thought I could make it into town, and I’d misjudged that poorly. Why do I always think I can do everything alone?

It’s a trait about myself that I least admire.

At least by now, Sadie should be home safe and sound. Cole should be on his way to the hospital getting the treatment he needs, and Wes should be talking to the locals about the missing cattle. Thoughts that provide me a bit of comfort as I sit alone in the darkness, watching thick snow fall relentlessly from the sky.

In just nine days, I have to make the biggest decision of my life. Sign the papers or hand the ranch over to Cash on a silver platter.

Unless the snow buries me in and I quietly slip away…

Fuck I can’t accept that.

Maybe I’m not ready, but the ranch needs me. The last couple of weeks have proven that to me. And Sadie… she needs me. And fuck, I need her too. I promised to prove my feelings to her, and I’d never prove a thing if I just gave up here on the side of the road. And she’d never forgive me for that.