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“Really?”
“Yes. Now keep them home.”
“Will do!” She gave him a mock salute before she jumped the fence and rummaged in the bed of her pickup.
It took her almost an hour to rig up a temporary fix, but when she stepped away and stared at it, she was pleased with her handiwork. It would do until she could come up with a better solution. She had her work cut out for her to keep everything running, but it was all worth it. She had never been happier than to be working for herself and making her own money.
Sliding into the cab of the truck, Eli shoved the vehicle into gear and headed for the house. She needed to figure out what the directions were on the toilet before Bill showed up in the morning to do it all for her. She loved him, had grown up living next to him, grew up with his kids—his daughter was her best friend—but she didn’t want him to think she was taking advantage of his kindness or his knowledge. She could easily do it all on her own if she needed to, and she wanted to prove it to him—and to herself for that matter.
Eli had grown up in this small western Kansas town, and even though she was an adult, she always felt like she had to prove she was twenty-eight and not eighteen, or even eight for that matter. Bill had been able to keep up with that for the most part, but then again, she’d gone to school with his daughter. The rest of the town still thought of her as the kid who hung out at the vet clinic one too many nights a week.
As soon as she was back at the house, she started the casseroles for the hunters and cleaned up what she needed to of the mess in the upstairs bathroom. Two days and she’d have to have it ready. Sarah was due to arrive, her only guest in months, and someone who was staying—oddly enough—for two whole weeks. She was curious about a woman who could take that much time off, but until they met and Eli got to know her and just what she was taking a break from, she was left to wonder.
With dinner cooking and her mess cleaned up, Eli plopped onto the couch in the common room and closed her eyes for a few brief minutes. She was about to head straight into a long busy season, and it was already taking a toll on her. Calving season was not for the faint of heart, and this year she was short-handed, meaning she’d be doing more of the middle-of-the-night checks than normal. She could do it, though. She’d have to. She didn’t want there to be another option.
Chapter 2
The album had been finishedmonths ago, but every time she heard the released single on the radio, she cringed. Sarah wanted to go into the studio and tweak it—the curse she had grown up with rearing its ugly head again. It turned her into an anxious perfectionist who strove to do the best and make everything perfect—which yes, she knew was unattainable.
Sarah paced in the tiny apartment she rented. She only spent half the year there at most. The rest of the time she was on tour or out recording or visiting family since she missed most everything that could be considered a special event. Her twin sister hadn’t taken kindly to her missing their birthday or her nieces’ birthdays every year. Unfortunately, there was little Sarah could do to change that situation.
She stopped at her window and put her hands on her hips. For some reason, she could not settle. She needed the break, and she knew she was about to get a full two weeks of nothing other than rest—well, as soon as she could manage to rest after she got there—which was the point of the inordinately long break. She’d been planning a vacation of some sort for weeks, but she really should have taken it sooner after finishing recording.
Sighing, Sarah plopped onto her couch and threw her hand over her eyes. It was three in the damn morning, and she couldn’t settle enough to sleep. Nothing had helped her in the past either. She was notorious for pulling all-nighters, especially when writing or on tour, but most people didn’t know she also pulled them regularly when she was home by herself.
She grabbed her phone and twisted it between her fingers as she debated. Kara would likely be asleep, which irked her only because she needed something to do, otherwise she was going to go crazy. The bars in Dallas were shut down for the night, the streets had emptied out, but it wasn’t like she could just go anywhere either. Sarah always preferred to have someone with her to help get her out of those awkward conversations of “Hey, are you Sadie Bade?”
Sighing, she bit her lip and gnawed on it, knowing the habit she had attempted to break for decades wasn’t going away anytime soon. She was a forty-one-year-old country singer, still living on her own, with only a handful of true friends. Bouncing her heel up and down rapidly against the soft rug on her living room floor, she groaned. She was failing at being an adult in so many ways.
Sarah tossed her phone onto the couch cushion next to her and groaned again before folding herself onto the couch, plopping her face into the pillow, and half screaming. She didn’t want to disturb her neighbors, but at the same time, she needed the release from all the pent-up tension. It was nearly becoming too much for her to handle, and the last time that happened—well, the last time that happened, it was bad.
Rolling onto her back and staring at her ceiling, Sarah fumbled around for the cellphone she had abandoned minutes before. She grabbed it and sent an SOS to Kara, texting,“You awake?”
She rubbed the heels of her hands over her eyes and face and closed her eyes as the energy she was so desperate to get rid of filtered through her body and made her skin crawl with jitters like she’d drunk two pots of coffee in the span of ten minutes. It took ten minutes, but her phone buzzed a response.
“I am now.”
Grinning, Sarah gnawed on her lip some more as she typed out a response.“Can’t sleep.”
“No shit, asshole.”
Kara’s response made her laugh.
“Go on vacation already.”
Sarah paused and pursed her lips. Kara wasn’t wrong. That had been the entire point of the trip, the one Kara had insisted she take—the one Kara had practically planned everything for. The silence of the apartment echoed at her in a way she hadn’t expected. Normally Sarah was surrounded by noise, but it was in the quiet moments in the middle of the night that she found she could think most clearly.
Staring at the phone, she tried to come up with some sort of snarky reply, but words failed her.“I leave in the afternoon.”
“Leave now.”
“What?” Sarah said out loud before texting the same thing to Kara. She wasn’t going to sit in the airport for hours doing nothing while she waited for her stupid plane to get there. No, that was just stupid.
“Leave. Now.”
Shaking her head in confusion, Sarah responded,“Like right now?”
“Yes. Leave now. I’m sure you’re packed already, and I don’t want to listen to you all night. I want actual sleep. You need this, so go. Drink an energy drink, call a ride, and leave now.”
