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“Am I making a mistake?” I ask him quietly. Tears spring into my eyes and I blink them back. “Not going home, I mean?”
War watches me from a few feet away. He doesn’t move, doesn’t come closer. “I don’t know,” he says and it surprises me. I expected him to say yes, yes, I’m making a huge mistake, I need to run homenow, but instead his stare is unflinching and his lips are pulled into a slight frown. “I don’t know what happened to you, Melody. I don’t know why you ran away, and I can’t say if it’s worth going back.”
“It’s bad,” I whisper and look away. “It’s ugly. It’s the ugliest thing I’ve ever gone through.”
“Then don’t go.” He faces me, hands on his hips. “All I know is, your father’s really dying, and you won’t get another chance to say whatever it is you need to say. It doesn’t have to be goodbye, and it doesn’t have to be forgiveness. You can show up and tell him you hope he burns in hell. Doesn’t matter. All I know is, I’ve seen regret, and I’ve felt it myself, and there’s nothing you can do about that. Trying though? Trying and fucking up? That’s something easier to live with.”
I hang my head and close my eyes. War’s so smooth, so clever, like he knows what I’m going to say and he’s three steps ahead already. But maybe I’m projecting something onto him when really, I’m the liar here, I’m the smooth talker, the con artist, the fake. I’m the one shoving stories down my own throat, wrapping stories around me like cloaks, pretending to be someone I’m not. Ford saw through it, but he let me keep the lies. Kat knows everything now, and she still loves me anyway. So why am I keeping these stories and not letting myself be who I am?
“What do you talk about when you call your mom?” I ask and wipe tears away.
War laughs bitterly and looks at the trees. “I ask how she’s doing. She tells me about her latest obsession. Handbags, jewelry, artists, that sort of stuff. Midcentury coffee tables. Vintage dresses. Early American outsider paintings. My mom has nothing so she fills herself with all of that, trying to close the gaps. But it’s never enough.”
“If I have a son, I really hope he never says that about me.”
“You won’t.” He starts walking again. “Come on, let’s finish this hike. I’m sick of talking about my family.”
“Me too.” I catch up with him. “I’m really not going back.” But the words feel cheap now. Like they’re thin and crumbling to pieces.
“I’m not going to force you,” he says. “Unless you want me to.” His eyebrows raise and he smirks at me. “Unless that’s your thing.”
“You always have to ruin it.”
We keep walking together and the conversation drifts to easy, safe topics: movies, music, TV shows, politics, that sort of stuff, and I catch glimpses of brilliant War, funny and clever War, but there’s still the man that calls his mother twice every week and has such deep insights into her, and the man that has nothing to say about his father at all, and I wonder if War knows more about a broken family than he’s letting on.
Not that it matters. He shouldn’t be my focus. My father should be, and every time I try to think about Leader Ranch and the great Colton Leader, it’s like my mind bends away from it.
I’m distracting myself with War. And I can’t help it.
As we finish the hike and get close to the farm, I spot a figure up ahead riding an ATV toward us. It’s Nicky, looking frantic. She’s young, early twenties, with auburn hair and green eyes, and she pulls up looking upset.
“What’s wrong?” I ask. “What happened?”
“It’s Bomber,” she says in a rush. “Oh, shit, Melody, I’ve been looking for you all over.”
“Bomber? What happened?” My heart’s racing, and War’s totally forgotten.
“We were going through his steps and there was this rock in the dirt and he didn’t see it and shit, Melody, I think it’s broken. I think it’s brokenbad.”
Horror lances into my stomach. “Let’s get back,” I say and glance at War.
He nods. “Go.”
I get onto the ATV with Nicky and she pulls out.
If Bomber’s as injured as she says, this is bad, very bad. Not only for all the work and invested time we put into training him, but for Bomber himself—a racehorse that can’t race isn’t worth anything. A lame racehorse ends up at a knackery, slaughtered for its parts, because a worthless racehorse is better off dead.
And I can’t let that happen.
Chapter7
War
My father appears in a flurry of calls and texts two days after my hike with Melody as if he sensed that I’d been talking about him. We make plans to meet at an upscale lunch spot and he shows half an hour late wearing black slacks, a white button-down, and a watch worth at least fifty grand. “There you are,” he says as if he’s been looking for me and I haven’t been sitting at this table alone staring at my phone and stewing.
“Dad,” I say and he hugs me roughly before sitting down and leaning back with a wary smile. “Where’ve you been? You look tan.”
“Spain,” he says and I doubt that’s true. He runs a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair, mostly salt these days. I wonder when he’ll start to color it. “What’d your mother tell you?”
