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I strip and pull it on. I’m so drunk I can barely untangle my braid, but I manage to get it free and shake my hair out. My heart thumps at breakneck speed. Gerard buried his hands in my hair, right at the base of my neck, and just that touch made me feel things I’ve never felt.
Fear, excitement.
Unadulterated lust.
When he held me by the nape, my body came alive. I’d never been touched like that before. Roughly, but without malice—the complete opposite of Clint. My fingers slip down my body and clench so hard my knuckles go white. Crushing the silk in my grip until my nails scrape my skin. Holding me the way he held me.
That’s what I need. To be loved so hard it hurts.
CHAPTER FOUR
KEIRA
SEVEN MONTHS LATER
I step out of the courthouse and feel the heaviest weight I’ve ever carried fall from my shoulders.
I did it.
All of Clint Garrison’s ranch is mine, including what he took from me when we married. It’s taken me a long time to acknowledge that he annexed my land into his ranch. He had me so convinced it was normal. Just like opening a joint bank account.
It wasn’t until I lifted my eighteen-year-old hand from the paper after signing away everything I had left of my family that I realized what I’d done. The Garrison Ranch owned Stowe Farm. I had nothing and my new husband was the legal owner of everything. He even marched me down to the courthouse and made me change my name.
Mrs. Clint Garrison.
Within a week, he erased Keira Stowe from existence.
The courthouse door slams behind me. My brother-in-law, Thomas, strides out. He stops to put his Stetson back on his head and shoot me an evil glare from beneath the brim. My heart thuds, I step back. My back collides with a warm body and I whirl, my fists clenching.
My other brother-in-law, Avery Garrison, stands behind me. Avery has always hated me.
My mouth is dry. I used to wonder if Clint knew the way his brother looked at me. The way he’d walk past me in the barn and accidentally hit me against the wall with his hip. Or that his hand would graze over my torso before I realized what was happening. Maybe he’d wanted me and that was why he hated me so much. Likely he just enjoyed torturing things that couldn’t hit back.
Well, today I’d hit back.
“Leave me alone,” I say, trying to stand as tall as I can.
It doesn’t do much. I’m five-three. The Garrison brothers are well over six feet and pack on more muscle than beef cattle. I’m in my sundress and heels and when I step back, my shoe catches on the courthouse stairs. My entire body hurtles backwards and my arms windmill.
I hear their laughter as I grip the guardrail and fall onto my knees. Pain shocks down my legs. My folder of papers spills out onto the dusty pavement.
My hair falls forward and shields my face. I know my knee is bleeding, but I ignore it. Tears stinging my lashes, I scramble to gather my things. From the corner of my eye, I see Avery’s boots draw close. He kneels down and I freeze, pulling back.
“I’m going to call the police,” I whisper.
“Go ahead,” he says, shrugging. “If they were going to help you, they’d have done it already.”
I know he’s right. Since Clint died and left everything to me, I’ve been harassed relentlessly by Avery and Thomas. I find my fences clipped, my cattle bitten by dogs, my barn that I know Ileft locked wide open in the morning. On one occasion, Avery pinned me against the wall in a bar and poured a beer down the front of my dress. Not one person in that bar did anything to stop him.
The Garrison’s are South Platte’s darling family. The only ranch bigger and wealthier than theirs is Sovereign Mountain, and Gerard Sovereign doesn’t meddle with our affairs. He rarely leaves the mountain save for the occasional city planning meeting or auction.
I’ve lived here my entire life and I’ve seen him once.
Avery’s jaw tightens and he spits onto the sidewalk. Ever since Clint’s death, I’ve been locked in a nightmare legal battle with the remaining Garrison brothers. They say the will is a fake. My husband’s lawyer says it’s real as they come. And now the judge declared it so.
But Avery doesn’t set much store by what the judge says. I flinch and draw back, trying to control my anger. The law might be on my side, but outside the courtroom, I’m helpless against him. When Clint gave me the ranch, he painted a bright red target on my back.
Avery rises, kicking one of the papers towards me. I stay where I am, eyes on the ground. Glued to the place where his saliva drips into a crack in the sidewalk. My chest simmers, but I know better than to antagonize him.
