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My toes curl again.
17
BRODY
The gate swingsshut behind me, the metal clanging over the sound of hooves hitting the snow. My grandfather comes to a stop a few feet back, a bulky midnight-black horse beneath him that I’d recognize anywhere as Kip.
Despite his age, Grandpa is the head of the ranch, and he intends to keep that position until he isn’t physically able to any longer. I’ve never understood his love for this place, his obsession with it. We were both born into the life of cattle ranching, but he feels like it’s what he was meant to do. I don’t. I never have.
Horses were more my thing when I was young. From sun-up to sundown, I was in the stables with my mother either brushing manes or fixing my saddle to go for a ride. My mother was just like me. It might have been her blood right to take over for Grandpa, but she wanted nothing to do with this life or the expectations that came with it.
When she married and got pregnant with me, there was finally hope that the Steele legacy wouldn’t die with my grandfather. My father was taught everything there was to know about cattle ranching, and he got along with my grandfatherfine. He loved my mother deeply and took the brunt of everything for her. For us.
The break allowed me to spend more time with my mom in the stables. Days, weeks, years. It was me and her and our horses.
Until it wasn’t.
Until I lost both my mother and father within the span of a single year. The trip down memory lane is unwanted, but it’s been happening more and more since I got back.
“Renner is broken down along on the far west fence. Need you to go bring him back before we can send a tow out,” Grandpa orders stiffly.
I wipe my gloves down my thighs and drop the locking mechanism over the gate. “Alright. I’ll grab my truck.”
His lips thin. “Be faster if you jumped on a horse. We don’t have time to waste around here with a man down.”
“I’ll get my truck,” I repeat.
Tension stiffens my muscles. He’s been pressuring me to get onto a horse since I got back. If he’s so against wasting time, he should drop the whole thing.
He must realize that now’s not the time because he nods sharply and tightens Kip’s reins. “Get it done and be at the house for dinner. Your grandmother misses you.”
“I’ll be late. I have plans before dinner.”
“Aren’t those studio folk getting bored hanging around this town yet? Either go back with them, or tell them to leave so you can get back to work. Don’t hurt your grandmother’s feelin’s by missin’ another one of her meals, Brody.” His words soften at the mention of my grandmother, and guilt slashes me.
“Can you ask her to wait for me? I’ll be half an hour late. This isn’t something I can cancel, but I’ll be back as soon as I can,” I promise.
If my grandmother knew I’ve been late to every meal this week because I’m fulfilling a promise to a woman, she’d be the one to shove me out the door. Her husband, on the other hand? I don’t know what he would do.
“Get Renner. I’ll see you later,” he says, and then he’s urging Kip into a trot toward the house.
My exhale is heavy with frustration, but I start toward the house regardless. The sooner I get this done, the sooner I can take a break from this place and the reminders of a past that can’t seem to let me be.
Banana: Are you busy right now?
I putthe truck in park and wait for Renner to hop out before replying to her text.
Me: I’m never too busy to talk to you.
The drive back from picking up my grandfather’s oldest ranch hand was filled with a lot of awkward conversation. We don’t know each other well at all, and while he may work for the Steele family, he’s my grandfather’s friend before anything else. His opinion is tainted by whatever it is my grandfather is holding against me.
Banana: That phone call I mentioned before . . . I have a few minutes to talk now.
My eyes bulge as I read the message. The ranch house is in front of me, the lights warm and bright. My grandmother isinside, no doubt already working on dinner. I have to leave to pick Anna up from work, but . . .
I’m calling Banana and connecting her to the Bluetooth in my truck before I’ve even made it out of the driveway. Nerves buzz beneath my skin, but I don’t back out. This is my friend.
“Hello?”
