Stealing Hearts (Wild at Heart #1)(77)

Beau gives me a small smile. “Food would be great.”

Rhett barely looks at me. “Sure.”

Sure? When we get done with this crisis, I’m going to throttle him for being an asshole. In the meanwhile, I practice deep breathing.

I return to the stove, where I grill their sandwiches. On the counter, my phone lights up with a message. I don’t recognize the number. I pull it up and press speaker so I can finish cooking.

“Hi, Paige. This is Lauren Wilcox from Elite Cheer in Florida. I got your number from your former coach, who said you might be available this fall. I need a full-time coach to work with my advanced high school-aged kids. Are you interested? Give me a call so we can chat. Here’s the thing, though. I would need to know as soon as possible.”

Holy shit. I grin, excited that they thought of me. Obviously, I can’t run off to Florida now, but I’m so honored they thought of me.

Looking up, I find Rhett watching me. “That’s the sister program to the one in Austin.”

“Are you gonna go?” he asks.

I frown. “They’re in Florida.”

He shrugs. “So? They’re a good program, right? Isn’t that what you wanted?”

Is he for real right now? Why is he acting like this? “Rhett, I’m not sure why—”

Someone rings the doorbell, and he pushes out of his chair to answer it.

Beau gives me a sympathetic smile. “That’s probably the guy from the Texas Livestock Commission, Eugene Dods. We’ve been waiting to hear from him.”

Rhett steps outside, and Beau joins him.

I run to the front window and see them talking to a slender man with glasses and a bushy black mustache. The guy is jotting notes on a clipboard and shaking his head.

I can’t hear what they’re saying, but Rhett looks pissed. I crack open the front door.

“But the test results aren’t in yet,” my husband argues. “How the hell can you quarantine my entire herd? Only five have gotten sick, and we don’t know if it’s viral yet.”

The guy adjusts his glasses. “Sir, I’m just doing my job, and that means containing this outbreak.” He must be from that state agency.

“It’s not an outbreak. How can you call it that when we don’t have confirmation yet? What if the rest are fine? You’re going to lock down my healthy cattle too when I have an auction I need to get to this weekend? They got a clean bill of health two weeks ago.”

Dods tears off a sheet of paper and hands it to Rhett. “Here are my findings. I’m sorry, but you can’t transport any animals from this property until I clear you.”

“And when might that be?”

“Hard to say. A few weeks. Maybe a month.”

“A month?” Rhett bellows. “Are you insane?”

Beau wraps his arm around his brother’s shoulders and tugs him back a few steps. The agency guy scuttles off to his truck like he’s afraid Rhett might beat his ass.

As his taillights disappear in the distance, I realize our best shot of turning around this situation is speeding down our potholed driveway like the devil is on his tail.

My heart hurts as I watch my husband.

I’ve never seen that kind of devastation in his eyes before. I want to throw my arms around him. I want to scream and cry at the injustice of this situation.

But more than anything, I want my husband to come to me. I want him to let me soothe his pain and be the rock he needs. I want us to be the partners he said we’d be.

Instead, he stalks off toward the barn.





42





RHETT




Sitting on Apollo, I watch the sky shift from pink to purple to black, my mood darkening with each minute that passes.

Exhaustion pulls at my eyes, but I can’t stop wrestling with the very real possibility that I’m going to default on Harlan’s loan.

If that happens, he’ll take our trucks, horses, and equipment.

Which means there’ll be no way to run our ranch, and I’ll be forced to sell it.

Could I sell some land and use that to stay afloat? Is there time to do that before I have to repay Harlan next week?

Even if I could unload a parcel of land, I’m not sure I’d find a buyer and get the sale done in a matter of days.

The bottom line is that we need every acre we have to support our cattle. Our whole operation is a careful symbiosis. Slicing up our property means we’d have to downsize the number of cattle too. With fewer animals, if the price of steer dips any more, we won’t make enough to cover our expenses.

The moon creeps out briefly from behind the clouds, and I can make out the hills that stretch past the horizon. I know every sinkhole, gully, and outcropping for miles. This is my family heritage. Our legacy. My legacy.

And I’m going to lose it.

I’m the dumbfuck who let it happen. Sure, my father’s second mortgage didn’t help, but I compounded the problem with Harlan’s bridge loan.

Shame and humiliation crawl over me like fire ants.

I’ve never been much of a drinker. Watching my father become an alcoholic made me steer clear of booze, but I admit I need a drink tonight.

Pulling on the reins, I turn Apollo and head back to the house. With each stride of my horse, my heart sinks. Paige and I have some shit to work through, but the memory of her smiling when she got that job offer makes something in my chest ache.