Page 31 of Running to the Cowboy

I laugh as I type out a reply, feeling like a schoolboy who just secured a date to prom with the most popular girl in school.

Ennis breaks me out of my trance.

“Hey, lover boy. The fence is busted along the west side. I’m gonna go and get the gear to fix it.”

“Okay.”

“Jake’s got the steers separated from the first-time heifers already, so that’s done.”

“Hm?”

Ennis shakes his head. “Are you gonna do any work today, or are you gonna stare at your phone all morning?”

“I’m working,” I say, annoyed as I stuff my phone back into my jeans.

“Right, I’ll be back.”

“Fine.”

“Hey.”

“What?”

“How long is that girl gonna be here?”

I level my brother with a serious gaze. “I’m going to spend the rest of my life with that girl.”

“Good,” he says to my surprise. “Make sure you don’t fuck it up.”

I know what he’s getting at. He’s coming right up to the edge of saying that the ranch won’t survive another emotional roller coaster if I don’t make this relationship last.

Ennis disappears over the hill, headed to get the supplies to fix the fence. It’ll take him about twenty minutes to go to the utility barn, load up supplies, and drive back out this way with the Gator.

In the meantime, I lead Ramsay to the creek, where I use my boot to chop away at the layer of ice so he can have a drink.

While I’m standing there, something moves in the nearby stand of trees.

From the way Olivia described him, I know exactly who it is.

Chapter Fifteen

Olivia

I’m finishing up toasting the chicken quesadillas and getting ready to wrap them in portable foil pockets for eating in the field, when Ennis and Jake come back for lunch.

“Where’s Wylie?” I ask.

Ennis stands in the mud room and kicks off his boots. Jake is hanging up his hat and coat. Ennis shrugs.

“He never met me to fix the fence, so I called one of the ranch hands out to help me. Lazy, lovesick fart.”

I would be offended if I wasn’t comfortable with their banter. It’s so different from the way the elders and the brothers at the compound conduct themselves. Such formality and piety. They all lack the warmth and homeyness that I’ve discovered at Sterling Ranch. I never knew a family to behave the way that the Sterlings behave.

They talk rough, they rib each other constantly, but underneath it all, the brotherly love is evident. If circumstances called for it, I know those boys would take up for each other in a heartbeat.

“That’s weird,” I say, thinking nothing of it as Ennis and Jake devour their quesadillas standing up over the sink.

“Dang, you might be a better cook than Curly,” Ennis says with a mouth full of food.

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