Page 13 of Delicate Escape

Cope

That your ass is going to get haunted the moment you try to step inside.

Kye

Or murdered. That definitely looks like it’s home to some lumberjack ax murderer.

The house was in the middle of nowhere. Desolate. Set on over five hundred acres and nestled between national forest land on one side and a ten-thousand-acre cattle ranch on the other.

But that isolation called to me more now than it ever had before. I needed a place where I could simply be without the pressure of all the things expected of me. Or the weight of all the people I’d let down at different points in my life.

I wasn’t an idiot. I knew the heaviness of that weight began at birth. But what did I expect when I’d been abandoned at no more thana few weeks old? Left in one of those safe-haven boxes at a fire station one town over, with no clue as to who I was or where I’d come from.

I was lucky as all hell that the Colson family had adopted me. They were the only family I’d ever known. But I couldn’t help but wonder what had made someone leave me in that box. And what was it about me that made me so damn unwanted?

Another ding sounded, bringing me out of my spiral.

Cope

Now who’s making death jokes?

I sighed, flipping the chat tomute. My eldest brother, Trace, and my youngest sister, Arden, had already pulled that move. Their replies to the group were few and far between. Arden’s mostly suggested that we had no lives. And Trace’s were to keep us in line—county sheriff, through and through.

But I didn’t blame them. Cope and Kye would go in circles for hours. And right now, I had work to do. With one last glance at the house, I headed for my truck. Beeping the locks, I climbed inside and started it up.

The clock read three-thirty. I had plenty of time to stop by the nursery before heading home to dive into rehab plans. I dropped my phone into the cupholder and headed in that direction.

It took me a good fifteen minutes before the rustic sign forBloom & Berryappeared. The nursery was my one-stop shop for all things landscaping and also the work home to my unofficial expert. I pulled into a spot on the outskirts of the gravel lot and went in search of Rhodes.

The photo she’d sent gave me a clue as to her location. I wandered around the greenhouses and through the central courtyard, complete with a tiny café. But it wasn’t until I smelled the hint of manure that I found her.

Rhodes had her dark hair threaded through the back of a baseball hat in a makeshift ponytail. With each strike of her pitchfork into the massive pile of compost and animal dung, the tail swung. I winced as she one-handedly turned over the manure mixture.

“Should you be doing that?” I asked as I adjusted my ballcap to shield my eyes from the sun.

Rhodes straightened, turned to face me, then leaned on her pitchfork. “I know you keep tabs on me via Anson, so that means I know thatyouknow that Dr. Avery cleared me for physical activity. This cast won’t hold me back.” She lifted her arm, waving the plaster-covered limb to punctuate the point.

“Probably wouldn’t hurt to take it easy your first full week back,” I suggested.

Annoyance flickered in her hazel eyes. “I have been stuck behind that damn cash register for days. What I need is sunshine and to feel useful again.”

I sighed. “Sorry, Rho-Rho,” I muttered.

“Not you, too.” She groaned.

My lips twitched. “What can I say? Cope’s rubbing off on me.”

“Cope needs a hobby,” Rhodes grumbled. “Something other than checking up on me.”

“Being a ridiculously overpaid professional hockey player isn’t enough?”

“Clearly not.” She shifted, tipping her head back to better study my face. “So, new house already?”

I tried not to shift, knowing it would give away my unease. But I couldn’t stop myself. “The place on Juniper Lane is done. It was time.”

Rhodes just shook her head. “Don’t you ever want to actuallyenjoythe places you painstakingly rehab?”

I didn’t. The longest I’d lasted in a place after it was done was two months. And that had been torture. Everything was too pristine. Too perfect. I craved mess and chaos, and putting it all back together again, making it better than ever before.

---