Page 25 of Finding His Redemption

Jax watched him go, the absurdity still settling in. Again, he thought about leaving, then remembered Echo’s suspicious eyes. All of the puppies he’d trained in prison had been bred and selected explicitly for their temperaments. They’d been friendly, eager to please, and easy to train. Echo wasn’t like that. She didn’t trust. She didn’t want to please. She was wounded and wary.

He’d never worked with a dog like her before.

He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t intrigued by the challenge.

He took another sip of scorched coffee and watched through the kitchen window as the goats scaled the woodpile. Rip still had the boxers in his mouth.

Yeah,he thought.Maybe one more day.

He could always leave tomorrow.

chapter

seven

They rodethe fence line for almost two hours, checking for damage after a spat of recent rain caused localized flooding. Jax’s thighs burned from the saddle, but he’d rather die than admit it. He’d also rather die than admit he found the ranch confusing, its network of roads and trails disorienting after living in a prison that was all straight lines and right angles.

His mount was a plodding buckskin mare with a white blaze, appropriately named Lazy Susan. She had one pace—slow—and often stopped to munch on tall grass despite his attempts to keep her moving.

River had assured him this was a feature, not a bug. “She won’t spook at shadows like the others,” he’d said, slapping the mare’s rump.

Meanwhile, River had chosen a sleek chestnut gelding for himself, who seemed just as restless as his rider, dancing sideways and tossing his head whenever River pulled back on the reins to wait for Jax to catch up.

When Jax finally did, he scowled at the guy. “A snail walks faster than this horse.”

River laughed, and his gelding pranced beneath him. “That’s the point. You’re new. We put new guys on the slow horses soyou don’t get lost and die in the mountains. Walker’s orders. You can’t get into trouble if you can’t catch up to it.”

“I get the feeling you have a knack for finding trouble.”

River’s grin widened. “Life’s all about finding the right kind of trouble, my friend. The trick is making sure you can get back out of it.”

“Since you’re at Valor Ridge, I’m betting you don’t always make it back out.”

River shrugged. “Let’s just say I know my way around an oops moment or two. Or ten. Some of us are slow learners.”

Interesting how River didn’t wear his brokenness like armor. It was a fashion accessory, a set of carefully curated eccentricities that dared anyone to look deeper. Jax had always kept his damage under wraps, the way he’d been taught to in the teams and in prison alike.

“What did you do?” He cursed himself the moment the question left his lips. He didn’t want to know.

River chewed the inside of his cheek, his gaze traveling up into the dust-blue mountain sky. “Same thing as everyone here. Screwed up more than was socially acceptable. But details bore me. Less ‘what’ and more ‘did you survive.’ That’s my metric, brother.”

Jax grunted, unsure if he respected the dodge or resented it. “You know, you talk a lot, but you don’t say much.”

“It’s one of my charms,” River said, not even pretending to apologize. He rode ahead a few yards, then swung back around like a boomerang. “You’re the first guy Walker’s personally recruited in a couple years. Must’ve seen something special in you.”

“Yeah, a rap sheet.”

“That’s the baseline here.” River gave him a sidelong glance, as if weighing whether to push.

He braced for another volley of questions, but River just nodded as if he’d made up his mind about something. “I killed my best friend, so if you’re worried about being the biggest fuckup on the Ridge, you’re going to have to try real hard. Everyone’s got a backstory.”

Jax said nothing. Mainly because he wasn’t sure what to say.

I killed my best friend.

The confession had come so casually, like River was telling him he used to play the drums, or that he was left-handed.

I killed my best friend.

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