Heaven’s eyes softened when she gently touched my arm. The ache to be with her was still as vivid now as it was all those years ago when she’d done the same thing on the worst day of my life. The feeling that loaded my soul at this moment told me to drop her off, turn around, and never look back at Heaven Lane. She was going to haunt my dreams forever, but there was no way I was going to poison her life too. No, what I wasn’t going to do waskeeppoisoning her life. I’d done enough of that over the last five years.
“I know today is hard, Blaze. I never forget. It still haunts me. Not in the way it haunts you, I know, but all the same. She was a good woman.”
I let my fingers drift over her left arm at the elbow. What was left of it now was skin, bone, and pain. Ever since I met her the first time, her left arm was tiny compared to her right. She could still use it for some things back then, but after that day five years ago, she had no movement in it whatsoever. Unfortunately, despite the lack of movement, the pain remained. The idea of her living with that kind of pain because of me was torture. “Not in the way it haunts me? I believe that,” I said, “but only because I know it’s twice as hard on you. You try to make this about me all the time. The truth is … what happened five years ago changed you just as much.”
Heaven never had it easy in life. Her mother, unable to deal with ranch life in a tiny Wisconsin town, up and left a six-month-old Heaven with her father while she went in search of greener pastures. Duane raised Heaven the only way he knew how, as a tomboy and a ranch hand. He once told me he’d have done anything to go back in time and raise her away from the ranch. He’d have done anything to erase that day when she was bucked off an angry horse at twelve years old. The little pixie hardly paused after the accident though, and she hadn’t pushed pause since. She was on all day, every day, and she turned me on equally as often.
She didn’t meet my eyes when she spoke again. “All the same, Blaze. I just wanted to say that I will always remember Callie for the amazing person she was.”
The way her eyes glistened had my gut clenched in a knot and part of my heart filling with blood again. It had been years since anything resembling life had rumbled in that organ, but when it did, it was always because of Heaven.
My hand fell from her arm. I nodded once, and then I turned and left the room.
Two
I lowered myself to the couch carefully, so I didn’t fall over again, and kept my eyes trained on the retreating backside of Blaze McAwley in a pair of tightWranglers. I hated that even when I had a bee in my bonnet about his damn beasts, the man still turned me on. I hated that he always turned me on, no matter the day or time. He was the quintessential Texas cowboy—except this wasn’t Texas—and he wasn’t raising cattle. We lived in Wisconsin, and he—what do you do with bison? You don’t raise them. Control them? Wrangle them?
My hand went to my forehead to rub it. I wished my head didn’t feel like I’d gone ten rounds with a bison’s horns.
I cradled my left elbow to my side; the memory of his hand on it moments ago hitting me hard. His hands were always rough-hewn from his work around the ranch but warm and tender when he touched me. He tried to pretend he was a tough Texan, but I knew the truth. He left the Lone Star State for the Badger State as a fresh-faced cowboy with endless dreams. Now he was broken beyond repair. Blaze still went through the motions required to run an operation this size, but he wasn’t present here—hadn’t been for five years. His mind was stuck on pause in that pasture where his life came to a screeching halt. It was five years ago today when his wife’s life ended in a horror show neither of us could ever forget. At first, I had the misguided belief I could fix him. It took me a few years to see that all I could do was patch him like a hole in the fence. I would never be enough for him because I wasn’t Callie. When I walked away from my job on his ranch years ago and he never came looking for me, he sealed that envelope in my mind.
Every year on the fourth of June—no matter how hard I tried not to—the events leading up to that moment in the pasture when I watched his wife die ran through my mind on repeat. Every time I looked at my arm, I thought about it. Every time I saw the bison in the field, I thought about it. I always asked myself the same questions: Was it my fault she died? Could I have done more to save her? The answer to both was yes.
Early this morning, before I had to leave for the auction, I had ridden out to the pasture to be alone with my thoughts. I wanted to sit on my usual log, watch the sun come up, and talk to my daddy about the cattle auction. I was hoping to connect with him wherever he was in this universe, so he’d do something to make sure the auction money kept us afloat. I had just settled onto that log when I noticed movement that shouldn’t have been there. My heart started to pound, only to all but beat out of my chest when I saw the horns swaying in the grass.
Blaze’s fantastical beasts were grazing in my field again.
He refused to believe me, but I knew my choices were few. I couldn’t leave them in the pasture and risk my animals, but I also couldn’t get back to the ranch without risking death. I had nothing against the beasts; they were doing what bison do. Their infuriating owner, on the other hand, gave me plenty of grudges to hold.
I leaned my head back on the couch and closed my eyes. My head throbbed, and I was afraid my eyeballs would pop out of my head with every beat of my heart. It was challenging to keep my thoughts straight through the pounding at my temples. I should probably see a doctor—I knew—but that was never going to happen. That was money I couldn’t afford to spend. Working on a ranch my entire life, I learned early on how to deal with a concussion. I’d manage it myself, but it would still suck.
A groan ripped from my lips when I thought about the truck in the creek. It was probably totaled now. Add another item to the checklist of things I couldn’t afford. I was getting nowhere fast, and I didn’t see that changing before the end of summer. I was in for another long haul, but when it came to being a Lane, that was nothing new. Two steps forward and four gigantic leaps back.
It likely had nothing to do with our name and everything to do with the enormous cattle ranch that three generations of Lanes had struggled to keep afloat. The auction today had gone as expected. I sold the majority of my herd, and not at the price I’d hoped to get for it. I would have to reinvent the ranch if I wanted to keep that land out of Blaze McAwley's hands. It was time to be a phoenix, even if I only had one wing.
I pushed myself up from the couch and stretched my back, the bumps and bruises from the crash starting to settle into my bones. I glanced down the hallway to see if Blaze was on his way, and that was when I heard the shower running. He wasn’t coming out anytime soon, so I stepped out onto the porch and leaned on the railing, inhaling the fresh June air. Early June in Wisconsin was my favorite time of the summer. It was warm but not too hot. The sun dried the dew off the grass early and warmed the swimming holes. The lilacs bloomed, filling the air with a scent that was uniquely Wisconsin. The winters were grueling here, but the month of June made it all worth it.
I also loved Blaze’s front porch. There was nothing better than a star-filled sky, a cold beer, and the laughter of friends on a summer night. The porch ran the full length of the front of the house and had plenty of room for relaxing. When Blaze first moved in, it was an enclosed porch, but his inexperience with the north was about to shine through. Deciding the windows and screens did nothing but distract from the beauty of the home, he tore it all down and rebuilt the porch to look like the one of his Texas childhood.
It was the next winter when he understood why that was the wrong move. Every time it snowed—or the wind blew—Blaze had to shovel off the porch. Suddenly, the windows and door made sense to him. I chuckled to myself at the thought. He was so arrogant sometimes he’d cut off his nose to spite his face rather than ask why something was the way it was. He never seemed to learn his lesson either.
Rapunzel came galloping back up the driveway, throwing dust and dirt behind her hooves in a cloud of urgency. The other quintessential Texas cowboy, Beau Hanson, pulled on the reins and jumped off the old horse. He was at the porch in two steps.
“Are you okay, Miss Heaven?”
I was careful not to nod out of fear that I wouldn’t be able to hide the grimace. “I’m fine. Did you check the bridge?”
He scratched the back of his neck for a second and glanced at the door, probably looking for Blaze. They’d been best friends since childhood and rode up together in that old pickup truck to start this adventure over a decade ago. Beau was quiet and hardworking. He had kept this ranch running for years, making sure the ranch hands got fed, paid, and housed while Blaze was in a stupor of grief and pain.
“Just tell me, Beau. I’m not some wilted flower who can’t handle the tough stuff.”
“You were right. There was a board missing. Must’ve busted up under you and fallen away into the creek.”
“Sounds about right. You know my luck. Of course I’d be the one to snap it.”
“Maybe, Miss Heaven,” he said. “But the way I see it, your luck held today.”
“How so, Beau? My truck is in the creek!” I exclaimed, motioning in that direction.