Page 1 of Mistletoe Cowboy
Chapter
One
SAGE
Walter’s drunk again…
Passed out in the stable.
Buzz—the Australian shepherd with one piercing blue and one dark brown eye—circles, whimpering and nudging him. Walter doesn’t budge an inch.
I throw a thick wool blanket over his crumpled form, resigned to the life he’s chosen now. My eldest brother. The one supposed to take over the ranch after our father’s untimely death six months back. Not drink away his life and the family’s future.
Pathetic to think that five generations of McCauley blood, sweat, and tears have come down to this.
The world may have stopped for the sleeping loser, but ranch demands never end. The life requires back-breaking work, three-sixty-five, twenty-four seven. I can’t do it alone.
I grab a pitchfork, start cleaning the stall out of habit more than purpose. The smell of hay and whiskey hangs in the air. My cracked, cold-weathered hands throb around the icy, wooden handle.
Outside, snow hangs in the gray dusk, a few flurries already starting. The horses are restless, their nickers and brays filling the gloom, hollow hoof-thuds echoing against the boards.
Not so long ago, I would’ve lashed out at the inebriated ranch foreman. But it never changes anything—not the stack of unpaid bills on the dining room table, not the man who escapes into the bottle, not the ranch’s slow decline into oblivion.
I set down the pitchfork and head to Buffalo’s stall, rubbing warmth into his neck. The big brown Quarter horse gelding has been my steady ride for as long as I can remember. Crooning to him, I talk out loud.
“The cows have already been moved to the winter pasture. But they’ll need daily feeding and watering … may fall to us if things keep going how they’re going.”
I sigh, look around, trying not to cave to the overwhelm. The shop needs cleaning, the trucks and equipment repaired and maintained. “The calving barn’s begging for a new wood stove. How do I do it all, Buff?” I whisper into his mane.
All priorities. All at the top of my list. Otherwise, I’ll be bringing blizzard-born calves into the house to keep warm. I rest my cheek against Buffalo’s soft neck, eyes squeezed shut, trying to remember a time when things felt sure, safe.
“Sage.” Ralph’s voice breaks the quiet as he steps inside the stable. His eyes skitter past me to Walter, face grim.
“Yes?” Ralph’s our oldest ranch hand, bow-legged and gray-haired, a lifetime of dust and devotion written on him.
He twists his hat in his hands, mustache twitching while he searches for words. “The boys are getting restless for their pay. Don’t mean to press you on it, but the grumbling’s getting too loud to ignore.”
My stomach churns, and I nod, unable to form words.
“With Christmas around the corner, can’t blame them. Though you know I’m good for whatever, long as I’ve got a place to hang my hat and grub to eat.”
Tears fill my eyes. Emotion flickers in his.
I shake my head, look away. “Things would be so different if Dad hadn’t died,” I say.
He shifts his weight uneasily, giving me that don’t-cry look rugged men sometimes get.
“A loss for sure, Sage. No one like him…”
“Except for Silas,” I say for the first time in eight years. My eyes meet Ralph’s.
The name hangs in the air, like it has ever since his departure.
He nods. We’re thinking the same thing, though I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know if Ishoulddo this.
“He has a life now. Far from here,” I say, stroking the horse’s neck. Buffalo and I used to barrel race together, back before the weight of this place started pressing down on me like the marble tombstones marking my ancestors’ graves in the north pasture.
“He would want to know … about anything involving the ranch.”
