Chapter 23

23

Melissa

I t’s close to midnight and I hear rustling in the kitchen.

“Darla’s getting us more champagne,” Mitch says as he sits on the couch, closer to my chair, while I let the fireplace glaze me with its golden warmth. “You haven’t touched yours, though.”

“I don’t really feel like drinking tonight,” I say, offering a faint smile.

“We’ve got people guarding the ranch,” Mitch replies. “They’re not coming back tonight. They’ve sent their message. They’re done for the day.”

“Doesn’t make me feel any better.”

Ethan and Colton come downstairs, both smiling broadly.

I give them a curious look. “What’s up?”

“It’s almost midnight,” Colton says. “We’re gonna head out and get the fireworks ready,” Colton adds. “I’ll text you to come out when we’re set.”

“That sounds great,” I mumble, but even I have a hard time believing my own words.

Nothing sounds great at this point. Nothing except anything along the lines of “we caught the cartel” or “we found evidence that’ll put Jake in prison and vacate your sentence.” Anything else falls short.

“Melissa.” Colt sighs and kneels before me. “It’s going to be okay. You’re not alone in this. Hell, we’re not on our own anymore either. You’ve seen the ranchers patrolling, right? Practically everybody is here tonight celebrating New Year’s Eve with us, for us.”

I nod my head. “I know and I’m grateful. Really. Now go do your fireworks thing.”

“As you wish, milady,” Colton quips and plants a quick kiss on my lips before he and his brooding twin brother head out. “I’ll text you.”

“I’ll keep my phone close,” I shoot back.

Once they’re out of the house, Mitch resumes his mini-interrogation. His eyes are gentle, and a subtle smile graces his face. “There’s something else.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m not doing this dance with you again. There’s something else bothering you.”

“You mean besides the dangerous drug lords who want me to cough up the kind of money I wouldn’t even be able to make in a lifetime or they’ll kill me?”

“Come here,” he says, leaning toward me.

We kiss, and he grunts softly as he pulls me out of the armchair and onto his lap. I nestle in his embrace, finding warmth, comfort, and love in his presence. For a few seconds, the world around us simply disappears. I only hear the crackling of firewood and the clinking of bottles from the kitchen.

“I feel safe with you, with Colton and Ethan,” I tell Mitch. “It’s all I can say right now.”

“Ah, so there is something else,” he chuckles.

“Isn’t that the way life goes?”

“Melissa, you missed out on a sparkling career as a politician, did anyone ever tell you that?”

“No,” I reply, giving him a confused look.

Mitch narrows his eyes at me, albeit in a playful manner. “You’ve got quite the skill at deflecting, baby. Granted, if I were you, I wouldn’t go around kissing all of your constituents when they try to hold you accountable. That’s just bad PR.”

I can’t help but laugh, throwing my head back for good measure. Mitch takes advantage and nuzzles my neck, breathing me in deeply before we both hear Darla coming out of the kitchen.

“More booze is coming!” she calls out, probably knowing what we’re up to.

Out of respect, Mitch and I go back to our original seats. By the time Darla comes in, we’re both decompressing. Granted, the room feels a whole lot warmer than before. She stops to admire the Christmas tree, still standing by the window with its colorful lights and tastefully themed decorations.

“I swear, this is the prettiest tree we’ve ever had on this ranch,” she says.

“It’s the same decorative set from the past few years,” Mitch replies, his brow furrowed.

Darla scoffs and sets the bottles on the coffee table, next to the champagne glasses and the hors d’oeuvres—I prepared a massive cheeseboard to accompany the pigs in a blanket, the mini quiches, and the crudité platter for tonight’s first course.

“Mitch, you poor soul, you have yet to grasp the touch of a woman,” Darla says, shaking her head in faux dismay. “The tree looks a lot better this year despite using the same decorations because Melissa touched it.”

“Aw…” I giggle.

“No, I’m serious. You’ve got excellent taste,” she says. “An eye for detail. I may be a cowgirl and a rancher’s daughter, but I know a pretty tree when I see one.”

Mitch sighs deeply. “I put the tree up last year. I’m guessing you didn’t like it?”

“Mind you, with literally the same decorations, you made it look like Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer puked all over that poor heritage balsam fir. By God, what a beautiful specimen that was,” Darla replies. “You cut that one down from the northern woods, didn’t you?”

“I did,” Mitch mutters, while I’m doubling over with laughter.

It’s what I need, and Darla can tell.

I need to laugh, to forget about the storm that has taken over my life and over the ranch. Hell, I think Darla needs this almost as badly as me, and Mitch seems to feel the brief relief as well. We have one another in this mess. We are, in fact, stronger together. A few months ago, I couldn’t even imagine I’d come to a place like this, that I’d leave that wretched cell and rediscover everything I love about life on the Avery Ranch.

But Jake and the cartel threaten to ruin everything.

I can’t have that.

I won’t have it. I deserve better, and these people are determined to give me better because I’ve already proven myself.

My phone pings with a message to come outside quick, so I bundle up against the cold as Colton and Ethan get ready to light the fireworks.

“Five, four…” Darla counts the seconds to midnight on her watch.

We’re out in the backyard, a safe distance away from the house. The snow twinkles underneath the full moon, the sky unraveling as the blackest backdrop overhead. It’s so beautiful in this seemingly endless quiet, as if the rest of the world has gone away with the darkness of the night.

“Three,” Darla keeps counting, while Colton sets the first tower of fireworks on fire, lighting multiple fuses, one after the other.

“Wow, y’all worked hard on these, huh?” I laugh as Ethan and Mitch light the other two towers, built after the same model.

“Two, one! HAPPY NEW YEAR!” Darla shouts.

We’re cheering and clinking glasses. Hugging one another. Laughing and wishing each other well, better than the year we just left behind. I revel in the love and the affection they so freely give me, but I make sure to toss my champagne over one shoulder when nobody’s looking.

“And here we go!” Colton exclaims as he motions for us to step back.

We follow his lead and move closer to the house. Just in time, too, as the first round of projectiles pops with a red flash before they all shoot upward into the night sky. I’m breathless, my eyes wide with wonder as I watch the fireworks bolt and explode in a dazzling display of colorful lights. Cascades of yellow sparks. Bursts of red and green and blue. Fiery swirls of orange and white. Poppers going off in the snow, too.

POP! POP! BANG!

For a moment, I’m reminded of earlier and Mitch’s rifle firing. But I quickly put the thought away as my men flank me and hold me close.

Sammy and Darla stick to our side, arms tied around one another. I can’t stop myself from smiling as I look at them. In this particular second, as we’ve just crossed into the new year, I see the brightness in their eyes, the hope for better days ahead, and the love they’ve yet to profess for each other.

“You’re going to be okay,” Mitch tells me. “I’ve said it before, and I’m going to say it until you see for yourself, babe.”

“I’m with you,” I reply. “And I believe you.”

“At least for tonight, let everything go,” he says. “It’s a new year. In a few hours, the sun’s going to rise. There are better days ahead.”

A new day does come.

Then another.

And a third.

Slowly but surely, Long Pine and its surrounding areas come back to life. It still snows heavily here and there, yet we haven’t dealt with another blizzard. It doesn’t look like the temperatures are going back up anytime soon, though, so we’re constantly prepared for a new icy front to come through.

The guys spend their working hours split between the ranch and the whole issue with Jake and the cartel. I rarely see them during the day—they’re always out, either patrolling the fence or driving around the district, liaising with the sheriff and the DEA to try and get a line on the goons who came to the ranch on New Year’s Eve. I’m still reeling from that awful moment.

My nights have gotten harder.

I wake up in a cold sweat, and while the physical comfort of the men does put me back to sleep, it doesn’t resolve the underlying issue. More than once, I dreamed of having a knife to my throat. I shudder from the memory of it as I go out on the back porch to drop a few pieces of cooked chicken for the barn cats. They’re roaming somewhere around, but the smell will draw them soon enough.

“Oh, fuck,” I gasp as soon as I step out.

The cold air hits me like a hammer, and the thousands of thoughts I’ve been trying to avoid come back with a vengeance. I don’t know what happened, but I lose control of everything quickly. The plate falls on the porch with a devastating crash, pieces of chicken scattered everywhere.

My knees follow, and I hunch over, struggling to breathe.

“My baby,” I whisper, terrified of what each of these panic attacks might do to my pregnancy.

I’m crying and wheezing, trying to take deep breaths.

“My baby,” I say it again, cradling my belly underneath a thick, plush winter coat. I’m cold and I’m afraid, the truth of my reality haunting me from every damn angle. No matter how I look at it, the situation is dire, and this whole waiting game is doing one hell of a number on my psyche.

Deep breath in, slow breath out.

“Melissa!” Darla’s voice cuts through the darkness that threatens to take me. “Melissa, hold on, I’m here.”

I hear her falling to her knees with a grunt. She gets in front of me, her shadow instantly soothing me as she rushes to rub my hands with hers. “Deep breaths, honey,” she says. “In and out. You know the drill, come on.”

“Right, right.”

Deep breath in.

Slow breath out.

“You’ve got this, Melissa. Keep breathing.”

“I’m so tired,” I sob when the worst passes and I’m able to inhale and exhale without a thousand nails poking through my lungs, my throat. “I’m so fucking tired of all of this.”

“Oh, girl,” Darla says and hugs me.

“I’m sorry,” I manage as I pull back. “I… I broke a plate… All this chicken…”

“Leave it,” Darla replies. “The cats will eat it. Relax.”

“I can’t relax…”

“You haven’t had an episode in over a week. I thought these were getting scarcer,” Darla says, her worried gaze scanning me from head to toe. For a moment, I worry she’ll pick up on my secret, but I’ve managed to keep the symptoms mostly to myself—I blamed everything else on stress, and no one has batted an eye thus far. “What’s going on? It’s been quiet the last few days.”

I give her a weary look. “That’s the issue. They vanished. They’re in hiding, biding their time, getting ready to deliver another blow. The cops can’t find them. I’ve yet to hear Colton say anything about new evidence against them. We’re in fucking limbo, every day the same while I’m barely allowed to leave the house.”

“It’s for your own safety.”

“I know, and I should appreciate that more, but I… Dammit, Darla, I feel like a prisoner. Even here, surrounded by good people and with all this land at my feet, the fresh air… I feel trapped. The way I felt in my prison cell.”

“I’m sorry,” she sighs and pulls me into another hug.

This time, I give into it.

It’s not like she can do much else about it. She is as helpless as I am. As dependent on the outcome as I am. It’s the impotence that’s killing us. The inability to fight back, to speak my truth and for people to believe me. In the eyes of the law, I’m guilty. I’m serving my sentence. In the eyes of the cartel, too.

“I’m so angry,” I say, lowering my gaze. “I wish I could find Jake myself and rip his eyes out. Oh, the things I would do to him… Argh!”

“Let it out,” Darla replies. “Cuss and scream and just let it out. Better out than in, I always say. Be loud. Be angry. Fuck ’em all.”

“I wish they’d all just… die, and I feel awful for wishing such things.”

“It’s absolutely normal and perfectly okay to feel this way about people who wouldn’t hesitate to kill you, Melissa. You’re human. You’re not a saint.”

“I’m supposed to be a God-fearing woman.”

“You still are. But with a lot of rage in your soul. And you’re entitled to it. That man Jake Miller did you wrong; he did you dirty. Rest assured, if you don’t gouge his eyes out with a spoon, I will. And don’t even think that Ethan will hesitate to blow his brains out the next time they meet,” Darla says. “You didn’t deserve any of it. And you certainly didn’t deserve part two, either. The audacity of that bastard… it boggles the mind.”

“And the cartel… how’d they buy his bullshit so easily?”

“You pled guilty,” Darla sighs deeply. “It didn’t work in your favor where they’re concerned. Either way, you have every reason and every right to feel the way you do. So don’t fight it, just feel it.”

“Oh, I’m feeling it.” Hot tears stream down my cheeks. My lips quiver as I look up at her. For a moment, I’m met with the silence of her soft, blue eyes.

“I’m still a prisoner,” I say. “And I’ve never felt more trapped than now.”