Chapter 3

Chapter Three

Zach

C losing my eyes, I inhaled deeply, pulling in the smells of the trees and the water, the grass beneath me, the faint scent of sweat on my skin from a hard day's work and the dust of the animals. I filled my lungs with the scents of the land and the work I loved so much. I concentrated on the sound of the river rushing a couple yards away while the jagged bark of the tree I was resting against pressed into my back as I tried to block out the thoughts swirling around in my head, hoping to find the calm I always found whenever I sat in this spot.

It was a place I'd discovered years ago. My favorite place on the ranch I had called home since I was twelve years old. This place offered me peace when my turbulent mind got in the way, letting the memories of the past loose. But I struggled to find that peace today. It was buried deeper below the surface than usual, beneath the weight of the news I received earlier.

Giving up on trying to quiet the thoughts that were raging harder than the river before me, I opened my eyes and stared out at the endless beauty my family's land provided. It was easy to get lost in the what-ifs of my life if I allowed it. Usually I was better at blocking them out.

What if I hadn't thrown that rock?

What if Cord hadn't caught me?

What if Rory hadn't turned out to be the guardian angel I hadn't even realized I needed?"

What if, what if, what if .

Today those questions rattled around in my skull and scratched at my skin, refusing to be ignored. It wasn't hard to get lost in the work as a rancher, especially on a ranch the size of ours, but that blessed quiet just wouldn't come today. My past had come screaming back to the forefront of my mind with one unexpected visit, and I'd been distracted ever since. To the point I was making careless mistakes.

I managed to snag my hand on the barbwire fence I was repairing earlier and sliced my palm open. I wasn't paying attention like I should have been and nearly got a chunk of my ass bitten clean off by Gretel, a particularly ornery goat that had taken issue with me since the day she came to the ranch. I knew better than to turn my back on her and the tear in the ass of my jeans where she'd ripped the pocket clean off was proof of that. Thank Christ I'd worn underwear today instead of going commando like I sometimes did, or there would have been no end to the shit I got from my ranch hands.

After nearly getting kicked in the head by one of the young horses we were trying to break, I decided it was for the best that I got my ass out of the way before I got myself or someone else seriously injured and let my crew handle the rest of the work for the day.

I knew if I went home I'd get lost in my own head and most likely find myself at the bottom of a bottle of whiskey, so I climbed on Roam, the horse I'd gotten when I graduated from high school at eighteen, and rode him out to this spot.

It might not have worked its usual magic in helping ease the storm raging inside of me, but at least I had a clear view of the sun lowering over the jagged peaks and ridges of the mountains that surrounded Hope Valley.

The cloudless sky put on a show for me, the colors slowly bleeding into each other and shifting from light to dark as the sun tucked itself away.

The snapping of twigs alerted me to incoming company, and I knew who it was without having to look.

"Thought I'd find you out here."

I turned in time to watch my grandfather dismount, leading his mild-mannered thoroughbred toward Roam and looping the reins around the branch of a nearby tree before starting toward me. My chest tightened at the way he tried to hide his limp, at the hunch in his shoulders and the slight curve in his back that was becoming more prominent with each passing year.

I could still remember the Bill Hightower I met when I was twelve years old. The giant of a man who'd been so intimidating at first sight I nearly pissed myself. Then he'd spoken, and all that fear disappeared because I realized he was nothing like the countless people who'd come in and out of my life up until that point. There was nothing mean or evil about the man. He was good, through and through. Back then, he'd seemed invincible, larger than life. But seeing the way he favored his left knee thanks to the arthritis or how he constantly reached around to massage at the ever-present aches and pains in his back was a reminder he wasn't immune to time. He'd been old when I first came into his life, and in the twenty-three years I'd lived here, he certainly hadn't stopped aging.

He and my grandmother, Becky, were in their eighties now. Time was passing faster than I would have liked, and it was only a matter of time before I wouldn't be able to seek him out for his guidance or stop by their house to con my grandma into sneaking me some of whatever she'd baked that day.

I pushed that unhappy thought from my mind. There wasn't enough room for it among all the other unpleasantness already swimming around in there. "Figured it would be you who found me."

His body creaked and he let out a handful of grunts as he joined me on the ground, stretching his long legs out beside mine. I would have argued that he didn't need to sit on the hard, unforgiving ground if I thought for a second it would have done any damn good, but the man was almost as stubborn as his daughter, the very woman who'd fought tooth and nail for me, going head-to-head with anyone who attempted to stand in her way. I learned a long time ago not to bother arguing with the people who'd chosen me to be a part of their family. There was no winning. Not that I minded one damn bit.

"Mom send you out here to bring me back?"

He took the dusty, worn cowboy hat off his head and set it on his lap, letting out a sigh as he looked out across the land. "Nah. Believe it or not, she's resigned to lettin' you have your time. Knows you need to get your head on straight on your own. But you know your mama. She only has so much patience, so if I were you, I wouldn't take too long. "

I let out a short, hollow chuckle as the screws in my chest twisted tighter. "So I'm guessin' everyone knows."

I felt my grandpa's gaze on me but couldn't bring myself to turn and meet it. "It's a small town, son. You know that. Would've found out sooner or later, was only a matter of time."

He wasn't wrong about that. I'd lived in Hope Valley most of my life, but until Rory pulled me from the nightmare of a foster home I'd been living in when I met her, I'd only been an outsider looking in. She had brought me into the fabric of this town, making me a part of something bigger than the small, closed-off world I'd been forced to live in. When she and Cord officially adopted me after they'd married, she'd stitched me in even tighter. I was officially a part of this place, so I knew exactly how it worked, and how thorough the grapevine was.

"I guess I should count myself lucky it took a whole day for word to spread."

Pop snorted, giving his head a shake. "Cord got the phone call not ten minutes after Captain Walker's truck pulled away from the barn. We've just been lettin' you process in your own way." He jerked his chin in the direction of my hand. "Which it would appear was a little more hazardous than any of us was expectin'."

I heaved out a weary sigh removing my own cowboy hat and resting it on the ground beside my cocked knee as I raked my uninjured hand through my hair. "I don't know why this is getting to me the way it is. I should be over it."

His hand came down on my shoulder, my grandpa's grip still firm and strong as he gave me a jostle. "There's no gettin' over a nightmare like that, Zach. You learn to deal. Learn to heal. Learn to appreciate the good that comes along. But you don't get over it. Best you can do is keep pushin' forward. That's what you did."

I shook my head. My grandfather was the wisest man I'd ever known, but in that moment, I couldn't help but wonder if he was seeing something in me that wasn't actually there. "I don't know, Pop. I think maybe I just buried my head in the sand and chose to forget. It explains why hearin' that they got out would hit me so damn hard."

As long as they were locked up, it was easy to forget they existed, but that was what today's visit had been about.

I'd spent a good portion of my childhood in the foster care system, being bounced from one place to another. Foster houses, group homes, you name it. None of them were five-star luxury, that was for damn sure, but the last house I'd been in had been the worst. When Pop had referred to it as a nightmare, he'd been putting it mildly. The Caswell home was a literal hell on earth, and I and the other kids who had been stuck there with me had spent each and every day in torment. Twenty-three years later and I could still remember the state of the house I'd lived in, could still smell the stench of filth and rot and decay. I could still remember the abuse. Being locked in a dark room for days on end, forced to sit in our own mess because we weren't allowed a toilet. Being beaten and starved to the point of desperation. It was the fear of starving to death that led me to my mom, Rory.

I used to dig through the dumpster behind her family's bar, the Tap Room, searching for food. There had been one time I was so frail, so weak with hunger and dehydration, that after I managed to climb into the dumpster, it had taken hours for me to find the strength to pull myself back out. I'd eat what I could, only enough to hold me over, and take the rest of it back to the other kids trapped in that hell hole with me.

When I snuck out of the Caswell's house one night to go dumpster diving for another meal, I found that Rory had installed a padlock, thinking raccoons were getting in and making a mess. The panic that had gripped my chest at the sight of that lock nearly took me to my knees. I didn't know what the hell to do if I couldn't get in there to get food. The Caswells had locked up the fridge and pantry, refusing to feed us as punishment for our sins. I'd only been twelve at the time, one of the oldest kids in the house, so finding a job so I could make money was impossible.

I'd molded that panic into rage as I grabbed up the biggest rock I could find and threw it right through the window of her bar. When I took off running, I remember being scared half to death of what would happen if the big man she'd been inside with caught me. And once he did, I remember thinking that my life was over. I never could have imagined that instead, it would officially start that night.

One look at me and Rory knew something was wrong. Cord, the man who'd raced after me and brought me back to face the consequences of my destructive actions, saw it too. He'd been a foster kid himself and knew all the signs.

That night had changed the entire course of my life. Rory took me home with her, and I never left. From that moment forward, I was hers. It had taken a while for her and Cord to bust through the thick granite walls I'd built around myself, but they never gave up trying.

They loved me and weren't afraid to show it, pouring that love on me until I had no choice but to fall in love right back. They married, adopted me as their own, then went about giving me a little sister.

For me, life started at twelve, and, Christ, it had been a good life. I had the best parents. The best grandparents. Lennix, my little sister, could be a pain in my ass most days, but I wouldn't trade her in for all the world. I loved my job, my home. My town.

So when Hayes Walker, one of the detectives who had worked my case all those years ago and was now the captain of the department, showed up on the ranch today to tell me that Doreen and Charles Caswell had been paroled and were getting out of prison, it had been a blow I still hadn't quite recovered from.

"You truly believe that, you've let them win," my grandfather said in the hard, no-nonsense tone he had used throughout the years when the message he was trying to get across was an important one. "You let them poison everything that's been given to you since you came into our lives and everything you built for yourself. Don't let them have that power over you, Zach. Your head hasn't been buried in the sand. You chose to live instead of giving them more than they'd already stolen from you."

Those screws that had been steadily wrenching tighter and tighter since the visit from Hayes began to twist in the opposite direction at his declaration, loosening their hold enough for me to pull in the first full breath I'd managed in hours.

"You're right. "

He leaned over, bumping his shoulder into mine. "Damn straight. Always am. Despite what your grandma and mom might say."

I let out a laugh, that peace I'd been struggling to latch onto finally filling me up and causing my chest to expand. As I looked at everything before me, I was able to see it all with the appreciation I usually felt.

This ranch had been my safe haven from the moment Rory brought me here twenty-three years ago. Hence the name, Safe Haven Ranch. For generations it had simply been Hightower Ranch, but when my grandparents officially handed it over to me, they'd told me to rename it. I was family, blood or not, but I wasn't a Hightower. I was a Paulson, having taken Cord's last name after he and Rory married and the adoption was finalized. My grandparents wanted me to carry on the family legacy, but they'd also wanted me to give it a name that meant something. I'd wracked my brain for weeks, trying to find something that fit this place perfectly, each name I came up with sorely lacking. Until I landed on Safe Haven. Because that's what this place was.

And as much as I hated knowing those monsters were out there somewhere, free to walk the streets and breath fresh air, Pop was right. I'd be damned if I let them take more from me than they already had.

"Ah, I see you finally managed to work it out and get yourself back to center. Knew you'd get there. You always do." The pride in his tone eased my heart that had been aching all damn day.

"Mom'll be relieved it didn't take me too long."

Pop chuckled. "She sure will. Because I was lyin'. She did send me out here. Told me I had until she got back to town in the mornin' to screw her boy's head back on straight or she'd be doin' it her damn self."

I smiled, because that sounded more like Rory than her giving me time and space. "Wait. Where'd she go?"

"Stayin' in the city tonight so she can be at the airport on time."

My head fell back against the rough bark of the tree I always sat against whenever I came out here. "Ah, fuck."

When my mom came to me a couple days ago, asking for a favor, I hadn't blinked before telling her yes. It was something I instantly regretted as soon as she told me what the favor was.

An old friend of hers would be shipping her trouble-maker daughter here from California in the hopes that roughing it out here with us might scare her straight or some shit. I didn't have the time or inclination to deal with some spoiled brat traipsing around my ranch, but despite my mother asking first, I really hadn't had much choice in the matter.

"Yep." Pop clapped me on my shoulder, then used his grip on me to shove himself back to his feet with a long groan and a ton of crackling, like his knees were full of marbles. "Figured I'd take your mind off one shitty situation by replacin' it with another." He chuckled and shot me a teasing wink over his shoulder, knowing I wasn't on board with what was happening. "You'll be fine, son. Just remember, this place is magic when it comes to giving second chances."

Damn it. With a parting line like that, how could I argue?