Jace laughed. Lyric never quit. Wasn’t she as exhausted as the rest of them were? Looking at her, you’d think she just stepped off the plane, enthusiastic as ever.
“Here she is,” said Billy when Tristan came back to the table.
Lyric took it from there, and Jace was glad their business had concluded. There’d be no getting a word in edgewise once Lyric got started.
“Who is she?” Bullet asked, leaning in close to Jace.
“She represents a brand that’s going to sponsor riders, some in partnership with Flying R.”
“Ya think she’d sponsor me?”
“Uh, I don’t know.” The look on Bullet’s face was equal parts hopeful and lustful. Jace didn’t want to rain on the cowboy’s parade, but he was afraid Tristan McCullough was way out of Bullet’s league.
Bree stared at the box. There it sat, on the dresser in the guest room.
When Red pointed out the cabin to her, last summer, she hadn’t gotten a good look at it from across the lake. In fact, what she’d seen through the woods, that day, wasn’t the cabin at all, it was the boathouse.
The cabin stood higher on the hill, almost impossible to see from the lake.
The main floor was comprised of a large great room, with a wall of windows that looked out over Pettit Lake and the Sawtooth Range. It was as though the dense trees surrounding the cabin magically opened to the perfect view.
The kitchen was expansive, with a vintage Magic Chef combination range. It had ten gas burners, five small oven compartments, and three warming trays that ran along the bottom. Bree had never seen anything like it. The design was brilliant. Why didn’t they make ranges like this anymore?
A wooden, winding staircase led to the second floor where there were five bedrooms, three of which had doors that opened to a deck overlooking the lake.
The bathroom closest to the guest room had a black, claw-foot tub, and a raised, dark wood, tall tank, and pull-chain toilet that had a black porcelain base, like the tub. The sink was the same black porcelain as the toilet and tub, and was set in a cabinet made of dark wood. It was one of the most beautiful bathrooms Bree had ever seen.
The guest room was feminine looking, despite the use of dark wood and black accents. The bedding and curtains were made from the same cream and black-colored French toile fabric. Upon closer inspection, Bree saw there were three distinct scenes woven into the fabric.
In one, a woman and child were gathering flowers. A man, carrying a hay rake, walked with them. In the background, other people were cutting hay. A second scene showed a man on a ladder, next to a grape arbor. The final scene showed a mill, and a woman and child stood on a bridge, looking down at the water.
Bree ran her hands over the bedding, plump with down filling. Her gaze lingered on the box on the dresser. She closed her eyes and willed herself to sleep. After fifteen minutes, she was still awake. She couldn’t avoid it any longer. She was here to read whatever she found in the envelopes, and it was time she got started.
She found a Hudson Bay wool blanket in the cedar chest near the door leading out to the deck. The snow had melted, and the sun had dried the wood enough that she wanted to sit outside. She slid her feet into the furry, ankle-height slippers, also sitting by the door, and wrapped herself in the blanket. She opened the door, carrying Zack’s journal with her.
She opened the cover and found a date, along with a volume number, written on the first page. Zack’s handwriting filled every page. He’d started this journal a few days before his last deployment. There was no end date, but the volume number was fifteen.
In all the years she’d known Zack, she’d never known he kept a journal. She went back inside and pulled the remaining envelopes out of the box. There were fourteen in addition to the one that contained the letters, and the one she’d pulled the first journal out of. Each one contained another journal. The last manila envelope contained volume one. The date showed Zack had started the journal when he was a freshman in high school, two years before she met him.
She put the journals in order and started reading. It was filled with entries about schoolwork, girls, and family, as you might expect from a teenage boy.
The second journal was much harder to read.
May 3
An angel visited our church today.
May 10
The angel came back, with her family. They’re joining our church. I invited her to come to our youth group meeting.
May 17
She came! Her name is Bree, and she is the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.
Bree closed the journal, and then closed her eyes. She remembered meeting Zack when her parents visited their new church for the first time.
“Dinner?” asked Red, standing in the doorway.