No White Knight

“No. I wanted to try and actually figure something out!” I huff. “Look, I’m trying to be civil, sis, but this asshole can’t even keep his shit straight about the bank—”

“You said you weren’t having him here for the bank,” she says a bit smugly, lifting her chin. “So what does that matter?”

“Don’t you try to run that mess on me, Sierra Potter.”

“Excuse you, you’re not Mom. You don’t get to talk to me like I’m a little girl!”

That makes us both stop.

When you lose not one, but two parents to cancer…

Sometimes just mentioning them freezes your heart.

We stare down each other for several seconds.

Then she looks away with a pissy little sound, though her shoulders sag, the wind knocked out of her.

“So what if you can get a payment plan? What then? Where are you even gonna get the money?” Sierra folds her arms over her chest.

“I…I don’t know yet,” I growl. “There’s a lot of idle farm equipment sitting around here. Some of it’s real pricey stuff. Dad had four tractors, most of ’em in good condition. I could probably take inventory and sell off excess junk for a decent chunk.”

Then an idea hits me on the head.

“You know what? You want money for the land, I’ll sell off those big old combines tomorrow and buy you out. If we ever get this place going for crops again, I’ll find another way. That sound fair?”

Sierra opens her mouth to spit something at me—but stops when Declan lays an almost proprietary hand on her arm.

He pulls her away.

I watch suspiciously as he bends down to murmur in her ear. She listens attentively, nods, and casts me a slit-eyed, almost triumphant look.

God, I don’t like the look of that at all.

Especially when she straightens and lifts her chin, eyeing me into the floor.

“I might consider it if the money’s good enough,” she says. “But why should I when I can take you to court and get the whole ranch for myself?”

“You don’t even want the ranch,” I say, throwing it out with heat born from pure frustration. “You don’t care about this place! You don’t care that Dad wanted us to stay here—and he wanted us to keep folks off our land!”

Sierra blinks, her smugness fading to leave blank-eyed confusion, her brows wrinkling, then smoothing as it clicks for her.

“Oh, what? You mean that old road he was always telling weird stories about? The one we weren’t allowed to go down?” The look she gives me is almost pitying. “Seriously, Libby. Don’t tell me this stubbornness is all over an old man’s ghost stories. Did you actually believe all that crap?”

I’m paralyzed.

I can’t say anything.

Whatever falls out of my mouth right now might send Sierra hunting down that road just to piss me off. Straight into places she has no business being and secrets I can’t trust her to keep.

She doesn’t care about protecting this family.

I’ve known it ever since she sold Mama’s things and took away our last memories of her.

Ever since she didn’t come home for Dad’s funeral.

So why would I think she’d give a single damn about my efforts to protect his name and legacy?

I only shake my head, my lips mute, my mouth dry.

Declan looks at me weirdly, something ugly in his flat granite chips of eyes.

“What road?” he asks.

“It’s nothing,” I bite off. “Hasn’t been a real road for over a century. It’s just an old mountain cut, and Sierra, if you think that’s the only reason I want to keep our home, then you were never part of this family to start with.”

I don’t mean to be so cruel. But I’m panicking, my palms sweaty, my heart racing, and I…

I’m hurt, too.

Just as hurt as the stricken look on Sierra’s face before I turn away sharply, giving them my back.

“We’re done here,” I say. “Screw lunch and get out. I guess if I see y’all again, it’ll be in court.”

There’s a huff.

A growling mutter from Declan and a rattled whisper from Sierra.

Then nothing but the door slamming shut.

I’m alone with that stupid shepherd’s pie, and we’re both steaming hot enough to melt through the wall.

Guess I’ll be eating alone today.

* * *

I’m tired, I need a drink, and I really need advice from someone who understands land deals.

Here comes my next big mistake of the day.

I checked around, and we’ve got no pro bono lawyers in Heart’s Edge right now.

Holt Silverton’s the closest thing I’ve got.

I sit on a barstool at Brody’s, nursing a can of beer and waiting, listening to the ruckus and the noise. I never really got to be part of the regulars who’d hang out here throwing darts and shooting the breeze.

Growing up, I was too busy already for drunken nights, keeping a ranch operational while minding Dad’s declining health.

Sometimes I wonder what it would’ve been like.