“So, then go on an adventure, then come right back home. Or take up more jobs at Mountain Village, like you mentioned. Harold needs you. I need you.”
Something caught in my chest with her words, but I ignored it with a quick shake of my head. “You don’t need me, Camila.” I smiled. “You don’t need anyone with that hard head of yours.”
She glared, and I sighed. We couldn’t start that same conversation again.
“It’s not just about me going on an adventure, Camila. This is about me needing to find my own way. I’m eighteen now. I’m free to figure out what’s next without being tied to this land just yet.”
“Where will you go?” she asked. “Back to the reservation?”
I let out a laugh. “The rez may still hold my roots, but it’s not where I belong. I guess I’m still trying to figure out where I do.”
Her chin quivered. “After all this time, you still don’t know? This is your home. Right here. You’re acting like someone’s got you tied up in chains, telling you how to live your life. Your problem isn’t where you belong. It’s why you don’t believe that you deserve it.”
I blew out a breath and looked off in the distance. “You’re too young to understand.”
My words pissed her off, which was why I had chosen them. I didn’t say things by accident, and she knew it.
She righted her shoulder, and the determination I’d come to know so well took over her expression. Then she started to walk away, but she swiveled around just as fast. “Why does everyone think I’m too young to understand? I’m not too young. You’re just too scared.”
She slammed her hand into my chest, and I caught it, pressing it against me while glaring down at her with just as much intensity as she was aiming at me. Then she growled in frustration before stomping away down the center of the field, back toward the woods.
I wanted to fire back at her. Though I was the calm one between us, that didn’t mean I couldn’t have a temper when she pushed me, and boy, did Camila Bell push the hell out of me at times. But before I could even open my mouth to call after her, a pair of headlights flashed, causing me to turn in their direction.
The engine of Harold’s tractor roared as it drew closer, and the large machine picked up speed until I realized he was headed straight down the corner of the cornfield, right for Camila. Until that moment, she hadn’t even turned around to acknowledge the lights coming for her. I always worried that Camila believed she was invincible. She wasn’t, and the proof was in the tractor barreling toward her.
16
Camila
I shook as I walked away from Ridge.
You’re too young to understand.
Repeating his words like a broken record, I grew angrier by the second. Since Ridge and I had become friends two years ago, he had never made me feel “too young to understand.” He wasn’t the condescending type. Instead, he listened and chose his words carefully, and we always had an unmistakable comfort between us.
Maybe I’d grown too comfortable with Ridge, because his words cut me the deepest. The fact that he’d been thinking about leaving Telluride and possibly never coming back, without bothering to tell me, hurt. Harvest season would be over in six weeks, give or take. That wasn’t long enough to get used to the idea of Ridge leaving.
I’d always thought the two of us would be sitting on the hilltop when we got old and wrinkly, admiring the land that belonged to us. We would work as one, because whatever feud had lasted over a century would be over. I was looking forward to that day almost as much as all the days in between. He was about to ruin everything.
I couldn’t walk away from him fast enough. When the headlights blasted me from behind, I assumed Ridge had gotten back on his tractor. It wasn’t until the machine’s engine sounded like it was getting closer to me did I whip around to confront him again. Does he want a fight? I definitely had one in me. But the moment I faced the other direction, I had to throw my arms across my face to shield my eyes from the blinding light.
My heart pounded as I realized too late that the tractor was coming at me, like Ridge wanted to run me over with it. Before I could think what to do next, a hard body slammed into me, arms wrapped around me, then we sailed through the air as I screamed at the top of my lungs. We landed hard, and I realized that Ridge was beneath me. From the way his eyes were squeezed shut and the sound of his moans, I knew he’d taken the brunt of the impact.
“What the—?” If Ridge is the one who grabbed me, then who was driving toward me in the tractor?
A door slammed, and I rolled off Ridge to sit up. It was too dark to make out much, but a pair of dirty-jean-covered legs walked toward me. Harold Cross leaned down, a furious scowl twisting his sunburned face, then he grabbed me under the arm and yanked me to my feet.
My heart was in my throat. I’d never been so scared in my life. Harold wore his natural scowl, but his gaze held something darker that frightened me to the core.
“Well, well, well, look who we have here. I should stick a stake in the ground of your daddy’s vineyard and tie you to it by your neck, after all your family has done to mine.”
His breath reeked like an ashtray, and his tone was nearly too gravelly to make sense of. Harold’s eyes were dark brown, almost black, not nearly as beautiful as the chocolate brown and golden hues in his son’s eyes. But his violent threat scared me most of all.
I tried to shake him off me, but he held on too tight. “Let me go,” I demanded.
He let out a coughing laugh. “Your daddy know you’re here? Did he send you to spy on me? To poison my harvest?” He jerked my arm, bringing me closer to him. “Tell me.”
“I—” My vocal cords wouldn’t act normal, with my nerves getting in the way. “I mean no harm. Truly. I came by to ask if you wanted any table grapes from our harvest.” My lie rolled like butter off my tongue, but my voice pitched an octave higher. “And no, sir, my papa doesn’t know I’m here.” I gulped. “I was hoping we could keep that between us.” A silent prayer whispered through my thoughts as I let out another breath.
“And why on God’s earth should we do that?”
Ridge stepped forward and pressed his hand to his father’s chest. “Let her go. Like she said, she means no harm.”
Harold’s head snapped toward Ridge. “And you know this how?”
Ridge bowed his head. “Look at her. She looks innocent enough to me.”
My heart, still beating a mile a minute, sank. It seemed like he wanted to make no claim to the fact that we’d become friends. Right then was the perfect time to admit that he knew me and my intentions were good.
“That right, Miss Bell?” Harold asked, narrowing his accusing eyes at me. “Are you as innocent as my son here claims? You mean no harm?”
I whipped my head from left to right. “No, sir. No harm at all.”
The grip on my arm tightened like he was planning to rip it right off. “That why you sneak through my fields when you think no one’s lookin’?”
My eyes shot open wide.
“I’ve seen you galivanting through my corn like it’s your personal playground. Guess I was hopin’ my son here would shoot you before I ever had to.” He let out a low chuckle as he shrugged his free shoulder. Then I saw the shotgun in his grip.