Peyton is thirteen, and not nearly as excited to chat with me. I’d describe her as suspicious. Twice I noticed her staring at me, but not with fascination the way people do when they realize who I am. More like she’s trying to decide how I fit into everything, and I don’t want to utter a word. She’s Warner’s child, and in the interest of not stepping on his toes, I’ll let him explain to her who I am and why the hell I’m on the ranch at all.
“Where to?” Warner asks me as we approach the outskirts of town.
“The diner on High Street,” I answer. He looks at me, waiting for an explanation as to why my Bronco is parked there. He was probably expecting me to send him to a bar, because he’s still operating under the mistaken impression that I met his brother somewhere and went back to his cabin with him for a wild night of no-strings-attached sex.
“Long story,” I mouth. Explaining it in front of his kids would do nothing but create more questions.
Warner turns on to High Street, and I feel disappointed he’s not dropping off the kids at school first. Now I’ll have to wait until we’re alone at some point on the ranch today to tell him nothing happened between me and Wyatt.
Warner pulls up behind Pearl. I say goodbye to the kids, thank Warner, and scoop Libby into my arms.
Just before the truck door closes, I hear Charlie say, “Dad, can we get a dog?”
Smiling to myself, I unlock Pearl and climb inside. I need to shower and head back out to the Hayden ranch. I’m nervous to go alone to the house I’ve been staying in, but I don’t know what else to do. There are other movie people here, but I don’t know them personally. Mostly it’s the set builders and designers out here now, building out a large previously empty warehouse on the southern edge of Sierra Grande for all the indoor scenes. Calvin won’t be here for a couple more weeks. He filmed a western a few years ago and has some experience already, so he’s not clueless like me.
If I’m that scared, I need to get security out here. In the meantime, I’ll check into The Sierra and smuggle in Libby. She’s a good dog, she’s not going to ruin their carpets or eat their furniture. I think.
On my way out, I call Gretchen and ask her to arrange for security to come out.
By the time I get to the house I’m feeling better, and even mildly foolish. It was a well-meaning crowd, not a dangerous one. Libby walks around the house with me, glued to my side as I check closets and look under beds.
“All clear,” I whisper into her soft fur. She sits on the bathroom floor while I take a shower. I get out, towel off, and walk back into the room, opening a dresser drawer.
My hand flies to my mouth, covering my gasp.
All my underwear is gone.
10
Warner
“Did you hear that actress is getting lessons in cattle ranching out on the Hayden ranch? Wouldn’t it be a hoot if one of those Hayden boys fell for her?” Barb can see it now, one of those handsome cowboys falling in love with an actress.
Shirley frowns. “The younger one?”
“No, no, he’s a bit of a scoundrel from what I’ve heard.” Barb adjusts the collection of bracelets on her wrist.
“There’s no one else. The middle son is still married.”
“Not for long. I saw him walking into that lawyers office this morning.”
Shirley makes a face. “You don’t know what he was doing there.”
Barb smiles her response. She knows she’s right. She’d bet every last one of the flowers in her garden on it.
“That’s it then, huh?” I sit back in the uncomfortable chair and toss the pen on the desk. It lands on the papers I’ve just signed.
Our family lawyer, Chelsea Banks, gazes at me across the desk. She is not one for emotion, which is probably why my dad chose her years ago. “Almost. They aren’t turned in yet. You could still change your mind.”
Considering my wife has moved on and didn’t bother to tell me about it, I’m unlikely to have a change of heart. “I won’t,” I say gruffly, shaking my head and pushing up from my seat.
I say goodbye and leave her office, stepping into the bright desert sun. A day like this should be dark and gloomy, the air heavy with impending rain. Instead, it’s yellow, the sun’s rays reflecting off store windows. I slip on my sunglasses.
Two streets over is the diner where I dropped off Tenley this morning. I know I was a jerk to her, but I felt entirely unable to stop. Fury pulsed through me when I saw her standing in front of Wyatt’s cabin, wearing those matching striped pajamas shorts and top. It wasn’t like it was even sexy, but it was what it all represented. My wife chose another man, even after the two years I spent supporting her needs. Tenley chose my brother, even after… well, nothing. I have no claim to her, even though I saw her first. We’re not children. Still, I feel slighted.
I reach up and rub my eyes. What a fucking day, and it’s barely even started. I need to get back out to the ranch before Tenley arrives. I need to figure out how I really feel about those papers I just dropped off.
And I really need a giant cup of coffee.
From a diner two streets over.
***
“Hello, Warner,” Cherilyn says to me before the bell above the door I’ve just come through finishes its tinkling sound.
I walk up to the counter she stands behind. “Hey there, Cherilyn. Just need your largest cup of coffee.”
“Been one of those mornings, huh?”
“Sure has.” In my mind I see Tenley’s flushed cheeks, knowing I saw her at Wyatt’s, then the picture is replaced by the image of my own hand, moving across the signature line on my divorce papers. Cementing the ending of my marriage to my high school sweetheart, the mother of my children. The crack in my family is deeper even than the fissure in my heart.
Oddly, I feel numb inside. Maybe two years of being separated, two years of learning to be a single father, and many more years of slowly letting go of the person Anna once was, has prepared me for today. That’s not to say it’s not excruciating, but more like I’m watching a machete hack away at the life I thought I had, instead of actually feeling it.
Cherilyn walks away to get my coffee. Her back is turned, and I ask, “Did you work last night?” I’m going for conversational, but Cherilyn smells subterfuge. She turns one shoulder my way and throws me a look.
“Yes, I did. What is it you really mean to ask me?”
Cherilyn’s take-no-shit attitude makes me grin. “Did my brother come in here last night?”
She lifts an eyebrow and turns back around, fitting a lid on my to-go coffee. “Which one? You have two,” she teases.
I laugh as she places the coffee on the counter. “Not the one who never leaves the ranch.”
“Ah, so that would be Wyatt you’re asking about then? Yes, he was in here last night.” She takes the five-dollar bill I’ve handed her and doesn’t offer me change. I’ve been coming here to grab coffee long enough that she knows I don’t want change. I could go to Marigold’s, the fancy coffee shop at the end of the street, but I like the strong, no nonsense cup Cherilyn brews.