Bet The Farm - Staci Hart Page 0,94

this good in days.”

He growled. “Get the fuck out of here. I’ll be in touch.”

“My pleasure.”

My smile faded as I walked to the truck where Bowie waited, panting out the window at me. I’d just been handed two surprises, one good and one bad. Chase might know where my herd was, and that was hope I’d lost.

The bad sat in a folder in Olivia’s possession.

I didn’t want to believe she’d accept such an unholy piece of paper. That she’d consider cashing it. This was where she’d gotten the idea to ask the Pattons for help. Where she’d driven a wedge between us.

How long had she had the check? How long had she been sitting on it without telling me? Could it have been weeks?

I hated that I didn’t know—and for more than knowledge’s sake.

I didn’t know that I’d believe whatever she told me. Not after I’d given her my trust, only to have her make a deal with the devil behind my back.

My heartache was complete—I felt it from brow to boot.

I didn’t trust her, and I could never be with someone I didn’t trust.

No matter how much I loved her.

28

Belonging and Other Lies

OLIVIA

My fingers fiddled with Alice’s crop of hair as we sat together on the hay bed floor of the medical barn that afternoon. Miguel had hooked her up to an IV, administering some medicine with a long and forgettable name, and told me to keep my chin up. We’d caught it early enough that there was a good chance for her.

The rest of the cattle wouldn’t be so lucky.

Most of them had advanced too far to save. Some had been affected by the poisoned water just before quarantine and were at the same stage as Alice—those we could maybe help. Over the days, as new water had been pumped into the tank, the copper solution had thinned out, resulting in lower numbers of new cases. And size mattered—though there were sick cows across the herds, the smaller they were, the faster they died.

We’d lose some barn animals too. But now that we knew what we were dealing with, we could act, and acting was always preferable to the hell of endless, helpless waiting.

Now the farm could move on.

It was the first bright spot I’d seen since Jake walked away from me in the red barn. Had it only been a yesterday? It felt like a week.

The long hours of the night had passed here with Alice, and I spent the time thinking. Thinking about all he’d said, all the ways he’d hurt me and how I’d hurt him. The ways he’d been right and how he’d been wrong. Maybe I had been naive. Maybe Chase had no good in him, despite what I thought. Maybe I was a sucker and a fool. Or maybe Jake was wrong.

All I knew was that we’d hurt each other again. He saw me as a liability, and I saw him as a roadblock. Here in a bit, when he’d had a little more time to stew, I’d find him so we could talk. We’d be fine, so long as we both apologized and found a way to communicate.

Hope sprang, sparkling and bright, at the thought. And I put all my focus on that in the interest of willing it to fruition.

That hope was dashed by a blood-red slash when Jake walked into the medical barn.

If I hadn’t known what’d happened by the grim calm on his face, I would have figured it out from the slip of paper in his hand.

My heart lurched and my stomach sank, my gaze hanging on the check.

His steps were long and measured as he approached, looking down at me like a furious god. “Have anything to tell me?” he asked quietly, darkly.

“I can explain,” I started, scrambling to my feet.

His eyes followed me as I rose. “I don’t know that there’s a way you could explain this one away, Olivia.”

He was so calm, so sharp, I didn’t think I’d ever been so afraid of what he’d say. The wild, angry bear could be met with a roar. But this I didn’t know how to fight.

“He just gave it to me yesterday—”

“You should have told me the second you came home. Just like you should have discussed it with me before you tried to put the farm up for a loan.”

“After you said … when you said …” I stammered. “What was I supposed to do, chase you down and hand you two hundred grand from