“Why would I go out in the cold and dirt and be around the smoke and soot of a fire when I could just stay wrapped up in blankets right here?”
“So that you could be with everybody else?” I asked. “And maybe eat some breakfast?”
“I’ll just stay here,” she said.
“Suit yourself,” I said.
I finished up my makeup and went outside to the fire. My father and Uncle Lucien were getting coffee from the pot already sitting in the coals of the fire Sawyer and Colt must have gotten going. They were still chatting about being in Montana and reminiscing about their time here when they were younger. I noticed Sawyer walking up to the fire and his expression shifted slightly when he heard what they were talking about.
“I haven’t gotten a chance to hear much about your time here in Montana,” he said. “I know you spent some time here, but you haven’t talked about it much.”
“I didn’t want to step on your toes,” Dad said. “Besides, it’s been a really long time since we’ve been here. And it wasn’t like we lived on a ranch anything like this.”
“I’d like to hear about it,” Sawyer said.
It was a simple statement, just something people said when they wanted to get to know a person better. Or even just because they wanted to connect over something they had in common. But him saying that made my heart warm.
He poured himself a cup of coffee and settled down on the same bench we shared the night before. My eyes slid over to him and his locked on mine. It was just a brief glance, but there was a lot held in that one look. I had to remind myself that my father, uncle, and cousin were right there around the fire, and my sister and Colt were only yards away. Sawyer and I were far from alone.
Even still, it took everything I had in me not to run over to Sawyer and wrap myself around him. Now wasn’t the time for that. I distracted myself by going over to the small tent Sawyer and Colt set up that contained the food. Everything was stored in coolers and secure boxes to ward off the wildlife, and I took my time collecting what I needed to make breakfast.
“Well, the Beauchamp family has deep roots in Montana,” my father was saying as I climbed out of the tent and headed for the fire. “There were several generations of dairy farmers. The farm wasn’t anywhere near as big as this ranch, but we were proud of it. We all worked the land and grew up knowing not just hard work, but how to appreciate the animals and the land itself.”
“I definitely know how that is,” Sawyer said. “I can’t even imagine what it would be like to not have this place. My earliest memories are working out on the ranch. My grandfather had us on the backs of horses by the time we were old enough to sit up.”
Dad and Uncle Lucien laughed in that way that only comes from really being able to relate to something. They understood that feeling. They could reach down deep into their memories of their childhoods and bring back the types of feelings Sawyer had about starting young and dedicating his life to his family’s ranch.
“The farm was successful enough,” Dad said. “It kept all of us supported and we did well. But over the generations, the lineage of men started fading out a bit. People had fewer and fewer children. Finally, it was just our parents and us. Lucien and I decided not to try to keep it up on our own. Rather than sharing it when our parents died, we sold the farm and headed to California. We thought we were chasing after a future full of possibilities.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever known anybody with your family name around these parts,” Sawyer said. “Or even in the parts of Montana I visited.”
Dad shook his head. “You probably wouldn’t. We were the last remaining men carrying the Beauchamp name when we left Montana. There were a couple of distant cousins still surviving, but we weren’t close to them by then, and they were women with different last names. We thought we were going to be the last of the line until Rubin came along.”
“Do you ever miss it?” Sawyer asked.
I glanced over my shoulder at him as I got a pan heating and started cracking eggs into a bowl to