the window when she leaned down and petted Max with a gentle touch. Seeing that, he decided Kenzie was good people deep down. She just had shitty taste in husbands.
A chair scratched across the tile floor and Logan looked back to find Jordan sitting down at his table. “So what’s first?” she asked. “I can call Jamie, Skylar’s best friend, if we need backup.”
Logan began to butter his pancakes and drizzle them with syrup. “She doesn’t need muscle to solve this problem with Bear, she needs money. Find a bank out of his reach that will loan her the money, and that will stop Bear’s harassment in its tracks. Ask your dad. He may know someone Bear can’t buy off.”
He could see the lightbulb go on over her head. She stood immediately with excited energy and started to leave, then turned back to Logan with another question in her eyes. “You’ll be the muscle if we need you though, right? If Ty tries to use this to his advantage?”
His face shut down at the mention of Skylar’s ex. For months he’d been searching for a place in this world that would help him push back the nightmares. He’d found Skylar instead. Maybe it wasn’t a location so much as who he needed in his life?
“Don’t worry about Ty. I won’t let anything happen to Skylar or her brothers.”
Four
Adulting Is Hard
DUST PARTICLES FLOATED in front of my eyes; the sun’s rays spotlighted them like a dancer on a stage. If I squinted carefully, they looked like diamonds glimmering on the air, like a treasure waiting for me to reach out and scoop up into my palm. Too bad I couldn’t grab a handful and make all our cares disappear, pulling my brothers and me out of our current crisis. Sighing, I scanned the bar for inspiration.
Big Sky Saloon was your typical small-town bar in Montana. It was dark, with a hunting theme throughout. A stage for a band, tables scattered here and there, and an open dance floor in the middle. Over the years, my father had purchased big game heads to put on the walls, emphasizing the hunting theme in case tourists forgot they were in Montana. The deer and moose hanging on the walls kept me company in the mornings before we opened, their eyes following me as I refilled bowls with peanuts or hauled empties the night staff had forgotten to the sink. They even had names. Rocky, the moose, hung over the backbar, while Edgar, the deer, hung over the stage. Edger sported a winter hat with tassels like he’d just come off the ski slopes, while Rocky wore a top hat for a more cultured look. Visitors sometimes curled a lip at the stuffed animals, but I ignored them. In Montana, hunting was a way of life. A way to provide meat for your family. I shrugged off their sneers because I knew for a fact Rocky had died of natural causes. The previous owner had found him dying on his land and put the poor animal out of his misery.
I wonder if someone would put me out of my misery?
“Call the bastard and try to change his mind,” my best friend, Jamie Webb, advised.
I closed my eyes and chuckled. I could almost hear Chance’s amused laughter if I made that call. It would, no doubt, make his year to hear me begging him to do the right thing.
Reaching out, I snagged another Kleenex and put it to my nose, blowing. I’d made it two steps inside the bar before tears of frustration and hopelessness had broken free with so much volume, I had to be dehydrated. That’s where Jamie found me thirty minutes ago. Knees to the floor while my body convulsed with silent sobs. Thank God, neither of my brothers had followed me. I’d made it a point to never cry in front of them since our father died. Until today in the street, I’d held fast to the rule since his funeral.
“There’s no way I’m calling him. I know Chance, Jamie. Nothing I say will ever change his mind, and I won’t give him the satisfaction of hearing me beg.”
Her brown eyes softened at the vehemence in my voice. “Does the term pride goeth before the fall, mean anything to you?”
I squinted at her. “I’m not prideful. Chance hates us for being born, and you know it. Do you honestly think he’d change his mind if I asked him to? If I got