Wild Card (North Ridge #1)

I pause at my truck and hold down my baseball cap as a gust of wind comes through. Part of me probably should have stayed behind in that bar, just to be around company. I know I would have put pint after pint into my system trying to poison the feelings out of me. It would have ended as it usually does, me passing out on a cot in the back room, Del laying out Advil and Gatorade beside me for the morning. In fact, it was my father who earlier today encouraged me to take the night off, head down to the pub and let loose.

The other part, the older, smarter part, knows that I have work to do and a head I need to keep on straight. It’s the braver part, to be honest. Knowing when I get back to the ranch, that my dad and grandpa will probably be out, that I’ll be alone. With the worker’s cottage empty for now—our old ranch hand David just left for university last week—the place is deserted and there’s something about the open sky and the towering peaks that make your brain go into overdrive. When you’re alone on a ranch, you have a lot of time to think. A lot of time to dwell on what could have been, on everything you should have done differently. Thank God I have the dogs and the horses for company.

That said, it’s not uncommon to have Mav drop by. Even though he shares a swanky alpine-style chalet with Fox on the opposite end of town, something compels him to come by every other night, either to have dinner with us or to lend a hand. Especially in the summer, when search and rescue isn’t in as high demand, reduced to a few hikers going off into the mountains and getting lost.

I get in the truck and hold my breath until the engine turns over. She’s been giving me trouble lately and I’m too stubborn to trade her in for a newer vehicle. She gets the job done and, well, there’s definitely a lot of sentiment at play.

It was in the back of this truck where I first told Rachel I loved her.

“Fuck,” I mutter after a moment, sitting in the parking lot just as the skies open up and the rain starts to pour down, a drumbeat on the roof that builds and builds but the crescendo never comes. It’s almost maddening.

Hearing that Rachel is in town has put me in a mental time machine. Six years ago I pushed her away because I had to, because I was stupid and immature and full of blind rage and the kind of naivety only young love can grant you. I pushed her away, brutally, irreparably, because of my own selfish choice. Six years ago I blasted my own heart to smithereens because I thought I had no other option, and even though I’ve tried every day to put it past me, tried to move on, the truth lingers. It’s kindling for future flames.

I never told Rachel the truth about what happened that night. Why my knuckles were raw and bleeding. Everything was a lie, right down to me telling her, yelling at her, that I didn’t love her anymore.

It’s a lie that’s been trailing me ever since, like my shadow, except darker and deeper.

And it’s far too late to come clean.

What good would it do?

The rain doesn’t seem to be letting up. I shake my head, trying to bring myself back to the present. But what use is the present right now when the past has its nails in it, firmly holding on. How can I go on and shove this all aside, how can I step forward with my life knowing she’s here?

She’s here.

It’s enough to make me go crazy.

I put the truck in drive and peel out of the parking lot, faster than I mean to, the wheels skidding in the rain before I straighten out and pull out onto Main Street. The cracked stone fa?ade of the library, the yellow, red, and peach colors of the historic storefronts, Sam’s grocery store that the locals still shop at even with a new giant Safeway around the block—they all blur past me as I hit the gas, getting luck with the lights, green leading the way until I’m on the highway heading toward the ranch. Rain splatters on the windshield and my wipers can barely keep up.

Up ahead there’s a car pulled to the side of the road, a figure hovering beside it.

Even though I just want to get back to the ranch and don’t feel like dealing with anybody, I’ll never drive past someone who might need my help. That’s the first rule of thumb out here—help others as you’d like to be helped. It’s a wild, unforgiving land and people need to stick together.

Without thinking, I pull the truck over to the side of the road and assess the situation.

There’s something strangely familiar about all of this. I don’t know if it’s the force of the downpour, Cherry Peak and the ranch completely hidden by thick mist, the look of the old car, or the way the figure moves in the distance. But it’s enough to make me stay an extra second inside, grappling with the feeling of déjà vu as it smokes through my veins.

I take in a deep breath and step out.

I’m soaked in seconds and I pull my cap down against the lashings as I walk along the side of the road toward the figure.

But it’s not just any figure.

“Having some trouble?” I ask.

There’s a change in the air, like there’s a lightning storm concentrated right between us, building, swirling until I look up.

And meet her eyes.

Rachel.

Right here. Right now.

Standing before me like a rain-soaked ghost, an angel dragged from the river, long dark hair framing her white skin.

It’s like the lightning strikes me.

Right in the heart.





2





Rachel





“Goddamn it!” my mother swears, raising her fist to slam it into the steering wheel.

Without thinking, I reach out and grab her wrist, just tight enough to hold her back.

Shit. Her bones feel like a bird’s under my grasp. It’s only hitting me now at how much weight she’s lost. My stomach sinks and I quickly release her, awkwardly taking my hand back.

“Your doctor said you need to take it easy,” I tell her, trying to sound as firm as possible.

She laughs. “Easy? First you almost wouldn’t let me drive, now you’re telling me I can’t get mad when the damn car breaks down?”

“It’s not broken down,” I tell her, reaching over to tap on the fuel gauge. “You’re out of gas. I’m not going to ask how long that light has been on.”

The good thing about our car being broken down on the outskirts of North Ridge while a thunderstorm is brewing is that this might mean our dinner plans are off. And even though Hank Nelson mentioned it would just be my mother and me and his father, Ravenswood Ranch is the last place in the world I would want to be. Hell, North Ridge comes a close second.

Two weeks ago I got a phone call that changed everything.

It wasn’t from my mother, though it should have been.

No, my mother and I haven’t spoken too often throughout the years. We’ve both made a half-hearted attempt to have a mother-daughter relationship, but the truth is, I’ve still got resentment that even years of counseling and medication hasn’t gotten rid of, and she’s as fucking stubborn as ever. Even diagnosed with stage 1A lung cancer, she’s acting like there’s nothing wrong. If it hadn’t been for the brief phone call from Hank Nelson, of all people, I’m pretty sure I would have never found out. Maybe not until it was too late.