Chapter One
Calvin
Goddammit! Every time I talked with that woman I fought with her. It was like we both came into the office with our dukes up. I tried to be nice on most occasions, but I was simply tired of the drama.
“For twelve years I’ve put up with your bullshit, Calvin,” she fumed.
“In a few minutes you’ll hardly ever see me again,” I reminded her.
“After twelve years?” We’d fought this round before; she desperately wanted to control me.
“I’m out, Nadine, and there’s nothing you can do about it.” I was very proud of myself for staying calm.
“You’ve ruined me!” she exclaimed, always the pouting child.
“Sell your shares too, you hate the oil business, anyway,” I coolly reminded her.
“You are a complete and total asshole!” Her eyes roved the room looking for something else to throw, but I’d packed up most of my breakable stuff and hauled it away already.
We were high school sweethearts, but I’d never let the fact that she was the richest girl in El Paso affect me. She was a gutsy little thing, and that was part of the reason why I fell in love with her. I remembered my eighteen-year-old self being awkward and sweaty when she asked me to dance. She was the most beautiful young woman I’d ever met, but she was spoiled, and I intended to spoil her more. I was a cowboy with a Stetson, dusty cowboy boots, and old school values. I grew up on the land and didn’t know much about dinner parties or idle chatter, but I wanted to carry a princess off into the sunset. Little did I know that she wasn’t the right princess.
Shortly after our wedding, I saw that her boldness was just her being used to getting her own way. She soon lost interest in me and found relationships outside our marriage instead. Stupidly, we never discussed kids until after our wedding. I told her I wanted at least one, but it turned out she never wanted any.
Other differences cropped up during our marriage that pointed us firmly toward divorce and after five years, we ended things. Sadly, when her father, Harmon Flatfield, died, half of his company went to her and the other half to me. He never liked our getting divorced, so he married us to his company instead. She’d remarried twice after we went our separate ways. Even though she’d found other husbands to torture, she still really enjoyed taunting me—and her presence alone could do that. I was sure she showed up to work every day just so she could nag me, and I’d endured the situation for as long as I could.
Then one day, everything changed when I visited my grandfather’s ranch. He’d died the previous year and left me the dilapidated old place. After listening to the long grass rustle in the breeze, the birds chirping in the wind, and breathing in the smell of earth and sky, I decided it was time to live my life differently. I was a rancher at heart. I grew up on the ranch, and I’d abandoned it all for a spoiled girl and the grind of the oil rigs that were destroying the very land I stood on.
I went back to work the next week, negotiated to sell my shares in the company to a competitor—which really pissed off my ex-wife—and I walked out with enough money to comfortably kiss my billionaire playboy lifestyle in the city goodbye, forever.
“You can’t do this!” she threatened. “You can’t just leave!”
“I can, darlin’… and I am so out of here.” I winked and walked out. “See ya, Nadine.”
I wanted to keep it simple, a clean break.
“Calvin!” she roared. “Fuck you!” I heard trailing behind me.
I was finally free. The sound of her crying filled the empty space between us, and for a moment I felt a bit of remorse—but not enough to turn around and go back.
***
That was a year ago, and I thought I’d have regrets, yet after all that time, I was still as much in love with the land, the sky, and the breeze as I’d ever been. I’d worked to rebuild the ranch, rejuvenated the alfalfa production, put my millions away in savings and tried to forget what money had done to me.
I was a solid man now. Lean from hard work, tanned from the Texas sun, and more focused on making a life that mattered than I’d ever been. Some say life on a ranch can be lonely, but it wasn’t for me. I had people around me all the time though I didn’t need anyone. I had the great purple sky and the wide-open spaces for company. My life was simple, quiet, and complete.
Little did I know, all that space was about to get much smaller as I watched the thirty-foot moving van pull up the dusty trail to Roanoke’s ranch, a mile down the road. I knew Paul Roanoke was moving to Florida with his wife—they were getting older and wanted to be near their children—and there’d been a lot of gossip about who may have bought the old place.
The rumor of an elderly man and his young daughter was the one most often believed and my curiosity had spiked hearing that theory. A single woman about my age moving so close? She could be a dowdy old troll, or a daddy’s girl, though—who knew.
It was more excitement than we usually got around here, and I was fascinated to find out. When I finally saw the new proprietors rumble down the road, I wanted to get a look for myself and as I watched the moving van kick up dust, I figured, I’d know soon enough.