Chapter Thirteen
Garrett
The sound was foreign to me at first as I woke up out of a deep sleep. But then I realized what I was hearing: it was gunshots. I wasn’t all that familiar with the sound of a gun going off, but I had heard them enough in Los Angeles to know what they were.
In Los Angeles, the gunshots had always sounded like they were miles away from where I was at. But the ones I heard that morning were clearly very close to us. They sounded like they were right outside the barn and I was scared to death. Even through my fear, I knew that I wanted to keep Sarah safe. No matter what was going on outside of that barn, I wasn’t going to let her be harmed. If it meant that I was killed instead of her, I was willing to end my life that way.
“Get up,” I said as I jumped up and started to get my clothes on. “Stay up here and hide in the corner.”
I was firm with Sarah and I hoped she would listen to me. The sun wasn’t out yet and my alarm on my watch hadn’t gone off yet, so there was no reason at all that gunshots should be going off at the ranch.
The only time we heard gunshots on the ranch was when Sid was chasing away coyotes, and even then, he used his shotgun and not a pistol. But the two shots I heard sounded much more like a pistol and that scared me. I didn’t even think Sid owned a pistol; he had no use for such a small gun on his ranch. It wouldn’t help him with the animals that he had to put down and a pistol wasn’t really Sid’s style either.
As I started to descend the old ladder, I couldn’t fathom why gunshots would be going off outside the barn. At least for a moment, I couldn’t fathom why; but then a fearful thought started to fill my head. What if Frank Gordano’s men had finally found the ranch? It was a chilling thought and the only thing I could think off for why there would be such horror going on at that hour. I hoped I was wrong. I willed myself to be wrong as I climbed down.
“What is it?” Sarah asked.
“I don’t know. But you’ll be safe up here. Don’t come out until I tell you to. I’m serious, Sarah; do not leave this area until I or one of your parents come for you. Not under any circumstances.”
I could tell she wanted to protest my directions, but then something stopped her. She just shook her head in agreement and slipped her clothes back on as she moved into the corner of the loft area. She grabbed one of the blankets off the makeshift bed and covered herself with it. I hadn’t explained anything, yet she trusted me enough to listen to me in that moment.
As I climbed down the ladder, I stopped dead in my tracks when I heard a man’s voice begging for his life. The terror in his voice made the moment real, although it still felt like I was in the middle of some sort of crime show. I desperately hoped that I would wake up and realize it had all been a nightmare. If only what I heard outside the barn wasn’t really happening at all.
“Please don’t shoot me. Please; he’s in the cabin. Please don’t kill me; he’s in the small cabin over there.”
The man’s voice was followed by two quick shots and then silence. I would have been more scared had I had the time to think about what was going on. But all I could think about was keeping Sarah safe and getting to Sid and Meredith to keep them safe as well. They were my family now and I couldn’t imagine anything happening to them. But it was happening. There was someone just outside the barn door shooting people, and from what I heard, it sounded like they were really looking for me.
If I was what they wanted, then I was what they were going to get. I couldn’t let another person get shot because of me. It was my responsibility and my burden to carry. I looked out the barn and saw two men making their way toward my small cabin. There was no doubt about it: Frank Gordano had found me.
For some reason, I had thought that he wouldn’t actually come after me. At first, when I had arrived at the ranch, I stayed up late worrying about Frank; but as time went on, I relaxed. The Miller ranch began to feel like my home and I felt safe there. I slept well at night and didn’t worry about my safety. The only thing I worried about was if I was doing a good job leading the other ranch hands.
The terror of the moment had my body frozen as I stood in the doorway to the barn and watched the two men. The bright lights from the barn illuminated me and I certainly wasn’t hidden at all if the two men had bothered to turn around and look behind them. I decided it would be best to try and put up a fight. At least I could try and do some harm to them before they killed me.
I grabbed a pitchfork that we used to feed the horses their hay and I was just about to leave the barn when I noticed Sid. No, no, no, I thought to myself as he came out of his house in his pajamas. I wouldn’t let Sid risk his life for me. There was no possible way I would let that man be the person they killed. It was me they wanted and I would be the one who they had, I wasn’t going to let Sid get involved if I could help it.
I saw Sid as he stumbled onto the front porch with a shotgun in his hands. The light on the barn was shining brightly and Sid looked over toward me. I motioned to my small cabin and nodded my head to confirm what he must have been thinking, then I held up the large pitchfork and started toward the cabin. Those were indeed shots that had been fired and all of our lives were in danger. I had never been so glad to see a man with a shotgun in all of my life.
Sid glanced from me to two ranch hands that lay dead on the ground. The sun wasn’t up yet, but the lights from the barn were enough for both Sid and I to see that Ralph and Devin had been murdered. That was all Sid needed to see. He pulled his shotgun up to his face and walked straight toward the cabin without stopping to look at me again.
Ralph was my second in command and had been a truly good man. I imagined that he had pushed the other men aside when the intruders started asking about me. Ralph had an ex-wife and three daughters he sent money to. He confided in me once that he had never been a good husband, but he wanted to be a good father. He worked hard and didn’t keep any of his salary for himself. Every month he went into town and had a cashier’s check made up and sent to his family. He was proud of the support he gave them and my heard ached to know he had been murdered.
Devin was one of the youngest ranch hands we had, although you wouldn’t be able to tell it by looking at him. He was six feet six inches and nearly four hundred pounds of pure muscle. He wasn’t the brightest of kids, but he was so kind that we all fell in love with him. He had been in prison after some boys were picking on him at his college and he punched one of them who ended up dying. I honestly believed that Devin hadn’t tried to kill that boy, but just didn’t know his own strength.
I turned and watched in total astonishment as Sid walked straight toward the cabin without hesitating at all. I ran after him. I didn’t know what I was going to do. I didn’t have a gun and only the pitchfork as a weapon, but I wasn’t about to let Sid get murdered by these men who were really there after me. I would rather them just kill me than see Sid or any of his family hurt. Whomever Frank Gordano had sent to kill me, obviously, they were cold blooded killers who didn’t have any problem with murdering an old man if Sid was standing in front of them.
Sid stood outside of the cabin about twenty feet away and just as I caught up to him the two men walked out the front door. There was no yelling at them. Sid didn’t give them a chance to put their weapons down. There were just two shotgun blasts to their bodies and the men fell straight to the ground. It was quite a sight to see as their bodies collapsed onto each other and everything went silent.
My hands shook, my whole body shook, as I walked with Sid over to them. He flipped the porch light on and we saw that one of the men was the new ranch hand that Sid had just hired. Sid had known that his hiring of ranch hands was the only way to get close to me. He had held off as long as he could before he finally hired the man. We had talked about it and Sid was going to lose other men from exhaustion if he didn’t get more help. We both shook our heads. It was a horrific scene, but we didn’t have time to linger over their bodies.
“Go check on those two,” Sid ordered me.
As I ran over to the other two men, I saw Meredith in Sid’s office. She was on the phone with someone, but appeared remarkably calm. It struck me that she knew exactly what to do and wasn’t crying or screaming in panic. Meredith Miller was a pretty strong woman.
When I got to Ralph and Devin’s bodies, it was clear there was nothing we could do for them. They had both been shot in the head a point blank range. The other men were standing at the window of the bunkhouse and slowly came out as they realized the two assailants were dead. Their eyes looked at me and I felt their stares even before any of them spoke.
The brains of Ralph and Devin were spewed out all over the dirt and I was the one the men were looking at. They knew I hadn’t actually shot the two, but I suspected they also knew that the gunmen had really been looking for me.
That evening I had my fill of gruesome bloodied bodies, that was for sure. I had never been so close to a dead body and it seemed unreal that I had four of them all around me. It was almost too much for me to handle and I desperately tried not to look at them anymore.
Instead, I looked at the ranch hands and searched the hate in their eyes; it wasn’t much easier to look at that. These men had been my co-workers and friends, but in that moment, they appeared fearful of me. I saw it in their eyes. They thought I had something to do with their friends being murdered. Which, technically I did. It was me who those men had wanted and I knew it.
“They were looking for you,” one of the ranch hands said. “They had your picture.”
His voice was filled with contempt and hate toward me. I didn’t know what to say or do. It was true, I knew it. If I hadn’t of been at that ranch Ralph and Devin would still be alive.
“I’m sorry,” I said quietly.
The group of men just looked at me and then at Sid. They were scared and didn’t know what was going on. I didn’t blame them for hating me. I had put their life at risk and their friends had been murdered all because of me. I deserved their hatred. I deserved every stare they were giving me. My heart sank as the scene unfolded and the reality of the situation began to weigh heavily on me.
Never in my life had I felt responsible for a man’s death before I got mixed up with Frank Gordano. My money hungry decision had changed the lives of so many people and ended the lives of good men. I was sick to my stomach. In that moment, I was feeling the true consequences of my actions. Up until that second I had believed my consequences were only that I had been sent away to the Montana ranch and that I had to take time out of my life. But that was not true at all.
My actions in deciding to work with Frank were a ripple effect that had changed so many people’s lives. I wished I could take it all back. I would give every last penny that I made back and I would live the already great life I had. But I couldn’t take it back, nothing I said or did could change what had happened that night.
Two good men were lying there dead, all because of me. It was a senseless act of violence and I felt so guilty I almost collapsed right there in the dirt. Since arriving at the Miller’s ranch I had only worried about my own life. It had never dawned on me that Frank Gordano would actually kill innocent people to get to me. And from what I heard, Devin had even willingly told them where I was, but the killers didn’t care and shot him anyways.
I stood there looking at Ralph and Devin as tears filled my eyes. They were dead and I was alive. It was a horrible injustice yet I couldn’t do a thing about it. I couldn’t bring them back to life and I couldn’t change what had happened.
Everything had happened so quickly that when I looked up and saw Sarah standing in the barn doorway it felt like it had been hours since I had been lying next to her. But in reality, it had probably only been about five or ten minutes. She had stayed in the barn like I ordered her, but with the talking of the men from the bunkhouse, she finally emerged.
“Daddy,” Sarah yelled as she ran over to her father who was walking toward me with his shotgun in hand. “What happened?”
“I need you to gather the men and keep them occupied. Take them to the north barn and feed the animals or something. Just keep them away from all this,” Sid said without actually answering her as to what was happening.
Sarah stood looking at Ralph and Devin in total shock and then looking at me. There was no time to explain what had happened; I would just have to talk to her later. For the time being, we weren’t one hundred percent sure that we had everyone who had come there to kill me and it wasn’t a good idea for Sarah, or anyone, to stay there.
But I knew that Sarah had heard Devin’s pleas to save his life just like I had heard them. She knew that the men had been looking for me and she knew that I was the reason that poor Ralph and Devin were lying there with holes in their heads. I couldn’t take the disappointment and sadness in her eyes. I couldn’t stand the way she was looking at me one more second.
She moved toward me and reached out to touch my arm. The look of concern on her face wasn’t something I deserved. She could keep her pity for Ralph and Devin and their families. Sarah had no idea the truth behind it all. She didn’t know that it was my fault those men were dead. Sarah had no idea what I had done to be sent to her ranch and how many lives I had ruined because of my selfishness. I couldn’t take her sympathy another moment. I didn’t deserve sympathy.
“Go!” I said firmly as she looked at me and tears continued to stream down my face.
It caught her off guard how I yelled at her and I was sorry about that. But I couldn’t have her staying there and looking at me the way she was. I couldn’t have her asking me a bunch of questions, because I wasn’t going to answer them. But most of all I wasn’t going to have something happen to her while I had a breath left in my body. She could hate me if she needed to, but I needed her to follow her father’s directions and get out of the area.
“Agent Walker is on his way. He’ll arrive in a couple hours. He said to let local police do what they needed to do with the scene,” Meredith said as she walked up to the three of us.
Sarah looked at her mother and then her father; she had no idea what was going on but she followed her father’s directions and gathered the men to bring up to the other barn. She was shaking as she walked past me and I wanted to reach out to her, but I kept my hands to myself. When this was all over with, Sarah wasn’t going to like me all that much. She was probably going to hate me for lying to her and hate me for putting her family’s life in danger, but because of her father, she was alive and so was I.
“I’m sorry,” I said to Sid as we stood there waiting for the police to arrive.
It had been a few minutes since Sarah had left with the men and none of us knew what to say or do. We couldn’t touch anyone and we couldn’t leave. We just had to stay there and wait. The only thing I could think to say was some sort of apology for the face that I was there and that those men had come after me.
“Boy, don’t be sorry. What’s done is done. I’m just glad I took those bastards out. Your agent will be picking you up when he arrives. You’ll need to gather your things, but wait until the local police have arrived. I don’t want you disturbing the crime scene.”
“Has this ever happened before?” I asked, suddenly curious how Sid seemed to know the exact protocol for what was going to happen next.
“Not exactly. But you’d be surprised at how many people we’ve hidden here and how many criminals have tried to find them. It’s the first time someone actually worked their way into the property though. We’ve had deaths on our ranch before, but it’s usually ranch hands getting drunk and stupid.”
“It’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have gone into town when I first got here. I’m so sorry,” I said through my tears.
If I had been in my right mind, I would have been embarrassed by the number of tears I was still shedding. But I wasn’t in my right mind. I was a mess. The events of the last year had all culminated into that moment and my nerves were utterly shot. I could have been killed that night. If Sarah and I had decided to go back to my cabin, we both would have been dead at that very moment. It was enough to shake me all the way down to my soul.
“Come on now, Garrett, that was months ago. We can’t change all that. The important thing is that you’re still alive,” Meredith said as she hugged me.
I totally lost all control of my emotions as Meredith’s arms held onto me. It had been a really long time since I had a good cry and there seemed no better time than to mourn the lives of two men. I felt safe there with Meredith and even with Sid. He didn’t seem to be judging my tears at all, although his hands were still steady as could be. It was impressive to me that Sid had just shot two men and then wasn’t even shaking at all.
Everything about my situation was more real in that moment than it had been since that day over a year before when I was pulled into the questioning room at the police station. This wasn’t the life I had hoped for, but it was my life and my mistakes. I hated that other people’s lives had been taken all because of mistakes I had made.
I could hear the sirens roaring in the distance and felt like I was in a daze as they arrived on the ranch. Meredith and I walked over to the front porch and sat down while Sid talked to the officers. The sun was coming up and it helped to illuminate the full scene as the officers swept the rest of the ranch to make sure there were no other people hiding and waiting to kill people.
Meredith talked to me and even held my hand a little as she calmed my nerves. I could tell she was a great mother and wished my own mom was still alive. I would have loved to of had a hug from my own mother that day. But Meredith would do just fine. She was sweet and calm as she kept me busy talking and tried to avoid any conversation about the incident that had just happened.
When they got to the barn, one of the officers noticed the secret love nest in the attic and came to talk to Sid about it. I walked over toward him and was ready to admit to what had happened between Sarah and I, but apparently, I didn’t have to. Sid already seemed to know. Maybe it was because both Sarah and I had come out of the barn that morning, or maybe Sid had known all along; but he clearly knew that Sarah and I had been sleeping together.
“No, they weren’t up there. My daughter and Garrett were up there,” Sid said as he pointed to me.
“What’s your name?” one of the officers asked me, as he looked at his notebook and seemed not to be able to find the name that Sid had given him.
It seemed like a simple enough question and yet I didn’t exactly know how to answer him. I had gone by Garrett Reynolds for a year, but that wasn’t my real name. Which name was I supposed to give him? Could I even trust him? I really didn’t know.
“Garrett Reynolds,” I said with an unsure voice.
“It’s okay, I know this man. His name is Chief Canter. You can trust him,” Sid said.
That was all I needed to know. If Sid trusted the man, I knew beyond a doubt that I could trust him as well. I would have given the man my real name right away, but I had been told to never give that out when I arrived at the ranch.
“My name is Malcolm Edwards,” I said.
“The FBI will be here shortly; they are going to want to get Malcolm out of here and safe as quickly as possible. Can he grab his things from the cabin?” Sid asked.
“I’ll have one of my guys go in with him.”
“Thanks.”
Sid patted me on the back as we stood there and watched the crime scene investigation as it unfolded. I was really glad I had been placed there with Sid and his family. I was certain had I been anywhere else, I wouldn’t have been alive at that moment. Sid had saved my life. I would always remember him and all my time at the ranch, no matter what else was in store for me with the trial and my future.
It took the police over three hours before they cleared my cabin so I could go in and grab my things. Not like I had anything else to do with my time, but did seem like a very long wait for the five minutes that I was in the cabin to gather my things. There weren’t many things that I had to grab. Some clothes, my journal, and a few small items I carried with me when I arrived.
The moment was surreal as I walked out the back door of the cabin with the same small bag that I had arrived with. I needed to find Sarah. I couldn’t leave without talking to her first. The agent was going to be there at any moment and I had to find her.
“Where’s Sarah?” I asked Sid.
“At the barn up north.”
“I’m going to take Buckjoy up there and say goodbye before I have to leave,” I said as I started to leave.
“Sorry, son. You’re not going anywhere; Chief Canter said I need to make sure you’re still alive when the agent arrives for you.”
I looked desperately at the officer and then over to Sid, neither of them seemed to care at all that I would totally destroy Sarah’s heart if I left without even saying goodbye to her. I had to talk to her. I had to apologize for the lies I had told and the omissions I had left out. I couldn’t have her last memory of me being my yelling at her to go.
“Please,” I begged Sid.
“No.”
He didn’t look at me at all when he answered. I wasn’t sure if he was angry at me for wanting to say goodbye to Sarah or angry because I was pushing them to say goodbye even after they told me no. Maybe he was angry that Sarah and I had been together; I really didn’t know. But I had to risk it. If I risked nothing else at all, I had to risk them being angry at me so I had the opportunity to see her and explain my side of things.
I looked to Meredith for help. She was kind and understanding, certainly she would say something in my defense so I could go say goodbye to Sarah. Meredith wouldn’t want her daughter’s heart-broken; I was sure of it.
But as I looked at Meredith, she turned just shook her head and motioned for me not to push it. She was on their side. No one wanted me to see Sarah or say good-bye to her. My stomach was in knots thinking about how much she was going to hate me.
We waited and watched as the coroner came and picked up the dead bodies. Then, just like clockwork, Agent Walker arrived to take me away. He exchanged pleasantries with the local police and then with Sid before coming over to check on me.
“Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve seen you. And sorry it’s under these circumstances.”
“I have a friend that’s up at the north barn. I need to say goodbye to her before we leave,” I responded to him without exchanging the normal pleasantries.
Agent Walker looked at Sid who shook his head no, and that was all it took for my request to be denied. I knew I had lost the battle. I was exhausted from the events of the morning and the adrenaline had drained from my body and left me so tired I could hardly keep my eyes open. As much as I wanted to see Sarah, I had to admit defeat.
“Let’s get you back home. They have scheduled you to testify via video tape and are hopeful that Gordano will take a plea after seeing that you’re still alive.”
“Okay,” I said in defeat.
I turned toward Sid to tell him what I thought of him and all he had done for me. Sure, I was angry that he didn’t want me to say goodbye to Sarah, but that didn’t matter. I knew he had gone above and beyond to keep me safe and that deserved my praise.
“I’ll never forget you, Sid. You’re a man I’d like to be someday. Thanks for everything,” I said as I extended my hand and he grabbed a hold of it.
“Keep yourself out of trouble.”
“I will.”
Meredith walked over and I was about to extend my hand to say goodbye to her, but then I reached for her and gave her one last hug. She had been the first person to hug me when I arrived and she would be the last hug I got before I left.
“You tell Sarah the truth for me. Tell her what we had was real. Please,” I said in her ear.
Meredith just looked at me and smiled as I pulled away. I wanted to hear her say that she would tell Sarah. I needed to know that Sarah wasn’t going to be told what a horrible person I was. It might not matter at all, but I wanted some sort of affirmation that Meredith would tell Sarah the truth.
“It was a pleasure meeting you,” Meredith said sweetly as she stood there with Sid.
They both waved at me as I walked to the car and got in with agent Walker. My time at the Miller ranch had saved my life. They had provided me the protection I needed while I waited for the trail and all I had given them was a horrific crime scene to clean up after.
I felt empty as we drove away. Like nothing I had contributed over the last year had mattered at all. All I could hope for was that they would forgive me for my mistakes and that Sarah would be able to look back fondly on the time we had together. I had to truth that she would be able to see I was genuine with her, even if I had lied to her about my past.
Chapter Fourteen
Sarah
“Do you want to come help me with breakfast?” my mother asked me as she stood over my bed.
“No, I want to sleep.”
“Honey, it’s been two weeks. We need to move forward.”
“I’m tired mom. Maybe I’ll get up tomorrow and help.”
My mother meant well, I knew it. She just didn’t like seeing me sad. Hell, I didn’t like being sad. I had expected Garrett would leave eventually, but I had always expected to have plenty of time to say my goodbyes. I just wasn’t ready to have him totally gone from my life without any notice at all.
For months, we had spent every single day together and then suddenly he was gone. I tried to understand why he had left; my brain knew it wasn’t his choice and he had probably no option to stay. But my heart hurt. It hurt thinking of Garrett living his life without me.
Even though we had settled on our relationship being just fun, deep down I thought it might be more someday. I thought he would grow to care about me and decide he wasn’t going to run off to Washington for that job.
But as the details of everything unraveled, I learned that Garrett wasn’t going to a job in Washington. He wasn’t going anywhere. My father had been hired by the FBI to hide Garrett at our home and keep him safe until he testified against some drug dealer or something. It all sounded really good and legitimate, yet I couldn’t shake the feeling that Garrett had lied right to my face. He hadn’t just done it once; everything I knew about the man was in question.
“You know your father and I weren’t allowed to tell you about the program. We are sorry we had to lie to you. But Garrett, I mean Malcolm, wasn’t allowed to tell you either. You can’t stay mad at us all forever.”
“I’m not mad, mother. I’m tired. Can you just let me sleep?” I lied.
Of course, I was mad at Garrett, or Malcolm, or whatever his name was. And I was also mad at my parents for keeping me in the dark during the whole thing. If my parents were allowed to know all the details, I didn’t understand why I couldn’t have been told about everything.
Instead, the three of them conspired to keep me in the dark and pretend that Garrett was a totally different person. This Malcolm guy wasn’t even someone I would have liked. I hated the corporate guys who were so self-absorbed that they couldn’t see a decent woman standing right in front of them. I liked Garrett, the drifter who wanted to make something of himself. That was the man I had fallen in love with.
“All right, but I’m coming back to check on you after breakfast.”
“Maybe make it after lunch so I can actually get some sleep,” I said as I pulled the blankets up over my head.
I wasn’t mad at my mother or my father; frustrated would have been a better word for it. As an educated woman, I understood there were rules in place around them agreeing to work with the FBI. In fact, I found it pretty cool that they had been hosting FBI witness protection people for the last twenty years. It made a lot of sense to me when they started explaining everything. I remembered so many of the men who had been at our ranch. It made a lot more sense that those men were from the program and not people my father had chosen to hire.
Like the guy who never worked past noon. I could never figure out why my father kept him around. It had been one of those things that baffled me and my father never could give me a good explanation for keeping the guy. It was a relief to have some of those puzzle pieces from my past finally falling into place. But I stubbornly still wished that they had been able to tell me the details of what was going on. If I had been informed, I would have been much more emotionally prepared when Garrett left the ranch.
I wasn’t mad at Garrett, or Malcolm, either; if I really thought about it, I wasn’t angry—I was sad. My mother had explained to me that he wanted to say goodbye before he left and she told me how sad he had been that they made him leave without seeing me. From what she told me, I could tell that he was a decent guy, but it still didn’t change the fact that I had started to have feelings for a man who wasn’t at all who he said he was. And even if I did get over that information, he was gone and would never be back again.
My heart still hurt though and I couldn’t make the hurting stop. Garrett and I were friends, at the very least, and I thought he would have given me some sort of clue to what was going on. He couldn’t have thought I would tell anyone. I wished I could talk to him, or write to him, but my father didn’t have contact information for him at all. Well, I hadn’t specifically asked for it, but I assumed he didn’t know how to get in touch with Malcolm. Once the FBI came to take him away, my father’s job was complete, and Malcolm was back in the hands of the government.
I knew that Garrett’s real name was Malcolm Edwards, but I didn’t know much more about him at all. It was weird to have known a man intimately and then found out he wasn’t that person at all. I Googled him and found out he own an airline or something like that. There were photos of him out at clubs with beautiful women and partying with celebrities; that man, Malcolm Edwards, looked like the man I fell in love with but he wasn’t the same person.
Tons of questions constantly ran through my head when I remembered conversations that we had had together. Were his parents really dead? Did he really come from Wyoming? Was he really writing in a journal so he could write a book someday? There was no way of knowing what had been real and what had been just part of his story.
I questioned everything that he said, every conversation and confidence we had had together. How much of the Garrett that I knew was the same as the real man named Malcolm? I might never have the answers. There was a genuine possibility that I would never see Garrett again and that I would have to learn to live with the questions that were filling my mind constantly.
My mother was right; I needed to get up out of bed and start participating in my own life again, but I was just so tired. My whole body physically hurt at the thought of climbing out of bed and each day I put it off. I kept telling myself it would get better. I would stop missing Garrett. I would get over him. But the truth was that it had been two weeks and I still missed his touch terribly.
Garrett had been a great love to me. His personality, his smile, even his damn body were embedded in my brain and I couldn’t forget about them. I didn’t know if I wanted to forget about them. I had fond memories of our time together and I just needed to figure out how to combine those fond memories with the reality that he was gone and would never be coming back.
As much as I wanted to sleep my morning away, I just couldn’t sleep. My mind raced with thoughts and questions about Garrett and I finally sat up in bed and turned the news on. The morning national news was bound to lull me back to sleep.
“International drug smuggling king, Frank Gordano, was found murdered in his cell this morning,” the newswoman said. “He was set to stand trial after murdering a pilot with Edwards Aviation last year. The CEO of Edwards Aviation, Malcolm Edwards, had been in hiding preparing to testify against the drug king. It’s unknown if he will retake control of his company now that Gordano has been murdered.”
I sat up in bed at looked at the screen in awe as a picture of Garrett, or Malcolm, flashed across the screen. He looked so different in the picture they had of him. He was in a tailored suit with his hair shorter and it took me a minute to realize the person on the screen and the person I knew were the same. He didn’t look like the douchebag I had seen in the clubs when I had searched Google for him.
When my father had explained what the protection program was and how it worked with our ranch, I knew that Garrett had been mixed up in something dangerous. I knew it the moment I had walked out of the barn and saw poor Ralph and Devin murdered. Garrett looked so distraught in that moment and I only wanted to comfort him, but he wouldn’t even allow it. I could only make assumptions as to why he pushed me away, but it didn’t matter any longer.
I was happy for Garrett though. The news that the man who wanted him dead was actually dead himself had to be good for him. I hoped he would be able to get back to his own life and maybe even forget about the horrors he had gone through at our ranch. Even if I never saw him again, I wished only happy things for Malcolm. Under the lies that I still had to sort out in my head, I knew he was a good man. Maybe not the right man for me, but he was a good man.
The news had given me a small feeling of closure though. Garrett was going to go back to his old life and I figured I would have to go back to mine. There was no use in sleeping my life away, I needed to get up and get moving. My mother was right: I had a life of my own to live and lying around in bed wasn’t going to help me at all.
Reluctantly, I climbed out of bed and into the shower. I was going to make an effort at my day and see if I couldn’t shake the feeling of loss that had been hovering over me since Garrett had left. It felt like he was dead to me and I supposed the man I knew was dead. Instead of Garrett, there was a man named Malcolm walking around the world and getting back to the life he had taken a break from. Garrett didn’t even exist; he was a made-up person who had hidden at my family’s ranch to stay safe. Garrett was no more real than a dream and it was about time I tried to forget about him.
Most of my memories of Garrett seemed skewed by the picture of the man I saw on the television. That man looked like he hadn’t struggled a day in his life, he was rich and good looking. Malcolm Edwards wasn’t the man I fell in love with and the reality of that hit me hard as I walked toward the gathering room to help my mother with breakfast. The man that I had shared so many conversations and nights with had talked about losing his parents at a young age and struggling hard to get where he was. It didn’t seem to match up at all with that rich man I had seen on the news.
Work on the ranch had returned to a somewhat normal pace again. My mother and father had decided to stop working with the FBI and take a much-needed break from that world. Life went on for us and that meant we were up early and taking care of the ranch, just like normal. The animals that we cared for didn’t care about the drama that was going on around us; they still had needs and we still had to take care of them.
“You got up,” my mother said excitedly as I walked into the kitchen area.
“Oh, mom, you are just so convincing, I couldn’t stay sleeping another moment longer.”
“Well get to cutting up those vegetables for me,” she said as she pointed to a pile of onions, peppers, and mushrooms. “I’ve gotten a little behind this morning. I’m glad you came down to help.”
“Omelets?” I asked.
“Yep, it’s their favorite. Everyone is going to be here soon; just bring those vegetables up to me when you get them done.”
My mother grabbed a few things and made her way to the front of the line so she could start making omelets for everyone. I curled my fingers under and held onto an onion as I started to chop it up.
The memory of standing in that exact same sport with Garrett was fresh in my mind and I couldn’t help but smile. He had pretended like he didn’t know a thing about chopping vegetables, yet as soon as I showed him what to do Garrett was slicing and dicing them up like a professional. It made me laugh to think about how he had tricked me into standing with him and holding his hand to slice up the vegetables.
I couldn’t forget about his bandaged hands and those sores that he had from shoveling horse shit the first few weeks before I had arrived home. I had never seen anything like that and at least now it made a little more sense why he had such sensitive hands. Malcolm didn’t look like he had worked much with his hands at all.
That moment with Garrett still seemed very much real in my mind. He hadn’t seemed like he was lying to me. The way he looked at me, the way his hands touched me, they had all seemed so genuine. I missed that feeling. I wasn’t sure what had been real between us and what had just been part of his game to occupy his time while he was on the ranch. Of course, I wanted to think that every moment we had spent together was totally real, but I wasn’t that naive.
Honestly, I tried not to blame Garrett, or Malcolm, too much. He was stuck with us and why not enjoy the time? He was a hot, young guy and he had been a perfect gentleman with me. He had even warned me on several occasions that he wasn’t going to be around forever. But I just couldn’t shake the feeling that what we had might have been the real deal.
When we were alone together, his looks, his touch, they all felt like reality to me. I knew that it was real for me, the time I had spent with him was totally real. I cared about Garrett, even loved him, and now he was gone and I was left on the ranch to pick up the pieces.
I hadn’t loved many men in my life, so it was just going to be difficult for me to work through losing him. But I was a strong woman, I knew that about myself and I knew eventually his memory would fade away and someone new would show up in my life. At least my mind knew all of that, the rest of me just had to catch up.
My self-pity party had gotten away from me, and before I knew it, I had cut up all the vegetables. I was dazed and totally distracted and it was a good thing I hadn’t cut off one of my fingers in the process. I gathered the bowls up and brought them to my mother as she made omelets for the men.
“Here you go,” I said as I started to head back to the kitchen.
“Stay. I could use an extra hand this morning. It takes me forever to make each of the omelets and the men can get to work quicker if you help me.”
Reluctantly, I found another pan and started to make omelets with her as the men came through the line. The ranch hands didn’t look all that excited to be up that early and I couldn’t help but smile when I noticed the newest man running in at the last moment before we stopped serving breakfast. He was out of breath and looked totally disheveled as he stood in front of us.
“I just don’t know how these guys all get up so early without an alarm,” he said as he chose his toppings. “Is there some sort of trick?”
“I don’t know,” I lied to the young man. “Maybe talk with George and see what he has to say.”
George was the new manager of the ranch hands. He had worked with us for about three months and had known Garrett, as well as the two men who had died. George was a quiet guy and not much to look at, but he was good enough at the job and the men trusted him. Trust was a hard thing to earn with the men who worked for us and it was the best indicator of if a new manager would do a good job. If the men trusted him, he was likely to be very successful in working with them. If they didn’t trust him, he was likely to decide to move on to a different job rather quickly.
There was a sadness that surrounded the ranch though, and nothing seemed to be lifting it. When Garrett had been in charge, he was always upbeat and happy in the mornings. His smile brightened the other guys up and his joking ways had them in a great mood every day. But with Garrett gone, as well as Ralph and Devin, the ranch was a solemn place. There hadn’t been laughter at our ranch in two weeks and I wasn’t sure if it would ever return.
As breakfast finished up, I decided to spend my morning with the horses. I hadn’t been taking care of them much lately and thought it might brighten up my own mood to clean up Bambi and maybe even see if my father wanted to take a ride out to the river with me. I enjoyed riding and at the very least I knew that was something I could do to make myself happy.
The photos I had taken were beautiful and the real estate agent we hired thought she would be able to sell the land for a much higher price than my father had originally intended to sell it to his friend. Of course, my father offered the land to his friend at the new price, but he declined. It turned out he had only been interested in it because my father was selling it so cheaply. Old man Joe had intended to resell the land at its rightful price and keep the proceeds for himself. Both my mother and I were furious over the details of what had gone on with old man Joe, but my father didn’t seem to mind at all.
“Buckjoy could use a little attention,” my father said as I walked into the barn. “He’s been pretty anxious this morning and a little down.”
“I’m sure he’d love it if you gave that to him,” I answered, although I knew he meant that he wanted me to spend time with the horse.
“No, I meant from you. I think he misses you.”
“Buckjoy misses Garrett and he’s just going to have to get over it because Garrett isn’t coming back. Plus, he’s a horse, Dad. How do you know he misses anyone?”
“He misses you,” my father said as he pulled Buckjoy out of his stall and walked him toward me. “Why don’t you take him out for a run? He needs to feel the air through his mane.”
“Dad, why don’t you take him out? I’m going to take care of Bambi today.”
I knew what my father was trying to do. He thought that spending time with Buckjoy would make me feel better. Well, he was wrong. The last thing in the world that I wanted to do was spend time with Garrett’s horse. I would just let my father take care of that horse from that point forward.
Just looking at Buckjoy had my mind flooded with memories of Garrett. I saw Garrett’s amazing smile and the way he had taken such good care of the horses that night of the storm. There were so many things that I missed about Garrett and looking at Buckjoy made them all come flooding back into my mind.
“All right, but I think he likes you better than me,” my father said as he walked out of the barn with Buckjoy behind him.
I didn’t think Buckjoy liked me better than my father. The horse probably just associated me with Garrett and was hopeful he would be back soon. But eventually Buckjoy, as well as the rest of us, would just have to learn to live our life without Garrett around. That was the reality of the world we lived in. Garrett was gone, in his place was a fancy-dressing, rich guy named Malcolm and I didn’t think Buckjoy would have liked that guy any more than I would.
I saddled up Bambi after giving her a good bath. It was still early enough in the day that I could have gone out to the river, but decided against that. Instead, we rode up north to the big barn that was at that end of the property. It was there that I had hid out with the ranch hands after the murders had happened. That was the only place I could go where I didn’t have a memory of Garrett standing next to me, or at least I thought it was the only place I wouldn’t think about Garrett.
Everything I saw and did at the ranch seemed to be covered with a memory of something funny Garrett had said to me. I was constantly inundated with memories of a kiss we shared, a witty remark he said, or something else that had happened between the two of us. It was so hard to be on the ranch and have to deal with those memories.
Even though Garrett hadn’t been to the barn up north, I sat there and still couldn’t get him off my mind. That night replayed in my head and I remembered the sadness on Garrett’s face as he stood over the two men who had been shot. I would never forget that night as long as I lived. No matter who Garrett really was, on that night I saw how much he hurt when those men were murdered, and I could only imagine the guilt he felt because of their death. I closed my eyes and his face came into full view for me; he was officially everywhere and I hopped back on my horse to head into the main ranch again.
It was going to take a lot of distraction for me to finally get over Garrett and that meant I needed some sort of project on the ranch to keep me busy. I didn’t care what it was; I just needed something to keep me busy. Somehow, I had to forget about the man that I had loved.