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CHAPTER 1
elena
Iwatched the man I’d loved my whole adult life kiss another woman deeply, passionately. He was a good kisser. I knew that. For a short few months, he’d been mine. I’d been eighteen and Duke twenty.
He was my first—everything. First love. First heartbreak.
The woman laughed, and he looked at her like she had his heart. I remembered that look well because he’d smiled at me like that—ten years ago.
“Te amo, mi cielo.” I love you, my heaven, my everything.
“I love you, Florecita.” Little flower.
We were children—madly in love, utterly devoted to each other. We whispered sweet endearments, held each other through the night, made love, and drank each other in. For three months, we were inseparable. Such a short time, and yet every day, every moment, still livedinside me.
I’d loved Duke Wilder with all my heart. Istilldid.
“You sure you want me here?” I asked Hunt, the Wilder Ranch foreman,again.
“Yeah,” he repliedagain.
He’d ordered all the cowboys and ranch hands to be present when thenewowner of Wilder Ranch arrived.
Nash Wilder had passed away, and his funeral was this weekend. He died at the ranch house in his bed as he’d wanted, as I’d promised him and my mother. Neither had wanted to die in a hospital or hospice.
I’d held his hand and soothed him to the end as I had Mama.
“He’ll forgive me, you’ll see,” Nash told me.
“He already has,” I lied.
“He’ll come back, won’t he, Elena? He’ll take care of the ranch.”
“He will; he’s on his way,” I lied again. I knew Duke hated the ranch. He saw it as the symbol of everything that had gone wrong with his family and had broken it.
“And you’ll help him, won’t you?” he pleaded.
“I will, Nash.”
“Promise me.”
Another promise. Another vow. Another heartbreak waiting to happen.
“If he needs me, Nash, I’ll be there for him.”
“He’ll need you. The horses…he can’t…not without you.”
He won’t need me formebut for the horses. It was the vulgar truth. And if Duke needed me, I’d stay. If he saidfuck off, Elena, I would gladlyleave as I’d wanted to when the boy I fell in love with told me I was a whore like my mother. When he told me that he hated me.
He’d thrown money at me, told me to take it and go—leave with Mama, leave the ranch, leave his father. That memory burned through me, hollowed me out until there was nothing but ash. And if that hadn’t been enough, being pregnant at that age—confused, lost, and alone—sure as hell hadn’t helped. Losing the baby when I tried to end my own life? That had shattered what little was left.
I couldn’t hold that last part against Duke ‘cause he hadn’t known about the baby or my failed attempt at getting the hell out of the ranchandthis world.
Hunt had been there for me—a brother, a friend, a hand that held mine when I needed it most. From that moment on, he protected me. He never asked what had broken me, never questioned whose baby I’d lost. He didn’t tell Mama. He didn’t tell anyone. It was our secret, sealed in silence, never spoken aloud.
There were whispers about Hunt and me. Of course, there were. Cowboys were worse than a sewing circle when it came to gossip. They could make shit up that could giveThe National Enquirera run for its money.
Nash had loved Hunt like a son and warned me not to use mycharmson him as I had Duke. The thing was that Nash lost his son, and he never forgave me for my part in that tragedy.