Page 41 of Love Is a War Song

It was a somber drive back to the ranch, full of lost potential and heartache. In another world, we could have been great and had it all, but we were stuck in this one. It was fully dark by the time we pulled up to the house, and a sleek black Mercedes car was parked in front of the porch steps.

It mirrored how I’d arrived here that first day.

Lucas and I exchanged a glance.

We walked together into Lottie’s house, not touching, and the inches of distance already felt like too much. It was quiet, but the tension made the air thick as if we were walking through slime. Something had happened.

“Avery, that you?” Lottie called.

“Yeah, it’s me. Lucas brought me back.”

“Is your tooth all fixed up?”

“Oh yeah. I’m good as new.” We turned left toward the sound of her voice, and I came up short.

Sitting at completely opposite ends of the dining table were Lottie and my mother.

“Hello, Avery.” Her eyes narrowed at Lucas and me standing next to each other.

“Hi, Mom.”

“What happened to your tooth?”

“It popped out, but it’s all fine now.”

“I should call Dr. Agassi. That smile cost a fortune. They shouldn’t be popping out like that.”

Just like my mother to focus on the money spent.

“I got a dentist to put it back in. It’s fine.”

“A dentist from here? No, we should really get it checked out by someone who knows what they’re doing.”

“Dr. Wyatt Cole went to OU College of Dentistry. It’s the best in the state.” Lucas stepped in, defending his cousin.

“And you are?” My mother sat back in her chair, crossing her arms and looking down her nose.

“I’m Lucas, ma’am. I help Lottie with running the ranch.”

My mother let out a sarcastic laugh and picked up a piece of paper off the table. Our flyer. Shit. That flyer was the complete opposite of lying low. We hadn’t brought it up to Lottie yet, so I’m sure she was pissed too.

“Good job running it into the ground.”

“Harriett!” Lottie snapped.

“What? This man is making a desperate attempt to grab cash, banking on Avery’s name and stardom too, and I’m quoting, ‘save Muscogee’s own Red Fox Ranch.’?”

“We can talk about this later, Lucas. Thank you for taking Avery to get fixed up,” Lottie said through bottled emotions. It looked like at any moment, she would blow.

“It’s my pleasure, ma’am.” Lucas stepped back to head out.

“No, he should stay.” I grabbed his arm, unwilling to let him go.

My mother eyed my hand clutching Lucas’s arm. “So, this is what you’ve been doing? Making moon eyes at some ranch hand while I’ve been working around the clock doing damage control?”

“I’ve been doing what you asked me to do.

Getting to know our heritage. The only reason I’m even in this mess is because I listened to you.

I’ve always listened to you, followed as you led my career this way and that.

Commercials since I was a baby, and when those dried up, it was acting and auditioning for anything and everything.

Music is mine and I’ve listened to you and all the people we have hired who have only led me astray.

I’m not here making moon eyes. I’ve been working and getting to know all these lovely people who you kept me from.

” My voice hitched. I’d never spoken to my mother that harshly, ever.

Years of pent-up emotions were threatening to explode out of me.

I just wanted her to care about me for once, not my brand.

“If you knew the truth, you wouldn’t be quite so forgiving.”

“That’s enough, Hattie.” Lottie’s voice cracked like a whip, and it made me jump. “Avery, you should go up and rest. We can discuss everything in the morning. Lucas, go, please.”

I turned around, giving him a silent plea to stay. I didn’t want to be in this house full of ghosts, scorn, and lies. I saw his family at its worst and stood by him. Lucas was the only one who really knew me or cared. I needed someone on my team right now.

His stormy eyes held so much in them, and I knew he was telling me to be strong, that he couldn’t stay. We both knew it. He was the first to break eye contact and leave, the thud of the front door casting an echo in the silence.

I had to get out of this room. I needed more space, more time before confronting my mother. I thought I had more time with Lottie too. I thought I could fix everything and instead it was all just as broken as it ever was.

“Good night.” My voice was quiet, but I knew they both heard me.

I slowly made my way toward the stairs, but my mother’s angry voice carried.

“History tends to repeat itself, doesn’t it?” she said. I hardly recognized her, her voice so ugly with malice.

“When you don’t teach the lessons learned from mistakes, those mistakes will be made again,” Lottie said, her tone forlorn. I paused at the bottom of the steps, eavesdropping when I knew I shouldn’t be.

“The only mistake was letting her come here alone.”

“You’ve always been welcome. You never even had to leave.”

“You and I both know that’s not true. You refused to let me stay here pregnant and unmarried, ‘like a common harlot’ was what you said.”

“I never should have said that.”

“Then had your creepy pastor talk to me about sin, as if my getting pregnant out of wedlock made me dirty.”

“I haven’t been to that church in two decades.”

“You and everyone were so obsessed with who the father was. So determined to keep our Indian line from being diluted, as if that matters at all.”

“Hattie, I made so many mistakes.”

“Don’t call me Hattie. You lost that privilege.”

There was tense silence, and I was starting to piece together the story of my existence. I sat down on the bottom step, absorbing the implication of the terse exchange, but before I could empathize for her situation, my mother said, “You want to know who her father is?”

I was gripping the edge of the stair, leaning forward. I had asked so many times as a little girl, and she kept saying it wasn’t important so eventually I stopped asking.

“He was a no-name nobody. Some white guy with a pretty smile I met in a bar when I snuck in with friends from school. I hooked up with him in that filthy bathroom. I never even caught his name. So that Fox lineage you found so important is meaningless.”

A loud sob cracked out of me. Never had I ever heard my mother speak with such resentment, pure vitriol. No wonder she worked me to the bone all these years. I wasn’t born of love. I was born of spite.

“Avery?” Lottie called out.

I couldn’t go back in that room; I couldn’t even stay in this house. I did the only thing I could—I ran out into the night. I needed the open air, to be as far away from my mother as possible. I sprinted, my heartbreak fueling me as I sped faster and faster down the hill toward the barn.

Rakko was standing by the paddock, a bridle still in his mouth.

He must have just had his evening brush-down.

I slowed my approach, coming at him from his front and letting him sniff my hand.

He was looking for a treat. I had none, but maybe an evening ride and some freedom would be good enough.

No one was around. Red must have gone to get something from his trailer, so I had little time before he came asking questions.

I led Rakko inside the barn and saddled him up. It wasn’t the best, but I made it work. Rakko stood patiently, waiting for me to finish. He was a little bigger than Peso, and I had to try twice before I was able to swing my leg around and seat myself up on the saddle.

I tsked my tongue, and he started moving out of the barn. “You want to fly, Rakko?” I kicked my heels in, and we shot off toward the pasture.

Voices sounded behind me, growing distant with every gallop.

“Avery!”

“Come back!”

“Where’s she going?”

I ignored them all. I needed space. Rakko was used to the land, but there wasn’t much moonlight; thick clouds hung heavy in the sky.

Still, I pressed us on. Let them worry I had Lottie’s precious horse.

I was dirty, a spite-child born to sully the blood and the name of this family.

I didn’t belong to the fake world of Hollywood I was forced out of, and I didn’t belong here. I was in limbo.

Staying here with Lucas was out of the question, especially after learning the truth about how I came to be and why my mother left.

Rakko slowed his steps and meandered through the dense wood.

He tried to stop at the pond, but I urged him with the reins to keep going.

I wanted to be as physically lost as I felt, floating along with no tethers anywhere.

Lottie said the horses knew the way back, so I wasn’t in any danger of becoming truly lost.

The night grew darker, and I let Rakko stop to nibble on some grass. The air was suffocatingly hot when I left, but the temperature had dropped at least twenty degrees. Gooseflesh pebbled my exposed arms and legs, a few water drops landed on my legs.

I wasn’t too concerned. What was a little rain? I was on a horse, not the 405 in Los Angeles.

Thunder boomed above me. That felt ominous. I was still angry, but going on this ride helped cool me down a bit. The heat that felt inescapable was gone. In seconds, the temperature dropped what felt like twenty degrees. The hairs on my arms were standing up.

“Okay, Rakko, boy. Let’s turn back. I don’t want to be stuck in the rain.

” The giant slowly turned around toward the direction we’d come, when sheets of rain started slamming down.

It was a freak storm that came out of nowhere.

The deluge was so intense, I couldn’t see through it. Rakko was rearing his head in fear.

A loud rumble of thunder sounded overhead, and the wind, which had been nonexistent for days, started howling against me. I cupped my hands over my eyes to see if there was a place among the trees that would provide some shelter until the worst of it was over.