Page 2 of Roaring Fork Rockstar (Roaring Fork Ranch #3)

HOLT

M y stomach knotted as I stared at the text from Six-pack that had arrived at nine this morning.

The snow swirled outside my cabin window as I sipped coffee that had gone cold. Less than twelve hours ago, we’d been at the Goat, celebrating Cord’s return from New York and his marriage to Juni. Now, this.

I’d known this day would come. But knowing didn’t make it any easier.

I shook my head, trying to focus on the view outside my window rather than the dread spreading through my chest. The mountains stood indifferent, snow-capped and silent, unconcerned with the games a mysterious LLC was playing with my family.

When I arrived at Six-pack’s office in Gunnison, all my siblings were already gathered in the conference room. Six-pack stood at the head of the table, manila folder in hand, wearing the same expression he’d had when delivering the news to each of my three brothers before me.

“Holt,” Six-pack greeted me. “Seeing as we’re all here, we can begin.” Flynn, the youngest of the five of us and our only sister, and I took the two open seats. Now that she was married, with twin sons, I hoped whatever this asshole was about to tell us would be something required of me, not her.

“Let’s get this over with,” I said, hating how my voice sounded. “What impossible task do I need to perform?”

Six-pack adjusted his glasses. “I’ve received instructions from the Roaring Fork Trust LLC regarding the next codicil.”

“Get on with it, Six-pack,” Buck snapped.

“It reads as follows. ‘The Roaring Fork Trust further stipulates that Holt David Wheaton must live in Crested Butte, Colorado, for a period of three hundred and sixty-five days, defined as not being absent from the boundaries of the town for a period longer than forty-eight consecutive hours.’”

I frowned. “That’s it? Stay in CB for a year?” It sounded suspiciously simple after what my brothers had been through.

Six-pack cleared his throat. “There’s more. ‘During this period, he must perform musical sets at local establishments no fewer than three times per week and donate fifty percent of all earnings from these performances to the Miracles of Hope Children’s Charity of Crested Butte, Colorado.’”

It was the same charity that would get everything if I didn’t do what the codicil demanded. I felt my jaw tighten.

“So I’m trapped in town, playing dive bars for a year,” I said flatly.

“That appears to be the requirement, yes,” Six-pack replied.

I laughed, but not because it was funny. “Any specific songs they want me to play? Any venues I have to avoid?”

“The codicil doesn’t specify further details about the performances,” Six-pack said, “only that they must be public, paid engagements and properly documented for verification purposes.”

I stood up, unable to stay seated. The walls felt too close, the air too thin.

“If the terms of the codicil are not met, then the ranch will be sold and the proceeds given to?—”

Buck stood like I had. “Shut the fuck up, Six-pack. We know all this shit. Holt doesn’t do as he’s told, we lose everything. Is there anything else we don’t know? Other than who the asshole behind the scenes calling the shots is?”

The attorney—a guy we all went to high school with—shook his head.

“Then, we’re outta here,” Buck added.

“When do I have to start?” I asked, the question sounding strange even to my own ears.

“Immediately,” Six-pack replied. “The clock begins ticking today. You have twelve months.”

I turned and headed for the exit, not trusting myself to say anything more. My hand trembled on the doorknob—not from fear, but from the effort of containing everything churning inside me.

Once outside, I stood by my truck, resting my hands on the hood, trying to steady my breathing.

“You okay?” Cord’s voice came from behind me.

I straightened, not turning around. “Were you a year ago when you found out you had to drive across the country to a place you’d never heard of?”

Cord shook his head. “You know I wasn’t.”

“To tell you the truth, I wish I had to go somewhere.”

“I get it, man.”

We all did. Buck, Porter, Cord, me, and even Flynn. We were powerless against a nameless, faceless trustee who pulled our strings like a puppet master. “Sorry. I know you do. Listen, I need some time.”

I hugged each of my siblings, then got in my truck. It was a thirty-minute drive to the Roaring Fork—a ranch that had been in our family for generations. It was worth millions, and if I didn’t do my part, every penny of it would be gone.

My brothers had done their share. Now, it was all on me.

The envelope in my pocket—the one with CB Rice’s official logo and tour schedule that included forty-eight cities in eighteen countries—felt like a brick. The tour I’d spent my whole life dreaming about, the kind that made songwriters legends, was now something I couldn’t be a part of.

I needed a fucking drink. And I knew exactly where to get one.

“Hey, Holt,” said Keltie when I walked into the Goat. “I didn’t expect you to be here today. Something I can do for you?”

I motioned over to the small stage. “Mind if I play a while?”

Her head cocked for a second. “You’re welcome anytime someone else isn’t on the schedule.”

“Thanks, darlin’.”

“Get you a drink?”

“I’d appreciate it.” I watched her walk away, unable to take my eyes off her.

Keltie’s five-foot-seven frame commanded the space behind the bar like she’d been born to it.

She’d tucked her flannel shirt into a pair of worn jeans that hugged her curves in all the right places—ample breasts, narrow waist, proportionate hips.

The kind of body that made a man’s hands itch to explore.

But it was her eyes that got me. Big, round, and a light brown that looked almost amber under the bar lights. They held secrets—I’d bet my guitar on it. Her wild, curly, dark-brown hair framed her face, a few strands escaping the loose ponytail she’d pulled it into for work.

I couldn’t help but remember our exchange of last night. “Being in bed is my favorite thing too—and I don’t mean to sleep.” I’d winked, and her cheeks had flushed before she raised her window and drove off. That blush had stayed with me all night.

When she returned with my drink, her smile lit up her whole face, transforming her from merely beautiful to breathtaking. Her square-toed cowboy boots clicked against the hardwood floor as she set the glass in front of me.

“There you go. On the house,” she said, seemingly unaware of the effect she had.

“Thanks,” I said, feeling more parched than when I’d walked in, but not for the whiskey in my glass.

“But lemme start a tab, Keltie. I’m not going anywhere for a while,” I said, thinking about the codicil’s requirement.

Three hundred and sixty-five days. Maybe being stuck here wouldn’t be as bad as I’d thought.

I picked up my guitar case and headed for the stage, feeling her eyes on me as I walked away. At least I’d have something worth looking at while I played my forced sets for the following year.

For the next couple of hours, my Gibson hummed under my fingers, a familiar comfort amidst the biggest disappointment of my life.

My phone buzzed again—probably Remi, CB Rice’s manager, asking for the hundredth time where the hell I was and when I’d get my ass over to the band’s recording studio, sign the contract, and start practicing with the rest of the guys.

The hardest part about responding was that I had no idea what I’d say.

How I’d explain that, even though my share of the money CB Rice would make on the road would have given me the means to launch my own tour, record my own music, now, I had to watch my dreams slip away.

While, at the same time, donating half my local gig money to a children’s charity that stood to get my inheritance should I fail.

I glanced over at the bar, and my eyes met Keltie’s.

She was drying glasses and looking at me like she could see right through me.

That was the problem with small towns—everyone thought they knew your story, even people you hadn’t known all your life.

Not that anyone outside our family was aware of the trust. All of us agreed that it was nobody’s business.

As I thought about what to play next, my father’s voice sounded in my head.

“Music won’t feed cattle, boy.” He was as right as he was wrong.

It sure as hell wouldn’t now that my one chance to make it big was gone.

No way would Ben Rice, the band’s lead singer and founder, give me another shot next year.

Why would he? By then, he’d find a line of guys ready, willing, and able to replace me.

When Keltie dimmed the stage lights as evening fell, they cast shadows across the bar’s worn floorboards. From here, I could see the old photograph of the Goat’s original opening day. Something about it nagged at me like a wrong note in a familiar song.

“What’s up?” she asked, sliding another whiskey closer, which I downed in one gulp.

“Nothin’,” I replied, running my fingers across the guitar strings once more. The emerging melody was unfamiliar, something sad and sweet and ancient, like a lullaby half remembered from childhood.

Keltie stilled, and her eyes widened. “Where did you learn that?”

“I didn’t,” I said, but my fingers kept playing, a muscle memory I shouldn’t have—like a secret someone had whispered almost too quietly for me to hear. “You know it?”

“It sounds familiar, but I can’t place it.” As she turned and walked away, I couldn’t help but wonder why music neither of us knew seemed to have such a profound effect on us both.

My mind was elsewhere as the bar filled with people, most of whom I’d known all my life.

I’d wave when they did, but otherwise, I couldn’t stop myself from thinking there was something I was missing with the trust—obvious like a word on the tip of my tongue that I couldn’t pull out of my head.

All I knew was that whatever it was would shake me, my brothers, and my sister to our collective core.

I couldn’t explain the premonitions that had started coming to me when I was a kid. The first was that my mama was going to die. To this day, I hadn’t told anyone that, at seven years old, I knew our mother had cancer before she or our father breathed a word of it.

I looked up at Keltie, who, like me, appeared lost in thought.

I was about to take a break, walk over, and talk to her when a feeling—like one of those premonitions—came over me that I couldn’t ignore.

As if she felt it too, she walked toward me.

“Sorry, I need a minute,” I said when she was within a foot of me.

I set my guitar on its stand and raced out of the bar’s rear entrance and into the frigid cold.

“Hello. Who are you?” said a little girl I’d almost knocked down when I barreled outside.

“I’m, uh, Holt Wheaton,” I said. “Who are you?”

“I’m Luna. My mommy owns this bar.” I should’ve known she was related to Keltie. Like her mama’s, the girl’s dark curls were wild around her face and her brown doe eyes bored into mine as if she could read my every thought.

“Vete para adentro ahora, pequenina,” said the older woman with her, who I didn’t recognize. Since I spoke Spanish fairly well, I knew she’d said something like, “Go inside now, little one.”

“It was nice to meet you, Mr. Wheaton,” Luna said, holding her hand out for me to shake.

It was tiny and fragile when I grasped it.

But worse, the feeling that had sent me outside in the first place intensified.

Something was wrong with her, something bad.

I was as certain of it as I was of my own name.