Page 140 of Sin With Me

He's never been a no-call, no-show, so it's out of character for him.

I spend the rest of the morning mucking stalls and moving horses in and out of the pasture. I'm back working on the retreat side but since we're still only doing one trail ride a day, I go back and forth with the ranch side since Jonah's working over there.

It's slow this time of year but when the weather changes abruptly, things break and fences need fixing, so I usually get stuck on bitch duty—which is why it'd be nice if Jonah actually showed up so he could help me.

Needing a break and some water from my jug, I head back to my truck and find a text from Delilah waiting.

She hasn't seen or heard from Jonah either.

Meanwhile she's probably worried about him, but I have a feeling he realized he's not cut out for working on a ranch. We've had a mix of rain and snow the past few days and he's bitched about it nonstop. With the Appalachian Mountains surrounding us, we get heavier snowfalls than the rest of the state and we're in that time of year where we have less sunlight during the day, so it gets cold as fuck toward the end of our shifts.

Although he previously did construction, he didn't have to deal with the weather while handling thousand-pound horses and walking through wet pastures.

Once the side of the fence I'm working on is done, I drive to the retreat barn and find Waylon fighting with one of the horses. Since the pastures are a mess, they're cooped up in their stalls and hate it.

"Need a hand?" I offer.

"Sure, but be careful. She's already kicked me once."

I chuckle, and then grab another lead rope and help push her into the stall. When we can't take them out and need to clean their stall, we rotate them in and out of the grooming stall.

"Feisty today," I say, rubbing her neck to calm her down.

When I get a phone call, I walk into the aisle and although I don't recognize the number, I pick it up.

"Hello?"

"Wilder? Thank God."

"Mattie?"

"Yeah, hi. Have you heard from Delilah?"

"We were textin' about fifteen minutes ago. Why? Isn't she at work with you?"

"I left to get a smoothie and when I returned, there were a couple customers wanderin' around, but she wasn't up front. Iassumed she was in the bathroom, so I helped them for a few minutes and then rang them up. As soon as they left, I went to check on her in the back, but she wasn't in there. Her truck's in the parkin' lot and her purse and coat are still here."

"Does she have her phone?"

"It's not in her bag, so she must have it."

"Did ya call her?"

"Yeah and texted."

"Is it possible she went to get somethin' to eat?"

"She'd never leave the store without one of us here. Plus, she said she wasn't hungry when I offered to get her a smoothie."

My heart races as I pace the barn. "Okay, let me try her?—"

"Wait, she responded."

I blow out a relieved breath.

"SOS. Jonah. Gun."

"Huh?"