Page 25 of The Wrong Ride Home (Wildflower Canyon #1)

elena

I had built a good fire.

Not too big, not too small—just enough to keep me warm, just enough to keep the dark at bay. The flames flickered low, their light casting long shadows across the open stretch of land. Above me, the sky stretched out in endless black, scattered with stars that felt close enough to touch.

I pulled my knees up, wrapped my arms around them, and watched the sparks.

I had left my phone at the bunkhouse. I didn’t want to be bothered.

There was a time when I could just wander off without anyone knowing where I went, but five years ago, I told Nash we had no choice but to set up a small cell tower on the south ridge, high enough to catch a decent signal without ruining the view.

It took me a whole year to convince him, and when he finally did, he did it grudgingly.

Most modern ranches had to adapt—signal boosters in the main buildings, satellite internet for emergencies, and radios for the areas where cell service still dropped off.

Even out here, you couldn’t run a business without staying connected.

But if there was an emergency, Ben knew that I’d either be by the river or here .

This place mattered, as did the riverside. The milestones of my life were all around this ranch. When Duke sold it, and there was a motel here on Dream Ridge—would it erase the past?

I called this place Dream Ridge because this was where Duke and I had dreamed of our future together. He’d run the ranch, and I’d help him with the horses.

Now, he was selling the ranch, and I was helping him sell my precious horses.

Not having money sucked because if I did, I’d buy them all.

I knew Maverick was going to buy a few, especially Whiskey because he knew I loved him.

He’d do that for me. For all his flirtatious behavior, Maverick was a good man and friend.

Oh, don’t get me wrong, if I spread my legs for him, he’d be there with a latex condom on, but that wasn’t why he was gonna buy my horse—he was going to do it because we were friends.

He saw some of himself in me. He came from nothing and built a juggernaut.

“You didn’t have my chances…and being a woman sucks in this business.” He told me when I protested that I was nothing like him because if I were, I would be running my own horse program instead of working for shit pay for Nash.

The sound of footsteps made me glance up .

“Ben, what’s on fire?” I asked when he stepped into the firelight, hands in his pockets.

“I….” He shrugged. “He’s the bossman.”

I nodded. Duke had made him tell him where I was, and Ben had walked him here, not knowing that he could’ve just said, ‘Hey it’s the ridge where y’all used to fuck when you were kids.”

Duke’s silhouette behind Ben cut sharp against the night.

“Duke, this time I’m really done for the night.” If he wanted to give me a hard time for how I treated his girlfriend, he needed to wait until I could wipe off the image of her on his lap, his hands on her waist, the proprietary way in which she held him.

“Thanks, Ben. And goodnight.” Duke clapped the kid on his shoulder and strolled to the fire.

Ben walked off, whistling under his breath. Duke lowered himself onto the grass beside me. Not too close, but not far either.

For a long moment, neither of us said anything. Finally, he broke the silence. “I came to apologize.”

“Again?” I didn’t look at him, just the fire.

“This time for putting you on the spot.”

“But you wanted to,” I reminded him. “Can’t apologize for something that you did on purpose, knowing fully well you did it to make me uncomfortable, and you succeeded.”

“Can you blame me?”

I turned my head slightly, meeting his gaze.

He grinned. “You’re so self-contained that I’m constantly trying to find ways to…well, meet my Elena again.”

My Elena!

“ Your Elena is dead.” I went back to looking at the fire. “She died the day you called her a whore and threw money at her for services rendered.”

“I was angry.”

“Is that another apology?” I wondered, trying my best not to allow the nails of the past to tear through me now.

“You’re a whore like your mother. What was the plan, huh? She fucks my dad and you fuck me? And then what? We’d be one big happy family?”

“I don’t know what you want from me,” he murmured.

Now I faced him and let him look at me, wanting to make this crystal clear. “I want nothing from you.”

He sighed.

“Fiona is sorry for how she’s behaved.”

“I’m sure she is.” I couldn’t keep the disbelief from my tone. “If she could talk to Ally, it would be much appreciated.”

“She may not do that.”

“Then she isn’t really sorry, is she?”

Duke rubbed a hand over his face. “Why are you making this so hard?”

“Jesus Fuckin’ Christ, Duke!” I cried out, truly and completely tired.

“I’m not the one making it hard. That would be you .

I don’t even talk to you. I do whatever you ask.

You say don’t come to the funeral, I don’t.

You say pack up and leave; I get ready to do that.

You change your mind and say sell the horses, I say, ‘ Aye, aye, Bossman .’ Your girlfriend says sell the cattle, and I say, sure .

I couldn’t make this easier unless I jumped off a cliff.

Is that what you’re expecting? That I kill myself? ”

I was screaming the last part because one moment ten years ago, I’d tried to do exactly that.

“Elena, no.” He put a placating hand on my shoulder. I jerked it away.

“You follow me around, you ask to talk to me, you…what are you looking for?”

“I’m curious about you,” he admitted.

“Let me assuage your curiosity, then,” I bit out. “I’m twenty-eight years old. I’m single. Have never been in a serious relationship. Generally, prefer hookups with out-of-towners. I work here for Wilder Ranch for about a third of what I’d get paid if I worked anywhere else.”

“Why do you do that?”

“What part?” I demanded. “Fuck out-of-towners, or work here for substandard pay?”

“Both.”

He was watching me intently, his eyes not wavering.

“I don’t fuck locals because I’m not looking for a long-term or short-term or any kind of commitment. I have an itch. I get it scratched. It ain’t hard to find a man to ride.”

He hissed.

I rolled my eyes. “I stayed here for Mama first, then because Mama wanted me to take care of Nash, and now…because I want to sell the horses to the right buyers, and then I will leave.”

Another silence. Not awkward, just heavy .

“You’ve changed,” he said after a while.

This time I smiled, but there wasn’t any warmth in it. “So have you.”

“Not in the same way.”

“No,” I agreed. “Not in the same way.”

He shifted, resting his forearms on his knees. “How do you think I have changed?”

“You’re not of this land anymore.”

He went still beside me. “I was never like you and Nash,” he remarked after a while.

“That’s not true. You loved this place once. You loved your father once.”

“Once,” he conceded. “I felt guilty that you weren’t at the funeral.”

I swallowed, looking back at the flames. He didn’t know where Nash was buried, and I felt guilty about that, but not enough to fuck up Nash’s last wishes. “It’s fine.”

“I don’t think so.”

I didn’t answer. What was there to say?

We sat, both of us carrying too much, neither of us willing to unpack it. A détente? Had we stopped fighting?

After a while, Duke pushed himself to his feet.

“I’ll leave you be.”

I watched as he walked away, disappearing into the dark.

When I was alone again, I stared into the fire, the crackling embers the only sound in the vast emptiness around me.

I thought again about his question .

Why was I still here? I had no damn idea—beyond the habit of being here simply because Mama had asked me to be.

Was selling the horses and cattle just an excuse? Was I really here because of Duke? The thought sank its teeth into me, and I hated it—hated the truth of it, hated how it made me feel like some pathetic, love-sick fool.

But addictions weren’t easy to break.

I knew what it was to chase a fix, to crave something even when you knew it’d wreck you. Everyone had their vices—mine was Duke Wilder.