Wild Hearts (17 page)

“Holden and Dad took Squirrel out on a hunting trip when Squirrel was a puppy. Squirrel found a nest full of baby squirrels in a tree hollow. She fetched a baby squirrel from the nest and carried it in her mouth like a puppy. Holden begged Dad to keep it, so we raised the baby squirrel and set it free.”

“Oh, my God. I would so love a baby squirrel,” I said, imagining the tiny gray face. “I like your dog already.”

Logan smiled and eased the truck to a stop. “There are a lot more dogs to like.”

His truck door was barely open when four or five—I couldn't tell in the flurry of fur—other dogs raced up to him, wagging their tails and barking. Logan waved me out of the truck.

“They're all harmless,” he said.

“Hi, guys!” I said to them. I offered my hand to a curious Lab mix who eagerly licked it.

Logan walked over to my side of the truck with his dog posse behind him.

“Sit,” Logan said firmly. All five dogs sat instantly and stared at Logan. They looked like mixed breeds. A few looked more like German shepherds, and Squirrel and another dog were border collies.

None of them moved.

“Wow,” I said. “You're a dog whisperer, too.”

“They have to be good,” Logan said. “They're working dogs.”

“Oh, right,” I said. “Do they herd cattle and things like that?”

He nodded and stood behind a border collie and rubbed its black-and-white ears. “They're like an extra set of hands. They pitch in wherever Dad and I need help. This is Lara, that's Echo, next to her is Hudson, and on the end is Jane. Jane is my dad's old dog.”

“Aw,” I said. I walked over to Jane and bent down to rub her head. Jane had a few white hairs on her black face. “She's
sweet.” Kneeling, Logan was almost laughing as he tried to evade sloppy kisses from Squirrel.

“Watch out,” Logan warned. “Don't spend too much time with Jane. She'll follow you home!”

“I'd take her home, but my dad would freak.” Pets annoyed Dad even more than bad cell reception.

“So would my dad,” Logan said with a laugh. He grabbed the bag with my hat off of the truck hood where he had placed it. “Ready to come in? Dad's working and Holden's at a friend's house.”

“Sure.” I glanced at the house as we made our way to the front door. Did I look as nervous as I felt?

Logan opened a patched screen door and twisted the doorknob.

I froze—shocked that no one was home and he had left the door unlocked. “You don't lock your door?” I asked. When we had lived in a cramped apartment in downtown DC, our door had four locks and two deadbolts. Ever since I could remember, I couldn't sleep at night without checking to be sure all the doors in the house were locked. Even if Mom swore she checked them, I had to do it myself. Borderline OCD, I know. Dad jokingly credited my security detail as the reason we'd never been robbed.

“Nah,” he said, pushing the door open and allowing me to step in front of him. “Nobody locks their doors in Lost Springs. People aren't surprised if they wake up in the morning and their neighbor had left a note on the table because he borrowed a beer in the middle of the night.”

“That's crazy. At least go for something like cheesecake.”

I stepped through Logan's front door and walked into a shabby but spotless living room. “It's not fancy,” Logan said as he kicked off his boots. “But it's home.”

A light blue couch was in front of a TV old enough to have knobs on the sides to turn it on and off. Dozens of photos hung above the couch. There were pictures of Holden and one of a boy holding a large mouth bass.

“There you are,” I said, pointing to the fishing picture.

Logan nodded, took my hat out of the bag, and put it on the counter. “Unfortunately. That was when the term ‘bowl cut' really applied to my hair.” I laughed and looked at the rest of the photos. There were none of his mom. Just Holden and Logan and Jack. I stared at a photo of Jack, smiling so wide, with his arms around a teensy Holden and a Logan who had two front teeth missing. I wondered if the photo had been taken by Logan's mom. Seeing Jack this way—not the man I'd come to know as my dad's arch nemesis—was strange.

I joined Logan in a large kitchen with dozens of cabinets. A few dirty pots were in the sink and there was no dishwasher or microwave.

“Is your dad one of those guys who hate modern technology?” I asked.

“No, he just never had a dishwasher installed. We had a microwave, but it got the brunt of Dad's anger the night my mom left.”

“I'm so sorry,” I said. “I didn't mean to bring that up.”

“Stop, stop,” Logan said with a smile. “It's okay.”

Logan took two plastic glasses with moons on them out of a cabinet and opened the refrigerator door. He motioned me over. “Pop, juice, or water?”

“Pop, thanks.” Even though I'd said “soda” all my life, I'd been influenced by Amy and Logan. I turned and looked out the kitchen window. The window looked right onto the farm lawn. Logan poured us each a full glass of Coke and grabbed a stainless steel pot from under the stove. I shot him a puzzled look. “Are we having tea, too?”

He filled the pot with water and turned the stove on high, flames licking the bottom of the pot. “We
could
have tea, but it's for your hat. We can't shape it without steam.”

We sat at his round kitchen table, sipping our drinks and waiting for the water to boil.

I took a deep breath. “This week has been amazing,” I said. “I don't know about you, but I don't know when I was this happy.”

Logan put his hand on the table, palm up. I placed my right hand onto his.

“Whatever
this
is,” I continued, “it doesn't feel like a summer fling to me. I don't want to freak you out, but I wanted to tell you that I think things with you are . . .
different.
”

Logan squeezed my hand. “I wanted to say the same thing to you. I chickened out. Things with us kind of exploded so fast. I wasn't looking for this.”

“Me neither,” I said. “At all.”

“I believe that. You have all these walls up. Like you're trying to protect yourself from getting hurt,” Logan said. “I guess I'd do the same thing if I had your life.”

“I'm scared,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “I really like you.”

Logan leaned closer to me. His breath smelled like caramel. “Is this worth being scared?” He was so close, his lips almost brushed mine.

“Yes,” I said. I tipped my chin forward, my lips on Logan's. I freed my hand from his and ran my hands up and down his back. I stood, keeping my head bent and my lips on Logan's, and managed to leave my chair and sit in his lap.

“I like you like this,” he said, breathing a little hard. “I'm bringing you here more often.”

We kissed, our tongues exploring each other's mouths. Logan wrapped his arms around me, pulling me even closer to him.

Whatever fear I had was quieted. I was over having my life dictated by when we would move. I was done not bonding with other people. I was just
done.

A sizzling sound came from behind me. I jumped and turned to the stove.

“The pot's boiling over,” Logan said. I hopped off his lap so that he could get up and remove the pot from the burner.

“Oops,” I said, grinning. I stood and walked over to Logan. My knees felt bendy and pliable. I wasn't sure the smile was ever going to leave my face.

“Ready for your hat?” Logan asked.

“Yes, please!”

Logan pulled tongs out of a drawer and grasped my hat with them. He held it over the steam. “About thirty seconds for each side,” he said. “Give or take a little.”

“What can I do?” I asked.

Logan glanced around the kitchen. “Oh, open that drawer over there and get the can of Kahl Hat Stiffener. It's brown and has a horse on it.”

“This drawer?” I asked. Logan nodded, so I pulled it open. Inside was a mess of tangled twine, keys to various machinery, and Kahl Hat Stiffener. I plucked the bottle from the drawer, shut it, and placed the bottle on the counter next to Logan.

He pulled the hat away from the pot and bent the rim. “Testing it out to see if it's flexible enough,” he explained. “It's just right. Do you want to shape it?”

“You do it. I don't want to mess it up.”

“Pressure!” he said. He sat back on his chair and put the hat in his lap. Immediately, he began folding and rolling the brim as he made a crease in the hat's crown.

“I can tell you've never done this before,” I said, joking.

He was silent—all his concentration on my hat.

Thirty seconds later, the hat was back over the steam. Logan repeated the process and in less than ten minutes, the hat looked just like Logan's, minus the dents and dirt streaks.

“Wow,” I said. “It looks great!”

He turned to me and placed the hat on my head. “No,” he said softly, brushing my hair out of my eyes. “You make it look perfect.”

 

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Always drink upstream from the herd.

A couple of nights later, I was lying on my bed and twirling my cowboy hat. I flashed back to that night. Logan had dropped me off at the end of my driveway. I could have kept kissing him all night.

I'd been working hard at the job site recently, since Logan was busy in the field and I wanted to get and
stay
on Dad's good side. He was happily breezing through construction. The mustangs hadn't shown up in weeks, and Dad and his team were making great progress on the build.

My phone buzzed beside me and I picked it up. A tan cowboy hat, my new icon for Logan, was on my iPhone screen. I swiped the phone to answer and held it to my ear.

“Hey,” I said. “What's up?”

“Just checking on my favorite girl while I'm on a break,” Logan said.

“What are you doing?”

“Planting a few rows of potatoes.”

Through the phone, I heard him open a can of soda.

“Are you tired?” I asked. “Can you stop soon?”

“I'm hot, but not too tired. I can quit when my dad gets home.”

“Good. You need someone to
tell
you to take a break or you'll never stop.”

“Well, I was thinking about taking Friday night off,” Logan said. “How about dinner at my house? Holden has a sleepover and my dad will be in the field until at least midnight.”

I smiled into the phone. “I'd love that. Can I bring anything?”

“Nope, just you.”

We chatted for a few more minutes before hanging up. Once I'd ended the call, I typed a text.

Ames! Dinner at L's on Fri night!☺

It took her seconds to write me back.

!! Dinner! OMG! So excited for u! <3

Yelling erupted downstairs and I jerked my head off my pillow. I dropped the hat on my chair and hurried down the hallway. “Mom?” I called. I found her pacing in the kitchen.

She put a finger to her lips, phone pressed tightly to her ear. “Come home when you're done,” she said into the phone, then tapped the screen.

“What's wrong?” I asked. She slid into a kitchen chair and dropped her head for a second. “Is it Dad?”

She nodded. “Your father . . .” She paused. “. . . had an incident at work.”

“Oh, my God, is he hurt?”

“No, sweetie. I'm sorry—I didn't mean to scare you. He's okay.” Mom reached across the island and patted my hand. “Apparently, some guy has been harassing your father almost daily since the job started. Letters, e-mails, phone calls—showing up and only leaving when the sheriff would come.”

“I thought that was over?” I asked. “Everyone knows that Dad's company didn't

just start chopping trees without all the permits and stuff. The building is going up—do people really think they can still stop it?”

It felt like my insides were being ripped to shreds. All this time Logan had assured me that he'd spoken to everyone and that they had calmed down. This was
not
my version of calm!