My father had bought this ranch for my mother – Miss River Leigh Hayes – exactly one year after making her Mrs. Paul Hardick. Born into an extravagantly wealthy family, he’d inherited his father’s oil rig business and all the dollar signs that went with it. But his new bride, River, hadn’t ever much liked the idea of her children being heirs to such an environmentally controversial kingdom. She’d been raised by what my father called “leftover hippies” and was obsessed with all things nature and animal. He’d sold the oil rigs and bought the massive Colorado ranch, and they’d left his home state of Texas behind for good.
It had worked in his favor as well. All he’d ever wanted to do was write books, and as he realized just how much River loved running the ranch (nearly entirely on her own) he’d been able to attempt his own pursuits in the world of fictional publication. He’d been able to completely exceed his visions of those pursuits, in time.
Mom started popping out little Hardick boys and Dad, in turn, began slinging his own new creations into the world. By the time Preston was born, he had four best-selling novels under his belt. By the time I was born, that number had doubled. Contemporary western romance – cowboys with hearts, he’d always joke – had been his bread and butter. He said it was easy to write them, because between his Texas upbringing and the Colorado ranch, he had all the inspiration he could need for such a genre. He also held that every single heroine was inspired by “his lovely River”, and therefore the romance also flowed from his pen with a great, natural ease.
I was five when the first major motion picture based on one of his novels hit theaters. Dad had called it a fluke and chuckled away the success as he humbly did so many things. But now I was twenty-four, and exactly ten of his best sellers had made it to the big screen. He was famous, and by proxy, so were we.
Aside from Preston, we all would have much preferred to remain unknown. Judging from my father’s face at the string of flashy events his success had procured for him, Paul Lincoln Hardick wasn’t entirely comfortable with his rise from obscurity himself. When my mother died, he’d refused to go to any public event for a full year. He would generally lock himself in his study, always working on something but not ever speaking of it. Sometimes he went days without sleeping, and we could hear the rapid tap-tap-tap of the computer keys on the other side of his locked door.
He finally admitted that he had written a novel he simply called River. No one was allowed to read it, and he had no intention of ever publishing it either. But it was apparently something he’d needed to do, and after that first year and the completion of the mysterious manuscript, our father had somewhat returned to normal. Not the same – no one expected that from him – but present. It had been an enormous relief to all of us. My brothers and I had missed him horribly, even though he was right there in that giant house with us the entire time, and in some ways, I felt that the experience of the first year following Mom’s death had seemed like we’d lost both parents. Betsy had basically raised us entirely on her own all those months.
Watching Pierce go through much the same process four years ago and seeing that he too had been severely reclusive that first year (and moderately reclusive ever after), I felt I understood my father’s temporary abandonment a bit better. Losing that person – your person – it seemed to send the heart away on some unforeseen journey that was entirely unavoidable. Pierce had appeared to “come back” as well, after a while – but I couldn’t help thinking that he hadn’t made it through quite as well as Dad had. Pierce was different now; he was darker.
Dad had mused that the suddenness of Sarah’s death was more jarring in nature than the slow loss of our mother. Mom had developed breast cancer and gone into remission a total of three times spread out over four years before finally succumbing to the disease. Dad said it had allowed him a type of mental preparation that Pierce hadn’t been given, making the mourning processes quite different from each other. Dad was also (in our private conversations) convinced that Pierce would love again – he was “too young not to”.
I wanted to believe that for Pierce – even more so for Avy and Braden, but I couldn’t imagine Pierce ever coming out from under that relentless, hovering black shadow he’d gained the day Sarah died. Pierce was still a good man and a loving father – he was still my big brother, or at least, one of them – but he wasn’t with us the way he had been.
As I stepped into the front office – our greeting station – I had the fleeting vision of seeing Sarah behind that broad pine desk, smiling ear to ear. But of course, it wasn’t Sarah. It was Jessie.
Jessie Timms had grown up on a ranch as well – albeit a much more modest one. Her parents were close family friends, and Jessie had been somewhat of a constant fixture at Hardick Ranch. She and Payden had been best friends since the toddler days, and that had never changed. It was nice – comforting – to have Jessie around. She helped run the front office during the summers, when she was on break from college. Like Payden, she’d gone to school for a veterinary degree. Unlike Payden, she was only two years away from achieving this goal.
“Penn! You’re back! You missed absolutely nothing!” Jessie called out, her constant humor in full play. She’d always been extremely outgoing – often speaking for both herself and Payden, which had never seemed to bother Payden one bit.
“Excellent. You know how bad I get FOMO. You see Pay around?” I peeked at the reservation book, although I really couldn’t process much of what I read.
Anne. How is someone like that hidden away in a town like Corydon? It’s borderline ridiculous. She’s so beautiful...
“He was in earlier for a cup of coffee. Said he was gonna tack up some of the horses today and take ‘em for trail runs. I mean. One at a time. He can’t ride them all at once. Although it’d be hilarious to see him try... Just lay flat across all those saddles and hold on for dear life!” Jessie cracked herself up, and I shook my head, smiling. I’d never understood the dynamic of Payden and Jessie’s friendship, but I figured one of its pillars had to be the fact that Jessie could make Payden laugh under any and all circumstances. Payden didn’t laugh much when Jessie was away at school. Payden didn’t laugh much – period.
“Alright. Well, maybe I’ll run into him later. I met someone that I wanna tell him about –”
“Oh. Someone. That sounds intriguing,” Jessie grinned widely, clasping her hands together and resting her chin on them. She obviously wanted me to spill the beans – assuming there were any beans to spill. Ranch life was a wonderful thing, but it could be rather lacking in the excitement and/or gossip arenas.
“Ha. You have no idea,” I agreed, strolling calmly to the door.
“You’re not going to tell me anything? Come on, Penn!” Jessie’s blonde hair swung around crazily while she stood to protest. I’d told Payden once that Jessie had hair just like the horses. It had only been an observation, but Pay had punched me on the arm incredibly hard for saying it.
“Have a nice day, Jess! Let me know if ya need any help up here!” I didn’t even look back at her – just left the office and busted out laughing once the door shut. She would most definitely be attacking Payden for any and all details later on, and that was just fine with me.