by Tia Siren
After feeding the chickens, I made my way over to the stables where the family of three horses was. As I walked, I couldn’t help but acknowledge how quiet the farmland was. Usually, there was my father’s whistling and a little bit of life from my mom’s positive energy. However, there was nothing to fill the void with them gone. There was a fog looming over the morning, as if even the skies were mourning the absence of two beautiful and brilliant souls. Tears brimmed my eyes, but I shook them away and started whistling to drown out the screaming silence surrounding me.
The horses were wide awake and extremely happy to see me. I couldn’t stay sad looking at the three other loves of my life. They were the only ones my family had kept, because each individual family member had had a favorite, and neither of my parents had been able to bear letting them go. First, of course, I greeted my favorite. She wasn’t the prettiest of horses, but she’d stolen my heart the moment I had laid eyes on her. She had white hooves and legs, but the white transitioned to gray on her upper body. She also had black spots over her body and a black mane and tail. Due to this, I’d named her Ash.
I nuzzled Ash and opened the gate to her cot. After untying her, I led her over to the food and water I had put out for them. Once she was eating, I walked over to my mother’s favorite horse. He was brilliant and beautiful, but old. His coat was platinum blond, and it shined even if he hadn’t been brushed in a while. His name was, oddly enough, Lady, and he was loved so that he gave nothing but love in turn. I patted him affectionately before letting him walk over to the food. Finally, I stopped in front of the final gate and came face to face with my pa’s horse. She was white with brown spots, like a cow. My dad had thought it was clever to name her Cow, and he’d spoiled her rotten. As I looked at her, she looked back with a familiar gaze that I was so accustomed to. Out of all the horses, I had ridden Cow the most. We had bonded almost as much as I had bonded with Ash. While Cow looked at me, a long tongue licked my cheek, and, maybe due to the shock or the randomness, I couldn’t contain the fit of laughter that bubbled from my stomach.
The irrational part of me thought she could feel my pain, but I figured she was greeting a loved one she hadn’t seen in a long while. I opened her gate and let her go over to the food before the others ate most of it. As Cow walked away, Ash walked over. I figured she wanted to be brushed, so I gathered everything I needed and got to work. Of all the horses, Lady included, Ash adored getting brushed and groomed the most. She would stand for hours, enjoying getting pampered and showered with attention. When the family business had been doing well, everyone had loved all our horses, but Ash and Lady were so unique that they were always the ones admired and ridden most. So many people had offered countless money for the two of them, but my parents had always refused to budge because they had a place in our family.
As I lost myself in memories and brush strokes, I didn’t hear my name getting called in the distance. I didn’t hear the gate opening and closing nearby. I didn’t hear the footsteps approaching me. I was so lost in my thoughts that I was scared almost shitless when a hand touched my shoulder. I jolted back to reality and jumped away from the person behind me. Quickly, I turned around and came face to face with my family’s lawyer. My heart was racing so fast that I had to place my hand over my chest to soothe it.
“Jesus, you scared the shit out of me,” I said, shaking my head as I realized how ridiculous I seemed.
“I’m sorry, Harper,” the silent startler said quickly.
Howard Mitchell was a middle-aged man of average height, and he had a bald spot in the center of his head almost as big as his beer gut of a belly. My pa had often tried to set us up with one another, but I was a country girl who didn’t just want a man who had money. As kind as Howard was, he was far from my type and closer to someone I would consider just a good family friend. I knew he had a soft spot for me, but I also knew he had recently gotten quite serious with another old friend of mine, and things were better off that way.
“What are you doing here?” I asked him in hopes that he had good news to bring to me.
He shuffled and sighed, obviously wracking his brain for the words that should have come easily. It was a simple question, and his inability to break bad news was something that he, as a lawyer, needed to work on.
“Come on, Howard,” I muttered, “it can’t be all that bad.”
“Well, I was trying to negotiate with the bank, but they’re not budging, Harper,” he finally said.
My heart sank a bit, but the news wasn’t all that new. It was a fear my father had had before dying, and it had been on my mind when I’d been arranging his funeral. The family was so far behind on all the bills, and I had to figure out something to do fast. The logic, however, didn’t curb the anxiety I was feeling about it all. I supposed he noticed the slight panic, because he reached forward and placed a hand on my shoulder.
“Look, let’s go inside and sit down to look over all of the paperwork,” he said. “I have an idea that I was going to run by you anyway, and it might help everything.”
Of course, that caught my attention. I looked up and tilted my head to the side. “What do you mean?”
He nodded for us to go inside, and, almost reluctantly, I followed. The sound of our footsteps and breathing were the only things filling the air as we walked toward the warm comfort of my home. I opened the door for him and let him in before making my way to the kitchen. My mother had instilled hospitality into me, and I wanted to make Howard feel welcome as we chatted about the business and financial matters that we had to take care of. I walked over to the coffee maker and started a new brew.
“Are you hungry?” I asked him as he set out the paperwork and information on the table.
“No. Coffee will be fine enough,” he said while sitting down.
I nodded and walked over, sitting across from him. I looked at the papers that were in front of me and read over them as I waited for the coffee. The papers were daunting because of how serious everything was. I was either going to have to take care of the financial matters, or at least some of them, or the bank was going to foreclose on the family ranch in less than thirty days. I was shit out of luck, and it felt like I was going to need to turn to other means of bringing money in.
I sighed heavily after spending a few minutes reading over the papers Howard had brought over. “This doesn’t look good at all,” I said. I pushed the papers away and walked over to the coffee maker. I poured both Howard and me large cups of coffee. I doctored mine to be a little sweeter for my taste buds, but Howard always liked his black and bitter. I set the cups down on the table and sat down once more. “What am I going to do? I can’t make that kind of money in thirty days, Howard.”
“If you keep going like your family did, no,” he said before taking a long sip of his coffee.
“What do you mean by that?” I asked him curiously.
“Well, this is still a bed and breakfast, meaning you can still house people and provide a service to make enough money to pay the mortgage,” he said.
I nodded slowly. “That may be true, but we haven’t had anyone interested in staying here in months—nearing a year, Howard.”
“You can lease some of the land and offer some barn space,” he said, “and the person who leases out this land can pay for lodging and hospitality as well.”
The more he clarified, the more I understood what he was beating around the bush to actually say.
“So you want me to start leasing out my family property to a stranger while acting as a doting housemaid? Oh no, Howard. I’m sorry. I would be fine with providing the boarding, but you know I can’t let someone else have my family property. That’s like slapping my parents in the face,” I said, shaking my head.
“But it can help with the payments,” he said. “You won’t have to risk losing your family land at all.”
“No. Instead, I’ll be selling parts of what my family worked so hard to build,” I said. “My pa died less than a week ago and my mom’
s grave is nearly as fresh. I’m not selling this business out so quickly.”
“Harper, you are as stubborn as your parents, I swear.” Howard sighed. “You would rather lose everything than try to save what you can?”
I bit my lip and allowed his words to register. He was right, as pissed as that fact made me. I was either going to lose everything by trying to do it all on my own, or I was going to take the advice of the man who had tried so hard to help my family stay afloat. My pa’s inability to ask for help was the main reason we were buried so deep.
“This will just be temporary, right?” I said.
Howard visibly relaxed and he nodded. “Only until we are back on good footing and in the bank’s good graces.”
I thought it over for several minutes longer before nodding. “Fine. We can lease a small bit of the space, but only for a little while.”
“I’ll get everything in order,” Howard said with a wide grin. “This was the best decision you could make, Harper.”
“I hope you’re right,” I muttered, sipping the coffee in front of me while I silently prayed for my late parents’ forgiveness.
Chapter Three
Lincoln
The cold February air nipped at the exposed skin on my face as I exited my Audi in the airport parking garage. I was bundled up in a black, double-breasted trench coat with a black fitted sweater beneath and a cashmere maroon scarf around my neck. In any and every situation, I was dressed to the nines. Even if I was headed to my own personal definition of hell. I gathered my bags and made my way into the airport, cursing my family the entire time. I had so much business to take care of and so many things to tend to, but I’d had to turn my work over to my employees after giving in to the pleas of my mother.
They said you could take the boy out of the country, but you could never get the country out of the boy. Whoever had said that was the proper definition of a dumbass, because I was out of the hick town I’d grown up in and happier than ever. It had been ten years since I’d left Dubois, and I’d had every intention not to return; however, my mom was dead set on coaxing me out of my safe haven over two thousand miles away. Despite me making sure my parents were well off and financially secure back home, they still demanded so much of me. Every holiday, they’d beg for me to come home, as if my holiday cards and overabundance of gifts and money weren’t enough. Every birthday, they’d ask to see me, as if the two decades they’d had with me before I’d left hadn’t occurred.
“I’m far too generous,” I muttered to myself as I walked toward the airport entrance.
Since it was so late at night, there were far less people than usual. After checking in my luggage, I passed by exhausted businessmen and women, and there was the occasional college student or family. I was more comfortable travelling at night, especially since first class was always far emptier during that time. I was a man who enjoyed having my own personal space, and I indulged in being alone quite often. Growing up, I had been intentionally isolated because I hadn’t been “enough” in the eyes of my peers. Their actions and treatment toward me created my comfort zone. I was alone, and that was how I liked it.
Only one person had been able to fit comfortably in my life, but she was a person of the past. I’d had to let go of her in order to move on to the path of success.
When I was twenty, I had decided I was wasting my life in Wyoming. I’d grown up with nothing—absolutely nothing. My parents had struggled to keep food on the table for their seven kids, and my dad had eventually decided that he would have rather supported his gambling addiction than his family at home. As the youngest, I’d had to watch my mother struggle to pay bills alone until each of her kids got old enough to either move out or help her. I’d gown up wearing hand-me-downs with more than a few holes and taking brown-bagged lunches with only half sandwiches to school. I’d been made fun of relentlessly for not having the luxury of having a stable family.
Damn, kids were assholes.
When I was twenty, I had decided to leave that all behind. My mother and my first love had been the only reasons I’d had to stay in that backward-ass old town of my past, and I couldn’t let them hold me back from my potential. So, with nothing but the clothes on my back and ten dollars in my pocket, I moved to New York and I never looked back. After three years of hard work and struggling, I had been able to get proper footing and ended up expanding my business into a billion-dollar empire less than five years later. Needless to say, I was a fucking beast who came from nothing and had turned that bag of rags into endless riches.
I relished in my accomplishments as I got comfortable in first class. I took off my coat and kicked back to enjoy luxury for three final hours until I was blasted back into the past. A part of me was hopeful that the town I was from had advanced and modernized itself; however, I was a realistic man. Even after a decade, I was sure I would be able to navigate my way through the town with a blindfold over my eyes. There was nothing but old people stuck in the 80s, and they were too stubborn to actually try to keep up with the times.
On the flight, I spent my time writing up emails and tasks for my employees for the short amount of time I was going to be away. I had started out as a real estate agent and ended up renovating and selling million-dollar homes to the rich. That business topped with my investments and the property I owned turned my net worth into what it was. For a man who hadn’t spent a day in college, I’d sure made it a lot further than those who were unemployed and suffering through jobs they’d always hate. Every time I thought about how miserable the people who had made me suffer were, I couldn’t help but smile.
Oh, I could not wait for them to see me.
The flight was a lot shorter than I had thought it would be. During the time, I savored the taste of top-quality scotch and enjoyed the late-night snacks they provided. Since it was so late and there weren’t many passengers, I spent most of my time flirting with the gorgeous redheaded flight attendant who was catering to my needs. While many things had changed, I was still a gentleman, and that was the only thing holding me back from taking her to the bathroom and getting to know her on a more intimate level. Instead, I took her number and promised her that I would text her when I was settled in.
Some promises weren’t made to keep, but I knew that if I contacted her months down the line, she wouldn’t hesitate to meet with the billionaire she’d met on her late-night shift.
A sense of dread filled me when the plane began to land. I knew I had my mother and God knew who else waiting for me in the airport, and I knew I was going to be smothered with affection. I had promised myself that I was never going to come back, and here I was, back in Wyoming. I took my time getting off the plane and made sure I was the last one to walk out. It was nearing three in the morning, and I just wanted to go to bed and sleep away the week I was supposed to spend there.
Much to my surprise, the only person waiting for me was my mother. My heart broke just a bit, because I had assumed everyone would be excited to see me. It had been years since I had seen my siblings, and we all barely spoke. I figured they would want to see how their baby brother looked and how well his money and the city was treating him. Instead, I was greeted by my exhausted but excited mother. She rushed over to me, and, even though she was short, she tackled me in a powerful hug. I stumbled back a few steps, but I wrapped my arms around her in turn. I felt warm, and, admittedly, a large smile made its way onto my face.
I was a mama’s boy through and through. I was happy to see that she looked less stressed and had put on some healthy weight now that she was eating properly. She had used my money to fix herself up and get to a better place, and a sense of pride filled my being. All I had wanted growing up was for her to never have to struggle again, and I had been able to make that happen for her.
She cooed over me after pulling away. “Oh, Lincoln, you haven’t changed a bit.”
“I wouldn’t say that, ma,” I muttered, looking down at her.
“I was worried that city you love so
much had done changed you, baby,” she said, cupping my cheeks. “You still look like the first time I laid eyes on you in the hospital.”
I felt my cheeks warm as she doted over me, and a pit made its way into my chest as I realized that she would have traded all the money I sent her just to spend more time with me. I quickly shook those thoughts and emotions from my head and placed my much larger hand over hers.
“Come on, let’s get you home. It’s too late for either of us to be out,” I told her.
She nodded and followed me to baggage claim. The entire time, she talked my ear off about how excited everyone was to see me and how I had so many nieces and nephews to meet. As she caught me up on everything, the feelings I had tried so hard to suppress came back. I didn’t understand how so much could have changed, and I hadn’t realized my siblings had accomplished so much. I had focused all my effort, energy, and attention on myself, and now I felt as if I were the one who had been left behind in the end.
I easily shoved those thoughts out as I reminded myself that none of my siblings were self-made billionaires and that I had accomplished what others only dreamed of. That thought comforted me, and I was content as I rode in the passenger side of my mom’s beat-up car.
“Why don’t you get yourself something new with the money I send?” I asked her as I looked over the car she’d had ever since I was a young boy.
“Honey, I hardly touch that money. You send so much,” she said. “I use what is enough, and I save the rest just in case something happens.”
“Mom, I send you that money to spend,” I told her. “I can always send you more when you need it.”
“Money doesn’t last forever, love,” she said, “and one day you might not have any more money to give, and then I can give it all back.”