The Cowboy's Baby: Devlin Brothers Ranch

by Joanna Bell

  I stumbled a little and fell back against the barn door as Jackson spat words at me, each one was as pointed and sharp as a dagger. He was so angry. I don't know that I'd ever heard him so angry. I thought we were doing well. Alright, not well – but OK.

  "Why –" I gasped, grabbing the latch on the door to steady myself. "Jackson, why would you –"

  "Stop," he cut me off. "Just stop with the wounded fucking bird act. It's not cute. You won, OK? You won. Good for you."

  What the hell was he talking about? Where was it coming from? I could feel the resentment wafting off him like cologne. And then, as I was standing there blinking and in shock, I remembered something.

  "Wait," I said, my face hot with emotion and my voice rising. "Jackson, you invited me. You invited me here! Why are you saying these things? Why would you even ask me to come here if –"

  "I was trying to be nice!"

  I couldn't help but laugh. "Nice?" I shot back. "Really?!"

  Jackson, no longer able to maintain his calculated air of calmness, stood up straight. "Yes, it is! I invited you to stay here. It sounded like you were having a hard time so –"

  "So you thought fucking me would make it better?!"

  For the first time, he seemed to be the one without a response. It didn't last for long.

  "I didn't – what the fuck, Hailey? Your ego is really getting out of control, huh?"

  I shook my head. "Yeah. My ego. That must be it. Whatever, Jackson."

  I had to get out of there. As angry as I was, I could already feel it beginning to drain out of me. How many times was I going to let Jackson Devlin treat me like dirt before I learned? How many times?

  "Don't walk away from me!" He shouted as I did just that.

  "HAILEY! Don't you –"

  He ran up behind me and I refused to let myself cower or pull away. Instead I turned to face him directly, determined not to let him see how shaken I really was.

  "What?" I yelled, defiantly meeting his gaze. "Not finished telling me how nice you are? You should really pick one, Jackson. Like, either you're nice and sweet and I'm an evil stuck-up bitch or you're a guy who loses his mind and tells people to fuck off because they don't always do exactly what you want them to. But you can't be both! You have to pick one."

  Once more, I walked away. I needed to look at flight schedules on my phone. No way was I staying in California for the rest of the week, not after that.

  And once again, he followed right behind me. I went into the main house, intending to fix myself something to eat before returning to the guesthouse to book a flight back to New York.

  "Leave me alone," I finally said when we were in the kitchen. "Look, I get it OK? You wanted something, you didn't get it and now you're pissed. Fine. But I'm still not sleeping with –"

  "That's not what I want," he replied, his voice low and filled with spite. "That's not what this is about."

  "Isn't it?" I asked, taking a couple of slices of bread out of a bag and throwing them onto the counter. "Are you sure? Because it sure feels like you wouldn't be this upset if I gave in back there, in the barn."

  He stood there seething visibly as I opened cupboard doors one after the other, looking for peanut butter and feeling momentarily buoyed by the fact that it was now me who was speaking in the calm, amused tone and Jackson who couldn't hide his emotions. "It sounded like you were having a hard time, so I thought it might help if –"

  "If you fucked me!" I yelled, losing my composure instantly as I remembered his words from the barn: Fuck you, Hailey. "Right?! Just like last time, right? So I can go back to New York and spend the next 6 months thinking about you all the goddamned time while you act like everything is my fault, right? So I can –" I broke off suddenly, sensing I was on the verge of losing control.

  "You ruined my life, you know."

  I was facing the window that looked out over the dry hills and, beyond that, the blue Pacific. In my left hand was a full jar of peanut butter. I don't know what it was about that sentence of Jackson's in particular, after all the ones that had come before it, but something clicked in my brain. I turned around and threw the peanut butter as hard as I could.

  It missed him. It did not miss a cabinet, the glass front panel of which immediately shattered into a million jagged pieces.

  "What the –" a voice came from outside the kitchen.

  Jackson and I both turned towards the doorway. Lacey. She had a bag of groceries in each hand. Behind her stood Brody, his eyes wide and his lower lip trembling...

  Chapter 39: Jackson

  That time, Lacey wasn't easy on me.

  "You really need to get your shit together Jackson," she told me after Hailey swept Brody into her arms and carried him off to the guesthouse. "Pass me the broom."

  I looked behind me, unsure about the location of the broom, the adrenaline still singing in my veins from the fight with Hailey. "Where is –"

  "In the cupboard next to the door!"

  It was as I was reaching for the broom, my feet crunching over glass shards on the floor, that I first noticed a strange smell, like something was burning.

  Lacey saw me sniffing. "It's the fire," she said. "The wind changed direction about an hour ago. There's nothing to worry about yet, it's still miles away."

  I'd been keeping an eye on the news bulletins about the fire, as you do when you live in California. Was I worried at that point? No. There were more pressing issues at hand.

  "You know she threw the peanut butter at me, right?" I asked when Lacey surprised me by snatching the broom angrily out of my hands. I'd barely even seen her annoyed before, let alone as angry as she looked that day.

  "You still haven't apologized, have you?"

  I could have played dumb, pretended I didn't know what she was talking about. But I did know – and Lacey knew it.

  "Things have been fine with us," I replied defensively. "We've been getting along fine, dealing with Brody and visitation and all of that."

  Lacey stopped sweeping up broken glass and looked right at me. "So you haven't even talked about the specifics with her yet? You haven't apologized? I heard what you said. I heard you tell her she ruined your life. You're lucky she only threw peanut butter at you, honestly."

  I walked out. I knew I was on the verge of saying something I was going to regret. Then I spent the next few hours getting caught up on odd jobs in the barn before giving a scheduled lesson later in the afternoon and then heading back into town, not eager to see Lacey or Hailey again that day.

  On the drive back into L.A. I pulled into a gas station to fill up – and to buy a sandwich I was pretty sure I was going to regret in a few hours. It was as I was walking back to my truck after paying that I noticed a few people standing out closer to the road, gazing north up the coast with concerned looks on their faces.

  "What do you think?" I asked the most old-timer looking member of the group when I realized it was the smoke they were looking at. "Is this the one that burns the entire city to the ground?"

  But the people were tourists, and none of them had any idea what the fire was going to do. Neither did the experts, as far as I could tell. The latest news seemed to boil down to not much more than 'we'll see!'

  I hesitated for a few seconds before turning right onto the road that would take me back to L.A. California was used to fires. The fire crews and city officials knew what they were doing. They weren't the type of people to take even the smallest risks with people's lives. At a red light I turned and glanced back up north at the haze of smoke hanging over the dry hills and the coast.

  No one wants you up there. Just go home.

  I drove home. When I got back to my apartment I turned on the local news, flopped down on the couch and ate the rest of the disgusting gas station sandwich while contemplating just what the hell my problem was.

  It wasn't Lacey. It wasn't even Hailey, although something about the difficulty of admitting to myself that she wasn't the problem should have been a hint. I was still so
wedded to my pride, and to the story I told myself about who I was and why I did the things I did. And the main point of that story?

  That I was the wronged party. That I, Jackson Devlin, had been wronged. Maybe Hailey Nickerson didn't wrong me, but someone did. Something did. God, fate, the universe, random happenstance – my family. So whatever I did wasn't really my fault, as I saw it. I had a right to my anger. I had a right to my rage.

  In a way, I wasn't wrong. I did have a right to those things. But I did not have a right to take out my anger and rage on an innocent person. And Hailey was innocent – just as innocent as I was. More than me, actually, because unlike me she didn't stoop to taking it out on others.

  "Fuck you, Hailey."

  My own words rang in my head. Why did I do it? Why did I act like that? I knew it was wrong. I knew she didn't deserve it. I knew it months ago, at Christmas when Lacey let me have it.

  And yet I still couldn't bring myself to apologize – for any of it. Part of me still needed it to be her fault.

  I dozed off on the sofa and woke up at just past 9 o'clock to the news reporting that the winds had neither weakened nor changed direction, but that no new evacuations had been ordered.

  I eyed my phone on the table. Should I call? She probably wouldn't even pick up. And it's not like Hailey wasn't on top of things when it came to Brody's safety. In so many ways she was still exactly the same girl I knew back in Sweetgrass Ridge, but there were a few differences. She'd developed an almost 6th sense-like ability to sniff out danger, for one. I watched her stand at the edge of a playground once, on one of my visits to New York, and calmly list all the dangers she could spot, the possible injuries that could befall Brody, and then conclude by asking me if I knew it would be faster to carry Brody to the nearest ER (which she knew the location of) instead of calling an ambulance if he hurt himself.

  That's not a woman who takes chances with her kid.

  Still. It wouldn't hurt to check in.

  I called Lacey instead, reckoning she would be the most likely to pick up.

  "Jackson," she said flatly, by way of greeting. "What is it?"

  She was still pissed off.

  "Just watching the news," I replied. "How are things up there?"

  "About the same. The smoke's a little heavier – we're playing board games in the wine cellar because the air is filtered down there, and I'm thinking about maybe getting a few of the horses out tonight, just in case. I don't want to be –"

  "Who's playing board games in the cellar?" I interrupted.

  "Who do you think? Me and Hailey and Brody. I sent everyone else home – there's nothing to do here but wait and see what happens, anyway."

  "Uh-huh. But you're going to move some of the horses out tonight? Do you need any help with that?"

  I was looking for an excuse to go back to Sea Vista. I should have just gone. I should have gone, helped Lacey move out all the horses and then taken her, Hailey and Brody out of there that evening. The fact that I didn't will be something I regret for the rest of my life.

  "No."

  I went into the kitchen when the call was over, my eyes roaming the countertops for some chore that needed doing, something to take my mind off the fire and the fight with Hailey. But the counters were clean, so I paid some bills online and then went for a run.

  I'm not a runner. I've never been a runner. I keep in shape bucking hay bales and carrying water, chopping wood and lifting little kids onto horses.

  But that night, I went for a run.

  Within 5 minutes, a pain in my left side forced me to slow to a walk. But I was outside, distracted. It was a hot summer night, full of music pouring out through open windows, people gathered in front yards to talk and chill. The smoke in the air didn't seem to be bothering anyone very much.

  When the pain in my side went away I started running again. I ran down street after street, through parks and parking lots, driven by the need to drain the nervous, paranoid energy out of myself. I kept running until it felt like I couldn't possibly take another step. And then I ran home.

  It was almost midnight by the time I got out of the shower and sat back down in front of the TV. And what was the news? There was still no news. No updates from before my run, anyway. The winds had picked up a little but no new evacuations were ordered.

  Even after all that running, I still couldn't sleep. I tried, for a bit. Lay in bed tossing and turning for an hour or so before giving up and returning to my spot on the sofa. At least I didn't have to be at work the next day – no one was going to be sending their kids to their horse-riding lessons in that smoky mess.

  On the news, the perky blonde woman from earlier in the night had been replaced by an excitable male anchor who was in the midst of narrating several social media videos of families evacuating in towns north of Malibu. I watched as a woman, her voice shaking with fear, screamed at her kids to get into the car. As she peeled out of the driveway there was a brief shot of a wall of flame behind the car. One of the children began to weep, the other just kept screaming that the fire was "right there!"

  I looked away from the TV screen, my heart pounding. Those kids sounded about the same age as Brody. And if their mom had been caught out like that, maybe...

  I called Hailey. Fuck the fight. I had to know what was happening. I had to know she and Brody were OK.

  But as soon as she picked up I found myself plunged into a fresh new hell of worry. Because Hailey Nickerson sounded scared. And she never sounded scared.

  "What's going on?" I asked, leaping to my feet and pacing around my living room "What – Hailey – what's –"

  Get your shit together, man.

  I got my shit together. Took a long, deep breath and forced myself to calm down. Or to sound calm, anyway.

  "Lacey left over an hour ago with a neighbor. He, uh – I forget his name. They took 3 horses in his trailer and, um – Jackson, the power went out ten minutes ago and –"

  She was rushing, each word spilling into the next.

  "Hailey," I said quietly. "Hailey."

  "What? Did you hear me? The power went out and – Jackson, I can see – I can see the flames over the back hill. I can see –"

  It was as if some unseen force sucked all the air clean out of my lungs. I stumbled over something on the floor and felt a sudden sheen of sweat break out on my brow. Flames? She could see flames?

  Keep it together. Keep it the fuck together. You're no use to her if you lose your shit.

  "Leave," I said. "Go now. Lacey keeps the keys to the Merc in the –"

  "She took the car!" Hailey cried. "She drove the car and the neighbor drove the horses – she said she would be right back but she's late and I'm starting to get worried. I tried to call but she's not picking up her phone, I think maybe it's dead or something – and the power went out and the smoke is getting thicker and the air filter in the –"

  My phone beeped to let me know another call was coming through. I looked at the screen.

  "OK," I said. "Hailey, that's Lacey. I'm going to take this. I want you to get a couple of t-shirts or dish towels and get them wet, OK? Stay on the line. I'll – I'll be right back. Hold on. Stay on the line."

  "OK," she replied, her voice trembling.

  I took Lacey's call.

  "Jack–"

  "WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?!" I bellowed. "HAILEY CAN SEE FLAMES OVER THE HILL! THEY'RE WAITING FOR YOU TO –"

  Before I could finish yelling at her, I heard probably the last sound on earth I wanted to hear. Lacey started crying. And Lacey was not the kind of woman who cried unless things were really, really bad.

  "They won't let me go back!" She exclaimed. "They just issued a mandatory evacuation order and they won't let me go back there, Jackson! I don't – I don't know what to do! I don't –"

  "No," I cut in. "No, there's no mandatory evacuation for Malibu."

  But even as I was turning towards the TV, part of me knew what I was going to see. And there it was, already scrolling across the
bottom of the screen before the anchor had even had time to announce it.

  New evacuation order issued for Malibu, all residents advised to leave immediately.

  For a split second, I teetered. In that tiny sliver of time, it could have gone either way. I could have collapsed, lost my shit, run screaming into the street. But I didn't do any of those things. I couldn't. Because Hailey and Brody were still at Sea Vista Ranch. And they didn't have a way to get out.

  I gulped the rising panic down into my chest and asked Lacey where she was.

  "On the highway just south of Corral Canyon. The police won't let us –"

  "Let me talk to one of them. The cops. Put one of them on."

  I could hear sirens in the background, shouted conversation. And then a new, male voice.

  "Yes?"

  I gave him my name. I gave him Hailey and Brody's names and the address of the ranch.

  "Sir, I'm a police officer. You need to call 911 so they can alert the fire brigade if this is –"

  I hung up. There was no time for anything but trying to get Hailey and Brody the fuck out of there.

  But when I tried to tap back into the other call, it was gone. The line was dead.

  I called Hailey back. Nothing. No ringing, just dead air. I tried a second time, and then a third. Same thing.

  My fourth attempt was made as I took the stairs down to the parking lot 3 at a time and ran to my truck. Still nothing.

  I held my phone between my teeth and peeled out onto the street outside my apartment complex, my heart pounding so hard it felt like I couldn't breathe.

  Chapter 40: Hailey

  When my phone lost reception I knew immediately that I was alone. As profoundly alone as I had ever been in my life. It didn't matter where Jackson was – or Lacey, or anyone. They weren't at the Sea Vista Ranch. Only me and Brody were there, and it came to me with sudden, perfect clarity that saving his life – saving our lives – was now down to me and no one else.

  I went outside to try to get reception. Brody was still in the wine cellar, where the air was marginally clearer than it was in the rest of the house. To my left was the dirt road that led to the highway. To my right was the barn, where I could hear the horses Lacey hadn't taken with her whinnying with fear. Behind me was the house.