Chapter 93 An Unsettling Call
Sierra stared at the screen, her breath shallow, as if her lungs had forgotten how to expand. The name pulsed like a heartbeat in the dark glass of her phone. She closed her eyes, pressing her fingertips to her temples, willing her pulse to slow, her voice to steady.
Then, with deliberate calm, she swiped to answer.
“Hey,” she said, and to her own ears, the word sounded almost normal. Cool. Detached. A practiced tone from years of client calls and boardroom negotiations.
“Si,” he answered, his voice low and warm, like sun-baked earth after a spring rain. “Long time since I heard your voice.”
She swallowed, her throat tight. “Yeah. It’s been a while. How are you?”
“Same as always,” he said, and she could hear him shift, the faint creak of an old chair or saddle leather, she couldn’t tell which. “Just checking in. Thought I’d see how things were going for you in the Big Apple.”
A small, humorless smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “Actually, I haven’t been in New York for a couple of weeks. I’ve—um—I’ve been in London.”
There was a beat of silence.
“London?” He sounded surprised, then impressed. “Well, I’ll be damned. You’re really living the dream now, aren’t you?”
She let out a soft laugh, brittle but convincing. “It’s just work. Expansion project for the firm. Nexora’s parent company is headquartered here. A lot of late nights, meetings with lawyers and accountants. You know how it is.”
“Nah,” he said, and she could hear the quiet amusement in his voice. “I don’t. But I can imagine. What’s it like over there?”
She turned away from the window, walking back toward her desk, forcing herself to move with purpose. “It rains. A lot. Gray skies, streetlamps in the fog, it’s like something out of a thriller movie. Beautiful, in a moody sort of way. But honestly, I haven’t seen much beyond the office and my flat. No time.”
“That’s a shame,” he said. “You always loved exploring when we were kids. Remember when we snuck into the old mines outside of Dry Creek? We were convinced we’d find gold.”
A real laugh escaped her this time, soft, surprised. “We found a rattlesnake and two cans of beans from the Prohibition era.”
“You screamed loud enough to wake the dead.”
“And you picked me up and carried me out like some damn cowboy hero.” Her voice softened, just for a second. Then she caught herself. Cleared her throat. “Anyway. No adventures this time. Just work.”
“You should really get out and explore the countryside some,” he encouraged. “I hear it’s pretty country, lots of green pastures, rolling hills, and hedgerows.”
Another silence. Longer this time. She compared how he approached the idea of getting out of the city to what Julian had just offered her minutes before. She also knew Ryder well enough to hear what wasn’t being said; the worry, the distance, the quiet ache between them.
“Ryder,” she said carefully, “is everything… okay back home?”
He exhaled slowly. “Cody’s doin’ his best,” he said at last. “But he’s in over his head, Si. Treadin’ water.”
Her stomach dropped.
Cody. Sometimes she still saw him as the little brother, who used to sleep with a stuffed horse under his pillow, and the precocious teen who once set fire to the barn trying to make a campfire indoors. The same brother who, after their dad’s funeral, had approached her drunk, furious with her for pushing papers when their father was dead. The same man who was struggling to leave his partying lifestyle behind committed to honoring their father by running Sage Ranch the right way. Maybe he knew the right way, but he simply didn’t have the will and self-confidence to do it.
She had trusted him to hold it together.
But could he really do it?
“He’s trying,” Ryder went on. “Takes the morning checks, handles payroll, keeps the books, but the bank’s tightening the loan, the north pasture fence is falling apart, and the vet bill for that calf with the twisted gut nearly wiped him out. He’s skipping meals, I think. Won’t say it, but I see him.”
She pressed a hand to her mouth, blinking fast. No. Not now.
“And the help?” she asked, her voice tighter.
“He’s got some decent help. Couple of hands from the reservation who come when they can. But it’s not enough. Not sustainable.”
She closed her eyes. Visions of the ranch flooded her, golden dawn light on the corrals, the smell of leather and dust, the slow, steady rhythm of life that was so easy to become lost in. She could picture Cody out there, shoulders slumped, trying to be a man when there was still a little boy inside.
“I should be there,” she whispered.
“You’ve got your life,” Ryder said simply. “Your career. Your…” He hesitated. “...your relationship.”
She flinched. Julian. The invitation to Scotland, the velvet trap of luxury and control. A weekend designed to pull her further from everything she’d ever known.
“That doesn’t change what’s home,” she said, her voice low.
“No,” Ryder agreed. “But it changes what you do there.”
She bit the inside of her cheek, tasting blood. He wasn’t accusing her. He never did. That was the worst part. He accepted her choices like a man who’d already said goodbye.
“Si,” he said, softer now, “when are you comin’ back?”
She paused. Not to consider, but to brace. “I think… in a couple of weeks. Maybe sooner. Once the London phase wraps up, there’s still due diligence, but I can handle that remotely. I’ll be back soon.”
“Soon,” he repeated, as if testing the word.
“Yes,” she said, almost pleading now. “Soon.”
He didn’t respond right away. She heard wind in the background, the distant lowing of a mother calling to her calf.
“I’ll tell Cody,” he said finally. “He’ll be glad.”
Silence settled between them, a chasm of unsaid words, of love and loss and the weight of choices.
She wanted to tell him everything. About Julian’s predatory charm, the way he studied her like a puzzle to be solved. His ruthlessness in business. About the Scotsman’s warning in a shadowed corner of the pub, threatening to expose her home and the firm to public scrutiny if she dared challenge Julian about buying up land around Kingman or breaking off their relationship. About how she lay awake staring at the ceiling, wondering if she was betraying her father’s memory, her brother, herself.
Most of all, she wanted to say: I miss you. I never stopped loving you. I don’t know how to come back, but I don’t know how to stay away.
But she couldn’t.
Because if Julian’s people were watching, and she was certain they were, then this call, this moment of weakness, could be the thread that unraveled everything.
So she said nothing. Just breathed, counting the seconds.
“Well,” Ryder said, “take care of yourself over there. Watch your step on those slick streets.”
“You too,” she whispered. “Be safe.”
“Always.”
And then the line went dead.
Sierra lowered the phone slowly, her hand trembling. The room felt colder now, the city lights outside blurred by the sudden moisture in her eyes. She pressed the back of her hand to her lips, her shoulders shaking in silent sobs.
She wanted to run. Not to Scotland, not to a billionaire’s retreat on some murky loch. She wanted to run to the ranch, to Cody, to Ryder, back to a life that was hard, but honest. Where love wasn’t a transaction, where power didn’t wear a tailored suit and whisper threats between sips of single malt.
But she was trapped.
In London. In Julian’s orbit. In this web of secrets and silent threats.
She sank into her chair, clutching the phone like a lifeline.
And for the first time in weeks, Sierra Quinn, pragmatic, polished, unbreakable, allowed herself to cry. Not for the loss of control. Not for the fear.
But for the man on the other end of the line, who still waited in the quiet red dust of Arizona, hoping she’d come home.