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“We’re going for a ride?”

“Yep. You ever been on Ransom before?” I caught his headshake out of the corner of my eye. “She’s a little leg-shy on the left, so keep it easy. Otherwise, she’s solid.”

Wren didn’t say anything to that, just walked off the porch and straight to the mare. She pinned her ears but looked him all over before one flicked forward. Wren moved slowly, petting her neck, watching her body language. When he decided she wasn’t gonna have a problem with him, he mounted up and I followed suit.

I led the way past the house and the cabins, then steered us northeast. Wren followed along, not saying anything, and I had the strangest impulse to take his reins and pony Ransom so that Wren couldn’t escape. The truth was, if Wren didn’t want to be here, he could take off. Ransom would love a good run, and even with all the changes that had happened over the years and the improvements Judson was making since he’d gotten home, Wren still knew this ranch as well as I did.

We hit open field before too long and I picked up the pace into a lope. I had a place in mind that would be a perfect spot to not only let the horses relax but where we could talk. Even still, I was surprised Wren hadn’t peppered me with questions by now, or demanded to know where we were going. I was desperate to find out what was going on in his mind but scared to know at the same time.

Wren let out a little sound, and when I glanced over at him, a tiny, wistful sort of smile was playing on his lips. He caught me looking and shrugged.

“I didn’t think the treehouse was still standing,” he murmured.

Of course he’d figured out where I was taking us. We’d built that the summer after eighth grade, hooking up a cart to whichever horse we could abscond with for the day, and dragging spare wood and other supplies out to that spot any time we got the chance. We called it a tree house even if the platform was only about a foot off the ground, since we’d used two blue spruce as anchor points for opposite corners.

“It’s not,” I responded, a little ruefully. A ghost of a smile played at my lips and I liked seeing Wren mirror the expression. Memories from that summer washed through me and I had to chuckle. Wren gave me a curious look, so I elaborated, “Dad was so mad at us.”

Wren’s smile grew. “It came from fear. He was so afraid we were going to break ourselves.”

I nodded, remembering the terror in my dad’s eyes as he lectured us, the way he had to stop and breathe deep several times. Dad had been working hard to keep himself regulated so we would listen. “Then he helped. Showed us exactly what to do to make it safe for us and everyone else.”

“That’s the Harrington way, isn’t it?” Wren’s voice held a note of something I couldn’t quite place, but he was purposefully not looking at me so I couldn’t discern it. “I only met Gigi Fern a couple of times before she passed, but she gave me the talk, even at five.”

Gigi Fern had been the reason my parents, and in turn our entire family, was what we were today. My parents had been functionally disowned, the town’s pariahs, since Mom got pregnant at fifteen, and they were not only determined to have me and keep me, but to be together forever. Gigi Harrington had been known in town as the scary old lady, but she took my parents in, gave them support and love, stood up for them, and gave them the seed money to start Blue Creek Ranch. When Mom and Dad got married about three seconds after they both turned eighteen, they took her last name as their own, and filed to change mine as well. I’d been born Bodhi Michael Crenshaw—my mother’s maiden name—but I had been a Harrington since I was two years old. Gigi Fern told me once I’d been destined to be a Harrington even when my name didn’t match yet.

At five, I had no idea what she meant, but I did now.

Wren nailed the helping thing, though. My parents were already kindhearted people, even as teens, but Gigi Fern showing them unconditional love and support had shaped them into the adults they were. Mom and Dad started paying that love and kindness forward the instant they could, and had instilled that tenet in every one of their children. Wren, since he’d been around and enmeshed with us from an early age, had absorbed the same philosophy.

“Which is why you paid off my loan on the Yellow Ribbon, huh?”

Ransom came off her front feet, dancing a few steps sideways, as Wren tugged on the reins and got her back under control. I gentled Ez to a stop so that I could be sure Wren was good, but the whole thing only lasted a few seconds.

“Squeezed too hard. She really is leg-shy,” Wren muttered, completely ignoring what I said.

I was familiar with that tactic though, and I knew how to handle it. So I didn’t say anything until after we crested the small hill, and the remnants of our tree house came into view. When I reined Ez to a stop, Wren followed suit, and we both took a few seconds to remove bridles and loosen girths. I didn’t think we’d be out here for hours, so there was no reason to take off the saddles. Not yet anyway.

Wren continued to ignore me as he climbed up onto the part of the platform that was still standing and secure. There wasn’t much left of the structure. Time, weather, and disuse had broken it down. Kind of like us.

“We gonna talk about this?” I asked, and Wren started, not having heard me walk closer. I leaned against one tree, and he turned, but made sure to keep as much distance between us as he could without going over the edge.

“Do we have to?” He murmured. He glanced at me then, and even though it was there and gone, I saw the pain in his eyes. That surprised me. Why was he hurting over this? It was just like him not to want to take credit, but it shouldn’t have hurt him.

“I think we do.” I kept my voice low and even though I wanted to climb up there with him, my feet stayed on the ground. “It’s not that I don’t appreciate it. Or that I’m going to turn down the gift, because fucking hell man, it’s going to open more doors for me. But I had a plan. I had it all worked out, and was making the payments without issue and—”

“So I’m just supposed to let you suffer when I have millions sitting in the bank?” There was a note of frustration, or maybe anger, underneath his words. “Even though you’re clearly done with me, or don’t think I’m important anymore or—”

“Wren,” I tried to interrupt because that couldn’t be farther from the truth. But he just kept right on going.

“That doesn’t mean I’m just gonna let it be hard for you. I could help, so I had my accounting team and my lawyers take care of it. Just take the fucking gift, Bode.”

The “Bode” was nice to hear, his old nickname for me that some of my siblings had picked up and still used occasionally. But it had always sounded different coming from him, the clear affection, and nod to our closeness, never not coming through in his tone. Even now, with that irritation in there too, it sounded so good.

“I already said I would,” I reminded him gently when I actually wanted to snap back at him. I considered that growth. “But I just—”

“Why name it the Yellow Ribbon Horse Retreat?” His gaze held mine, firm but studying me.

I scoffed. “You know why.”