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“Sebastian.”

“I’m not saying it. Not yet. Not until we’re better. But, Len.” He kisses me, still breathing hard from making love to me. “What I feel for you… it scares the hell out of me. But I want it to be real. I want this to be real.”

I can’t respond. I can only hold him tighter as we’re both quiet, reflecting on what is changing between us.

Eventually, we get dressed, return to the main cabin and prepare for landing. But something has shifted between us. Something fundamental.

By the time we touch down at the ranch airstrip, it is mid-afternoon. Pete is there to meet us, driving us back to our house while Sebastian makes calls about ranch business he’s missed.

But his free hand finds mine in the truck. And I hold it tightly.

The house looks the same when we arrive. Stone walls, timber beams and the view of the operation below. Everything familiar and foreign at the same time.

“Welcome home,” Sebastian says as we walk inside.

Home. He keeps calling it that. And maybe it is, in a way. This place has started to feel more like home than my apartment in California ever did.

“I’m going to unpack,” I say.

“Stay.” He pulls me against him. “Just for a few more minutes. Let me hold you before reality crashes back in.”

So I do. We stand in the entryway of our house, our home, and I let him hold me. Let myself be held. Let this complicated, messy, beautiful thing between us just exist without questioning it too hard.

34

SEBASTIAN

I stand in my office, looking at the files Caroline compiled while I was in Montana. Phone records. Security footage. Witness statements. Everything points to Adam Johnson as the source of the leak.

Twenty-two years old. We hired him last spring because he is great with horses. The kid’s quiet and keeps to himself. Nothing remarkable until you look closer and see a thirty-second call from his phone to a number registered to the Marshalls’ ranch the night before our raid.

One call. That’s all it took to set up an ambush that got my father shot and turned my life upside down.

My phone buzzes. Nathaniel.

“Adam’s in the barn. When do you want to handle this?”

I look at the clock. Four thirty. Lennox will be out riding for at least another hour. The other ranch hands will be finishing up evening chores. Good timing, public enough that word will spread, private enough that we can control the situation.

“Now.” I head down to the barn, my jaw tight with barely controlled fury. This kid sold us out. He gave the Marshalls information that nearly got people killed. And for what? Money? Threats? Some misguided sense of loyalty to our enemies?

Nathaniel waits outside the barn with Pete and two other senior hands, Miguel and Stetson. Men who’ve been with us for decades. Men I trust with my life.

“He’s inside?” I ask.

“Stall eight. Doesn’t know anything’s wrong.” Nathaniel hands me his phone, already connected to a call.

“You found him?” Dad asks.

“We found him. You ready for this?”

“Been ready since I got shot. Make him talk, Sebastian. I want to know everything.”

I hand the tablet back to Nathaniel and walk into the barn.

The kid’s exactly where Nathaniel said, brushing down a mare who’s been worked hard today. He looks up when he hears my boots on the concrete, smiles like nothing is wrong.

“Mr. Drake. I didn’t know you were back from Montana.”