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“Because you need someone to beat some sense into you!”
Pulling himself to his full height, Clint glares at me. “I’ll fucking destroy you.”
“Come do it then,” I taunt. “You’re being a total idiot, and I’m about ready to fucking make you into a toothless one, too.”
“The fuck?”
“Nora isn’t your mom!” I yell.
Clint goes very, very still.
“Nora isn’t your mom, Clint. She isn’t going to just walk away from us. She’s pissed off, but that isn’t the end of the world. We don’t need to go fix things with her right now,” I say, casting a glance at Landon, who looks like he’s itching to run out the door after her still. “But just because she’s mad doesn’t mean she’s going to be done.”
Clint looks at me. He narrows his eyes, and I’m about ready to punch him in the face when he gives me a sharp nod. He grabs one of the radios that we use around the ranch. “I’m going to the barn,” he barks.
Landon and I watch him go.
I turn to Landon. “You also letting your past issues come up, Lan?”
“Nope. I didn’t want to go and make her feel better, so she admits her feelings for me and says she will never leave. Not me,” he says bitterly.
I sigh, then cuff his ear lightly.
“The hell was that for?”
“I punched Clint. You got off easy,” I say.
Landon rolls his eyes. “I’m going to help Clint. I’ll take a radio.”
“Okay,” I say. I watch him go, too.
The house feels weirdly quiet with the two of them gone. I sigh, looking around once more, before I head up the stairs to the attic.
Landon and Clint are both doing what they do best. Working with horses, making the ranch run. It’s time for me to do the same.
For the time being, I’m going to do just that. I’m going to sit here, behind a wall of computer screens, and I’m going to watch.
There’s a whole day before anything happens.
Surprisingly, Nora didn’t shoot out any of the cameras. They’re all up and running, so I watch her do a ton of things: get home, sit on the porch, cry, and talk to her friend Kendall on the phone, which I can see based on the excellent image quality that brings up Kendall’s name on my screen.
One night passes, totally uneventful, and one day. The darkness is descending on us again, and I’ve been here. Watching. Waiting. Doubting that what I told Clint and Landon is right.
From where I’m sitting, it seems like maybe I was wrong. That Nora is not just a little pissed, but she’s absolutely ready to move on. I don’t know that she’s coming back.
The only hint I have of something other than anger from her is when she comes out onto the porch by herself and cries. She looks down at her phone, pulling up each of our numbers in turn. Sometimes she taps out messages before deleting them and shutting her phone down.
I’d give anything to know what she’s saying.
It’s a slow two days. Surveillance, other than that, is incredibly boring.
I’m half asleep when something crosses the screen. I blink slowly, trying to figure out what it is. I look again.
It’s a man in a dark, all-black outfit.
Jolting forward, I hit the button to zoom in. The camera obeys, focusing specifically on the man on the screen.
My heart sinks. I know that fucking face. It’s the face of the man that she showed us. Her ex-boyfriend, Aaron.
