Page 129 of Ironwood Ranch Cowboys

What is happening? My goodness, I’m way too deep in this family. It’s terrifying.

It takes me a second too long to realize something fundamental.

This isn’t dinner. It’s positioning, control, and I’m sitting right in the middle of it.

Vivian lets the silence stretch just long enough to make it uncomfortable, then smooths it over with another small, elegant smile like she didn’t just drop a match into dry grass.

“Well,” she says lightly, “I’m sure we’ll all adjust.”

“I think…” I scrape my chair back. “Yeah, I think I’m going to go. I think, for a temp job, we’ve all gotten to know one another well enough…”

Duke’s hand brushes my arm under the table, quick and grounding, like he’s checking I’m calm before I bolt. Cody’s gaze flicks up, assessing, already anticipating fallout. Silas doesn’t move at all.

“Of course,” Vivian says, folding her napkin with that same precise care, like nothing about this moment matters. “We wouldn’t want to overextend hospitality. I expect everything else we need to discuss is a family matter anyway.”

It lands exactly how she intends it to. Like I’m the one who doesn’t know how to behave.

I force a smile that feels like it might crack if I hold it too long. “Thank you for dinner.”

I don’t wait for anything else. If I stay another second, I might say something I can’t take back. Or worse, that she can use.

So I turn and walk.

I keep it measured, controlled, even though my pulse is kicking hard enough to make my fingers tremble.

The hallway feels longer on the way out, like the house is listening. Like it already knows how this is going to go and I’m the only one catching up.

By the time I push through the front doors, the cold hits me, and I finally breathe properly. I keep moving down the path, the sound grounding in a way nothing inside that house was.

Everything in there felt… curated. Controlled down to the tone of someone’s voice, the way a napkin gets folded, the exact second you’re allowed to speak.

Out here, at least, the air doesn’t expect anything from me.

I don’t stop until I’m far enough away that the shine from the windows doesn’t feel like it’s following me.

Then I slow.

Then I stop.

My hands are shaking.

I stare down at them, flexing my fingers like I can physically push the feeling out of my body, like I can decide I’m not affected by what just happened.

That’d be nice.

It’d also be a lie.

“Temporary,” I murmur, the word tasting wrong in my mouth now that it’s been handed back to me like a label. “I know I’m temporary, but that…”

I didn’t come here looking for anything permanent, didn’t come here to build roots or carve out a place at someone else’s table. I came for a job, a contract, a clean in and out.

That was the plan.

But plans don’t account for people.

They don’t account for Silas looking at me like I’m something he chose instead of someone he has to manage.

They don’t account for Cody watching me like I’ve rearranged the way his entire world works.