Wild Card (North Ridge #1)

But none of that was true. It wasn’t a scratch—it was a knife to my heart. I wasn’t drowning in the memories—I was dying in them. And every single thing I felt about her came rushing back, a flash flood of desire and pain that nearly blindsided me.

The worst part of all of this is, when it comes down to it…I don’t think I ever stopped missing her. The days turned to weeks, the weeks to months, seasons came and went, the years followed, and yet deep in the darkest parts of me, I’ve missed her. More than I would ever let myself admit.

A pair of ravens fly overhead, their large wings making that distinguished whooshing sound, stirring up air like a storm, and my grandfather looks up. “Do you still believe in good luck, Shane?”

I glance at him curiously. We’ve been riding for just over an hour now and are just about to the crest of a hill, the dogs at our heels. I watch as the ravens swoop down over the other side, disappearing from sight. The sky is tinged with red, deepening in the corners, haze from the wildfires that are raging in the province this time of year, caused usually by lightning strikes, sometimes by careless humans. I know for a fact that Fox is out there right now, fighting them, though it’s something I don’t tend to dwell on.

My attention is brought to my grandpa. “Luck? What do you mean?”

“Nothing,” he says, leaning forward in his saddle for the last push to the top, taking the weight off the back of his horse, Manuel. “But I remember you kept that half a wishbone in a glass jar for many years.”

It’s still in the glass. Tucked away in the closet since I can’t bear to look at it, because in the end, it was just another wish that didn’t come true. But it’s still there. I guess that says something.

“It had sentimental value,” I finally say, and my grandpa nods, mulling it over before clucking to Manuel.

We reach the crest and look down at the land below us. It takes my breath away. The golden grass is tinged orange from the light, sweeping into forests of pine. In the distance, the always snow-capped peaks of the glaciers sit. In front of everything are the cows, all twenty-three of them. A fraction of our herd, but it’s enough to keep us busy.

They raise their heads from the grass. This isn’t even Crown Land anymore, at least not the parcel of acres we’re allowed to use until mid-October, and the cows are looking at us as if they know they’ve gone out of bounds.

Fletcher, my dog, a descendent of Blue, whines impatiently, ready to get herding. The dogs live for this life, thrive in having a job and a purpose. Sometimes, if I feel I’ve lost my way a bit, I look to them and try and find my path all over again. The passion for the every day, for what you’re born to do.

But I wait for grandpa, because in the end it’s still his ranch and he doesn’t seem too quick to move.

“You worry about your brother?” he asks me, staring at that mean red sun.

“Fox?”

“I would say John too, but he doesn’t need anyone’s worry. You want to talk about luck, he’s got that in spades.” John is Maverick’s real name. My father said the nickname stuck when he was five. Apparently he fell in love with Top Gun.

“Sometimes,” I admit. “But Fox seems to know what he’s doing.” And that’s the truth. I know the ins and outs of his job, but I couldn’t do it. I don’t have the stamina and I’m not a thrill seeker. I’m content to invite danger and adventure but not court it for long periods of time. What Fox does, it puts his life at risk every day. I mean, the man jumps out of an airplane into a forest fire. I don’t know what sane person does that.

But in some ways, I don’t really know Fox. We haven’t had the easiest relationship. Maybe it’s something to do with him being the oldest, therefore there’s the most distance between us. Sometimes I think it’s something deeper, like resentment that worked its way into his bones, the fact that our mother died because of me, but that might just be my own complex.

“It’s good to worry though,” he goes on, resting his hands on the saddle horn. Manuel dips his head, content, smart enough not to try for the dry grass. “Just remember that life is out of our hands.”

I wait patiently, sensing he’s going to continue. He always does. Grandpa will talk your ear off for hours if you’re not careful.

“Fox was always troublesome, the minute he was born. I saw him in your mother’s arms and I knew it. There’s always a troublesome Nelson in the family. Little did I know that your father would have three of them.”

How am I troublesome? I want to ask, but Grandpa goes on. “Fox was climbing out of his crib before he could walk. When he could walk, he was climbing up the couch. I swear he jumped in the lake and taught himself to swim. Whatever adventure he could find, he would find it. Your mother did what she could to protect him, but in the end, she couldn’t. Because beyond the best that she could do, it was out of her hands.”

He looks at me and grins. It makes him look positively young. “Then came John, and it was the same thing all over again. He wasn’t as bold as Fox. Fox possesses a strange absence of fear. But John had the confidence. He always believed he could do something and he did it. Just like that. If he ever failed, he brushed himself off and smiled, as if it was the fella’s plan all along. It gave your mother a heart attack, I swear, just trying to keep up with those two. But she let life play out as it needed to.”

I swallow. I don’t want him to go on. I can listen for hours about the way my mother was with Mav and Fox. But once it comes to me, I don’t want to hear it.

“Then she had you,” he says after a long pause. “As you know, she didn’t know she could have any more children. We’d been told that John was the last. But you popped up. A surprise. And God, did your mother ever love you. She thought she was the luckiest woman in the world. You were a gift, Shane. A blessing.” He lets out a long sigh, his eyes drifting over the cattle and the blood-red sun. “And you were just like the other two, only quieter. You never cried. You were always so calm, like you were already lost in your thoughts. And though you weren’t climbing out of your crib, you weren’t afraid, either. You were the most serious baby I’d ever met and we all loved you for it. You looked at fear, weighed it carefully, and then faced it.”

I’m clenching my jaw. I don’t want him to continue. I want to get the cows and go. Sensing my impatience and change of vibe, my mare, Polly, shifts underneath me, alert.

“I know you don’t believe it,” he says. “I don’t know how to make you believe it. None of us do. But when your mother took her life, it had nothing to do with you, Shane. You were just a baby. And she was a sick woman. Lost to society, to the doctors, to us. We knew but we didn’t really know. But we were the adults. We should have realized how serious her depression was. And we didn’t. We failed her, not you. Never you, Shane. She loved you.”