PROLOGUE
Hadley
Garrett's been dead for nearly two years now, and I'm out of money.
I'm driving a U-Haul that I can’t afford for another week down a Hill Country highway I've never been on before, with my six-year-old asleep in the passenger seat and a job interview at the end of it that I haven’t let myself think about since I got the call.
If I think about it, I'll turn the truck around.
So I don't.
I drink the cold Buc-ee's coffee in the cup holder, keep my hands at ten and two, and I watch the cedar fence line tick past the window.
I tell myself the same thing I’ve been telling myself since I sold my wedding dress to a consignment shop in Tyler for ninety-eight dollars: thereisa roof at the end of this road, and my son is going to sleep under it tonight.
Two bedrooms. The man on the phone said.
A cabin behind the bunkhouse.
Fifty thousand a year with meals included and medical through the ranch's books. Plus, a school bus that stops at the gate every morning at eight-fifteen.
He said all of that with the voice of a man who had already decided I had the job before I'd opened my mouth.
I’ve spent every mile since wondering what kind of man hires a stranger over the phone, sight unseen, to live on his property with a six-year-old.
I’ve wondered, and I haven’t let myself stop driving.
Nash makes a small sound in his sleep beside me.
His head is tipped against the window, his stuffed Stitch is wedged under his chin, and his mouth is open the way Garrett's used to be when he slept.
I have to look back at the road because if I look at my son's face for too long I'm going to lose it. What the hell am I doing? I’m being crazy. I’m taking him into a random place I don’t know anything about.
For all I know, the guy who hired me is a total creeper. We could be murdered on this ranch.
A green highway sign says SHARP appears—12 MILES.
My stomach does the thing where it flops around before anything nervewracking.
For a moment, I wonder if this is the right choice, but in reality, it’s my only choice unless I want to be homeless.
I keep driving.
The town is one stoplight, a feed store, a Phillips 66 with a hand-painted price board, and a diner.
That's it.
That's Sharp.
I pass through it in about thirty seconds and take a left where the man on the phone told me to. I follow a road that runs for what feels like an hour past nothing but black cattle, cedar posts, and the kind of fence line that costs money to keep tight.
There’s a livestock vet, a small strip mall, and another diner right by the ranch.
When the gate appears, my hands go cold on the wheel.
Two iron pillars taller than my truck. A cattle skull silhouette over the top, crossed shotguns underneath, the words ‘Sharp Shooter Ranch’ in heavy block letters that look like they were burned into the metal with a torch.
The gate is open.