Part 6
Claire’s hand found the edge of the table behind her. Nathan had said the words without looking down, without checking whether there was an easier way through the conversation.
Lauren’s eyes moved between them.
“It isn’t because she keeps the accounts,” Nathan said. “I want a life with her. Even when this place is doing badly.”
Lauren lowered her gaze. For a while, only the rattle of a trailer on the distant road broke the silence.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” she told Claire at last. “About you using him.”
“No,” Claire said. “You shouldn’t.”
“I’m sorry.”
Claire nodded, accepting the words without stepping forward to make the moment easier.
Nathan walked Lauren to her car. They said goodbye politely. He didn’t offer to call, and she didn’t ask.
Adrian arrived later that same afternoon for a meeting already on Nathan’s calendar. In the office, he reviewed the latest figures and repeated his case for selling the southern tract. Nathan acknowledged what the sale would accomplish and refused the existing offer again.
Adrian left for Alderby with the folder beneath his arm.
When the guesthouse had quieted and Virgil had gone home, Claire carried two glasses of iced tea onto the porch. Nathan sat with Rook beside his chair. She put down a glass and took the other chair.
He ran his thumb along the damp side of the glass.
“I meant to tell you before today.”
“I hoped you did.”
He gave a small, embarrassed smile.
“I kept thinking I should know whether I could keep this place before I asked you to build anything here.”
Claire leaned back. “I spent almost seven years with someone who could describe our future beautifully. Then I found out he’d been planning a different one.”
Nathan looked at her.
“You’re stubborn,” she said. “And some days you make a conversation feel like dragging a hose uphill.”
“That sounds about right.”
“But you listen. Eventually. And I don’t have to wonder whether you mean what you say.” She reached for his hand. “I love you, too.”
They sat until the ice had melted. When Claire collected the glasses, Rook rose to follow her inside.
“I feed you every morning,” Nathan reminded him.
From the kitchen came Claire’s laugh, then the clink of glasses in the cupboard.
The next days were filled with sale lists. Nathan and Virgil reviewed livestock that could be sold before the end of August. Claire contacted buyers and gathered the information an auction company would need.
Then Veydor raised its offer.
Nathan spread the pages across the kitchen table. The new amount would cover the looming payment, settle smaller obligations, and leave money for winter. He could see the relief in it without doing any arithmetic.
The folder stayed there for three days.
Each morning, he opened it before going outside. On one of those mornings, he drove Claire to the southern fields. They walked beside the hay ground while the irrigation pump worked farther off. The first cutting was already stored. Another season’s feed was growing around their boots.
Claire had calculated the cost of buying what the tract produced. She’d included transport, price swings, and the loss of the equipment route. She had also shown him how badly matters could go if the auction failed.
Standing beside him now, she didn’t repeat any of it.
Nathan knelt to pull a length of twine from the grass.
“If I keep it, there’s no guarantee.”
“No,” she said.
He wound the twine around his hand and carried it back to the truck.
On the fourth morning, he called Adrian.
“We’re not taking it.”
His cousin’s frustration came through clearly.
“You’re putting the whole ranch behind an auction that hasn’t happened and rooms that have barely been open a summer.”
“I’ve heard you. My answer’s no.”
Nathan put away the contract and went to the barn.
Thirty-five calves were already scheduled to leave that season. After reviewing winter feed requirements, he and Virgil selected twelve more cattle. Four young quarter horses would be offered, including the chestnut mare Claire had worked with since her first afternoon.
They discussed every animal. A smaller herd would mean less future income, but also fewer mouths to carry through winter. Nathan made notes beside the stall cards while Virgil checked identification records.
Claire hired a professional livestock auction company. Its staff would handle registration, the auctioneer, payment procedures, and the required sale documentation. She prepared photographs and descriptions, contacted people from her Denver years, and sent information to ranchers across the region.
Nathan took the telephone list.
His father had known cattlemen and horse breeders throughout Colorado, Utah, and New Mexico. Some had stayed in touch. Others had fallen away while Nathan tried to manage every difficulty without letting anyone see how little room he had left.
He called, then drove when a visit seemed better. Over two weeks, he sat at kitchen tables, walked pens, and asked people to consider coming.
One man outside a neighboring town met him with an old grievance about a hay delivery. Nathan could have argued that it had happened before he came home. Instead, he asked to see the figures.
He found the corresponding records at Talverra, went back, and laid them out between them.
“Dad should’ve settled this,” he said. “I’m sorry he didn’t. We’ll correct it.”
The man studied him, then named the outstanding difference. Nathan arranged payment. There was no promise about the auction, but the man shook his hand at the gate.
At home, Claire dealt with interest that didn’t become commitment. A horse buyer couldn’t arrange transport. Another decided the date was wrong. Several asked for photographs, pedigrees, and videos, then stopped answering.
She changed the advertising, returned calls, and kept a separate list of people who had merely sounded enthusiastic.
Virgil checked holding pens and planned trailer parking. Signs went up to keep visitors out of working areas. Nobody had spare time to spend admiring the preparations.
One afternoon, Rook stopped near an old gate beside the pens. A dry wind rattled the hardware. His ears came forward, and when the gate shifted again, he gave a sharp bark.
Nathan followed his gaze. The upper latch had loosened enough to jump in its bracket. It held now, with no cattle pressing nearby, but he could see how easily that could change.
He secured it, checked the other fittings, then crouched to rub Rook’s neck.
“Good catch.”
The dog leaned against him for a moment before they continued.
Later, Claire found Rook moving stiffly near the porch. She brought fresh water while Nathan opened the farmhouse door and sent him to his quiet bed. The rest of the work could be done without him.
On the evening before the auction, the three of them sat over their estimates at the kitchen table. Available funds from the guesthouse and earlier equipment sales would cover part of the payment. The auction needed to do the rest, after fees and immediate operating costs.
Virgil checked the livestock totals once more.
“Everything we can have ready is ready,” he said.
After he left, Claire put the registration folder beside Nathan’s keys. Nathan stayed downstairs another half hour, moving no numbers at all.
At sunrise, the drive was empty.
The auction staff came first. A few local buyers followed, stepping out with notebooks and cups of coffee. Then another truck turned off the road, and another behind it.
Virgil started directing trailers into the designated field. Before long, he waved an auction employee over to help…
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