I take a step back from the light brown horse standing in the flipped trailer "Dad there's no way fucking way he's gonna make it"
"I know honey," Dad says before wiping some blood off of my cheek and walking towards the injured animal. "It's not fair this life. I know you deserve better. Best I can offer you is peace."
Bang
I watch Dad pick up his hat and go to the flipped semi in the ditch. I hear sirens in the distance as I make my way to the fence Dad was leaning on. He stares out at the cows "The things we lose to keep you fed"
"Jesus, that's John Dutton and his youngest" One of the state troopers says while jogging towards us.
"Commissioner, are you alright," The other asks.
"We're fine." Dad steps away from the fence to talk to the troopers. I pull my phone out of my pocket and call Lee.
"Lee, I hope you're not too busy…"
\
"Jamie, if you stick that needle in our father's head, I'm gonna stick it in your eye," I say while walking over to him and Dad in the living room.
"I know how to do stitches, Clara," Jamie says while handing me the instruments
"I know that, but I literally went to school for this shit," I say while taking the instruments from him and starting stitches on Dad
"All right, Alan asked me to mention it so I will. They'd allow us to harvest the timber before the–"
"No" Dad waves me away. "The answer is no"
"Can you let me do this?" I ask. Dad nods and I go back to stitching him up.
"When you say no, it must be the death of the question. If there's even a hint of maybe, the questions won't stop until they find something you can't say no to. You got to learn when to think like a lawyer, and when to think like a landowner. Or a lawyer's all you're ever going to be"
"All done Daddy," I say after tying off my last stitch. After stitching up the gash on my check last night and now the one on Dads' forehead, I seem to be getting awfully good at fixing up people.
"Clara, you have your mother's hands," Dad says while checking out my work in the mirror. He stands up and heads outside. Jamie and I quickly follow behind.
"Hey," Jamie yells from the bottom of the steps. "I told them no." He follows after Dad as I trail behind him. "Hey, I said you wouldn't consider it. Should you consider it? Absolutely. We could use the money and the leverage that comes with it."
Lee pulls up and jumps out of his truck and makes his way over to us. "You're not coming, Dad?"
"No, I got a meeting in Bozeman. Why don't you take your badge out with you today? Take a rifle too." Dad pours his coffee out and hands the cup to Lee.
"I mean, they won't give us any trouble over strays. I mean, hell, they'll probably help us round them up." Lee states
"Well, the badge is for the ranchers riding with you. It'll keep them from bringing home any extras. Why don't you go with him, Clara." Dad says before Jamie starts talking to him again.
Lee and I get in his truck and leave before we can hear whatever rebuttal Jamie was working on.
\
The car ride was mostly silent except for the rattle of the trailer and the low hum of the radio. I look out the window and see the Brocken Rock sign up ahead. After that, I couldn't contain my curiosity.
"So why are we going to Broken Rock?"
Lee glances over at me from the driver's seat. "A bunch of the surrounding ranch cows, ours included, got out onto rez land and it's our job to get this whole dispute settled without too much fuss."
We pull down a rocky road and park behind the other ranchers. I get out and join Lee on his side of the truck. "There's another rifle in the backseat that I want you to grab just in case anything starts to go down." Lee quietly says while still looking straight ahead. I carefully open the back door and take out the riffle. What the hell did Dad get me into?
All of a sudden the shouting from the standoff got louder as one of the ranchers crossed the fenceline and got thrown to the ground by a man who I think is Monica's brother. Everyone draws their guns and starts pointing them at each other. Lee grabs his rifle from beside him and rushes over to the two men and points his gun at Monica's brother's head. "Whatever happens next happens to you first"
Monica's brother gets off of the older man and stares my brother down. I grab my rifle and move halfway toward them. All of a sudden, the ranch helicopter flies over and lands near our truck. Lee walks away from the man and heads toward the helicopter. As soon as he moves past me, I join him in his walk.
Dad jumps out and heads over to me and Lee. "Boy, you sure made a mess of this."
"It was a mess when we got here," Lee says as we make our way back over to the standoff.
Lee grabs my arm to stop me from following Dad as he goes to talk to an older man sitting on an even older truck's tailgate.
While waiting for Dad to return, Lee's phone rings from his truck and he lets go of my arm to go answer it. I look around at the cows spread across the land and see a white man sitting on a brown horse. "Is that Kayce?" I whisper to myself.
"Lee!" Dad yells, making me look away from the figure I thought to be my brother. Lee hangs up his phone and heads back over to me.
"Clear everyone out," Dad says while walking over to us.
"You know, there was barbed wire on this fence not even a week ago," I say
"I know. Now clear them out."
"Move out! All right, let's go!" Lee yells.
This is going to be a long week.
\
The next morning I made my way into the kitchen and saw my big sister sitting at the bar.
"When did trouble come into town?" I ask as I went to pour myself a cup of coffee
"Last night, Daddy wanted me to find out everything I could on the people who owned the semi that ran y'all off the road. So are you headed out to see the still unnamed cowboy you had a wild night with?" Beth said changing the subject before I could ask any questions.
"I've already told you that nothing happened between us," I rolled my eyes. "I'm actually going to see all of the buffalo Dad bought." Before Beth could get another snarky comment in, I walked out the door and down to where the buffalo were being unloaded.
I saw Lee standing on the fence by Lloyd, Colby, and Fred, and made my way over to them.
"Now, what the hell are we supposed to do with buffalo?" Colby asks
"You'll see," Lee says
"Yeah, well how much these sumbitches cost?"
"Well, they ain't cheap." Lee looks over at me. "Are you going with us?"
"I was planning on it," I say while stepping away from the fence to head to the barn
"Kayce's coming," Lee says making me stop in my tracks
"What?" I turn and question.
Lee walks over to me. "He texted me this morning. Said he was bringing Tate too."
"Well, I guess I better tell the cowboys to saddle up a couple of extra horses"
\
I was checking Sundance's cinch when Kayce's truck came to a stop by the lodge. Kayce and Tate hopped out of the truck and walked over to where Dad and I were.
"Thought I'd bring the fix to you," Kayce says
Dad walks over and looks at Tate. "You know how to ride a horse?"
"Course I do. I'm Indian." Tate says
Dad picks him up "Yeah, maybe so. But you're a cowboy today." He looks over at Kayce who still hasn't even looked at me. "Thank you for this."
Before I could say anything to Kayce, Lee comes walking over. "Well, shit, Kayce, I've dated women with shorter hair than you."
"Yeah, you sure they were women, Lee?" Lee tussles Kayces hair and Jamie comes over and engulfs him in a hug.
After Jamie lets go, Kayce looks at me. "Clara–"
"Hey, cowboy," Beth interrupts from near the porch. "Last time I saw you, that hat was high and tight." Kayce walks over to her.
I smack Lee on the arm. "He's all cool with y'all but he could barely fucking look at me. What the hell?"
"Can y'all fight this out later? I think we all deserve a good day."
"Fine." I huffed as I walk over to Sundance and pull myself onto his saddle and started to follow the others.
"Hey, Kayce, let's go. Grab a horse." Jamie yells from behind me
Before we even made it out of the first pasture, Kayce comes riding up beside me. "How is it being back home"
"Fine." I sternly say
"Listen Clara I'm sorry I couldn't make it to your graduation. You see–"
"Why'd you do it Kayce? I saw you with the cows on the rez and I saw Monica's brother at the standoff. Are you really still trying to win over their attention after all this time?"
"Listen, Clara, it's complicated. They're family–"
"We're family!" I yell, turning a few heads.
Lee comes riding over to ease the tension. He points to Dad and Tate. "I don't think I've ever seen Dad as happy as he is right now."
We all watch Tate try to get Dad's stubborn horse to move faster.
I look over at Kayce. "I think I speak for everyone when I say we've missed you"
"I missed you too"
"Race you" Lee tells Kayce once we reached the buffalos' final destination. They both take off without any hesitation.
I watch them for a minute then head over to where Ryan is on his blue dun horse.
"I just love when the whole family gets together," I say sarcastically as I ride up beside Ryan
"I heard"
"Lee says we're all due for some "sibling bonding time", which apparently means fishing in the river like when we were kids."
"That doesn't sound so bad." Ryan looks over at me. "Try to enjoy it, Clara. Family is…complicated but if you can make it work it's worth it"
"Thanks, Ryan. You always know just the right things to say" I smiled
"Clara let's go," Lee yells from across the buffalo.
\
"I don't remember the last time we did this" I mused as I cast my line into the river
"It's been a very long time," Jamie says from the top of his horse.
"I miss those days," I say quietly before sinking deep into my memories.
"You got something on your line," Kayce pointed out, snapping me from my thoughts.
After reeling in my fish, I volunteered to go make a fire and start cooking the fish. Once the horses were tied, we all sat around the fire waiting for the fish to cook.
"You're gonna raise him on a reservation?" Lee asks. I hand Tate his fish and sit between him and Lee
"People do it every day," Kayce replied
"'Cause they have no choice, Kayce," Jamie says while cutting into his fish
"It's a good day," Tate interrupts from beside Kayce
"Every day, just like this." Jamie bantered
Kayce took his hat off. "Who are you kidding? You and Clara said earlier that y'all haven't fished here in years,"
"Only thing we haven't done in years is see you, Kayce," I butt in
"Well, he told me to leave."
"He told us all to leave. You were just the only one who did." Lee says while picking at his fish
"It's different. You know that." Kayce argued
"Right, so you're gonna raise him in that meth-filled desert to prove a point." Lee scoffed
"Lee!" I scolded
"What I'm proving you'll never understand."
Lee laughs "Shit, I miss being young. You wake up in the morning, and you just keep right on dreaming, huh Kayce?"
"You're a 38-year-old bachelor living in your father's house, working 100-hour weeks for a nibble of his approval. Is that the dream, Lee? Sure as shit ain't mine."
Lee grabs a stone from beside him and tosses it at Kayce making all of us siblings laugh.
"Hey! Don't throw things at my dad." Tate says before chunking his fish at Lee. "Fսckеr."
"No ones mad Tate, this is just how siblings act," I tell him through laughter
"You gonna tell me there's no fight in that blood?" Lee jokes
"He's right though. It is a good day." Jamie adds
"Speaking of good days, guess who had such a good day last week with some mystery cowboy, that she woke up basically naked in her brother's house the next morning with absolutely no explanation?" Lee tells
My jaw drops. "You son of a bitch,"
"Ew. At Lee's house too?" Kayce cringed
"Now was this cowboy the same one whose shirt she wore to breakfast the morning after the rodeo?" Jamie adds.
"Is Travis in town or something?" Kayce butts in.
I glare at my brothers. "I think I liked it better when y'all were bickering. What I do or who I do it with is none of y'alls concern. I'm a grown-ass adult." I say point blank
My brothers all look at each other and then nodded. Lee grabbed my arms while Kayce grabbed my legs. I thrash around knowing what's about to happen. They hoist me into the air and walk closer to the river.
"I swear to God don–" My pleading was cut short by me hitting the water. I sit up and grab my hat. Tate was right, today is a good day.
\
After tossing and turning for hours that night, I headed downstairs for a drink. When I reached the bottom of the stairs, I heard voices coming from Dad's office. I sneak down the hallway to listen.
"We got to go around the whole damn herd" I hear Dad say.
I inch closer and step on a creaky floorboard. Knowing my cover was blown, I walk straight into dads office to see Dad, Lee, Rip, Ryan, and a couple of people I didn't know standing around a map on my father's desk.
"Clara what are you doing up?" my father questions
Everyone in the room went quiet and I felt their eyes on me. At that moment I realized I was wearing nothing but a light blue, silk pajama tank top with matching silk bottoms that were a little too short. "I came down to get a drink but instead I found all of you." I move closer to my father and the map. "So what did I miss?"
"Honey, what we're doing is gonna be dangerous. I don't think that–?"
"I thought you wanted me by your side during things like this?" I interrupt
"Fine" He says. "You're with the team that's going to get the cattle off of the reservation."
"She'd be a lot safer with me sir" Rip interjected.
Dad looked as if he was about to agree with Rip until Lee spoke. "Yeah but she's a real hand when it comes to moving cows."
"Um, she's standing right here." I interrupt
"Dynamite or sneaking onto the rez, honey?" Dad somewhat humorously asks.
"I'll go with Lee to the rez."
"Now that that's settled, let's go over everything again" Dad huffs
\
The next evening the ranch was full of people, ATVs, and trailers.
"You have to do everything I say, Clara, do you understand?" Lee said as he checked the straps on my bulletproof vest for the hundredth time
I put my hands on his shoulders. "Yes, now for the love of God Lee, I need you to trust me on this."
"You can still stay here Clara, you have nothing to prove to anyone," He says quietly
"I know. I'm just doing what I came back to do: help" I grab his gun and hand it to him as we hear Jamie walk by.
"Both in one night?" We fall in next to Dad who was walking next to Jamie
"Everyone's forgotten who runs this valley."
"So this is how you remind them?" Jamie stops as the rest of us head to our vehicles. "This is not the way to remind them. It's a... It's a bad idea"
"We don't choose the way, little brother," Lee calls back to Jamie
\
We park the trailers a few miles from the reservation and begin unloading all of the horses and ATVs.
"Hey Clara, Lee told me to give you this," Ryan says with a badge in his outstretched hand
I take it from him and put it around my neck. "Ryan, can I ask you something?"
"Anything,"
"What were you going to ask me the other night before Lee called?"
"Y'all know what to do so let's load up and get it done," Lee yelled from atop his horse
"I'll tell you as soon as we get back to the ranch," Ryan promises
I nodded and mounted a dark brown gelding.
"Clara come here," Lee shouts to me. I trot up to him. "I want you by me or Ryan the whole time and if things start going south you get your ass out of there"
"Lee, you've told me this a hundred times. Are you ever gonna stop worrying?" I joke
"About you? Never"
We finish making our way over a hill when Lee told everyone to hold our spots. After what seemed like forever, Lee took off down the hill with everyone following after. As soon as we crossed the fenceline bullets started flying from both sides.
"God damn that boy." I hear dad say over the radio. He has to be talking about Kayce.
"Pull back!" Lee shouts as we all turn our horses and head back over the fenceline
"We got to get the fuck out of here," Ryan shouts at Lee
"We ain't going anywhere without our beef."
We watch as a few cows cross the fenceline as the helicopter dusts out the tribal police giving us just enough cover to start moving them back to the ranch.
Gunshots keep coming from behind us. "Keep them moving." Lee commands. When the others were over the hill I turned my horse towards Lee. I stop and watch him move his horse a few steps toward the rez.
"You want 'em back, come and get 'em!" Lee shouts into the distance
"Lee we have 'em, let's go" I shout to him.
He looks through his scope at something in the distance. As soon as he sets it back down a gunshot echos and Lee falls off of his horse.
"Lee!" I scream, praying for a response.
I see a man walk over to Lee with an aimed gun and I gave my horse a kick to his side. But before I could make it to him, a horse comes racing past me and the rider knocks the other man to the ground. As soon as I reach Lee I jump off of my horse and try to see where he was hurt. I take off my vest and use the jacket I had on underneath to try and stop the bleeding from his neck. Blood starts coming from his mouth "Lee please stay with me, I can't do this without you" I blubbered
"You're gonna be just fine" he sputtered out
"Hang on, I'm gonna get you out of here." I look over to see Kayce kneeling on the other side of Lee
"Look at you... you're a man now" Lee mutters out
I hear rustling from behind me and look back to see the other man start to stand up
"Kayce"
He looks up and quickly grabs the handgun from Lee's holster.
Bang
I throw myself over Lee as the shots continue. As soon as they stop so did the beating of Lee's heart.
"Lee! No no no no, you can't do this to me" I wailed as I checked his pulse.
One final shot rang out before Kayce ran over. I look up at him with teary eyes. "He… he's gone"
Kayce sits on the ground and quietly sobs as I hug Lee.
"Is…. is the other guy–" I sputter to Kayce
"Yeah." He puts his hand on my shoulder making me sit up. "Listen, Clara, I need you to promise me that you won't tell anyone what happened here tonight."
"I won't" I look Kayce in his eyes "Was that Monica's….?" I struggle to question
"Monica's brother, Robert" He deadpanned
We sit in silence for a while just looking at the sky, the land, and Lee.
Kayce stands up. "We got to get back to the ranch before they send out a search party"
"How? Your horse ran away"
"I'll ride with Lee on his horse"
"I want to ride with him. You can take mine"
\
The whole ride back to the ranch went by in a blur. Lee was draped across the front of the saddle with me sitting behind him. I had the reins in one hand and the other holding onto Lee.
I stopped my horse when Kayce stopped his and looked up to see my father galloping over on his horse. He jumped off and ran over to us.
"Give me the reins." I heard what he was saying but I couldn't do it. "Give me the reins, Clara" I hand them other to him as Kayce helps me down
"Daddy I–"
"I know." He says while putting his hand on my still injured cheek. "Kayce, take her and go straight to Jamie. Tell him everything while it's fresh, all right?"
Kayce nodded and put me on his horse and climbed up behind me. We raced off to the lodge.
When we made it to the lodge Jamie came running over to us with Beth trailing behind him. "What happened?"
Kayce said nothing as he got off of the horse and tied it to the brush guard of a parked ranch truck. I look Kayce up and down, I never noticed in the dark but seeing him in the morning light, I saw his once-white shirt soaked with blood. "Kayce are you hurt?" I franticly asked
He looks down at his shirt and then looks at me. "It's not mine" He replied.
I started to feel myself get lightheaded. Beth walks closer to me and puts a hand on my calf. "Why don't you come down and we'll head inside to get you cleaned up." I looked her in the face and saw tears welling in her eyes.
Cleaned up? From what? I looked down to see my arms and pants covered in Lee's blood. I tried to move but I couldn't.
"I–I can't" I stammered
"Why don't I help get you down?" I look over and see Ryan. I nod my head as he grabbed me by my waist to pull me off of the horse. As soon as my feet touched the ground my knees buckled. Ryan held tighter onto my waist as I wrapped my arms around his neck. "He's gone" I whimpered into Ryan's ear.
"I know," he whispers back
"Ryan, can you take her to her room? She doesn't need to be around all these people." Beth asks. I can feel him nod in response.
Beth places her hand on the back of my head making me look over at her. "Wipe your tears, hold your head up, and don't let anyone out here see you cry." She wipes the tears from my eyes. I found my footing and let go of Ryan. As I begin the walk to my room with Ryan, I feel everyone's eyes looking me up and down as I walked past them before heading up to the porch.
"Is it bad?" I whisper to Ryan
"Is what bad? He whispers back as he holds the door to the lodge open for me.
"Th– the blood," I ask as I make my way to the stairs.
"I wouldn't look too long in the mirror before you take a shower if I were you" He advised as we made our way inside my room.
"Sit wherever, I'm probably gonna be a while," I tell Ryan. He nods and takes his hat off before sitting at the foot of my bed.
I take my boots off before I head into my bathroom and lock the door behind me. I turn on the shower to as hot as it would go. Against Ryan's advice, I take a deep breath and look at myself in the mirror. The end of my honey blonde side braid has dried blood on it, my gray shirt looks brown, and my jeans have blood caked all over them. Maybe riding back with Lee wasn't the best idea. I shed my bloody clothes and undo my hair before I step under the scalding hot water. After washing my hair and scrubbing my skin raw, I stepped out to start drying off.
"Where is she?" I heard Jamie demand from the other side of the door.
"She's in the shower. But I wouldn't–" Ryan's warning was interrupted by Jamie banging on my bathroom door.
"What happened Clara? Kayce wouldn't say shit before he left."
I wrapped myself in a towel and opened the door. "No,"
"No!?" Jamie questioned. "Are you kidding me?"
"Get out Jamie. I can't do this right now" I say wearily
"You know they're investigating this as a murder?" I feel my eyes begin to water. I can't lose another brother over this whole thing.
"I think you should go, Jamie." Ryan stands up and head towards Jamie
"I'm not leaving until she tells me what she saw"
"You want to know what I saw?" Jamie and Ryan look at me as I move close to them. "I saw our brother get shot. I saw him spit up blood while saying his last words. I saw him take his last breath. Is that good enough for you?" I furiously told Jamie
"Clara–"
"Get out Jamie"
He gives me one more look and heads out. I slam the door close behind him and lean on it.
"There are times when I get why Beth hates him so much"
"Are you okay?" Ryan said as he wiped a stray tear from my cheek
I walk into my closet and close the door to change into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt. "Not really. Lee was my best friend and honestly the only stable thing in this family"
"You know he talked about you all the time when you were at college. Showed us any pictures you'd send him no matter if it was a new haircut or just a pretty sunset"
I laugh and walk out of the closet to go sit next to Ryan on my bed. "No, he didn't."
"He did. He kept everyone updated on anything new going on with you. Lloyd almost had a heart attack when you dyed your hair brown."
"I almost did too" I chuckled. I tried to hold back my tears but a few started to fall. "God I miss him"
Ryan reached out his hand and wiped my tears with his thumb "I need to get back before Rip starts wondering where I am but I'm just a text away if you need anything" I nod my head. Ryan stands to leave but turns back to me with a mischievous smile on his face "Word of advice, if you don't want to get caught when you steal someone's shirt, don't wear it around them"
I look down to see Ryan's shirt I borrowed the other night. "I'll keep that in mind for next time" I gloomily chuckled.
\
After being on autopilot the whole funeral, I stood on the porch between Beth and Jamie trying to process my day as we watched Dad talk to the Governor.
"He's never looked at me the way he looked at Lee," Jamie says, breaking the peaceful silence.
I send Jamie a look of disgust as I see the anger in Beth's eyes. "And he never will." Beth sneered before grabbing my hand and pulling me with her to meet Dad, who was making his way over. When we reached him, he pulled Beth in with one arm and Jamie in with the other. I grab Jamie's left hand with my right.
"I need you more than ever," he says to Jamie
"You have me," Jamie replies
He then looks at Beth "Can you stay for a while?"
"I'm not going anywhere. Just tell me who to fight." Dad gives her a kiss on the cheek and grabs mine and Beth's hands.
"Everyone,"