by Tijan
Copyright © 2018 Tijan
ISBN-10: 163576422X
ISBN-13: 978-1635764222
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission of the author, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes only. This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, or any events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created by the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously.
Edited by: AW Editing
Proofread by: Kara Hildebrand, Paige Smith, Amy English, and Rochelle Paige
Cover designer: Hang Le, www.byhangle.com
Formatting: Elaine York, Allusion Graphics, LLC, www.allusiongraphics.com
Cover image: Depositphotos 15561905
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty-One
Chapter Fifty-Two
Chapter Fifty-Three
Chapter Fifty-Four
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
Sneak Peek at Cole
This is for my father, who loved to train horses,
even though it wasn’t his job.
This is for my sister, who brought our own Taffy into the family.
This is for my cousin, who showed so many his love of horses and that he could stand on two separate horses at the same time.
I think he even had a third in the middle too.
And this is for my own nieces.
Lastly, this is for all the readers out there
who are awed by the beauty of horses.
It truly is majestic.
Brody
Los Angeles
Seven months earlier
There was press everywhere. The camera lights were flashing. Glitzy people were all over the room, but I looked around, watching from the back corner.
“Brody.”
I frowned at my publicist, who was heading over to me. Before Shelby could say anything more, I asked, “Have you seen Kyle?”
“Kyle?” She pretended to be confused, patting her hair.
I cut her another look. She didn’t like my brother, never had, but she could suck it. Honestly. This was my big movie premiere, and I wanted my fucking brother there. He promised to show.
“Shelby, don’t fuck with me.”
Her confused look melted into a sultry one as she pressed her body against mine, her hand playing on my arm. “But I’d love to fuck with you. You know that.” She made sure to rub her breast against my arm before standing away from me.
This was Shelby’s game. She was one of the best publicists out there, and most of the time she acted as my manager too, but she’d never made it a secret how much she wanted my dick. To her credit, she’d had it. I’d been acting for two years. She got my dick on a regular basis for the first six months of our relationship, but then we started a professional one, so I ended things. I wasn’t a goddamn idiot.
I knew where I wanted to be, and being single would help.
That made me sound like a manipulative asshole, but I didn’t give a shit.
I had been an extra on movies before moving to small parts. Supporting actor roles had been next, and finally, I landed the movie role that was already promising to launch me into the type of movies I needed.
I was going to be a goddamn A-list actor, but my fucking brother wasn’t anywhere he was supposed to be.
“He said he’d come tonight.”
We had no parents. They both died too young from cancer, so it was just Kyle and me, and he had always been supportive.
Something was wrong.
I couldn’t shake this feeling. It was nagging me, and I couldn’t shake it. It was growing more by the minute. Something was off.
A waiter passed with a tray of champagne, and I reached out, snatching one of the glasses. I threw it back, still straining to see around the filled movie lounge. People were looking over at us. I saw the interest, and that was fine with me.
I knew I commanded it. I wasn’t an actor who put my life out there for the magazines to know. I kept the interviews to a minimum. I did the press junkets only when I needed to. I showed up on time. I knew my lines before walking into the studio. I rarely flirted. I shook hands with whomever I needed to. I played golf with them too. I did just enough so people knew my name, but not enough for them to know me.
And no one knew about Kyle, but this night was for him too. It was a celebration of the hard work and sacrifice we’d both gone through to get me here. He and his wife put me up so many times that there was a permanent indentation on their couch. Countless nights I’d eaten spaghetti or ramen noodles, until Cheryl wouldn’t take no for an answer and demanded I join them and their two kids for dinner.
God. A wave of nostalgia rose in me.
I loved his family.
Ambrea and Alisma were like my own little girls.
One day, I promised myself, one day I’d do an animated movie and they’d be my dates for that premiere. I might have to do it sooner rather than later since they were both drawing past eight and ten years old. They’d be adults in the blink of an eye.
I glanced at my phone again. It was still blank—no calls from him. Kyle was supposed to have been here forty minutes ago.
“Something isn’t right.” That sick feeling wasn’t going away.
“Come on.” Shelby’s hand curled over my arm. She indicated a couple drawing close to us. “That’s the president of Dreamepics Productions. They want to meet you. They already sent an email about working on a project with you later in the year.”
I glanced up. Edward Branch and his wife were almost to us. I saw the keen look in his eyes, but that wasn’t what I was preparing myself for. It was the wife. She had the same stark hunger in her eyes so many other females in my life had. Catching my gaze, she smiled coyly and licked her lips.
Yeah. She was going to be a problem.
Fuck this. I pressed Kyle’s number and murmured in Shelby’s ear, “Stall for me.”
“Wha—”
“Bro—” Edward Branch started to say, but I ducked out from behind Shelby.
It was rude. And stupid. Okay, it was ri
diculously stupid of me, but I had to check on Kyle.
She twisted around, and I mouthed Stall to her again before slipping into a back and more private hallway.
It was almost time to go in.
I couldn’t shake the edginess. It was a feeling of doom hanging over me.
Kyle’s phone rang, and then I heard his voice message. “Yo. This is Kyle. Do your thing. BEEP!”
“Kyle, fucking call me. Where the hell—”
BEEP. BEEP.
I glanced at the screen, saw he was calling me back, and switched to that line. “Where the hell are you?”
“I’m coming. I’m sorry. Cheryl and I had a fight.”
“Again? You guys have been fighting a lot lately.”
There was static in his background. He was straining to speak on his end. Pressing a finger in my ear, I moved farther down the hallway. I had to find out what was going on. “Kyle, where are you?”
“Listen, Brody, I’m damn proud of you. I can’t wait to get there.”
My throat was swelling, tightening with emotion. Goddamn. “Where are you?”
“I’m in your car.”
“My car?” The fuck? “Are you close? I gotta go in pretty soon.”
“No—” A screeching sound cut through his words, metal on metal slamming together.
“Kyle.”
No answer.
“Kyle!”
No.
No.
No!
I knelt, hunching over. I was in some corner, hidden by a fake plant. My palms were suddenly ice-cold and sweaty as I gripped the phone. My pulse sped up. My heart was trying to thump its way out of my chest.
“Kyle, answer me!” I was desperate. My throat was dry.
Someone touched my arm, and I shot to standing.
I rounded, finding Shelby standing there.
Her hand went to her chest. Her lips parted on a startled gasp. “Brody?” Her eyes went to my phone. I had it in a death grip, pressed so tight against my ear it could’ve drawn blood. Her throat moved. She was swallowing. “Wha-what’s going on?”
I shook my head. I couldn’t talk, not to her. I was too focused on full-on shouting into the phone. “Kyle!” People were coming from the main lobby to see what the commotion was about.
The line . . . there was still nothing on his end.
“Please, Kyle. Answer me.” I was begging. My voice cracked from the pressure. Shelby’s hand covered her mouth. She choked out a sob. I watched as the blood drained from her face.
The line went dead.
“Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God—” Shelby was scrambling for her phone.
I couldn’t do anything.
I . . . my brother . . .
I heard her punch in some numbers, then a faint, “9-1-1, what is your emergency?”
Matthew
Pryor Mountain Range, South Montana
Present day. Early May.
A car crept up the driveway.
Its tires crunched over the gravel, moving closer to the large three-story home. There was a crisp chill in the morning air, which didn’t seem to bother the man who got out from the driver’s side. Standing over six feet tall, Matthew Kellerman ran a brisk glance over the Kellerman estate. It’d always been a gorgeous home.
He could already see telltale signs that it was empty. The grass hadn’t been mowed. Paint was stripping from the sides of the house. The shrubbery in the fields that would normally be trimmed low looked untouched.
He sighed.
Of everyone, the only one who remained at the house was his stepsister, and he found his eyes tracking out to the fields surrounding where he stood on the mountain as if he could see Morgan. He couldn’t. The house was nestled into a side cliff, just short of one of the higher peaks on the hill. He was able to see some of the land around them, the spots that weren’t hidden by dense forest and the river that swept its way around the mountain, winding to the end and leading into a lake that was hidden in the valley between two other mountains.
He could already feel the effects on his body from the altitude. His mouth was parched, and he felt the beginning of a headache forming just behind his temples.
Yes. He looked back to the stately home. It’d been too long since he’d been back.
Way too long.
Grabbing his bag from the trunk, Matthew went inside, using the keys that hadn’t been used in four years.
The second he stepped inside, memories came at him with breakneck speed.
He could hear Morgan’s laughs of glee as she raced around the house. She was the youngest of them and was brought into the family when his father and her mother married. Either he or one of his two other siblings always raced after her. Finley and Abigail doted on Morgan as much as he did. The twins might’ve only been two years younger than him, but they were four years older than Morgan.
The last time he’d seen her, which was four years ago, he had hardly recognized her. She would’ve been twenty-four then. Her hair had darkened, but there were still streaks of blonde in it from her time in the sun. Her skin had been golden tan. And she held the same smell of the wild mixed with the scent of the horses she spent more time with than she spent with humans.
Even then, he saw how wild she was. He also saw just how much like her mother she looked too. She had the same slender build, the same striking beautiful hazel eyes, and the same cheekbones. Yes. Morgan had been stunningly beautiful back then. He couldn’t help to wonder how much more so she had become, but glancing out the window, his thoughts were interrupted.
Another vehicle was pulling up outside. Matthew heard the same sounds of the tires moving over the tiny rocks, and he went straight for the coffee machine. Seconds later, laughter pealed through the air.
“Holy shit. It hasn’t changed up here.”
“Are we looking at the same house?” A feminine voice laughed. “This place is a mess. Morgan hasn’t been keeping it up.”
A snort from the other. “Are you kidding me? Taking care of a house isn’t in her repertoire. We all know that.”
A trunk slammed shut as Matthew was pouring the full-sized pot of water into the machine. He was rummaging through the cupboards when the door opened and his two siblings walked inside.
Finley dropped his bags onto the floor with a thud. His eyes lit up when he saw his older brother, and his arms spread wide. “Matt! You’re a sight for sore eyes.”
Abigail laughed as she came in next, dropping her bags next to Finn’s. “And when he says sore, he means it. He’s been complaining about his back for the last hour.”
Matt and Finley caught up in a hug, smacking each other on the shoulder. Pulling away, he turned toward his sister and pulled her in for a tight hug. “Man. I’ve missed you guys.”
Abby let out a soft sound, wrapping her thin arms even tighter around him. “Not as much as we’ve missed you.” Tears filled her brown eyes, and she wiped them away. “I’m already crying. What a mess.” She waved her hand in the air, drying her face and letting her gaze travel to the opened back of the coffee machine. “Oh, I didn’t think Morgan would have coffee stocked for us.”
“Well, I haven’t actually found any, but I was hoping.”
“Nope.” Finley shook his head as their sister left the house. “Abby knew this would happen. She made me stop in Silver Springs on the way because of it. We all know Morgan is outside as long as the weather allows it.”
That was most of the year. Even back when they were kids, she took to the mustangs living around the property like a fish to water. It was an old cliché, but the best way to describe it. It wasn’t normal, but it was special. She was “adopted” by one mare, and since the first day Morgan had clambered onto Shoal’s back, she lived more in the mustang world than the human one. He had hoped growing up, getting her high school diploma, and then an online college degree would urge her to become more ingrained in their world. His world.
It hadn’t.
“Have you seen her?”
> Finley was going through his phone but paused and looked up. His features tightened before he shook his head. “I was hoping maybe you had.”
Four years. That was a long time.
Abby returned, carrying three grocery bags. Finley took them, setting them onto the counter, and Abby opened the one closest to her and pulled out the tin of coffee grounds. “Now we have coffee.” She laughed again and ran a tired hand down her hair. “The essentials.”
Finley reached into one of the other bags and pulled out a bottle of bourbon. “Speak for yourself, Abs. This is my essential.”
“Speaking of.” Matt pulled out three glasses. Inspecting them for dirt, he raised his eyebrows. “They’re actually clean.” He put them in front of his brother. “Fill me up, Finn. It’s been a long day of traveling for all of us.”
Finn opened the bottle, pouring a double shot in each before offering the bottle to his sister. “You want in on this?”
She grimaced. “No, thank you.” She moved to the coffee machine, measured out the grounds, and then hit the brew button. “Coffee will do the trick for me.” She pulled open the cupboard closest to her, saw it was more glasses, and moved to the next. She pressed her lips together. “I’m in shock. Morgan must’ve been here recently. Maybe she’s more human than horse, after all.”
They all paused, sharing a look before bursting into laughter.
Abby shook her head. “Whatever she is, she did the dishes. They’re freshly washed.”
“How can you tell?” Matt had moved to the other side of the counter so he was standing next to Finn. Both brothers wore custom-tailored suits, but while Matt kept his dark hair a couple of inches long so he could tuck it behind his ear, Finn’s was trimmed short. All three siblings had dark, almond-shaped eyes and dark hair; though, Matt’s had a touch of blond in it.
Abby took out a plate and held it up. “It’s still warm to the touch.” Biting her lip, she put the plate back and opened the fridge. She gasped in surprise. “And stocked the fridge too.”
One bin was filled with lettuce, tomatoes, green peppers, and onions. A crisper had oranges, apples, strawberries, and raspberries. She pulled out a ketchup container and twisted off the top. It still had the seal over it. “She went shopping for us.”
