He felt the heartbreak as if it had been only yesterday as he carefully eased open the back flap and took out the handwritten letter inside.
Colton,
Im sorry we fought. But I cant stay here at the house any longer. Its only getting worse. Im running away. I hope youll come with me. Ill be waiting for you at our special place Friday night at midnight. If you love me, youll meet me there and well go together. I have a surprise for you and cant wait to tell you.
Love,
Jessica
Colton felt as if his heart had been ripped out of his chest all over again. He let out a howl of pain as he reread the words. Jessica hadnt just taken off without a word. Shed sent this letter. Only he hadnt gotten it.
Theyd had a fight the day before she left school, left Whitehorse, left him. He had been beside himself. Hed even braved going over to her house, knowing the reaction hed get from her father.
Sid Granger had answered the door, his wife, Milli, behind him. What the hell are you doing here? Havent you done enough, you son of a His wife had grabbed his arm, trying to hold him back, but she was no match for her husband.
Sid had grabbed a baseball bat and chased him out to his pickup. Jessicas gone and if I ever see your face around here again, Ill kill you.
In the days following, Colton had called the house, begging Sid to tell him where Jessica had gone. But the phone calls had ended with angry words and the slamming down of the receiver. They blamed him for Jessica leaving? He couldnt understand why. Shed loved him. It was whatever was going on at home that had made her run away.
A few weeks later, hed seen Mrs. Granger coming out of the Whitehorse Post Office.
Please. Tell me where shes gone, Colton had pleaded.
Go away. Millie Granger had glanced around as if she was afraid Sid would find out shed talked to him. Jessicas gone. She isnt coming back. And even if she was, she wouldnt want anything to do with you.
Colton hadnt believed it at first. Hed been inconsolable for weeks.
She obviously wasnt the right woman for you, his father finally said after watching him mope around. Trust me, her leaving is the best thing that could have happened. You both were too damn young to be so serious.
As weeks had turned into months, Colton had been forced to accept that the first woman hed ever loved no longer wanted anything to do with him.
Now he stared at
the letter and understood what had happened, why shed never tried to contact him. Shed reached out to him, gone to their secret spot that night, only to have him fail to show.
How long had she waited for him, thinking he would come for her? The thought of her alone there that night, waiting for him, broke his heart all over again. He couldnt bear that shed gone away believing he hadnt loved her, that he wouldnt have been there for her. He had promised to take care of her, look out for her, and when shed needed him, he hadnt been there.
I never got the letter.
He hadnt been to their special place for fourteen yearsnot since their fight and her disappearance from his life. As he drove out of town toward the ranch, he remembered the times theyd met there in secret. He would spread a blanket out for them beneath a stand of huge old cottonwood trees alongside the creek.
Even after all these years, he could remember the sound of the breeze in the leaves overhead, the sweet scent of the wild grasses, the cool coming up off the creek, the heat of her body against his.
It was in the shade of those trees that hed first told her he loved her. Theyd both been seventeen the first time theyd made love under that tree. It had been the first for both of them. Jessica had cried afterward and told him he would always be the only one for her. Hed told her hed never let anyone hurt her again.
Colton drove past the Granger place, glancing in the direction of the house, as he had done for the last fourteen years. The house was set back off the road, almost hidden in a stand of trees. He never passed it without thinking of Jessica.
As he drove by the barbed-wire fence that marked the end of the Granger property and the beginning of Chisholm land, he slowed. Seeing no other vehicles coming down the road from either direction, he pulled in, stopping short of the barbed-wire gate.
The gate into this part of the Chisholm ranch property was seldom if ever used. The barbed wire had cut deep into the wooden posts, a sure sign that no one had been back in years. Once opened, he drove through the gate, then got out and closed it behind him.
The way in could hardly be called a road. It was a dirt path through some rugged terrain. Grass grew up between the two ruts, scraping the underside of his pickup as he drove until he reached the creek and the path petered out.
Parking in a gully where his pickup couldnt be seen from either the road or the Granger property, he walked the rest of the way, following the creekjust as hed done as a teenager on his way to meet Jessica.
That night Jessica would have sneaked out of her parents house and taken the back way, along the creek and through the barbed-wire fence onto Chisholm property, following the creek to the secret meeting place.