“Yep. Now get on with yourself.”

“Why exactly aren’t you out working the fields?”

“None of your damn business.”

“Something happened with Sammy, didn’t it?”

“And how the hell do you know that? Always so fucking insightful, aren’t you? Asking me if I’m in love with her. Telling me I’m in love with her. Now you know something happened.”

“Not because I’m particularly insightful, but because her camper’s gone. What the hell did you do?”

“Loved her,” he ground out. “I fucking loved her. I gave her everything that she could have asked for. But she didn’t ask for it. Never once. In fact, she gave it back. She doesn’t want me to love her. She says I don’t have a choice but to take care of her and I don’t know what I want. Like I’m a kid. I haven’t been a kid since I was one. You want to talk about dealing with shit? I lost my parents, and then I had to become a parent. I am a hell of a lot more in touch with my feelings than most. And a hell of a lot more in touch with them than I would like to be, I can tell you that.”

Logan nodded slowly. “Look. I don’t actually know anything about relationships. I’m as bad a bet as there even exists. I know so little about love it’s not even funny. But I know you. And I know her. And I know that she must feel like she’s taken an awful lot from you for someone who wasn’t blood. Because I know that I sure as hell feel that way. And indebted to you. In a way that... I can’t even put into words.”

“I don’t want you to owe me, not any of you.”

“But of course we do. Look at you. This is your life. You didn’t do anything else. You didn’t go anywhere else, because of us.”

“Neither did you.”

His friend looked at him, long and hard.

“Well, what the hell, Logan? Is this some kind of indentured servitude?”

“This was the most stable, secure family experience I ever had. Staying in it isn’t a hardship. But yeah, I owe you one. I’m glad that Jake and Colt felt like they could move on. But I never did. Maybe because we’re not blood. Maybe I thought I owed you a little bit of a stronger oath for that reason. I think Sammy is just scared. Scared as hell.”

“Well, she’s gone. So I can’t ask her.”

That seemed to make Logan shut up. But Ryder wasn’t sure he liked that any better. Because in some ways it was better if his friend was being relentless. Because at least then the other man had some hope, or an idea. Ryder himself didn’t have either.

“Well?” Ryder pressed.

“No,” Logan said. “You have a point. She’s not here. And you know what? I think that’s the whole point. She’s going to have to solve this on her own, and you can’t do it for her.”