The Boy and His Ribbon (The Ribbon Duet, #1)(80)

Even though my heart begged me on a daily basis to run into the forest and never look back, I knew I could never be that selfish.

The Wilsons had been nothing but good to us.

They’d given me the ability to grant Della the best foundation I could with her education and personal development. The fact that she had a surrogate brother and sister in Liam and Cassie meant the world because no way should she grow up with only me as her companion.

Not only had the Wilsons ensured that the hours I put into running their farm, increasing their bottom line, and turning a hobby crop where Patricia had to work part-time at a local accountancy firm and John picked up odd jobs here and there into a thriving income where they could retire, but they also taught me the basics in life.

Things like regular doctor and dentist visits.

The first time I’d taken Della and myself to the dentist, I didn’t know who hated it more. Luckily, I’d ensured she kept up with regular brushing, and I was a bit obsessive when it came to cleanliness, even while living rough, so we didn’t have too much wrong. A filling or two and we were done for another year.

Another year older.

Another year wiser.

And another year where I fought my lone-wolf tendencies and forced myself to stay for her.

For my Little Ribbon.

And it was the right decision because as the spotlight shone on her glossy blonde hair and her cherub cheeks glowed and her blue eyes twinkled like stars, she wasn’t just Sandy from Grease Lightning, singing a song about a boy and summer.

She was Della Wild, and she was perfect.

*

Two things happened a month later that proved to me just how far apart our worlds had become.

The first, Patricia and John believed it was time that our two pushed together single beds should be split back apart, now that Della was getting older.

I’d swallowed back the denial that always followed when someone remarked how tall she’d become, how willowy and pretty and strong. I’d also gulped back the sudden terror that I’d never be able to sleep again unless I could reach out in the night and touch her—to appease my fear that she might be hurt in the darkness just like those kids at Mclary’s barn.

The day when the bed we’d slept on for years was suddenly broken back into two singles and shoved to opposite sides of the room, the dynamic between Della and I switched again.

We’d been so used to our routine.

We didn’t think anything of it or stopped to think that it might be strange for others to see a ‘brother and sister’ sleep side by side.

Even though I’d raised Della, I never truly thought of her as my sister. Somehow, even all this time later, when I looked at her, I saw her as a Mclary…not mine.

She looked nothing like her mother or father—which was a blessing—but she also looked nothing like me.

I was dark and angles and broody desire to be left alone.

She was light and curves and infectious kindness toward everyone.

Ten years separated me and my slavery at the Mclary’s, yet it had carved something deep inside me, covering me with wariness, cloaking me with suspicion, and never letting me relax in company no matter how old I became.

I never stopped to think that sleeping next to her would be seen as inappropriate and never viewed our relationship from an outsider’s point of view.

Della would kiss me often. Smacking my lips with a strawberry-lip-glossed mouth before running off to class or to play with Liam or help Patricia in her garden or ride with Cassie.

Her quick-fire affection always melted my gruff heart, and she was the only one who could touch something inside me—slipping past my walls, infiltrating my fortresses to remind me that I might not like many humans but I loved one more than I could stand.

Needless to say, both Della and I didn’t sleep that night, or the next, or the next. Our hands somehow found their way from their covers to dangle over the edge and reach for each other, never quite touching no matter how much we wished.

Her ribbon would wrap and drip over her fingers, kissing the dusty floor and reminding me all over again that she wasn’t a baby anymore, but she still had childhood ties.

Eventually, we got used to sleeping apart, and neither of us ever said how much we preferred sleeping in one large bed. I kept my mouth shut as I didn’t want to overstep important boundaries, and I guessed she didn’t feel the same way because after that first week, she went shopping with Cassie and purchased a bedspread covered with leaping horses frolicking in ocean spray, leaving my drab black sheets looking like a black hole in the corner.

The second thing to show the growing distance between us was a mid-summer evening where John opened his paddocks to the public to purchase hay bales directly off the meadow the moment we’d finished baling.

With over two thousand bales to sell and already a barn full of supplies for our own livestock in winter, John put me in charge of choreographing the countless arriving Utes, trucks, and trailer-pulling cars, directing them to appropriate fields and keeping tally of how many bales they took so I could grab the cash as they left.

I’d had a minor panic attack when he waltzed back to the house to do whatever he needed to do. That minor attack turned full blown when the first customer finished loading ten bales and drove toward me manning the exit gate.

The guy with his sunburned nose and stalks of hay on his t-shirt asked, “What do I owe you?” He cocked his head at the back with his loaded hay. “Ten bales at what price?”