*Things were shitty with Emily, and not for the first time, Donovan wished Otto and his crew hadn’t booked this weekend. But they had and they were already here. And Emily was still distressed about what had happened with the hogs and the poachers. He knew it was upsetting to her to see animals die, but the gang of feral hogs who weren’t afraid of man, machine, or gunfire were not what he wanted to run into on a stroll through the woods.
Besides, the meat didn’t go to waste and he got paid for it. He did feel badly that she was traumatized by it. Emily was just too kindhearted, but it felt like it had pushed their relationship back to where it was in the beginning when they were adversaries.
“Just leave me alone for a bit,” she had said to him, so he gave her the space she needed.
Still, he missed her. Of course, maybe this was for the best. He was rapidly falling in love with her and their relationship had an expiration date. Getting his heart involved wasn’t part of the plan. Of course, it wasn’t that easy to ignore how wonderful she was—even if she was too tenderhearted.
Otto and friends arrived shortly before six and they had a barbecue with the ranch hands. The beer was flowing and everyone was having a good time telling stories. Then one of Nate’s boys decided to tell the story of the white elk.
Son of a bitch.
“We’ve all seen her,” the ranch hand said. “At one time or another. She’s pure white and the size of a car.”
That was a bit of an exaggeration. She was good-sized for a female, but she didn’t weigh more than seven or eight hundred pounds.
Otto laughed. “I wasn’t born yesterday, boy.”
“Ask Donovan. He’s got pictures on his phone.”
“That right, Donny?”
He sighed. “I was going to show you it tomorrow. And you’ve got to sign waivers that if you see Ghost, she’s off-limits.”
“Show us your phone,” Otto said. “I think you guys are full of shit.”
“I can do one better.” He went inside and got the digital picture frame that he’d loaded the video and pictures on to. It was only the size of a tablet, but it beat all of them crowding around him and his tiny phone screen. Donovan passed it to Otto and went back to finishing his dinner.
They must have played it back about five times before Otto looked up at him. “This is better than the zebra. I’ll pay you five thousand dollars for her head. Hell, I don’t even have to shoot her.”
“No. She’s protected. That’s a condition of my lease.” A verbal one anyway. “We are not allowed to hunt the white elk.” Not that he was going to lead them to her anyway, but he wanted that to be clear.
“Donny, you’re a terrible businessman.”
“Be that as it may, Ghost and any other white elk you see are off-limits.”
They grumbled about it, but in the end, what were they doing to do about it? After the fire was out and the beer was gone, they headed back into the hunting lodge and called it a night. They were going to get in the trucks at dawn and head out to bag what they could.
Donovan paused on the porch and looked toward the ranch house. He could just see the lights in the distance. He wondered what Emily was doing now. Walking back to his bedroom, he waffled about calling her. But she wanted some time and, truth be told, he didn’t want to hear her bitch about the hunting party, so he put his phone to charge and went to bed.
*
Emily couldn’t sleep. Creeping out onto the porch, she silently closed the door so as not to wake anyone. She could see the lights of Donovan’s hunting lodge in the distance. There had to be a way she could stop them from killing Ghost, or any of the other elk. She grudgingly accepted that the hogs were a problem and she wasn’t a hypocrite. She knew if they just relocated the hogs, they would be killed off-ranch. It was more humane for Donovan to kill them with one shot than it would be for them to be terrified until they were slaughtered.
But the elk weren’t hurting anyone. Nature was keeping their population in check.
She wished she didn’t care for Donovan as much as she did. It would have been so much easier to hate him if he was a stereotypical hunter and just out for himself. But she saw how kind and protective he was. She would never be able to repay him for keeping Alissa safe.
If he hadn’t shared his childhood with her, Emily wouldn’t be feeling guilty that he would be moving on. He needed a home and a family and she could give him both. All she would have to do was accept that he made his living killing animals.
Only she just couldn’t do that. She could compromise on the hogs, not because she wanted to but because there wasn’t an alternative solution that would allow them to live. And the meat went to feed the hungry—if not her own family, then the local soup kitchens and restaurants. She wouldn’t eat it, but the hogs wouldn’t die in vain.
But with every gunshot, she cringed at the turkey, javelinas, deer, and elk that would senselessly die for someone’s cheap thrills.
When she was in charge of the ranch, she could make those changes. But she wasn’t, and hopefully her father would be around for a long time so she would have time to learn from him and maybe bring him around to her way of thinking.
Rubbing her shoulders against the chill in the breeze, Emily wished she could go to Donovan and convince him to change his clientele to people who would appreciate the beauty of nature instead of wanting to destroy it. He was everything she wanted in a man, and everything she hated at the same time. Fate had a sense of humor.
Emily took a step off the porch and paused. He was leaving after his lease was up. Every night she spent with him would make it more difficult to let him go. What had started out as something fun and casual had developed into something more. She thought he felt the same way, but she knew he would leave all the same. He may be a hunter, but Donovan was also a protector. He would leave to protect them from his father.
The power company was coming out tomorrow to take a look at the property for the wind turbines and surprise—they weren’t charging her a dime to do it. If things went well, she could start construction on the first of the turbines by the end of the month. Emily needed to move forward for the sake of her family and the ranch.
But she wished that she could go back and have some more carefree zip-line adventures and wild tree-stand sex with Donovan before things had gotten so serious.