Boots Up (Port Ranch Book #1)

Chapter 6

MITCH

I wipe the sweat from my brow and glare over at Granger, “I thought Sundays were supposed to be a day of rest.”

“Sorry, Pro Bowl,” he scowls at me, “but the cattle never take a day off, and neither do we.”

“I didn’t even do anything with cattle today. I drove around and dug big ass holes.”

“You dug those holes so tomorrow we can put in new fence poles to replace the ones that are damaged. Do you know what would happen if the cattle grazed over there and pushed against some of those rotten posts you saw today?”

“There weren’t cattle in sight when we were out there,” I counter.

“Well, they’re bad at following directions and all it takes is one rogue cattle to venture off and a group follows. Stop complaining. Nobody ever said this was easy work.”

“Don’t you ever get tired of it? I mean, I don’t have much of a choice to be here, but you could go do something easier like work in a bank.”

Granger glares at me again, “Do I look like the kind of guy they’d hire in a bank?”

“Good point.”

It’s another two hours before I finish digging all those damn holes with Granger. He looks like he’s barely sweating and here I am drenched, soaking through my shirt, and covered in questionable brown stains. While I hope it’s just mud, the whiff I’m getting here and there says otherwise.

Before we can wrap up for the day, Granger has to finish some paperwork. I follow him into the office, but he turns around and puts his hand against my chest to hold me back, “Take a shower, Pro Bowl, you smell like shit.”

“I will later.”

“Do it now, I’ll take you into town to grab something to eat and maybe a drink. We can celebrate your first week on the ranch. You’re allowed to drink, right?”

The question initially pissed me off and reminded me why I was here. Granger wasn’t saying it to be a dick though. Well, maybe he was but that’s just because he’s always a dick. “Yes, I can drink, but I’m not going to get drunk and I’ll make sure I have a DD if you’re offering. I’m not digging another hole.”

“Learned that lesson, huh?”

“Yeah, this has been a wake-up call, for sure.”

I leave the barn office and make the walk over to my bunkhouse. The walk isn’t far, but after about twelve hours of work today, I feel like I’m walking through five feet of snow in my bare feet right now. Speaking of snow, I had to dig holes in the practically frozen ground today. It’s hard, so damn hard. Some of the holes took an hour of both Granger and I digging to get the depth we needed. What the fuck is this shit? I cannot believe that this is what Max WANTED to do.

Max…damn I’ve thought about my brother more this week than I have my entire life. Being here is both good and bad for my healing process. Granger and Brian are working me to the bone and I don’t have a lot of time to think and get myself into trouble, but it also means I’m running into things that remind me of Max.

His picture is in the foyer of the Big House, so every morning for breakfast I see him on the wall looking back at me. Feels like he’s judging me sometimes. I know I’ve made a lot of dumb mistakes since he’s been gone. The dumbest wasn’t even the DUI. The dumbest was the one that caused me to get drunk as hell that night a week ago.

Seeing Britt is also hard. She’s looking good, looking happy on the outside, but every once in a while I catch some sadness in her eyes. I wasn’t in touch with Max as much as I should have been, but every time we did talk he went on and on about Britt and the boys. He loved them. This isn’t fair. I wish I could provide him some sort of peace. I wonder if it’s hard for her to see me as well.