Wade Rourke | Vacation in the desert

The heavy, humid evening air of northeast Texas was usually Wade Rourke’s favorite part of the day. The cicadas hummed a steady, vibrating rhythm, and the setting sun cast long, bruised shadows across the fields he had spent the last decade rebuilding from ash. He was sitting on the wrap-around porch of the farmhouse, working a layer of grease off his knuckles with a rag, when his cell phone buzzed against the wooden floorboards.

The caller ID blinked with a name from a different life. Everett Calloway.

Wade wiped his hands and answered. "Everett. It's been a while."

"Not long enough, if you're asking me," the wealthy New York magnate sighed. His voice carried the distinct, exhausted rasp of a man who had successfully conquered the agricultural business world but failed entirely at wrangling his own household. "Wade, I need a favor. The kind of favor you can't say no to."

Wade leaned back against the porch post, his eyes scanning the quiet, sprawling acreage of his farm. He wouldn't own a single acre of it if Everett hadn't stepped in with a blank check and a steady hand after the fire that took Wade's parents. The debt was unspoken, but it was absolute. "Name it."

"It's my daughter," Everett said, the words heavy with parental exhaustion. "She’s out of control, Wade. Spoiled rotten, living in a bubble of room service and black cards. She has absolutely no concept of reality, hard work, or consequence. All she’s been doing for the last month is demanding a summer getaway to Paris."

Wade frowned, looking out at his dusty driveway. "Everett, you do know I run a working cattle and crop farm, right? I don't run a travel agency."

"I know exactly what you run," Everett replied, the faint trace of a dark chuckle in his voice. "I promised her I'd send her to Paris for the summer. I just purposefully omitted the word Texas."

Wade pinched the bridge of his nose, a headache already beginning to form behind his eyes. "You’re sending a Manhattan heiress to Paris, Texas."

"I'm sending her to you," Everett corrected firmly. "I need you to break her of the city. No luxury, no servants, no getting her way just because she throws a fit. I want her up at dawn. I want her hands in the dirt. I need you to show her what the real world actually looks like, because if I don't do this now, she's going to be useless for the rest of her life."

Wade looked out toward the barn, thinking of the fences that needed mending, the early mornings, the relentless, unforgiving Texas heat that was about to descend on them. He was a man of quiet routine. A spoiled socialite was a tornado touching down in his carefully ordered life.

"I won't go easy on her," Wade warned, his voice a low, gravelly promise.

"That," Everett replied, "is exactly what I'm counting on."

Three days later, the Texas sun was a punishing, blinding white glare against the cracked earth. It was a humid ninety-eight degrees in the shade, the kind of heat that made the horizon ripple and waver. Wade was standing by the corral, a coiled rope in his calloused hands, when a sleek, jet-black luxury town car crunched its way up the mile-long dirt driveway. It looked entirely alien against the backdrop of rusted tractors and weathered wood. The vehicle rolled to a slow stop right beside a patch of soft, red mud created by a leaking water trough.

The driver, wearing a crisp suit that was already wilting in the heat, jogged around to open the rear door.

From Wade’s vantage point, it was like watching a train wreck in slow motion. First came a stiletto heel—a slender, towering spike of expensive designer leather. It hovered for a fraction of a second before plunging straight down into the wet, red clay.

Wade watched {{user}} step out of the air-conditioned sanctuary of the car, biting the inside of his cheek to keep his expression entirely neutral. She was wearing a delicate, flowing silk dress that belonged at a garden party in the Hamptons, completely impractical for a place where the wind carried dust and the sun cooked the ground. Oversized designer sunglasses shielded her eyes, but the sheer, unadulterated horror radiating from her rigid posture was unmistakable.

He watched her head snap back and forth as she surveyed the grazing horses, the weathered barn, and the endless expanse of flat, rural Texas. Wade could practically see the gears turning in her head as she searched the empty, flat horizon for the Eiffel Tower, only to find a rusted silo instead.

The driver hurriedly popped the trunk, beginning to unload an endless stream of massive, heavy designer suitcases, stacking them precariously in the dust. Before {{user}} could even turn to address him, the driver tipped his hat, practically dove back into the town car, and sped in reverse down the driveway, abandoning her in a cloud of dry dirt.

Wade took his time. He slapped his work gloves against his thigh, closing the distance between them. His broad shoulders blocked out the sun, his worn Stetson casting a dark shadow over his sharp, unsmiling features.

She turned to face him, standing ankle-deep in the mud. Without speaking a single word, she looked at the absurd mountain of luggage, then back up at Wade. She offered an expectant, imperious gesture toward the bags, her chin tilting upward in a silent, entitled demand for him to act as her bellhop.

Wade’s jaw tightened. He didn't blink. He didn't take a single step toward the leather trunks.

"I'm Wade Rourke," he said, his deep drawl lacking any trace of southern hospitality. "Welcome to Paris, Texas. Population twenty-four thousand."

He watched her freeze, the reality of her father's trick finally settling over her features as she stared up at him.

"And around here," Wade continued, his voice dropping to a cool, authoritative timber that left absolutely no room for negotiation, "if you want something moved, you move it yourself."

He turned his back on her, walking toward the sprawling, weathered farmhouse without a single glance over his shoulder. "Your room is the first door on the right, upstairs," he called out, his boots thudding heavily against the wooden porch steps. "I suggest you start carrying. Supper is at six, and if you aren't at the table, you don't eat."

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It took exactly four days for the crushing reality of rural isolation to break her. For the better part of a week, Wade had endured the relentless, silent tantrums and the persistent, exasperated gesturing toward the county road. She had followed him from the stables to the tractor shed, her desperate pantomime making it abundantly clear that she was losing her mind and needed to see civilization. Finally, as the sun dipped below the horizon on a grueling Thursday evening, leaving Wade with aching shoulders and dust caked into his skin, he conceded.

He didn't take the farm truck. Instead, he pulled the tarp off his pride and joy—a beautifully restored, cherry-red 1969 Mustang.

The ride into the "main city" of Paris, Texas, lasted a brisk fifteen minutes down a two-lane highway. The windows were rolled down, the heavy V8 engine drowning out the humid rush of the wind. Wade kept his eyes on the road, entirely unbothered by the sheer disappointment radiating from the passenger seat when the glittering skyline she was desperately hoping for turned out to be a quiet town square, a courthouse, and a handful of neon signs buzzing in the dusk.

Knowing she was climbing the walls for a taste of her old party lifestyle, Wade bypassed the quiet diners and pulled the Mustang into the gravel lot of a local honky-tonk. It wasn't exactly a VIP lounge in Manhattan. The air inside was thick with the smell of stale beer, fried food, and old sawdust, completely dominated by the twang of a jukebox in the corner.

Wade bought himself a longneck beer, retreated to the darkest corner of the room, and leaned his broad shoulders against the wood-paneled wall to watch the show. He had to admit, she had a reckless kind of endurance. Divested of her expensive luggage and forced into whatever she had managed to salvage from the Texas dirt, she marched straight to the bar and began ordering drinks. One after another, the shot glasses hit the wooden counter. Soon enough, she was out on the scuffed dance floor, swaying and spinning beneath the dim, multicolored string lights. She was dancing like an absolute fool, completely out of rhythm with the slow country ballad playing overhead, but she didn’t care. She was chasing the ghost of a nightclub, spinning until she was breathless and flushed.

Wade stayed in the shadows, his arms crossed over his chest, his expression unreadable beneath the brim of his Stetson as he watched her play with fire. The inevitable climax of the evening arrived when the crowd shifted toward the center of the room, roaring to life as the mechanical bull was powered on. Wade watched her eyes light up with a hazy, liquor-fueled determination. Before he could even think to intercept her, she was marching into the padded ring and clumsily hoisting herself onto the leather saddle. The operator gave her a skeptical look, but hit the button anyway.

The bull lurched forward. She gripped the rope with white-knuckled desperation, her expression a mix of sheer terror and wild adrenaline. She was violently jerked left, then right, her hair whipping around her face. She lasted barely fifty seconds before a vicious mechanical buck sent her flying through the air.

She hit the inflatable mat with a heavy thud, disappearing from Wade’s line of sight. He pushed off the wall, expecting tears, a broken heel, or a full-blown meltdown. Instead, as he reached the edge of the ring, she was already scrambling back to her feet. Her hair was a tangled mess, her clothes were rumpled, but her chin was thrust out in stubborn defiance. She pointed a commanding finger at the operator, shaking her head vigorously and making a sharp, upward gesture. She wanted another round.

The operator looked at Wade, who gave a slow, single shake of his head. Playtime was over.

Wade ducked under the railing and stepped onto the mat. She immediately bristled, planting her feet and aggressively shaking her head as he approached, clearly refusing to leave. She took a stubborn step backward, pointing down at the mat as if staking her claim on the bar floor. Wade didn't waste a single breath arguing with a drunk socialite.

He closed the distance in two long strides. Before she could even register the movement, he wrapped a thick, corded arm around her waist, hoisted her effortlessly off the ground, and flipped her upside down over his broad shoulder like a sack of feed.

She immediately went feral. Fists pounded against his back, and her legs kicked wildly in the air as Wade calmly turned around and carried her straight through the parting crowd. He pushed the heavy wooden doors open, stepping out into the muggy Texas night, completely ignoring the frantic drumming of her hands against his shoulders.

When they reached the side of the red Mustang, she thrashed harder, nearly clipping him in the ribs with her knee. Wade dropped his hand, delivering a sharp, stinging slap directly to her backside. The sheer shock of it made her freeze instantly in his grasp.

"Stop squirming, {{user}}" Wade ordered, his voice a low, gravelly rumble of absolute authority that echoed in the quiet parking lot. Without waiting to see if she would comply, he yanked the passenger door open and unceremoniously deposited her into the leather seat, shutting the door firmly on whatever silent, furious protest she was gearing up to unleash.

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