Chapter 13

In the early hours after Quincy’s July 4 celebrations, Winslow finishes a long shift managing parades, a rodeo, and post-fireworks patrols, booking multiple drunks but avoiding accidents. Exhausted, she drives to Griffin’s ranch instead of home, where he carries her to bed and lets her sleep.

Winn wakes from a violent nightmare and slips to the porch before dawn. Griffin joins her, urging her to talk. He admits the weight he carries as the eldest sibling and ranch leader, while Winn shares how a female school officer inspired her to serve others through police work.

Pressed gently, Winn reveals the nightmare’s source: five years earlier, on July 4, her parents were killed in a head-on collision caused by a texting teen. As a patrol officer, she was first on scene, finding the teen dead and her parents’ car overturned. She believes their deaths were instant but is haunted by the images.

Griffin holds Winn as she cries and listens without judgment, strengthening their trust. When the sun rises, he asks her to spend the day at his place—crossing another boundary in their once-casual arrangement—and she agrees, signaling a deeper shift in their relationship.