Knotted by the President

She left the Copperhead range at nineteen with a duffel and a restraining order. She's come back to bury her father. The will leaves the ranch to Dovie Rae and Ledger Kane in equal halves, with a clause: neither can sell without the other. The ranch is the club's winter ground. Ledger is the club's president. He's also a lycan, and so, Dovie is starting to understand, was her father. They split the house with tape and the range with wire. Then somebody cuts the north fence at night, a rival charter starts running cattle over it, and the Copperheads turn out to be too few to hold the line. Ledger asks her to stand. She says no. Then she sees the cut fence, and the dead heifer on the porch, and the way the pack looks at her like a name on a deed. By spring there's a new brand over her father's — and a knot that doesn't come undone.