Julia comes stumbling into the kitchen rubbing the sleep from her eyes. She wasn’t a morning person and had a hard time concentrating on things. Sphinx was following behind her as the two of them head over towards the breakfast bar.

“Morning sleepy head.” Gina just grins at her older sibling. Julia would sleep in, but they were going horseback riding with their father today.

He was taking them to his favor spot on the ranch.

Julia just waves at her younger sister and sits down at her usual spot. She hated early mornings, but she had to get up. Julia looks around looking for her father.

“Where’s father?”

“Let me check.” Selina touches the flat panel computer monitor to bring up the lay out of the property. She looks for Jack’s blue color dot on the property map and finds him at the hangar. She touches Jack’s dot and the cameras in and around the hangar show all of them what he is doing. They watch as he inspected the Lear jet.

“I wonder where daddy is going? He only inspects the Lear when he has an important business meeting.” All three of them watch Jack as he doubles checks everything on the Lear. Once he is done, they watch as he closes the hangar and head back towards the house.

Selina starts serving the girls their breakfast and sits down with them to enjoy her. She had already set Sphinx and Cadmus dish down.

Jack comes walking in twenty minutes later “morning everyone”

“Morning daddy.” Both girls chorus at the same time.

“Morning Sir.” Selina just hands him his favor coffee mug.

He walks over towards the coffee and fill his favorite coffee mug up which has printed on it “I haven’t had my coffee yet so piss off.”

Jack just stands at the counter, leaning against it drinking his coffee. He grabs one of the fresh baked muffins that he knew Selina made. He takes a bit e of it and couldn’t believe the taste.

“New recipe Selina?” Jack had the half-eaten muffin in his hand.

“Nope, Gina made them. She wanted to try a new recipe she had found.” Selina looks proudly at Gina.

Jack directs his gaze towards his youngest “this is good kiddo. You should make them more often.” He finishes the one he had been eating.

“Thank you, daddy.” Gina blushes from her father’s praise.

Julia drinks her orange juice and takes a bite out of her muffin. She had to agree with her father and Selina about Gina’s baking. The four of them finish breakfast and pack a picnic to take with them out on the property.

Jack rides his Arabian, while the girls ride their Andalusian. Selina rides April’s Arabian. They ride out towards the mountain range at the back of the property. Jack takes them on a hidden path that leads them further into the mountains.

“Here we are ladies.” Jack stops at a spot that is totally secluded. The only way to it was the hidden path that was hard to find unless you knew about it.

All of them dismounted and look around the place. The girls loved it and Selina just smiles to herself.

She looks over towards Jack “so this is where you and April disappeared for hours on end.”

“Yep, this was her favorite spot.” Jack looks towards an area that he and April use to make love at. This was their favorite spot to get away from everything including cell phones.

Selina and Julia set out the picnic blanket and the food they packed. The sun was high overhead, but there was plenty shade here so that they weren’t in the sun all the times. There was a cascading river only half a mile from them.

The girls go exploring around the area, while Jack and Selina stay with the horses. He walks over to some flowers he had planted years ago to see how they were doing. He hadn’t been up here in a few years since his wife died. He wanted to share this with the girls, since it was special to him.

“Daddy, look what I found.” Gina comes running towards Jack with Julia trailing behind her.

She had in her hand an ancient arrow.

Gina had been exploring with Julia, when they had stumbled across an arrow sticking out from some rocks. At first her and Julia weren’t sure about it, but then when Gina started digging it out. They were both amazed at what they had found. So, they brought it back to their father.

Jack looks at it “It seems you have an ancient arrow. It looks like it dates to the 1800s.” He hands the arrow back to Gina.

“You might want to preserve that arrow, Gina. When we get back to the house. I’ll show you how to preserve it.” Jack ruffles his daughter’s hair.

He looks towards Julia “don’t worry sweetie. You’ll find something out here. There’s a few places out here that have artifacts laying around. This spot use to be a hiding spot for the Native Americans in this territory.”

Jack and the girls spend the night out there. He shows them how to fish and Selina shows the girls how to clean and cook the fish. Julia and Gina have never spent any time out under the stars.

“If anything, ever happens at the house Selina. I want you to bring the girls out here. There’s a go bag hidden behind a rock with a Celtic cross on it. I know you already know this, but the girls don’t.” Jack figure this would make a good hiding place.

“I know, but thank you for reminding me, Jack. Do you think something is heading towards us?” Selina knew how jack operated.

“No, but I just like to be prepared. Besides, I wanted to share this with you and the girls. April would have wanted it.” Jack could feel the emotions about his wife surfacing.

Jack looks over towards the girls sleeping by the fire they had built. He hopes that the girls would make this their place when they need to be alone or just need a place to get away from everyone or everything. He looks up at the sky and silently say a prayer for his wife.

Jack gets his bedroll out and lays it near the fire and use the saddles as a pillow.