by Laney Powell
His Redemption
Broken Falls Ranch Book 3
Laney Powell
Contents
Welcome to Broken Falls Ranch!
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Epilogue
His Destiny
About the Author
Also by Laney Powell
Welcome to Broken Falls Ranch!
Welcome to Broken Falls Ranch, where broken hearts come to heal.
Want to see where it all started? Check out
Cowboy’s Heart
Chapter One
Raif
“Morrison,” I whispered into my mic.
There was a crackle in response, and then nothing. Where the fuck was he?
“Morrison,” I said again.
Now there wasn’t even a crackle.
“Fuck it,” I swore. He heaved himself up, gritting his teeth at the pain in his hip. If he had to guess, he’d dislocated it. The ball was definitely not in the socket. Every step he took sent a searing knife of pain up and down his leg, and through his groin. It meant that he was taking longer than necessary to get to his partner.
But enduring the suck was part of being a pararescueman, a pararescue jumper. PJs, we were called. PJs were the Air Force’s Special Forces. The Navy had the SEALs, the Army the Green Berets and Delta Force, the Marines had the Raiders, and then there was the best. The PJs. I smiled at myself and the grim competitive urge that was always there, even now. Even when I was limping like someone had just kicked my ass and used my own leg to do it.
“Morrison,” I said again, scanning the ground with his night vision goggles.
Ten feet ahead, I saw where Morrison had hunkered down. Which was not where he was supposed to be.
“Morrison,” I hissed. “Report and get off your ass!”
I crept closer, trying to keep my lame leg from making too much noise. I got right next to Morrison and reached down to shake him.
Morrison didn’t move.
“Oh, holy fuck,” I breathed, not wanting to believe it. I hit the call button on my mic started to call it in. “This is Bravo Two, to—”
Then everything went dark as I felt a sharp pain in the back of my head. My last thought was I hoped I didn’t crush Morrison.
“Raif? Raif Garzon?”
I blinked, feeling the bright light against my eyes, and wincing at the pain it brought. I closed my eyes and concentrated on not puking. As I focused on breathing, and not puking, I did an inventory. Legs, check. Arms, check. Torso, hurt like a mother fucker. Check. Head. Jesus. Was it even still all there? Was that why the light hurt me like a knife through the eyeball?
“Raif Garzon?” The voice floating over me was persistent, droning. Like a fly. Or a gnat. No seeums. Buzzing things that bite. “You need to open your eyes, Raif.”
It was a woman. But she wasn’t taking no for an answer.
“Open your eyes, Raif. I need to see you.”
Why? Why did anyone need to see anything? A fresh, sharp pain hit me as I remembered. Morrison, lying in a still, quiet heap. Then a pain at the back of my head—had someone snuck up on me? I’d never live it down.
“Raif, I know you’re awake. Now I need you to open your eyes.” Whoever she was, she wasn’t giving up.
Damn it. She wasn’t going to leave me alone until I did what she asked. I carefully opened one eye, and then the other. The bright light burned like fire, but I forced my eyes to keep blinking, even as tears slid down the side of my face.
“Good. That’s what I need. Now, if you can, squeeze my hand.” A cool hand slid into mine.
I closed my eyes for this one, and l concentrated on what she’d asked. I didn’t know what she looked like, but she was the most tenacious person I’d ever met. I squeezed her hand so hard.
“He was able to curl his fingers,” her voice said. “And he blinked. That’s enough for today.”
There was silence, and then I heard footsteps walking away. But the woman stayed. “All right, Captain Garzon, it’s time for you to get your ass in gear. We don’t quit. Endure the suck, Captain.”
I laughed. Or at least, I tried to. “What… what happened?” I tried to say.
“Open your eyes and look at me and I’ll tell you.”
She was hard core. “You… PJ?”
“No thank you. I just patch your dumb asses up.”
I let my lips curve into what I hoped was a smile. It hurt to do anything else.
“So you want to know or what? No deal unless you open your eyes and look at me.”
Fuck. She wasn’t giving up. I steeled myself and opened my eyes. It wasn’t as bright as it had been—maybe they’d turned the lights down? I saw an older woman, maybe the age of my grandmother, peering down at me.
“Good, you did it. Now, what happened to you? You were on a mission, meaning you hung your own ass out to dry, and it went sideways. You were attempting to recover your team member when a bullet hit the side of your head.”
What? I made a noise.
“Yes, it is a miracle you’re not dead. A centimeter to the right and you would be. But you’re here, and you brought Airman Morrison back to his mother. She’s been here, you know.”
I blinked, feeling the tears slide down the side of my face again. I didn’t bring him back alive. He was my responsibility, and I didn’t bring him back. Not the way I wanted to. Not the way I was supposed to.
“Don’t you go feeling like a big failure,” the woman said. “I’m Mona, by the way. I’m your nurse, and outside of your docs, everything goes through me. I know you types. Been taking care of them for a long time. You all think alike. You do a dangerous job, Captain Garzon.”
“Raif,” I whispered. No one called me Captain Garzon unless my ass was in a serious sling. As I considered it, this might meet the standards of being in a serious sling.
“Good thing we’re getting all personal,” Mona said. I could hear the grin in her voice. “You’re going to hate me in about three days. That’s when you’ll be wanting to sleep after all the PT.”
My eyes opened.
“For your hip,” she said. “You fractured the hell out of it, tore ligaments, and basically landed yourself into a long surgery. So now you get the physical therapists.”
“Shit,” my whisper rang out.
Mona laughed. “Well, you’re aware of what’s coming. That’s a good thing. Get some sleep, Raif. You’re going to need it.”
I knew wise words when I heard them. I closed my eyes and let myself fall back asleep. I didn’t have to work that hard.
Over the next two months, I worked really hard. The PT sucked, as Mona had warned. I’d never been hurt, but I’d seen guys have to go through it and they were never happy. I had the same experience. Although in my moments of self-pity, I felt like no one had ever been in daily PT as long as I was.
At the end of the two months, I met with my doctor. Mona was there, as were both of my therapists. Everyone was nodding and looking grave.
“Well?” I asked, looking around. I’d worked hard to make sure that I walked without a visible limp. I’d had more scans of my head than was appropriate, and there was nothing wrong with my brain pan. I’d even talked with the shrink which wasn’t exactly a walk in the park. But I’d done it. And I knew I’d have to keep doing it. So I couldn’t figure out the
reason for the long faces. “When can I get back to my team?”
“Why would you think that was ever the goal?” The doctor, a crusty colonel named Basterson, shook his head.
“Wasn’t it?” I asked.
“No, honey,” Mona said.
“I didn’t fix you up, fix up that hip and all your ligaments so you could keep jumping out of a damned helicopter!” Dr. Basterson exploded.
“What did I do all this work for then?”
“So you could walk, have a life,” Mona said.
“The PJs are my life! What else am I supposed to do?” All this time I thought I was getting better with the goal of getting back to my team. I’d never thought anything differently. Such a thought about a life away from the PJs, from my team, doing the work I’d busted my ass to be able to do—what the hell was I going to do with myself?
I didn’t have a clue.
The doc and the therapists talked around me, talking about the need for me to decide what I wanted to do, where I wanted to go. The noise was like the buzzing of bombs in my ear. I could hear them whirring all around me, but like from a distance. I got up and went back to my room and closed the door.
My life as I knew it was over. I had to get used to the fact. Holy shit did this suck.
Chapter Two
Taylor
I closed the lid of my trunk and moved around to the driver’s side of my SUV. There was no more reason for delay. I’d done all that I could, and there was nothing more for me to do. Nothing more that I could do.
Or that I wanted to do, but I barely acknowledged that to myself, much less out loud. But it was the truth. I didn’t want to be part of this—of my life—anymore. I looked up at the hospital building. I had to leave now. While there was no one to try to stop me. I got into the car and started the engine. I feared being seen and cursed myself as a coward. But I knew by now there was no other way.
The hospital faded in the distance as I drove away. Despite my desire to be gone, I watched it until I turned the car and headed west. This life was over. A few tears slid down my cheeks. Even though I was leaving, and it was my choice, this hurt.
It had been my life for a long time. No matter how much I was glad to leave it, it remained my life.
Until now.
I wiped my eyes. This was it. This was the new start that I needed. I wished that it hadn’t come to me in this fashion, but it had. And I’d finally realized I had to leave. Kasper was not going to get better. If he did, by some miracle of medicine not yet attempted, he was no longer my concern.
“What have you done?” Margaret, his mother, bit out as she whipped around to look at me. Behind her, the machines beeped on in silent accusation, surrounding Kasper in the hospital bed.
“I’ve done nothing, Margaret.”
“You were supposed to keep him from any more,” Margaret Antony said. “You were supposed to make sure he didn’t get any drugs!”
“I couldn’t do that,” I said, taking a step toward her. “Karl went through the house three days ago, and got rid of all the bottles, alcohol and pills. He threw it all away. Last night, Kasper went out. I couldn’t stop him any more than you could!” To have her glaring at me so, as though I’d poured the vodka or whiskey or gin or whatever down his throat along with pills.
“I told you to look after him,” Margaret said.
“Why couldn’t you? I’m not his next of kin. You are,” I shot back.
The aforementioned Karl, Kasper’s older brother, stepped between us. “Mom, it’s not Taylor’s fault.”
“It most certainly is!” She hissed at him, giving him no more quarter than she did me. “She was supposed to make sure that he stayed off of it!”
“That was Kasper’s job,” Karl said quietly.
“No!” Margaret whisper-shouted. “It was hers!” She pointed at me like I was some sort of demon.
I backed away toward the door.
“You will stay right here with him,” Margaret declared, as though she were a queen and I was a lowly subject. “You stay until he wakes up.” With a hard glare, she swept from the room.
“I’ll talk to her,” Karl said, giving me an apologetic look as he followed his mother.
I watched them both go and then sighed. Walking over to Kasper, where he lay still in the bed, I put my hand on his. “I’m sorry I couldn’t help you. I’m sorry you didn’t want my help. I loved you. I could have loved you for a lot longer.” Then I let go of his hand and walked out of the door. Out of the life I’d lived for nearly the past three years.
I shook my head. That part of my life was over now. As the hospital moved out of my rear-view mirror, I brushed a few tears from my eyes, and then straightened. This was it. I was finally getting away. I’d given so much to Kasper, and it had never been enough. I hadn’t been able to vanquish his demons. To help him move beyond the role assigned to him by his family. To allow him to be all that he wanted to be.
He wasn’t able to do any of that, and it wasn’t my place to try to fix him, or anything else, any longer. I was done with projects. After this, the only project I was taking on was me. Even though I didn’t know what the hell I needed to do for me, I was going to be the only thing I focused on.
I hoped that I was making the right decision. And to help me make sure I kept thinking I was making the right decision, I was going to the one place where I knew that I’d be able to have a soft landing. At least, I hoped I’d be able to have a soft landing. I hadn’t been there in nearly six years, mostly because I’d been with less than desirable boyfriends. But now, I was on my own.
So I was going home.
Home to Paulson, Montana. The smallest little town in Montana that wasn’t so small. We had a Cherry Festival. Tourists came to have fun at the lake. There was fishing and water skiing, and hunting. It had it all—so to speak. Outside of being in the northern part of Montana, and basically the middle of nowhere.
But what it didn’t have was project men. I knew all the men. I’d grown up there. None of them would be interested in me, little Taylor Claiborne. Nope. Not one. And my family would be on my ass in such a way that even if one got the nerve, they’d scare the shit out of him.
I came from a family of very strong women. I wished I was as strong, but by going home, facing their censure? Disappointment? Would let me try to stop this shitty, self-destructive pattern. Because I’d used up all that I had in packing up my stuff and leaving Kasper and his family.
The thought of the shit fit his mother was going to throw when she came back and I wasn’t there, when she realized that I wouldn’t be there again—it made me shudder. She was one scary woman. Part of me had sympathy for Kasper with that kind of mom, but that sort of thinking was what allowed me to make excuses for him for the past year and a half.
I sang to the radio as I drove, and when I wasn’t singing, I thought about what I was going to say to my mom. My sister. Jesus. I didn’t know which one would be worse. At least it was only the two of them. Granny was gone—she’d passed away when Kasper was having a rough period. Oh, hell. All of Kasper’s periods were rough. On me. When my sister had called, Kasper had told her I was busy, and I’d never been able to call her back.
He didn’t hit me, or restrain me.
He cried. He would sit in our living room and cry.
And I fell for it, every single time. When Granny died four months ago, he’d promised he was quitting. It was a lie, even as he agreed to quit since I was willing to stay with him. That’s when I’d walked out and run into Karl. I’d told him everything. Karl had left and then showed up a week ago. I hadn’t heard from him, or any of the family, even Margaret, until he walked through the door last week. What the hell he was doing before that was beyond me, but whatever. He went through the house and found all of Kasper’s drugs. Emptied out all the bottles of booze and took them all away. Kasper was going ballistic, but Karl was a lot bigger, so he didn’t go after him. I was surprised.
After Karl left, Kasper sat quie
tly in his chair in the living room, his hands on his knees. I sat on the couch, tucked into the corner and not saying anything. Kasper got up and stalked out without saying anything. I was shaking when he left, and that’s when I began packing. I had a Suburban, and I started to load it up with my things. I didn’t know what he planned to do, but the sense of danger to me was something I couldn’t ignore. I didn’t want to ignore it anymore. Even as I cried while I packed.
Probably because I knew that I’d been lucky that Kasper had been so focused on his drugs, and not me. I was no more than the chair in the living room to him. Easily ignored, and easy for him to take his anger out on. That realization had nearly knocked me on my ass. All the things my family had said to me finally hit—and I knew I had to leave. No matter how painful it was.
Now, as I crossed the state line into Montana from Wyoming, I wondered if I still loved him. I didn’t think so. I felt… obligation. Which was reinforced not only by Kasper, but his mother. Somehow, even though I tried to encourage things that weren’t drinking or drug related, as I tried to be entertaining, and cook, and keep him clean, it was my fault that he’d gone out and gotten drugs. That the doctors had no idea what he’d taken, but he’d come into the hospital reeking of alcohol. Kasper hadn’t been awake or responsive since he’d been brought in. I hadn’t seen him since he’d walked out the door.
I didn’t know until Margaret called me and told me to come in. I told her I had to work, and that I’d be there as soon as I could. I wasn’t working, but I finished packing. I drove to my job, a small Greek family restaurant near the mall, and told them I was leaving. Davina, one of the owners, burst into tears as she hugged me and told me to get the hell out of there. They’d seen enough of the mess that was the Taylor and Kasper show.