by Stacy Gail
“What’s wrong?” Des said the moment Killian slid out of the truck, looking about as welcoming as a rabid wolf that hadn’t bitten something in days. “Why are you here?”
“Hello to you, too.” Pocketing the truck’s keys, Killian slowly headed toward him. Easy, non-threatening. When in doubt, handle him with kid gloves. “Beautiful day, yeah? So far this summer hasn’t been too hellish, heat-wise.”
“The weather?” Des’s face, so similar to his in structure, with prominent cheekbones and a squared-off jaw that looked like it had been carved out of granite, tightened into a scowl. “You’re seriously talking about the fucking weather?”
Damn. Swing and a miss for him. “It’s called being polite. You’ve heard of it, yeah?”
Des folded his arms and took a stance that would have been intimidating six months ago. But he’d lost a shocking amount of weight since a bull had gored him, and he was much more angular now. “Jesus, you’ve got some balls, preaching to me about being polite when someone unwanted shows up on the doorstep.”
Here we go. “Why do you say that? Because I was a big ol’ meanie back when I was an idiot kid and didn’t know any better?”
“Mean?” Des fairly snarled the word. “You were a fucking asshole.”
“Guilty as charged, with no excuses.” He nodded, not shying away from it. Anything less would have been cowardly. “And just to be clear, you’re saying you remember what happened back then, yeah?”
The scorn in Des’s eyes should have left blisters. “As if all the shit you threw my way is something I’d ever forget.”
“Then I have no fucking clue what that says about you and the man you are, Des. But I’ve gotta think it’s nothing good.”
Rage poured into Des’s peridot eyes, and he uncrossed his arms while taking a threatening step closer. “What the hell do you mean by that, asshole?”
Nice. “I mean you don’t break a sweat holding a grudge, remembering all that negative bullshit that hasn’t existed in me for well over a decade and a half. But you refuse to acknowledge a sister who loves you so much, she has screaming nightmares about the moment you were ripped out of her arms. A sister who still loves you so much she’s happy to surrender a living part of herself to you so that you can live a healthy life.”
“Don’t make it sound like a Hallmark card commercial. The only reason she’s here is because you dragged her back to Bitterthorn.”
“Wrong. Sure, I forced Dallas to come home with me, but the fact is she was already on her way. And guess what, genius? She’s still here, even though she now has a car, a phone, the internet, and no babysitter to make sure she stays put. She’s here because she wants to be here.” Though he’d screwed that up so royally she was ready to hightail it out of there without a backward glance. “If you can understand that, yet still feel nothing but bitterness and resentment, then there’s nothing left to be said. If that’s the man you really are, then I don’t want Dallas to cross your path. I wouldn’t want her to see the black-hearted dick her much-adored baby brother grew up to be.”
“Go to hell.”
As far as Killian could tell, he was already on his way. “I’m just saying that Dallas has had enough disappointment in her life already without you adding to it. From what little she’s told me about herself, the world hasn’t been kind to her, Des. But at least I can spare her from discovering that the brother she remembers so fondly doesn’t give a shit about her.”
A muscle worked hard in Des’s jaw as he regarded Killian for a good ten seconds. “What do you want?”
Finally. “May I come in?”
For a heartbeat, Killian thought his brother would let the bitterness win. Then he jerked his head toward the front door in grudging invitation before leading the way through it.
“Damn.” Killian looked around in admiration. A soaring two-story ceiling and a wall of glass looked out onto a starkly beautiful panoramic view of Lone Sentinel Butte and the Nueces river hugging its base. The ceiling line was sharply slanted, with massive beams of mellow, polished wood and industrial-style pendant lights hanging uniformly throughout the living space. There was no formal living room, dining room or kitchen, but one great room that held all three, with the view as the focal point in the almost cathedral-like setting. “You missed your calling. This place should be on the cover of magazines.”
“Let me guess. You’re saying now that I got myself gored and I’m nothing but a piss-poor has-been in the world of rodeo, I should take up another hobby, like interior decorating.”
Killian sighed and turned his attention to Des, who’d walked to the open kitchen area, opened the fridge and got out a couple bottles of beer. “Will you get your head out of your ass long enough to notice I’m not attacking you? I love your place. It’s beautiful and you should be proud of it. It sucks that you’ve lived here for five years and I’ve never been allowed to see the inside of your home until now, but I’m not going to complain. I’m just grateful to be here, and I’d appreciate it if you’d wake the fuck up to that fact. I haven’t been your enemy since I was a kid.”
“Hm.” With that noncommittal sound, Des twisted the caps off the bottles of beer and handed him one. “Did you really kidnap Dallas, or was Fin yanking my chain?”
Shit. “Kidnap is such an ugly word.”
“Did you?”
“I’d like to think I didn’t kidnap her. I just don’t know what else to call the actions of physically picking her up in a parking lot, throwing her into my truck, and driving her to Bitterthorn while she fought me tooth and nail. Maybe we can call it escorting her to the ranch with profound authority.”
“Yeah. No.” With a reluctant almost-smile, Des sank into a chair facing the panoramic view and took a swig. “That’s kidnapping, plain and simple. Fin said she dislocated your thumb?”
“And loosened my front tooth. I deserved it.”
“Damn right you did.”
Killian nodded at the bottle in his brother’s hand while taking a seat on the couch. “Should you be drinking alcohol?”
“Beer doesn’t count as alcohol.”
“I’ll bet your doc would disagree with you on that.”
“Thanks for the concern, Mom, but we’re not talking about me now. We’re talking about what the hell possessed you to kidnap a woman in broad daylight.”
Killian shrugged. “I was freaking out at the time. Doc said you were on your way out if we couldn’t find you a compatible liver, so I went and got you a compatible liver. End of story.”
Des’s peridot eyes, so like Dallas’s, narrowed. “You’re saying you entered a life of crime to save me.”
“I’m your oldest brother, dumbass. That’s what big brothers do.”
“Hm.”
Killian rolled his eyes. Again with the skeptical grunt. “Dallas is that way, too. She’s your big sister, and she sees it as her duty to look after you. If you’d let her see you, you could show her that she doesn’t have to worry herself sick about you. And while you’re at it, you could also tell her that you’re not mad at her.”
Shock rolled across Des’s lean face. “Mad at her? Why the hell would I be mad at her?”
“For years she’s held herself responsible for the dissolution of your first family.” Shaking his head, Killian took a sip of his beer. Mm. His brother had good taste. “I know it’s nuts, but that trauma cut Dallas in a way that not even all this time has been able to heal. When you were little and she was holding on to you, she thought that if she just kept you with her, she could somehow keep the whole family together. Then her old man smacked her in the face and yanked you out of her arms. If you could tell her that it wasn’t her fault, and that she was one hell of a gutsy eight-year-old trying to hold your universe together by holding on to you, I’d really appreciate it.”
“I couldn’t breathe, she held me so tight,” Des said, his tone as distant as his gaze before he zeroed in on him with a stare hard enough to slice. “Why do you care about how she feels? T
ouchy-feely shit has never been your thing.”
“It is when it comes to Dallas.” He felt almost as surprised as Des looked when those words came out of his mouth, but there was no taking them back. He didn’t want to, even if he could.
Very slowly, Des moved out of his comfortably boneless slouch to sit, ramrod straight, on the edge of his chair. “Do you want to run that by me again?”
“Not especially, but since you’re her half-brother and the only official family she’s got left in the world, I guess you’ve got a right to know what the hell’s going on.”
He paused so long Des’s black brows rose nearly to his widow’s peak. “What exactly is going on, Kill?”
“Dallas might look like the image of her mother, but she’s nothing like her. Dallas is...different.”
“In what way?”
“By all accounts, Delphine was sophisticated, charming—the kind of femme fatale that Dad obviously had a weakness for. But Dallas is anything but. She’s rough around the edges. She can cuss like a sailor if the situation calls for it, and she could give lessons to porcupines on how to be prickly. It’s clear she’s used to taking care of herself in a way that makes me think no one took care of her after the you two were split up. I think she did the best she could to raise herself all on her own.”
“No one took care of her?” If Des squinted any harder, his eyes would close. “What the hell makes you say that? She had her parents.”
“She’s been working like a dog ever since she could legally hold down a job. She graduated high school but never went to college, so I’m thinking that since she mentioned growing up in foster care, she didn’t have anyone to help her with tuition, like we did. And when she gets into trouble—like some guy getting fresh with her—she doesn’t look to anyone for help like a normal person. It’s like it doesn’t even occur to her that someone would care enough to help her. She just goes about the business of taking care of those assholes all by herself, then gets salty if you try giving her a hand.”
Des’s brows slammed together. “Wait, back up a second. Foster care? What the fuck do you mean by foster care? Dallas had parents who wanted to keep her. I was the one they couldn’t wait to get rid of.”
And there it was, the festering wound hiding in Des that no one ever got to see. “That situation was fucked up, no two ways about it, man. The Faircloths... They were lucky to be blessed with two little kids, but they obviously didn’t know shit about being good people, much less good parents to you and Dallas. I know what happened to you was a nightmare. Literally that moment in time is still a nightmare for your sister. The thing is, I don’t know what happened to her after you two were separated. All I know is that she’s mentioned foster care, she works herself to the bone by taking any job she can get her hands on, and her first foster father was such a perv she took to changing clothes in closets in order to feel safe.”
Something terrible exploded in Des’s eyes, and it took him a while to unlock his clenched jaw. “Fuck. Jesus... fuck. Who was that guy?”
“I don’t know.” But he would find out. When he did, there would be hell to pay, though Dallas would never know about it. “Here’s the thing, Des. I know I was a prick to you when you first showed up here. I’ll regret that for the rest of my life, I shit you not. I’m grateful you had Fin and Ry who loved you right from the start, and while it took me a little longer to get my head screwed on straight, it wasn’t long before I loved you, too.”
“Yeah, sure,” Des snorted, seemingly unable to stop himself.
Geez, little brothers and the chips on their shoulders... “But as far as I can tell, Dallas has never had anyone she could depend on. Until now.”
Des was silent for a long moment. “Are you talking about yourself?”
“I am.” Killian nodded, keeping his eyes on his, just in case his brother thought he might be playing. The one damn thing he hadn’t come here to do was play. “Who else does she have? Just today she told me she’s finally given up the hope that you’d ever want to have her in your life, but that’s okay. I can look after Dallas as well or better than anyone. I just thought you should at least be the first to hear about it. And I was serious about you dropping by to let her know you don’t blame her for that terrible moment when she was forced to let you go. If I could climb into her head and battle her night terrors for her, I’d do it in a hot second. Since I can’t, you’re the only thing I can think of that might be able to help her find some peace.” Draining the beer, he tipped the bottle toward his brother before pushing to his feet. “Thanks for the beer.”
Des surged to his feet. “Stay away from Dallas.”
Killian slow-blinked before putting the empty bottle on a nearby table. Something told him he might need the use of both hands real soon. “Why?”
“Are you fucking serious? She’s my sister.”
“She’s not my sister.” Good thing, too.
Again the muscles worked in Des’s jaw as he ground his teeth. “I don’t want you to hurt her.”
Too late. “Des, what do you think you’ve been doing for the past two months? But if you’re serious about not having Dallas hurt,” he went on while Des grappled with that, “do what a good brother should do, and go say hello. Show her that she was wrong to lose faith in you. And for God’s sake, let that woman off the hook for that night you were separated. I’ll see myself out.”
Chapter Eleven
“Thank you for calling Green Rock Ranch. How may I help you?” Dallas was just getting ready to jot down a name when a knock sounded on the wooden framework of the converted office’s open archway. Automatically she glanced up, then forgot how to breathe when her gaze slammed into Killian’s intense green eyes.
I’ve decided...
She stared as Killian slowly approached, all the while frantically trying to figure out the wild fluttering in her stomach that his mere presence caused. Was it anxiety? Nervousness? Anticipation?
The only logical solution...
It had been more then twenty-four hours since he’d said he was going to try to open a door for her and Des, but so far there had been no sign of her little brother. At this point there didn’t seem to be any rock-solid reason for her to stay at the ranch, yet here she was working her new job like nothing had happened.
To this mess...
She told herself she was staying on because Des might want to reconnect, but that was a lie that had pretty much run itself into the ground. Deep down she knew the reason why she hadn’t run for the hills.
After all, that reason was currently staring at her as if he’d never seen a woman before.
Is to seduce the fuck out of you.
She had to be out of her mind.
Belatedly she realized someone was talking in her ear. “Ah... sorry. Yes, hello, Mr. Delacourt. Delacourt Farms, yes. Of course.” At the name, Killian made a face like he smelled something bad. Then he moved around the desk to where she sat, plucking up a pen from a cup on her desk as he went. “How may I help you today?”
Killian leaned over her shoulder. The head-spinning scents of soap, fabric softener and red-blooded male flooded her senses, and it took her a moment to realize he’d begun to write on a notepad.
“Yes, Mr. Delacourt, I believe we still have a few A.I. straws from our Black Angus bull, Magnus, still available. However, we have been extremely busy this breeding season, so I’ll have to check. Just as a precaution while I review our inventory, do you want to think about an alternative choice?”
The hard wall of Killian’s chest brushed her shoulder, and his face came within inches of hers as he put an exclamation point on what he wrote.
Delacourt owes us money!
Dallas bit her lip. Every nerve closest to him threw a wild party, to the point where it was a wonder he didn’t hear it. “Aha. Let me just call up our inventory to see how best Green Rock Ranch can accommodate your needs. One moment, please.” Gamely she tried to focus on work, instead of how delicate he made her feel with his
huge body leaning over her. If she could just remember what she was supposed to do...
Oh, yes. Now she remembered.
Accounts.
Click.
Clients.
Click.
Delacourt. Delacourt...
“You smell good, Spice.” Killian bent to rest his mouth to the ear not covered by a phone, his warm breath tickling her until she shivered. “You always smell so damn good. Better than any dream I ever thought to dream.”
“Um...” What was she doing? How was she supposed to concentrate on her job when her panties were melting?
Killian dropped the pen. With her hand frozen on the computer’s mouse, he reached over, rested his hand on hers, positioned the cursor where it needed to go, and laid his index finger on top of hers.
Click.
“Ah. Okay.” With her brain glitching big-time and her heart trying to jackhammer its way out of her chest, she desperately tried to read what was on the screen in front of her. “We would be happy to fill your order, Mr. Delacourt, but unfortunately someone in your office neglected to pay for the last products Delacourt Farms bought from us. Not your fault, of course, but it is Green Rock’s policy to have all delinquent accounts paid up before filling new orders. Would you like to pay that outstanding bill now? That way we can ship your new artificial insemination straws out to you right away. After all, you know better than anyone that a cow going into estrus isn’t going to wait.”
“Very nice,” Killian said approvingly when she finally hung up. He had moved to perch on the side of her desk, still distractingly close as she wrapped up the order. “Bartholomew Delacourt is a millionaire several times over, but damn, does he hate letting go of a penny. Getting him to cough up the dough upfront was pure gold.”
She edged out of her chair on the excuse of pouring herself a cup of coffee from a machine placed on a credenza off to one side. “It’s a new policy I just invented—pay now, or fuck off.”
“That’s a good policy.”