by JoAnn Ross
“How about a beer?” he asked.
“I wouldn’t turn one down,” Cooper said.
They rode the short distance to the log cabin where Sawyer had spent the past two nights.
“This is where you’re going to be living?” Cooper asked as he walked into the front combo kitchen/living area, which, except for a stove, a harvest-gold fridge dating back to the ’70s, and two barstools at a kitchen peninsula, was as empty as it had been when Austin had shown it to Sawyer.
“That’s the plan.” Sawyer went over to the fridge and pulled out three beers.
Ryan unscrewed the lid on the brown bottle. “Have you happened to notice that it doesn’t have any furniture?”
Sawyer shrugged. “It’s all I need.”
Cooper glanced toward the hallway leading to three bedrooms and a bath. “What are you doing for a bed?”
“I have my bedroll.”
“So,” Ryan said, “you’re camping out.”
“It’s not like I plan to spend a lot of time here,” Sawyer said. And yes, that was defensiveness he heard in his voice. Sometimes it sucked being the youngest brother, always feeling that you had to measure up.
“If you’re not going to accept Dad’s offer to take some of the extra furniture from the ranch, you could at least nab some stuff on craigslist. Like maybe a table, a couch, and hey, go a little wild and get a bed.”
“I don’t plan to be doing a lot of entertaining.”
“What about Austin?” Ryan asked.
“What about her?”
“Ry’s being subtle,” Cooper said. “Which is how doctors tend to talk. Being a cop myself, I’ll cut to the chase. What do you intend to do about her?”
“I intend to pay her rent for the use of her land and hopefully, if she’ll let me, do some of the work that’s been dumped on her since Buck’s polio came back.”
“Yeah, that polio thing sucks,” Cooper said. “Dad wanted to send over some of the men from the Bar M, but Buck’s damn pride got in the way and he turned him down.”
“Which only dumped more on Austin.” It also explained the shadows of fatigue beneath her eyes. “How is he?” Sawyer asked Ryan. “Really?”
“It varies day to day. Although we’re still learning about post-polio syndrome, evidence is pointing toward the cause being degenerating nerve cells. When poliovirus infects your body, it damages or destroys motor neurons carrying electrical impulses between your brain and muscles.
“To compensate, the remaining neurons sprout new fibers, which promotes the use of your muscles again but also puts added stress on the nerve cell to nourish more fibers. Over the years, the stress can be more than the neuron can handle, leading to gradual deterioration. Also, if you regularly perform physical activity to the point of fatigue—”
“Like any rancher does every damn day,” Sawyer said.
“Exactly. Overworking already stressed-out neurons can increase the risk of PPS.”
“Can he build the muscles back up with exercise?” Back in high school, Sawyer had broken his lower leg being thrown off a bucking horse. After the cast had come off, he’d been forced through weeks of flexibility and strength rehabilitation therapy.
“That works in a lot of cases, but PPS patients are advised to pace their physical activity, combining it with frequent rest periods to avoid fatigue. Moderation is the key. Overdoing on a good day can lead to subsequent bad days.”
“That’s got to be hard on a guy who was as tough as those bulls he breeds.”
“His ego took as hard a hit as his body,” Ryan agreed.
“Maybe even more,” Cooper said. “He used to always show up for breakfast at the New Chance. But I haven’t seen him in town since Austin dragged him out for the Christmas tree lighting and caroling.”
“Since he’s as stubborn as those bulls he breeds and refuses to listen to me, I’m sending Layla over to have a come-to-Jesus talk with him,” Ryan said. “See if she can convince him to at least get a wheelchair or one of those scooters so he can get out and about again.”
“Good plan,” Cooper agreed. “I don’t know many folks, especially men, Layla can’t wrap around her little finger.” He took off his black Stetson and sent it sailing across the room at a steer horn hook rack next to the kitchen door. Conversation paused as all three brothers watched it land exactly on point.
“Show-off.” Sawyer knew his brother had started practicing that back in elementary school as a way to show off for Ellen Buchanan, who’d lived on the ranch on the other side of the Bar M. The ironic thing was that, as impressive as the skill might be, everyone had known Cooper Murphy didn’t need tricks to catch Ellen’s eye. The two were practically joined at the hip all their lives. Until the plane she’d taken home from visiting a friend in Denver had gone off course during a blizzard and flown into Modoc Mountain.
“I can teach you how to do it,” Cooper said. “In case you want to impress your woman.”
“She’s not my woman.”
“Hell. She’s been your woman since before she became a woman. Same as Ellen and I were.”
“You’re so sure of that.” Okay, once again he’d come off sounding defensive, making his brother’s damn point.
“Sure am. I’ve watched you making calf eyes at the girl since you were wearing Pampers pull-ups and riding that wooden rocking horse Gramps made you.” He pointed the neck of the bottle at Sawyer. “Nothing cuter than puppy love.”
Sawyer shot him a middle finger before taking a long pull on his own bottle. “It’s complicated.”
“Women are complicated.”
“You sure as hell aren’t going to get any argument there.”
“You do realize Rachel’s going to ask me what this place looks like when I get home,” Cooper said. Then held up a hand as Sawyer opened his mouth to answer. “And I’m not going to lie for you, little bro. This isn’t like when you filched that Copenhagen from the mercantile when you were eight, swallowed too much like a damn fool, and when you spent the night barfing your guts out, I lied and told Mom you’d gotten a bad hot dog at the fair.”
“Just tell Rachel it looks fine.” Looking around with a more judicial eye, there might be a layer of dust on the windowsills and plank wood floor, but after two tours in Afghanistan and another in Iraq, if there was one thing he’d grown used to, it was dust.
“She’ll know. Among their many superpowers, women have this eerie radar that failed to evolve in us mere mortal males. Back when I was working the rough streets, putting bad guys away in Portland, I really could have used Rachel’s powers during interrogations.”
“The women are going to show up here,” Ryan warned. “Layla was talking about your moving in yesterday. It’s not going to take long for her to drop in and check up on you.”
“Check up on me? Why? I’m a grown man.” He’d been to war. And, unlike too many others, had managed to make it home.
“It’s what women do,” Cooper explained patiently, as if he were talking to a five-year-old and not a battle-toughened Marine. “You may see this as just some place to crash for a few hours before getting back to work. I get that. But they make nests. It’s in their DNA. Between Mitzi and now Rachel, our place is starting to put Scott and me at risk for estrogen poisoning.”
While he was no fan of the sofa pillows strewn over Cooper’s leather couch and chairs, Sawyer knew that to be an exaggeration. What the women had done was turn his brother’s log bachelor’s house back into a home. That certain feeling that had been missing since Ellen’s passing.
“You might want to at least get a bed,” Ryan suggested. “For when you get laid.”
“I don’t want to get laid.”
“Said no guy ever,” Cooper returned.
“I don’t want to screw things up.”
“Seems you already did that,” Ryan said. “Back when you wrote her that numb-nuts email telling her that you weren’t interested in tumbling her in the hayloft.”
“I didn’t say that,�
�� Sawyer mumbled as a vision of Austin lying in a bed of hay—her pink lips curved in a come-and-ride-me-cowboy smile—rolled across the flat-screen in his mind.
“It’s obviously the message she got. Why else would she marry that loser so soon after tangling tonsils at the hospital with you?”
Sawyer shot him a searing look. “How the hell do you know about that kiss?”
“Next time, if you’re inclined to indulge in some PDA, you might want to make sure you’re not doing it right outside the bistro where Rachel was picking up some boxed sandwiches for the family back in the heart center waiting room.”
“Shit.” Sawyer scrubbed his hands down his face. “Who else knows?”
“Rachel told me because couples share stuff,” Cooper said. “Heather probably knows, because they’ve been BFFs forever and women tell their girlfriends everything. But since neither woman would do anything to hurt Austin, I’d say that’s probably it. Oh, and Ry, since I told him about it so we could double-team you and set you straight. But then Austin up and eloped before we came up with a plan we figured you might listen to.”
“I didn’t tell a soul,” Ryan assured him. “Not even Layla, who was as surprised as the rest of us at the effed-up way things played out between the two of you.”
“Well, that’s something. Austin’s got enough on her plate without having to worry about being embarrassed every time she goes into town.”
“You know,” Ryan said, “getting back to the topic of your love life—”
“Or lack of it,” Cooper interjected.
“You could always cook her dinner,” Ryan continued his thought. “Women like that.”
“Says the man who, from what I can tell, hasn’t managed to lasso a female of his own.”
“I’ve been a little busy going to medical school and, like you, serving in the military to pay off my ROTC debt,” his brother, the most easygoing of the three of them, said mildly. “Plus, I’m particular.”
“So, Mr. Particular, even if I were interested in making a move, which I’m not saying I am, what the hell would you suggest? Should I nuke her a Hungry Man frozen dinner or pop open an MRE? Because, along with calling out for pizza delivery, which I can’t do because River’s Bend doesn’t even have a pizza joint, those are the levels of my kitchen skills.”
“It’s a damn pitiful thing when a man can’t feed himself,” Cooper said.
“Not that you have to worry about where your next meal is coming from because you just happen to be living with a New York Culinary Institute trained chef.”
Cooper shot out his jaw. “I wasn’t exactly starving before Rachel came to town. I can make stuff.”
“How about taking her out?” Ryan tried again, obviously wanting to soothe the waters before fists started flying. As the middle Murphy, Ryan had always been a bridge between the occasionally troubled waters of Cooper’s oldest-brother bossiness and Sawyer’s youngest rebellion.
“Great idea. To the New Chance? Which, in case you’ve forgotten and unless you’re talking peanuts and wings at the Shady Lady, is the only place to eat in town.”
“Excuse me?” Cooper folded arms that were all muscle and sinew and could undoubtedly still wrestle a steer to the ground without him so much as breaking a sweat. His dark brows dove down toward his nose. “Are you suggesting that you have a problem with my woman’s cooking?”
“Hell, no.” Cooper didn’t rile easily, but on the rare occasion he did, the wisest tactic to take was to back away. “From what she dished up for the party, it’s a freaking miracle that she decided to settle down in a cow town like this instead of making a name for herself in New York or Vegas or L.A. Or maybe even being one of those TV chefs. She’s sure pretty enough.”
“And yet she chose me over the big city, flashy lights, and television fame.”
“Yet another miracle.”
Sawyer was happy for his brother, who seemed to have hit the woman jackpot not just once but twice. But that didn’t mean he was in the market for a wife.
All he wanted was to be left alone.
5
AUSTIN WAS OUT in the corral, working on getting a yearling to come to her, rather than her chasing him. Last year, when he’d been a colt, she’d put in the groundwork getting him used to humans by touching him, lifting his feet, having people move in and out of the pen with him. Now she needed to build his trust and make him want her attention rather than just hanging out with his herd.
She’d bred him as a future cattle horse for the Flying Goose, who’d be putting him to work next year. Meanwhile, she was teaching him how to be a working horse and, as a prey animal with a strong flight response, how to deal with stressors. Which would be vital in keeping not just him safe and happy but the herd he’d be joining happy, as well. A disruptive horse was an unhappy horse, which no one, especially Austin, wanted.
Building up to saddle training next year would take time and patience. But when things were going well, as they were this morning, allowing her to get in a zone, it was almost as good as the meditation Rachel had taught her to do during the stressful ending days of her marriage.
As she let the horse trot awhile around the corral, Austin’s gaze drifted to the far pasture, where cattle grazed. As she watched, two SUVs drove down the dusty road from what was now Sawyer’s cabin. She recognized them as belonging to his brothers, who’d obviously shown up to help him move the stock from the Bar M.
Although the Merrills had built their reputation as stock breeders and she had no plans to enter the increasingly competitive beef business, the sight of the cows and calves proved surprisingly pleasing. Perhaps, Austin admitted, because they were Sawyer’s cows. Just seeing them was an indication that possibly she’d been wrong about having destroyed their relationship when she’d married Jace. Maybe Heather was right. Perhaps there was some way forward for them. But first they’d have to talk about the past.
Going back to the future.
She was pondering yet again how to best attempt that when the colt stopped in front of her, nudging her, trying to regain her attention.
“Good boy,” she said absently, running her palm down the front of his blaze face. “You’re such a baby.”
He’d always been needy for human attention, which put him ahead of others she’d worked with over the years. And while he was easy to spoil, the trick would be teaching him responsibility. Fortunately, he came from a long line of cattle horses, so herding—which was what he was doing right now, pushing against her, trying to move her where he wanted her to be—was in his blood. Even if he didn’t know it yet.
“You may not realize it, but you’re going to do Green Springs proud when you go off to your new home,” she told him. The ranch’s reputation was only as good as its next horse, and so far, over several generations, it had risen, thanks to diligent breeding and records that went back to her great-great-grandfather.
After returning the yearling to the herd, she’d just gone over to a small paddock next to the corral when a sunny yellow minivan drove up the gravel road, kicking up dust behind it. It pulled up in front of the barn, the doors opened, and two children jumped out, racing toward her, their mother following behind.
“Buttermilk had her baby!” Seven-year-old Jack Campbell scrambled up on the paddock fence, leaning so far over Austin had a momentary fear he’d go flying right over it.
“She’s pretty.” Sophie Campbell grabbed her younger brother by the back of his jeans. Being five years older, Sophie had always acted as a junior mother to her active brother.
“He is, isn’t he?” Austin ran her hand down the foal’s mane.
“What’s his name?” Jack asked.
“He doesn’t have one yet,” Austin said.
“I know!” Jack wiggled free of his sister’s hold and began jumping up and down. “You should name him Zombie Butt!”
“And we should rename you Idiot Child,” Sophie shot back.
“Though Zombie Butt would definitely be an original nam
e,” Austin said, fighting back the smile that was trying to get free.
“That B-word has become the word of the day. And yesterday. And for the past month before that,” Heather said. “I totally blame Santa for bringing him that copy of The Day My Butt Went Psycho.” She ruffled her son’s red head. “That was followed by Zombie Butts from Uranus.”
“Which he’s not allowed to say out loud.” Sophie scowled a warning at her brother, who’d just opened his mouth to blurt it out.
Austin ran the forbidden word through her head, separating the first two letters of the planet’s name from the last four—Ur-Anus—as a young boy might relish saying. Laughing when she figured it out, she glanced over at Heather, who merely rolled her eyes with maternal patience.
“I’ll bet, when we were talking about you wanting a large family while growing up, you never factored in butt books.”
“No,” Heather said emphatically. “I was thinking more along the lines of Dr. Seuss, Where the Wild Things Are, and fairy tales.”
“Yuck.” Jack’s freckled face wrinkled up as he stuck his finger in his mouth and made gagging sounds. “Fairy tales are for girls. I like the wild things book,” he allowed. “But I’m too old for it now.” He started to climb on the fence again. “Can I ride him?”
“He’s still too young for riders,” Austin said. “He’s not even a week old. But if you’re very gentle and quiet, you can pat him.” Austin turned toward Sophie. “You, too, if you’d like.”
“Be careful,” Heather warned. “He’s just a baby and you don’t want to upset his mother.”
“I’ll be super careful!” Jack promised.
“And quiet,” Austin repeated.
The seven-year-old made a zipping motion against his lips, then threw away an imaginary key before scrambling over the rails to the other side. Sophie followed with much more decorum.