Long Road Home

by JoAnn Ross

  “I never got to say good-bye to my house.” A challenging defensiveness surrounded her like an electric barbed-wire fence.

  “We should have thought of that,” he admitted. “Maybe Austin thought it would be better if we waited until the remodel was done.”

  “Then it wouldn’t be my house,” she said. “It’d be someone else’s.”

  “Good point.” He put an arm around her shoulder, encouraged when she didn’t pull away until he remembered what Austin said about her crushing on him. Which, since he must seem really old to her, he doubted was possible, but just in case, he eased away a bit.

  “Hey, Sophie,” Brody said as she made a beeline for the kitchen. “It’s good to see you. I’m really sorry about your mom and dad.”

  “Yeah. So am I,” she said with acid teen sarcasm. Not that she was a teen yet. Sawyer wondered if all the horror stories he’d heard married guys on deployment talking about were even halfway true. She ran a hand over the countertop, just as Brody had done. “You didn’t do the butcher block.”

  Sawyer saw fear in the look Brody shot him. “Uh, no. But—”

  “This is the color Mom wanted for the table.”

  “Yeah. That’s why I picked it.”

  “I have this friend. Madison. Her mom wants to redo their kitchen, and she has all these Pinterest inspiration pictures. She says quartz is really trending.”

  “So I was told,” Brody said carefully. “Which is why I thought it might be a good idea.”

  She pulled open a cabinet drawer beneath the hunter-green counter. Let go of it and watched it slide closed again. “Because we have to sell the house.”

  “Because you’re going to be living with Austin at the ranch,” Sawyer reminded her.

  “Why can’t she move in here with us when it’s done?”

  “I guess because she has to take care of her dad. And the stock.”

  “Maybe.” She didn’t sound convinced. Or at all happy. “I’m going to go upstairs.”

  “Take your time,” Sawyer said. He decided she probably didn’t want his company. Damn, this was one of those cases where he knew a woman would be better suited to handle it. Speaking of women, a thought belatedly occurred to him. “Does Rachel know you’re here?”

  Before she could answer, his phone rang. With Rachel’s photo on the screen.

  “Hey, Rach,” he said as Sophie made a quick exit toward the stairs.

  “Have you seen Sophie? I called Austin, but she’s on the way to Medford to pick up Lexi.”

  “She’s here. At the house. Her old house,” he qualified.

  “Thank God. I was worried sick. I don’t know how she sneaked out without me seeing her. It must have been when Jack broke the window.”

  “He broke a window?”

  “Well, cracked it. He and Scott were playing catch with a baseball in the backyard. For a skinny little guy, he’s got a really strong arm. Unfortunately, he needs to work on his control.”

  Thinking back on the boy getting stuck in the apple tree, Sawyer concurred. “Don’t worry about her,” he said. “I’ll drop by, pick up Jack, and take the kids to the ranch. See if we can work off some of that energy.”

  “Good luck with that.”

  Rachel had no sooner ended the call than Sophie returned to the room with a pink backpack filled with stuff that Austin must have missed. “I’m done.”

  “Okay. So, the plan is that we’ll pick up your brother, then go out to the ranch. I was thinking maybe we’d drown some worms.”

  “I hate fishing. It’s cruel to animals.” She shot him a glare that told him that, in her mind, he’d just suggested drowning kittens.

  “Fine. You got a book in that bag?”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “So you can read it while Jack and I fish.” He paused a moment, wondering if he’d get in trouble for what had just flashed into his mind, then decided to go for it. “Unless you’d rather bait the hooks. I figured we’d pick up a box of night crawlers at the bait shop.”

  “Ewww.”

  “I take it that would be a no.” He opened the passenger door to the pickup. “Hop in and we’ll go get your brother.”

  “I can’t go to the ranch. My friend is coming over to help me figure out what to wear to the funeral.”

  Sawyer might not have had sisters, but he realized that this was a big effing deal, and once again he wished Austin were here to handle it. “Why don’t you text her to come over to the ranch instead,” he suggested. “Maybe she’d like to go riding after you figure out the dress thing. And Austin will be there with Lexi, who, I remember, is a real fashion expert. She works with showgirls in Vegas now.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.” He was tempted to suggest that hopefully Lexi would also be able to do something with Sophie’s hair, which, and he couldn’t lie, looked pretty much as if it’d been attacked by a chain saw.

  27

  LEXI O’HALLORAN SWEPT through the revolving arrivals door, wearing skinny black jeans, a cheetah-print silk shirt, a wide belt that emphasized her curves, and stiletto pumps so high Austin figured she’d have less chance of breaking her ankle by falling off a horse than trying to walk three steps in those shoes. Over her shoulder was a red purse the size of a small suitcase.

  “You look amazing!” Austin hugged her friend carefully. Wouldn’t tipping Lexi over into that young mother passing by with a toddler in a flimsy-looking folding stroller just add to an already wretched week?

  “Thanks. Other than a dress I found hidden in the back of my closet left over from a misguided attempt to please a former boyfriend’s ultraconservative Palm Springs mother, this is the only dark outfit I own. Black isn’t that popular a color in the desert. Damn.” She shook her head, sending sleek, ombre-tinted hair that went from a deep purple at the roots down to light violet at the tips, swinging across her shoulders. “Would you listen to Shallow Girl, bitching about clothes at a time like this?”

  “Heather would approve,” Austin said. “The two of you had different styles, but you were both always light-years ahead of River’s Bend. I’ve been worried that she’s going to be looking down asking, ‘Why the hell is Austin wearing that to my funeral?’”

  Lexi laughed as they began making their way to the baggage carousel. “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure you pass muster.”

  “I was depending on that.”

  “You aren’t afraid you’ll come off looking like a Vegas showgirl?”

  “Not at all,” Austin said honestly. “I overcame that fear when you didn’t make me look like one of the Kardashians at Heather and Tom’s wedding.”

  “That was a fun time. Everyone was so happy. And Heather glowed like one of those paintings of the Madonna.” Lexi blew out a breath and dabbed at her emerald-green eyes. “I should’ve come home more often. I don’t even know her poor orphaned kids.”

  “You’ll like them. Sophie’s going to be a beauty like her mother, and Jack, well, he’s a pistol. As for not having come home, you’ve been busy. From what I’ve seen, things run at a lot faster pace in Vegas.”

  “Yeah. Including marriages, which, I only wish you’d thought to call me before you staggered into that wedding chapel. I would’ve stood up at that question about objections.”

  “If I could’ve hit the buttons on my phone, I wouldn’t have been in that chapel in the first place.”

  “If there was ever a case for drunk dialing, that was it,” Lexi said. “That’s it,” she said, pointing toward a lipstick-red case the color of her purse that was rumbling toward them. She’d leaned forward when a man wearing jeans, a snap-front plaid shirt, a bolo tie, boots, and a tan Resistol reached in and grabbed it as it passed by.

  “Here you go, ma’am,” he said, placing it between them. “Would you like some help taking it out to your vehicle?”

  “Why, aren’t you sweet?” Lexi batted her lashes. “But it’s not that far, and these four wheels make it easy as pie to roll.”

  Although
his handsome face fell, he didn’t argue. “Well, good.” He nodded and tipped the brim of his hat. “You ladies have yourselves a nice day.”

  Although Austin might be in love with Sawyer, that didn’t stop her from appreciating watching him walk away, his own duffle thrown over his shoulder. On a scale of one to ten, Sawyer topped the list with a gold-star ten. But this cowboy came in at a close eight. Maybe an eight and a half.

  “I’d forgotten how good a cowboy can make a girl feel.” Lexi waved her hand in front of her face. “They don’t make them like that in the desert. At least not my part of it. And speaking of cowboys, how are you and Sawyer?”

  “It’s a long story. I’ll tell you about it on the drive back to River’s Bend.”

  “That bad? Or that good?”

  Despite the reason for Lexi’s trip home, Austin felt the smile lifting her lips. “Better,” she said. Maybe a woman shouldn’t kiss and tell, but she’d been dying to tell Heather about Sawyer. Lexi wasn’t her BFF, but there’d been a time, when Buck used to call them the Three Amigas, that she’d come in a close second.

  “About time,” Lexi said.

  *

  “SO,” RACHEL ASKED while Sophie took her book bag of things she’d taken from the house upstairs to the guest room, “how are you holding up?”

  “I’ve had weeks at an FOB outpost easier than this,” he admitted. “I nearly freaked out when I saw her hair.”

  “It’s radical,” Rachel allowed. “But not surprising, I suppose. If she’s going to cut something, better it be her hair than some other part of her body.”

  “Jesus.” Sawyer was so in over his head here. What he knew about teenage girls went back to his own high school days, which he didn’t want to even think about, since Tom and Heather’s daughter wasn’t that far away from the age of the girls he’d tried, with occasional success, to coax into the back of his pickup bed down by the river. “Girls do that?”

  “Too often, unfortunately. I read an article that suggested close to twenty-five percent of girls self-injure. And not necessarily because they’re depressed, which I have a hard time believing Sophie isn’t, but also because they’re trying to find a sense of self. Something that most of us struggle with during those formative years.”

  Sawyer had a hard time believing Rachel had ever struggled with anything. Then again, she’d been widowed at a young age, lost everything, and after paying off her late husband’s considerable debts, driven her young son all the way across the country to begin a new life, only to arrive to find the café that she’d hoped would be the cornerstone of that new life smoldering from a kitchen fire.

  “I guess the counselor will talk with her about that?”

  “I’m sure she will. Cooper says she’s very good. She’s done wonders with some of the local kids who were hovering on the brink of going down some dangerous, dead-end paths.”

  Something that, although it wasn’t talked about all that much, was just as easy for country kids as those in the big city. Especially when kids were pretty much on their own when it came to entertainment.

  Which, looking back on it, was probably why his dad let him off the hook when it came to ranch chores in order to rodeo. He definitely hadn’t been an angel, but when he was roping and bull riding, he wasn’t out doing stupid stuff like drinking and driving, blowing up mailboxes with fireworks, and shooting up stop signs.

  “That’s good to hear,” he said. “There’s something else I was wondering.”

  “Okay.”

  “If you were a woman . . . well, of course, you are . . . but if you weren’t getting married to my brother and going out with a guy and he was going to make you dinner, would you like a steak and potato? Or is that too much of a man food thing?”

  “In this part of the country, I’d guess the woman would pretty much expect something like that.”

  “Okay. Thanks.” Well, that part of his mission plan might not be as difficult as he’d feared.

  “Of course, women do tend to like green food, too,” she said.

  “You’re talking vegetables.”

  “Or a nice salad.”

  “You can get everything you need in one of those bags at the mercantile.” He hadn’t bought any, but he’d seen the woman in front of him checking out with three different kinds.

  “You can.” Her tone suggested she wouldn’t recommend it.

  “Something wrong with that?”

  “Nothing at all. But it wouldn’t be that hard to trick it out a bit. Make it more personal. And show her you went to some extra effort.”

  “Like how?” he asked just as Jack came crashing down the stairs, Sophie following behind him looking as if she were on the way to the gallows.

  “I’ll email you a few suggestions,” she said. “Nothing difficult, I promise. But it’ll make your evening more special. And I know Austin would appreciate you going to the trouble for her.” She lowered her voice as the kids argued about something as they passed by on their way out to the truck. “Her husband never treated her with any consideration. So, a few mushrooms and tomatoes, a nice bit of cheese, green onions, an easy vinaigrette, along with a decent cab or merlot from Lombardi Vineyards, which I’ve finally convinced the mercantile to carry, would definitely score you points.”

  “You’re a gem.” He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek.

  She patted his. “I’m happy to help. It’s heartwarming, not to mention inspiring, to see some happiness during this very sad time.”

  He wasn’t going to deny his and Austin’s relationship to his brother’s fiancée. “We want to keep it low-key for now. Especially since it might seem inappropriate.”

  “Love’s never inappropriate. But, in this case, I can appreciate your feelings. And your secret’s safe with me.”

  “Thanks.” He glanced out at the truck. “I’d better get going before Jack decides to drive to the ranch himself.”

  Rachel smiled. “You and Austin are going to have your hands full with that one,” she said. “But fortunately, you won’t be alone.”

  Alone. That thought ricocheted around in Sawyer’s mind as he drove back to the ranch. That was exactly what he’d thought he’d wanted when he’d returned home. But that was then. Now, he found himself anticipating arriving at the ranch to find Austin waiting.

  28

  MADISON’S OLDER BROTHER, who dropped out of OIT to tend bar at the Shady Lady, had already dropped the girl off at the ranch house when Sawyer arrived with the kids.

  “Your friend’s upstairs,” Winema told Sophie. “Jack, why don’t you go out to the corral with Buck? He’s got a new rig he’d probably like to show off.”

  “We’re going to drown worms,” Jack said.

  “Then I’ll change the menu to fried fish for dinner.” She made a waving motion with her hand. “Meanwhile, scoot.”

  As the boy raced out the back door, Winema shook her head. “If he were yours, I’d say you were getting what you deserved,” she told Sawyer. “Because he sure does remind me of you at that age.”

  “I was a perfect young gentleman.”

  “You were perfect,” she allowed. “More like a perfect terror.” Then her expression softened. “Except with Austin.”

  Austin had always been Sawyer’s exception. At seven. Twelve. And all the years since.

  “You think Austin can do anything with Sophie’s hair?”

  “Unless it can grow six or eight inches by the funeral, I’d say no.” And didn’t that send his stomach through the heart-of-pine floor? “But I’ll bet my great-grandmother’s cast iron chicken frying skillet that hasn’t seen soap and water in four generations on Lexi Ann being able to put the girl together.”

  Lexi O’Halloran had always been ahead of the fashion curve. Sawyer remembered more than one occasion when she’d been sent home from school after an admonition from the principal that “River’s Bend isn’t ready for that.” Although he didn’t know two hoots about fashion, he’d often thought that if Sexy Lexi, as
the guys had referred to her back in the day, had been eight inches taller than her own five-foot two and had had bones where her curves were, she could’ve gone to New York City or even Paris and become one of those supermodels.

  Sawyer was out at the corral with Buck and wild Jack when the women arrived back from Medford. And yep, as she jumped out of the truck and wildly waved at him, Lexi still looked as if she’d just flown in on a private jet from the South of France, where she’d been tooling around with movie stars.

  “Is Sophie upstairs?” Austin asked Winema, who met them at the door.

  “In that room we fixed up for her,” the older woman said. “Did anyone warn you?”

  “About her hair? Yes, both Rachel and Sawyer called while we were on the road.” She glanced up the stairs. “How bad is it?”

  “Kinda like it was gnawed by a crazed beaver.”

  Austin briefly closed her eyes. “How much stuff do you have in that bag?” she asked Lexi.

  “Don’t worry. You’ve no idea how many just-broke-up-with-my-boyfriend hair disasters I’ve had to deal with. I don’t suppose this cow town has a salon that might at least have some clip-on extensions.”

  “No salon. And while Rachel’s had the mercantile improving their food and wine departments, I doubt you’d find any extensions next to the plastic barrettes and banana clips.”

  “You’re kidding about the banana clips.”

  “I wish I were.”

  They found the girls in what had been designated as Sophie’s room. Sophie was wearing a sleeveless purple minidress. Her friend was dressed in a bright orange crop top, a pair of Daisy Duke shorts, and tasseled boots. Multi-hued beaded earrings hung from her pierced ears nearly to her shoulders.

  “Hey Sophie,” Austin greeted her, determinedly not flinching at the hair. Winema had gotten it wrong. It didn’t look as if it had been gnawed by a crazed beaver. It looked worse. Much, much worse. “This is my friend Lexi. She’s from Las Vegas now, but she grew up right here in River’s Bend.”