Long Road Home

by JoAnn Ross

  “Really?” Sophie’s skeptical gaze swept over the sprayed on jeans, the blousy jungle top, the high, high heels, and the bag that Austin figured had probably cost as much as a month of hay.

  “Really.” Lexi tilted her head, studying Sophie. Assessing the hair. “That’s a darling pixie. It reminds me of the one Zendaya wore to the Grammys.”

  “That was a wig,” the other girl said. “I’m Madison. Sophie’s BFF.”

  Madison Graham, Austin remembered, was the girl whose sleepover Heather hadn’t let Sophie attend. Looking at her outfit, jewelry, sparkly blue eyeliner, and about a bucket of mascara, Austin understood why. Tom may have joked about Sophie being twelve going on thirty-five, but this girl was definitely riding a supertrain to adulthood on an even faster track.

  “Hi, Madison. Nice to meet you. And you’re right, it was a wig. But she looked really cute and sassy. And believe me, very few of the girls you see on TV or in the movies or music videos are wearing their own hair. Take it from someone who’s done a lot of them.”

  “Really?” Sophie asked. “In Las Vegas?”

  “That’s my day job. But not only have I done a lot of freelance videos, stars all the time fly me out to do their red carpet hair.” She grinned. “Have flat iron, will travel. That’s my motto. I have some wild stories I’ll tell you later.”

  “About famous people?” Madison asked eagerly.

  “No point in telling stories about people no one ever heard of.”

  “I like your hair color,” Sophie said shyly.

  For the first time since they’d broken the horrible news, Austin felt a glimmer of hope.

  “Me, too.” Lexi’s grin faded. “I was worried that it might be too much for a funeral, and here’s where I say I’m so sorry about what happened to your folks.”

  “I am, too,” Sophie said.

  “Of course you are. It’s a terrible thing, but we’re all here for you, so if there’s anything you need, you just need to speak up, because as brilliant as Austin and I are, we’re not mind readers. And even though I haven’t seen you since you were the cutest ever toddler, I can see so much of your mother in you that I know we’re going to be good friends.”

  “I don’t look like my mother.”

  “Not yet. But I knew her when she was your age, and believe me, you’re going to be a beauty, just like her. Anyway, like I was saying, I didn’t have time to change out the ombre, so I just told myself that your mom would like it. After all, she had me put blue streaks in hers for graduation.”

  “Really?” Sophie’s widened eyes looked even larger in her small face without any softening frame of hair. “Mom had blue hair?”

  “Well, she wasn’t a mom yet, and they were just streaks, but I kid you not. What are you wearing to the funeral?”

  “I’m not sure. I’m not good about clothes like Mom was. I took this test in Seventeen that said I was a summer, which means I’m supposed to wear pastels, so I don’t have anything black. But Madison brought over this dress she thought would be perfect.”

  “I’m an autumn,” Madison volunteered. “So I can’t wear it. I sent my grandmother the chart of my colors, but she still totally ignored it and bought me this dress for my birthday. Which has just been sitting in the closet because no way am I going to be seen in public in it. Bad enough I had to put it on for the picture my mother took to send to Grandmother. I was going to remind Gram in the thank you note I had to write to check the color chart next time, but Mom said that would be rude.”

  “I’m sure your grandmother meant well,” Austin said evenly. “And it is a lovely color purple.”

  “It’s plum,” Madison corrected in a know-it-all tone that grated on Austin’s last nerve. “That’s between purple and magenta.”

  “How very clever of you to know that,” Lexi said with a smile. “Are you going to be a fashion designer when you grow up?”

  “I might be. But I’d really rather have a Disney show like Zendaya and be a big star. I’m a VIP member of her fan club. Which is how I knew about the wig.”

  “Well, isn’t that special?” Lexi’s response had Austin biting her lip to hold back a laugh. “That dress will be lovely. As you undoubtedly can figure out from my hair, I personally adore any shade of purple. And if your mother’s looking down on you, it’ll make her smile because her entire freshman year of high school, shades of purple, from lavender to plum, were all she wore.”

  “I’d forgotten that,” Austin said. “She was all the time having your grandma take her to Klamath Falls or Medford to buy fabric.” A memory flashed back. “I brought her back three yards of white cotton with purple polka dots I found in a quilt shop in Idaho while Dad and I were there for the Snake River Stampede. She used it to make a retro halter sundress.”

  “She has a picture wearing that,” Sophie said, seeming actually excited about something for the first time since they’d had to break the news of her parents’ deaths. “It’s in her and dad’s bedroom.”

  “We’ll make sure it gets here during the move,” Austin assured her. “She wore it to a barbecue at the Bar M the night your dad asked her to go steady.” She smiled and ran a hand over the girl’s raggedly cropped hair.

  “I knew that. But she never told me she only wore purple that year!”

  “I suppose there are lots of things kids don’t know about their parents,” Lexi said with a shrug. “I certainly couldn’t tell you much about my mom when she was in high school, other than she was in the theater club and played the Ann Margaret role in Bye Bye Birdie. Sometimes she’d dance all around the kitchen and reenact the part where Ann sings good-bye to Birdie, who’s been drafted into the Army.

  “Anyway,” she said, shaking off the memory that had brought a smile to her eyes, “Madison’s right. This plum will look wonderful with your hazel eyes. Which, by the way, look even larger with that cut. Have you thought about putting some wax on your hair? To give it a bit more definition?”

  “No. But I only cut it last night, so I didn’t have any.”

  It was Lexi’s turn to widen her eyes. “You cut that? By yourself?”

  Sophie lifted a hand to the hair in question. “Yeah.” She looked as if she were bracing herself for criticism.

  “Wow. You’re talented. I tried to give myself a bob for my first day in high school and ended up looking like I was wearing a mop on my head.”

  In reality, the bob had looked as if Vidal Sassoon had done it with his own talented shears, but Sophie didn’t need to know that. Watching the girl physically relax had Austin loving Lexi O’Halloran even more than she had when she’d called her friend in a panic the morning after her and Jace’s wedding.

  Lexi had shown up at the off-the-strip motel and, while Jace was still sleeping off a night of drinking, dragged her down to the Golden Gate Casino. Over a sky-high stack of pancakes that she swore were locals’ cure for soaking up a hangover, she’d told Austin to cut her losses and bail. Now.

  Advice Austin should’ve taken, but as crazy as it had been to get drunk married, it had been even more difficult to think straight with maniacs pounding sledgehammers in your head, running power drills behind your eyes, and your mouth feeling as if you’d swallowed up all the miles of desert surrounding the city.

  Tossing the suitcase she’d brought upstairs with her onto Sophie’s bed, Lexi opened it, pulled out the tool box that Austin remembered from the pre-wedding makeover, and retrieved a pair of scissors.

  “Let’s go into the bathroom, sweetie,” she suggested. “And get to work.”

  29

  SAWYER DIDN’T KNOW anything about women’s hair, but he could tell that Lexi had managed to make Sophie’s look as if the short style was intended. And he wasn’t sure, but he thought he saw a bit of purple showing through on her bangs. She was also wearing makeup. Nothing too extreme, just a bit of pink on her lips and some mascara that highlighted her wide eyes even more and made her look older.

  Which wasn’t reassuring. Especially giv
en her friend, who didn’t look like the most wholesome influence. Then again, he considered, Sophie had had a good upbringing. As long as whacking off her hair was the worst thing they had to worry about, they’d be okay.

  Austin and Lexi took the kids back to Rachel and Cooper’s, where they were going to have dinner together. Which, damn, blew his plans for a quiet dinner with Austin. Saying he had some ranch accounting to do, Sawyer begged off. Fifteen minutes later, he was at the mercantile, filling up a cart with the items on the list Rachel had sent him. Tonight’s plan might have been shot to hell, but he wanted to be prepared to take advantage of any opportunity that might arise.

  He’d been back at the ranch a mere ten minutes when he saw a car driving past the ranch house. It stopped in front of his cabin, and a woman, somewhere between forty and fifty, climbed out. She was carrying a saddle-brown leather purse and a clipboard.

  Returning the beer he’d just taken out back to the fridge, he went and opened the door.

  “Mr. Murphy?”

  “I’m Sawyer Murphy.”

  “I’m Martha Grimsley. Social Services. I’ve been assigned to Sophie and Jack Campbell.”

  “It’s good to meet you.” Sawyer stepped aside, letting her into the cabin. “I didn’t realize you people worked on Sundays.”

  “We work when there’s work to do,” she said in an officious tone that had him beginning to worry. “We don’t want to keep the children in limbo any longer than necessary.”

  Sawyer didn’t think staying with his brother and Rachel could be categorized as limbo but, having dealt with his share of bureaucracy in the Marines, wasn’t going to argue that point. “And both the sheriff and Colton Kane called, asking if we could expedite matters. So.” She pulled out a pen and opened her clipboard. “Here I am.”

  “You do know that I’m not applying for custodial guardianship, right?” Sawyer asked.

  “I do. I also know that you were close friends with the deceased and that you live on the property where the children may be staying.”

  “In the ranch house,” Sawyer pointed out.

  “Yet they may be frequent visitors. Even, perhaps, spending the night here?”

  “That’s true.” Sawyer belatedly remembered his manners. “Why don’t you sit down? Can I get you anything to drink?”

  “I’m fine, thank you.” She glanced around. “This is quite a nice cabin.”

  “I like it. It used to belong to the foreman and his family.”

  “So I was told in the paperwork Mr. Kane emailed me. Would you mind giving me a tour of the rest of the rooms?”

  “Sure.” Breathing a sigh of relief that the women had seen this coming, he showed his bedroom, where, thanks to the Marine training drilled into him, he’d actually made his bed. The attached bath. “The kids’ rooms are across the hall.”

  She glanced around both rooms, making notes on the clipboard pad. “Is this furniture from the previous family?”

  “No. It was bought for Sophie and Jack.”

  “I see.” More note taking. “How did you have time to do all this? Considering you and Austin Merrill have been making funeral arrangements and preparing for her petition to the court.”

  “Our friends did it for us,” he said, wondering if that were some type of trick question. “There are a lot of people who were close to Tom and Heather Campbell. People who care about their children. And want to help ease them over this tough time. And help raise them.”

  “It takes a village?”

  Was that a touch of snark in her tone? “You could put it that way,” he said evenly. “Austin was Jack’s age when her mother left to go back to Sweden. I was Sophie’s age when my mother, who’d been like a surrogate mom to Austin, died after a long battle with cancer. In both our cases, there were a bunch of adults who stepped in to become part of an extended family, so to speak. Austin and I didn’t ever feel alone. Nor will Sophie and Jack.”

  “Well.” She blew out a breath. Wrote some more. “Now I’d like to see your refrigerator.”

  “My fridge?” What the hell was next? Was she going to go back into his bedroom and find the condoms he’d stashed away in the bedside table?

  “It’s been my experience that bachelors don’t have the best eating habits.”

  For one fleeting moment, Sawyer was certain that Coop and Ryan were punking him. Surely she couldn’t be serious? As he watched her open not only his fridge but the cupboards, he decided he owed Rachel a huge thank you.

  “Once again you surprise me, Mr. Murphy.”

  “How’s that?”

  “There’s the expected beer, of course. And frozen dinners. But you actually have fresh vegetables.”

  “I’m a big fan of the food pyramid.”

  She gave him a long look. He suspected she wasn’t buying that. But the mixed greens, spinach, fresh fruit, and other stuff on Rachel’s list backed up his claim.

  “I’m meeting with Ms. Merrill tomorrow morning. If that goes well, so long as the judge rules in her favor, which, given her high standing in the community, I can’t see any reason why he won’t, you can expect the children to be moving into the ranch house next week.”

  “That’ll be good for them,” he said. “Getting settled somewhere permanent.”

  “Yes.” She was headed back to the door when she turned. “One last thing. I’m told you were one of those Special Forces soldiers sent to Afghanistan. And that your unit took heavy losses.”

  Sawyer wondered how the hell she knew that, then realized that since he’d been wounded and gotten those medals, it had probably made the local paper.

  “That’s true.”

  “Do you have any lingering problems from that?”

  Sawyer had two choices. He could tell the truth to a woman who wouldn’t begin to understand what he and his unit had been through. Who might not realize that no one could experience war on any level and not return home changed in some way. Or have nightmares. Which he figured the majority of civilians occasionally suffered and he’d never heard of them having to defend themselves.

  Or he could lie. Not for himself but for Jack and Sophie. And Austin, whom he didn’t want to be forced to handle this guardianship deal on her own.

  He folded his arms. Met the social worker’s stern gaze. “None at all.”

  She nodded. “Fine. I believe we’re done here. Thank you, Mr. Murphy. Have a good rest of your Sunday.”

  “You, too, Ms. Grimsley.” He shook the hand she’d extended, then stood in the doorway, watching her climb into a car as gray as her personality and drive away.

  Then he went back into the kitchen, popped the top on that beer she’d interrupted, turned on the TV, and channel surfed until he landed on a Giants home baseball game just as Williamson splashed a homer into McCovey Cove with the bases loaded in the bottom of the eighth. Which, short of a miracle, pretty much put the already-five-runs-behind Braves out of the game.

  “Now what?”

  He could go over to Rachel and Coop’s. But the truth was that he was exhausted from the past two days. He’d humped his butt all over some of the most dangerous, godforsaken places on earth. He’d gone as many as thirty-six hours without sleep, many times needing to stay alert enough to fight off the bad guys. During SERE (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape) training, he’d suffered six long winter days in the wettest, darkest, location on the continent: Washington’s Olympic National Park rainforest.

  Maybe he wasn’t cut out for this parent gig, he thought, not for the first time, as he went and got another beer from the fridge and grabbed the cardboard six-pack to save walking back and forth. Fortunately, he and Austin hadn’t discussed marriage. Which, under any other circumstances, would probably be a given. But as much as he wanted her, and he did, with every atom of his being, neither did he want to screw this up.

  So, for now, until he discovered whether he could live up to what would be required of him—not just short term, like this damned depressing funeral gig, but forever�
��as he unscrewed another beer top and began channel-surfing again, Sawyer decided it’d be better for everyone involved if they just took things one day at a time.

  30

  AS MUCH AS she would’ve liked to be with Sawyer, Austin couldn’t deny that having Lexi back in River’s Bend lifted her spirits. It was like being back in high school, where they stayed up all night and talked about boys. The only difference was that this time the boys were men, and although Austin didn’t want to be judgmental, she thought Sawyer topped Lexi’s lounge singer by a mile on the hot boyfriend scale. She had to admit, after listening to the mix tape, that he had a nice voice, though she’d bet he didn’t look nearly as good in a pair of Wranglers.

  Not that she was superficial enough to judge a male solely by his body. But when a man had a body like Sawyer Murphy’s, well . . .

  She’d gotten the call from a Ms. Grimsley at precisely eight this morning. The only reason she knew the exact time was that the county social worker had told her that she’d be at the ranch at “precisely” ten. Despite both Tom and Heather listing her as Jack and Sophie’s guardian in their wills, despite Colton Kane’s recommendation to the court, despite her long relationship with the children, and her reputation for being a good and honest person who’d never even gotten a jaywalking ticket (not that Cooper would ever ticket anyone for that), as she watched the hands of the kitchen rooster clock slowly tick off the minutes, her nerves became more and more tangled.

  “Go over to Sawyer’s cabin,” Lexi said finally. “Work off some of that energy before you drive us all crazy.”

  “Lexi!” She tilted her head toward the marble slab part of the counter, where Winema was rolling out dough for bread. The house was run on a schedule, and Mondays had always been bread baking day.

  “Don’t mind me,” the housekeeper said. “Just because I’m old doesn’t mean I don’t remember having sex. And I vote for a roll in the hay.” She punched the ball of dough down with her fist. “So to speak. Truth be told, hay is a lot pricklier than it’s portrayed to be in all those cowboy romance novels Jenna sells at her store.”