by Nicole Helm
“Why are you doing all this? You don’t even know me.”
Rose stared straight ahead as she squared her shoulders. She shook her head as if she couldn’t believe what was transpiring.
Which would make two of them.
“You ever just want to help someone? And maybe you don’t have a good reason for it, it’s just there?” She glanced at him then, and he couldn’t make out much of anything in her expression, but he knew that feeling.
All too well. “Yeah, I guess I know what that feels like.”
She laughed, shaking her head. “So I don’t have an answer to any of your whys, Jack. Let me walk you to the door. Consider it a practice run.”
He agreed if only because he did understand that inclination, and it would make his life easier, and a few more seconds in Rose’s presence wasn’t a hardship. Like everything else in his life right now, she made no sense. But like nothing else in his life right now, it didn’t twist him up into guilt, fear, and bitterness.
So he walked toward the ranch next to Rose, and where he might have veered off toward the bunkhouse, Rose was clearly dead set on delivering him to the front door of the ranch house, based on the fact that she’d grabbed his hand and was tugging him that way.
“I’m not going to hurt myself, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”
She didn’t stop walking toward the house, but she did drop his hand. “No.”
“Because I’m not that bad off. I wouldn’t give Madison the satisfaction of thinking it was over her.”
Finally Rose stopped her persistent march forward, but before she could say anything to that, the door to the ranch house opened, and Alex, Becca, and Gabe all stepped out onto the porch.
When no one said anything, Jack rocked back on his heels. “Beautiful night, huh?”
“Is everything okay?” Becca asked, though in the porch light, it was clear her gaze was on Rose, a questioning kind of concern in that expression.
“Sorry I kept him out late and didn’t call. Got carried away,” Rose returned, everything about her voice light and cheerful. She sauntered over to him and moved onto her toes.
Jack held himself perfectly still as she brushed her lips featherlight across his jaw. He watched her, and her gaze held his, an amused little quirk tilting the corners of her mouth as she dropped back down to her heels.
“See you later, sweetie.” And then in a completely unnecessary display, she smacked his ass as she sauntered back to her car.
Maybe it should have irritated him, but all he could do was laugh. Rose was… He blew out a breath, the laughter dying. Because Rose was something a lot more complicated than he probably needed right now. But he preferred half-naked swim in a pond complicated over facing his ex and his brother or a doctor’s office waiting room kind of complicated.
“Come inside, Jack,” Alex said, the first to interrupt the silence.
“I don’t believe you’re my commanding officer anymore, Alex,” Jack replied, but something about tonight had unwound that tight spiral of panic he’d been fighting off with anger and bitterness. So despite the snappish words, he stepped up onto the porch and walked inside.
Alex, Becca, and Gabe followed, and they all stood in the entry way, three pairs of concerned eyes on him.
The scrutiny didn’t press down on him like it usually did. It wasn’t the stilted silences he’d sat through while talking to his family over the course of the past year and a half, or the bitter arguments he and Gabe and Alex sometimes got into when one of them was having a bad day.
There was something okay about this. They were worried about him, and it wasn’t in the way his family worried—the please be okay so we don’t have to discuss the elephant in the room. And it wasn’t the way Alex and Gabe had worried before coming here—if we just keep moving forward, eventually it’ll be okay.
This was something simpler. Something about him, instead of them, and that was very nearly new.
“My family is coming to visit,” he blurted when it was clear no one knew quite what to say.
Everyone’s eyes went wide because, yes, everyone knew exactly what that could mean.
“Your whole family?” Alex asked carefully.
Jack nodded. “Mom. Dad. One sister can’t make it, but big bro, cheating ex-fiancée, and their kid are sure going to be here.”
“Like hell they are,” Becca retorted, fisting her hands on her hips. “You tell them neither of them are welcome. And if you don’t want to tell them, I sure will.”
Jack had to force himself to breathe through the heavy thing on his chest, because the thing about your fiancée cheating with your brother was that you never quite got that unequivocal support Becca was showing him now. No doubt Alex or Gabe would have shown it, but all three of their lives had been blown apart before they’d had a chance.
So no one had ever simply blamed Madison and taken his side without anything else muddying the waters, and he didn’t know how to respond to that. He didn’t know how to thank Becca for that.
“I’m serious, Jack,” Becca continued when no one said anything. “I will call your mother up myself, and I will tell her that’s unconscionable and awful, and no one should expect you to—”
“It’s okay,” he managed.
“No, it isn’t.”
“Rose had a good point tonight. It’s been something like two years, and I can’t go back and change anything. So maybe it’s time to move forward. And if that means them coming here, well, I can take it.” He hadn’t been so sure of that until right now, thanks to some combination of a woman jumping into a pond and Becca standing up for him.
“What exactly does Rose Rogers have to do with all this?” Alex asked.
“Ah. Well, in a weird twist of fate or something, I was talking to Mom in Pioneer Spirit’s parking lot, and Rose called me over. Mom overheard it, and suddenly she was asking about women and yapping about how Madison was worried I hadn’t moved on.”
Becca made a squeak of outrage. “That two-timing, lying, horrible sack of sh—”
“Easy, tiger,” Alex murmured, giving Becca’s shoulders a squeeze.
“Anyway, Rose and I agreed to trade favors. Like I mentioned the other night, she needs a little extra security at the bar on weekends, and I need a fake girlfriend.”
“Fake?” Gabe asked, raising an eyebrow and looking pointedly at his clothes. Which, yes, were rumpled and a little dirty and… Well.
“We were just talking.” Jack didn’t think explaining they’d gone swimming would be met with unquestioned understanding.
“You’re awfully muddy for just talking,” Gabe returned blandly, neither censure nor much of anything readable in his tone.
“We went for a walk. Look. She’s… I don’t know. There’s nothing going on, and she’s going to pretend to be my girlfriend while my family is here, and all you guys have to do is play along. That’s all I ask.”
Alex, Gabe, and Becca exchanged glances, and Jack knew exactly what those looks meant.
“I really am okay,” he said firmly, taking time to look each of them in the eye. “It might be temporary, but you know how that goes. Now, it’s late, and we all have a lot of work to do in the morning, so why don’t we go to bed?”
There were murmurs of agreement, and Alex and Becca moved toward the staircase that would lead them up to their bedroom, and Gabe moved toward the front door.
Call it the booze, stupidity, or some other thing, but Jack couldn’t let it go. “Hey, Bec?”
She turned. “Yeah?”
He thought about how best to express it. All he could think about was the day at the diner a few months back when he’d told her about Madison, and she’d told him she’d always wanted siblings. “The, uh, whole offer to call my mom and give her a piece of your mind? Thanks, Sis.”
Becca’s face crumpled a little, and
suddenly she’d recrossed the room and was squeezing him tight, something that sounded like a sob escaping her lips.
Jack stood stock-still, arms in the air. A million years ago, he might have known what to do with this outburst—he did have two little sisters after all. And he’d been Madison’s go-to for when she was upset.
An entire lifetime existed like a brick wall between that Jack and this one, and he didn’t know how to… He didn’t know.
Jack looked over Becca’s head at Alex. “A little help here?”
“Hey, you were the one who made her cry, so you have to deal with the consequences.”
Becca sniffed into his chest, and he patted her back awkwardly. She finally pulled away, wiping at her cheeks.
“You don’t need any help, Jack. You’re doing just fine.”
He could almost believe it.
* * *
Rose groaned and swore and eventually gave in to the relentless pounding on her door. She glanced at her clock. It was nearly one in the afternoon, which wasn’t that terrible considering she ran a bar that was open until two in the morning.
But usually she was up and moving by noon, dealing with distributors, schedules, receipts, or what have you.
She swung out of bed. She didn’t have any appointments, and her one-man cleaning crew, Cletus, never let anyone back here.
Except family.
A cold dread grabbed her by the throat and she hurried her steps, jerking the door open to find Delia on the other side. She was calm as could be, Sunny wiggling in her arms.
“Hey,” Rose greeted breathlessly, moving aside so Delia could step in. “Everything okay?”
“That was going to be my question for you. You’re usually up by now.”
“Had a late night.” Rose scratched a hand through her hair. She’d showered the pond off her when she’d gotten home last night, but she hadn’t bothered to do anything beyond wash up and fall into bed. And now she was a sleepy, tangled mess.
And a little too curious about what Jack was thinking this morning.
Rose shook her head and held her arms out for Sunny. The one-year-old gladly nose-dived into Rose’s chest.
“Rose, what aren’t you telling me?”
Oh, a whole slew of things. She looked up at Delia and smiled. “About what?”
Delia stood there in silence, staring that imperious older-sister stare. Her jaw worked. “I know,” she said gravely.
Rose frowned and walked over to the little playpen she kept set up for Sunny’s visits. She placed the girl down onto the mat and handed her one of the toys before turning back to Delia and lowering her voice. “You know what?”
“I know Dad’s out,” Delia said, her voice not breaking exactly, but weakening. “The lawyer called me.”
“What?” Rose said on a gasp. An actual, soap-opera gasp, because. No. No. No! Delia was not supposed to know. “I told that little weasel not to tell you.” She shook her head vigorously. “You shouldn’t be worrying about this. Forget that asshole ever called you and focus on growing that baby. You can’t worry about this.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t,” Delia said, absently patting her stomach. “But you didn’t want Mr. Rombach to tell me before you knew I was pregnant, so I’m going to have to toss out that excuse. Why the hell did you think you should keep this from me?”
Rose blew out a breath. She hadn’t even had her coffee yet. Why had that bastard told Delia? “Oh God.” Rose grabbed Delia’s hand. “Who else? Did he call everyone?”
Delia sighed. “Yeah. Elsie and Billie and I talked yesterday. We all decided I’d break the news to Steph this morning, then come ask you what the hell you think you’re doing.”
So all her sisters knew. She’d been trying to spare them, and they knew. Why could she never get it right when it came to them?
“Rose.”
She couldn’t face that note of hurt in Delia’s voice. This wasn’t supposed to hurt. Not anymore. She was going to make up for all her old mistakes. She thought she had, saving Steph, getting Dad thrown in jail once and for all.
But he was out now, and that was on her too.
Delia stepped close, her fingers curling around Rose’s arms. “Sissy, this isn’t like it was. We’re in this together.”
Rose forced herself to face Delia’s sad, all-too-empathetic gaze. “I know we are, but I can handle this. I handled Steph. I can handle this. You guys have lives—”
“And so do you.”
“You have a kid and one on the way. Steph has to get ready to move into her dorm in a few weeks. Billie and Elsie are out there making Seattle their bitch. And I can fight this. I can fight him.” I owe you. God, how I owe you.
Delia couldn’t seem to listen to reason. “We’re not separated anymore. I won’t let him separate us again. We fight this together. We fight him together. Just like when we were kids.”
Except it hadn’t been like that at all. Oh, Rose had always pretended to be one of them, as though she were part of the fight, but she’d been Dad’s favorite. She’d been his secret weapon. And for so very long, a part of her had relished that.
She wanted to cry, but hell if she was going to cry twice in one week. “In all likelihood, he’s back in that hellhole with Mom and he won’t bother any of us.”
“I hope so,” Delia said, watching Sunny happily babbling away at a mirror. “Everyone at Shaw is on high alert. I don’t think Caleb’s even sleeping, the idiot. Dan suggested hiring a private investigator, someone who could keep tabs on him.”
“We can’t afford that,” Rose whispered. Maybe she could take out a loan. The bar could be collateral—
“Dan can. And as much as I hate taking charity from my brother-in-law, this is about everyone’s safety. It isn’t as though the ex-hockey player doesn’t have the money. Even Caleb’s considering it, and you know he’d rather eat his own arm off than take money from Dan.”
“I, um, have a guy doing a little extra security for me at the bar, but I guess someone keeping tabs on him wouldn’t be bad.” Like it did for Caleb, the idea of accepting help burned and frustrated, but she couldn’t possibly argue with Delia when she had a kid to protect and another one growing in her freaking stomach.
“Who?”
“Who what?”
“Who’s this guy you trust to do security for you? You don’t even trust Tonya with the keys to your bar, and you’re thinking about making her manager.”
“He’s just a guy.”
“And now you’re being cagey.” Delia studied her face, and Rose looked away. Delia had an uncanny way of getting to the bottom of things, and Rose didn’t want to talk about Jack. Not when she felt all weird.
“What’s his name? Why’d you pick him? Where’d he come from?”
Rose groaned. “You know I have work to do, right?”
“And you know I’ll get out of here a lot faster if you spill the details already.”
“Fine.” Rose unsuccessfully tried to rake her fingers through her tangled hair again. “His name is Jack. He’s a former Navy SEAL.” And that was all she was going to say.
“Jack what?”
“Why? So you can google him?”
“Is he one of those guys over at the Maguire ranch? They’re doing some sort of injured military rehab thing? What are they calling it now? Re…Re something?”
“Revival Ranch,” Rose muttered.
“Yes, that. And you hired this injured former Navy SEAL to watch after you?”
“No, I traded him a favor to stick around here on Friday and Saturday nights and be on the lookout. He doesn’t even know who he’s looking out for, just what Dad looks like. He is most certainly not protecting me.”
“It’s not the worst thing,” Delia said, her voice hushed.
“What?”
Delia sighed, walking over to t
he playpen. She looked down at Sunny, who was still happily busying herself with toys. “It’s not the worst thing to let someone look after you. To trust someone. To let go a little.”
Rose didn’t know how to control her face. She didn’t know how to fight all this. It was too early and she was too tired and Delia didn’t get it.
It wasn’t other people she didn’t trust. It was herself.
“Rose, if you want to be a good sister, you want to take care of me while I’m pregnant, then you listen to me. I want you to let me in. I want you to tell me everything. I don’t ever, ever want secrets between us.”
“It wasn’t a secret. It was just—”
Delia crossed and grabbed her again, this time giving her a little shake instead of a squeeze. “This is our chance, Rose. To have whatever we want, be whatever we want. We get to live and love, without fear and without holding back. Do not shut me out. Do not shut the girls out. We are in this together. Always. Forever.” Delia’s lips quivered, but she pressed them together. “Puking my guts out or no, I can handle this as long as we’re all in it together.”
“We are.”
“Good, because we aren’t helpless little girls at his mercy anymore. We are five grown, kick-ass women, and we have the Shaws behind us one hundred percent. He can’t do anything to us anymore.”
Rose wished she could believe it, but for her sister, she nodded. For her sister, she did the one thing Delia had asked her not to do.
She lied. “You’re damn right he can’t.”
Chapter 8
Jack arrived at Pioneer Spirit around sundown, per Rose’s previous instructions. Tonya quickly ushered him to a table close to the door, gave him an iced tea, and that was that.
He didn’t get a greeting from Rose. Not even a glance.
So he did what she’d asked him to do. He sat there and sipped his tea and watched the door. He’d stared at the picture long enough, trying to read the hidden danger in a sixty-something-year-old man’s face, but much like in a war zone, you couldn’t read sins in the supposed enemy’s eyes or wrinkles.
Regardless, this was his mission. Never mind that he hated sitting still, whiling away hours in a bar. He was working, so he couldn’t drink away all the crap that whirled around in a constant loop in his brain. A mission was a mission, and it didn’t matter if you hated it when it was for the greater good.