“Thanks, Dust,” he murmured.
Dustin nodded and looked down at his hands in his lap before looking back at Vince. “It’s just that you have so much, and you don’t even realize it. Sure, you lost your mom, you lost Jane in a way, and you’re still trying to figure your life out. But just spending as little time around your dad as I have, I know he actually loves you because you’re his son, not because you’re great at what you do. You’re great at what you do because he loves you enough to support you. I doubt you ever had to deal with being almost constantly lectured and grounded. I’m nineteen years old, and I’ve never had a cell phone. I never had a MySpace or a Facebook account, not even so much as an e-mail or instant messaging account. I got a crappy laptop when I started having to write a ton of papers in high school and my parents were sick of driving me to school early or picking me up late because I had to use the library to write them. I didn’t dare make any of those accounts, because someone would tell my parents eventually. But yeah, I was desperate enough to use it to watch porn because that was the only way I had to figure out why I really didn’t give a crap when my friends got so excited about watching the girls during gym class.
“And nothing I ever did was good enough. Grades were either straight-As or the nightly hour of TV was taken away. I never learned to drive in the year I had my permit because my dad considered it a privilege that I had to earn. But whenever I’d do well on a test or have straight-As, there were never any ‘good jobs’ or ‘I’m proud of you.’ Hugs never happened once I hit about ten. If I was sick, my mom would make me soup and toast and give me water and ginger ale, but she wouldn’t act worried. And if I couldn’t make it to the bathroom before puking, I’d hear about it for a week. I never had so much as a goldfish for a pet, and I told you how I wasn’t allowed to do pony rides.”
He took a deep, shaky breath. “And when I see you with your dad, I wonder if you realize how lucky you are. Someone who smiles and laughs and hugs you. And who sends someone other than a church minion to look out for you while you’re drunk. Some people never have parents like that. And I don’t want you to feel bad for me, just appreciate what you have. I mean, you told me how your dad was okay with it when you came out to him; if he’d made you leave the farm, I know Jane would find you a place to stay. Or Mandy. I didn’t even have friends who tried to help me. I’m really, really glad you found me and gave me a job and a place to live, but who knows how long I’ll be staying? I’m definitely not going to take it for granted while I’m here.”
As he watched Dustin wipe his eyes, Vince realized there were tears on his own cheeks. There was nothing he could find the words to say, so he leaned over and hugged Dustin. He held him for a few moments while Dustin cried softly against him, and he didn’t care if Dustin—or anyone—perceived it as anything more than friendship.
Chapter Fifteen
AS SOON as Vince parked the truck and trailer in front of the barn, he saw Anna walking quickly toward him.
“I need to show you something in the feed room,” she said as she reached him.
He closed the door of the truck heavily and looked back at Dustin, who was walking around the front of the truck. “Can you get Xander unloaded and everything? I’ll be there as soon as I deal with whatever this is.”
Dustin nodded and turned around to open the trailer from the other side. He hadn’t spoken much since they had stopped hugging on the side of the road almost an hour ago.
“How’d the show go?” Anna asked as Vince followed her to the barn.
“Good,” Vince replied. “Xander kicked Warmblood’s ass.”
“Always good,” Anna replied, but she didn’t sound as amused as Vince was used to. She was obviously distracted.
“So what’s going on?” he asked as they entered the barn and made their way down the aisle to the feed room.
She shook her head. “I have an idea, but I don’t know for sure.”
The feed room contained several storage bins full of feed, and four full bags that had been purchased recently as the level of feed in the storage bins declined. The bags had been sitting in the feed room for about two weeks.
Anna walked right to the bags and lifted one easily with two fingers, and Vince immediately knew what was wrong; the bags were empty. Though they looked full, they usually held fifty pounds of feed, and Anna definitely didn’t have superhuman strength. She was one of the most physically strong women Vince knew, but she wasn’t that strong.
“Mice?” he asked. They’d had rodent problems before, and it was always a risk keeping the bags around before dumping them into the bins. But eating that entire bag must have taken a lot of mice. Maybe Mia’s dog had gotten out of his run at some point and helped those mice out. It wouldn’t have been the first time, nor would it be the last.
“Not unless mice are now carrying pocket knives,” Anna replied, holding the bag out to him.
Vince took it and looked at the bottom corner, where there was a perfectly clean cut about three inches long.
“There’s a bunch of mouse shit on the floor,” Anna explained, “so I’m guessing they did eat it, but they sure as hell didn’t make that cut. Someone sliced open all of these bags. Only that one is empty so far. And I’m not feeding any of the rest to the horses.”
Vince nodded, still examining the bag. “Yeah, just toss it all outside away from the pastures. Let’s try to keep the mice out of the barn. Do you want help?”
She shrugged. “I think I can manage. I’ll do it after the evening feeding.”
“I’ll call the feed store in the morning and see if they can set some aside for us,” Vince said, setting the bag on the floor. “Are you thinking of the same person I am?”
“I’m thinking Chris,” she admitted.
“Me, too,” he agreed. “But we don’t have any proof. Let’s just handle this without making a big deal out of it. I don’t have the energy to confront him right now. Next time, he’ll be buying the replacements.”
Anna nodded. “Agreed. I’ll keep you in the loop.”
“Thanks.”
Vince found Dustin brushing Xander down in his stall a few minutes later. Dustin looked up when Vince entered the stall. He leaned against the far wall and sighed, his hands stuffed in his pockets.
“What’s wrong with the feed room?” Dustin asked.
Vince reached out and rubbed Xander’s nose. He knew that Chris could be in any of the nearby stalls and wasn’t going to voice his suspicions. “Apparently, mice got to the unopened bags of feed,” he replied, pulling his pocketknife from his jeans. He flipped the blade out and held it up.
Dustin looked confused for a moment, and then an obvious look of understanding crossed his face. “Chris?” he asked, barely a whisper.
Vince shrugged and closed his knife before clipping it back to his pocket. “Someone,” he murmured. “So,” he went on in a normal tone, “I might see about getting some barn cats. It’ll help. Unless anyone is seriously allergic to them.”
“I’m not,” Dustin replied as he went back to grooming the horse that was currently rubbing his face on Vince’s chest. “My grandma had one.”
Vince hugged Xander and smiled at him. “I’ll check with everyone.”
A FEW days later, with a collective okay from the farm, Vince and Dustin went to get three cats from the local animal shelter. Vince knew he would have been able to handle the task alone, but he wanted to give Dustin the chance to get some more driving practice, this time on back roads. Vince had been taking him grocery shopping every payday and had been stopping on the way to let Dustin drive around empty parking lots and the deserted campus of the local high school.
Vince wasn’t worried about Dustin’s driving—he was overly cautious, not overly daring—but Dustin seemed relieved when they made it to the parking lot of the shelter.
“I don’t have to drive home, do I?” he asked, resting his forehead on the steering wheel. “I don’t want to kill the cats.”
“The c
ats?” Vince replied with a laugh. “What about me?”
Dustin smiled and shook his head—or rolled his forehead back and forth on the steering wheel, rather. “You have accepted the risk of letting me drive. The cats would be innocent bystanders.”
Vince laughed and opened his door. “Come on, help me find those cats.”
The local shelter was pretty large and had about thirty cats available for adoption at the time. Vince and Dustin wandered down the hallways among the cat cages, where many cats were sleeping and some were eager to meet people. Dustin seemed taken in by a mother cat with three black-and-white kittens, and Vince smiled as he watched the kid wiggling his fingers through the bars on the cage to get the kittens to play. Meanwhile, the solid-black mother cat decided that her babies were safe and went to sleep in the corner.
“Can I help you?” a female voice asked behind them. Vince turned to see a pretty girl who had to be in her summer between high school and college. Her name tag said she was Lisa, a volunteer.
Vince smiled and shrugged. “We’re looking for some barn cats. I have a stable where mice have taken a liking to our horse feed.”
Lisa returned the smile. “Great job for cats. How many were you thinking of?”
“Would we be able to take this whole group?” Dustin asked, motioning to the mother cat and the kittens he was playing with.
She smiled again and looked back at Vince to answer. “I’m sure that would be all right. The kittens are old enough. We would just require that you have them all spayed and neutered at the appropriate time.”
Vince nodded. “We can do that. We don’t need a breeding population, just a few at a time to keep the mice at bay.”
“Well then,” she said, still smiling and tilting her head to get her light-blonde hair away from her eyes, “we can get the paperwork signed. Your friend can stay and play if he wants.”
Vince shrugged. “Sure.”
As he walked away, he heard Dustin snort and didn’t understand what it was for. The kid seemed perfectly happy to play with the kittens, though.
Lisa seemed overly friendly as she explained all about caring for the kittens if they were going to be living in the barn, when they and the mother should be spayed and neutered, and what the adoption contract entailed. Her boss—an overweight woman his father’s age—was there the whole time, Vince assumed to make sure she told him everything he needed to know, and rolled her eyes several times during the conversation. Finally, he signed his name on the contract and returned to Dustin with both women, who loaded the cats into a large travel carrier that he had been convinced to purchase by the ever-smiling Lisa.
They loaded the carrier into the backseat of the truck, where Dustin chose to sit to keep the cats company. It didn’t stop them from meowing, and even Vince had to admit it was both a cute and a sad sound.
“So did you get Lisa’s number?” Dustin asked as they started pulling out of the parking lot.
Vince glanced in the rearview mirror to see that his friend was grinning. “Yeah, actually. She said I could call if I had any questions.”
Dustin burst out laughing, and Vince suddenly felt very confused and like he should be embarrassed about something. “What’s so funny?” he demanded.
“Other than the fact that you’re too blind to know when someone is flirting with you?” Dustin replied, still laughing.
“No she wasn’t,” Vince argued. “She was just being friendly.”
“Well,” Dustin pointed out, “she wasn’t exactly friendly to me. She told me to stay with the cats while she took you away.”
Vince cleared his throat. “Maybe, I guess. I must be pretty socially clueless.”
“Yeah, a little,” Dustin told him, and he definitely sounded like he was teasing.
For a minute, the only sound in the truck was that of the crying kittens, because Vince had no idea how to respond to that comment, even as true as it was.
Finally, in an attempt to spark some sort of conversation, he said, “Thanks for picking the cats. I’m sure they’ll be helpful. We’ll still have the Chris problem, but the mice won’t be his allies anymore.”
Dustin chuckled. “Yeah, that’s true.”
“It’ll be fun to watch the babies grow up, too,” Vince added.
“Yeah, it would be,” Dustin agreed quietly.
Vince frowned and glanced back at him quickly. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, it would be fun if I was around to see it,” Dustin replied, still quiet.
“Why wouldn’t you be?” Vince questioned.
Dustin was quiet a moment before answering. “I don’t know. I mean, it’s not guaranteed that I’ll be staying. Your dad said I had a job until the end of the summer, then we’d see.”
“My dad isn’t going to fire you,” Vince declared. “He wouldn’t have given you Justin if he had any doubts. Plus you’re a great worker. Sure, you can’t do everything because you’re just not that experienced. That doesn’t mean you’re a poor employee, it just means you need to get more experience. Which working will give you.”
Dustin didn’t respond, and when Vince glanced back at him, he saw Dustin just looking at the box of cats. He frowned again and looked back to the road.
Chapter Sixteen
IN THE next couple of days, Vince started wondering more and more if Dustin might actually leave, even if Wes didn’t decide to let him go. The fact that he had such a bond with Justin strongly suggested that he wouldn’t choose to leave if he could stay, but there was still a nagging voice in the back of his mind warning him that it might happen.
The most terrifying part of the whole thing was when he watched Dustin wandering in the pastures among the horses and realized that Jane was right.
He wanted Dustin to stay around. And he couldn’t lie to himself enough to say that it was only because Dustin was his best friend besides Jane or that he was one of the best hands they had. The feelings he found that day were far beyond the realms of friendship, and he fled immediately to Xander’s pasture, where he lay down in the grass and let Xander graze around him. When that didn’t help, he took Xander by the halter to the fence and climbed onto his back. He lay there, looking at the sky, until Anna found him and informed him that he should wear sunscreen when he decided to take a nap on a horse’s back. He really wished he’d thought of that when he looked at himself in the mirror later.
Before he got into bed that night, he picked up the box on his nightstand that held the ring he had purchased for Jane. The ring she had rejected when she had forced him to face reality. He opened the box and stared at the shiny silver band and the glittering diamond. With his other hand, he picked up his cell phone and hit her number on his speed dial.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, her voice sleepy.
He took a shaky breath. “Tell me how to act normal around someone on a daily basis after you realize you feel something for him and you can’t cope with a relationship yet.”
“Vince,” she said quietly. “You don’t want to do that.”
“Yes,” he replied, gripping his phone tightly, “I do.”
“Is this who I think it is?”
“Goddamnit, Jane!” he practically yelled. He pulled the phone away from his ear and hung up, then turned his phone off and threw it as hard as he could onto his bed, followed by the ring box. He sat down heavily on the mattress and went to rub his hands over his face, until the pain of his sunburn stopped him and he decided to attempt forcing himself to sleep.
SOMEHOW, VINCE managed to sleep fairly well that night and woke up feeling pretty good. Until the panic and fear set in about ten seconds after he opened his eyes. He grabbed his phone and turned it back on. There was one missed call from Jane from the night before and a text.
I’m sorry, Vince. Let me come talk to you.
He sighed and replied, I’m going to the mall at 11. Meet me at Starbucks.
Instead of waiting for a reply, he got out of bed and headed to the bathroom. After taking
a cold shower with the sole—and failed—goal to clear his mind, he dressed and went straight to the barn to feed Xander. He felt like he was avoiding everyone there, but he was in no mood for social interaction, especially if it was Dustin who tried to talk to him. But no one did, and Vince heaved a sigh of relief as he walked back to his house a short time later.
At eleven, he walked into the mall, clutching the engagement ring he’d purchased for Jane and the receipt he had kept just in case.
The woman working that morning smiled at him from behind the bright glass counter filled with glittering jewelry in all forms, from rings to bracelets to necklaces and earrings. “Can I help you?” she asked cheerily.
He placed the ring box and receipt on the counter. “I need to return this.”
She took the box and opened it, then smiled sadly. “That’s too bad. You’re sure you don’t want to keep it for the next one? Or you’d rather pick one out specifically for her later?”
“That one won’t work for ‘next time,’” he replied, stuffing his hands into his jeans pockets. “It won’t be the right style.”
She looked puzzled, but smiled anyway. “That’s all right. I’ll get this all taken care of.”
At eleven thirty, Vince met Jane at Starbucks, where she insisted on buying his coffee.
“Tell me what happened,” she began as they sat down in the most secluded part of the cafe.
He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t know,” he stated. “I just started thinking about how he might be leaving.”
“And you don’t want him to.”
Vince nodded and took a sip of coffee.
“And it’s more than that he’s your friend and employee?”
He sighed. “Yeah.”
“When did you come to this conclusion?” she asked, watching him curiously as he drank more coffee.
By Chance Page 9