by West, Dahlia
Caleb wandered over with a tall dark-haired woman on his arm. She was sleek and sharp, and for some reason Jonah got the impression she’d be hell in the ring. They were private investigators, the pair of them—that was the official story—but Jonah had heard the words ‘bounty hunter’ thrown around a few times in connection with Izzy Boucher’s name. She definitely looked the part, if nothing else.
“How’re the ribs?” Caleb asked him.
“Still healing.”
Caleb nodded. “Takes a while.”
“Hey,” Jonah said in hushed tones. “Did that guy live?”
Caleb’s jaw twitched and his gaze darkened. A long silence hung between them. Finally, Caleb said, “No. No, he didn’t.”
Before Jonah could ask any more questions, Sarah called out, “Food’s ready!” in a voice louder than any tiny woman should possess.
Everyone flocked to the picnic table where she brandished a large spoon, stirring chili in a crockpot.
“Oh, it looks good!” Sienna declared. “What’s the green?”
Sarah smiled. “Special ingredient.”
“Ebola,” Tex snorted.
Sarah kicked him in the shin and then turned back to Sienna. “Fresh cilantro. Picked it this morning from the garden.”
“Yummy,” Sienna declared and wandered off with her bowl.
Tex scowled at Sarah. “Witch.”
“Redneck,” she replied coolly and scooped Jonah a bowl of his own.
Jonah finished the chili in record time and dumped his bowl into the garbage. Behind him, he heard a rumble of disgruntled voices. He turned to see Adam and Hawk squaring off in the middle of the yard.
“I could rip your arm off, beat you with the bloody stump,” the giant Sioux growled.
Adam, rather than being intimidated, threw his head back and laughed. “That’s…the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”
Hawk took a menacing step forward. “You don’t think I can do it?” he asked, flexing his biceps.
“No, moron, you can’t!” Adam snapped. “Because the stump is the part of the shoulder where there’s no arm anymore! How can you beat me with a thing that’s still attached to me?”
Hawk’s jaw twitched. “I… Shut up!”
“Hawk!”
Heads turned as a little, tiny woman with a baby on her hip, and one more clearly on the way, pushed Dalton aside and stepped in between Hawk and Adam. She gave the Sioux a withering look.
Incredibly, the giant melted and hung his head.
“Go sit down,” the pixie ordered.
“But…”
“Go sit down,” she repeated.
Hawk’s shoulders slumped and he turned away but not before giving Adam a final shit-eating look.
“Enjoy your time-out!” Adam called, chuckling, then turned away himself…and nearly crashed into Calla. He froze, mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. “I…He…”
“Adam,” she snapped.
“He started it!” Adam cried.
Calla shook her head and Adam slunk away toward the opposite side of the yard.
The lines had clearly been drawn.
Jonah rolled his eyes at the two of them and wandered away, toward the house where there was some shade. Underneath the kitchen window, he leaned up against Tex’s house and watched the women talking, and the men possibly sharing fishing stories (or measuring other things with their hands stretched out wide). DJ, nestled in Zoey’s arms, was screeching excitedly as he watched Hope dash across the yard. Both kids seemed deliriously happy.
Above Jonah, Shooter’s voice drifted through the open window. “Thing is, over there—, Iraq, Afghanistan—it was pretty bad.”
“Seems like you’re keeping it together,” Pop pointed out.
Jonah frowned as he realized he could hear them.
“I am,” Shooter replied. “The woman is most of it.”
“The woman always is. I saw my share in Da Nang. More’n any one person should probably ever have to see. But I made it home, to her. And so did you.”
“I held a bad man’s life in my hands recently,” Jonah heard Shooter say. “Hate to admit it, but it was actually a difficult decision.”
Pop grunted. “It always is. Or at least it should be.”
“I’ve got medals,” Shooter told the old man. “Ones I probably don’t deserve. I’m not as proud of the things I’ve had to do here at home, though.”
Pop made a sympathetic noise. “Wars are easy. By comparison, I mean. No one pins a medal on your chest for what needs doing over here. And here, not everyone who needs killing does you the favor of wearing a uniform so you can easily suss them out. But when you do come across them, and it seems as though men like us always will, the best you can do is put him on his knees, look him in the eye, and tell him exactly why you’re pulling the trigger. Not for him, but for yourself.”
Jonah finally moved away from the house. He shouldn’t have listened; it felt too much like an invasion of privacy. Instead, he moved back to the yard, sought out Sienna, and wrapped his arms around her from behind. He kissed her on the side of her head.
She giggled and turned toward him. When she saw his face, though, she frowned. “Are you okay?”
He considered it, swallowed hard, and then nodded. “I am now.”
He smiled and she smiled back. “Good,” she replied.
Tildy appeared, looked peaked.
Sienna reached out her arms to the woman. “Here,” she offered, “let me take him.”
Tildy’s eyebrows shot up. “Really?”
“Oh, yeah. It’s not a problem. You look worn out. I can watch him.”
Tildy passed the baby boy over and rubbed her swollen belly. “Thanks. I’m starving, and I’m pooped.” She shot a look at the boy. “From poop.”
Sienna laughed and tucked the boy into her side. “Go eat. We’ll be right here.”
Tildy left in search of sustenance and Jonah watched Sienna cooing to the dark-haired boy who snatched gleefully at her hair and the collar of her shirt. When she caught him staring, her eyebrows raised. “What?”
Jonah shrugged, though he felt anything but nonchalant. “Nothing,” he said. “Just making a wish.”
Shooter and Pop emerged from the house and came back to the party. Both men were smiling, the burden apparently eased from their time together. Jonah realized that Pop could do that with everyone—anyone, really. He could look at you, see your problems in a way that you hadn’t before—or couldn’t—and then changed your perspective.
Perhaps that’s what Mom had seen in the gruff, stoic Marine she’d married. Mom saw the good, Pop saw the bad, but both of them cared for the person, in their own way.
“We should toast,” Shooter announced, picking up a Solo cup of Sarah’s sweet tea. He handed one to Pop as he spoke. “‘Cause we’re all here, all together.” He looked at the old man, and nodded at the cup. “You should do it, though, Lieutenant.”
Pop grunted but took the cup. “Now, I’m not big on speeches.”
Shooter shrugged. “Doesn’t have to be long. Just a little something.”
The old man stood up and lifted his cup to chest level and surveyed their small group. “Well, then. To family.”
Shooter grinned and clapped him on the shoulder. “Couldn’t have said it better myself, sir.”
Chapter Forty
Epilogue
Jonah Stark stepped out of the Lincoln Town Car, crushing the gravel under his leather boots. He moved out of the way, holding the door open for the other passengers. He closed it gently and sighed heavily. He wanted to go home, crawl into bed, but he had to be strong. He had a family to think about.
Ava approached and hugged him fiercely. He returned the sentiment, hoping his little sister was holding up well. Emilio appeared by her side and took over comforting her.
Sienna appeared, holding Noah in her arms. “Da!” Noah gurgled and reached for Jonah. Sienna held the boy back, though, and wiped a tear from her chee
k. Jonah smiled at them despite the circumstances. He smiled whenever he looked at them. He couldn’t help it.
She might have gotten pregnant the second time they’d been together, or even the third. But in the story of their lives, the way Jonah whispered it to Noah as he watched his son sleep, it was that first night. Their love for each other burned so brightly between them that it couldn’t be contained inside just two people. So, that night they’d made a third.
Adam opened the rear door of the hearse that had preceded them and turned to the rest of the family. “Are we ready?” he asked, and Dalton nodded slowly.
Calla and Zoey, holding their children, comforted each other while the four Stark children assembled around the old man’s coffin.
Ava moved across from Dalton, giving him a wan smile as she did. Adam placed himself across from Jonah and everyone grabbed a brass handle.
The coffin was well-made, light and beautiful. Smoothed and polished by hand—by Dalton’s own hands—and lined with silk that Zoey had sewn. In unison, the four Stark siblings lifted it and carried it to the open grave.
Emilio appeared again beside Ava, taking her hand. Their matching wedding rings twinkled in the bright summer sky. Jonah’s brother-in-law looked up and glared at the sky. “Seems like it ought to rain,” he said.
“Yeah,” Adam replied. “But it never does.”
Jonah took out a thin, white envelope and lifted the coffin’s lid one last time. Everyone murmured their final goodbyes as he slipped the letter inside and onto the chest of the only real father he’d ever known.
Adam nodded silently as he closed the lid. They’d made an agreement not to read Mom’s letter to Pop. A marriage, they agreed, needed secrets of its own. But Mom’s final sentiments would be buried with the man she loved, and Pop—wherever he was now—could always be comforted by her words.
Jonah stepped back and took his son in his arms, marveling, as always, at the weight of him and the smell of his hair. He touched the boy, in all the ways a father should, every time he saw him. A pat on the head, a squeeze of the shoulder, a hug.
Jonah was never sure who was more comforted by it, himself or Noah.
The pastor gave a fine service, or at least Jonah assumed so. He wasn’t really listening. He was saying a silent goodbye to the only father he’d ever really known, the only man who’d ever cared enough to take a chance on him. The man who’d turned a scared, messed-up kid into a man worthy of the family he had beside him.
“Pop-pop!” Noah whined and reached for the coffin. Jonah held him closer, drawing his wife under his arm as well.
“I know,” Jonah whispered against his son’s head. “Pop-pop’s gone. But we’ll see him again. We’ll all be together again. Someday. I promise.”
And it didn’t rain that day, but Noah’s head was damp just the same.
“Family always finds each other,” Jonah whispered to his son.
The End
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PREACHER
Jack "Preacher" Prior is at a crossroads -- literally. Left for dead in the Badlands, he's managed to survive. He's stolen a truck, but where can he go? Body broken, mind reeling from betrayal from his own MC brothers, he knows he won't last a day back in Rapid City in his current condition.
Two roads stretch out in front of him. One leads to the city and one deep into the black hills where no one knows him as the former President of the Badlands Buzzards. Revenge is not a question; it's an absolute. Preacher will get his due soon enough or die trying.
Erin Walker is at a crossroads of her own. Dealt a bad hand by being the daughter of Buck Walker, ex-Rodeo Champ, she's made her own way in the world without his help. She owns Thunder Ridge Ranch outright, and she's carved out a piece of paradise for herself with her own two hands. She's not giving it up without a fight, but she's alone in the world with no one to trust.
In Erin, Preacher finds something that doesn't exist in his own world: a smart, fierce independent woman who sets his blood on fire. For Erin, the mysterious man who threatens her life might very well be the only one who can save it.
Can Preacher put aside his desire for revenge against his old MC and accept what's in front of him: a woman who needs him and a future worth having? Erin knows in her heart that Preacher is a bad, dangerous man, but can she trust him anyway?
Not every choice is theirs to make, though, and in Rapid City the past never stays buried.
Coming Winter 2015!
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