Chapter Thirteen – Dead Set
Chapter Thirteen
Sadie
DEAD SET
Performed by Max McNown
The smiling, charming Rafe who’d watched his daughter and flirted with me had been almost more entrancing than the broody bar owner I’d first met. I regretted that mentioning Lauren and the work I saw her doing with no help—not from her brother or from her child’s father—had closed him down like a book shutting, and yet I could read the cover. The tight muscles of his shoulders and hard line of his jaw made it very clear it wasn’t my business. I might not know what had happened in order for Lauren to wind up married to his brother after having given birth to Rafe’s child, but I could see it had left wounds behind. Ones that would be hard to heal if you had to face them every time you wanted to see your daughter.
For a brief moment, I’d thought maybe he’d try to win Lauren back, but he'd asked me twice now to come to his bed, and somehow, I doubted he’d do that here if he intended to woo Lauren back. And the tension between them yesterday had not shown any indication of easing. So I knew the hot and cold he’d sent my way didn’t have anything to do with her. It had everything to do with seeing me with Lorenzo.
After going to my room last night, I’d tossed and turned rather than slept. The lingering need he’d ignited had never drifted away even though I’d tried, once again, to shake it on my own. It had been my rampant curiosity as much as the lust that had kept me awake. I’d tried to make sense of all the pieces of the story I’d garnered about Rafe, his daughter, Adam, and the ranch without much success. There was still too much of their history I hadn’t been told. How Lorenzo fit was an even bigger unknown.
But it wasn’t the mystery of their pasts that was the last thing I’d thought about before I’d fallen asleep. It was that feeling I’d had by the waterfall of fate, so when I did finally drift off, I dreamed of laughing wee folk. They pulled strings on me like a puppet, making me dance around Rafe in a bluebell-studded field, and I’d woken with the word forever rolling from my tongue in a forbidden whisper that had sent my heart racing.
Rafe walking up to the corral in jeans, cowboy boots, and a hat this morning had spiked my pulse all over again. He’d looked damned good, almost better than he’d looked in his handmade suit. It made me want to peel back his layers and understand what had turned the farm boy into a multi-million-dollar business man. It made me want to show up in the cabin he’d said he was staying at just to get answers.
We walked through the back door of the castle-like house after watching Fallon and left our boots and hats in the mudroom. I felt his gaze on me the entire time, trailing after me as I made my way down the hall to the enormous kitchen, but he didn’t say a word. Knowing he was saving them all for tonight only made my blood pressure spike more.
The dark cabinets and older appliances in the kitchen screamed of a 1990s remodel, but it was large enough that, with some slight changes, it could be used as a restaurant kitchen. The addition Ryder had added on to our farmhouse had a large hall with oversized bench tables perfect for the family-style bowls of food we served, but the Harringtons’ formal dining room, with its mahogany table and gilded mirrors, could easily accommodate a buffet that would meet their needs. Or perhaps they could use the old bunkhouse mess hall.
I was surprised to find Lauren had a full, hot breakfast on the table with scrambled eggs, bacon, grilled tomatoes, and avocado toast. No grits, but there were country potatoes instead, reminding me that we weren’t in the South but rather in California.
“You didn’t need to do all this,” Rafe grunted out. “Each of us could have found something on our own.”
She hardly acknowledged him, stacking dishes she’d already used in a large dishwasher. “I wanted Sadie’s opinion on the breakfast. Do your guests order off a menu, or do you serve buffet style?”
“All our meals are served family style. Large bowls and platters on long tables in the restaurant with multiple families at each one. But the guests can also order room service until about ten o’clock or so. We set up picnic lunches and sack lunches for those who will be out exploring during the day. We find most of the guests want the full experience though, and they like coming to the restaurant and feeling like they’re part of the ranch.”
Fallon and Adam joined us, and an awkward silence settled down while everyone ate. Adam had set a folder down on the table when he’d first entered, and he slid it toward Rafe. “Here’s Spence’s login information. Take a look through the accounts, and let me know what you have questions about. Should be fairly straightforward. I imagine your books for Marquess Enterprises are a lot more complicated.”
Rafe didn’t take the folder, but his gaze lingered on Adam’s for a moment with something a lot like suspicion before he slid it behind his blank facade. Fallon watched the exchange with skepticism that mirrored her father’s, but Lauren seemed oblivious to it. Everything about the silent conversations added more questions to the pile that had kept me up at night.
“I’ll be out in the alfalfa fields this morning, baling,” Lauren said, looking at Fallon. “I’ll need you to take care of getting the horses fed and exercised.”
“I already started before I came in,” Fallon responded without even a blink.
When I was her age, I’d despised doing chores on the ranch. It had felt like it ate away at all my free time, and I’d been jealous of my friends who lived in town and got to play their way through their weekends and school holidays. Fallon didn’t look like she cared, and I wondered just how much responsibility she’d been given now that Spence had died. How much had she picked up right along with her mother?
Adam didn’t seem obligated to help either of them, and Rafe’s jaw was stiff again, as if he was biting his tongue not to intercede.
“If you give me a list of things to do, I can help,” I offered.
“Yesterday, we mostly talked about our weddings, and we have so little of your time, so I’d really rather you work through the details of your ranch’s conversion with Adam,” Lauren said.
“I can do both. I’ll leave Adam all the information Ryder sent me with, and he can go through it while I work on some of the chores this morning. After lunch, I can answer any questions he has.” When Lauren hesitated, I smiled at her and said, “Seriously, my family would tell you it’s best to put me to work. Otherwise, I get up to all sorts of mischief. Idle hands and all that.”
She looked hesitant but said, “If you could help Fallon, that would be great. Her instructor is coming this afternoon for her trick riding lessons, and I want to make sure she’s done before then.”
“Why aren’t Kurt and Teddy doing the baling?” Rafe asked tersely.
Lauren flushed. “We had to let them go last year.”
“They were here when I came for the funeral.”
“They were just helping out because of what had happened, pitching in like our community always does,” Lauren’s voice got small and pained.
“So, how many people do you actually have left working on the ranch?” he demanded.
A tense silence filled the air until Fallon answered, “No one full-time.”
“No one?” Rafe’s voice held astonishment and a hint of frustration.
“It’s cheaper and easier to bring them in for one-off jobs. We’ll have staff on hand to help out while we focus on the wedding, but we can’t keep them year-round and pay all the employee benefits. Adam suggested the contract work last year, and it’s worked out for us,” Lauren explained.
“Has it,” Rafe said, and you could hear in his tone that he didn’t agree. “And how’s that working out for Teddy and Kurt and the others? Do they even have health insurance now? How are their families getting by in between the jobs they do for you?”
Adam dropped his napkin. “Don’t act like you care about us or any of them, Rafe. This community has done what it needed to do to keep everyone afloat. Kurt has a job in town bartending. Teddy works out at the national park.”
Rafe ignored Adam and looked at Lauren. “So who’s helping you bale today?”
“I don’t need help. The machines do it all,” Lauren said.
Rafe’s gaze narrowed. “Cut the crap, Lauren. One person can do it all, but it’s easier to have at least two working it.”
She didn’t say anything. Instead, she got up and started cleaning up the kitchen.
“Why aren’t you helping?” Rafe addressed the question toward Adam. His cheeks flushed, and the hand that reached for his coffee cup actually shook.
“You know I’m allergic to alfalfa,” he said. “I’m loaded up on meds as it is during harvest with the wind blowing pollen all over the place.”
That explained his red eyes and runny nose, but I couldn’t help but think his tone was a tad bit too defensive and whiny. It made me like the guy just a hair less. I understood allergies could be deadly, even something seemingly as simple as hay fever could cause a person’s lungs to close. But to my ears, that wasn’t what kept Adam away. He simply didn’t like the work.
Farm labor was dirty and hard. You had to truly love the land and the life it provided you to continue to do it day after day, year after year. My dad and Ryder would never stop working the ranch. While I didn’t mind lending a hand here and there, I certainly didn’t want to do it as my job every single day. Just like I wasn’t sure I wanted to sling pints across a bar top every night. But I preferred spending my time at the bar more than cleaning rooms or stalls at the ranch.
Still, I did all of it whenever my family needed me. I’d never leave them short-handed.
I’d never leave Ryder alone baling hay. It was dangerous, even if it was doable.
I scraped my plate clean then rose to help Lauren clean up. In my family, if you cooked, you weren’t allowed to cleanup.
In the strained silence that had settled in the room, Rafe’s deep voice sounded like a gunshot. “Fine. I’ll help.”
Lauren whipped around to stare at him from the sink. “What? No.” She shook her head. “Spence would hate that.”
“Last I checked, Spence was dead and didn’t have a say.”
It wounded her. Fallon gasped. Even I felt like I should snap at him for being so harsh.
He didn’t wait for anyone to say anything. He just stormed out of the kitchen.
“You know it isn’t a good idea to have him here,” Adam said dryly.
“Like I have a choice!” Lauren bit back.
When I looked across at Fallon, she was staring down at her plate as if she wanted to cry. No sight of the girl who’d danced on a horse’s back just minutes ago with a vivacious energy all but beaming from her. This one looked as if she’d slowly withdrawn, making herself as small as possible.
The air in the kitchen had already been tense, and it grew now until it felt like it was an actual entity. As if suddenly realizing they had an outsider watching the exchange, Adam shot a smile my way. It was friendly and full of a charm I might have been taken in by if I hadn’t witnessed everything else. “Sorry to let our family drama ruin your day, Sadie, but you can probably tell how important the information you’ve brought is to us.” He wasn’t just talking about the ranch’s conversion but about the jewels.
I didn’t know how to respond and wasn’t sure I could because my heart was in my throat. So, I simply nodded. Sympathy and compassion welled inside me for Fallon. For Rafe. For all of them caught in this limbo of pain and betrayal and loss.
Fallon brought her dishes over, set them in the dishwasher, and then left the kitchen as if she was a ghost floating on light feet. Neither Lauren nor Adam even acknowledged her as she disappeared down the hall. My sympathy disappeared in a surge of anger on the teen’s behalf.
Even when things had been tight growing up, even when there’d been the threat of having to sell off the land lingering over our heads, my parents had never argued about it at our kitchen table. We’d always been a family at mealtimes—siblings razzing each other, and Mama and Daddy asking about our day. We’d had all of their attention. Their kids had always been their priority, even over the ranch, and we’d known it.
I finished helping Lauren clean because I felt like I had to after I’d started, but I made quick work of it. I ran upstairs and got all the documents Ryder had sent with me and left them in the office on Adam’s desk before heading back out to the outbuildings.
I found Fallon cleaning water troughs. She’d exchanged her vibrant pink hat and boots for worn tan ones that look like they’d seen better days.
I dove in without asking, filling feedbags and mucking stalls.
“You shouldn’t have to help,” Fallon finally said. “You’re our guest.”
I leaned on the handle of the pitchfork I was using, tipped my hat back, and smiled at her. “The good thing about opening a dude ranch was finding some people actually want to experience the work firsthand. You’re charging them to clean stalls for you.”
Fallon’s mouth dropped. “No one really signs up to do the work, do they?”
“Not a lot. And even less now that we’ve built a reputation for having plenty of first-rate outdoor experiences, but you’d be surprised.”
We worked in silence for a few minutes before Fallon asked with an almost breathless hope, “Do you think it would work here? Do you really think we’d be able to keep the ranch if we made it a resort?”
I wanted to tell her yes, just because she seemed so desperate, but instead I told her the truth. “I don’t know. It saved us, but every ranch has a different cost base, and I’d say things are a lot more expensive here in California than where we’re at. It also means you might be able to charge more though. In truth, my brother worked all the numbers and figured out just what we could afford to invest in order to make it profitable. I just did some of the grunt work. And now, I’m pretty hands-off as I spend most of my time running the family bar.”
Fallon snorted. “Is that how you met Dad? Because you’re both in the bar business?”
“Is he? I mean, I know he owns The Fortress, but I guess I don’t know much else about his business.”
“You knew enough to be in the penthouse Sunday night. I saw you leave.”
She was staring at me, and I met her gaze with my own, trying not to blush, wondering what I’d looked like storming out with my tail between my legs and fury trailing behind me.
“I didn’t know you saw me.”
“I wasn’t sure it was you yesterday, and I didn’t get why Dad was freaking out. But this morning, when I saw him next to you at the corral, it clicked. Did you have a fight before I got there?”
Definitely not fighting, but I willed myself not to blush. As I teased Gemma all the time, there was nothing wrong with sex, engaging in it, enjoying it. Nothing wrong with talking about it, but not with a teenager who wasn’t mine.
“No. We’d just started to get to know each other, and when you showed up, he wanted you to be his focus.” Her eyes went wide. “Then, there was a misunderstanding when he saw me the next day.”
“Dad can be cold and hard at times, but I’ve never seen him as icy as he was with you when we got here, so I thought you’d fought. But then this morning…” She trailed off, and it was her turn to be embarrassed. Her cheeks, already flushed from working hard in a barn that was nearing eighty degrees, turned even more heated. “He seemed to like you.”
“It’s complicated,” I told her.
“I’ve never seen Dad with anyone,” she said with a careless shrug, turning back to her task. “I actually thought maybe his heart was made of stone.”
That hit me solid in the gut. Not only the fact he’d never brought another woman around her but that she wasn’t sure he could love at all. Feel anything. I’d been on the receiving end of multiple emotions with Rafe. Passion. Anger. Disappointment. Even charm and laughter.
“I can see he loves you,” I said softly.
She looked up and then away. “Yeah. It’s easy to pretend when you only see someone for a few days here and there.”
“I don’t think it’s a pretense.”
She shrugged. “If he really loved me, he’d do whatever he could to let me stay here. He wouldn’t threaten to sell my home out from under my feet. What am I supposed to do with Daisy if I have to move to the Hurly house? Or worse, if I have to go live with him in Las Vegas?” She threw a hand toward the buckskin’s stall. “He wants to sell all the horses. I can’t lose her too...” her voice cracked, but she caught herself. Anger took over, pushing away the threat of tears. “And all my friends are here. Everything I love is right here in Rivers. The last thing I want is to go live in some cold penthouse in a casino and go to school with a thousand other kids whose parents work in Sin City.”
I didn’t miss the fact she’d said everything she loved was here, but that her dad didn’t live in Rivers. And I felt sorry for Rafe all over again, for all of them, but especially this girl who’d been raised in the middle of some strange-ass dynamic that included an uncle as a father and a dad as a weekend-warrior parent.
It wasn’t my place to fix any of it. I was here for a handful of days, and then I’d be gone, but I found myself wanting to. I wanted to leave them in better shape than I’d found them. Wanted to soothe and heal and somehow see them wind up as a family again.
I had the means in my hands of giving them some of what they needed to turn their lives around. I could hand over the jewels without telling the insurance company, or even my family, that I’d done it. If anyone ever asked about the costume jewelry again, I could just say I’d sent it off to Goodwill with the rest of Great-grandma Carolyn’s movie props. Someone might be disappointed, but they’d never miss it. The money could help the Harringtons turn things around. It would give this girl what she said she wanted most. But I had this uneasy feeling that until I learned more, I shouldn’t make any rash decisions. And the truth was, handing over the jewels wouldn’t give Fallon what she really needed, which was to feel loved and wanted. She needed a place in the family that wasn’t the crack breaking it apart but the one welding it together.