Chapter Twelve
H e should have known. It was a quiet Sunday, her husband was buried here—he shouldn’t have been at all surprised she had come here. She certainly loved her husband enough to do so, even after several years. And, knowing what he now knew about her, he shouldn’t have been surprised that she’d pay a visit to the old guard, as he thought of them, before she left.
Maybe she came here every Sunday, and he’d just missed her before. Because this was his routine, a stop at the range—after a stop at Kolaches Bakery in town for Mike’s favorite cinnamon rolls—a practice session, then some coffee with Mike and Scott, then, on his way back to his isolated, quiet house, a stop here to visit the cemetery. More than once he’d been told it was a morbid habit, but he thought of it as a historical one, since he had no blood family buried here. Or anywhere else, for that matter, that he knew of.
No family that had wanted him, anyway.
But Bud was here, and that was enough. Bud Dailey, the man who had, in essence saved him. Who’d given him a path, and the training to walk it. And who, in the end, had given him more than any blood family could have, a life he actually wanted to live.
But none of this explained why or how he’d known that the person he could see in the distance, far from where he’d parked, that slender woman in the long shirt over those leg-hugging things that made his pulse kick up, that woman who was too far away for him to see her face, was Tris.
Yet he had known. Been certain.
He’d known in time to leave without being seen. In time to avoid any contact with her at all. But he’d come over here anyway.
He was noticing a definite theme. Whenever Trista Thorpe Carhart was around his logic, common sense, and self-control seemed to vanish. And not necessarily in that order.
But even noticing that, he hadn’t been able to stop himself when she’d started toward him. As if he’d been roped by some rodeo star, he’d done the same, moved toward that vision up ahead, with her burnished hair and those bottomless blue eyes made so famous by her brother.
And he was thankful she had spoken first, even if it was about the weather, since opening words were apparently not a menu choice for him today. With her, anyway.
And they would be proud to have a man like you stand as they stood.
She’d stunned him speechless with that one. But he couldn’t help smiling. That anybody thought that of him was a prize, for Tris to not only think it but say it was a treasure.
The feeling that gave him enabled him to ask, “Do you always come back here to the originals, when you’re here?”
Her eyes widened as she looked at him. “That’s exactly what I call this, the originals section.”
Of course you do. He chalked up yet another instance of them thinking almost exactly alike. Maybe someday it wouldn’t totally disconcert him.
Quit thinking like this is going to continue. It can’t. And the reason why is buried here in this cemetery.
“Do you…feel better, after you’ve visited him here?” He didn’t clarify who he meant, knew he didn’t have to.
“Not really,” she said. “If I want to feel close to him, I go to the school. It’s like he’s in every wall of the new section. So, I don’t come here very often.” She gave him an odd look. “I’m not really sure why I felt I needed to come today. But I did. And here you are.”
He drew back slightly. She’d said that as if she’d expected him to be here. Or at least, like she’d thought he might be. But she had no way of knowing this was a regular stop for him—it had never come up. They’d talked about many things, but certainly not visiting the Last Stand cemetery.
Surely she must have just been referring to the coincidence of them once again being in the same place at the same time. That explanation calmed him a bit, but then she blew that to bits.
“I was going to stop at Java Time on the way back home. Care to join me?”
No. No, I can’t. Shouldn’t. Won’t.
What came out was, “I’d like that.”
And so he found himself, a bare fifteen minutes later, sitting in the local coffee shop drinking the strongest black they had while Tris sipped on a creamy, frothy thing that looked more like a dessert than the caffeine deliverance system coffee was to him. So they weren’t alike in everything.
He should be relieved by that, but he was too tangled up in realizing he’d apparently been tracking the ways in which they were alike.
Feeling a little like a wary horse who wasn’t sure just how scared he should be of this new, big thing that seemed to be closing in on him, he watched her take a long sip of her warm drink before he spoke.
“Planned your next excursion yet?” So I can be sure to be elsewhere…
She gave him a delighted smile. “I talked to Jackson, and he loved the idea of taking Jeremy to the Apollo Mission Control Center. He may even go himself, if we can keep it quiet.”
That shook him out of his self-centered thoughts. What must it be like, to have to even think like that? Wonder if you could or should go somewhere with your own sister and son, because your presence might cause an uproar?
“You should come with us, since it was your idea.”
He managed not to choke on his swallow of coffee. Barely. “I…no, it’s your family. You don’t want a stranger horning in.”
“Stranger? You’re not a stranger, Logan. To Jackson, to Jeremy, to any of us.” She gave him a long, steady look that was somehow unsettling. “Nor,” she added softly, “are you strange.”
As clearly as a photograph the memory snapped into his mind, of the day he’d admitted some people found his fascination with the past strange. He’d felt safe saying it to her, knowing she had a bit of that herself.
You know what they say about people who don’t learn from history…
Yeah, they’re destined to repeat it. And the first thought that barreled into his head now was that his history with women he dared to let himself care about was not something he wanted to repeat. Ever.
Not even with a woman who seemed to already know him well enough to guess what that “Nor are you strange” statement would mean to him.
By a few days later, he’d successfully put the tempting offer to accompany them out of his mind. But the moment he realized he’d made a promise to go back and recheck the Baylor horse with the flat foot problem and make sure the raised shoe was working, it all came roaring back. Even if he didn’t see Jeremy, he’d know the boy, Tris’s nephew, was there, and that was all it took.
But a promise was a promise, so he loaded up what he’d need if it turned out the animal needed the extra padding he and Richard had talked about and headed out there.
The horse was doing fine, and he thought he was going to skate when Jeremy bolted out the front door of the main house and ran toward him. A large golden retriever bounded along behind him. He remembered hearing something about the dog having belonged to a friend of Chance Rafferty, and that the animal had tracked Jeremy down when he’d been lost in that thunderstorm.
“Mr. Logan! Are you coming with us this weekend? It’s going to be so cool, and Aunt Tris said it was all your idea, and even Dad’s going to come, but you know how to get there so you have to come, right?”
He’d swear the boy hadn’t even taken a breath during the outpouring. He tried to think of a way out that wouldn’t dull the child’s enthusiasm. “It’s going to be a family thing, Jeremy. I’m not family.”
“Neither’s Uncle T, but he’d come. Dad says the family you build yourself is better sometimes. Except for Aunt Tris, a’course.”
The family you choose. So much for those who thought all actors lived only on the surface, pretending in life as they did in front of a camera. Just as with his sister, there was wisdom in Jackson Thorpe.
On the thought he heard the familiar voice from behind him. “He’s right, you know,” Jackson said. “It was your idea, and a good one, so you should come.” He reached out and tousled his son’s hair. “Besides, then the adults will really outnumber this guy, and that’s a good thing.”
“Aw, Dad,” Jeremy protested, but he was grinning almost proudly.
Logan had only seen the boy a couple of times back when they’d first abandoned Hollywood for the Hill Country. But now he saw him more often, and the change was obvious, even to him. Obvious, and remarkable.
“Tell him he has to come,” Jeremy ordered his father. Then, “C’mon, Maverick, let’s go!”
Boy and dog took off at a run, headed into the barn, no doubt toward Pie. The pony was still Jeremy’s favorite animal on the ranch, although Logan guessed the dog had already tied him in the boy’s affections.
“You heard him,” Jackson said, and Logan’s head snapped around to look at the famous face. He’d never been an avid TV watcher, preferring to read, but he’d watched a bit of Stonewall over the years it had been on. Enough that it struck him odd to be standing here looking at that face in person instead of on screen. And he remembered Nic’s disdain for the show and, as she called it, Hollywood fakery. And yet here stood the star, on her ranch, and from what he could tell solidly and probably permanently in her life.
Just proves you know jack about it, Fox.
“—like your idea of going from there to the tall ship, so it’ll be a long day.”
Logan blinked, tuned back in. “All in one day, yes, it’d be full.”
“It would help if you can drive once we hit Houston. Nic hates driving in cities, and I’m clueless there. GPS can only help so much, and it’s a pain in traffic in an unfamiliar place. So, thanks.”
Nic. He should have realized she’d be coming. The two of them were rarely apart for long these days from what he’d heard. And seen. Did that mean Tris wasn’t coming along? Despite her enthusiasm for the idea?
Belatedly, because of his distraction about Tris, he realized Jackson had said thanks. As if it were a done deal. Had he somewhere along the line, without realizing it, said yes?
“—and we’ll cover all the fees, so don’t worry about that. And you should probably have my phone number, and vice versa,” Jackson was saying now.
“I…sure,” Logan said, not sure either how he’d gotten into this or how to get out. His mouth quirked wryly as he thought of all the people out there, mostly women, who would love to have this man’s phone number.
Numbers exchanged, Jackson nodded. “I’ll let you know if anything changes. We’ll all meet up and leave from here in our full-sized SUV, so since her place is closer to yours than we are, Tris will come pick you up.”
Tris will come pick you up.
Now he’d done it.