Chapter 1
Riley’s plane landed smoothly. He had done some initial research on the plane, checking into the waterfront pub, confirming ownership, even glancing at its current market value.
Impressive. The Beltran family owned a nice asset on the Willamette River area of Portland, Oregon.
Granted, they were rich by many standards, but they were nowhere as rich as the Montoya family, Gail’s parents.
Or at least that was the way it looked on the outside.
He also checked into Montoya Ltd, Gail’s father’s business, finding the website decidedly vague. Figures. Riley even checked into Peter, her fiancé. His family seemed to be venture capitalists, or so their website said. Riley sighed. He would have to do further research later.
By the time he exited the airport, he wondered whether his brother remembered he was coming in or had forgotten, as always. Riley should just grab a rental. As he headed toward the rent-a-car area, his phone buzzed, and he looked down to see a text from Jeremy, saying he was outside.
He smiled at that, tossed his duffel bag over his shoulder, and followed the crazy directions his brother had given as to where he was parked.
Riley finally found Jeremy, standing outside the truck that the two of them had rebuilt together many, many years ago.
As Riley neared him, he smiled, happy to see that his brother had taken care of it as well as he had.
Jeremy took one look, let out a bellow, then gave him a great big hug.
Honestly, it was damn good to see him too. When they finally separated, he grinned at Jeremy. “You look a lot better than I expected.”
Jeremy snorted and added, “You look a lot better than you deserve to.”
“Oh, I’m not arguing that,” Riley acknowledged. “It’s been a tough couple years.”
“You’re not kidding.” Jeremy eyed him slyly and noted, “Now, a part of me says you’re just coming back to confirm Gail’s getting married, but another part of me is hoping you already let all that go.”
Riley winced. “I did hear from Mom that Gail was getting married, but I don’t know if she told me as a Hey, just so you know kind of thing. I realize that Mom hasn’t forgiven either Gail or her family; but regardless I’m not sure I’m really ready to look at it. I’ll just have to see.”
“Well, I’m hoping you don’t because you know that whole family is messed up.”
“That much I do know,” Riley confirmed, “and you’re right. It would be absolutely foolish to get involved again.”
His brother groaned, staring at him, and shook his head. “But you’re still thinking about contacting her, aren’t you?”
Riley gave Jeremy a lopsided grin. “I might call her, you know, to wish her future happiness and all that,” he quipped, with a wave of his hand. “I’m not sure I’m up for anything other than that.”
“Ah, you say that, but,” Jeremy declared, “then you take one look at her, and it all goes straight out the window. You’ve been sweet on that girl forever.”
“Sure, but I also walked away from that girl a long time ago,” he pointed out.
“Uh-huh.”
Jeremy didn’t look convinced, but then it’s not as if Riley was doing a hell of a job convincing himself either.
He’d done nothing but think about what he’d shared with Kat and Badger before leaving, trying to figure out the truth of what he really felt.
“If nothing else,” Riley added, “it would do me good to see her and to get some closure on it all.”
“If that actually meant closure,” Jeremy pointed out, rolling his eyes, “I would be all for it, but that family is poison.”
Riley smiled at his brother, then tried to change the subject. “So, I hear you’re happily married now too.”
Jeremy shrugged. “Yeah, we got married in Vegas.” He gave him a bright grin.
“We weren’t going through any of that crap with family,” he declared.
“You and I both know that not a whole lot of people would show up anyway. Since you couldn’t come because of your injuries, we just decided to go get the job done. ”
“I’m all for that,” Riley confirmed, adding a smirk. “I’ve always loved Sandy. You know that.”
“I do know that,” he noted, “and I needed to get her locked down before you got back on your feet and stole her away from me.”
“Speaking of stealing away from you,” Riley began, “can I borrow this truck while I’m in town?”
“Of course,” Jeremy replied.
The two kibitzed back-and-forth with the same sibling rivalry they had kept alive for a very long time. As they got into the vehicle and drove out of the airport, Riley looked over at his brother and asked, “How is Mom doing?”
“She’s actually doing okay. She was pretty upset after you got hurt.
She always blamed herself, putting all kinds of guilt trips on anybody who would listen.
We finally got her calmed down, and I think she’s doing better now.
” He then glanced at his brother and asked, “What about you, Riley? How are you doing? That’s the real question. ”
He shrugged. “I’m okay. … It’s been an adjustment, but we do survive.”
“And that adjustment,” Jeremy noted, glancing at him, “I presume is that you’re missing part of a leg, and you have what? Some rods in your back or something?” he asked, frowning at him.
“Yeah, I’m missing a bunch of muscle on that thigh,” he added. “That’s the real pretty leg.”
Jeremy shook his head at that. “I don’t think the ladies give a shit,” he stated, “but I can see that, for you, it might be an issue.”
“No,” he countered, “because, if some woman had any issue along that line, I wouldn’t be with that lady in the first place.”
“Well, I am really glad to hear you say that,” Jeremy replied quietly, “because Gail might have been okay, but that bloody sister of hers—”
“That part of my life I am very glad is over with,” Riley interjected.
“And that father of theirs is one scary dude, especially when he thought you got his baby girl pregnant on the sly while dating her sister.”
“Yeah, well, his baby girl didn’t help me with her lies, did she?”
“No, she didn’t, but she did go off and marry the father of her child.
They are still married. I believe the daughter’s name is Sissy, or at least that’s what they call her.
” At Riley’s raised eyebrow, Jeremy added, “I just happened to see Debbie and Sissy in town one day. She didn’t see me, and I sure didn’t track her down to say hello. ”
“So glad to hear it.” Riley snorted. “If Debbie hadn’t been so terrified of her father, she wouldn’t have gotten me into that whole mess in the first place.”
“Or if she wasn’t so jealous of her sister,” Jeremy clarified.
Riley nodded. “Good point. I can’t blame everything on her though. That family is one messed-up unit, all the way around, with the exception of her grandmother.”
“And yet you’re still back home to see Gail,” Jeremy noted.
He gave his brother a shrug. “I get that everybody else probably doesn’t want me to see Gail at all. There’s no probably to it, but I still have to do some things myself—to help me heal from that injury too.”
His brother sighed. “Yeah, I figured as much. I was really hoping I could convince you to not even talk to her.”
Riley stared at him. “You and I both know that I need to resolve this, once and for all.”
He groaned. “Okay, fine. I’m just warning you. Her father won’t like it.”
“I know what you’re telling me, and I won’t be a fool about it.
” Yet Jeremy obviously didn’t really trust anything Riley was saying.
Riley smiled at him. “Look. I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life, and some of those mistakes have come around to bite me in the ass many, many times,” he admitted, as Jeremy nodded vehemently.
“This time, I just want to confirm that everything I lost back then is truly lost.”
Jeremy shook his head, frowning. “She’s not going to say, Oh, thank God, you came back to me. She’s going to say something like, If you had really cared for me, you would have come back years ago.”
“Yeah, well, she also told me to get lost years ago,” Riley admitted, “and her other words were far less than kind.”
“But, then again, she also thought you had cheated with her sister.”
“Yeah, instantly believed her sister over me.”
“Right. The fact that they’re all so petrified of their father and what he would say—or do—also explains an awful lot too.”
“It sure did.”
“You can always hope that they’ve grown up, I guess, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.”
“Yeah, there’s always that but in there,” Riley noted, staring at his brother.
“You and I both know the Montoya clan is not really good at growth.” Jeremy didn’t say anything to that, just shrugged.
Riley knew he would have to have this same conversation with his mother.
As he looked at his elder brother, Riley asked, “Have you had any contact with any of them?”
“Nope, sure haven’t. Neither has Mom. Her heart broke when all this happened because everybody blamed you for all the shit that went down,” Jeremy shared pointedly. “So, from her perspective, while it wasn’t as devastating as it was for you, it sure as hell wasn’t easy on her.”
Riley nodded, then changed the subject. “Do you know anything about the waterfront Beltran pub that does the tours downtown?”
“Yeah, of course. We used to go there until it became such a hot tourist trap. Now it’s more for the out-of-towners, not the locals.” Riley just nodded. “Why?” Jeremy asked him.
“Because somebody in that Beltran family applied for a War Dog,” he replied.
“Really? I don’t know anybody in that family who would need it.
” Then he stopped and clarified, “Although I don’t know that it’s a need, but Timmy Beltran always wanted a dog.
He’s in his early twenties, I think. He was in a really bad accident recently.
” He frowned. “I heard some talk about a dog going missing.”
“What kind of accident?” Riley asked.