25. No Glove, No Love
NO GLOVE, NO LOVE
Braxton
“Brax. Someone’s in the office for you.”
“Not a good time, Cyler. Can they come back?”
“She says she’ll wait. And that it’s urgent.”
I pull the phone back from my ear to look at the screen. One, Cyler doesn’t tell me when to come and go. He works for me… or, rather, us. But, two, my text tone is also dinging.
Cyler: Stuffed suit. Not happy you’re not ‘immediately available.’ Her words. Did what I could, but she won’t budge.
“How much time can you buy me?” I’m sure he can hear the sigh that pushes from my bone-deep weariness.
“Sure.” His response doesn’t actually reply to my question. “We know it’ll take a while to get here. Shit. Guessing it’ll take you nearly forty-five minutes from that fence.”
“That’s all you can buy me? Forty-five minutes?”
Scratching meets my ears, followed by, “Mr. Ranger is several minutes out. Can I get you some water? Coffee? Miss…”
I don’t hear her response, but notice a second text.
Cyler: Harriet Browning. She’s from the state.
“Shit. Be there as soon as I can.”
I take my hat off, swiping at my forehead and the sweat running down it, then stare at the phone one last time, wishing it had answers for me.
“Pop, got someone from the state at the office. Need to get there. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” I drop my phone into my breast pocket.
He doesn’t look up from the fence post. His wide-brimmed hat shields his face, but it bobs once so I know he’s heard and agreed. His overalls are dirty and his boots are gray with dust.
“Send Cyler in your place so we don’t lose the day.”
“Will do.”
Foot in the stirrup, I swing up onto Wandy, steadying my hat back on my head, and point my mare toward whatever trouble has befallen me today.
“Let’s go, sweet girl. Ya.”
“Come again?” I ask the woman in the ill-fitting polyester suit who just rocked my world.
“Mr. Ranger, I can see you’re surprised, but, frankly, your disbelief doesn’t negate your responsibility.”
I’m sure she keeps talking but I stand stock-still, hat in hand, in my office, wondering what the hell just happened. And that’s before the insult kicks in and ratchets up my anger.
“Pardon me.”
“I said—”
“I know what you said. It’s the insinuation I have a problem with. Do not talk to me about responsibility, Miss Browning. You know nothing of my responsibilities. You’re here for your job. Do your job, but leave the insults for someone else.”
She snaps her mouth closed and slits her eyes.
“Mr. Ranger—”
“Miss Browning,” I counter, holding her gaze until she averts her eyes. “Am I clear?”
Her curt nod moves not a hair in her tight-bunned head.
“So, what are our next steps?”
We discuss them before the woman with the broom shoved firmly up her ass pulls her small Chevy SUV from the gravel parking area in front of the office.
I drop my head, hand tugging firmly on my neck.
What in the fuck just happened? I look around the office.
Look around the ranch. The familiar logo of two stallions rearing up in a combative dance is as familiar as my last name.
This land has been in my family for four generations.
More than three thousand acres, more than ninety-nine thousand feet of fencing.
Stallions, mares, fillies, a few ponies, plenty of ranch hands.
And so much dirt. Lots with grass on it…
but with this drought and the hot Texas sun, much has been allowed to go fallow.
Because four square miles of real estate in Texas is expensive.
More so if you have to water it. Way too much if the horses aren’t bringing in what we need.
And all of it on my shoulders. Every last blade of grass. It all rests firmly on my shoulders—my responsibilities.
“What did you just say?” My dad might have grown six inches with the ire he shoots my way.
“Pop—”
“Boy, I asked you a question.”
“And, all due respect, Sir, I’m telling you what I know.”
“Braxton Paul Ranger.”
Oh, Lord, here we go. He’s using my full name. This lecture may never end.
“From the time you were eleven and started pulling on that wiener, I told you. I told you to be careful. Told you to be smart. I said—”
“Pop, almost thirty-seven years old, remember? I know what you said. I followed what you said. Not loving having this conversation with you either, for the record. But what’s done is done and if Colt is mine…”
The sentence just hangs there. This is not a conversation I want to be having with Pop.
Our fence-mending is long since forgotten.
Cyler is back at the office. My foreman is great at what he does, and I appreciate the privacy he’s given me twice today—first with the lady from CPS and again for this moment with my dad.
“Colt?”
“Colt Emerick Ranger.”
“She gave him our last name?”
“Apparently.”
“What do you know about him? Are you sure he’s yours? Is she after something?”
“Nothing, Pop. Nothing. Six months old and healthy. CPS took a hair sample and a buccal swab. If the hair is a match, he’s mine. His mom was Emerson Carrington of Highland Park.”
“Wait. His mom was… as in, she’s dead?”
I scrub a hand down my face. A one-night stand—well, a two-night stand, since I spent way too long playing and flirting and fucking—with a woman whose last name I didn’t know until today.
Call me a manwhore. Call me a bastard.
But, fuck, she was beautiful and now…
Well, now this.
“Car accident.” I pause and look him dead in the eyes. “Pop, her family wants to contest custody. They have money and they want the baby.”
Pop stands a little straighter, like someone’s poked him in challenge. “You think they’ll try to take him from us?”
There’s the man I know and love. “From us, huh? You decided he’s mine and needs your protection?”
“Fuck if I know. But if he’s yours—”
“If he’s mine… We’ll know in forty-eight hours.”
“What are you going to tell your brothers?”
“I don’t know.”
“And Brighton?”
“Same.”
“What about—”
“Pop!” I groan. “I know nothing. Next to nothing. In two days, we’ll know something, but until then, we work on this fence.
We keep on keeping on. And, if by some chance, Colt has my last name but not my DNA, you can lecture me on condoms and safe sex and make all the ‘wrap it before you tap it’ comments you want. ”
“No glove, no love.”
“Pop!”
But his laugh is a welcome sound. “You ready for this?”
“Not even remotely.”