Building Their Home (Valor Ridge Christmas)

Chapter 1

one

She’d told herself last night that if he called again, she’d go.

But here she was, driving toward a man she’d promised herself she’d forget, and a ranch that was more dream than reality at this point.

The sky looked like an empty slate, the mountains like smudges of charcoal against the polar white.

Most days, you could see the pale burn of the sun behind a lid of clouds, but not today.

It was dark and gloomy, and as Johanna Perrin nudged the old Subaru up the last quarter mile to the turnoff, she wondered if she should take the weather as a sign.

The ranch was easy to miss once you left the county road, nothing more than a rusted metal gate stretched between two posts, and a new wood sign with hand-burned lettering: VALOR RIDGE RANCH.

VETS WELCOME. There was no mailbox, just a black PVC pipe sticking up out of the snow, stuffed with rolled-up notices and coupons.

The gate stood open.

She sucked in a breath and turned onto the long driveway. It was caked in salt and ruts, a thin layer of ice glinting in the tracks, crackling under her tires.

God, what was she doing here? This was crazy.

She rolled the window down to clear her head. The air tasted like ice, woodsmoke, and pine resin. Seven degrees and dropping. Her breath stung her nostrils as she sucked in the fresh air.

The land was empty, broken only by the main house, a squat rectangle of blue siding and a sheet-metal roof, with other buildings set farther back. A barn and maybe a bunkhouse.

She pulled to a stop in front of the house and let the engine die. The silence afterward was so complete she thought she’d gone deaf. Nothing moved except a windrow of snow peeling across the fenceline. Johanna’s jaw ached from clenching it, but the rest of her felt hollowed out.

She couldn’t do this.

She couldn’t face him.

She should turn around.

The porch light came on, even though it was barely past noon, and the front door opened.

Too late.

No backing out now.

Walker Nash stepped out onto the porch, and, dammit, for a man approaching fifty, he still looked good.

He hadn’t changed much in the past five years.

Maybe a bit more gray at the temples and a few more lines around his eyes.

But that body—always tense like he was waiting for a sniper’s bullet—hadn’t softened a bit.

He was still all shoulders and square jaw, even under the battered Carhartt vest and a flannel that was obviously new.

Johanna’s last mental snapshot of him came from a hospital corridor five years ago, under artificial lights that made everyone look jaundiced and haggard. This light was barely better, so why did he look so damn good now?

He stood there, hands shoved deep in his vest pockets, holding himself like a man who would rather take a bullet than admit he needed anything.

She didn’t wave. He didn’t either.

Okay, she was here. She could do this.

She braced herself, popped open the door, and crunched across the crusted snow. Walker met her at the midpoint, where the drive gave way to the concrete slab leading to the porch.

“Hey,” he said. Same voice as always—low and rough as torn burlap—and it still had the same effect on her, setting a rabble of butterflies loose in her belly. “Thanks for coming, Jo.”

She nodded, not trusting herself to answer.

There were words she’d rehearsed all the way up—blunt, clinical, safe—but now they sounded useless.

There was a Tootsie Pop in his hand, and she was thrown back to the first time she’d seen him with one.

He’d come grudgingly to a support group she ran through Frontier Veterans Services, a non-profit for veterans the VA wouldn’t take.

He’d always had one in his cheek back then, said it kept him from returning to cigarettes.

“You… said there’s a veteran here in need of help,” she said finally.

Not for the first time, she wondered if that veteran was him. Was he in crisis? He didn’t appear to be.

Lonely, maybe.

And, yes, now that she was closer, she could still see some of that old burn of anger in his blue eyes. But he also seemed… calmer, somehow. More settled, like he’d finally found peace with his demons.

She hoped that was true. This man deserved peace more than most.

Walker nodded once. “Yeah, there is.” He stepped aside and held out an arm, indicating the house. “It’s cold.”

She didn’t move right away. She watched him for a second, trying to see the angry, wounded, unbearably beautiful man she’d known before, but there was only this new version—older, quieter, standing on the edge of an empty ranch like the last man left in Montana.

He looked tired. Had he slept at all since he called her, or had he just sat here, staring at the road, waiting for a car that might not come?

That almost hadn’t come.

Inside, the place was a work in progress.

The floors were unfinished pine, and in places the walls were ripped down to the studs.

The air smelled of burnt coffee and smoke from the woodstove.

There were no pictures on the walls that were still standing, only a paper calendar thumbtacked by the old landline phone in the kitchen, each day crossed off in thick black marker.

One mug sat in the sink, stained to hell.

The counters were cluttered with paperwork—VA forms, printouts from legal aid, a tangle of Post-it notes stuck everywhere.

She didn’t take off her coat.

Walker noticed. Of course he did. He noticed everything. “Sorry, it’s a mess. The place.” He unwrapped his Tootsie Pop and popped it into his cheek. “Still figuring out how to run it.”

“It’s fine,” she said, even though it wasn’t. Nothing about this was fine.

He cleared his throat. “You look good, Jo.”

She almost laughed. She was months away from her fortieth birthday, and every day there seemed to be new lines in her face.

And don’t get her started on the bags under her eyes—they were heavy enough that airlines should charge her extra to fly.

No amount of good grooming could hide the fact that she’d spent her life working twelve-hour days and sleeping fitfully when she slept at all.

“Liar.”

He held her gaze. “I don’t lie.”

They stood there, the gulf between them filled by all the things they wouldn’t talk about. It had been five years. He shouldn’t still have this effect on her. He’d been her favorite disaster, right up until she left him twisting in the wind. She wondered if he hated her for it.

Or worse, if he didn’t care.

She didn’t trust herself to stand here staring at him—she might do something stupid, like climb him like a tree and taste that Tootsie pop off his lips—so she turned away and wandered through the kitchen, dragging her finger through the layer of dust on top of the microwave.

The man had apparently never heard of a Swiffer.

She winced and brushed her hand off on her jeans. “So where’s your resident?”

Walker leaned back against the counter, drawing her gaze down his long body.

No man should look that good in jeans and those same old cowboy boots he’d had all those years ago, but damn if Walker Nash hadn’t somehow grown more attractive with age.

The way those jeans hugged his thighs made her mouth go dry.

His forearms, exposed where he’d rolled up his sleeves, were all corded muscle and sun-darkened skin.

She remembered what it felt like to have those arms wrapped around her, those big hands skimming up her sides.

“Boone’s in town with his mom right now,” Walker said, snapping her back to the present.

Right. The veteran in crisis.

She shook off the memory and refocused on the conversation. “He has family in town? That’s good. That means he already has a built-in support network.”

Thankfully, Walker showed no sign of knowing where her mind had gone just now.

He took the lollipop from his mouth and snorted with disgust. “Boone’s family is full of liars and assholes.

His mom is the only one who’s worth a damn, but she’s not well—was never quite right in the head again after his father died.

He’s her only caretaker, and he’s in rough shape himself.

Still young, but already so angry at the world.

Don’t blame him for that, though. The world ain’t done much for the kid.

He did his time in the military and was back home for barely a month before he landed in prison for voluntary manslaughter. ”

“You didn’t tell me that part on the phone.” She watched his jaw move as he switched the lollipop to his other cheek.

“Didn’t want to scare you off. But yeah, he got into a fight at the local dive bar.

Saw a guy roughing up a woman, and something in him snapped.

He’d been drinking. Got in between them.

They fought. The other man died.” Walker shrugged, but the casualness didn’t match the worry in his eyes.

“The woman then accused him of murder, and he paid for it. I think Boone’s been punishing himself for it ever since. ”

Prison, manslaughter, anger issues… this was a lot more than she’d been prepared for. But this was what she did, wasn’t it? She worked with broken men. She’d built her entire career on it.

“And he’s staying here? With you?”

“That’s the plan.” Walker gestured at the unfinished walls. “Gonna fix this place up together. Give him something to focus on besides the past.”

“And the mom? Does she live here, too?”

“No. She’s got a place in town. He checks on her most days, makes sure she’s eating and taking her meds.”

Johanna bit her lip, trying to imagine Walker Nash playing house father to an ex-con. It seemed impossible, and yet... There was something right about it, too. Walker had always been a protector. A fixer of broken things.

“So what am I doing here, Walker?” The question came out harsher than she’d intended. “You’ve got this all figured out.”

His eyes found hers, and there was that intensity again—the look that had always made her feel like she was the only person in the world. “Because I got the broad strokes figured out, but I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to help him. You do.”

Walker Nash, admitting he didn’t know something? The world must be ending.

She crossed her arms, trying to ignore the way her heart squeezed at the vulnerability in his voice. “You said he’s angry.”

“Yeah. But it’s more than that. It’s like he’s... waiting for something. Permission, maybe. To live again.” Walker moved to the woodstove, opened it, and tossed another log in. Sparks scattered like fireflies. “I thought I could do this on my own, but—”

“But you called me.” She finished for him

He turned to face her, firelight casting half his face in shadow. “I called you because you’re the best, Jo. Always have been. And because I know if anyone can get through to him, it’s you.” A faint smile tipped up for the corner of his hard mouth. “After all, you got through to me.”

The compliment shouldn’t have warmed her the way it did. She’d built a career on understanding troubled men, but Walker had always been her blind spot. The one she couldn’t quite figure out. Or maybe the one she understood too well.

“I can’t stay long,” she said. While she no longer worked with the VA, she had her small private practice to consider. “I have clients.”

“I know.” He nodded, rolling the lollipop stick between his fingers. “Just... meet him. Talk to him. Tell me if I’m in over my head.”

She glanced away from him as something cracked inside her chest. Damn him. Damn his honesty and the way he never pushed. He just stated what he needed and waited, as if her answer actually mattered. As if she mattered.

“I can stay until New Year’s,” she heard herself say, the words escaping before she could think better of it. “That gives us just over a week. But I can’t promise anything beyond basic assessment and recommendations.”

Walker’s eyes widened slightly—the closest he ever came to showing surprise. He nodded once, a sharp dip of his chin. “That’s more than I expected.”

“Don’t get excited. I’m not moving in,” she said, gesturing at the half-finished walls. “I’ll stay at the Mountain View Motel in town.”

“No need. There’s a cabin out back. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s clean. Got its own bathroom and everything.” He paused, studying her face. “Unless you’d rather be in town.”

Johanna considered it. A motel would give her distance, space to breathe. But it would also mean driving up and down this icy road twice a day. And if this Boone was as volatile as Walker suggested, she needed to be close enough to observe him in his natural environment.

“The cabin’s fine,” she said finally.

He nodded, and now that he had her agreement, he didn’t seem to know what else to say. “You hungry?”

She shook her head. “No. If you could show me to the cabin…?”

He hesitated. “Right. Yeah.” Without another word, he turned and walked across the kitchen, pushing out through the back door.

She closed her eyes and exhaled the breath caught in her lungs.

Oh, God. Had she just agreed to share space with Walker Nash for an entire week?