Chapter 26
TWENTY-SIX
I remember being able to get up without making sound effects. Good times.
—Denver to Holly
DENVER
“Give her a reason to stay, Dad.”
I looked at my oldest girl and said, “Short of throwing myself at her, which she’s already indicated that she wouldn’t care for me to do, I got nothin’.”
That wasn’t completely the truth.
Neither one of us had discussed all that much of anything.
Our relationship was a weird one. I expected her to be there.
Sometimes she was. Sometimes she wasn’t.
I went to her when she wasn’t. We spent the night together with her in my arms, and the next day she would see me and pretend that that night never happened.
Hell, this morning I’d woken up to get the horse stalls cleaned, thinking I was being nice by letting her sleep in, and she’d glared at me all morning before she’d left. Not saying a single word to me.
I didn’t know what I was doing wrong here.
“Give her something she wants,” she suggested. “And, maybe, eventually, she’d be open to dating you.” She paused. “Have you even discussed your relationship with her?”
She made me sound like such a catch. Not.
“Got any ideas?”
“I do!” DeeDee cried.
“What?” Joe and I asked at the same time.
“Well, she was telling me this story about when she was younger,” DeeDee spoke animatedly with her hands. “And she’s kind of sad, so I really started listening. She was talking about a horse.”
“A horse?” I asked, confused as to where this was going.
“Just listen,” she ordered.
The bossy kid.
“Okay,” I held up my hands in defeat.
“She was talking about her childhood, and what she missed the most.” She looked around her.
“She said that, out of everything that she missed, there were only a few things she wished she still had. Her horse, her reading spot down by the river, and her dad. She can’t have her dad back, obviously.
But she said that they had to sell the horse to pay for her dad’s cancer treatments.
Her childhood best friend’s dad bought it from them.
For, might I add, a song. I think they were cheated out of a lot of money.
They’ve used that horse to breed for years.
Don’t ride him. Don’t do anything but breed him.
She told me that it made her sad that all he was to them was a stud when he was her best friend growing up. ”
My mind was whirling. “Who’s the friend?”
“Her name is Callista something.” DeeDee tapped her finger against her mouth. “Callista Heart…Braveheart…”
“Heartsan,” I guessed. “The Heartsans own a ranch not far from here.”
An idea took root.
“And where’s this reading spot?” Joe asked. “I haven’t found anything like that.”
“You haven’t been down to the river, either,” DeeDee pointed out.
“I have,” Catalina said quietly. “I think I might know what she’s talking about. It’s pretty overgrown where I’m thinking it’s at. But I’ll bet that we can get a path down to it pretty easily.”
“All right, Dad.” Joe clapped. “It’s your turn.”
My kids were good ones.
“Would y’all be okay with me dating Holly?” I asked carefully.
It was a subject I hadn’t broached yet because I didn’t want it to be too soon.
But we were past hiding it.
They knew how I felt about her, and I felt like they liked her, too.
Wanted her for me.
“We’d be more than okay with her and you becoming a thing, Dad.” Joe rolled her eyes. “Just know that she doesn’t want any kids, though.”
I blinked. “How do you know that?”
Even I didn’t know that.
It’d been at the back of my mind these last few days, though.
Holly was young. She’d want kids. But kids were the last thing that I wanted. At least, not brand-new babies that required a lot of work. And I didn’t want to add another to the mix that I couldn’t spare the time for.
“She told us.” DeeDee rolled her eyes. “Aren’t these things that men usually ask women when they first meet?”
Well, maybe.
But Holly and my relationship hadn’t been the most conventional.
To be completely honest, I hadn’t done much talking when I was with her. At least not at night when we had the most time. Usually, we were going at it hot and heavy. And we were both too tired to have any pillow talk.
I sighed. “Let me see what I can do about this horse and a place to read.”
By mid-morning, I had a few of the ranch hands down by the river clearing it out with the mulcher.
I, on the other hand, was on the way to the Heartsans with high hopes.
My mother was also by my side, practically giddy to get out of the house and be a part of my “let’s win over Holly” endeavor.
I wasn’t quite sure how she’d gotten involved. But when I’d gone out to my truck to hook the trailer up to it in hopes that they’d say yes, I’d found my mother in the front seat sitting like we had plans of going to their farm together.
“How’s everything going, baby boy?” my mother’s frail voice asked.
I refused to acknowledge why it was so frail.
It’d been getting weaker and weaker day by day, and that was a fact I wasn’t willing to think too long and hard about.
“You mean with the ranch?” I asked. “Or the fire?”
“Anything,” she said. “Or the dog fighting ring that you decided to break up by yourself.”
“I wasn’t by myself,” I admitted. “Thumper was there.”
“Thumper, I’ve heard, was only there because he followed you,” she pointed out. “I like him. When are you going to patch him in?”
My mother was a lover. She refused to see the bad in anyone.
She also loved the club with her whole heart, mostly because when I joined and then eventually became president, I became the center of their world. And with that world came a lot of brothers and my mother that refused to treat them as anything but her own.
My mother had always loved Thumper, though.
“Why do you like him so much?” I asked. “And I wasn’t planning on ever patching him in until he helped me break up that ring.”
She sniffed. “That boy is deserving.”
I frowned. “What’s he done that I don’t know about?” I asked. “Because, from my end, all it feels like he’s done is cause mayhem and bitch and complain when he’s asked to do something.”
“And what kid that age doesn’t?” she asked.
“You don’t like being questioned. And Thumper has all the questions.
He doesn’t follow blindly. You’re not used to that.
You think your word is above all others and should be followed no matter what.
But he’s good for your club. He never stops pushing for more.
Also, he brings me tea and cookies almost every day when he drives past on the way home from Jawbone. ”
I blinked. “He what?”
“He’s a good kid, Denver. He’s rough around the edges, but he has a heart of gold.”
I grunted. “I’ll think about it.”
“You’re lying to me,” she snorted. “You’ve already decided to patch him in with Bells.”
I had.
“You don’t know me,” I grumbled.
She scoffed. “I’ve known you better than any of my children. Wiser and older parents, I guess.”
I didn’t comment for a long time, and she didn’t bother to fill the silence.
We were pulling into the Heartsans’ driveway when my mother said, “Let me talk first.”
I didn’t argue with her.
My mother was the matriarch of this small town.
She’d helped create it with the help of my father.
That was why we owned so much of the real estate.
Her and my father had been the ones to build it all.
“Don’t make me have to pay more than I have to,” I grumbled.
“You let me deal with that.” She gave me a look. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is my money still. At least until I die and it splits three ways.”
I grimaced. “I don’t want to talk about that.”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s cute that you think I’ll live forever, son. But one day I won’t be here, and you’re going to have to finally accept that.”
Before I could say anything more, she opened the door and slid out of the truck.
She may be old, but she was spry.
She slammed the door closed before I’d even finished leaving the truck.
I rounded the hood to see her stomping toward the Heartsans’ front door.
The door opened and a young woman smiled at my mother. “Mrs. Windsor. Hello. What are you doing here?”
The woman was stunning. Probably around Holly’s age.
“Hello, dear. Are your parents home?” Mom asked.
The woman smiled. “Dad’s in the barn. Mom’s not feeling well.”
My mother softened. “How’s the cancer?”
The woman’s face fell. “Not good.” She looked around at the farm. “She thought she was going to beat it, but it came back very aggressively. It’s not looking good.”
Fuck cancer.
“I’m sorry, honey,” my mom said. “You let me know if you need anything. And if the ban’s ever lifted on visits, I’ll be the first to stop by.”
She smiled. “Be careful. The road to the barn’s a little rough.”
Mom waved and caught my hand.
We were halfway to the barn when she said, “Now, I don’t like Mrs. Heartsan all that much, but no one deserves to be riddled away by cancer.”
I rolled my eyes. “What was all that bluster back there then if you don’t like her?”
“They practically stole Holly’s horse. I don’t know if you were around when that happened, but I watched that girl cry for days.
And they pretty much gave them bottom dollar for that horse, claiming that they’d love and take care of it for the rest of his days.
But every time we drive by, that horse is just lonely in the field.
Doesn’t have any companions. Broke up the friendship between Holly and the Heartsan girl, too.
“I hated that for Holly,” she continued.
I did, too.
The barn doors loomed, and Mr. Heartsan came out looking ragged.
He blinked at us in surprise.
“Uh, can I help you?” he asked.
It was then that I realized that he was one of the men that I’d seen that night at the dog fighting ring.
I narrowed my eyes as anger started to fill me.
He saw my anger and blanched.
“We’re here about the horse, Mr. Heartsan,” my mother replied. “We want the horse back for Holly.”
Mr. Heartsan looked like he was going to say no immediately, but stopped.
“How much?” he asked.
My mother crossed her arms. “I paid your bail.”
I blinked.
“That was you?” he asked.
She nodded.
“I…”
“I got you out because I want something from you.” She pointed at a horse in the field closest to the house. “You’ve had him long enough. Give him back.”
“He’s my only source of income besides my accounting job,” he pointed out. “If I get rid of him, I won’t have money to pay for any more treatments.”
My mother leveled him with a look. “From what I understand, you stopped treatments last week.”
Mr. Heartsan blinked.
“Give us the horse, or I’ll let everyone in this town know where you were last weekend and why you were sent to jail in the first place,” she ordered. “I want the official paperwork done, too.”
Mr. Heartsan cleared his throat. “I don’t have it.”
She smiled. “That’s fine. I came prepared.”
She held out a bill of sale explaining that the horse was being sold and to whom and for how much.
Mr. Heartsan took it and signed using the pen that my mother also provided.
“Go get the horse, dear,” my mother ordered.
I did as my mother said and got the horse, who was sweet as pie.
Yeah, Holly definitely had a hand in raising this big baby.
I rubbed him down as I led him into the trailer, then locked him up tight.
Just as we were leaving, my mother called out, “You better go to your court hearing, Mr. Heartsan. Or I’ll have your farm.”
Mr. Heartsan swallowed roughly. “Yes, ma’am.”
I chuckled as I helped her into the truck.
It was only as we were halfway down their drive that I said, “You’ve had that planned for a while, but you know that they still owe us money.”
She smiled secretively. “I’m not sure you will ever see what he owes you, but I’ve been planning this ever since I noticed that you had a thing for her.”