Chapter Nineteen #2
Cal sighed, frowning into his coffee. “It’s like … knowing someone is out there in the dark waiting for you, but you don’t know who or when they’ll jump out at you.”
“A haunted house.”
“Yeah, my mind is a haunted house. Good times.”
Jill felt unaccountably guilty. “Cal, I’m sorry. You certainly don’t want to spend your day discussing this with a near-stranger.”
“No, it actually doesn’t feel bad to talk about.
” He had his hands grasped around the mug.
Big hands, long fingers. “Better with someone who doesn’t have the whole family hangup.
And I’m not paying to be my therapist. Besides, since you’re not one of my brothers, I don’t have to be an ass about it.
Because you’re not my therapist I don’t have to analyze my feelings.
I can just be kind of matter-of-fact.” He shrugged. “I don’t mind it.”
“You have to be an ass about it with your brothers?”
He sent her a doleful look. “Clearly you don’t have brothers.”
“Actually, I do have a brother.” And maybe she kind of did know, a little bit, what he meant. She just thought … well, she liked to think if she and her brother were going through something as horrible as the Bennets were, she wouldn’t spend her time being an ass to her brother. Or vice versa.
Cal studied her, but she didn’t know what he was gleaning from that study. “Let me guess. He’s younger.”
She didn’t feel uncomfortable exactly. But she did feel a bit like for the first time in all the times they’d talked, Cal was looking at her. As an individual, rather than Glenda’s granddaughter or Aly’s friend. Rather than a sort of side plot.
“Well, good guess. Four years younger.”
“Younger and a screwup? You seem like the golden oldest daughter type.”
That made her smile in spite of herself.
The idea Sid the Perfect could be a screwup.
“Quite the opposite. He’s a surgeon, like my dad, or is going to be.
He’s getting married next year once they’re both out of med school and know where they’re going for residency, which will likely be much closer to Boston than Montana is.
So, he’s the golden child. Though he hasn’t started procreating yet.
My one saving grace is they might take years to give my parents grandchildren since Disha is going to be a doctor too. ”
“Moving all the way out here and taking care of your grandmother doesn’t make you the golden child?”
Jill twisted the mug in her hands. She didn’t laugh, because she knew it would be bitter, and she loved her parents, her brother. She didn’t want to be bitter. But… “No, it was, in fact, frowned upon.”
“Why would that be frowned upon?”
“I was supposed to support my dad wanting to move her into an assisted-living facility in Boston. I was supposed to acknowledge she needed real medical care after the stroke, not what I could offer since I refused to even become an RN.” Jill flicked her wrist, like she was flicking away those old hurts.
“I like to think they’ve come around and are more supportive now, but it was a process. ”
Cal was studying her now in a direct way that made her feel uncomfortable. Like with just a few minor details about herself, he could paint a full, three-dimensional picture and understand her completely.
When sometimes she didn’t even understand herself.
Also, he was a disaster. If he could understand her, what did that say about her?
Thankfully, the back door opened, and Grandma stepped in. She closed the door behind her, her gaze steady on Cal as she stomped the snow off her boots.
Cal looked up at her. The tension and weight crept back on him, enough for Jill to realize that for a little while there, their conversation had relaxed him. The focus on her instead of his issues had allowed him to probably set it all aside for a little while.
Now, he was fully tense again.
“Hi, Glenda. I want to talk about our last conversation. I think Jill should stick around for it, but that’s up to you.”
Glenda slowly turned her gaze from Cal to Jill. Jill couldn’t read Grandma’s expression. It reminded her of that sad, wistful one she got during the very rare times something about the grandfather Jill had never met came up.
Cal kept talking, even as Glenda gazed at Jill.
“Landon and Nate … and Aly, and probably Sam, seem to think these … factions Dad kept us in for so long was on purpose. Was to help him. Well, I’m done helping him.
So no more factions or hiding—even beyond the Bennet Ranch.
You were a part of this somehow, so we’re all in this together.
Jill’s part of that together right now. Whether you’d like to protect her from that or not, she’s here. ”
Jill frowned over at Cal. Protect. What would Grandma be protecting her from?
Cal stood, offered his seat at the table to Glenda. Grandma still hesitated another moment, but then she slid into the offered seat. Jill was about to get up to offer Cal hers, since he was the guest, but he shook his head and leaned against the counter.
He almost looked more like the man she’d first met back in the spring. In control. Self-possessed. But the harsh lines of a face too skinny for his frame undercut it.
“The first thing you should know, Jill, is that when the detective talked to Glenda, he asked her about a man named Bowman Lake. A man who is one of Sam’s newest clients. He was found as a child, abandoned. Doesn’t know his true identity.”
“Now there’s a book,” Jill muttered. How many more twists could one turn make?
One side of Cal’s mouth quirked into an almost smile. “Glenda didn’t give me much to go on the other day, but she did say that I should get Bo far away from here, and I shouldn’t tell anyone.”
Grandma made a few signs that basically translated to, Not a very good listener, are you?
Cal didn’t pick up on it and Jill didn’t think she needed to fill him in.
“So, you know this guy Sam’s investigating?” Jill asked her grandmother.
Grandma made a sort of gesture. Which made no sense.
“How can you sort of know someone, Grandma?” Jill asked.
Grandma pressed her lips together, a sign of irritation. And she was not forthcoming with answers.
“Landon has suggested we all get together, sort it out and talk it out. Tomorrow. Dinner at the ranch. Including Bo Lake. With as much … truth telling as we can suffer through.” His gaze was fierce on Grandma’s.
Grandma made no real reaction. But after a few tense moments, she inclined her head. Silent agreement.
“Tomorrow night then. Aly said five.” He set his coffee mug in the sink. “Let’s get this shit over with,” he muttered as he moved for the door.
“Tell Aly I’ll bring brownies,” Jill said, hurrying to trail after him, wishing she had something more profound to say.
“I will.” He didn’t look back at her. Just opened the front door and left.
Leaving Jill standing there looking at a closed door. She felt like a whirlwind had passed through. Those quiet moments talking about themselves wiped away with the bombshell he’d dropped and run away from.
Jill looked back at her grandmother. Who had the answers, even if she was trying to protect Jill in some way from them. Maybe even protect the Bennets from them. “Grandma. Do you know who this guy is or not?”
Grandma took her time, as if thinking that question over when it was a clear yes or no.
She inclined her head. Yes.
“Is it going to be more trouble?”
Again, Grandma took her time, but her expression wasn’t that enigmatic mask. There was something more naked there, which made Jill realize how much her grandmother kept so secretly under wraps.
I don’t know, Grandma signed.
And the worst part was, Jill believed she didn’t.