Chapter Twenty-One
The Bennet Ranch
Landon scraped the caked-on mud off his boots. He knew better than to believe in the recent warmup. It was too early for this kind of warmth to stick around.
Still, he was enjoying it. Oh, the mud of it all would be tiresome come May, but for now, he would just be grateful. Something he was learning. Easier to do with ranch stuff than anything else, but Aly seemed convinced gratitude in one area could lead into other areas.
And there wasn’t anything he was more grateful for than his wife.
He still got a kick out of that. Wife. Landon Bennet. Married.
Stepping inside, there was a smile on his face. He smelled dinner. It was the same routine they’d had before the wedding, and still there was just something a little special about this same routine now being with his wife.
He whistled a little to himself as he hung up all his ranch wear. Aly was at the stove when he entered the kitchen, like usual, but right away he knew something was different than the past week. “What’s all this?” He knew the difference between a dinner for two and a dinner for a crowd.
He’d enjoyed it being just the two of them. No crowds. Just them and the ranch and being married. No, it couldn’t last. They had family, and they had friends, and he knew Aly needed both.
But he preferred the isolation, truth be told.
“Sam texted that she was stopping by, and then Nate called that he would meet her here, and I figured I’d just make dinner for everybody. I haven’t been able to get ahold of Cal, though.”
“I’m sure he’ll be here if he got your messages.” Landon came up behind her as he usually did, wrapped his arms around her waist and rested his chin on the top of her head while she kept working at whatever she was making.
Tonight it was chopping garlic for whatever she was sautéing on the stove. But she stopped and put one hand over his, with a little friendly pat.
He looked at the matching bands on their fingers. Symbols of promises made. A reminder, that no matter what the rest of his family wanted to stir up, this circle didn’t end. Not him and Aly.
“Bad news I take it.”
“Sam didn’t say, but I can’t imagine why else.” Aly sighed. “I’d think her and Nate had some special news, but they weren’t even together. And Nate didn’t sound happy.”
A knock sounded from the front of the house.
Landon pressed a kiss to Aly’s cheek. “I’ll get it.”
He walked through the house and opened the front door to Sam. There was still an instinct to scowl. Fifteen years of antagonism meant it was just … ingrained, even with all the strides they’d made.
A lot of their unease around each other had cooled since Dad’s trial.
Hell, maybe all of it. Sam had been a huge part in the truth being told and his dad being put away for good.
Landon figured he owed her a lot for that—add on she was the reason Nate had finally come home and that she seemed to make him happy, there was no reason to scowl.
But that didn’t mean Landon knew what to do when it was just him and Sam. “Hey,” he greeted, then after a minute remembered he needed to move out of the way so she could come in.
“Hey,” she replied. “Nate’s not here yet?”
“No. And we haven’t heard from Cal.”
Sam frowned at that. “I’m sure Nate will grab him if he’s at the offices. Otherwise … well, I really needed to talk to Aly the most, but I could use a group answer on this one.”
Landon nodded. Then awkward silence descended.
“Uh, Aly’s in the kitchen,” Landon said. “Why don’t you come on back?” He waved her to follow him, because standing in the entryway staring at each other—or expressly not at each other—wasn’t ever going to be comfortable.
They walked into the kitchen and Aly smiled in greeting, but before she could say anything, Sam was talking.
“Aly. You always go to too much trouble.”
“I don’t mind,” Aly replied, wiping her hands on a dishtowel. “And to prove it, I’ll put you both to work until Nate gets here.”
So she gave them tasks to do, which meant Landon didn’t have to worry about being awkward, because he could focus on setting the table or pouring drinks. When Nate arrived, saying he hadn’t heard back from Cal at all, Landon didn’t know whether to be worried about their missing brother or not.
Still, as they all sat down around the dining room table, he knew there were more pressing things to worry about based on the way Sam was acting. Not her usual abrasive self. This weird softer side of her Landon really never knew what to do with.
“I didn’t mean for you to go through all this trouble, Aly,” Sam said. “But it’s nice.”
“Because you have bad news,” Aly supplied for her.
“Yes. Sort of. I don’t even know what parts to tell you, what to not. But hell, I’m tired of secrets. I’m … tired. Period. Jill hired me to look into Glenda. To try and figure out what might have caused her trauma.”
Landon looked at Aly and could tell Jill hadn’t shared this with her based on the expression of surprise. And a little hurt.
“It’s … been a while, actually, since I started. I’ve been looking into Glenda, her family, and recently I expanded it to Glenda’s husband and his background. I still haven’t really found anything, just … a lot of odd little threads I don’t know how to make sense of. Like today.”
“You found something today? Something bad?” Aly said.
“No, it’s not bad. Well, yes, it is, but not a new ruin-our-lives bad. It’s a … I don’t really know how to handle this. You guys know Jill—and Glenda—better than I do. I need your input on how to approach what I’ve found.”
“Which is?” Landon asked.
Sam inhaled deeply, let it out slowly. Landon noticed that Nate’s hand moved from the back of her chair to her back. A little physical support.
“Jill didn’t know how her grandfather died. Not all that uncommon, actually, for things that happened almost before a person was born. So I didn’t think much of it, just that I wanted to have a full picture. I’m grasping at straws for anything to determine what Glenda’s … hiding.”
Landon didn’t know why they needed to poke into any of this, but that was between Jill and Sam, he supposed.
“I got the death certificate today—and that was a whole rigmarole which makes it all feel more … weird, I guess.” Sam’s expression was uncomfortable and pained. “The cause of death was listed as self-inflicted gunshot wound.”
The silence that fell around the dining room was heavy. It was a heavy topic, and wading through all the different elements of that little piece of information would certainly take longer than a dinner.
Landon had never thought much about Glenda’s husband. He didn’t remember the man at all, though from what Sam had said about the case, Landon would have been six or so when he died.
So maybe it made sense, at the time, they’d been sheltered from that piece of information, but for all the stories he’d heard about Glenda as some kind of boogeyman figure, he’d never heard anything about her husband.
Tragedy was often at the very least whispered about in town, if not outright discussed in the loudest, most detailed terms.
“How did we not know that?” Landon asked into the silence.
It was a small town and a tight-knit ranching community. How would no one have known that? Used it? Sure, suicide was a sensitive topic, but that didn’t stop people.
He knew that firsthand. When it came to death, some people would talk about anything, no matter how uncomfortable or inappropriate. Hell, there had been people who’d wanted him to give them details of his mother’s gruesome murder.
People were weird. Full stop.
“I really don’t know,” Sam replied. “Those types of stories tend to make the rounds. I get we were kids, but still … it seems like we should have heard that. Jill clearly doesn’t know, which means either her father doesn’t—or he’s purposefully keeping the truth from her.”
“But Glenda must know,” Nate said quietly. “If it’s a secret, it’s one someone kept on purpose.”
“I think she knows, and I think … well, even if it’s not the whole secret, it’s a part of the secret.”
“Do you think she was there?” Aly asked softly.
“I think seeing something like that would be pretty damn traumatic. So, it would make sense—whether she was there, or found him, or what have you. If that’s tied up in her speech issues.
If she’s worked to keep it a secret somehow.
Glenda was the informant on the death certificate, but that can technically be anyone.
The issue is, I’m struggling to find any kind of police report, and there would have to be one even if the medical examiner was the one to notify police.
I’m taking big leaps here, but it makes me think she was either there or found him and did a lot of legwork to keep the details hidden from as many people as possible. ”
“Oh, this is so sad,” Aly said, clasping her hands under her chin, a sign of true distress. Landon put his hand on her leg under the table, hoping to offer some comfort.
It was sad. It was also … just plain odd. Like all the facts didn’t quite add up, and he couldn’t say he loved that feeling.
“I just don’t understand why Jill would hire you to poke into this,” Aly continued. “Especially without telling anyone. What was she thinking?”
“I think she was probably tired of feeling like there was a truth she ought to know, right there, right out of reach. Touching and affecting everything she has to deal with day in and day out.”
They all looked up at Cal’s voice. He was standing in the doorway between kitchen and dining room. He looked … pale. Haunted.
Not unusual, but Landon thought he’d been looking better. Before this.
And he didn’t think Cal was actually talking about Glenda or Jill. Or he was at least putting himself in their shoes more than he was just … trying to understand their point of view.
“You made it,” Aly said, pushing to her feet. “I’ll get you a plate.”
“No, I’m not hungry. I want to see the death certificate, Sam.”
Sam opened her mouth, then closed it. She nodded. “I’ve got it in my car.” She pushed away from the table. “I’ll go get it.”
Her exit left the room in utter silence. A year ago, Landon would have let that stretch out. But tonight, Cal looking all haunted and hunted again, Landon couldn’t let it go.
“What’s wrong, Cal?” Landon asked.
He was still getting used to asking that kind of thing of his brother. Still getting used to knowing he had to deal with whatever it was.
“I don’t know,” Cal muttered. “I just know something is.”