Chapter Five #2
A very sweet, humble cowboy. And Trish definitely saw why her friend had fallen for him. “She’s so smart that she realized what a good man you are,” she told him.
And Blake blinked. “That’s really nice. We were so worried that you wouldn’t approve, that you would think I was trying to manipulate her or the will or something.”
She shook her head again. “I know how smart Maci is.” Far smarter than Trish was.
“I know she wouldn’t fall for that, and if, for some reason, she had, Frankie would have shaken some sense into her.
” Like Frankie had tried shaking some sense into Trish before her wedding.
But she hadn’t listened to her cousin any more than she had her dad.
And because Frankie and her dad hadn’t approved of her marriage, she’d pulled away from them.
Even when the relationship got bad, she hadn’t reached out to her family because she’d been so embarrassed that they’d been right and she had been so very wrong.
Blake chuckled. “Yeah, Frankie would have taken me out for sure if she thought I would ever hurt Maci.”
“She’s given me a couple of earfuls over stressing Maci out about the will,” Trish admitted. “Deservedly so. I was so caught up in my own mess that I didn’t realize the turmoil I’d caused back here. I’m really sorry.”
“Wow,” Blake murmured.
“What?”
“You’re not at all like I expected you to be,” he said.
She patted her belly. “Pregnant?”
“Yeah, I definitely didn’t expect that,” he said with a grin. “But you’re nice, too.”
She chuckled. “And you didn’t expect me to be?”
He shook his head. “That was just because of the lawsuit, though.”
“I never actually sued anyone,” she pointed out.
“Nolan just filed for the extensions because we didn’t want the estate to get settled before my divorce was.
That had gone on too long, and I didn’t want to give my ex another excuse to put it off.
But now I realize I was putting you all through what he was putting me through. And I am genuinely sorry.”
Blake smiled at her. “We’re good.”
“You and I,” she said. “But the others?”
“Maci is, too. She told me that when she suggested I check on you,” he said. “And Liam and Elise will be. They’re so happy, in love with each other and Lucy, that nothing bothers them as much as it does…”
“Brett or Frankie?” she asked when he trailed off.
“Both of them,” he admitted. “They’ve been the most upset about all of this. And they’ll struggle the most to let it go.”
Trish sighed. “That’s going to make it tough for me to work with them,” she said. Especially since, with the way her father had set up his will, she would need a majority vote to make the changes she wanted for herself and her babies.
“Once the estate settles, Frankie will probably be off with her band again,” Blake said as if trying to make her feel better.
“But that’s not going to mend our relationship,” she pointed out. And she’d already been apart from her cousin for too long.
“Doesn’t distance make the heart fonder or something?” he asked.
“That did not work with my parents,” she said. No. She would have to fix things with Frankie before her cousin took off, if she took off. While Blake seemed to think she would, Maci, who’d known her longer and better, wasn’t as certain.
And as for Brett…
Trish wasn’t sure what it would take for him to forgive her for not seeing her dad as much as she should have, and for not coming to the funeral. She wasn’t sure she could ask him to forgive her for the things she wouldn’t be able to forgive herself.
But she did want to figure out a way for them to be able to work amicably together. Given the way he made her tingle with awareness, though, maybe it would be better if she kept her distance from him. But how would she manage that when they would both be living at the ranch?
* * *
Frankie could not remember the last time she’d been this angry.
When she’d found Uncle Frank after he’d fallen off his horse, she’d been upset.
Scared. When Trish hadn’t come to visit him in the hospital or even shown up for his funeral, Frankie had been disappointed.
And maybe a little angry—but not like this.
Then, when Trish and her lawyer had contested the will, Frankie had gotten a little angrier. But she still hadn’t been furious.
Today, however, seeing that lawyer in her uncle’s house, trying to manipulate her cousin into contesting her father’s last wishes, had infuriated Frankie. Even after he left, she couldn’t stop shaking with fury. How dare he pit her family against each other?
And that was what the Lemmons were to her—they were her brothers.
And Trish had always been more like a sister to her than a cousin.
Even as mad as she’d made Frankie, Frankie would never stop loving her.
Now that she’d learned about the divorce and the miscarriages and pregnancy that Trish had gone through all alone, Frankie wasn’t just upset with her cousin.
She was upset for her. And she wished she’d been there for her.
But after Maci took Trish into the den to show her the will, Frankie had headed out to the barn. She needed to calm down before she talked to Trish again. She wanted to be there for her cousin now.
Being on the ranch had always calmed Frankie down.
It had been where she’d come after her parents died.
And it had been her safe place after that devastation.
Any time she was going through something tough, a breakup with a band, a canceled tour, she’d come home.
And usually she hung out in the barn with the horses or out in the pastures with the cows.
But one of those cows was in the barn now. The baby she’d personally pulled from her mama’s womb. She’d saved Cocoa, and she was counting on Cocoa to save her right now. To calm her down.
And once she was calm maybe she could figure out how to convince Trish to look at the Lemmons as family, too.