Barbara Dunlop - A Cowboy Comes Home

Caleb instantly came to his feet.

Reed didn’t look angry, exactly. But he didn’t look happy, either.

“What are you doing in Chicago?” was the only thing Caleb could think to say. He couldn’t help but wonder if Mandy was with him.

“Wanted to talk to you,” said Reed, taking a few paces into the office.

“Okay,” Caleb offered warily. He’d been feeling off-kilter since he last saw Mandy, and his emotions continued to do crazy things to his logic. He really wasn’t in the mood for a fight.

Reed stepped up to the desk. “Don’t sell the ranch.”

Caleb’s jaw went lax.

“It’s mine,” said Reed.

Caleb didn’t disagree with that. Morally and ethically, the ranch belonged to Reed.

“And I want it,” Reed finished.

“You want it?” Something akin to joy came to life inside Caleb. Which was silly. The ranch wasn’t good for Reed.

“Yes.”

“Just like that.” Caleb snapped his fingers.

Reed’s dark eyes went hard. “No. Not just like that. Just like ten years of sweat and blood and hell.”

“I was going to give you the money.”

“I don’t want the money. I want the land. My land. Our mother’s land.”

Caleb’s heart gave an involuntary squeeze inside his chest.

“Did you forget her great-grandmother was born at Rock Creek?” asked Reed, voice crackling hard. “In that tiny falling- down house next to the waterfall?”

Of course Caleb hadn’t forgotten. His mother had told them that story a hundred times.

“And her grandfather, her father. They’re all buried on the hill, Caleb. You going to sell off our ancestors’ bones?”

“You going to live with the memory of him? ” Caleb blurted out.

“You going to let him defeat us?” Reed squared his shoulders. “He was who he was, Caleb.”

“He killed her.”

“I know. Do you think I don’t know? And I can’t bring her back.” Reed’s voice was shaking with emotion. “But do you know what I can do? What I’m going to do?”

Caleb was too stunned by the stark pain on his brother’s face to even attempt an answer.

“I’m going to have her grandchildren. I’m going to find a nice girl, who loves Lyndon Valley, and I’m going to give her babies, and my first daughter will be named Sasha, and she will be loved, and she will be happy, and I will never, ever, ever let anyone hurt her.”

Caleb’s chest nearly caved in, while his heart stood still.

“Are you going to stand in my way?” Reed demanded, bringing his fist down on the desktop.

“No,” Caleb managed through a dry throat.

“Good.” Reed abruptly sat down and leaned back, crossing one boot over the opposite knee.

Caleb slumped in his chair. “Why didn’t you say all that in the first place?”

“I’ve said it now.”

“You’re going to find a nice girl?” Caleb couldn’t help but ask.

Reed nodded. “I am. A ranch girl. Someone like Mandy.”

Caleb’s spine went stiff, and his hands curled into fists.

Reed chuckled, obviously observing the involuntary reaction. “But not Mandy. Mandy’s yours.”

“No, she’s not.”

“Yeah. She is.” Reed’s tone was gruff, his eyes watchful. “Unless you’re going to cut and run on her, too.”

“I’ve never-”

“She’s in love with you, Caleb. Not that you deserve her.”

Reed had it all wrong.

“No, she’s not. She’s…” Caleb wasn’t sure how to describe it. “Well, ticked off at me for one thing.”

“Because you were such a jerk in Helena?”

“So were you.”

Reed shrugged. “She’ll forgive me in the blink of an eye, once I tell her I’m moving back.”

“I’ll sign it over to you today,” Caleb offered. Now that the decision was made, he felt as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

“What about Mandy?”

“That’s between me and Mandy.”

Caleb’s brain was going off in about a million directions. Was it possible that she loved him? Had she told Reed she loved him? What business did she have loving him? She was a Lyndon Valley woman, and he was a Chicago man. How was that going to work?

“You slept with her, right?”

“None of your damn business.”

“Do you think a woman like Mandy would sleep with just anyone?”

Of course Caleb didn’t think she’d do that. And he couldn’t help remembering how it felt to have her sleeping in his arms, the taste of her lips, the satin of her skin. And he wanted to feel it all again, so very, very badly.

“I thought you were going to take my head off in Helena.” Reed chuckled low. “She had no idea what she did, by the way, telling you she was staying with me.”

Caleb remembered that moment, when she had a choice and she hadn’t picked him. He never wanted to feel that gut-wrenching anguish again. Mandy belonged with him. Not with Reed and not with any other man. Him, and him alone.

“You should go talk to her,” Reed suggested.

“I was going to talk to her. Good grief, can I make at least one decision on my own?”

“Apparently not a good one. When were you going?”

Caleb pasted Reed with a mulish glare. “The jet’s warming up on the tarmac.”

“You have a jet?”

“Yes.”

“Bring a ring.”

Caleb drew back. “Excuse me?”

“You better bring a ring. You’ve been a jerk, and you need to apologize so she’ll forgive you. And that whole thing’s going to go a whole lot smoother with you on one knee.”

“You haven’t spoken to me in ten years, and you come back and the first thing you do is tell me who I should marry?”

“Second thing, technically,” said Reed.

“Where do you get your nerve?”

“I’m bigger than you. I’m stronger than you. And it’s not me who wants you to propose.”

Caleb scoffed out a laugh at that. “It’s not?”

“No. It’s you.”

Caleb stared at Reed, suddenly seeing past everything to the brother that he’d loved, still loved. Because, despite everything that had happened between them, it was still the same Reed. And he was still smart and, in this case, he was also right.

Caleb grinned. “You want to catch a ride back to Lyndon?”

Mandy had sworn to herself she wouldn’t wallow in self-pity. She wouldn’t pine away for Caleb, and she wouldn’t let herself get involved any further in the brothers’ conflict. She was going cold turkey.

Abigail was right. It was none of Mandy’s business. They were grown men, and she had to let it go and let them work it out for themselves. Or not.

When it came down to it, Travis was right, too. Getting involved with Caleb had brought her nothing but heartache. What had she been thinking? That she could spend days and nights with a smart, compelling, exciting, successful man, and her heart wouldn’t become involved.

She ran a curry comb over Ryder’s haunch, dragging the dust out of the gelding’s coat.

It was ironic, really. She’d spent the better part of her life giving advice out to people. She could be quite obnoxiously meddlesome at times. But she was always so certain she was right. She harped on people to take her advice, since she usually had some distance from the problem and a better perspective than the person who was in the thick of it. Yet, when people who loved her gave her perfectly reasonable, logical, realistic advice, she blew them off and did it her own way.

It served her right.

And she was now exactly where she deserved to be, losing Reed as her dear friend and neighbor and desperately missing Caleb. Reed had been right. She loved Caleb. She was madly, desperately in love with a man who’d never again give her the time of day.

If she closed her eyes, she could still feel his arms around her.