Gena Dalton - Long Way Home

Then she looked at Monte.

“Annie’s my mare and you know it. Until we make a deal, I’m staying.”

Monte looked at her straight.

“Well, I hope you brought your suitcase,” he said. “I own her now and I’m not selling.”

The look she gave him then was enough to make him flash back through the last six years in a heartbeat. It was Jo Lena’s famous, mule-stubborn, I-will-not-give-up-or-give-in look.

“I already have clothes here,” she said. “In fact, I have my own room.”

She turned her back on him and started for the house. He stared after her for a moment, then he caught up with her as fast as he could with his leg stiff and his back hurting like crazy.

His head was hurting worse, though. And he was losing his mind. Was this jealousy he felt, jealousy that she evidently was in his family and he was out?

No, it was irritation. Was he never going to be rid of her, even if he sold her the mare?

“You live here? Why? What about your husband?”

Jo Lena flicked him a glance and walked faster.

“I don’t have a husband.”

He was losing his mind. He knew that because suddenly, he knew what he was feeling—and it was fury. Some no-good rounder had left Jo Lena, who was a fine person in every respect, alone with a child to raise.

“Who is he, Jo Lena?”

She threw him another, more irritated, look and lengthened her stride. Jo Lena wasn’t as tall as he was, but she had long legs and had always been able to match him, stride for stride.

“Who is who, Monte?”

“The bum who left you…”

Without slowing a bit, she turned and gave him another, sharper, more significant look. It stopped his tongue.

It nearly stopped his feet.

Well, yes, he himself had left her. But he hadn’t married her and given her a child and then left her.

“Monte,” Bobbie Ann called. “It is so good to see you, son.”

He was close enough now to see the joy in his mom’s face. His mother loved him. Even if Jo Lena had thrown him out of her heart before he got to the county line six years ago, and even if his brothers and sisters were still mad at him, his mother loved him.

“It’s good to see you, too, Ma,” he said.

Suddenly, it was true. So true he didn’t know how he’d lived all those long days without seeing the love in her sparkling blue eyes. He went to her and hugged her, kissed her on the cheek. She held on to him for a minute.

The car drove into the yard behind him and the engine shut down.

“Here’s your brother,” she said. “Everybody’s so glad you’re home.”

Warily, he turned to look. It really didn’t matter which brother. Neither of them had any use for him.

Clint and Cait were getting out of a big, white SUV. He’d never met her, because he hadn’t come home for John’s funeral, but this must be Cait, who was his sister-in-law twice over.

Monte couldn’t help but watch. Cait, clearly, was pregnant and Clint was positively tender as he helped her step from the running board to the ground.

He lost his tenderness, though, when he looked at Monte.

“Hey,” he said. “Here’s the prodigal son.”

Cait gave Clint a quick look, almost like a warning, then she smiled at Monte.

“Are we ever glad to see you,” she said. “I’ve been craving Bobbie Ann’s biscuits and I hate to show up on her doorstep every single morning without an invitation.”

They all laughed, Clint introduced Cait and she gave him her hand, then Clint shook with him, muttering, “It’s about time you came home.”

Monte thought about that as they all moved across the back porch and into the kitchen, milling around, trying to make small talk. It made him bristle. No doubt Clint and Jackson both would soon let him know, in no uncertain terms, where he stood with them, but he didn’t care. He had a legitimate gripe about each of them, too, and if they didn’t know what it was, he’d tell them.

Fortunately, Bobbie Ann took charge. She shooed Monte upstairs to his old room to shower and change, saying that breakfast would be ready in thirty minutes, and then she gave everybody else, including Lily Rae, a job to do.

Monte escaped gratefully. A shower would help clear his head and he would love the feel of clean clothes. Not to mention a chance to calm his heart about Jo Lena.

How could she have let go of him so soon? Let go enough to marry someone else and have that someone’s baby within a year? It was still hard for him to believe.

Because that wasn’t like Jo Lena. She had always been as loyal as she was stubborn.

Guilt stabbed him. He had hurt her enough to drive her straight into the arms of another man.

He must put the past out of his mind and deal with Jo Lena here in the present. Or not deal with her. He needed to get himself together and just ignore her. Avoid her.

His old room surrounded him peacefully. He sat down on the chair at the side of the bed, kicked the bootjack out from under it and stuck one heel into it, pulling carefully. Boots finally off, he began to peel the dirty clothes from his battered body, focusing on keeping his mind blank and all regrets and memories at bay.

This physical pain was enough to keep him busy. He had no need to dwell on his emotional hurts, too.

He levered himself up and went straight into the shower, standing for a long time in the tingling sluice of hot water, letting it relax some of his muscles and wash some of the ache out of his back. Soaping every inch he could reach without yelling in pain, shampooing his thick hair and rinsing took a long, blank time, and he was thankful for it.

Finally, he made himself shut off the water, step out and towel off. Cleaning up had made him feel a lot stronger.

And it actually made him smile to find that he still fit into his old, battered Wrangler jeans. He put on the most worn pair because they were the softest, and then, after clean socks and boots, his favorite, faded T-shirt he’d bought long ago when Billy Joe Shaver had played Gruene Hall and he and all three of his brothers had gone to hear him together.

Long ago and far away.

That opening line from one of the songs they’d heard started running through his head. Yes, that night seemed decades ago and thousands of miles away. But today it was now and he was here. On the Rocking M. Back home.

He had to go downstairs and face them—all but John, who was gone forever. John wouldn’t be mad at him for not going to his funeral. John would take up for Monte if he were here this morning, even if they had been on opposite sides of the religion question.

He walked to the window and looked out over the ranch. John had been closer to him than to the others because for so long they’d been the young ones, bossed around by the big brothers. They’d staged their little rebellions, though.

Monte grinned to himself. Thinking about John was driving away that shaky feeling inside him. He could hold his own with Clint and Jackson.

But then, while he walked carefully down the stairs and through the entry hall and the great room, he wasn’t so sure of that. He just needed peace. And time alone. And an empty head.

And an empty heart. He didn’t want to look at Jo Lena and see the girl he used to know and the woman he might never know all rolled up into one magnificent package that made his heart skip a beat.

She was the first thing that met his eye, though, when he crossed the threshold into the dining room. Jo Lena. And the rest of the women and babies. It didn’t even seem like home, there were so many women and babies.

None of them belonged to him.

It was as unsettling as walking into a whole herd of unpredictable bulls to try to find his place at the table. There was a baby in a high chair on one side and Lily Rae on the other. His father and John were gone. Their absences screamed at him.