Long Road Home (7 page)

She’d stood there, her hands fisted on her hips, practically throwing the words at him like stones. She’d been mad a lot lately. Which wasn’t anything like her, but Buck had decided that it beat the way she’d been last year. When her mood had dived lower than a diamondback in a rut.

At least mad showed a spark.

“I wasn’t going to drag you through the mercantile.”

Being that River’s Bend was a small town, he’d known Winema all of his life. They’d gone to school together. After her husband’s lumber mill had burned down, Warren had to switch gears and take up teaching machine shop at the high school. Needing the extra income, Winema had started coming in once a week to clean for Buck’s wife.

It was a few months later when Britta had taken off to Sweden, leaving him with a seven-year-old daughter to tend to. Since what Buck knew about little girls could fit on the head of a pin and still have room for a thousand dancing angels, he’d been grateful when Winema had suggested that so long as her kids could stay with her when they weren’t in school, she’d be willing to come help out with Austin for a spell.

More than two decades later, she was still here. Though Warren, unfortunately, was not, having keeled over from a heart attack in Young’s Hardware while picking up a gallon of apple-green paint for their kitchen six years ago.

“I thought you might want to stop by Harry’s, get your hair trimmed and a shave, and maybe play a game or two of checkers while you’re there,” she said.

“No point in spending good money when you can cut my hair.” Buck rubbed his chin, feeling the scruff of bristles he’d ignored for the past week. “And there’s nothing wrong with my hands. I can damn well still shave myself.”

“Then why don’t you?” she challenged.

Bossy woman. He was about to ask her if she’d henpecked Warren to death, but was able to stop the words, which had shot from his brain to the tip of his tongue, just in time.

“No reason to shave to watch TV,” he mumbled.

“My point exactly. You spend too much time in front of that boob tube,” she countered. “When was the last time you got out and mixed with folks?”

They both knew that had been six weeks ago, when he’d stumbled over the curb outside Ryan Murphy’s office. He’d gone sprawling, ending up on the ground, splay-legged like a helpless newborn foal.

“Going to the doctor doesn’t count,” she said when, instead of answering, he turned his attention to the TV, watching as Desperado sent Joaquin Sanchez—who’d been ranked second rider in the world on that day—flying off his back into the dirt.

“And another one bites the dust,” he said with a spark of pride.

The animal athlete he’d bred and raised from a calf was in the pantheon of rodeo bulls, right up there alongside Bushwacker, Asteroid, and Little Yellow Jacket. Go into any cowboy bar in the country, and before caps were popped off bottles of Bud Light, you could get an argument going about which of the four deserved the pinnacle. Not that Buck had any doubt. The others were good and had their special moves, but to his mind, Desperado was the best-all-around bull ever.

Winema blew out a long, frustrated breath. “Speaking of bovine, you did know that Sawyer Murphy brought his stock over today?”

“Yeah.” Buck still wasn’t sure how he felt about that development. Sure, they could use the money. If he’d been willing to sell Desperado back when offers rose as high as a cool million, they wouldn’t be in the straits they were. But though he didn’t want anyone to think him soft or sentimental, the bull was family. And you don’t sell off family.

“Maybe you might want to go look at them.”

“I can see the pasture from the window.” He couldn’t fault the Murphys for their stock. They’d always bred for ease of birthing and quality of beef, rather than falling prey to any popular beauty contest standards many other ranchers had gone for.

“You could go welcome him home,” she pressed on. Stubborn. She just never let up once something got buzzing in her bonnet. “Given that the boy’s been fighting for his county and even the president called him a hero. You missed his party,” she reminded him.

Since he and Dan Murphy had been best friends all their lives, Buck felt a bit guilty about that. “Couldn’t help it. In case you forgot, I tripped over that damn rug.”

“I’ve watched you take a lot harder falls. Like back in high school when you were riding that bronc at the Basin Junior Rodeo and got throwed.”

“You remember that?” It had been the summer after their junior year of high school.

“Sure do. I was in the grandstands with my girlfriends. I remember thinkin’ that you might need some cheering up, and Anna, who’d been there to cheer on Dan in the bull riding, dared me to go talk to you. Of course the others took up the idea.”

Her dark eyes took on a momentary mist of memory. “I’d just gotten up the nerve when you up and hightailed it out of there without looking back.” As that confession hit like a bullet to the brain, she shrugged. “Just as well. If you’d had an opportunity to fall for my considerable female charms, we might have ended up being the ones going steady, and Warren wouldn’t have asked me to the Fall Fantasy.”

Buck remembered that day all too clearly. He’d landed on his back and had lain there, helpless as a pup, unable to move with the air knocked out of him. The rodeo clowns—bull fighters, they called them these days—had gotten the bucking horse out of the arena while he’d struggled to catch enough breath to stagger to his feet.

Which was exactly how he felt right now. That revelation that might have changed both their lives had knocked the air right out of him.

He was about to spiral into regrets when he looked out the window and saw Austin working with a yearling in the corral. He might not say it enough, but from the moment the girl had drawn breath, she’d been the sunshine of his life. And the one good thing to come out of a marriage to a woman who’d never fit into his life.

When Britta had taken him to Sweden to meet her wealthy, high-society family, who was actually related to royalty, she’d enjoyed showing off her American cowboy to all her European friends. Though he’d felt a lot like a stud bull in a show ring, Buck couldn’t deny that having so many females, all as flashy as exotic tropical butterflies, fluttering around him had sent his ego into the stratosphere.

For a very short time. Until they’d returned to River’s Bend and settled into the routine of ranching life, which didn’t involve shopping for designer clothes with her girlfriends, Saturday night clubbing and Sunday jazz brunches, or formal teas at the palace.

They’d both been miserable, and he couldn’t blame his wife. There was a reason people tended to marry within their circles to people they knew well. Because that way you’d know what you were signing up for. Once the novelty had worn off, the difference between his remote western ranching life and his wife’s jet-setting, free-spending lifestyle had caused the marriage to crash and burn.

Still, as rough as life had been back then, Buck couldn’t regret how things had turned out, because if he hadn’t married Britta, he wouldn’t have Austin. Who may have thought she was hitching herself to a cowboy who’d fit into River’s Bend, but had managed to screw up just as bad as he had.

Sometimes, Buck considered, life could be damn complicated. Which was why he’d never spent that much time contemplating it. Things happened, good and bad. You savored the good, got past the bad, and moved on. Just as Austin had done with whatever the hell had happened between her and the youngest Murphy boy. And like she’d shed that no-account rodeo cowboy she’d gone and married. At least that guy was half a world away and wouldn’t be setting a boot back on Green Springs. And now, maybe if the Murphy kid played his cards right, he could end up Buck’s son-in-law, like he and everyone else in town had always expected.

7

S
AWYER WAS AT
Fred Wiley’s Feed and Seed when his phone buzzed with a text from Tom Campbell.

Saw your truck
, it read.
How about a beer at the Shady Lady
?

Since the crowd had kept him and his old friend from having any time to talk during the party, Sawyer texted him back.
Be there in 10
?

Works for me
.

The Shady Lady was one of two bars in River’s Bend. Previously known as the No Name, after the sign had blown away during a winter storm, one of the many movie companies had hung up a weathered wooden sign declaring it the Shady Lady Saloon.

Tom had already taken a table in the far corner of the room when Sawyer walked in.

“Gotta love small towns.” After sliding into a wooden chair, putting his hat on the spare one next to him, he looked around at the velvet couches, bordello-red walls hung with framed paintings of dance hall girls and faded sepia photographs of more girls along with cowboys, outlaws, and miners dating back to the days of the town’s gold rush founding. “They just don’t change.”

“That’s why some of us, those who either stay here or return, like them. It’s also the reason others can’t wait to get away.”

“Can’t argue that.” Sawyer plucked a peanut from the bowl in the center of the wooden table and cracked it open. “Okay,” he said as a waitress dressed in jeans, a ruffled-front rodeo queen blouse, and tasseled red boots headed toward them. “That’s changed.”

“Not everyone would agree for the better,” Tom said with a sigh and a slow, regretful shake of his head. “Maggie Washburn used this place as one of the platforms in her campaign for mayor.”

Mrs. Washburn had been Sawyer’s high school civics teacher. He wasn’t surprised to learn when she’d come up to welcome him home that she’d gone into local politics. But she hadn’t mentioned anything about the Shady Lady. “How?”

“She decided that having the waitresses dress like saloon girls didn’t present a family atmosphere. And demeaned women.”

“Seriously?” One of the appeals of the Lady had always been those sassy red satin dresses and black petticoats.

“I bullshit you not. She even compared it to Hooters.”

“No way.”

“Way,” the waitress, who’d apparently overheard the latter part of the conversation, said as she plunked two bar menus down onto the table. “And it’s easy for you to complain, Tom Campbell, but none of you guys had to wear fishnet stockings that dig into your skin for hours at a time. Not to mention the fact that those damn dresses needed corsets.” She efficiently swept away the nearly empty bowl and slammed a freshly filled one down next to the menus. “You try doing your job without breathing and see how you like it.”

“Hey, I get it.” Tom held up both hands in a gesture of surrender when she looked inclined to throw the peanuts at his head. “I really do. And I admit that men are pigs. My wife has reminded me of that on more than one occasion. And, if it gets me off the hook, I voted for Maggie.”

“That, along with the fact that you still treat Heather like she’s the queen of the world after all these years, is a point in your favor,” she allowed. Then shot Sawyer a look. “How about you, cowboy?”

“I was out of town,” he said. When her eyes narrowed dangerously, although he wasn’t willing to go as far as to use his hero status, he did decide it was time to play another card. “Serving my country.”

“Oh. Well.” This time the look she swept over him wasn’t so much challenging but speculative. “Welcome home, soldier.” Her smile was as smooth and inviting as her voice. “And the first drink’s on the house.”

“I’m a Marine. And thanks, but it’s not necessary.”

“Oh, I insist.” The exaggerated batting of her lashes, after that sharp, feminist lecture, had Sawyer thinking yet again that he’d never understand the complexities of the female mind. “It’s the very least I can do to thank you for keeping our homeland safe.”

After taking their order for two bottles of Bud Light and some wings, she left with a seductive sway of those jean-clad hips. “You do realize,” Tom drawled, “that you could get so lucky.”

“I’m not looking to get lucky.”

“She’s definitely hot.”

“And you’re married.”

“I love Heather and would never, ever even contemplate cheating on her,” Tom said easily. “But just because a guy puts a ring on it doesn’t mean he locks his balls away in cold storage. There’s nothing wrong with looking. It’s not that different than when Heather and I went to Eugene for a Tim McGraw concert a couple years ago. It didn’t bother me at all that she was practically drooling over him in those tight black leather pants. Because I knew that she’d be going home with me.”

“You’re the lucky one.” Sawyer meant it.

“And don’t I know it.” Tom looked up and offered another conciliatory smile to the waitress, who’d already arrived with their order. “Thanks, Harley.”

“No problem,” she said without sparing him a glance as she zeroed in on Sawyer. “You all enjoy now.” The hint of Texas twang in that sugared tone explained why he hadn’t recognized her.

“Funny.” Tom held his hand up in front of him and studied it thoughtfully after she’d sashayed over to another table with two bottles of beer and a mountain of fried onion rings. Then he waved it in front of his face. “I don’t feel invisible, but you seem to have become the only guy in the place.”

“Not interested,” Sawyer repeated.

“It’s just as well,” Tom decided. “Her ex, who, word has it, hasn’t exactly gotten over the breakup, is a long-haul truck driver the size of the Merrills’ Desperado, but with a lot meaner personality.”

He tilted the wooden chair on its back legs and ran a finger down the condensation on the outside of the brown bottle. “So,” he said finally, “Heather sent me here on a mission.”

“Heather did?”

“Yeah.” He cracked another peanut. Chewed. “She wants me to invite you to dinner Friday at the New Chance.”

“I thought Heather said you guys were going to Ashland for the weekend.”

“We are. This would be earlier in the evening.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “Who knows a woman’s mind? I’m guessing the anniversary has her feeling sentimental about our wedding. God knows she’s been talking about it enough. She took a selfie last night wearing her old wedding dress.”