Page 29

Twenty-Nine

Stephanie

I’m drained, the last couple of weeks have been hell.

Trying to clean up forty-plus years of living from a house you turned your back on is a painful experience. Not to mention frustrating, when you have to do it with one arm because the other one is useless. Of course, with everything going on, I haven’t really kept up with my PT or my exercises.

I got the call from the Traverse City police department the morning after Jackson and I returned home. We’d gone straight to the airport when we left my father’s house and crashed at my apartment in Kalispell because the plane got in late. We never even made it back to the ranch.

Jackson said he wasn’t really surprised my father chose to blow his brains out. According to reports, he probably did so shortly after we left. His cleaning lady found him.

I was mostly angry. It felt like the ultimate betrayal, final confirmation I meant nothing to him. Not that I needed it, it was pretty clear to me already.

My first stop after receiving that call was the office, where I had to sit down with my boss and my partner to fill them in on my father’s involvement with Ben Vallard and Mitchel Laine. Jackson wasn’t happy to be told he had to wait outside, but there wasn’t a whole lot he could do about it. Apparently, he spent his time calling the ranch and making arrangements, because by the time I walked out of the office several hours later, he already had taken the rest of the week off, had flights to Michigan arranged, a hotel booked in Traverse City, and had sourced a funeral home for us to talk to.

Of course it wasn’t as simple as arranging a funeral, we had to wait for an autopsy first, and then it took the FBI three days to go over the house with a fine-tooth comb before we were allowed in to dig through his paperwork to see if he’d left any instructions.

I hadn’t realized there was a small part of me still craving for some kind of affirmation from my father, until I found an old shoebox in the back of the closet in my old bedroom, which my father had used for storage after I left home. The box was filled with old drawings, silly elementary school awards, snapshots, report cards, water safety certification, a second-place medal my team won in a soccer tournament. A collection of mementos, little milestones of a young twelve-year-old’s life.

Nothing was added to the box after my mother died. Not a single piece of paper, no photographs, no ribbons or medals or accolades. The box was tucked away on a dusty shelf, like my father’s heart, after Mom passed away. With her gone, our family ceased to exist.

I’ve been walking around with a raw ache in my chest, but I still haven’t cried. Not after burying my father next to her, as per his wishes, or the long days following, sorting through a house holding many mixed memories.

Jackson stayed and helped until we buried my father, but then he had to get back to the ranch. He would’ve stayed longer if I hadn’t told him to go. He seemed to understand I needed to finish this by myself.

It’s been a purging of sorts, trying to get the house ready to put on the market. With every tangible piece of my history passing through my hands—deciding what was worth holding on to and what could be discarded—I felt myself grow lighter. Cleansed and hollowed where the shadowed parts of my soul used to be.

But I still haven’t cried.

Until I catch sight of Jackson, standing by the baggage carousel inside the terminal, waiting for me.

My knees buckle and hit the floor, every single emotion I’ve tucked away these past weeks washing over me at once. I barely notice the concerned looks or kind offers to help. I’m falling apart on the floor in the middle of the damn airport.

Strong hands slip under my arms and hoist me up, and my face is pressed against a clean cotton shirt, smelling of detergent and Jackson.

“Let it out, baby. I’ve got you,” he mumbles with his lips pressed against the shell of my ear.

Somehow, we end up on a row of seats against the wall of the baggage area, with me curled up on Jackson’s lap, my face shoved in the crook of his neck, as I bawl until my eyeballs are raw and my head is pounding.

“Ready to go home?” he asks as I mop my face with the hem of my shirt.

I’m a fucking disaster, but you’d never know, seeing the way Jackson looks at me with love in his eyes.

“So ready.”

He lifts me off his lap, takes my left hand in his, and walks us over to the carousel to collect my bag. I should be mortified at the spectacle I just put on in public, but I don’t care.

I’m too busy filling that hollow feeling in my soul with all the goodness Jackson gives me.

* * *

Jackson

Man, I’m glad she’s home.

She was an absolute mess at the airport, but I’m not surprised.

Stephanie bottles shit up, and there was a lot of it, both stuff she carried with her from her childhood, but also this last fresh wave of crap landing on her shoulders.

We both lost a parent at twelve, but the comparison ends there, because I ended up with a mother who focused all her love on me, working her butt off to make sure I had a good life. Stephanie, on the other hand, was mostly ignored by her father in favor of her brother. Then her brother died as well, and now that cowardly piece of shit of a father blew his brains out on his kitchen table and basically left the mess he made of his life for her to clean up.

Yeah, she was a mess, but it’s been a crazy few weeks for her.

We haven’t been sitting around twiddling our thumbs back at the ranch either.

I’m not sure what crawled up my stepfather’s backside, but he’s been cracking the whip on us. Aside from the normal workings of the ranch, and the search-and-rescue callouts, he’s been having us work down some kind of honey-do list. Replacing older sections of fencing, painting the barn and the rest of the outbuildings, fixing the roof and the gutters, and putting in several new windows at the house. It’s been all-hands-on-deck all the damn time.

I’ve asked him a few times if he was planning to sell or something, but he just shakes his head. It’s been frustrating, so when he caught me alone after the welcome-home dinner Ama and my mother put together for Stephanie, and asked if I’d join him on the porch for a chat later, I said yes.

Now, looking down at Stephanie asleep in my bed, where she crashed hard when we got back to the cabin, I regret agreeing to it. I’d much rather strip down, crawl under the covers, and gather her in my arms.

Instead, I press a kiss on the side of her head and exit the bedroom, gently pulling the door shut. Then I grab my phone and make my way over to the main house, where I can already see Jonas rocking in the old man’s chair.

Damn .

When I walk up the steps he pulls the side table out in front of him and grabs what looks like blueprints from the bench beside him.

“What’s that?”

“Pull up a chair,” he orders me instead of answering.

He perches the reading glasses he finally conceded to on his nose and rolls out the drawings. I recognize the barn and the breeding shed on the other side of it. New is the building on the other side of the corral across the driveway from the cabins.

“What is that?”

“Equipment storage, offices.”

Annoyed I’m still trying to drag information from him, my tone is a little sharp when I prompt him.

“For?”

He looks at me over his readers with one raised eyebrow. I almost laugh, despite my mother’s efforts to soften him up, the man is still very much commander of his troops.

“Both the ranch and the search and rescue. We’re moving them out of the house.”

“Why?”

He ignores my question and flips the top drawing aside to reveal another one. This one shows the view of the front of what looks to be a single level house.

“We’re gonna break ground on the office building next week. It’s gonna be loud and messy for a while, but it should go up pretty fast.” He taps a finger on the image of the house. “This will take longer.”

Then he points over to the hill where we buried Thomas last month.

“It’s going over there.”

“You’re building another house?”

Before he answers, he pours us both a bourbon from the bottle he has sitting on the floor next to him. Then he clinks my glass with his and takes a sip.

“Hurts your mother to go up the stairs. Her arthritis isn’t getting better with age, and my knees aren’t the best anymore either. We’ll have a bedroom, bathroom, laundry, everything on the same level. Plus, I can still see everything that goes on here, even if I’m no longer involved.”

I almost choke on the mouthful of bourbon I was just swallowing down.

“No longer involved? What are you saying? Are you sick?”

“Fuck no, but I think it’s time I hung up my hat. Your mother and I aren’t getting any younger and like I told you a while ago, I’d like to take her traveling a bit before we’re both too old to enjoy it.”

My mouth is already open with the next question, even as I process the shock at Jonas’s announcement, but he already has his hand up to cut me off.

“You’re like a damn three-year-old with your questions, you know that? Give a man a chance to explain, for chrissakes,” he grumbles.

I mimic zipping my lips, which earns me a roll of his eyes.

“Effective as soon as the office building is done, I’m handing the breeding program and the running of the ranch over to Dan. Bo is gonna help him out for a year or two until he’s ready to call it a day.”

I’m trying hard not to show my reaction. As much as I couldn’t see myself living out my days as a rancher, I’m surprised at how much it hurts to see it all passed on to Dan. We’re brothers in every way but blood, and Jonas is a father figure in both our lives, but it still feels like a letdown.

“The ranch has been his dream, ever since he came working here when he was still wet behind the ears. Trying to learn the ropes while also looking after his mother, who was already very sick at the time. He turned out to be a natural, as if he was born to it.”

I nod in agreement. He’s right, Dan could run this ranch in his sleep. Other than my mother, who is a bit of a horse whisperer, Dan has a special talent with the animals, and the ranch hands respect him.

“He’s moving into the house then?”

Jonas shakes his head as he offers me a cigar.

“He’s already living in his dream house. That’s why I’m moving the offices to the new building.” He lights his before handing me the lighter. “The house is yours.”

I freeze, the light inches away from the end of my cigar.

“Sorry?”

“The house is yours,” he repeats. “I don’t know if it’s your dream house or not, but you can turn it into whatever you want it to be. You’ve got Stephanie, you’re settled in, you need a house.”

His head disappears in a cloud of smoke as he takes a draw from his cigar and sits back in his chair, rocking gently.

“I don’t know what to say,” I finally manage.

He shrugs. “I picked Dan to run the ranch and carry on the family tradition for my father, but I’m handing you my house and my legacy; the High Mountain Trackers. That was my passion as much as you told me it’s yours.”

I’m too emotional to speak, so I stay silent and listen as he continues.

“I wasn’t blessed with kids, but I can’t tell you how grateful I am to your mother for giving me a chance at fatherhood. Son, you are mine in every way but blood and I love you. I could die happy and grateful tomorrow, secure in knowing my heart’s work is looked after.”

“I don’t know what to say,” I struggle to share.

“Nothing to say,” Ma says from the doorway.

I don’t know how long she’s been standing there, but long enough to have a few tears tracking down her face.

“Besides,” she adds as she steps out on the porch and makes her way over to Jonas, perching a hip on his armrest. “It’s pure selfishness on this man’s part. He wants to keep you close so he’ll have a front-row seat when you make him a grandfather.”

Jonas lets out a boom of laughter, squeezing Ma’s hip.

“I think your memory is starting to go, woman. I distinctly recall you’re the one who brought up the proximity to possible grandkids more than once when we were discussing the future.”

“Are you saying you don’t want any?” My mother turns it around on him, catching him by surprise.

“Well, no. That’s not what I said. Of course I’m?—”

But Ma won’t let him finish and smirks triumphantly as she cuts him off.

“Exactly. Just like I said.”

I toss back my drink and get to my feet.

“Both of you are jumping the gun, but I’ll leave you two to fight it out. I’m going to check on Stephanie.”

Ma smiles at me. “You do that, honey.”

I lean in to give her a kiss, and then find myself bending over to kiss Jonas’s weathered cheek as well.

“Thanks, Dad. I love you too.”