Page 18 of Killer on the Homestead (Bent County Protectors #2)

Duncan had given Rosalie space after that. He had a bad feeling if he was around her too much, she’d change her mind.

So he’d taken her little biographical sketches on the different ranch hands back home. He’d gone over them, added his own notes to the margins. Tried to draw some conclusions and come up empty.

He’d gone up to his parents’ for dinner, both to help them learn the new security system, and to get their take on Rosalie’s sketches.

But by the time he’d finally talked them into actually using the security system, and they’d sat down to dinner, he could only see how pale and off his father was and figured the sketches could wait.

He’d talk to Mom in the morning after Dad headed out for chores.

She seemed sturdy enough to handle it, even if she was worried sick over Dad.

So he’d made sure the security system was set, headed back to his cabin, then taken a pain pill and gone to bed.

He’d actually slept well, and it had been a while on that front.

He supposed he’d taken Rosalie’s advice from the other day and tried to take care of himself so he would be able to take care of his parents.

In the morning, he considered not wearing his sling.

His arm still ached, but wasn’t it time to move on?

He drank some coffee, choked down a protein bar, and took a pain pill while he considered it.

In the end, he slid it on. He’d wear it today, leave it off tonight, and hope that there was some kind of progress there.

And that he didn’t have to remind himself and everyone else at a baseball game what had happened to him.

He drove up to the main house, which was empty as he walked through it.

Empty and not locked up. He was going to be mad about that, but he spotted his mother from the window that looked out over the backyard.

She was attacking her garden. And Duncan knew his mother and her moods well enough to know this was a stress-filled planting morning.

So he went out back to help. He approached as she ruthlessly hoed a line of dirt.

“What can I do?” he asked by way of greeting.

Mom wiped her forehead with the back of her forearm. Her gaze dipped to his arm in the sling. “I’ve got it handled, honey.”

“You have to let me help, because I’m not going to be around tonight.

” He probably couldn’t hoe much with his left hand, but he could plant.

So he crouched next to the line of seedlings and started dropping them where he knew they belonged.

He felt like a kid again, but in a kind of nostalgic, nice way.

“Where will you be tonight?” Mom asked, going back to the task of hoeing rows.

“I’m taking Rosalie to the Bent County High baseball game.”

Mom sent him a doleful look. “That’s not very romantic.”

“First, I wasn’t trying to be romantic. Second, baseball is very romantic, Mom.”

“I went to every one of your high-school baseball games, Duncan. There is nothing romantic about a bunch of sweaty boys—and girls, Sarabeth is the talk of the county, aside from you being back—throwing a ball around.”

It made him laugh in spite of himself. “Trust me. Rosalie wouldn’t have agreed to dinner or much else. This is…we’ll call it an easing-in.”

“Mmm.” Mom studied him. “Are you at least going to bring her flowers?”

“I’m going to bring her more information for our case,” he replied, dropping the last plant for this row. It hurt a little, but he began to scoop the dirt over the roots.

Mom sighed heavily. “Duncan. Honestly.”

“She won’t trust flowers.” Though it was tempting, just to see the narrow-eyed suspicion on her face. But since she was actually going out with him, he didn’t want to rile her up too much. There was a fine, careful line with Rosalie that required some…finesse.

Luckily, he’d spent most of his adult life learning the fine art of when to finesse an off-speed pitch and when to blast one right down the middle.

When it came to Rosalie… “She doesn’t trust much.”

“No, I don’t suppose she would.” Mom’s sigh was sympathetic this time.

“I could throttle Tim Young for what he did to those girls. If he was alive. Joan too, for that matter. But make sure you understand, just because Audra got all the sweet, and Rosalie got all the sour, doesn’t mean she’s not tender under all that bite. ”

He glanced up at his mother. Her cheeks were a little red from how hard she’d been working, and she scowled down at him like he’d done something wrong.

“You warning me off all of a sudden?”

“No, I’m not warning you off .” She puffed out a breath.

“Haven’t I been the one…? Oh, never mind.

My point is… That girl is so busy looking out for everyone else, including us, by looking into this murder, even though she doesn’t have to.

I just want you to understand, you should be looking out for her. ”

It amused him that’s how his mother looked at it, that it would annoy Rosalie to be looked after , that it was exactly what he wanted to do anyway.

He’d spent most of the past fifteen years—longer maybe—not being selfish, necessarily.

The last few years he’d mentored some rookies, he’d given back, but that had always been about baseball.

And sometimes that bled over into the personal if a teammate was making some bad choices off the field, but he’d never had the time, taken the time, to take care of anyone who mattered to him just because of who they were.

His parents. A friend—romantic or not—that didn’t connect to a baseball uniform.

Even though he wished it wasn’t murder , he was glad to be here, taking care where he could. Whether Mom, Dad, or Rosalie liked it or not.

“I do understand that,” Duncan said, getting back to his feet and brushing off his dirty knees with his good hand. “And you know why I do?”

“Because she’s got a pretty face?”

“Because my mama raised me right.” Being back home gave him a new perspective on how everything he’d managed to build as a professional athlete had been built on the foundation his parents, and this ranch, had laid.

She made a scoffing noise, but her mouth curved.

“I should hope so. We’ll see how long that sweet talk lasts when I task you with my next favor.

I don’t suppose you can think of a way to follow your father around this morning without making him think we’re trying to babysit him?

I’d rather you do that than ruin my garden by continuing to plant my cowpeas too close together. ”

“I’ll see what I can do,” he said, ignoring her old complaint. She used to joke she’d put him in T-ball just so she could plant her garden right.

Then both his parents had sacrificed a whole hell of a lot, all because he’d fallen in love with a game. And he wanted to pay them back the only way he thought they might accept. By figuring this damn murder out.

“But first, I want you to tell me more about Owen.”

Mom blew out a breath and squinted out toward the bunkhouse. “I didn’t have much interaction with the boy before the murder. I remember the first week he was here, Terry had some complaints about the both of them. Lazy work. Bad attitudes. Dad, of course, asked Terry to be patient.”

“Was he?”

“Always,” Mom said loyally. “Kept complaining for quite some time, but no threats to turn them out. It takes time to work the lazy out of boys who’ve never been given a chance.”

“And when do you think they worked it out of them?”

“Your father would have a better grasp on timing.” Her eyebrows drew together, as if she was trying to think back. “I can’t remember when the tide really turned. Sometime after Christmas I’d have to guess.”

“So they’ve been model hands these past few months?”

“Model? No. Efficient? Not really. Better? Yes. Improvement. I had high hopes for Hunter. Less for Owen, but that’s probably how I feel about your father’s family coloring my perspective.

” She glanced toward the bunkhouse again.

“Poor boy has been nothing but grief-stricken since. I asked him if he wanted to go home, be with family, and he begged me to stay. Said he’d worked twice as hard, enough for him and Hunter. Just begged me not to send him away.”

“Something back home scares him?”

“I don’t know about that. I just don’t think anyone cares about him back there, poor kid. And not that Terry cares , but he takes good care of those boys. So does your father. This is a good place to be.”

That sentiment stayed with Duncan as he went about his day. Helped with a few ranch chores he could do one-handed, talked with some of the hands, shared a sandwich with Terry at lunchtime. He tried to poke into Owen, and Hunter for that matter, without being too obvious about it.

Not one of them, Dad included, would give the two compliments on their work ethic, but the consensus among the hands matched up with Mom’s. They’d been improving.

This is a good place to be .

Except someone had been murdered. Right there, in his own front yard, and the cops hadn’t found any answers yet.

So if they wouldn’t, he and Rosalie would have to.

It wasn’t a date . Rosalie told herself that as she debated for far too long about what to wear. It was a high-school baseball game. So jeans and a T-shirt and she needed to stop overthinking which T-shirt.

But she considered about ten different options, told herself to wear her ratty old Bent County High School T-shirt, and ended up pulling on the form-fitting V-neck the color of her eyes.

She considered her hair next. She should just throw it up and slap a hat on it, but she didn’t.

She took time—too much time—curling the careful strands she pulled out of the ponytail.

Then putting on makeup—ridiculous, just ridiculous—with a deft hand to make sure it didn’t look like she was wearing any.

When she was done with that, irritated with herself, irritable with the situation, so damn nervous she thought she’d be sick, she marched herself downstairs.