Page 47 of Rocky Mountain Devil

Wisely, his mom changed the topic. “I heard something interesting today.”

Anything to not have to talk about Ben. “What’s the latest gossip in Rocky?”

She smiled coyly. “I hear there’s a new lady in your life.”

Rafe was tempted to lean his head on the table. Great change of topic—from one thing he didn’t want to discuss to another. “That wasn’t the kind of gossip I expected.”

“I like her. She’s solid and yet fun, and you’ve been friends for years.” Dana waggled her fingers as she seemed to consider the matter a little more then nodded. “Yes. I think she’ll be good for you.”

“I really don’t want to talk about this with you, Mom.”

“Which is why we’re not talking. I’m simply offering my opinion, as mothers do.”

He chuckled. “As mothers do—you got that right.”

“You two always did get along so well.” She eyed him. “Too well at times. I never expected the pastor’s daughter to be such a troublemaker, but all those detentions couldn’t have been your fault for so many years.

“This is starting to sound an awful lot like a conversation.”

Dana leaned back in her chair and examined him as Micah stared between them, brown eyes blinking as he gummed his cookie into a sloppy mess. “And that would be an absolutely terrible thing? To have a conversation with your mother.”

“About Laurel, yes. That would be a terrible thing to talk about right now,” he teased.

His mother’s eyes brightened. “Oh, Ilikethat. If you don’t want to talk about it, that means you must be in that first giddy falling-in-love stage, where everything is new, and you just want to keep it to yourself.”

Rafe pinched the bridge of his nose. “Mom…”

She laughed at him, patting his shoulder as she got up to get a cloth and a toddler sippy cup from the counter. “Relationships are important. Every mother wants to see her kids happy and settled down, and with Gabe and Allison doing so well, of course I would be thinking about you.”

He really shouldn’t have asked, but she’d brought up the topic of relationships…

“Why do you stay?”

A stillness settled over the kitchen, sounds of the fire in the wood stove and the ticking clock on the kitchen wall loud as his mother stared out the window. Micah banged his fist on the highchair tray, but Rafe waited. It was rude that he’d asked, but since he had, he wanted to know the answer.

She faced him, an unreadable expression on her face. “I promised. I made a vow to stay with him. It’s not always easy to keep our promises, and sometimes we make mistakes, but this is one that I can keep, so I have.”

“He made promises too. I don’t think he’s keeping them,” Rafe complained with a grumble.

His mom took a deep breath. “But my behaviour is not based on somebody else’s. What I do needs to be the right thing, even if everyone else is failing around me. I promised for better or for worse—”

“But lately it’s all been worse,” Rafe pointed out.

Dana shook her head. “I know your father isn’t the easiest man to get along with. He’s got…troubles, especially when it comes to you boys, but as far as I know he’s never done anything that’s beyond the line. That means something. That means enough to keep trying, and keep hoping.”

They stared at each other. Rafe heard it in her voice— Ben had never crossed the line, but if he ever did, she’d leave.

It was the most he could hope for.

All afternoon he kept thinking about her words as he worked. Right before supper he slipped into the quiet of the new barn outside Gabe and Allison’s. He settled onto the bale beside Gabe, wondering why his thoughts had gone so morose. “You ever think how different life might have been if Mike hadn’t died?”

A grunt escaped his brother. “All the time.”

They sat in silence for a long moment, Rafe throwing bits of straw to the floor in front of them in a steady rhythm. “Sometimes I get jealous. When I look at what the other guys have—at their relationships with their dads. I mean, at least with Uncle Mike and Uncle Randy.” Uncle George was more a mystery, choosing mostly to hang out at the Whiskey Creek ranch to “get things done” since he didn’t think his girls could do it without supervision.

“I know. I’ve felt it too,” Gabe admitted. “The good thing is while they’re not our dad, they’re willing to listen, and help, and they’re family.”

Which was good, but it wasn’t the same.