The cobbler was one of the best Grady had ever eaten. He wondered if his appetite affected his sense of taste, because things always seemed to be their best when strong hunger was involved. Either way, it went down easy and satisfied the hollow gnawing in his gut.
For the next hour, Buck and Walt chatted on the porch, a mug in their hands and rocking chairs swaying gently beneath them. Though the hour was late, there was always time for old friends to catch up. Grady didn’t want to feel it, but a foreign surge of jealousy snaked through him. Relationships didn’t come easily, and he wondered if he’d have a comrade to shoot the breeze with when he grew older. He sure hoped so.
After dessert, he excused himself to head to bed and Josie did the same, and only then did Grady realize that although he’d said she was like a sister, Josie was still an eighteen-year-old woman and Grady was a red-blooded man. Sharing a room wouldn’t be a wise decision. Grady opted instead for the couch in the family room. His six-foot-two frame would extend well beyond each end, but his integrity would remain intact. That was certainly more important than his comfort.
The rest of the house shut down a little after midnight. Walt retreated to his room down the hall and Grady located a throw pillow and patchwork quilt to use as bedding. It would be all he’d need to ensure a decent night’s sleep.
He was dog tired, his muscles aching and his mind shot. The third day always did this. Ranch work was a different kind of hard. Rodeo work was taxing on more than just his body. Each time a bronco would burst out of the chute, it was Grady’s job to make sure the rider ended up safe on solid ground once their clock ran out. He never worried about himself when he got in the saddle. Sure, he knew there were inherent risks in mounting a thousand-pound animal with a mind of its own, but Grady took on that risk willingly.
When he took on the safety of another man, it became a risk Grady still hadn’t become completely comfortable assuming. Maybe someday he would.
Sleep came fast, even in a different place. Grady was lucky that he could instantly fall asleep wherever his head landed. Not everyone was like that.
Apparently not Josie.
He felt her hand on his shoulder, jostling him deeper into the back of the small sofa before he registered it taking place outside of a dream. The murmured, “Cutter, wake up,” that gritted out as an order masked in a hushed whisper took even longer to process.
A good minute passed before his right eyelid pried open, the left one refusing altogether.
“What? Something wrong?” He couldn’t decide if he should rub the sleep from his eyes or not. In truth, he wanted to snap his squinted eye shut and go back to dreaming. He couldn’t remember what he’d been dreaming about, but his brain clung to that euphoric sensation of slumber and he wanted to slip back into it. Just those few hours alone had been heaven.
“Cutter,” Josie said again, more quietly now that she had even a little bit of his attention. “Cutter, I need your advice.”
Grady swiveled his head toward the clock that hung on the far wall and opened both eyes to examine it. “At 3:30 in the morning?”
“Yeah.” She pushed his legs aside and folded hers up beneath her on the couch. Her arms wrapped around her knees. “Couldn’t sleep.”
“I gathered as much.”
“I can count on you to give me an honest answer?” Her voice rose softly at the end. The tiredness that blurred his eyes moments before began to lift. His vision adjusted to the pitch black of the room and fixtures snapped into focus. Josie sat curled up beside him wearing an oversized maroon t-shirt and her long hair was twisted into a knot at the top of her head. She looked much more awake than she had any business being in the middle of the night.
“As honest an answer as I can offer with only half my brain functioning.”
Grady didn’t feel her body shift on the cushions, didn’t sense her move closer until her palms were suddenly flattened to his chest and her lips crushed his in a desperately shocking way.
He wanted to believe that if it had been daylight and he had his wits about him that he would’ve shoved her off and made her stop instantly. He wouldn’t have encouraged her mouth to move against his, their lips meeting in a rhythm that made his head spin and his breath labor. He wouldn’t have slid the band from her hair to run his fingers through the silky soft strands. He wouldn’t have pulled her to him, reveling in the long-forgotten feel of the closeness of a woman.
And he wouldn’t have pretended Josie was her older sister the entire time.
“Get out of this house.”
The throaty growl from the hallway was enough to launch Josie from the couch and to catapult Grady completely into sudden consciousness.
“I mean it, Cutter,” Walt sneered. His voice was angry, frustration spreading through his harsh tone. He loomed as a shadowy figure, the wash of light from the crescent moon filtering through the windows not enough to show his expression. But Grady didn’t need to see it. He easily felt the daggers that shot from Walt’s eyes. “Boy, you need to get out before I end up doing something to you that I’ll sorely regret.”
Grady scrambled to find his shirt and fit it back on. Josie’s eyes were wide as saucers, damp with guilty tears. She pressed her mouth on Grady’s cheek, close to his ear, and whispered, “I just wanted to know if I could help you move on. How’d I do?”
Grady’s eyes slanted and he pinned his lips. He wasn’t about to speak his answer, but Josie knew it. She knew it before she even asked it. He’d never be able to move on. And for as much as he wanted to be angry with Josie, Walt’s anger didn’t allow space for anyone else’s. He had already swallowed the room whole with his righteous fury.
Leland picked Grady up just over an hour and a half later, making it there in record time. The drive back to Riverburn was quiet, the unspoken shame weighty in the air around them.
Sitting in the quiet cab with his buddy, Grady realized he didn’t have anything to be jealous of when it came to Walt Friar. Grady had Leland, and he was the best friend a man could ever ask for. Leland always had Grady’s back. Walt had Grady looking over his back. The difference was evident and it was painful. Grady hadn’t wanted to believe he’d also lost Walt when he lost Maren, but one couldn’t occur without the other following quickly behind.
Grady realized right then and there that as long as the Friar family existed, he’d never have a welcome place within it.
Present Day
7
Maren
A gaze settled onto Maren’s computer screen the moment she propped the laptop open.
The man—broad and too close for comfort—rotated in his seat so his shoulders were square with the narrow aisle. But Maren knew his attention was fixed on the open document, even if he pretended otherwise. She was sure it was difficult to ignore the way she would swipe her cheek with the fuzzy inside of her sweatshirt sleeve every few minutes. She tried to be discrete in her grief, but trains didn’t allow for that secrecy.
He’d maintained his polite silence for several hours, but when he finally spoke, his voice broke into the melodic white noise, shaking Maren from her isolation. She jumped.