S toney avoided Ford for damned near a week.
He let it happen because, to be fair, Stoney had a lot to process. Ford was trying to do what Ty asked and give the guy space and all, but damn. Winter was hard upon them, and Thanksgiving was coming, and….
“Shit.” Ford rose, grabbed his coat on the way out the back, and waded into the newest crust of snow.
He could hear hammering coming from the back of one of the cabins, could hear Stoney singing along with George Strait.
Ford had to grin. You could take the boy out of Texas. He peered around the cabin, hunting said Texan.
Stoney was fixing shingles, all alone. Crazy son of a bitch. Why on earth wasn’t Stoney doing something important and hiring someone to do this menial upkeep?
“Hey! What the hell are you doing, man?” Ford shaded his eyes and stared up at the roof.
“Fixing shingles.”
Yes, he could see that. Christ, if Stoney strung more than three words together in a row, he’d be stunned.
“Why are you doing this and not a maintenance man?”
“Not been one here since the spring.”
“Why not?” If he could get his hands on a hammer, he would hit Stoney. Hard.
“Victor quit.”
Irritating motherfucker. Ford closed his eyes, counting to ten. “I’m trying here, Stoney. You could meet me halfway.”
Stoney stopped hammering, then took a deep breath. “Victor left in a snit, and there’s nothing I can’t fix, for the most part, and I figured we’d save a few pennies. That’s all.”
“Okay. I’ll work a handyman into the budget. I need to sit and talk to you about operations. We got Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I have no idea how any of that works.”
Stoney blinked down at him, obviously confused. “Well, Thanksgiving is turkey and Christmas is Santa and lights. Usually there’s a ham.”
“I bet there’s also tofu loaf, knowing Geoff. What I want to know is, are there guests? Will Ty come in? What should I get Quartz?”
Stoney’s laugh rang out, and Ford found himself blinking up, stunned into silence by the unexpected sound. “Tofurky shit. Avoid it like the plague. We got one family looking to unplug their teenagers, I think, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, but it ain’t a big time for hunters. I’m getting Quartz a tablet, so maybe a gift card for games would be nice.”
Hello! Ford had found the push button. Woo. So, now would not be the best time to mention a Christmas open house. Mainly Ford wanted to invite contractors and community business people, help make some connections for all the work they needed to do in the spring.
He wanted the place decorated up nice too, so there could be pictures for the website.
“Cool. Games I can do. My assistant in Santa Fe is a huge geek.” God, he hadn’t been home in… weeks. Christ. Really? Eileen was going to rip off his head and shit down his neck.
Also, he’d obviously been spending too much time with cowboys.
“Yeah, me not so much, but Quartz loves making things.”
“I’ll have to consult him on my tech.” Ford was glad he was wearing his treaded boots. He glanced around for the inevitable toolbox.
“What you need, man?”
“A hammer.” He could help out and get the job done that much faster.
“There’s one up here….”
“Come on, Stoney. I grew up here. I know how to lay shingles.” Not to mention he worked with Habitat for Humanity every summer. Ford climbed the ladder, holding out a hand for a hammer.
Stoney handed it over. “Thanks, man.”
Okay. Okay, that was actually pleasant.
Ford grinned, feeling like he was actually helping out for the first time since the BLM contract. It was a good thing. They worked together and got the roof repaired, but by the time they were done, Ford was frozen, and he could only guess how cold Stoney had to be.
“Geoff probably has coffee,” Stoney said.
“Probably? That man is a coffee whore.”
“True. He also keeps mulled cider in a crock pot.”
“What the hell are we doing up here on the roof, then?” Were they having a conversation? Him and Stoney?
“Fixing the roof, Ford.”
“Yeah, well, it’s fixed. I say we find cookies.”
“Cool.” Stoney put the tools away as he headed down the ladder, then shimmied down himself, giving him a look at a tight little ass.
Ford couldn’t help but look. He’d always admired that butt. It had been fine in college, but now it looked hard and firm enough to bounce a quarter off.
The things he could do with that….
Only not so much.
Stoney was… what? Bi? Why Brit? Why jump from him to his cousin? He didn’t get it. Hell, maybe Stoney had been experimenting with him, but the way he’d sucked…. Well, a man had to be into cock for that.
“You okay, man?”
“Yeah. Sorry. I could murder some lunch.”
“Head on in. I’ll put stuff away.”
Ford paused, then decided to trust. “See you inside.”
Stoney trundled into the maintenance shed, the wind blowing the door open as a new round of snow began to fall.
Lord, it was cold. The ski places ought to be ecstatic this year. Maybe they should have some cross-country trails, training. Snowshoes.
“Huh. Mental note.” He stomped snow off his boots at the back door, then almost fell over when Geoff opened it.
“About what?”
“Snowshoes.”
“Ah. Love them. You?”
“Went once.” He shrugged. “I’ll try it again.”
“Cool. You looking for anything in particular?”
“Lunch.” He chuckled. “Frozen.”
“Ah. I have vegetarian chili and grilled cheese.”
Oh, that sounded magical. “Enough for Stoney too?”
“Of course. Everybody else ate while the boss was playing the martyr.”
“Well, I helped him out.” His hands felt like hamburger. “I’ll wash up if you can show me where to dish out.”
“Bowls. Spoons. I’ll make sandwiches.”
“I’m on it.” Ford ran water as hot as he could stand it and scrubbed.
He saw Stoney tromping across the yard, and he was only stopped, what? Ten times on the way? Everyone wanted a piece of the guy, which was why he shouldn’t be on the roof fixing shingles.
That wasn’t a good use of Stoney’s skills, dammit.
“You’re looking all grim,” Stoney told Ford when he walked inside.
“Nah, this is determination.”
“Ah. Good to know.” Little shit.
Ford pulled out bowls and spoons. “Geoff is making sammies.”
“Cool.” Stoney headed for the sink. “There coffee?”
Geoff rolled his eyes. “Duh.”
Ford chuckled. “Okay, here’s a question you’ll like. What kind do we have today?”
“Pinyon from down your way. I love it. It smells like chocolate.”
“It does. I should bring up a load of wood next time I come up. It makes the whole house smell amazing.”
“Ty likes that, quite a bit.” Stoney washed his hands, the skin raw and red.
He frowned. Gloves. Someone needed work gloves for Christmas. “Yeah? You think he’ll come in for the holidays?”
“Miss Sophia wants to visit her kids in Vermont, so I don’t know. He’ll be here for one of them, I’m sure.”
“Wow.” Ford just—he felt both out of the loop and a little hurt. He and Ty hadn’t spent the holidays together since he’d left home, and while Ford knew that was his fault, he’d still been looking forward to the idea this year.
“Yeah. They’re having fights, from what Quartz says. None of mine.”
“Right.” Ford chuckled. “I guess it’s tough to blend lives at their age.”
Geoff laughed. “Dude! My Aunt Louise retired as a nun and married a lady up in British Columbia ten years ago. You want to talk about adjustment.”
“I bet. There she had to divorce Jesus.”
He blinked at Stoney. When had the Cowboy of Stone developed a sense of humor?
Geoff cracked up and slid two sandwiches onto plates. “Yessir. And she had to eat weird Canadian food.”
“Hey, I eat your weird-assed vegetarian chili, don’t I?”
“It’s good.” Geoff looked all offended for the two seconds he kept a straight face.
Stoney nodded and gave Geoff an easy, relaxed hug. “It is. I’d even admit to eating it.”
“There, see?”
The red hot flash of jealousy Ford felt spear through him shocked him, jolting him to his toes. He didn’t want Stoney touching someone else.
He wanted that easy grin directed at him, dammit. Ford was trying. He really was. Working with Stoney instead of against him. This bizarre wave of homesickness hit him, because even though he was back at the ranch, he knew in his heart no one wanted him there.
Still.
“You okay, man?” Stoney asked, and the offhand kindness was almost too much to bear.
“I’m fine.” Ford didn’t force a smile, because it would just be obvious. “Just need to eat, I think.” He sat at the kitchen table, because the big table was too formal.
Stoney settled next to him, eating like a man who was starving. Skinny butt. He needed to eat more.
“You okay if I run to Carbondale for supplies, boss?” Geoff asked.
“Totally. Grab me some apples, would you?”
“You got it. Anything for you, other boss?” Geoff gyrated a brow at him.
“Swiss Cake Rolls.”
“Those things are obscene.”
“Oh, man….” Stoney leaned in, close enough that he could see the flecks of silver in Stoney’s eyes. “Just nod or he’ll be inventing his own for days.”
“Mmm. Okay. I mean, I need something sweet and gross. I know you like salty and crunchy, but I’m having stress.”
“Get him the Little Debbies, and I’ll let you make tofu this week, Geoff.”
“I’ll make it crispy!” Geoff bounced out, bellowing what sounded like Don Giovanni .
“Thanks.” He nudged Stoney with his elbow. “This chili is good.”
“Yeah. He’s a damn good cook. I found him at the bus station beat half to death trying to get out of town.”
“What? What happened?” Christ. Geoff didn’t seem confrontational at all, and he was Desiree’s brother, for fuck’s sake.
“He was here visiting family. They’re sort of the hippie-dippie types. You know, Quonset huts on the river. His sister, Desiree, was one of Brit’s friends. Apparently some assholes took offense to the fact he was gay and beat the living fuck out of him. I was picking up a couple of wranglers, and there he was. I couldn’t leave him there. He needed a safe place, and I had one.”
“You’re a good man, Stoney.” The words popped out, but Ford found he meant them. He’d seen Stoney with Quartz, with Ty, with all the staff.
Hell, the man was even being nice to Ford right now.
“Why did you hook up with Britney, Stoney?” Oh, fuck. There it was.
“What?” Why the fuck did Stoney look confused?
“I mean—” Ford waved a hand in the air. “Why didn’t you just tell me you were bi? Was that why you….” He trailed off, not sure why he had diarrhea of the mouth.
“What the fuck are you on about? Are you trying to prove a point or something?” Stoney gave him a scowl, thunderclouds brewing.
“Prove a point? About what? You knocked up my cousin? I want to know why! I mean, I was pretty sure you were full-on queer back in the day!”
“I didn’t….” Stoney cut himself off so quickly Ford swore he could hear it. Then the son of a bitch just stood and left. Just walked off without another fucking word, leaving what was left of his food behind.
Stoney didn’t? Stoney didn’t what ?
Ford hopped up and chased Stoney outside. “No. I want to know!” He slammed into Stoney’s shoulder like a defensive lineman, sending them both sprawling. “How the fuck could you do it?”
“Do what? Save her ass? Save Ty’s? I did it. This is my home, you motherfucker!”
“What does that even mean?” Ford slogged his way to his feet, panting from the shock of the cold mud.
“What part don’t you understand? I did what I had to, and I don’t regret it. She wasn’t supposed to die on the river. It wasn’t supposed to be….” Stoney threw up his hands and then stood, cold mud dripping from him.
“You had to get my cousin pregnant? That doesn’t make any fucking sense!”
Stoney looked at him like he’d lost his mind, but he knew he hadn’t. He knew it.
“What? What the hell is it I don’t understand? How is getting her knocked up covering her ass?” Ford was going to blow a vein.
“We’re not talking about this here,” Stoney hissed. “Anyone could hear us.”
“Then come back and talk to me, damn it. Stop running away.” Ford held out a hand. “Make me understand.”
“I thought you already did.” It took a second, but Stoney accepted his offer, rough calluses dragging against his skin.
“I don’t get anything that’s going on around here.” They headed inside, and Ford shivered. Man, they needed towels.
He took Stoney into his part of the house, back past the office and the little family room and into the room he was using as a sitting room-slash-library.
“Let me grab some towels and that Thermos of coffee Geoff always leaves me.”
“Yeah, sure.”
He hurried to the bathroom, stripping off his soaking sweater; he grabbed him some sweats, his robe, and a handful of towels. To his utter surprise, Stoney was still there when he got back, staring at the books piled on the shelf beside his desk.
“You’re welcome to borrow any of them you’d like.”
Stoney damn near jumped out of his skin. “No. No, that’s cool.”
“I know you read, Stoney. It’s not like I think you’re stupid.” He didn’t. Stoney thought that for him, always putting himself down.
“Towel? I’m dripping on your floor.”
“Here.” He handed over a towel and his robe. He had sweats to slip into, and he’d forgotten Stoney would be freezing as well as wet.
“It’s okay. I’d just get it nasty.” Stoney tried to dry off, then sighed. “I should go change.”
“Promise you’ll come right back?” They lived in the same house. He couldn’t hold Stoney hostage.
“Where am I going to go?” The hopelessness in the words surprised him, but Stoney just shrugged. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
The slump of Stoney’s shoulders spoke of defeat, and Ford wondered if he’d stepped aside into another dimension. “Look, you stubborn bastard. Just tell me what happened with you and Brittany. Why did you sleep with her?”
“I didn’t.”
“What?” Ford felt as though someone had hit him in the gut. “But Quartz is your kid.”
“He’s my son. My name’s on the birth certificate, and I’ll beat anyone down who says otherwise.”
“Please tell me, Stoney.” He gave Stoney the robe, and this time the man took it and slid out of his shirt and hoodie before putting it on.
“She caught pregnant from a guy in Aspen, someone important enough and married enough that Ty worried, I guess. He came to me and asked if I’d put my name on the birth certificate, say it was mine so’s she wouldn’t get in trouble. She wasn’t supposed to die.”
Ford felt an increasingly familiar sensation of being hit, right in the breadbasket.
“I—how.” He sat in the chair that was, thankfully, right behind him. Ford spread his hands. “Why wouldn’t someone tell me that?”
“I thought you knew.”
“Clearly not.” Fuck. All this time he’d hated Stoney for not just taking his home, but moving on so damned fast. With his cousin. The floor was just—shit, it was just gone like a black hole opened up under him and he was free-falling in space.
“She wasn’t supposed to die. I mean, he was just a baby, and… I love him. I couldn’t turn away from him, not for anything.”
“No. No, of course not.” Ford wanted to scream. He wanted to call Ty and read the old bastard the riot act. “I couldn’t understand it, man. I just couldn’t. Jesus, I wanted to know why so bad, and now there isn’t a why.”
“Ford, man, I left you because I’m a fucking idiot, not because I decided to stop being gay.”
Ford stared at Stoney, not sure what to say at all. He was never lost for words.
“Quartz is my life now. You won’t tell him.” It wasn’t a question.
“I’m not a complete dick.” Even if his whole family clearly thought he was. Christ. He could have helped. What had Ty thought of him? What kind of bastard did Ty think he was, for fuck’s sake?
“No. I’m not either.”
No. No, in fact, Stoney was a good guy. Like a genuinely decent human being. Ford couldn’t even argue Stoney had done what he had to get the ranch. No one had expected Brit to frickin’ drown.
Ford kind of wanted to kick him in the shins. Not hard enough to bruise, just enough to make it sting. Or maybe beat that still fine ass until it was raw.
“I wish Ty had told me. I could have helped.”
“I thought he had.”
“Yes, well, you should have verified.”
One eyebrow shot up. “Sure. Dear guy who hates me. You did know that I didn’t fuck your cousin because I’m, one, queer as a three-dollar bill, and two, not a giant bleeding asshole, right? Also, there’s the baby that doesn’t look anything like me situation and the fact that I agreed to take half the ranch to give Quartz something I couldn’t manage on my own. Your former lover, the total loser.”
Okay, that was the longest speech from Stoney ever.
It was also bullshit. Ford wouldn’t have turned away from Brit back then, even if he was mad at Stoney and Ty. “I would have done something, Stoney. I would have. Hell, I stayed away because I thought every damned member of this family thought I was an utter prick, when it comes right down to it.”
“You know Ty loves you.”
“You don’t have to like someone to love them.” He sighed, studying Stoney’s face, trying to find something familiar in this stranger. “I’m sorry. I promise, we’ll make the ranch into something Quartz can count on for college money or whatever he wants to do.”
“He wants to be an engineer. He wants to build huge things.” Stoney smiled as he said the words, the obvious love the man had for his son enough to make Ford forgive a lot. Stoney could have walked away, could have let Brit and Ty hang, but he hadn’t. Far from it.
Some small part of that may have been that Stoney didn’t know what else to do, but that wasn’t the only reason, clearly. It also wasn’t Ford’s place to judge.
Fuck, his head hurt.
“That’s too cool,” Ford said. “Has he ever been to science camp?”
“Do they have those?”
God save him from insular cowboys with gorgeous gray eyes and perfect asses. Ford rolled his eyes. “Yes. And God knows, he could use some time with kids more like him. That was not a criticism,” Ford added, holding up a hand to stall the protest obviously forming.
“Yeah, it sorta is, and I sorta deserve it. It’s hard to let him go do things. I worry.”
“Like, in general, or does he have specific issues?” Ford needed to know everything. Now.
“He’s got autism. He’s doing great, compared to a few years ago, but he’s got himself his momma’s temper and….” Stoney shrugged. “He has to try harder than other kids, but he’s wicked smart and just about the neatest person I’ve ever met.”
“He’s honest as hell, which I like.” Ford rolled his head on his neck. “Sorry about tackling you. I’m glad you told me, though.” He could stop thinking the worst of Brittany too, which relieved his mind. Maybe he was a shitty human being. Who knew?
“I really thought you knew. Honest. Not many folks know, but I thought you were one of them.” Stoney held out one hand to him.
Ford took it, half shaking, half just holding. The gesture felt a lot like Stoney handing him a lifeline. The calluses fascinated his thumb, and he found himself exploring them, one hard ridge after another.
Stoney stared at him, lips open the tiniest bit, cheeks flushed. Oh, God, he wanted—
Ford let Stoney’s hand loose. “You need to go take a hot shower, man.”
“Yeah. I’ll wash your robe.” Stoney headed out, damn near running.
Ford found himself grinning, even in the mood he was in.
Possibly because he’d heard Stoney mutter, “Hot shower, my ass. I need a cold one.”