—EIGHT—

 

Dane stood in the doorway between the kitchen and hallway quietly, entertained by watching Ren. She'd opened the cupboard to the left of the sink twice, clearly looking for something, but this time, she stopped, as if taking inventory of what was inside and committing it to memory. The house was large and entirely foreign to her; he couldn't blame her—he forgot where things were half the time.

After watching her struggle for a second more—she was so damn cute doing it and he didn't mind the view when she stood on her tiptoes to peer into the higher cupboards—he cleared his throat and entered the kitchen.

"Whatcha looking for?"

She looked a little embarrassed and turned, offering him a bewildered smile.

"Cheese grater?"

He reached past her, second cupboard to the left, passing so close the space between them shared their breaths, and produced the grater, one corner of his lips turned up in a mischievous grin.

"Lucky guess," he said.

She ducked her eyes for a moment but then met his again with a full-watt smile and his heart soared. The woman was attractive, he would give her that, but she also had a way of making him feel like the most important person on the planet when she cast her smile at him.

"I'm just trying to figure out the lay of the land. It's a big house."

He chuckled; she was right. The house felt particularly large and lonely when he was up after Gage went to bed. It was accustomed to being full-to-overflowing but the most action it usually saw these days was two Sundays a month, when everyone came over and Ella cooked a big meal while they caught up on anything that had been neglected for want of a few extra pairs of hands.

"That's the truth. You'll get used to it eventually." He took a step back, pushed his hands into his pockets for fear he'd reach out and touch the girl. He'd been thinking about the feel of her soft body against his as it had relaxed into his touch two nights ago. Not constantly, but every once in a while, when he wasn't paying attention, she'd cross his mind. She'd been here all of two days but that was all the time it had taken for him to know she was the kind of girl he could probably hold for a lifetime.

Her appealing feminine form wasn't the only thing he could appreciate and she'd made that abundantly clear over the last couple of days. She was endlessly patient and kind with Gage, encompassing a maternal quality he wouldn't have expected in a childless woman of her age. Already, she had forged a great relationship with him, and she guided Kerri as if it was her second nature to parent a teenager. She could make just about any meal with any type of ingredients and for not having had a rural upbringing, she wasn't afraid of the fresh produce and meat Ella had delivered for them. In fact, he wasn't sure she was afraid of anything, least of all, hard work. Just this morning, he had caught her on her knees in his mother's long-abandoned and grown over garden, pulling weeds while Kerri listened to music on the porch and Gage played with the dog in the yard. She'd already made herself completely indispensable. He hadn't known how badly he needed someone like Ren in the house until she'd actually gotten there and shown him what he'd been missing for the last two years.

He wanted to know everything about her, from the finite details of what had happened with her mother, to her favorite color, right down to the noises she would make when he pressed his lips to the soft flesh of her throat.

In order to stop himself from finding out all of those things right now, he crossed the floor and pulled open the fridge, making a face at the contents.

"Looks like we need a grocery run. I've got to drop Gage off at mama's for his weekly sleepover… how about you, Kerri and I run into town?"

She pursed her lips like she had to think about it.

"I'm fine to run into town alone. I'm sure you're too busy to babysit me." When he arched a skeptical brow at her, she conceded. "… but if you have to go in anyways...I just don't want to be a bother."

"It's no bother, trust me."

*

Twenty minutes later, Ren found herself in the front seat of Dane's pickup, Kerri and Gage buckled in safely behind. Gage chattered happily to Kerri, telling her about how he ran Grandma's store in return for supper and a sleepover once a week.

"So what do they sell there?" Kerri asked from the back seat.

Dane met her eyes in the rear view mirror. "Everything from a ladies' fart to a clap of thunder."

Ren turned to catch the absurd expression on Kerri's face and laughed out loud. They were both still figuring out the interesting, and oftentimes amusing local dialect. Kerri struggled a bit more though.

They stopped briefly at Baylor's store, Ella waving at Ren and Kerri from the front door as Gage skipped from the truck to his grandma. A five minute drive past the store brought them to Three Rivers' one independently owned grocery store.

The three disembarked from the truck and Dane gestured to the diner next door to the shop. A crowd of young people were congregated outside.

"They make a mean milkshake, Kerri, if you're not interested in groceries. Might be nice to meet some new faces?" The teen skipped off with a word of thanks and a five dollar bill from Ren, leaving her alone with Dane at the entrance of Sawyer's Grocery. He stepped ahead of her and pulled a shopping cart from the row, pushing it into the store.

Ren had scrawled a list on a sticky note and followed beside the cart, pulling items off of shelves and out of coolers as they moved slowly up and down each aisle so she could figure out where everything was.

"Eventually I'll know where everything is, but I'll still go up and down every aisle when I'm just here for a carton of eggs." Ren laughed.

"No, the eggs you'll get from the Pierces. You'll be here for cheese. We don't have a neighbor who makes that yet." To illustrate his point, Dane stopped and put a block of cheddar cheese into the cart—it hadn't been on Ren's list.

"Ah, gotcha." She made a mental note to figure out where the Pierces lived and pulled her list out to cross eggs off of it.

They continued down the aisles, taking their time—the banter between them was comfortable and easy.

Dane was a popular man. Just about everybody who passed by them stopped to say hello and was just as pleased to see Ren as they were to see him. Everyone knew he'd been raising Gage and were pleased to see he'd gotten some help. The Baylors were obviously well respected within the community and Dane was friendly, asking after grandkids and jobs. Ren had never had that kind of connection within a neighborhood and it made her heart ache a little bit.

As they made their way through the bakery, a short, white haired woman in a motor scooter nearly ran Ren over. Dane saw her coming and tugged Ren briefly to him, out of the line of fire. The woman's face lit up at the sight of Dane. He shot a good humored smile at Ren, murmuring, "Watch this."

"Dane Baylor! You grow taller every time I see you!" The woman flashed a smile at Dane that was full of adoration.

"I think you're just getting shorter, Mrs. Bates." He teased, his tone affectionate.

"And this, is this your new bride I have been hearing so much about?" The woman grasped Ren's hand. Ren smiled and patted the woman's hand lightly, completely confused. Her stomach did a flip-flop. This was either something bad or she was either the butt of a cruel joke.

"Oh Mrs. Bates… this is Ren Maddock, she works for me."

"I heard it was a beautiful wedding! I bet you've got a bun in the oven already. Have to catch up to Gavin. I've got to get going, Henry is waiting for me!"

Dane watched her go with an amused expression on his face. Ren shook her head at Mrs. Bates' back, flabbergasted at the way the woman had bowled the pair of them over.

"Have you been telling the locals you mail-ordered a bride?" she teased, recovering quickly.

"Mrs. Bates… I've known her my whole life and then some. She confuses me for Finn on a regular basis… she's done it ever since we were kids."

"Wait," Ren stopped, narrowing her eyes at Dane. Finn had sat at her dinner table the last two nights, but on his own. "Finn is married? Or is that completely imagined?"

"Was." Dane cleared his throat, continuing to push the cart through bakery without making eye contact. "Finn and Sunny were married all of six months when she was diagnosed with cancer. It went quick. That was about a year ago."

A curse escaped under Ren's breath. It was no wonder this family was so close. Two devastating strikes in the last two years, and those were just the ones he had disclosed to her. Who knew what else had happened—for all she knew, Dane was a widower, too. It put her issues into perspective—what business did she have complaining about her mother's presence in her life? At least she and Kerri were both still alive.

"I'm so sorry, Dane."

He shook his head, pushed the cart ahead and plucked a bag of Doritos off the shelf.

"Bad things happen to good people. It's part of the journey. Gotta be there to get here."

She considered his words.

"That's a good way to look at it."

"It's the only way to look at it if you wanna make it through."

The rest of the shopping trip passed in general silence, but Ren had a deeper appreciation for the man who walked beside her. Not only did they have to deal with the grief of loss in their family, they regularly had well-meaning neighbors who couldn't keep things straight and dredged up the pain without intending to.

As they exited Sawyer's, grocery bags in hand, Ren caught sight of Kerri outside the restaurant. She was leaning against a wall with her back turned and a tall, gangly teen aged boy stood beside her, the pair of them peering down at her cell phone. Neither heard Ren and Dane approaching.

"And when you get home, go to the bathroom and lift your shirt and send me a picture of your tits…"

Ren stopped short, seeing red. She reached for the boy but Dane got there first, dropping his bag of groceries and clamping a hand on the boy's shoulder to turn him around and get a look at his face.

"Kyle Sullivan, I know your mama didn't teach you it was okay to talk to ladies like that."

The boy's eyes widened when he saw Dane's furious face. Dane pushed the kid a couple of steps back, hand still tight on his shoulder, until he was pressed against the brick wall of the restaurant. He wasn't overly rough but there was no give in his eyes. His voice was firm, his gaze pinning the boy's.

"You're gonna leave this girl alone. She's gonna take your number right out of her phone and you're not going to get any pictures of her, or of any other girl...'cause you're not going to ask any girls for that kind of thing again."

Kerri's eyes remained rapt on the scene unfolding as Kyle nodded, giving Ren an opportunity to pull the phone from her sister's hand and hit the delete button on the contact she had been keying in. Kerri still hadn't moved when Ren put the phone back into her hand, but a bright blush had run up her fair cheeks and her eyes had filled with embarrassing tears. Ren put her arm around her sister's shoulders and squeezed reassuringly.

Though Kyle clearly didn't feel he should have to, a sullen apology crossed his lips.

"I'm sorry, Dane."

"Don't you think you should be telling Kerri, here, that you're sorry for disrespecting her?" Dane didn't hesitate to correct the boy.

"I'm sorry for disrespecting you, Kerri." The boy didn't lift his eyes to either of the recipients of his apology, and shuffled back to a crowd of young people who had gathered to watch the altercation. Some of them jeered at Kyle for being schooled by an 'old guy', others slapped him on the back in congratulations.

Dane glared at the group and then turned, putting a hand on Kerri's shoulder as he picked up his discarded grocery bags and guided the Maddock girls away from the diner.

"That kid is bad news, Kerri. I'm sorry," he said as the trio returned to Dane's pick-up. "I'll take you down to one of the rodeo nights sometime and introduce you to some good people."

Kerri shrugged, her strides matching theirs. The flush was still in her cheeks and her eyes were downcast. "It's okay."

It occurred to Ren, as she watched her sister, that she just expected people to treat her poorly. In truth, Ren had felt the same way for much of her adolescence. Being taken advantage of was normal and sincerity was rare and appreciated.

They were almost to the truck when Kerri spoke again, so quietly Ren almost didn't hear her. "Thanks, Dane."

"No thanks necessary. First thing's first. Nobody disrespects a woman, least of all when I'm there, and one I care about. Second of all, and trust me on this one - the only men worth knowing are cowboys. The Sullivans only ride gas-powered horses, and not a one of them has ever treated a lady right." He started off somber but by the time he finished and they were all piled in the truck, Dane's tone was teasing.

When they got back to the ranch, Kerri immediately headed for her bedroom and Dane helped Ren put the groceries away.

"Thanks for what you did for Kerri back there." Ren put the block of cheese in the fridge and straightened.

"It was nothing, really."

Leaning back against the counter, she took in his casual expression.

"I know it was nothing to you, but it was something to her. She's had a rough life, and someone besides me being kind to her is pretty monumental."

"Look, you girls are part of my family now." When Ren chuckled aloud, he continued. "Seriously. Wait until you meet the rest of my family. Nobody's just an employee. Everybody's family."

Considering all of the 'employees' she was currently aware of, Ren raised a skeptical brow at him and Dane raised his hands in mock surrender.

"Okay, currently, all the employees are family, literally. But you two have already made yourselves indispensable, so… family."

"Well… "

Dane cut her off with a raised finger.

"Family. Gage sees you that way already."

"Fine. Family."

Ren hoped she could remember the meaning of the word.