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The day after Jason laid everything out to Zach and Meg, his brother was arrested on suspicion of arson. And instead of being swamped with relief and starting his climb out of the dark hole toward daylight, Jason still felt like hell. If he knew his mom, and if she remained angry, Adam would indeed go to prison. He gathered from their phone conversation that the rift had been brewing for some time, and since she expressed no interest in bringing Jason back into the fold—after all, she barely knew him, so why should she?—he was essentially free. Until Adam broke out of prison or something.
But for once, he didn’t see the bad thing happening, so, other than delayed reaction, he had no reason to feel so isolated and messed up.
Meg stayed with him the night after the arrest, without bothering to do the sneak-out-of-the-house-late-at-night thing for appearances’ sake. They were past appearances, which in some ways made things feel more overwhelming. Why?
He was trying not to withdraw, doing his damnedest to stay in the moment, but it wasn’t working. And two days after the arrest, Meg called him on it, shortly after they’d released Albert and Bill following a training ride.
“Talk.”
Short and to the point, and as he prepared to face off with her, a dust devil came up from behind, blowing Meg’s hair into a wild halo around her head before hitting him and knocking off his hat.
“Weather’s changing,” he muttered as he caught his hat before it blew across the round pen.
“Weather’s not the only thing.” Meg brushed the hair out of her face with an impatient swipe of her hand. She angled her head, regarding him with a concerned frown. And that was what got him—the concern. “Is it your family?”
“Probably.” He turned his hat in his hand. “I don’t know.”
“Is it me?”
Not a question he wanted to answer. It was her, but it wasn’t. She shifted her weight and folded her arms. “Do not give me the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ line.”
He met her eyes then. “Not even if it’s true?”
She drew a breath in through her nose as she held his gaze, her chest rising then falling. “Really?” It was more of an accusation than a question.
Either way he had no answer.
“What, Jason? Are you afraid you have too much of your family in you to be a good partner? Because that’s bull.”
“Partner. What happened to in-the-moment?”
She pushed her hair back again before calling him on his attempt to sidestep. “We’re past in-the-moment and you know it.”
He did. They’d slipped from a casual fling into something that felt a whole lot like a relationship weeks ago. It had simply happened. And after talking with Cody, he’d accepted it...right up until Adam showed up.
“I don’t know how to go forward.”
She shook her head, not understanding.
He stepped forward, gently brushing the hair off her cheeks. “I don’t know what to do.”
“It isn’t like there’s a checklist or something. You follow your gut.”
“What if my gut is telling me to back off?” Because it was. It was saying you don’t know enough to be a good partner. It was saying things are good now, but if you continue to build things with this woman, then fuck up and lose her, the pain will cripple you. Even more than you’re crippled now.
“Then you need to ask yourself why. If you don’t care for me...that’s legit. If you do and you’re—” Her mouth tightened. “I can’t believe I’m saying this. If you’re leaving for my own good, then...no. That’s not acceptable.”
“Damn it, Meg. I don’t know what to do with these feelings.”
“You’re afraid of them.” She spoke softly.
“Yeah.” She had it dead on.
“So you wall them off.”
“It’s a hell of a lot better than going forward and failing someone.” Losing someone.
“Someone being me.”
“I haven’t seen anyone else in my bed.”
She glanced down at the ground, where the dusty toes of their boots were only a few inches apart. It may as well have been miles. The chasm was growing with each sentence they spoke. He was pushing her away. Following his gut. It was killing him, but the ball was in motion and he wasn’t going to stop it. He was reverting to form, because it was his form. Who he really was.
Meg met his eyes again, frowning deeply. “Well, fuck me,” she said softly. It was not an invitation. “You’re doing it again.”
“I can’t help who I am.”
She snorted. “So it’s easier to back off than to figure out what the problem is and do something about it.”
“I know what the problem is.” The words were dark and hard.
“I do, too.” One corner of her mouth quirked up into a sardonic expression. “And before you walk away thinking you’ve won, you should know that I’m not leaving.”
His eyes narrowed. “What about grad school?”
“Deferring for a semester. Maybe a year.”
“Is that a good idea?”
“It’s a hell of an idea. You know why? Because I’m at a place in my life where I can do it. I have no encumbrances. My sisters are quite happily running the Marvell North without me. My cousin Brett runs the hay farm. I have no little mouths to feed. I don’t even have a dog to worry about. If there was ever a time to take a year off, it’s now.” She hooked a thumb into her belt loop. “So, here’s your conundrum—do you leave to get away from me? Or do you stay?”
“I stay.” There was no question of leaving. Especially when she was now drawing a line in the sand in front of him.
She gave a casual shrug. “Then I guess we’re both staying.” She reached for the bridle she’d laid over the rail fence. “Oh, and by the way...I’m doing this for your own good.”
Meg was so angry that her breath was coming in short huffs by the time she stalked up to the back door of the main house and slipped inside, taking care not to let the screen door slam behind her. She was angry with herself, angry with Jason.
And she was not leaving this ranch with her tail between her legs. The final decision to defer grad school for a year? She’d been seesawing back and forth on the matter, and had just now come to a final decision in the heat of the moment. The crazy thing was, it felt right. She liked what she was doing on the ranch. Someday she may go back to teaching, or she might figure out some way to earn a living on the hay farm. She’d invested her parents’ inheritance wisely and it put her into a position where she could make decisions like this.
She sank down onto the bed, settling her hands in her lap, and took a calming breath. And then another.
Planning paid off, and she was genetically programmed to plan ahead. But shooting from the hip had paid off, too, at least for the short term. She’d had one of the best summers of her life here on the MCC—if one didn’t count getting her heart twisted into a knot. Again.
The price she paid for feeling free for the first time in her life.
She flopped onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. The problem with her style of planning was that the plan seemed to always manage her, instead of it being the other way around. But here on the ranch, she had no plan. She couldn’t—wouldn’t—live her whole life this way, but it gave her a new perspective and she was sticking with it until she figured out how to walk the line between rigidly adhering to a plan and having no plan at all.
There had to be a middle ground.
She reached for her phone on the bed stand and called Jo. No time like the present to be told that she was crazy again. Definitely easier to deal with criticism when one was already angry.
But Jo had no criticism for her. Instead she gave a small snort and said, “I think you’ve shaken the wimpy sister reputation.”
“It’s like...I don’t know...I’ve been cautious for so long that taking chances feels really good.” Maybe better than it should.
“Like holding off on having sex for the first time?”
Meg gave an appreciative laugh. “A little.” She propped the pillow under her head. “I had this fear that I was going to keep making impulsive choices.”
“And...”
Meg laughed. “It’s coming true. So if you see me about to drive off a cliff or something...give me a heads-up.”
“Is that code for ‘are you doing the right thing’?”
“Maybe.”
“I can’t tell you what’s right, because I tried to tell you not to go to the MCC. Yet, you’re happy there.”
Or rather she had been—and she fully intended to be happy again.
“Good point.”
“You aren’t staying there forever, are you?”
“I don’t see that happening. But I am staying until I work out a few more things in my head.”
“What kind of things?”
Meg gave a soft snort. “Just...stuff. I’ll talk to you about it later. I have to go.”
Jason discovered that he didn’t much like it when people did things for his own good...although there was no way that Meg staying on the MCC and making him crazy could be construed as being for his own good.
It wasn’t. She’d been getting in a dig, but it didn’t make it any easier to get up and go to work knowing he would see her. He didn’t know if she’d spoken to Zach, but the day after she’d told him she was staying on, Zach put her on fence duty—checking the enclosures on the huge ranch, as well as the allotment boundary fences. And when she wasn’t checking fences or cows, she worked with Cody again. Jason had his colts to himself and he immersed himself in their training. And if his life felt emptier than it had before...well, he’d have to come up with a way to fill the void.
He didn’t check in with his mother again, but he read what news he could find online and it looked as if the evidence against his brother was damning—which was another reason not to make contact with the family. If they got angry with you, there was no telling what they might do. He was done with that. It’d left a mark—or rather a festering wound that still hadn’t fully healed—and he wasn’t a masochist. Some people had families. Some didn’t. He fell into the latter category.
As he caught Ike, he saw Meg riding off across the pasture on one of Cody’s mares. She’d offered to ride the colts when she checked fences, but he’d turned her down, even though the offer made perfect sense. The colts would get miles in a way that also benefited the ranch. Meg had accepted his response with a cool nod and went on her way and Jason debated about whether he should have told her that he wasn’t being contrary—that he didn’t want to take the chance of her being dumped by a young horse miles from the ranch. Commonsense precaution. But no—he’d made it look as if he were throwing the offer in her face to put more of a barrier up between them.
By the time he broke for lunch, he decided that he and Meg were going to have a face-to-face. That evening. If her intention was to make him feel tense and stressed as hell, then she was winning.
It started to lightly rain around noon. Jason went to his cabin for lunch, then stopped by the barn where Cody and Brandon were elbows-deep in the tractor.
“Is this thing ever going to run again?”
“It’ll climb trees when I’m done with it,” Brandon said from where he was tightening a bolt.
“Well, I wasn’t aware we needed a tree-climbing tractor,” Jason said as he studied the manual on the iPad Brandon had propped up on the workbench. “Where are you getting the parts?”
“Some coming from Craigslist, some from eBay. I have to pick up the fenders at a ranch near Marietta.” Brandon came to stand beside Jason. He pointed at the screen. “This part is my white whale. I hope I can find it.”
“White whale?” Cody gave him a curious look and the kid’s mouth tightened self-consciously.
“I’m listening to Moby Dick.”
“Do you like it?” Jason asked.
“Kind of boring in places, but I’m trying to get through a classic. Whaling sounded good.” He went back to the tractor.
Jason gave a small snort. “I had to read it, too.” In the boot camp. The higher achieving kids were given something close to a regular education in addition to being introduced to a trade.
“Reading wasn’t an option for me.”
Jason tilted his head. “How so?”
Brandon looked at him over his shoulder, then said simply, “I couldn’t read. Not much anyway.”
Cody and Jason exchanged looks as Brandon dove back into the tractor.
“Couldn’t read?” Cody asked.
“Meg’s teaching me.”
Everything fell into place in one big aha moment. The reason she spent so much time with Brandon. Why she wouldn’t break confidence. A kid’s pride was on the line.
“Well, damn,” Cody said. “Good for you.”
“She threatened me,” Brandon said from inside the tractor. “I wouldn’t have done it otherwise. I didn’t want to feel dumb all over again.” He stood up again and went back to look at the online manual. “I’d felt that way for too long.”
“Took guts, man.” Cody shot Jason a look that he didn’t quite understand. No...make that a look he didn’t want to understand—not if Cody was referencing the obvious. Meg had been keeping her distance from him and the guys had to have noticed, but the last thing Jason wanted was to call attention to the matter. Because it wasn’t any of their damned business.
“Tell me about it.” Brandon tapped the wrench in his hand. “One of you guys want to go to town with me tomorrow and help with the fenders? I guess they’re buried pretty deep in the guy’s boneyard.”
“I’ll go,” Cody said.
Good because Jason had a full schedule now that he no longer had Meg’s help. The rain started to let up and he headed toward the door. “I’d better get to it.”
He saddled Kenny and checked the sky to the north. The storm hadn’t lasted long, so the trails shouldn’t be too slick to ride on. And he felt the need to get out into the fresh air. Away from the ranch.
He headed out on the big colt, riding across country, intent on crossing creeks and walking through the tangle of low logs and rocks along the banks, giving the colt experience in picking a trail and not panicking when he encountered an obstacle. Not panicking was the key to just about everything when it came to dealing with horses. Or life.
So why was he panicking?
The thought came out of nowhere. He pushed it away, but it came edging back into his head after Kenny gave a small jump when a rabbit darted out from behind a rock, then put his nose down and sniffed the small boulder instead of trying to race across the meadow as he might have done a couple of weeks ago.
Fight or flight.
Horses were all about flight and if someone had asked Jason what his instinct was, he would have instantly said fight. He didn’t run...unless it was for the good of someone else.
Now he wasn’t so sure what his true motivation was. He sure as hell wasn’t fighting now. Was he more afraid of hurting, or being hurt?
Clouds hung low over the mountains when Meg returned from checking a section of the north fence. Rain was a constant threat, but other than a few scattered showers—not enough to make the trails slick, but enough to slow down Cody’s haying—the clouds had been just that. A threat.
She rode across the pasture into the back of the ranch, noticed that all of Jason’s colts were in the corral. He was back from his training rides, which made her think that she was late. Her watch had died and she never bothered taking a phone. There was no service on the peripheries of the ranch and she didn’t need to know the time that badly. Maybe this weekend she’d take a run into Marietta, have her watch battery replaced, meet up with Whitney for lunch.
The more time she spent with her ‘town girl’ cousin, as Cody called her, the more she resented the stupid family feud that had kept them apart growing up. Whitney’s parents were still alive, as was Vincent Marvell, and they debated asking about the details, then decided that details didn’t matter. Moving forward into the future was what mattered most.
She rode up to the barn and unsaddled the mare, hauling the damp saddle into the tack shed, then releasing the mare into the pasture. She’d ride Shane’s gelding tomorrow, having made it a habit to rotate through the ranch mounts. They all got exercise and she had the pleasure of riding a bunch of different horses.
“Hey, Meg?”
She glanced toward the barn at the sound of her name, saw Cody standing in the wide doorway. He disappeared inside as she reversed course and followed him in.
“Something on your mind?” she asked.
“Yeah. Jason.”
Her gut tightened. “What about him?” Instead of answering, he leaned into the inner workings of the tractor, leaving Meg to wonder if the conversation was over or if he was forming a reply. He straightened up again and set his wrench on the fender. “I told Brandon I’d work on this frozen bolt. So far no luck.”
“Jason?” Meg reminded him.
“Yeah. Jason. Have you ever noticed that he never raises his voice?”
Meg started to reply, then closed her mouth. Frowned.
“Why do you think that is?” Cody asked.
“He’s very controlled?”
Cody shook his head. “That’s the symptom. Not the cause.”
“Spell it out for me, Cody.”
Cody reached for the rag and wiped his hands. “He’s afraid of becoming them.”
“His family.” It wasn’t a surprising deduction...so why hadn’t it occurred to her? She’d only been considering the damage done by growing up in such an environment. “I don’t know how to deal with that.”
“Neither does he. Thus the problem.”
Meg inhaled deeply, rubbing her hand over the side of her neck. “It’s not something I can fix.”
“You’re right.”
“He’s got to do the fixing.” Cody nodded again and Meg made a frustrated gesture. “I can’t nag him or harp on him about this. I can’t convince him that he’s okay the way he is.”
“I think you can.”
She shook her head. “I tried twice. Failed both times. If he wants to work things out, talk, I’m here. But I am not taking the lead again. Been there, done that, don’t feel like getting burned again.” She blew out a breath. “Would it be easier on everyone if I went back to Sweetheart?”
As soon as she said the words, she knew how much she didn’t want to leave this ranch. Yes, it was hell seeing Jason every day, knowing she could look, but not touch, and by touch she meant his mind as well as his body. She loved being with him, sharing with him. Loved it when he relaxed and let his true self shine through.
But she hated it just as much when he walled himself off. Did she have what it took to work through this?
“We’ve kind of gotten used to you here. It frees Brandon up to do part of Len’s old job. Plus, and I know nothing about this, it looks like you’re doing some good in the reading department.”
Meg smiled a little, despite the tight feeling in the pit of her stomach. “How do you know?”
“Brandon confessed a couple days ago. Then we went to lunch while on the town-run yesterday, and he read one of the menu items out loud word for word while he pretended to be considering whether to order it.” Cody smiled up at her. “Bleu cheese burger. Stumbled on bleu a little, but figured it out. And he ordered it.”
Meg’s heart swelled a little. “That makes me feel good—the reading, not the burger.”
“Made him feel pretty good, too.”
“That’s a major step, confessing and reading to you guys.”
“Yeah.” Cody glanced down, cleared his throat. “Sometimes it takes a while to overcome old habits and fears.”
“Very smooth, Cody.” She sucked a breath in through her teeth. “I can’t force Jason to accept himself.”
“Do you love him as he is?”
“He’s a good guy,” she said softly. “Has his quirks, but don’t we all?”
“He’s like a skittish horse. Needs patience.”
“Yeah.” But she knew as well as Cody did that sometimes there were horses you just couldn’t reach, no matter how much you wanted to.
