Page 67 of The Cowboy Comes Home

“First,” he said, holding her gaze steadily, “I need to know what the point of that was.”

She didn’t pretend not to understand. She had the feeling that would be a very wrong thing to do. But she wasn’t sure how to explain, and it took her long enough searching for a way, that he spoke again, now with a bit of an edge in his voice.

“What was that for? Was that a ‘You think you’ve got it bad’ moment? Is that what you wanted me to understand, that other people have been hurt worse, other people in the same situation have lost people in worse ways? You think I don’t know that?”

“Tucker, no!” That thought had never entered her mind, and she hastened to explain. “That’s not it at all. I wanted you to know that here you’re surrounded by people who understand, from all sides. Kane, his wife Lark, Lucas…and Scott Parrish, Sage’s husband. He was conceived strictly as an organ donor for his older brother, and—”

She stopped as he held up a hand. “I get it. Really, I do.”

“Please don’t think I was…trying to teach you a lesson or something idiotic like that. I just wanted you to know they’re here. And that they understand what it’s like to go through crap like you did.”

For a long moment he just looked at her. Then, his head tilted slightly, he asked, “But you don’t?”

“No,” she said, feeling she owed him the honesty. “I was one of the lucky ones. I have wonderful, sane parents who love me. I had, teen angst aside, a great life growing up, and I’m doing what I love today. You don’t get much luckier than that, in my view.”

He turned slightly and leaned back against the solid trunk of the big oak tree she’d been using to shelter a bit from the crowd. He tilted his head back then, to rest against the bark. She wasn’t sure what it was, but something about his expression impelled her to ask.

“When you were hurt, was…was your mother there for you?”

He let out a sour snort of laughter. “Oh, she was there. It was a hospital, and there were drugs, after all. After she got caught stealing twice they banned her.”

She felt a burning, acid sensation rising in her throat. Before she could fight it down enough to speak, he went on.

“My dad did everything for her. It was part of who he was—a caretaker. When he was killed, she couldn’t survive on her own. She had an emotional pain threshold of zero.”

“And she expected you to step up and take his place? To take care of her, instead of the other way around, as it should have been?”

“Pretty much.”

“Did you try?”

“In the beginning. When I first started winning, and she promised to get straight. I paid for therapy, for different programs, doctors. But she just flunked out and then spent any cash I gave her doing the same old, same old, so I quit.”

“Good for you.”

He turned his head to look at her then. “No ‘She’s your mother, you owe her’?”

“All you owe her is your pity,” she said.

“What if it was your mother?”

“It would never be, but even if it happened now, she’s seen to me my whole life, so has earned help if she needs it. Sounds like your mother has earned only your contempt.”

“I used to hate her. Finally decided it took too much energy.”

“Good for you again.”

A round of applause from the other side of the tree made them both turn to look. Frank Buckley had stepped out on stage.

“You’re not here to see me,” he said into the microphone with a grin, “so I’m not going to say anything except that I’m proud and happy to introduce our former handyman, who some of you may remember made even shoveling manure a tuneful experience. I do miss hearing him singing while he worked, almost as much as the extra tips we got from guests who enjoyed the music long before he became a famous name.”

He got a burst of laughter for that. Then he cut to the chase.

“We thank all you folks for coming. Now give our boy Kane the kind of welcome he deserves!”

A roar went up from the crowd as Kane Highwater’s hometown welcomed him back to where it had all begun.

“I just want you to know,” he said into the mic as Frank turned to go, “that all those tips he mentioned? He gave ’em to me. Because that’s who Frank Buckley is.”

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