Page 27 of Red Hot Rancher

Justin shook his head and grabbed his worn sheepskin jacket from where it was hanging. He shrugged into it. “What’s your deal against Moore anyway?”

Like Caleb, Justin didn’t understand. “There’s nothing here for me.”

“Other than Caleb.”

She rolled her eyes. “Right. I stay here and make babies and get married and forget the whole career thing.”

“No one’s expecting you to do that. Staying in Moore doesn’t mean you’re condemned to maternal servitude.” He peered at her. “I didn’t realize you were so against the whole family thing.”

“I’m not.” She sounded sullen, but the truth was she wanted a family of her own more than anything. But she wanted a career she could be proud of, too, and she wanted to do that first. The years were ticking away, and she was losing her chance at both of them. Her brothers had been able to go school and come back and have a ranching career handed to them. “I just want to have something of my own.”

Understanding flashed through his eyes. He wasn’t technically the youngest, but like her, he’d watched their older brother and the other firstborn cousins become the pride and joy of the Walker family. She and Justin had been told to be relieved. Dad claimed they should be grateful that the responsibility hadn’t fallen on them. It’s a big operation. A lot of people depending on you and too many variables out of your control. But no one understood the lingering feeling of What now? Where was their place in the world if not their own home?

He nodded. “Yeah, I get that. Law school not working out really threw you for a loop.”

“Yeah.” She almost winced. Did she sound as taken off guard as she felt? She almost never thought about law school. That ship had sailed—after she’d untied the rope and pushed it out to sea. But no one knew that. “I’m still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up. Oliver was a huge setback. I almost settled with a guy who would’ve glued my feet to the kitchen floor and blamed me for buying the glue.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask you ‘what the hell’ about Oliver, but I thought it was too soon.”

“Maisy May Jorgenson,” she said flatly.

“Like I said—”

She barked out a laugh. “Talk to me again in a year and we’ll see how that turned out. Anyway, I have no land and no house, and the only job openings in town barely pay above minimum wage or need a specialized degree I don’t have.”

“I get that.” Justin started for the house. “So here’s the deal. You gotta help me clean the house so Mom doesn’t get here and run her finger over the mantel again.”

She chuckled and said in a prim tone, “‘Oh, I do hope this house holds up through your bachelor years.’”

Justin’s laugh sent her back to their childhood, when they’d do chores and get into deep discussions about life. “As if my future wife is going to clean up after my ass. And I dust at least once a month.”

“Mom used to dust daily. And she ironed our jeans.” They lobbed house-cleaning memories back and forth and Brigit had never been so grateful. It didn’t keep one particular question from cycling in her head.

Caleb would want to avoid her mom during the holidays. He wasn’t a guy who wanted to cause tension. But with no house and no family, where would he go on Thanksgiving?

Chapter 8

This still wasn’t his worst Thanksgiving ever. That award went to the year he was in kindergarten. All he’d understood then was that he had a long break from school and he was hungry.

Mom had just met Russ and was wildly happy, or just wild. So was Russ. The man was nice enough to Caleb. Nicer than any of her previous boyfriends. That wasn’t why Caleb called him Dad.

No, he did that to blend in. Nearly all the other kids at school had a mom and a dad, divorced or not. It only took explaining once that he didn’t know who his dad was to teach him never to admit that again.

That year, Mom tossed a frozen turkey into the oven, trying to impress Russ with cooking skills she didn’t possess. If it weren’t for beef stew dumped out of a can and Kraft mac and cheese, Caleb would’ve starved before the first hot lunch at school. And he wouldn’t have eaten at school if Grandma hadn’t kept that account current.

The turkey took hours to cook and by then, his parents had consumed every drop of alcohol in the house and passed out. Caleb knew enough to turn the oven off before going to bed with stomach cramps so severe he hadn’t slept all night.

The entire day had sucked. No cable. No phone available to him. Too cold to play outside. He’d sat inside all day and driven his little Matchbox car through every room. He’d used wadded-up socks as cattle and played rancher. And he’d rushed around with an imaginary hose, putting out fires.

Quietly, of course. Bothering Mom when she was drinking and cuddling Russ never ended well.

The rest of the weekend he’d spent at Grandma’s, where he’d stuffed himself until he puked.

The crinkle of the gas station sandwich wrapper was the only sound in the motel room. He inspected the limp bun and the meat patty that maybe had some actual beef in it. It was covered in manufactured cheese product, but Caleb doubted actual milk had made it onto the ingredient list.

The motel room could’ve been worse. There was a lot of room for improvement, but guests didn’t stay at the Moore-tel for comfort. It was little more than a stopping point for hunters. A fish-cleaning station was parked at the end of the building and there was a sign posted in probably every bathroom exhorting guests not to clean fowl in the shower. Too many hunters thought it was a great idea to just clean their birds in the shitter.

He took a bite of his burger and grimaced. Between the gas station where he’d heated it and the two-minute ride back—and the few minutes he’d allowed himself a little pity party—his food had cooled. He couldn’t stomach cold pseudomeat.

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