Page 54 of Red Hot Rancher

“You want to do it, Brigit. We’ll make it happen.”

“Twenty-four hours and I’ll be home.” They disconnected. She had to stare at the phone for a while. She’d just made plans to stay in Moore. To stay with Caleb and use the animal science degree she’d snuck into her coursework.

And it felt right. So, so right.

She grinned and squealed, pumping her arms and wiggling her hips. Tonight, she’d talk to Mom and Dad. It might be a heavy conversation, but a long, long overdue one.

So… What now?

She no longer had to hop online and go through more classifieds. Watch TV?

That wasn’t appealing. Too much anticipation flowed through her veins. Her dream job was at her fingertips. But she couldn’t just pace the hard floor until Mom and Dad came home.

Did Dad still subscribe to ranching magazines? A guy who’d ranched as long as him couldn’t just drop it. Over the last year, she’d avoided all her favorite reads on agriculture trends and animal practices. All her stuff had been online, but Dad was old-fashioned. Maybe she could find something to page through while dreaming about her wide-open future.

Ooh—maybe she could write for a magazine like that. Start her own blog. People made money off those, right? She could figure it out.

Thinking outside the box was easy when that box had been busted wide open. All those ideas banging around in her head—workshops, presentations at ag conventions, or even just short seminars for farmers and ranchers in her own area. None of her education would go to waste.

It’d take time to build toward profitability, but with Caleb’s help, she had time. They had time. Together.

She entered the second bedroom that functioned as an office and catchall room. Bookshelves flanked the desk. Perusing the first shelf didn’t unearth anything she was dying to read, and the Farm & Ranch mags stacked on the second shelf she’d already read.

“Where’s the new stuff, Dad?” she muttered. She might have to look on his nightstand.

As she turned to round the desk, her thigh hit a pile of papers. They fluttered to the floor.

“Damn.”

Squatting, she swept them into a pile and was in the middle of straightening them out when she stopped. These were tax documents, and the pile included correspondence with their accountant.

Brigit sifted through them. Withdrawals from their retirement account over the years had all her attention. Calculations about catch up and how much longer they’d have to work to make up for the difference knocked her on her ass. She folded her legs under her and read through the documents.

Her parents had paid for her school. All of it. She’d assumed they’d saved for her and her siblings’ college tuitions, but they hadn’t really. Travis’s, maybe. But being hit with twins and saving enough to get them both through school after the firstborn had gotten not only a degree, but a PhD, had tapped them out.

Her parents weren’t working to stave off the boredom of retirement. They didn’t have enough to retire.

Tears welled in her eyes. Her parents were broke and hadn’t told anyone. And they were broke because of her.

Her phone rang. She stared at it numbly. An unknown number.

“Hello,” she answered woodenly.

“Brigit Walker?”

“Yes.” She had no desire to be pleasant.

“Hi, this is Emily from Murphy and Associates. We’d like to meet with you about the operations analyst position. Are you available early next week for an interview?”

Early next week? She had a flight home tomorrow. Into Caleb’s waiting arms. She was supposed to tell her parents about what she really wanted to do with her life. But they were working. Because they’d spent all their money on her education.

“Yes, I can meet with you next week.”

As the wait grew longer, his only solace was tomorrow. Brigit would be home tomorrow, and they could start planning their future together. He could rely on Brigit. Apparently not his own mom. But then he knew that.

Then why, after an hour, was he still waiting, wasting his gas as he idled in the driveway on his property? He should’ve dressed for work, but he thought he’d come here and give his mom and her new man a tour. A new man. Caleb had stupidly wanted to make a good impression and see if the man measured up at all to the man he called Dad. Russ had never earned being called Dad, but dammit.

Caleb took one more looked around his property. He’d messaged Mom a few times, but she hadn’t replied.

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