Page 68 of A Rancher's Bride
It wasn’t as if Luke could complain. Not after having been gone for a week, but talk about shitty timing.
He stuck his hand in the air to acknowledge he’d heard. “Be right there.”
“You too, Kelli,” Caleb added.
This command made Kelli wilt like a bouquet of daisies left too long in the hot sun. “You sure?” she asked.
Caleb had already turned and headed into the house. Kelli let out a heavy sigh before pushing past Luke and marching toward the house.
He followed after her, holding his tongue. But inside he was wrestling to make sense of the past five minutes.
What the hell had gone wrong?
16
It was the farthest thing from a clean getaway that could have happened.
Kelli walked through the mudroom door, stopping far enough to one side of the entrance to allow Luke to step in as well. Then she realized that was a mistake, because instead of taking off his stuff and heading to join the rest of the family, he stayed beside her, glaring as if he wanted to pick up the conversation she’d been attempting to avoid outside.
She turned her back and slid off her boots, making tracks to a spot closer to Tamara. She stole a cookie off the island as she passed, taking a bite and hoping the calorie rush would give her the energy to get through this chaos.
It wassupposedto have been simple. She was supposed to have been able to walk away.
Tamara looked her over and nodded briskly. “The holiday did you good.”
Kelli opened her mouth then closed it. She glanced at Luke who had just stood after pulling off his boots. He appeared to be one second away from bursting into rain like a storm cloud.
Definitely not the direction she needed to face. She forced a smile and nodded briskly. “I think it was a success. But what’s going on?”
Caleb stood, stepping in front of the fireplace. He took his time glancing over the family gathered, which along with Luke included Tamara, Walker and Ivy, and Dustin, who was perched on the back of the couch.
Ashton was there as well, which made Kelli feel a little better instead of being the only non-Stone person in the room.
Luke came and stood beside Kelli, but he folded his arms instead of touching her. She stared at Caleb, working hard to keep from bouncing on her toes.
“I’m glad things went well, and we want to hear all about it, but Tamara and I were talking and realized we need to get things out on the table sooner than later. You all know we’ve been fighting to get the red off our ledger. It wouldn’t take much, but the truth is, it won’t take much to send us the other direction, either.”
“Is it really that dire?” Ivy asked, her fingers tangled in Walker’s where they sat at the very edge of the room.
“Possibly. Like I said, it could go either way. The thing is, some of the measures we can take start us down new paths, and some of those need to happen as early as this spring.” Caleb shuffled to the right, reaching down to accept the hand Tamara had extended him. As if he was drawing strength from the contact.
He turned back to his family. “I know we all love Silver Stone, but we need to do what’s responsible for the whole family. For all of us, and that means at the end we’re all happy with the new direction, if possible.”
“Can’t live your life by committee,” Ashton said bluntly. “And you can rarely make a whole group of people happy when you’re changing things up.”
“Agreed,” Walker said. “But let’s lay out what our options are, and we’ll take it from there.”
Caleb nodded. “Just so you know, Tamara and I talked to Ginny. She shared a few ideas, but she knows what’s going on.”
“Is she planning on coming back early and getting the CSA gardens running?” Dustin asked. “Because, if we’re short on money, I don’t mind working double time to make sure we get that going.”
Caleb nodded. “Ginny offered, but she’s in the middle of an incredible opportunity. If she cancels out of her journeyman experience now, she’ll never get another chance. I don’t want that for her.”
“But what if it means she’s got somewhere to come home to,” Dustin insisted.
Tamara held up a hand to assure him. “It’s on the list, Dustin. Trust me, we’re thinking of everything.”
Dustin folded his arms across his chest. His expression was far more stubborn than Kelli remembered seeing. It had to be hard, at that point between being a boy and a man, to face the possibility of losing the only home he’d ever known.
