Page 76 of The Cowboy's Christmas
“I’m going to swing through in a few months so that I can see you guys and the new baby, of course.” He’d already said his goodbyes to Austin and Kristen.
Pepper was waiting in the driver’s seat of Quinn’s truck but jumped into the back seat when Quinn opened the door. Quinn got inside and rolled down the window.
“Don’t be a stranger,” Ty said with a smile.
“Ha, ha,” Quinn said darkly. He liked having brothers more than he’d expected.
Or he did until Ty said, “What are you going to do about Savannah?”
Before he could form a response, Ty said, “I wasn’t going to ask.” He shifted his weight, one hand coming to rest on the open window. “Curiosity got the better of me. And Shelby wants an update.”
“How—” He knew how. Carol Bingley. “I don’t know what I’m going to do,” he said to his brother. “She’s had a rough go. I don’t want to make it rougher.”
“Rumor has it that she’s moping around her ranch.”
This time he didn’t know how his brother knew this, so he asked.
“Jeff Barnett’s talking, as usual.”
“I don’t like that guy.” But right now, in an odd way, he felt like he kind of owed him.
Savannah was moping?
It was probably just Barnett exaggerating, but what if it wasn’t?
He frowned at Ty. “Tell Shelby I’ll let her know if I have any updates.”
“Will do. Travel safe.”
Quinn drove out of the ranch yard feeling just this side of dazed. Pepper pushed her nose into his shoulder as he drove under the log archway. He continued down the long snowy 46 Ranch driveway, then turned onto the county road without allowing himself to think about anything except the trip ahead of him. South to West Yellowstone, then on to Idaho Falls, Pocatello, Boise, Jordan Valley.
But when the county road hit the highway, instead of turning south, he turned north toward Marietta.
He was going to take the long way home.
*
“A penny forthem.”
Savannah gave a jump at the unexpected voice behind her, then glanced over her shoulder at Deke. She’d been staring at the little snowman hanging from his scarf at the awkward forty-five-degree angle.
“Just thinking about crooked snowmen.”
“Uh huh. Me, too.”
She smiled at her uncle, who was moving better. Five days of Jeff Barnett had proven to be something of a miracle cure. And so far, Jeff hadn’t hurt anything, but there was always tomorrow, and the day after. Deke had decided that he’d give chores a go after that.
“All right, I was thinking that I’d been really worried about this Christmas with the girls, and it turned out okay.” In fact, facing Christmas had turned out to be the least of her concerns.
“Uh huh.” He gave her a spill-it look.
“And maybe some other things have weighed on my mind.”
“You going to be all right on that front?”
Savannah glanced down at the sparkly cloth she’d arranged around the bottom of the tree, which would be totally covered with gifts by morning. “Are we talking in code?”
“No. We’re talking about a hired hand.”
