Page 6 of The Cowboy's Bullfighter
“In town like here in town, or in town like the States?”
“In town like Albuquerque. Seems like I might have some family business to take care of.” He’d never met Andy’s youngest two. He’d stopped by to see them when little Mason had been born, and everyone had assumed they were done having babies. That had been, what? Eight years ago? Ten? He wasn’t sure.
“Oh? Then you heard that Benji got hurt bad, I guess? He’s healing real good from what I understand. He’s still got a few more months of physical therapy and such, but he’ll be back working by the springtime, they think. Don’t know if the Chiaras will let him go to work for me again. Cooper Adams was pissed.”
Benji’d what? Brooks frowned and shook his head. “No, mate. I came because I heard about my brother.”
There was a sudden silence, then—“I’m real sorry for your loss.”
“Yeah, I just found out about that like two days ago.”Because no one could be arsed to let me know.
“What?” Wacey sounded confused, which sort of pissed him off.
“What are you talking about? I just learned about my brother and his wife. I came out to get the kids.”
“He didn’t know about Andy and them.” Wacey had to be talking to his man, because a deep voice answered.
“Tell him to come on. I’ll get the guest room ready.”
“Where are you, Brooks?”
“I’m heading out of Albuquerque. I stopped to get a bite to eat before I got on the road.”
“Oh, it’s a three-hour drive out to the Chiaras’. Just stop out here by the ranch. You can sleep here for sure. You’ve got to be exhausted. No reason to get into a wreck yourself.”
“No, I got to get to Chama and take care of those kids.”
“It’s fixin’ to be the middle of the night, and it’ll be dead late by the time you get there.” Wacey snorted in the way of wealthy men who were used to being listened to. “You got a hell of a drive, and you’ve been up for how long? You’re only about half an hour away from us. Come on. You can come have a rest, have some food and breathe. There’s no reason going off half-cocked.”
Shit. Going off half-cocked was his entire universe.
“I don’t want the kids alone.”
“They’re safe. I promise. You come on. Sleep. Catch up your inner clock. Eat some good food. Then you can gear up and go see the kids.”
“What are you not telling me?”
“Will you just come on?” Wacey snapped.
“Yeah.” He scrubbed a hand over his neck. “Sure. I appreciate it, man.”
“I’ll be waiting for you, buddy. I’ll drop you a pin.”
Yeah, like he couldn’t remember where Turquoise was. “I’ll see you in a bit.”
“Yep. Later.” Wacey hung up on him, and he looked at the bag of food he’d bought. Ugh. He would nibble the onion rings and the burger, but he wasn’t sure he could face the whole thing.
But he had a place to stay, and Wacey sounded like he knew what was what.
Brooks reckoned he needed to go in with his eyes wide open and full of knowledge, and if Wacey said the kids were safe for now, then he had to believe it.
Holy fuck, he was tired.
It wasthe smell of green chile that woke him up.
It wasn’t home, not exactly, because home was jalapenos.
But it was damn good, and he was there for it.
