“That’s fine. It’s going to take a while for you to believe that, I know.” He swallowed hard, and the sound of his heartbeat blended into more seconds ticking by.
“Do you have an Xbox or anything?” Dallas asked, breaking the silence.
“No,” Bennett responded.
“Really? What the hell do you do?”
“I have animals,” Bennett responded. “They’re time-consuming.”
Dallas frowned. “What the hell do you do for work?”
“I’m a veterinarian,” Bennett responded. “Big animals. Cows. Horses. Llamas.”
“Llamas?”
“Llamas get sick too.”
“What do you do around here for fun? Did you...go cow tipping?”
Bennett crossed his arms and looked at Dallas. “Well, I got my girlfriend pregnant when we were sixteen, so I think that answers your question about what we do for fun around here.”
Dallas blinked, and then huffed a reluctant laugh. “Great. But you just told me to stay away from the girls.”
“I didn’t say I recommended that kind of behavior,” Bennett said. “I mean, I got my girlfriend pregnant. And now I’m standing here with you.”
“Condoms, dude.”
Bennett shook his head. “Okay. Too much honesty. Way too much honesty. I’ll get you an Xbox.”
Bennett was a terrible parent already. He was making deals and bargains and buying Xboxes. And he hadn’t even told his brothers yet. Or his sister. Or Kaylee.
Dammit. Kaylee.
She was going to be so mad at him.
“Where’s that bedroom at?” Dallas asked, looking around.
For just a moment a crack in the kid’s bravado seemed to break. Right around the moment when Bennett felt his own beginning to crumble.
“I’ll show you.” He walked him down the hall and opened the door to a room that was fully furnished, and definitely not the kind of thing a teenage boy would find interesting at all. Because it was done up for guests he had never had. Hypothetical ones that he thought someday when he and Olivia had married they might have.
There was a plaid bedspread and a full-size bed with headboard. Art with Oregon landscapes framed on the walls.
Dallas looked around and dropped his trash bag next to his feet. “It works.” He turned to Bennett. “Don’t worry. I probably won’t kill you in your sleep.”
Bennett lifted a brow. “Probably?”
“I’ve lived with a lot of families. I only did that once.”
Bennett had to laugh at that, a forced, short chuckle, because of course the thought had crossed his mind. And of course this kid was calling it out. Because he was just that kind of kid. Hard and direct and more than willing to put himself at odds with Bennett in the interest of not showing any vulnerability.
But it was there.
The very fact that the kid was standing here, and not running off in the woods was evidence of that.
“Can I take a shower?”
“Yeah,” Bennett said. “Bathroom is across the hall.”
“Cool.”
He stood there for a moment, and then looked over at Bennett. “Is there any point in me unpacking this?” He gestured down to the plastic bag.
“Yeah,” Bennett said. “Unpack it. Throw it away.”
He’d get him a new bag. But not now. Not when it would just look like he was giving him nicer luggage for a nomadic existence. No. He’d make sure he didn’t need a bag for a good while.
“I’m just checking. Because if you really didn’t know about me, and you’re really as surprised as you say you are, I figure it’s going to take a little while for reality to set in. And when it does, you probably won’t want me here.”
“I’m going to have you here,” Bennett said.
That was the truth. He was giving him the truth. Want was... He didn’t even know what that word meant right now.
But he had been prepared sixteen years ago to upend his life to raise a child. To put everything aside for the baby he had made with Marnie, accident or not. That it was all happening sixteen years later didn’t matter.
The kid was still his responsibility. And Bennett was still going to lay it all down for him.
Because outside of what he felt, Bennett knew what was right. And even if he couldn’t feel it all, he could still do what needed to be done.
“You’re staying,” Bennett said decisively, resolutely. “Unpack the damn bag.”
KAYLEE WAS IN her pajamas when her phone rang. She’d just come inside after riding her horse, Flicka, around the trail behind her house and getting her put away, and was currently sprawled on the couch with her cat, Albus, lying across her chest.
Her heart kicked a little bit when she looked at the screen and saw that it was Bennett.
“Are you having more cow drama?” she asked. “Because I’m getting ready for bed.”
“No, not exactly.”
“What’s going on?”
He sounded...he sounded weird. Not like himself. Bennett was cool and in control, always. He was the kind of guy you wanted to have around in a crisis, and he professionally handled animal crises on an almost daily basis. He was not the kind of guy who ever sounded... Well, whatever it was he sounded now. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Only that it wasn’t him.
“It’s hard to explain. Can you come over?”
Thoughts chased each other around her head like rabid foxes. He was ill. He had some kind of terrible disease. He was quitting the business and leaving her.
“I’ll be right over.”
She hung up and started hunting for something to wear. She put on a pair of ripped jeans and a gray T-shirt that had a logo for the veterinary clinic on it. By the time she had gone to her truck, she had thought of at least three new scenarios, each one more upsetting than the last, for why Bennett had sounded so grave.
Olivia wanted him back. Olivia, who was pregnant with another man’s baby, wanted him back because Luke had abandoned her. Yes, that was it. Luke had abandoned her, and she was
