“Well, you would know if you ever fucking listened.”
“Yeah. Well, I’m listening now.”
Michael stared out at the river, his eyes drifting with his thoughts as he told me about meeting Blake. How she threw him out a window, and that was the beginning of the end of his estrangement.
“What kind of virus?”
“Nasty,” he answered, his eyes meeting mine with horror. “End of the world, shit.”
“And you stopped it,” I beamed with pride.
“Well, I had a hand in it, but I didn’t do it alone. There were some good men and women we worked with.”
“So, how does all this lead to you coming home?”
Rubbing his hand along the back of his neck, he huffed out a laugh. “The guy I was working for…he got the president to look at my case.”
I couldn’t have heard him right. “The president? As in…”
He nodded, his eyes wide as if he still couldn’t believe it. “It’s the only way to have a dishonorable discharge overturned. Because of what Blake and I did, he agreed to look at my case again. That, coupled with evidence I was able to gather thanks to a very dark and mysterious friend?—”
“The same one who brought you in in the first place?”
“Exactly. The president agreed that I was set up. He reversed the DD. My record was expunged and I can now say I retired from the military.”
“So, it’s over,” I said, still in awe of everything my brother had accomplished.
I was out here, struggling to keep the ranch afloat while he was out saving the world. He could have died for it, but his sense of duty was so strong that he never would have failed or backed down. It just wasn’t in him.
And that was something I had always admired about him.
“I’m sure there’ll still be a few assholes around town who want to spread gossip, but…I’m done running. I’m not leaving again, Liam.”
The earnestness in his voice hit me hard and deep. I couldn’t stay mad at my brother, not when he had been battling his own demons.
“Well, I’m glad you’re home. Seriously, the place wasn’t the same without you.”
“But I left you in a mess,” he acknowledged. “I had no idea the ranch was doing so badly.”
“A lot of them are. We’re not the only ranch to fall. But we pivoted in time. As long as we can keep sales up, we won’t lose the land.”
He nodded to the cabin across the river. “And that?”
“A necessary expense. Or, it would be, but Pop told me not too long ago that he wants the cabin for someone in particular.”
“A long-term rental?”
“I would assume so, and I would also assume that we can’t jack up the rent on this person.”
“Any idea who it is?”
I shook my head, my eyes drifting over to it. “It’s a shame. It’s gonna be one helluva cabin.”
“And what are you gonna do?”
“Rebuild,” I sighed. “God knows I can’t live with Ma and Pop forever.”
“You could have chosen to live with Jeff.”
