Chris nodded. “It’s true. He asked to live out there, and I respected what he wanted. But, make no mistake, he was our son. He still is, and his story is his own to tell.”
She watched as her uncle put his hand on Justin’s shoulder and they shared a knowing, invisible conversation with each other. Okay, that was vague and only made everything more confusing than it already was. Did Addie and Evie know his story? Why was she the only one in the dark? Maybe she just wasn’t important enough for them to tell. Apparently, when she’d been younger, and even still right now.
“Oh, well, forgive me for stepping on sacred ground. So, you’re thirty-ish now?”
The room went silent and Justin nodded as he chewed a bite of his lasagna. Chris broke the tension by asking everyone what they’d done that day. As she sat there trying to figure out who the heck Justin was, everyone else ate their lasagna—like the giant bomb they just dropped on her wasn’t a big deal. They laughed and told stories about how each of their days transpired.
Justin had gone ranch to ranch, client to client. He’d worked on five horses that day between shoes and trimming. Chris had done his regular chores, assigned each ranch hand theirs, andhad gone about his business until supper. The girls continued to be silly, cracking jokes while their faces were covered in the red sauce.
Blythe reminded them more than once to use their napkins and not forget their manners. She smiled to herself each time. As a girl, she wouldn’t have cared what was on her face, either. She guessed it made sense why she hadn’t noticed Justin. She was still a daydreamer as an adult.
When the dishes were done and the kitchen nearly cleaned, she watched Justin hug each family member goodbye and prepare to leave. Blythe wasn’t expecting a hug. She barely knew him. But as he finished squeezing the girls for a third time, he walked over to her and paused.
“I want to apologize for what happened last week. I shouldn’t have acted like I knew you so well. We’d only just met, and I did scare the living shit out of you.” He looked at his feet, hands in his pockets.
“It’s just, you were um…well, I acted on impulse, and I just want you to know I’m sorry for it.” He looked up at her, his ocean eyes bleeding into her soul.
Blythe let out a small sarcastic laugh. “Well, cowboy, I appreciate your honesty and your apology. But I’m not really in aman trusting moodlately.” With that, she turned back to hang the dish towel on the door of the fridge and headed up the stairs to help the girls get ready for bed.
She wondered how much he knew about her situation and why she was there. She never told her uncle that he couldn’t say anything, and apparently Justin was part of the family…kind of. She finished brushing her teeth, put in her retainer, and started unmaking her bed.
Who the hell was he?
She was one-hundred percent bugged, and actually hurt, that she didn’t know he existed before this. She was going to find out the reason, come hell or high water.
She woke up the next morning and came down the stairs early to meet her uncle before he went out for the day. She knew he would be drinking his morning coffee on the porch. She opened the screen door, and it made a squeaking sound.
“I really need to WD40 that damn thing, don’t I?” Chris gave a light chuckle.
“Well, that’s not hard. If you tell me where to find it, the girls and I can make it good as new.” She sat in the wooden rocking chair next to him.
“Nah, I’ll go grab what I need and do it before I leave today.” Chris stared out over his property with an air of melancholy surrounding him.
Claire had been his entire world. When he finished his military service, she was the one who pulled him back out of the dark. She was a ray of sun, shining on everyone, and life would just never be the same for any of them.
“I miss her, too.” Blythe paused and looked at Chris with tender eyes before asking her question.“Why was Justin a foster kid here?”
Chris sat his coffee down on the arm of his wooden chair.
“It seems like something I should at least know. If not all of it, the important parts.”
“That’s not my story to tell, Blythe.” He rarely said her name. He always called her Lythie.
“Oh, but it is,” she drawled. “He was just a boy when you brought him here. Why did he want to live at the bunkhouse? Why was it his job to clean out the barn and pick up my muddy boots?”
Chris let out a gut rumbling laugh. “Your muddy boots—god, I miss those days.” He paused. “For hell’s sake, Lythie, we weren’t hiding him. I’ll give you the damn spark notes. Claire and I struggled with infertility, you know that. Justin needed a home, and ours was open. Justin asked to live with the boys, so I let him live with the boys. Paid him like one, too. That's it.”
She wasn’t convinced, but she reached over and patted his knee. “There’s more reason than that, and you know it. But you have a good day. The girls and I have plans to ride the horses this afternoon. If you’d send one of the guys to help us saddle them up, we’d be grateful. We could do it on our own, I’m sure, but with help it will go a lot faster.”
She walked toward the screen door and went inside, letting it swing shut as it squeaked loudly behind her.
“Don’t fix it, uncle!” she called back through the screen. “I like it this way.”
JUSTIN
He’d apologized. He’d flat out said he was sorry, and she brushed it off like she didn’t believe him. He wasn’t her ex fiancé. He didn’t need to know everything that went down or why she left. Whatever it was, was enough to make her run. He could remember her as a child…maybe this shouldn’t have been such a surprise. He knew she liked to do things her own way. Except, now he felt challenged to prove something, and she had no idea she’d even done it.
“Hey, Justin…” Chris was tapping on the driver’s side window of his truck. How long had he been sitting there, lost in his thoughts? Apparently, littleLythiewasn’t the only one who drifted off into her own world. Justin smiled through the glass and reached for the window crank to roll it down.
