Hot color rushed into Randy’s face. At nineteen, he was plenty old enough to know right from wrong.
“Did you set that barn on fire?” his father pressed.
Randy’s mouth thinned and his narrow face went iron hard. He jerked away. “He had it coming! He had no call to fire me!”
“Good God!” Jim Stevens looked appalled. “This is what comes from your mother’s refusal to discipline you. I let her raise you and look how you turned out! I should have paddled your ass years ago instead of letting your mother spoil you rotten. Now get in the house!” He shoved the kid inside and slammed the door behind him.
Stevens shook his head. “I don’t know what to say. I can’t wrap my head around it.”
“You’re not going to be able to ignore this, Jim. If you do and it happens again, someone might get killed.”
Stevens blew out a shaky breath. “I won’t ignore it. I promise you. I’ll figure a way to make it right.”
“You can’t make this right for your son. That won’t solve anything. Randy has to make it right for himself.”
Stevens ran the back of his hand over his mouth. “You’re right. I’ll call Emmett Howler, turn the boy in myself. My wife will go ballistic, but maybe if I’d stepped in sooner, this wouldn’t have happened.”
Josh just nodded. “I’m sorry.”
“So am I,” Stevens said.
Turning, Josh walked back to his truck, got in, and fired the engine. Making a U-turn, he headed back the way he had come. It was five o’clock somewhere and he really needed a drink.
He checked his watch. Hell, it was five-thirty right now in Iron Springs. Pulling onto the highway, he headed for Jubal’s Roadhouse. After his run-in with the kid, it was way worse than a Lone Star night. He needed a shot of Jack Daniel’s.
The good news was, Damon Bridger hadn’t set the fire. At least for now, Tory and Ivy were safe.
He hit the hands-free button and pushed the number for the landline he used for business. He’d been putting off hiring someone to design an Iron River Ranch webpage and set up the ranch’s bookkeeping and tax records, but he’d need to do it soon.
The phone rang a couple of times before Tory picked up, which reminded him to buy her one of those throwaway phones to use when she was in the trailer. He didn’t like her being over there with no way to communicate.
“Tory, it’s Josh,” he said.
“Hey, Josh.”
Just hearing her voice made his groin tighten. He couldn’t believe it. “You don’t have to worry about Bridger. Randy Stevens set the fire.”
“Oh, God, that’s the teenage boy you hired?”
“Randy’s nineteen. Grown up enough to know the difference between right and wrong.”
“Did the sheriff arrest him?”
“Not yet, but odds are he will. His father’s taking care of it. I trust him to handle it.”
“At least it wasn’t Damon. I can’t tell you what a relief that is.”
“Yeah. Listen, I’ve got to go. You and Ivy have a good night.”
“You too,” she said softly.
He was hard by the time he hung up. It made no sense. She wasn’t even his type. He liked big, buxom women, the kind who could handle what a man his size had to give. Not some petite little female half afraid of men. For him sex was a stress reliever. He didn’t want to have to hold back, worry about hurting the lady in his bed.
He stopped by the grocery store to pick up a couple of items and buy that phone, then headed for Jubal’s, even more in need of a drink after talking to Tory. When his phone rang, he hit the hands-free. “Josh Cain.”
“Josh, it’s Noble Blanchard.” The guy he’d bought the ranch from. “I got your call about the stallion.”
“What can you tell me about him?”
