“But that’s not going to mend our relationship,” she pointed out. And she’d already been apart from her cousin for too long.
“Doesn’t distance make the heart fonder or something?” he asked.
“That did not work with my parents,” she said. No. She would have to fix things with Frankie before her cousin took off, if she took off. While Blake seemed to think she would, Maci, who’d known her longer and better, wasn’t as certain.
And as for Brett…
Trish wasn’t sure what it would take for him to forgive her for not seeing her dad as much as she should have, and for not coming to the funeral. She wasn’t sure she could ask him to forgive her for the things she wouldn’t be able to forgive herself.
But she did want to figure out a way for them to be able to work amicably together. Given the way he made her tingle with awareness, though, maybe it would be better if she kept her distance from him. But how would she manage that when they would both be living at the ranch?
* * *
Frankie could notremember the last time she’d been this angry. When she’d found Uncle Frank after he’d fallen off his horse, she’d been upset. Scared. When Trish hadn’t come to visit him in the hospital or even shown up for his funeral, Frankie had been disappointed. And maybe a little angry—but not like this.
Then, when Trish and her lawyer had contested the will, Frankie had gotten a little angrier. But she still hadn’t been furious.
Today, however, seeing that lawyer in her uncle’s house, trying to manipulate her cousin into contesting her father’s last wishes, had infuriated Frankie. Even after he left, she couldn’t stop shaking with fury. How dare he pit her family against each other?
And that was what the Lemmons were to her—they were her brothers. And Trish had always been more like a sister to her than a cousin. Even as mad as she’d made Frankie, Frankie would never stop loving her. Now that she’d learned about the divorce and the miscarriages and pregnancy that Trish had gone through all alone, Frankie wasn’t just upset with her cousin. She was upset for her. And she wished she’d been there for her.
But after Maci took Trish into the den to show her the will, Frankie had headed out to the barn. She needed to calm down before she talked to Trish again. She wanted to be there for her cousin now.
Being on the ranch had always calmed Frankie down. It had been where she’d come after her parents died. And it had been her safe place after that devastation. Any time she was going through something tough, a breakup with a band, a canceled tour, she’d come home. And usually she hung out in the barn with the horses or out in the pastures with the cows.
But one of those cows was in the barn now. The baby she’d personally pulled from her mama’s womb. She’d saved Cocoa, and she was counting on Cocoa to save her right now. To calm her down.
And once she was calm maybe she could figure out how to convince Trish to look at the Lemmons as family, too.
CHAPTER SIX
Brett stepped intothe dim light of the barn and breathed in deeply of hay and horses. The smells cleared his head a bit and reminded him what mattered most: the livestock, the ranch and Frank Dempsey’s last wishes.
Would Trish accept them? Hopefully, Maci would be able to get through to her.
But Brett wasn’t naive enough to think that would end their problems. It would just create a whole new set of them because Trish was here.
And someone else was in the barn.
Brett tensed as he heard someone murmur as they shifted within a stall. Then a husky voice began to sing, and he relaxed again.
Frankie really had a beautiful voice. Too bad it was being wasted here on the ranch where more animals than people got to hear it. He walked over to the stall where she’d moved Cocoa, next to the horse that Frank had given to Maci. He opened the stall door and leaned against the opening.
Cocoa was cuddled up against Frankie, who sat with her back against some hay bales. The calf stared adoringly up at her mama.
“You’re spoiling her,” Brett said.
Frankie jumped and glanced up at him. “I didn’t hear you come up.”
He nodded. “I know.”
“And let’s talk about spoiling her,” she said. “You must have fed her this morning before I got in here because she wasn’t interested in her bottle.”
He nodded again. “Yeah, she was hungry so I grabbed the milk replacement for her.”
“You didn’t have to do that,” she said. “I promised I would take care of her.”
Their veterinarian, who was also one of Brett’s new stepcousins, had offered to bring the orphaned calf to his practice. But Frankie hadn’t been willing to let her go.
