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“The party’s tomorrow night so he has to come in sometime soon.”
“You’re not going to let this go, are you?”
“Not on your life.” She vaulted onto the horse. “At the very least, Paxton owes me an explanation.”
He caught the reins of her horse before she could gallop away. “Don’t come to the party, Jenny. If you care anything about the Rebel family, you’ll stay away and not make a scene.”
“I thought you were my friend.”
“I am. That’s why I’m trying to protect you and keep you from getting hurt any further.”
“I can take care of myself.”
He loved many things about Jenny, but her stubbornness wasn’t one of them. “Mom said Paxton and his fiancée are going to stay at the ranch for a while so she can get to know the family. Maybe it would be best if you didn’t come around during that time.”
Her face crumpled. “You’re asking me not to come to the ranch anymore?”
He drew a deep breath. “Yes. I appreciate your help with the paint horses...”
“Since Paxton rejected me, the whole family now has rejected me. I love working with the horses and you’re taking that away from me, too.”
There was a limit to how much Quincy could endure and this was just about the last straw. He had to end this conversation one way or the other. “Jenny—”
“Stuff it!” she shouted and jerked the reins, charging out of the barn for the Walker property, stirring up the heat and dust.
Clyde Walker, Jenny’s dad, owned about a hundred acres that cut into Rebel Ranch. John Rebel had tried to buy it for years, as had Quincy’s mom, but Clyde was hanging on to his property.
Jenny lived so close, and she was like one of the family and was at the ranch a lot. Sometimes to see Paxton and other times just to ride the paint horses. Lately, Quincy had spent more time with her than Paxton. Looking back, he could see that wasn’t a good idea. But it was a little late to change now.
She’d be angry and hurt for a while and then he would apologize for hurting her feelings. At this time, though, he didn’t have any other choice. Maybe it was for the best. He had no future with Jenny. She belonged to his brother.
“She was pretty mad,” Jude said from the doorway.
Quincy turned toward his brother. “Yeah. Paxton didn’t tell her he’s getting married.”
“Why did you discourage her from coming to the party?”
“How do you think she’s going to feel when she sees him with another woman? I’m just trying to save her some pain.”
“Jenny and Paxton are adults and it’s their relationship. Let them sort it out.”
“Says the man who never interferes and minds his own business.”
“You bet. Ready to get those broken bales of hay off the field?”
“Yeah, sure. I was just unsaddling Red Hawk.”
Zane, Jude’s son, ran into the barn. “Hey, Uncle Quincy, I’m going to drive the tractor.”
“You got it. I’ll be right with y’all.”
Zane had just turned twelve and he was a clone of his father in looks—in personality, not so much. Jude and Paige, Jude’s girlfriend, had gotten pregnant in high school, similar to his older brother, Falcon, and his wife, Leah. Paige was incredibly smart and had received a scholarship to the University of California, Berkeley. She was torn about what to do. In the end, her future was more important than the child she carried. They’d decided to give the baby up for adoption. But Jude hadn’t been able to live with that decision. He’d gone back to the clinic and got his son and raised him. Jude hadn’t seen Paige since, nor did she know about Zane.
Quincy knew that weighed heavily on his brother’s mind. Jude was the quiet, responsible one in the family. He stayed mostly to himself, never caused trouble and was a straight-up kind of guy. He was the one everyone could depend on and trust. He carried a scar on his forehead where Ezra McCray had shot him the day John Rebel had killed Ezra. That, too, weighed on his mind.
It didn’t take them long to get the broken bales of hay off the field. Zane drove, and Jude and Quincy threw them onto a trailer in heaps. Quincy would use the hay to feed his paints. They already had three barns full of square bales and many round bales stored away. Since it was the beginning of September, hay-baling season was almost over.
Zane drove the tractor into Quincy’s barn, and Quincy and Jude jumped from the trailer to unload.
“Sorry, Quincy.” Jude removed his hat to shake hay from his hair. “We have to meet Zane’s teacher in less than an hour.”
“Aw, Dad.”
“I got it,” he told his brother. He welcomed the work, anything to get his mind off Jenny.
Just as he started to stack the hay, Elias and Jericho walked in.
Quincy straightened. “Is all hay off the ground?”
“Yes, sir.” Elias saluted. Of the seven brothers, Elias had a devil-may-care attitude that came with a dose of spit-in-your-eye.
Jericho grabbed a pitchfork. “I’ll help you stack.”
Jericho had saved his brother Egan’s life in prison and for that Kate Rebel had offered him a job. He was Egan’s friend, but now he was a friend of the family. They didn’t know much about Jericho, nor did they need to. He had more than proved himself to the family.
He stood about six-four and was an imposing character with dark features, long hair tied into a ponytail at his neck and a scar slashed across the side of his face. No one knew his nationality, but Egan said he was part white, black, Mexican and Indian. He’d grown up on the streets of Houston, involved in gangs and drugs. Today Quincy would trust the man with his life and the lives of his brothers. He had completely turned his life around.
Elias grabbed a pitchfork, too. “Can you believe ol’ Pax’s getting married? A bull must have dumped him on his head. Why get married when he has the pick of every pretty buckle bunny on the circuit?”
Quincy worked without answering. He didn’t want to have this discussion.
“And Jenny? I wonder if he’s told Jenny.”
“That’s none of our business.”
Elias leaned on the pitchfork. “There’s going to be fireworks, I tell you. Jenny Walker is not going to take this without a fight and I have a front-row seat. Oh, yeah. I see a catfight in Pax’s future.”
Again, Quincy didn’t respond. They finished unloading the hay and Quincy started to jump onto the tractor to take it back to the equipment shed, but Jericho stopped him.
“I got it, Quincy. Mr. Abe is probably waiting on his supper.”
“Thanks, Rico.”
As Rico drove the tractor and trailer from the barn, Quincy brushed hay from his clothes. It stung down the back of his shirt and clung in sweat-slick places. He needed a shower.
“I’ll see you at the house,” he said to Elias.
He and Elias lived with their Grandpa Abe, who was getting up in years and at times appeared to be a little senile. They refused to let him use the stove anymore because he’d set the house on fire twice. These days Grandpa was happy to let Quincy or Elias do all the cooking. Eden, Falcon’s daughter, helped out when she could.
There were four houses on the property. Their mother, Jude and Zane lived in the big two-story log house at the front. Falcon’s wife had returned after many years, and they now lived in the old family home where Quincy, Elias and Egan used to live. Falcon and Leah had wanted their own house, so the brothers had happily relocated to Grandpa’s. Egan had gotten married and moved out. Now Quincy and Elias were left to deal with the old man.
Grandpa’s place wasn’t far from the old house, and then there was the bunkhouse where Paxton, Phoenix and Jericho lived. They had a commune right there in Texas. The thought brought a smile to his face and he wasn’t in a smiling mood.
So many women in the world and he had to fall in love with the one woman he couldn’t have. The only way to get over it was to stay away from Jenny. And he planned to do just that.
* * *
QUINCY OPENED THE gate in the old chain-link fence and walked up the steps of the white-board house his grandfather had built for his wife many years ago. It had been redone over the years and held many memories.
Mutt, Grandpa’s dog, wasn’t on the front porch to greet him. Quincy couldn’t remember how old the dog was, but he now had arthritis and didn’t leave the yard. He was an outdoor dog and only came inside when it was cold. And he didn’t like it then. He had a bed on the front porch and the back.
Opening the front door, he heard the TV. Loud. Grandpa was losing some of his hearing. He sat in his recliner, Mutt on his lap, watching an old Western.
Grandpa, with thinning gray hair, stooped shoulders and bowlegs, was about the orneriest character you’d ever want to meet. But he was fiercely loyal and devoted to his grandsons, as they were to him.
“What’s wrong with Mutt?”
Grandpa stroked the small black-and-white mixed breed dog. “I guess he’s just lonely.”
Quincy felt a tug on his heart, for he knew that was Grandpa’s way of saying he was lonely. He usually spent time with them on the ranch, but today he’d been absent. Maybe Grandpa was feeling bad.
“Are you okay?”
“Healthy as a horse,” Grandpa replied. “I knew you’d be tired so I put baked potatoes in the oven and there’s steaks in the sink you can do on the grill.”
“Thanks. I’ll take a shower first. I’m sweaty and I’ve got hay all over me.”
“Suit yourself. Where’s Elias?”
“He’s on his way.”
“He better hurry up. Those potatoes’ll be ready in ten minutes.”
Grandpa was in an unusual mood this evening. It wasn’t like him to plan supper. On second thought, Quincy went into the kitchen to check on things. The potatoes, wrapped in aluminum foil, were sitting on top of the stove. Quincy shook his head, placed them inside and turned on the oven. The steaks were thawing in the sink. That was good.
After taking a shower and changing clothes, he seasoned the steaks and placed them in the refrigerator and then went outside to the back porch to clean the grill.
He kept waiting for Elias to show up, but as usual, Elias was dragging his heels. Quincy sat in the living room with his grandfather watching the Western. Suddenly, Grandpa turned off the TV.
“What do you think about Paxton?” Grandpa asked.
Not again. Why was everyone asking him that question?
He rubbed his hands together. “None of my business.”
Grandpa pointed a finger at him. “You need to find yourself a woman.”
Quincy groaned. This was Grandpa’s standard lecture to his grandsons. Find a woman, get married, have babies and be happy. Sometimes it just didn’t happen like that.
“And not Jenny Walker,” Grandpa added for effect, and he had Quincy’s attention.
He didn’t know, did he? He couldn’t.
His eyes narrowed. “Why do you say that?”
“She’s over here all the time and it’s not to see Paxton, because he’s not here. She comes to see you.”
“She likes the paints and she’s good with them. I don’t have a problem with that because I’m busy on the ranch.”
“Not all the time, so don’t fool yourself, boy. I’ve seen the way you look at her, and that’s just asking for trouble. You’re a Rebel and you never cross that line. There’s a lot of lines us Rebels have crossed, but we don’t go after our brothers’ girlfriends. Not even if they’re an ex.”
Elias stomped in, preventing Quincy from answering, and he was grateful for that small act. For the first time, he didn’t know how to respond to his grandfather. He thought he’d kept his secret hidden. If his grandfather could gauge his feelings about Jenny, how many other family members had?
Did they all know he loved Jenny Walker?
Chapter Two (#ulink_5f715cbd-e3f8-5308-bde7-046b1c2c4f3c)
Jenny sat on the back stoop watching a cow stick her head through the barbed-wire fence to reach the green grass in the yard that Jenny had watered. The grass was always greener on the other side. That was how Paxton felt. He’d found someone better than Jenny and she had to bite the bullet and accept it.
The back door opened and her sister, Lindsay, sat down beside her. “What are you doing out here? It’s hot.”
Jenny was so upset, she hadn’t even noticed her skin felt as if she’d taken a bath in honey. Sticky. All she was aware of was the hollow ache in her stomach. “Thinking.”
“Come on, Jenny. You have to have seen this coming. You haven’t heard from Paxton in months.”
“Seven weeks. That’s how long it took him to fall in love with someone else.”
“You have to get past this. There are a lot of guys out there who would be more than eager to go out with you.”
“I’ve spent half my life waiting for Paxton and now I just feel like a horse without a bridle. I’m free, but I don’t know which way to turn without Paxton.”
“This isn’t like you. What else is going on?”
The cow pushed on the barbed wire and Jenny was afraid the fence would break. She got up to shoo her away. When something around the ranch broke, Jenny and Lindsay were the ones to fix it. Their dad had had a tractor accident some years ago and now had a gimpy leg and walked with a cane. He still had cattle, but some things were hard for him to do, and having no sons, his daughters picked up the slack.
She and Lindsay were both nurses and worked in a hospital in Temple. Lindsay was director of nursing and didn’t work on the floor anymore. Her job was stressful and she spent a lot of hours at the hospital, including weekends if there was a problem.
Jenny was a pre-op nurse, the one who prepared a patient for surgery, took vitals, dealt with consent forms, started an IV, calmed nerves and answered questions. Working three twelve-hour days was a challenge, but it gave her a lot of free time at home with her dad. Sometimes she was called back for extra duty. Since Lindsay was in charge, that didn’t happen too often.
She resumed her seat by her sister.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Jenny shrugged. “I forgot what it was.”
“You’re really down about something other than Paxton. What is it?”
They were four years apart and very close, and Jenny knew she could talk about anything with Lindsay. But her sister tended to be bossy and sometimes that grated on Jenny’s nerves. She needed to talk, though. She wiped the palms of her hands down her jeans. “I went over to talk to Quincy to see if he knew anything about Paxton and the engagement.”
