A Montana Homecoming

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Epilogue

Prologue

“What do you mean you’re leaving?” Laurel sat up, clutching her cotton dress to her chest. Her bare back felt itchy from straw that only a half hour earlier had felt like the sweetest of mattresses. And there was a horrible hole yawning open inside her.

Shane didn’t look at her. He yanked his T-shirt over his head. His thick hair looked more brown than blond in the dwindling light of the ancient barn and was messy, as much from her fingers as from the shirt. “I have classes.” His deep voice was clipped.

“Starting tomorrow?” She couldn’t hide her disbelief. She knew good and well that Shane’s graduate school classes weren’t beginning for another few weeks. She knew, because he’d told her so himself.

His gaze finally slanted toward her, and he crouched next to her, leaned toward her—making her heart stop with hope that he really couldn’t be serious about leaving her, not like this, not now, after they’d—

He plucked his sock from the straw beside her, and his hand brushed her bare thigh as he pulled back, straightening. He didn’t even bother to sit on one of the hay bales. Simply balanced easily on one foot and drew on the sock, then did the same for the other, then shoved his feet into his scuffed athletic shoes.

Her eyes burned. “Did I do something wrong?”

He made a low sound. Shoved his hands through his hair. “Laurel—”

Laurel. Not songbird, which he’d been calling her for weeks now.

It had been her first time. But not his. “I didn’t cry because it hurt, Shane, I—”

“God, Laurel.” He kicked the bales of hay so hard that suddenly the top one tumbled off the stack and landed with a thud. A cloud of dust and bits billowed out, making her wince and squint against the shower of debris.

He swore again, which made Laurel’s eyes burn even more, because Shane just didn’t swear.

“I should never have touched you. I’m twenty-three. You’re barely eighteen.”

“But I am eighteen.” Her voice was thick with tears, which wasn’t at all the way she wanted to sound. She scrambled to her feet, awkwardly pulling her dress over her shoulders and fumbling with the buttons that ran all the way down the front. But her fingers couldn’t seem to match up any of the buttons with the proper holes and she finally just clutched it together at her waist. “And we love each other.” Didn’t they?

He looked pained, his gaze fastened on her white knuckles. He took a step toward her. Then another.

She nearly stopped breathing.

He put his hands over hers and slowly unclenched her fingers from the pale-yellow fabric.

Then he just stood there, staring down at the hands he held. Her dress, soft from too many summers and too many washings, parted a little.

He swallowed. She saw it work down his strong, tanned throat. Then he squeezed her hands just a little and released them. And reached for the top of her dress.

Her knees—not particularly steady after what they’d just done, anyway—felt like her mama’s strawberry jam left out on a sunny counter.

His fingers were so long. A little bony, and a lot callused. He might be a preacher’s son, but he’d spent the summer working for old Hal Calhoun right here on his farm.

“Shane.” His name was barely a whisper on her tongue. She loved his name. She loved him. He was tall and good and golden and so incredibly gentle.

“I shouldn’t have touched you,” he said again. And as deliberately as he’d unbuttoned each and every one of those tiny white buttons, he began doing them up again. “I’m sorry, but it was a mistake. It’s my fault. So go ahead and hate me all you want.”

By the time he reached the hem, just below her knees, the tears were crawling openly down her cheeks. The bleeding from her heart, broken wide, wasn’t visible at all.

He rose.

She was glad that he didn’t bother hunting around for her bra or panties. She could see them from the corner of her eye, tossed carelessly aside near her sandals.

“I’ll drive you home.”

She didn’t want to go anywhere. She wanted to stay there in Calhoun’s barn with Shane. She wanted him to put his arms around her again, to press his lips to hers, to breathe softly against her ear and make her feel as if everything in life was good and fine.

They’d barely had a summer together, but it had been the best summer of her life.

“I’d rather walk,” she said quietly.

“Laurel, I’m not leaving you here—”

“Yes, you are,” she interrupted, feeling a curl of anger nip at the yawning pain inside her. “That’s exactly what you’re doing.”

He shoved his hands in his front pockets. She could see the shape of them, fisted against the worn-white denim. “I never made it a secret that I was going back to school.” He looked away for a moment, and she saw the muscle in his jaw flexing. “You’re starting college classes soon, too, dammit.”

“Preachers shouldn’t swear,” she murmured.

He snorted and looked back at her, then pointedly looked at the bed of straw, then her underwear. “I have no business becoming a preacher, either.”

Despite her cracking heart, she reached out to him. “Don’t say that, Shane.” He had plans. Wonderful, admirable plans. He wanted to be like his father, to help people however best he could. On someone else, those plans would just be dreams. But Shane would make it happen. He was just that way.

His lips twisted. “Get the rest of your things. You can’t walk home. It’s nearly dark.” He ignored her outstretched hand and walked to the barn door, sliding it open enough to walk out. A moment later she heard the rumble of his old truck engine cranking to life.

Dashing her hands over her cheeks, she snatched up her panties and yanked them on, balled up her bra into her pocket and shoved her feet into her sandals.

She didn’t look at him as she joined him in the cab of his truck. But she had to close her eyes against a fresh rush of tears when he silently reached over and pulled a long piece of straw from her hair.

Then he put the truck into gear and drove her home.

Chapter One

Who was inside the old Runyan house?

The car—dark blue and dimmed by a thick layer of dust—was still parked in the cracked, uneven driveway when Shane drove past. It hadn’t been there when he’d gone to the station in the morning. But it had been there when he’d driven out to his brother’s place that afternoon. And it was still there this evening on his way home for the day.

He could have kept on driving. Instead he pulled in to the rutted driveway and parked behind the small blue sedan.