Slow Burn Cowboy

Finally, Violet looked up, a long-suffering expression on her face. “They all do.”

Not him. He was thirty-four years old. He wasn’t somebody’s elderly relative.

“Do I have a room or something?” Violet asked, directing the question at her dad.

Finn could tell that Cain was about to lecture her for being rude, but as far as Finn was concerned getting rid of the teenager as quickly as possible was optimal. “Up the stairs. First room on the left,” he said.

It had always struck Finn as odd that his grandfather had designed the house to hold so many people, when the old man had few friends and little contact with his family in the broad sense. But the place was big enough to house a small army.

Most of the bedrooms had gone unused since the house had been built five years ago. And when Finn had gotten a look at the will after the old man had died, he’d wondered if they’d been put there for this purpose.

Which had made him feel like a damned idiot. Thinking any of this was for him. Was for a job well done. Hell no.

He’d busted his ass, worked his fingers to the bone—literally in some cases—and they would reap the rewards.

“Thanks.” She shoved her phone back in her pocket and tried to force something that looked vaguely like a smile before walking up the stairs. It was strange to see somebody come into the house for the first time and not be completely awed by the sheer scope of it.

The custom-built cabin, with its high beam-crossed ceilings and breathtaking views of the misty green wilderness, was usually enough to stop people in their tracks.

Apparently, that reaction did not extend to surly teenagers.

After Violet disappeared, Finn turned to his brother. “Well,” he said, “she’s gotten—”

“Impossible?”

“Not what I was going to say. But, you’re the expert.”

Cain pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m not an expert on anything, just ask Violet. But that’s not really relevant to why we’re here.”

“Okay,” Finn said, shoving his hands into his pockets. “You’re here because?”

“Why do you think? It’s not like this is some random appearance you weren’t expecting. Our grandfather died.”

“And per his wishes there was no service. He wanted his money to go back into the ranch, and his body to go back to the mountains. I spread his ashes and didn’t make a deal out of it, just like he said to do.”

Cain set his jaw. “Grandpa left part of the ranch to me, and I’m here because I want it.”

Tension crept up Finn’s spine. He’d known his brothers would come for their inheritance. Hell, who wouldn’t? But he’d imagined they would be discussing money. Finn had been prepared to issue payouts—or make arrangements for them anyway.

What he hadn’t thought was that anyone might want their share of the ranch itself.

“In what capacity, Cain? Because you’ve never paid much attention to the ranch or what goes on here before. In fact, you never even came to visit in the past eight years. It has to have been that long. The last time I saw Violet she was a kid, now she’s...that.”

“I’d apologize to you about that, Finn, but I was kind of in the middle of dealing with my life, which hasn’t been easy for the past few years.”

Finn knew that his brother had been going through a hard time. With the divorce and all of that, but he’d also figured if Cain was having trouble handling it, he would have said something.

He wasn’t sure why he’d figured that, since he would rather die than go to one of his half brothers for help.

Which made him feel like a jackass. He resented that something fierce. Feeling like a jackass in his own damn living room when he was the one being invaded.

“Right,” Finn said, unable to make his tone anything other than hard.

It wasn’t that he didn’t care about Cain’s issues. It wasn’t that he didn’t have some sympathy. It was just that it was all buried beneath the mountain of resentment he felt over this situation.

Cain shrugged. “Now I figure I’m going to deal with it here.”

The sound of a feminine throat clearing caused both men to turn. “Hi,” Lane said, a sheepish smile on her face. She was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, her hands clasped behind her back.

“Cain,” Finn said, doing his best to school his voice into an even tone, “this is Lane.”

“Is she your...”

“Oh, no,” Lane said, a note of incredulity running through the denial. “I’m just his friend. I came to bring casserole, because I knew that you would be coming. At least, I assume you’re the person that I thought would be coming. You’re his brother, right? You do look like him,” she said, rambling now at that full-tilt pace that he had only ever seen Lane accomplish.

Cain looked slightly surprised by the avalanche of words he had just been subjected to, but then he seemed to recover quickly enough. “Hi,” he said, “I’m Cain.”

Lane looked at Finn as if she was waiting for additional information. Well, Finn didn’t have any. At least any he felt like giving. The silence stretched on, and he could sense Lane getting increasingly twitchy, since silence was an enemy she typically made it her mission to defeat.

“Cain and Lane,” she burst out. “That’s funny. And you probably won’t forget my name.”

She stood there, looking no less uncomfortable. As uncomfortable as Finn was starting to feel.

“How long are you staying for?” Finn asked.

Cain glanced around the room, studying the surroundings intently. And then his blue eyes fell back to Finn, looking far too serious for Finn’s liking.

“Well,” he said slowly, “I figured we would be staying for good.”

CHAPTER TWO (#udbd83345-e894-5bdf-8835-3bfa8ab29052)

MAYBE SHE HAD demonstrated a little bit of cowardice in leaving Finn alone with his invading family. But Lane hadn’t really seen what she could contribute to the scene. She loved Finn to pieces, and he was her best friend in the world. But he was gruff and he didn’t share his feelings easily. He was the kind of guy who led with angry, then made up for it with grand gestures, like the time he’d come to her house and built a deerproof fence for her new garden. Or the time he’d spent an entire day clearing away all the thick brush around the cabin, and forging a path for her that led into the woods so she could more easily access the berry bushes that grew around her property. Or when he’d rebuilt the dock at the lake by her home so that it was larger and didn’t have any soft, damaged boards.

Yeah, Finn was more hammer and nails than hearts and flowers. He had a soul of gold beneath his general cranky exterior.

That didn’t mean she wanted to hang out and witness the ensuing crankiness, though.

And anyway, she had standing plans to meet up with her friends Rebecca Bear and Alison Davis.

She was just going a little earlier than necessary. And if they could make it at the new time, all the better. If not, she would just sit there and eat French fries while she waited. Since she hadn’t stayed for dinner at Finn’s, she was officially starving to death.

And here she had given him a hard time about his palate. But she, Lane Jensen, known foodie, also had a soft spot for really greasy food. And when she wanted that, Ace’s bar was the place to go.

“Hi, Lane,” Ace Thompson said from his position behind the bar. “French fries?”

Ace had made women swoon across town for years. And he still did, but the wedding ring on his left hand put a damper on things. He was lumbersexual hot. But he was also a one-woman man since marrying Sierra West and starting a family with her.

“You’re like my dealer. And yes. Regular, not sweet potato. I’m not in the market to pretend that there’s any nutritional value involved in this.”