Lone Star Kind Of Man

“What do you mean?” he growled.

“You seem...” She shook her head in confusion. “I don’t know...angry or something. I’d hoped that—”

He took a step nearer, his eyes darkening to a stormy gray. “What did you hope, Regan? That I’d kill the fatted calf? That I’d welcome the prodigal sister home with open arms like Harley?” He took another step nearer and the heat of his anger all but smothered her. “Well, I’m not Harley, Regan,” he ground out. “And I’m not your brother. I never was and I never will be. I—” He clamped his lips together before he could say more, before he could say something he would regret.

With a scowl he turned his back on her, and headed for his truck, leaving her standing on the drive behind him.

Two

Telephone poles and road signs flashed by in a blur as Cody raced his truck through the night, venting his anger with a little speed. When the highway narrowed to two lanes he slowed to the legal limit, then stopped altogether when the pavement ended, giving way to the rock road that led to Jack Barlow’s place.

He sat a moment, his arms draped loosely over the steering wheel, staring but seeing nothing. He drew a long breath. The anger was gone, or at least most of it. He could deal with what was left.

With a glance to his right, he saw the familiar gap in the fencing, the faded path of a dirt road now choked with weeds. Years before he’d stood in that gap many a morning, rain or shine, waiting for a school bus to take him to school. At the end of that dirt road, protected by darkness, lay his old home place. On impulse, or maybe because it seemed a fitting end to the day, Cody turned and headed down the road.

Ignoring the scrape of mesquite trees against the sides of his truck and the occasional thunk of a rock to his underpinning, Cody bounced his way down the deeply rutted road. When the cabin came into sight, he yanked the steering wheel hard to the left, then braked to a fast, dust-churning stop in front of the shadowed structure, aiming the beam of his truck’s headlights dead on.

In front of him sat his inheritance, the only thing Buster Fipes, the town drunk, had left behind when his liver had finally said “No more.”

Cutting the engine, Cody swung down from the truck, leaving the headlights on for illumination. At the intrusion, a trio of rats darted through a gap low on the front door and leaped from the sagging front porch, disappearing into the tangle of vines and weeds that had taken over the yard.

Ignoring them, Cody peeled off his suit jacket and tossed it onto the seat, then cuffed his shirtsleeves to the elbow as he walked to the front of his truck. He settled his back against its warm hood, then folded his arms across his chest and crossed his legs at the ankles as he stared at the place he’d once called home.

He snorted in disgust. Home. This place had never been home to him, or anyone else for that matter. It was merely the place where, long ago, he’d stored his belongings and rested his head on occasion. Now, it had lain vacant for more then eleven years.

At one time the property had been owned by the Kerrs, and the old cabin used by hunters who leased seasonal hunting rights on Kerr land. But then Cody’s dad had come along and cut a deal with Harley’s father, promising work in exchange for ownership of the cabin and the five acres of land that surrounded it. His old man hadn’t lived long enough to uphold his end of the bargain, and it was Cody who had worked for the Kerrs to repay the debt.

Cody shook his head, remembering. Harley’s father had tried to talk the then sixteen-year-old Cody into simply letting him deed the land over to him after Buster had died, but Cody’s pride wouldn’t let him accept the gift. Instead, he’d worked part-time during the school year and full-time during the summers, then after graduation he’d hired on full-time, working on the Kerr ranch until the debt had been paid.

He’d lived alone in the cabin until he left Temptation. He’d packed up and headed out of town, seeking his fortune with the only skill the good Lord had seen fit to bless him with... riding bulls. And when he’d returned four years ago and accepted the job as sheriff, he’d chosen to live in the quarters at his office rather than try to make the cabin livable again.

When trespassers had shot out the glass panes, he’d simply boarded up the windows and tacked a No Trespassing sign on the door.... But it hadn’t kept the vandals out. Not that there was anything of value inside to worry about. There never had been, not even when his old man was alive. The shack wasn’t worth the price of the match it would take to burn it down.

But the place was his, he told himself. That and the five acres it stood on. Not a lot, but then Cody had never had much.

Frustrated by his thoughts, he pushed away from the truck and strode toward the one-bedroom cabin. He’d come back to the place only once after that first year of riding the circuit, then left again when he’d found Regan had gone.

Regan. The anger he thought he’d burned up on the highway came singing back with a vengeance. With a growl, he scooped an empty whiskey bottle from the weeds at his feet and hurled it hard and fast at the cabin’s front door. It hit the metal No Trespassing sign and shattered, the splinters of glass gleaming like a starburst in the silver glow of the headlights.

If only he’d had something to offer her when she’d asked him to run away with her, to marry her, he thought angrily. Maybe things would have turned out differently. But all he’d had was this sorry excuse for a cabin and the wages he made working on her family’s ranch. Not much to offer a woman who was accustomed to more.

So, he’d told her, no, to be patient. Another year and she could make the decision to leave home without tying herself to a man who had nothing to offer her. What he hadn’t told her was that he’d be back to claim her once he had a stake.

He’d left Temptation, chasing his fortune on the back of a bull, hoping to make it big and bring home his winnings. Enough to earn him her brother’s blessing when Cody asked for Regan’s hand. Enough for the two of them to buy a place of their own.

But Regan hadn’t been patient...or maybe she simply hadn’t cared enough to wait, he thought grimly. A year after he left, soon as she’d turned eighteen, she’d hightailed it for the big city, then married some guy she’d known less than six months.

Cody braced a hand against a splintered post and dipped his forehead in the crook of his arm, wiping the perspiration that beaded his brow before lifting his head to stare at the tumbling-down cabin.

He didn’t know why he’d come here. He rarely set foot on the place. He supposed he’d needed to remind himself of his roots, of the fact that he wasn’t good enough for Regan Kerr—or Reggie Giles, as she called herself now. Reggie. Anger burned through him as he remembered the name she’d assumed upon leaving Temptation. Why had she chosen to be called by his special name for her? He shook his head, refusing to consider what that might mean. He hadn’t been good enough for her eleven years ago, and nothing had changed much since then...at least not for him.

But he’d seen that Lexus out front of Harley’s house and had known without even asking that it was Regan’s. He’d listened in silence as she told Harley about the real estate business she owned, about the properties she’d invested in. If anything, the gap between them had widened over the years, not narrowed.

And now she was back.

Firming his lips against the emotion that burned through him, Cody forced himself to take slow, even breaths. He tipped back his head, his gaze on the stars overhead, searching for an answer to the question he couldn’t even voice.

How would he survive when he was forced to stand by and watch her leave again?

With a vicious growl, he kicked at the rotted post, then spun and headed for his truck. Climbing behind the wheel, he turned the key and looked up, his gaze hitting on the reminder of where he came from, who he was...at all that separated him from Regan. Narrowing an eye at the cabin, he shifted into first and let out the clutch.

The truck bucked across the uneven ground, the cabin growing larger as he drew near. But Cody never once wavered from his goal. He slowed, then stopped when the bumper of his truck met the porch post. Easing off the brake, he hauled in a deep breath and stomped the accelerator to the floor.

Rocks spun behind the truck’s wide rear wheels and the old wood groaned and creaked at the pressure. Cody set his jaw, feeling through the steering wheel the vibration of the post’s resistance before it finally gave way with a loud crack. He quickly shifted and reversed before the porch roof collapsed, then he stopped again once he’d reached safety, watching as the dust settled around it.

His lips thinned in determination, he backed again, reset, aiming straight for the side of the house. Wood splintered, tin flew, dust spewed. Cody quickly reversed again and floored the accelerator, shooting out of danger’s way. The wall hung at an odd angle a moment, teetering like Cody’s old man had when he’d come home drunk, then slowly toppled, taking the roof along with it.

Cody worked methodically, circling his truck around the perimeter of the cabin, taking down each wall in turn, until nothing remained of the old cabin but a pile of rotten lumber and rusted tin.

Sweating from the exertion and breathing hard, he draped his arms along the top of the steering wheel, watching as the debris shifted, then settled over his childhood home. There’d been no happy memories there, so the tears that stung his throat weren’t for what was...but rather for what might have been.

What did you hope, Regan? That I’d kill the fatted calf? That I’d welcome the prodigal sister home with open arms, like Harley?

Cody dropped his head to press his forehead against the back of his hands as the spiteful words he’d thrown at Regan came back to haunt him. He hadn’t meant to hurt her, not when all he’d wanted to do was hold her in his arms and never let her go. But the anger of her leaving, of not waiting for him, repressed for so many years, had spewed out of him before he could stop himself.

He could still see the look of shock on her face, the hurt. The realization that he had put it there shamed him more than any words of recrimination she might have hurled at him.

He sank back against the seat with a frustrated sigh. He knew there wasn’t a chance for them. There hadn’t been eleven years ago, and there certainly wasn’t now. And that was what had made him angry. That was what had made him turn on her, taking his frustrations out on her. It was that feeling of utter helplessness, knowing there was nothing he could do to change the way things were...and wishing like hell he had the power, the right, to claim her as his own.

But they’d been friends once, he reminded himself as he continued to stare at the pile of debris. Maybe they could be friends again... if he hadn’t already ruined his chances for that, too.

He sighed, wishing with all his heart that he could have more with Regan. But he realized that friendship with her was better than nothing, and Cody Fipes had lived with nothing for too many years.

Reggie managed to hold back the tears until she was alone in her room, the same room she’d occupied as a young girl. Now, as then, her pillow absorbed her tears of frustration, of hurt, and muffled the sounds of her sobbing from the others in the house.

She tried to get a grip on her emotions by reminding herself how much she had to be thankful for. Harley had accepted her openly with no sign of anger or resentment for the past. Mary Claire and Leighanna had forgiven her for the little white lies she’d told them, for the evasions that had been necessary to protect her secret from them. Before leaving for their mother’s home in San Antonio, Tommy and Jenny had even promised to visit her in Houston, and in addition to them she now had a new niece and nephew, Stephie and Jimmy, to lavish her love on.

But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t make the hurt, the disappointment go away.

She tightened her fingers on the pillow, pressing it closer to her face to muffle the new wave of sobs that rose.

Why? she cried silently. Why had Cody treated her so cruelly? What had she done to deserve such anger, such fury?

She hadn’t known what to expect from him when he saw her again, but nothing could have prepared her for the wrenching her heart had undergone when he’d turned his back on her and walked away.

She had carried his memory and her love for him for so many years—even through a brief marriage—clung to them through bouts of loneliness when she’d yearned for home. It was foolish to think he had done the same.

And Reggie Giles was anything but a fool.