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Yes, she was. But Eve suspected that Roman thought he was the lucky one. According to the gossip—and there was plenty of it—Roman had gone through a string of women before he’d finally fallen hard for his childhood friend.
“Sorry that I didn’t call first, but I was in the area and decided to check on you,” Roman said when she got out of the car. He scooped up the package and started toward them.
“No worries. It’s good to see you.” She kissed Roman’s cheek, made introductions, and when Roman tipped his Stetson in greeting to Cassidy, Eve could have sworn that her friend sighed. A swoony sigh that made Eve smile. Then frown. Too bad there wasn’t a way to make women immune to the Granger charm.
“I hope you haven’t been waiting long,” Eve added. She scooped up Aiden from his car seat. “I was in town.”
“I’ve only been here a couple of minutes.” He shifted the gift under his arm and helped her with the diaper bag. “Yeah, and I knew you were in town. For the baby’s six-week checkup. I heard. You and this little man make news wherever you go.”
It was the truth. The reporters and paparazzi had left her alone for the most part. So had the hornies. But the townsfolk still paid attention to her every move. Of course, they did that to plenty of other people, including Lawson.
On her weekly trips into Wrangler’s Creek for groceries and such, nearly everyone who crossed her path had the urge to tell her that Lawson was still on a business trip, one that had no end in sight since he’d been gone for six weeks and had no projected return date.
Beneath the gossip, there was the underlying tone that she was responsible for that, and Eve had no doubts that she was. Lawson didn’t want her here, which meant when he finally did return, they were going to talk. Maybe she could convince him this town was big enough for both of them. Maybe while she was at it, she could convince herself that the old memories in this house were nothing but memories.
“I was out checking on Lawson’s place for him and figured you’d be back soon,” Roman explained. “Wanted to see how you and the baby were doing.” As they went up the steps, he touched his finger to Aiden’s nose, causing the baby to give him a sleepy smile.
“You didn’t have to bring a gift.” Eve tipped her head to the purple box he was holding.
“Oh, it’s not from me. It’s from Dylan. He dropped by, too. Said it was a housewarming present.” Roman paused. “Someone also left a horn by the gate, but he tossed that.”
Good grief. Not another one. At least the person hadn’t gotten onto the grounds, but then, one of the reasons she wanted this house was because of its remote location and the security that the gate offered.
“That’s not from me, either.” Roman motioned toward the horse. “Dylan was at the post office earlier, and the clerk begged him to bring it out to you since it was taking up the whole sorting room and giving folks the willies. He brought it over with the gift. Is it an old prop from Demon High?”
“No, it’s from a dimwit ass,” Cassidy grumbled.
Eve gave Cassidy a scolding glance. Yes, it was true that Kellan was clueless and was frequently ass-like, but he was Aiden’s father, and Eve didn’t want her son to grow up hearing things like that. Not from his nanny and mother, anyway. She was certain Aiden would figure it all out soon enough.
Probably by age two.
Then one day Eve would have to explain that on a troublesome night in her life she, too, had gotten clueless and stupid and slept with someone who was, well, a dimwit ass.
“Come in and I’ll fix you some iced tea or something,” Eve offered Roman when Cassidy unlocked the door, and they went inside.
Roman hauled in the horse and stood it in the foyer. Cassidy also took the baby from Eve so that she in turn could take the gift from Roman.
“Thanks,” Roman said, “but I can’t stay. I need to go to Lawson’s place and chew out the contractor. Apparently, there was some miscommunication that resulted in a green quartz countertop instead of a white one. Lawson didn’t feel he was getting his point across over the phone, so he asked me to go.”
Eve was certain Roman would indeed get the point across. He hadn’t lost that bad-boy edge.
“Plus, I don’t really like hanging around at Heavenly Pastures,” Roman added in a grumble.
“But you came to see Dylan,” she pointed out.
“Lucian’s threatening the lawsuit again, says he’s thinking about bringing in livestock and making this place a full-scale working ranch again. I came out here to attempt a bud-nipping.”
Oh. That. The lawsuit generated a lot of gossip, but from what Eve could tell, it was something Lucian had been threatening for years.
“Did you succeed?” she asked.
“No. If Lucian wins, you could have cattle or horses right in your backyard.”
“Better than horns or paparazzi.”
He smiled at her. “Are you okay?”
She considered a lie or a smidge of BS but went with the truth. “Most days. I stay busy,” she amended.
“Yep, a baby can do that.” He knew that firsthand, too, because Roman had become a father when he was a teenager. “And I’ve heard your charity foundation keeps you working hard.”
It did, but thankfully no one in town had made the connection that the foundation helped pregnant teens. Nor were they aware it was something she knew about firsthand.
Of course, unlike a lot of teens, she’d had plenty of money when she had been carrying Tessie. Plenty afterward, too, from her residuals off the reruns of Demon High and the investments she’d made from her salary during the show’s run. And she’d had some support.
Sort of.
Cassidy had been there for her, and the studio had worked hard to keep the pregnancy a secret so she could continue doing Demon High. The studio’s motives, though, had been driven not by her well-being but by profit. Sponsors would have dropped the show if they’d learned the costar was a pregnant teenager.
“You’ve been busy, too,” Eve commented.
Roman nodded, pointed to his wedding ring. “I heard hell froze over that day.”
“And I heard the sound of hundreds of broken hearts.”
“Hearts mend. Those women who’d once been interested in me have already moved on to Dylan. And Lawson.”
She hoped she didn’t look too shocked by Lawson’s name being mentioned in the same sentence with Dylan, the reigning king of heartbreakers. “I thought most women in town wanted Lawson to get back together with Darby.”
“They do,” he readily admitted. “Those are the women going after Dylan. Lawson’s getting attention from the rest, those not on Team Darby. In case you’re wondering, there’s a Team Eve, too.”
She’d missed that particular tidbit of gossip. “Who’s on that team?”
Roman smiled. “Me.”
“I’m not sure you count,” she said under her breath. Since Roman was already heading out the door, Eve followed him out onto the porch. “Any idea when Lawson will be back?”
“I figure another week, maybe less. He’s had time to look at every bull, steer, heifer and calf in the whole state.”
It sure seemed like it.
Since she couldn’t figure out a subtle way to put this, she just put it out there. “Mary Ellen Betterton, the nurse at the pediatrician’s office, said she thought Lawson and Darby were getting back together. He apparently called her last week on her birthday, and Mary Ellen thought that was a good sign.”
Roman blew out a long breath. “You know how confused and frustrated you’re feeling about Lawson?” He didn’t wait for her to answer. “Well, he feels the same way about you. Of course, he’d rather eat that rabid stuffed horse than admit it. That’s my way of saying, don’t read anything into what Lawson’s doing right now. He’s just trying to sort it all out.”
Those were very wise words, and Eve brushed another kiss on his cheek to let him know that. “Thanks.”
He shrugged in that lazy way that only he or a Greek god could have managed. “It’s good to have you home, Eve.”
It was good to be home, but the jury was still out on whether or not anyone other than Roman and she felt that way.
By the time Eve made it back inside, Cassidy had already taken Aiden to the nursery, and she was carrying the pair of baby monitors—one of which she handed to Eve. It had seemed like overkill for both of them to have monitors, but Cassidy had a suite upstairs where she did her paintings for the illustrations for kids’ books. That way, if Cassidy was on a roll with the artwork, she could signal Eve to get the baby.
Not that Eve was far from him anyway.
Her bedroom and office were right next to Aiden’s bedroom, and the baby napped in her arms almost as often as he did in his crib.
“Your housewarming gift,” Cassidy reminded her, and she handed her the box.
Eve opened it and saw the binoculars. Not the cheap kids’ kind. These looked more like something the military would use on recon missions. There was a note attached.
“‘Go to your family room bay window and look out,’” she read aloud.
With Cassidy following her, Eve did indeed go to the window, and she set aside the box so she could adjust the focus on the binoculars. After she’d done that, she had a zoomed-in view of Lawson’s house.
Eve rolled her eyes and handed the binoculars to Cassidy so she could have a look, as well. “Good choice of gifts. Well, it will be if and when Hot Cowboy comes back.” She shifted the binoculars toward the road. “In the meantime, I’ll be content with memories of Roman.”
“You don’t have to settle for memories,” Eve reminded her. “I know you won’t date actors, but there’s none around here. Plenty of cowboys though.”
“Hmm. Maybe the elusive Lucian, then? I’ve yet to see him, but if he’s as hot as Roman, Lawson and Dylan, then it might be fun to have a late-summer fling with him.”
Eve couldn’t shake her head fast enough. Cassidy had been burned more than a couple of times by falling for the wrong man, and Lucian was almost certainly in that wrong man category.
“Lucian isn’t the summer-flinging type,” Eve told her.
Cassidy gave her a flat look. “I keep hearing what a badass ass he is, but are you saying he doesn’t have sex?”
“I’m sure he does, but it’d be like playing with fire while running with scissors and skating on thin ice.”
The flat look turned to a sly smile. “Or it could be like taking the bull by the horns while taking time to smell the roses and sowing some oats.” She paused. “Unless there’s another Granger I don’t know about yet.”
“Reed,” Eve said quickly. “But he’s out of the picture. He left Wrangler’s Creek years ago.”
“All that testosterone in one house,” Cassidy commented.
Yes, and Eve had often felt sorry for their kid sister, Lily Rose. She’d had an abundance of big-brother interference in her life, but all was well now. Lily Rose was married and ran her own horse-training business.
Eve checked the monitor. Aiden was still sacked out, so she should probably catch up on some paperwork for the foundation. She was about to head to her office, but her phone rang. When she took it from her pocket and saw the name on the screen, her heart went to her knees.
Tessie.
Eve’s hands were suddenly shaking so hard that she bobbled her phone and nearly dropped it. She finally managed to hit the answer button.
“Tessie, it’s good to hear from you.” Eve tried to tamp down the emotion in her voice but was certain she failed.
“Yesterday, you left six messages for me to call you,” Tessie greeted her. “Five the day before. You’re going in the wrong direction, Mom. I told you I wasn’t ready to talk to you.”
“I know.” And as harsh as Tessie’s tone was, it still gave Eve a warm feeling to hear her say Mom. “I’m sorry. I just miss you, that’s all.”
“No, that’s not all. You want me to forgive you. Well, I can’t. You lied to me. You made me believe I was adopted.”
“I know,” Eve repeated. And she couldn’t even defend or excuse herself. The studio had created the lie, and Eve had taken that lie and run with it. A way of having her cake and eating it, too. “But I’m sorry that I hurt you.”
Tessie made a yeah right sound that was identical to one Lawson had made. “I saw a magazine in the grocery store, and it had an interview with Kellan. He was bragging about his son.” Tessie paused. “Is Kellan my father, too?”
“No.” She didn’t add more, though she was pretty sure Tessie was waiting for her to do that. But what could she say? Nothing that would make this better, that’s for sure. “Just please let me come and see you in Austin.”
“Don’t you dare come.” Tessie didn’t wait on that response. She blurted it out. “There’s a whole Demon High cult club here, and they don’t know we’re related. I want to keep it that way.”
Because Tessie was embarrassed about it. Always had been. It was one of the reasons she’d been so cooperative about keeping a low profile. It was probably also why she’d wanted to attend an out-of-state college. She wanted to get far away from anyone who knew her.
Little did Tessie know how close she was to her blood kin.
“I gotta go. I have a class that’s about to start.” Tessie ended the call before Eve could get in another word.
The first tear spilled down Eve’s cheek before she could even put away her phone, and Cassidy was right there to pull Eve into her arms. Cassidy just held her and let her cry it out, but the tears wouldn’t help. This was an ache that Eve felt all the way to her soul. Her daughter might never forgive her, might never love her again.
“So, let me play devil’s advocate,” Cassidy said. She led Eve into the powder room just off the foyer and grabbed her a handful of tissues.
“That’s the role you played on Demon High,” Eve muttered as she blew her nose.
Cassidy shrugged. “Well, now I want to reprise it to give you a glimpse of the double poop-storm that could be brewing.”
Poop-storm was one of Cassidy’s go-to curse words. Once, Cassidy had had a serious cursing problem, but after she’d become Tessie’s nanny, she’d toned it down—other than calling Kellan an ass. Eve only wished her toning down didn’t sound so, well, toned down when she was talking with adults.
“Tessie doesn’t know that Lawson’s her father,” Cassidy went on, “but one day she’ll find out. Heck, one look at him, and she’ll know.”
She would. Because Tessie looked very much like Lawson’s cousin Sophie. “I plan to tell her...eventually.”
“If eventually doesn’t happen before she finds out from someone else, then Tessie will get mad again that you didn’t come completely clean with her. She’ll go to Lawson since she’ll be curious what he’s like, and he’ll see her and will almost certainly suspect she’s his daughter. Then they’ll both be mad at you. Hence, the poop-storm times two.”
It wasn’t exactly a revelation, but it did stir a new urgency in Eve. Cassidy was right. This secret had already blown up in her face once, but there could be a secondary explosion.
One that might cause her to lose Tessie forever.
“Deep down, I think you had another reason for moving back here to Wrangler’s Creek,” Cassidy went on. “Yes, you wanted to get away from Hollywood and start a new life, but you also knew Tessie was just an hour away. She’d been talking about going to the college in Texas for years. And I believe you realized then that the time had come for her to know the truth.”
It had. God, it had.
“Help me get the baby ready,” Eve said. “I need to go to Austin right now.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
LAWSON HAD DONE some pretty stupid things in his life, but this might make his top ten. Top five if he didn’t figure out something better to say other than Uh, Tessie, I’m just here in Austin to check on you because my ditzy aunt Belle and your mom are worried about you.
This was definitely an example of sticking his nose where it didn’t belong. And even though he’d told Dylan he might visit Tessie, Lawson had also dismissed it shortly after the dumb-assed notion had first entered his head. So, why had he let Belle talk him into it with her repeated pestering calls and garbled texts?
Because he’d obviously wanted to be talked into it, that’s why.
Despite his dismissing this visit, he was still running with the self-serving theory that if he could smooth things over between Eve and Tessie, Eve would leave Wrangler’s Creek. Then he wouldn’t have to risk seeing her every day in a house and place that would eventually make her miserable because it would bring back old memories of why she’d left in the first place.
Every time that theory played out in his head, he felt lower than squished shit beneath a horse’s hoof. But a happy resolution between mother and daughter with Tessie would benefit Eve, too, since Belle had assured him that Eve was sick with worry about the rift with Tessie. So, even if this didn’t make Eve leave Wrangler’s Creek, at least she wouldn’t be miserable if she could reconnect with her daughter.
Following the directions of his GPS, Lawson took the final turn onto a narrow street lined on both sides with parked cars. He didn’t have the name of the building, only the address that he’d gotten from Dylan, but there’d probably be a sign for the boarding school or whatever it was called. But no school sign. It was just rows of apartments.
“Arriving at destination on left,” the GPS told him.
Yep, definitely an apartment building, but maybe the middle or high school that Tessie was attending was using some of the units as dorm rooms. Top-of-the-line dorm rooms, since this was a pricey area of Austin. Lawson knew that because his cousins’ business headquarters, Granger Western, wasn’t too far from here, and it certainly fell into the pricey category. Eve was loaded though, so she probably didn’t mind shelling out the money if this was a good place for her daughter.
There were no parking spots nearby, so Lawson kept driving until he found one at the end of the street. The August heat slammed into him the moment he stepped from his truck, and he hated to admit it, but it almost felt like some bad omen. Maybe like one of Vita’s foretellings that he dismissed but still gave him an uneasy feeling. He shook that off, went up the steps to the building, but the door flew open before he could even reach for it.
And the smell of booze came rushing out at him.
Lawson quickly saw the source of the smell. Three teenagers, two girls and a guy, who were trying to come out the door despite the fact that he was directly in front of them. They were giggling and wobbling but tried to straighten and look sober when they spotted him.
“Shh,” the guy said to the others. “Just keep walkin’.” His attempt at a whisper could have probably been heard as far away as Kansas.
The guy, who had stringy long blond hair, was on one side of one of the girls—a brunette with her head down—and he had his arm hooked around her waist, obviously supporting her weight. The other girl, a blonde, was doing the same thing on the other side of the middle girl.
Even though the trio was trying to get by, Lawson didn’t move. “Are y’all all right?” he asked.
It didn’t matter what they said because he already knew the answer. They were drunk. And clearly underage. A bad combination. But that wasn’t even the worst of it. The worst was the flashbacks that hit Lawson like a mean kick from a rodeo bull.
Brett.
It all came back—the handful of parts that he could remember, anyway. The party. The drinking. And yeah, Eve, Brett and he had been underage, too. They’d been so sure they weren’t doing anything wrong, that it was something plenty of kids did. Kids like these. But it had been wrong, and Brett had died.
“We’re doin’ just fine, man,” the guy said, or at least attempted to. He missed a couple of syllables and slurred the ones he did manage to say. Even the smile he tried was off the mark and looked as if someone had yanked up the right side of his mouth with an invisible fish hook. “’Kay?”
No, it wasn’t okay, and Lawson felt the anger slide through him. It wasn’t anger directed at the kids but rather himself. Yeah, and Eve, too. The trifecta of Eve, Brett and him usually led to his piss-poor attempt to completely shut out what he’d failed to shut out for the past eighteen years.
And he failed today, too.
The anger was there all right, but Lawson tried to keep his touch gentle when he put his fingers beneath the middle girl’s chin to lift it. His heart felt as if it stopped until he saw her eyelids flutter open.
Alive.
Thank God. But she wouldn’t stay that way if she got any more booze in her or if her blood alcohol was already too high.
Most people wouldn’t have thought the worst-case scenario in a situation like this, but since Lawson had been there, done that in the worst-case department, he knew how fast things could turn ugly.
“All of you live here in this building?” Lawson asked.
That got the attention of the girl on the end. “You a cop?”
“Yeah,” he lied.
Her eyes widened to the size of hubcaps, and she suddenly looked as if she might puke. Good. That would get the booze out of her stomach. The guy did puke, and when he turned his head to do that, he let go of the brunette in the middle. If Lawson hadn’t caught her, she would have probably splatted on the floor. He hooked his arm around her, moving her away from the puking—which was only getting worse because the blonde girl started barfing her guts out, too.
There was nothing worse than the smell of booze-vomit, so he took the semiconscious girl several yards away to the massive stairs in the center of the foyer and he had her sit down. At least she stayed upright. Mostly, anyway. She drifted into a slow lean until her arm was against the banister.
While he took out his phone to call an ambulance and the real cops, Lawson turned back to the two pukers. They obviously didn’t have the mobility issues of the nonpuker, though, because they ran out the front door. He didn’t go after them but was about to go through with the ambulance call when he heard the footsteps on the stairs. Lawson soon spotted a young woman making her way toward them. She didn’t look much older than the brunette, but at least she wasn’t drunk.
“What’s going on?” she asked. But she got her own answer because she groaned, then made a face when she got a whiff of the brunette and the puke. “Idiot,” she muttered to the girl. She caught hold of her, pulling her to her feet before she looked at Lawson. “Are you a cop?”
He frowned because he was reasonably sure he looked nothing like a cop. Hell, he still had some cow dung on his boots from the stockyard he’d visited earlier, and he was wearing one of his prize rodeo buckles.
“You know this girl?” he asked. Yeah, it was a cop maneuver, answering a question with a question, but he wanted to know what was going on.
The newcomer nodded. “She’s a sorority sister.” She rattled off some Greek letters. “And she’s my roommate.”
“Sorority?” His frown deepened. “As in college?”
She was no longer giving him an are you a cop? look. She was staring at him now as if he was an idiot. “Uh, yes. We’re staying here temporarily until our sorority house is ready.”
All right. So, maybe the brunette wasn’t underage after all if she was in college. But that immediately led Lawson to something that didn’t fit.
What was Tessie doing here if this was for college students?
Maybe there was still a boarding school along with the sorority sisters? Or it could be that Tessie was indeed college age. Since he’d never seen a picture of her, it was possible that Eve had adopted her when she was four or five instead of an infant.
“I’ll take her back to the room, and I’ll call the janitor about the throw-up,” the young woman said. “I’ll make sure she’s okay. Just please don’t arrest her. Wellsmore College has a no-drinking policy, and she could get in big trouble.”
Lawson wasn’t letting her off the hook just yet. “There were two other people with her, and they were also drunk. A guy and a girl, both blond.”