Cade bit his lip.
Not about the chewing tobacco, but against the guilt he still couldn’t shake.
If he hadn’t shot Sonny, Carlina Sanchez never would have overdosed.
And Reno would’ve had the mother she’d needed.
RENO CLEANED UP the kitchen, washing the plastic tumblers and sun tea jar. While the clean container filled again beneath the running tap, she reached in the cupboard for tea bags, and noticed the note Wynonna had scribbled on the dry erase board fastened to the fridge: “BBQ—Diamond L—5:30 Sun.”
She’d nearly forgotten.
The Lantanas had been putting on an annual Fourth of July barbecue ever since the summer Cade left. Reno wondered if the tradition had started out of guilt or remorse. After all, he hadn’t gone under pleasant circumstances. And while a lot of townspeople thought of him as a hero, there were those who weren’t so sure.
No matter her own personal feelings, Reno had sympathized with Cade’s parents, Estelle in particular. How hard it must seem to be the mother—a mother in a small town—of a man who’d had to shoot and kill someone. Even if your son was a deputy sheriff. Even if the man he shot was a pedophile and a killer.
And even if Sonny Sanchez was the only father Reno had ever known.
Reno raised one eyebrow. The note hadn’t been on the fridge earlier.
“Ah, you noticed,” Wynonna said from behind her. “I, uh, forgot to remind you before.”
“No problem.” She turned off the faucet, straightened her shoulders, lifted her chin and knew she wasn’t fooling Wy any more than she was fooling herself. “I’ve gone to Estelle’s barbecue for the past nine years. Why shouldn’t I go this year?”
“Exactly.” Wynonna nodded, relief spreading over her features.
Reno’s shoulders slumped. “Who am I kidding, Wy? I can’t go this year.”
Wynonna busied herself drying the tumblers Reno had stacked in the dish drainer. “And why not?”
“You know why.”
“It’ll be fun. You’re going to stand there and tell me you’d let a man—even Cade Lantana—stop you from going?”
Reno pulled the tea bags from their individual wrappers and placed them in the jar. “I think you know the answer to that.”
“You have to go. It would be rude if you don’t attend.”
She didn’t want to socialize with Cade. The mustangs were one thing, but…
But she was still pissed at him—her big brother—for leaving her.
“Estelle went to a lot of hard work,” Wynonna said. “I’ve been helping her here and there.”
Since Wynonna often went on a baking spree, Reno hadn’t really thought much of it when she’d noticed the extra homemade desserts stored in the refrigerator. She was about to protest when the phone rang, making her jump.
“Hello?”
“Hi yourself, gorgeous.”
“Austin. What are you up to?”
“About six-one.” He laughed.
Reno couldn’t help but chuckle. “Ha. You ought to get your own stage act.”
“Maybe I will. You want to be my assistant?”
“Nope. I have an aversion to being sawed in half.”
“That’s a magician’s assistant, not a comedian’s.”
“Comedians don’t have assistants.”
“Darn. Do they have dates?”
“I don’t know. Maybe they prefer raisins.”
He laughed again. “Oh, that’s bad. But not bad enough to keep me from asking you out.”
“Is that right?” Reno wrapped the kitchen phone cord around her index finger. “Where to? If it’s Red Lobster, I’m there.” There was one in Grand Junction—worth the eighty-five-mile drive.
“Sorry to disappoint you. I was thinking more along the lines of a barbecue—the one at the Diamond L, to be exact.”
The Lantanas’ barbecue…shit.
Reno cupped the phone with one hand, turning her back on Wynonna, who pretended to be busy putting the dishes in the cupboard.
“You’re going?”
“Of course. I always do.”
“Well, yeah, but I thought…”
“That Cade would keep me away? Not hardly. He may think he’s a big bad BLM agent, but this isn’t Idaho.”
Reno rolled her eyes. “Austin, you don’t have to play macho to me. I’m not impressed and you know it.”
“I’m wounded.” She could picture him clutching his chest, and she had to smile. “Don’t tell me Cade’s scared you off going?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I think someone had a crush on someone else a long time ago. And I also think I know a pretty woman who got her heart stomped on when that coward left.”
“Don’t call him that.”
“Hey, take it easy. I’m just quoting your grandpa Mel.”
Reno’s chest burned. “Leave my grandfather out of this,” she snapped.
“He should be a man. Stand up for what he did. He wasn’t wrong.”
Maybe not in shooting Sonny. But Cade had been wrong to leave her. That had broken her heart and angered Grandpa Mel. Reno often wondered if the shooting and her mother’s suicide had contributed to her grandfather’s decline in health, and ultimately the back-to-back strokes that had killed him.
“And, no,” Reno said, “I don’t plan on letting Cade Lantana get to me.”
“Does that mean you’ll go to the barbecue with me then?”
Why not? She enjoyed Austin’s company, had even slept with him recently and had found him sexually stimulating, though she wasn’t sure she was ready to do it again. They’d both agreed to back off and take things more slowly, though at times Austin was bad about keeping his hands to himself.
And she sure wasn’t about to let Cade dictate where she could and couldn’t go. Her earlier reservations slipped away as a feeling of spite and power replaced them.
“Yes,” she said. “I’ll go with you. It’ll be fun.”
“Good.” She could hear the smile in Austin’s voice. “I look forward to it. And don’t forget, the first dance is mine.”
“Depends on whether or not Matthew Mc-Conaughey shows up this year.”
Austin guffawed. “Pick you up at five?”
“See you then.” Reno hung up the phone and faced Wynonna, who stood with hands clasped like an eager child.
“So you’re going?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Excellent. Go look in your room. I made something for you for the barbecue, and I don’t mean fudge brownies.”
Reno stood with elbows akimbo.