Falcon had had to sneak up on the idea of marriage a bit more slowly. First, he hadn’t met that many women. He worked a lot, like everyone else in this room. They were soldiers, all of them, trained for covert ops and sniper fire, and everything else one faced in the Special Forces. The job wasn’t the best backdrop for casual dating. Anyway, the first time he’d laid eyes on Taylor, something had hit him in the gut. And it had hurt so good he’d known he was onto something with the spicy brunette.
“Sloan, you’re settled now, got kids,” he said. “What do you think about marriage?”
Sloan smiled. “I recommend it. Just maybe not with the first girl you lay eyes on. It’s all fine and good to try to win the ranch land, but maybe you don’t want to propose every day that ends in y until you finally pick off a female. Be patient. Eventually a woman will take pity on you.”
“Very funny.” Falcon grimaced. “It can’t be that hard. Marriage is just a contract between two people.”
Ash came over to sit next to him, leaned against his shoulder. “You really want that land, don’t you?”
“Look who’s talking—you’ve already named it,” he pointed out. “I’ve got a name chosen for when I win it, too.”
Galen sighed. “This is what Aunt Fiona and Running Bear want, all of us focused on the land and settling down at the drop of a hat. They did it to our Callahan cousins, and they’re going to be really happy to see all of us sink like rocks into the wedding swamp.”
“Swamp?” Dante laughed. “Even I wouldn’t have thought of Aunt Fiona’s wedding dare as a swamp. Maybe a soup.”
His twin, Tighe, shuddered. “Swamp works for me.”
Jace got up, went to look out a window. “I’m looking as hard as I can for a bride. It’s not happening.”
“They say a watched pot never boils,” Sloan said. “Maybe your fire’s not turned on.”
“My fire’s fine,” Jace snapped. “Let’s not worry about my fire, thanks.”
“I move we get on to the general business.” Falcon felt edgy, impatient. “Any news?”
“Fiona mentioned the chief dropped by.” Galen’s expression turned intense. “She said Running Bear wants to meet with us tonight in the stone circle.”
“Did our cagey aunt say what the topic is?” Falcon asked.
Ashlyn smiled, her once-short, light blond hair now grown just past her ears, making her look less soldier these days and a bit more delicate. “Apparently, Running Bear may have word about our parents.”
Falcon blinked. They hadn’t heard from their parents in years. At least twelve. He tried to remember. He was thirty-three now—he’d last seen their parents...on his twenty-first birthday.
Ash, the baby, had been thirteen, Dante and Tighe fifteen.
Falcon had been a man then—but it hadn’t felt like it. Galen had come home from his medical studies in the military to keep them in line. The siblings had tested Galen, giving him a bit of hell, but it hadn’t lasted long. Those who were of age followed him into the military. The rest Galen ramrodded into growing up good.
Good and tough.
He looked around at his siblings. “Well, that would be news. If it were true.”
They all gazed at him. He sighed.
“I’m sorry. I can’t get excited about it. It’s been too many years and too many dead ends in the maze.” He shrugged. “We all know how the story ends, anyway.”
They looked away. Falcon knew his words were perhaps harsh, but they were honest. He went to the windows and stared out at the vast horizon toward the canyons, feeling angry, hurt, somehow betrayed, even though he knew their parents had done exactly what he would have done—and would do, at this very moment if necessary, to protect his family.
He didn’t focus on the pain anymore. It didn’t do any good. He held his parents’ memories inside him, respecting them, knowing they were in his heart, where they could never be taken away from him.
Still, peace was elusive.
There was not going to be a happy reunion, and he knew it as well as the rest of his family did.
He brooded about that—until he saw shadows swirling in the evening light washing the distant mesas. “Look,” he told his brothers and sister, and they came to stand beside him. They watched as the mystical Diablos, a sure portent of things to come, thundered through the painted canyons.
Yes, he would make the very same decision his parents had made. It was all about protecting the family—and right now, his mission was guarding his parents, Callahan cousins, Rancho Diablo, and the Diablos from the danger stalking them.
* * *
J ILLIAN LOOKED AT T AYLOR as she finished tidying up the diner’s mahogany counter. “You don’t want him to know, do you?”
Taylor didn’t look at her old friend and employer. “Falcon isn’t serious about marrying me. He doesn’t need to know anything about my private life.”
“He sounded pretty serious to me.” Jillian cocked her red mop of hair, thinking. “Callahan men usually stick to that ‘strong, silent type’ way of thinking, but say what’s really on their mind.” She nodded. “Maybe you should tell him the truth.”
“Falcon doesn’t need to know that I received another marriage proposal. It’s none of his business.” At the moment, Taylor didn’t want anyone in Diablo to know more about her than necessary. She’d grown up here. People talked, and talked a lot. And she hadn’t quite accepted the astonishing proposal of Storm Cash. She’d said she’d think about it.
Falcon’s proposal was the second she’d received in a month. “I’m in shock, to be honest.”
“I am, too.” Jillian walked over, took the dishrag from her. “Go home. Think about all this. Talk to your mom about everything. It’s not often a woman gets proposals from two men almost at the same time.”
“They’re enemies,” Taylor murmured.
“True enough.” Jillian nodded. “Falcon’s going to hear about it eventually.”
A chill teased at Taylor. “Do you think he knew that Storm proposed?”
“I feel certain that Falcon isn’t the kind of man to do things out of a sense of competition for a female. There’s too many pretty ladies around who would give anything to go out with him, or any of the Callahan boys.” She shrugged. “Tell me again why Mr. Cash offered to marry you?”
“He said he needed a wife,” Taylor said. “He said he’d heard that Mama was ill, and he didn’t want to take me away from her when he knew she needed help, so he would wait for me. But he also wanted to help Mama out. I told him we were fine, that we didn’t need his assistance. To be honest, I thought his proposal was more sincere than Falcon’s.”
“Never underestimate a Callahan. They don’t do anything half-baked. It just seems like they’re half-baked, all of them.” Jillian laughed. “They are wild men, for sure—both sides of the Callahan family tree. And Ash follows in her brothers’ and cousins’ footsteps. In fact, I do believe Ash taught those boys a thing or two about staying crazy and free, at least according to what Fiona has shared.” She smiled, enjoying telling the yarn. “No, Callahans are fully baked, like clay fired in a kiln. Falcon was serious.”
Taylor realized she’d completely dismissed Storm’s proposal, kind as it might have been. Yet her heart had leaped at Falcon’s words—first in surprise, then with what she could only identify as happiness, even as she knew he couldn’t truly love her. He was too wild.
How long had she carried