“Carson,” WT said and extended his hand.
Her brother gave a slight nod, his face expressionless as he reached down to shake his father’s hand. WT pulled him closer and awkwardly put an arm around the son he hadn’t seen in years.
For the first time in her life, Destry saw tears in their father’s eyes. He hadn’t cried at her mother’s funeral, at least that’s what she’d heard through the county grapevine.
“It’s good to have you home, Carson,” their father said, his voice hoarse with emotion.
Carson said nothing as his gaze shifted to Destry. In that instant, she saw that his coming back to Montana hadn’t been voluntary.
Her heart dropped at what she saw in her brother’s face. Fear.
CHAPTER TWO
CARSON COULDN’T TAKE his eyes off his sister. When he’d left she’d been a tomboy, wild as the country WT couldn’t keep her out of. Eleven years later, she’d turned into a beautiful woman. Her long hair, plaited to hang over one shoulder, was now the color of rust-red fall leaves, her eyes a paler blue than his own. A sprinkling of freckles graced her cheeks and nose. Even after all these years she never tried to conceal them with makeup.
He smiled. “You have no idea how much I’ve missed you.” Or how badly he felt about the pain he’d caused her. “Little sis,” he said, pulling her into his arms again.
She hugged him tightly, making him wonder what their father had told her about his return. Given her surprised reaction, he’d guess the old man hadn’t told her anything.
“Why are we standing out here? Let’s go inside,” WT demanded impatiently. “Don’t worry about your luggage. I’ll have one of the ranch hands unload it for you. You haven’t even seen the house yet.”
Carson released Destry and glanced behind him at the looming structure. How could he miss it? He’d seen the massive house perched like a huge boulder on the hill from way down the road. He didn’t need to ask why his father had built such a house. Apparently WT still hadn’t shed that chip on his shoulder after growing up poor in the old homestead house down the mountain. Back then, the house and a few acres of chicken-scratch earth were all he’d had.
But WT had changed that after inheriting the place when he was only a teen. He’d worked hard and had done well by the time he’d married. Carson had never known poverty, nothing even close to it.
But WT couldn’t seem to shake off the dust of his earlier life. He just kept buying, building, yearning for more. The manor on the mountain, planes, a private airstrip, and he’d even mentioned that he’d built a swimming pool behind the house. A swimming pool in this part of Montana so close to the mountains? How impractical was that?
As his son, Carson had certainly benefited from his father’s hard work. But it came at a price, one he’d grown damned tired of paying.
“Wait a minute, WT,” he said as his father began to wheel himself back toward the house. He hadn’t called him Dad since the fourth grade. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”
* * *
DESTRY WATCHED THE passenger side of the sports car open and one long slim leg slide out.
She hadn’t noticed anyone else in the car, not with the sun glinting off the windshield, and neither she nor her father had apparently considered that Carson might bring someone home with him. That now seemed shortsighted. Carson was thirty-one. It was conceivable he’d have a girlfriend or possibly even a wife.
Destry glanced at her father and saw his surprised expression. She cringed. WT hated surprises—and Carson had to know that.
“I want you to meet Cherry,” her brother said, going to the car to help the woman out.
Destry felt her mouth drop open. Cherry was tall, almost as tall as Carson who stood six-two. She was a bleached blonde with a dark tan, slim with large breasts.
Cherry gave WT a hundred-watt smile with her perfectly capped ultrawhite teeth, which were almost a distraction from the skimpy dress she wore.
Carson was looking at their father expectantly, as if awaiting his reaction. There was a hard glint in her brother’s eyes. He had to know what WT’s reaction was going to be. It was almost as if he was daring their father to say something about the woman he’d brought home.
Beside her, their father let out an oath under his breath. Destry didn’t need to see WT’s expression to know this wasn’t the way he’d envisioned his son’s homecoming.
Cherry stepped over to WT’s wheelchair and put out her hand.
He gave her a limp handshake and looked to Carson. “I think it would be best if your...friend stayed in a motel in Big Timber.” Big Timber was the closest town of any size and twenty miles away. “Of course I’ll pick up the tab.” Only then did he turn his gaze to Cherry again. “I thought Carson would have told you. We have business to discuss. You’d be bored to tears way out here on the ranch.”
“WT,” Carson said in the awkward silence that followed, “Cherry is my fiancée.”
“Destry, show Cherry the swimming pool,” her father ordered. “Carson and I need to talk. In private.”
* * *
WT ROLLED HIMSELF INTO his den and straight to the bar. His son had brought home a Vegas showgirl and thought he was going to marry her? Over his dead body. As he shakily poured himself a drink, he realized that might be a possibility if he didn’t calm down.
“I’ll take one of those,” Carson said as he came into the room behind him. “I have the feeling I’m going to need it.”
Unable to look at his son right now, he downed his drink, then poured them both one. His hands were shaking, his heart jackhammering in his chest.
“Close the door,” he ordered and listened until he heard the door shut. “You aren’t going to marry that woman,” he stated between gritted teeth as he turned his wheelchair around to face his son.
Carson took the drink WT held out to him and leaned against the long built-in bar. His son had grown into a fine-looking man. WT felt a surge of pride. Until he noticed the way his son was dressed. Loafers, a polo shirt and chinos, for God’s sake. Who the hell did he think he was? He was the son of a rancher.
WT hated to think what that sports car parked out front had cost or about how much money he’d spent keeping Carson away from Beartooth.
“You aren’t going to marry that woman,” he repeated.
Carson met his gaze and held it with a challenge that surprised WT. With an inward shudder, he realized this wasn’t the son he’d sent away more than a decade ago. That scared twenty-year-old boy had just been grateful to get out of town alive.
“I’m in love with Cherry,” Carson said, as if daring him to argue the point.
WT shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. It’s not happening. And I don’t want to talk about that right now,” he said with a wave of his hand. “We need to talk about the W Bar G. You’re my son. This is where you belong. When I’m gone, I want to know you’re here, keeping the ranch and the Grant name alive.”
“I think I have more pressing matters to concern myself with right now, don’t you?”
WT fought to control his temper. “You let me worry about the sheriff and that other matter.”
“That other matter?” Carson demanded. “Is that what you call Ginny West’s murder?”
WT refused to get into the past with his son. He’d looked forward