Walker Pride

by Bernadette Marie

  Chapter Eighteen

  A day without his horse hurt more than Eric could have imagined. But another night with Susan wrapped in his arms had been just what the doctor had ordered.

  She’d brought him a gift when she’d arrived with a tin pan of spaghetti and meatballs, just for him.

  Now on his mantel was the picture she’d taken that morning in the barn, of him and Whiskey River. It was priceless, Eric thought in the early morning light of the quiet Saturday morning. She’d captured them interacting just as they always did, but the depth even had nearly brought him to tears.

  In the past two days, he’d tried to remind himself he was just a horse. But he’d been more than that. They’d been a team and now a part of him was missing.

  Susan moved in behind him and wrapped her arms around him. “I’m going to have to learn to wake up earlier,” she said softly with her cheek pressed to his back.

  “It’s nice to wake with you next to me,” Eric said turning and gathering her in his arms. “Looks like it’s going to be foggy today.”

  “It’ll be a good day to snuggle up to a fire then.”

  “I have to go check on the cattle.”

  She nodded. “I know your work is never done. I’ll make breakfast for you and be here when you get back.”

  Eric kissed the top of her head. “I’d like that.”

  A half hour later, Eric was driving the fields in his truck and missing Whiskey River more than he had the morning before. He drove the fence line and noted that the fence they’d fixed earlier that week was still holding. It seemed strange that one simple fence was the border between the Morgans and the Walkers. And that made him think of his mother.

  Of course, she’d been on his mind a lot. The older he became, the more faint a memory she’d become, until he’d met Lydia on the front step of the Morgan house. In her face, he could see his mother again. Lydia had her eyes, the pout of her lips, and the same build in body as he remembered as a child. Why didn’t that comfort him?

  Eric stopped the truck and put it into park. He closed his eyes and thought about her voice. He almost couldn’t hear it anymore. The words Eric darling still resonated in his mind in her voice, but those were the only words. A tear slid down his cheek and he quickly wiped it clear. He missed her terribly.

  “Why is all of this happening?” he asked aloud as if he were asking her. He opened his eyes. “What do I do?”

  Suddenly the fog seemed to push away as if to let the sun shine down on only him. He breathed in the peace.

  For that very moment the thought of losing his home didn’t feel so daunting because Susan would still be there—he felt that. His horse, which had been his trusty companion, was a great loss, but Susan was there to comfort him. He hadn’t yet grieved his grandfather’s death—because of Susan.

  There was nothing the Morgans could do that would defeat him. Hurt him emotionally, maybe, but he couldn’t help but believe that Susan had somehow been sent to him.

  As the sun was again covered by the fog, Eric decided to head back to the house. He figured he’d done what he needed to do for today and for the first time in twenty years he was going to take the rest of the day off.

  Susan was grateful for that loud truck of Eric’s. She was able to plan his breakfast and have it ready for him as he drove from the barn toward the house.

  She hadn’t started a fire in years, but she’d managed one in the fireplace in the living room. It took the chill out of the air and certainly made the house homier.

  It had been a very long time since she’d learned the preferences of a new man. Her ex-husband was a simple breakfast man. He liked fruit and oatmeal before he rode for twenty miles. Eric, she’d already learned was a little more traditional. He liked eggs and breakfast meats, which she couldn’t quite wrap her head around. He’d enjoyed a hearty plate of waffles at the diner the other morning as well.

  She chuckled to herself as she slid the eggs from the pan. For having only known the man almost a week, she’d had breakfast with him an awful lot. She never would have imagined that when he came slamming his way into Glenda’s kitchen that day, she’d want to always wake in his arms either.

  Eric’s truck was right in front of the house now as she set the plates on the table and turned back to gather the coffee mugs.

  Eric walked through the door carrying the cold on him. He hung up his hat, shrugged out of his coat and hung it up, then toed off his boots leaving them on the mat. This was obviously his process she decided.

  “I have a feast laid out for you,” she said smiling.

  “I’m hungry enough for that. Hopefully, my brothers will keep away today. I’d like to have you to myself. So you can feed me that is.”

  She laughed as he walked into the kitchen. “If they showed up I’d be obligated to feed them too. It’s how I work.”

  “Don’t let them know that. You’ll never get away from them.”

  “Can’t be so bad,” she said sitting down at the table.

  Eric picked up a piece of bacon and bit it as he sat down. “It’s not so bad—I guess.”

  “My sister moved to California for college and stayed there. So I’d give anything for her to just drop in and eat.”

  “Dane will be the first to move away, further than a few hours away,” Eric said as he spooned eggs on his plate.

  “Where is he going?”

  “Ohio,” his voice dropped as he said it. “He’s not too excited.”

  “Why? That’s awesome.”

  Eric shrugged as he took a bite of his eggs. “He’s a homeboy. I mean he’s still living at home with Dad and Glenda.” He washed down the eggs with a sip of coffee. “Okay, to be fair he’s living there with the intent to make this move. When his lease was up he moved home.”

  “It’s nice that your parents have the room for him.”

  “Him and Russell.”

  “They both live at home?”

  “Russ has been in school forever. It makes more sense.”

  “How old is he?”

  “Twenty-eight.”

  “What kind of school has he been in?”

  Eric picked up another piece of bacon and bit it. “He enlisted, did a few years, they put him through college and then he finished up his service. Up until this week, I think his plan was to make the ranch more profitable by expanding it.”

  “Why does that have to change?”

  Eric sat back in his chair and looked at her. “I’ve more than once been accused of being a closed book.”

  Susan picked up her coffee mug and shook her head. “Meaning?”

  “I don’t include the people in my life in the things going on in my life.”

  “You’ve had a busy week and even though we’ve become very involved, I wouldn’t hold that against you.”

  Eric studied her. “I want to keep you and continue to be very involved.”

  Susan swallowed hard. “I want that too.”

  He leaned in and rested his arms on the table. “My family is messed up,” he said very matter-of-factly.

  “I’ve met them. I don’t think…”

  “Not all of them,” he interrupted.

  Eric reached for her hand. He gave it a squeeze and then ran his thumb over her knuckles.

  “My mom died when I was eight. Dad met Glenda and gave me four more brothers. I don’t think I appreciated her as much as I should have,” he said as if he’d only just realized that.

  Eric lifted her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to it. “My uncle isn’t so family oriented. He’s obviously married multiple times. He never even married Bethany’s mother. He’s not very close to any of his children.” He sucked in a breath. “And he has a severe gambling problem.”

  “Is someone getting him some help?”

  “It just kinda came to full light the other day at the reading of the will. It seems as if he was in debt over a million dollars.”

  “A million dollars? Oh, that’s a lot of money.”

>   Eric nodded. “Well someone paid it off for him in trade for the acreage I’m living on—including this house.”

  Susan narrowed her eyes. “He paid off his debt with your land?”

  “My grandfather’s land. It’s written into the will that the land goes back to the original owner, now that my grandfather is gone.”

  Susan shook her head. “None of that makes sense, really. Isn’t there something you all can do about that?”

  “We’re working on it. There’s a lot of strife between my family and the family which will get the land back.” Eric sat back in his chair letting go of her hand. “The family in question is my mother’s family.”

  “That’s very complicated.”

  He nodded. “They disowned her when she fell in love with my father. I never laid eyes on my grandfather until the other day. I met my cousins when I got beat up,” he said raising his fingers to his blackened eye.

  “I wish I could have met her. Anyone who would give up their family for love…well she must have been very certain of that love.”

  Eric nodded. “I guess so.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “I was young when she died. I don’t remember their love. She loved me and that was all I cared about then.”

  Susan picked up her cup of coffee and took a sip only to find that it had gone cold. “Can I warm your coffee?”

  Eric looked at his mug and shook his head. Susan stood and walked to the sink to pour out the cold coffee. She filled her mug with hot coffee and sat back down across from Eric.

  She lifted the mug to her lips. “So her family wants the land?”

  Eric nodded. “They want her back too.”

  Susan set her mug back on the table. “They want who back?”

  “My mother.”

  She wasn’t sure what to think about that. “Where is she?” she asked with her words drawn out as she tried to think it through.

  “We have a family plot. My mother is buried there.” He kept his gaze steady on her. “The plot is just up over the hill on our original land.”

  “And now they want her buried on their land?”

  “Yes.”

  Susan reached for his hand now. “You look to lose your land and your mother?”

  Eric’s eyes narrowed and his lips tightened. “Over my dead body will they take her from me.”

  Susan certainly didn’t like the thought of him putting his life on the line. Though she certainly understood it.

  Eric raked his fingers through his hair. “All of this has led us to someone poisoning my horses and my cattle. They cost me my business. You tell me my mother’s family isn’t involved.”

  “You know that for sure?”

  He shook his head. “No. My father says it’s not them. But they sure were defensive when I showed up asking questions.”

  Susan moved to him and positioned herself on his lap. “If you need a place you can…”

  “I won’t need a place,” he said. “No one is taking my house. No one is taking my mother.”

  She rested her head on his shoulder. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “Sharing all of this with me.”

  Eric touched her cheek and then brushed his fingers into her hair. “Your turn, you know.”

  “My turn for what?”

  “Why did you get divorced?”

  Susan winced. Yes, it was only fair she supposed. “I was horribly bored.”

  The surprise in her answer surprised him. That was evident by the flash of shock in his eyes. “Bored?”

  “I wanted to go to culinary school. I wanted children. I freaking wanted to drive from one end of town to the other without my husband telling me how bad it was for the world.” She took a breath. “I heard the phrases ‘you should have, why don’t you, and I think it would be better if you’ more than I ever would have liked. My obsession with food was wrong.”

  “Wrong?”

  “Yes. Just wrong. I needed to focus on doing good for the environment and the world. I needed a job that brought in decent money. I simply wasn’t good enough for anything. I just got bored with being nothing.”

  Eric brushed his thumb over her cheek. “I don’t buy into you being not good enough. I’ve seen what you’re building.”

  Susan couldn’t help but smile. “That’s why I’m in Georgia. It was far enough away to not matter what I did. I gladly drive across town and I’m doing what I love.”

  “You do a good job too.”

  “He’d never have said that.”

  “He doesn’t have to. I’m saying it.” Eric lifted his lips to hers and sealed his words with a kiss that had her clinging to him.

  He pushed them back from the table and carried her to the couch, his mouth still firmly pressed to hers. Gently, he laid her on the couch and slid atop of her.

  Susan hadn’t imagined she’d be happy with a man, ever. She’d written this part of her life away. But Eric had brought back the wanting.

  Eric kissed her until her body eased beneath him. The warmth from the fire made the room’s new heat grow in intensity. Then, he pulled back and looked down at her with that grin that tugged at only one side of his mouth.

  “What the hell does Q stand for?”