by A. J. Downey
“What’s eating you?” he asked when I got within earshot.
“Got time for a beer with your dumbass twin?” I asked.
“Oh, Lord. What’d you do this time?” he asked.
“Do you have time for a beer or not?”
“Yeah! Yeah, I got time.”
We went in through the barroom which was thankfully vacant and picked up a couple beers each. I led my brother through the club and out the back door to the expanse of grass rising up into a plateau of some kind. When this was a juvie, I guess this used to be a running track around a raised ball field of some kind. The track had been paved over making a loop of a driveway to get out to the outbuilding that housed my room and the huge, three bay shop building that now housed Dani’s jeweler’s studio and my woodshop.
The bay between them we’d managed to clean out of the random stored crap in it and it now stored a bunch of my completed furniture. It’d helped me save on a rented storage locker and I was damn grateful Dragon had let me have so much space to do my thing. He hadn’t wanted anything for it, either but it hadn’t stopped me.
Nox and I dragged ourselves up to the top of the little rise and to my completed project up here. I’d built the club an outdoor fire pit. A raised circle of bricks instead of the old fifty-five gallon drum they’d been using. Around it, I’d erected a round pergola framework of timber and then I’d gotten really down and dirty.
I’d built six hanging benches and had affixed them to the framework with solid, industrial, weather proofed chain. When we had a full house, it still hadn’t been quite enough seating, so I’d built some sturdy lawn furniture to sit closer to the fire with some tables between ‘em to hold drinks and dead soldiers.
I led my brother to a couple of the chairs now, and we each dropped into one. It didn’t look like much, but there was an odd rectangle framework on one side of the pergola with wood neatly stacked underneath and to either side. There were some hook and eyes driven into the top of the rectangle and we had a nice LED TV tucked into one of the empty club rooms that we hung from it and could watch the game from. That’d been Data’s idea, and with his technical know-how, if there wasn’t rain in the forecast, we typically had it hooked up out here except when no one was home, like now.
Nox used one of the bottle openers I’d installed under the overhang of the arm in front of the lawn chair and cracked his beer. I did likewise and took a long drink.
“Looks like I got that job workin’ Dray’s cousin’s horse farm.”
Nox nodded slowly and let that sink in, “You need anything…”
“Shit, I’ll call the right people, but it won’t be you,” I said taking a pull from my own beer. He looked pissed at that and I laughed.
“You’re as good as a daddy now,” I raised a hand to stop him from getting really pissed, and added, “I meant to Sage, I wasn’t trying to take a shot there.”
“Better not be, fucker. I’d have to kick your ass again.”
“You might still wanna when I tell you this next bit.”
“What’d you do now?” he asked and I could just see his heart sink. I had that effect on my twin sometimes, and every time I did, I felt guilty about it.
“To be fair, I didn’t know I was doin’ it at the time…”
“Rush…”
“I’m serious!”
“Rush…”
“Alright!” I laughed, he hated it when I kept him in suspense when it was likely to be bad news and I couldn’t say I blamed him.
“What’d you do now, you fucker?” he asked and I finished off my first beer and cracked my second. I needed a bit of the liquid courage.
“That chick I told you about, the one at The Spot?”
“You got her pregnant.”
“What? Fuck no! All though, this could be arguably worse,” I said and Nox blinked and leaned back in his seat.
“No!”
“Yeah, none other than my new fuckin’ boss and our president’s niece.”
“Oh, dude… I’m tellin’ you right now, it’d probably be a good idea if you told on yourself before shit gets real.”
“You kiddin’ me? Dragon might be chill about it but Dray’d probably try to beat my ass. Seems like he and Bailey might’ve been tight when they were kids.” Nox was looking at me and the look on his face, I had to ask… “What the fuck is that look for?”
“I think, right now, I feel a little like you probably did when Maren and I first started seeing each other.” He dropped back in his chair, his back thumping hard against the smooth wood. I blinked and started laughing and couldn’t seem to stop. I laughed and laughed while my twin turned bright red and told me to shut up.
“Sucks a little, doesn’t it?” I asked, wiping at the corners of my eyes.
“A little.”
“Yeah, but here’s the thing, she doesn’t seem terribly eager to let the cat out of the bag, brother.”
“I still say you should tell on yourself before either the P or VP find out on their own.”
“I don’t know what I’m gonna do yet, except take my happy ass to work and do my job.”
“Which is?”
“Knowing little miss rich bitch, probably mucking out stalls and general labor. I’m cool with that, though.”
“I’ll just bet you are. Ranch life always did suit you best.”
“Yeah, here’s to no more dumbass mistakes.”
“Wasn’t a mistake, Rush. You did what any man in his right mind would do. You just had the deck stacked against you from the get go with people and their preconceived fucking notions.”
“Yeah, that.” I sighed, and polished off my second beer. Nox handed me his unopened second and finished off his first.
“I’ve gotta get back to the house, pick up Sage from school, you know, the usual.”
“Yeah, you know I’m happy you got your family, unconventional as it is.”
“You know me, man. I march to the beat of my own drum.”
“Yeah, you do,” I agreed.
My twin got up and patted me on the shoulder, heading down the grassy berm back toward the club. I sat in the Kentucky sunshine and finished my beer before I took my ass inside to shower and go to bed. I had to be up fuckin’ early if I was going to show this bitch up. Only thing I hated more than a cheating gold digger was an uppity rich bitch.
I sort of wanted to punch her ticket with the little mind games. I don’t think she realized the hot seat she’d put my ass in by not being up front about who she was that night. Thing was, I may not have known who she was, but she damn sure knew what I was. Now I was gonna show her who.
Chapter 4
Bailey
“Well, looks like the new guy is late,” I mentioned to Renaldo who was getting into the farm truck’s driver’s seat to take me out to the north pasture. Apparently there was some new fence damage I needed to see and possibly requisition materials to repair.
“The new gringo you hired yesterday?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
He looked at me and gave me one slow, long, blink as if to ask silently, are you serious? I raised an eyebrow and cocked my head, a classic ‘out with it’ gesture and he said.
“Actually, he was here early.”
“What do you mean, early?”
“Got here about two, drove up to the caretaker’s house. I was making coffee and told him where to park his truck.”
“You’re serious.”
“Yes ma’am. He’s already making repairs to that fence. Seems pretty handy with a hammer.”
I was fuming, but not at Renaldo. He’d been with this farm for as long as I’d been alive and was as dedicated to it as I was. I was more pissed at the new guy for beating me at my own game, but he was about to find out that when it came to me, you were damned if you did and damned if you didn’t. I’d perfected the art from my mother.
Now that I’d had a day or two to think about it, I honestly felt like my mother had played me. She was pretty much the queen wh
en it came to manipulation and I was heartily regretting caving as easily as I had. The more and more I stewed on it, the more I thought that having this guy around was just plain a bad idea. My father had always taught his children that there wasn’t anything out there that couldn’t be fixed without a little ingenuity and elbow grease so that’s just what I was going to do. Figure out a way to make this guy quit.
I was doing fine with the farm, I needed the manpower, sure, but I had some interviews lined up this week. I was sure I could get the help I needed. Even Caleb had to admit we were too short staffed to operate fairly. I mean, there was understaffed and then there was understaffed. We were the latter by this point, and I had no idea why. I was at a complete loss and none of the men and women who remained would tell me if they knew anything.
I was hoping Renaldo would say something, but alas, the rest of the ride out to the point in the north pasture was completed in little more than small talk about which horse was exercised where and which stud was coming in to be bred to what mare. There was no such thing as artificial insemination in racing world; it all had to be done the old fashioned way. Personally, in a world full of technological advances, it was nice that there were some old traditions that still held true.
Renaldo pulled up beside an unfamiliar pickup, dented and old. If vehicles were capable of holding an expression I’d label this one careworn. I didn’t see anyone else around except the new guy, so I guess it was safe to assume that the truck was his. He stood driving a post-hole digger into the sod just a bit inside the old fence line and I scowled. Renaldo hadn’t even stopped the truck completely and I already had the door open. I hopped out onto the uneven ground and called out, “Trying to take out my property line?”
“Trying to fix this damn fence,” he called back and lifted his clinging white tee shirt off of his chest. He was sweating and the material was nearly transparent and molding to his musculature. I mentally slapped the shit out of myself and tried to focus on why I was really here which was to inspect the damaged fence.
Damaged… yeah, that was one word for it. Several of the fence posts were ripped clean out of the ground while several more of the split-logs had been cut through with a chainsaw, bright sawdust littering the ground like confetti. I gritted my teeth and actively fumed, pulling my cellphone out of my pocket.
My asshole brother picked up on the second ring, “Really, Philip? Now we’ve moved on to actively trying to sabotage the farm? You selfish prick why can’t you let me have just one thing?” I demanded.
“Bailey, where is this coming from? I have no idea what you’re babbling about.”
Right. He was too calm and I could just hear the grin in his voice.
“Fuck you, Philip. Stay the fuck off my goddamn farm.” I seethed.
“Our goddamn farm, little sister. Or did you forget that I still own a third of it?”
“I swear to god, you don’t stop this I will find a way, come hell or high water, to buy you out, you smug bastard.”
“You can try, but just remember, I don’t have to sell either.” He ended the call on me, the dick. I turned around to find both Renaldo and the new guy both watching me intently.
“What are you looking at?” I snarled at the new guy. He leaned on the fence post digger and swept his golden brown eyes over me in an appraising look that set my goddamn panties on fire.
“Nothin’ ma’am.”
You’re goddamn right, nothing, I thought to myself and then remembered to ask, “Did you come in early today?”
“Yes, ma’am. Thought I’d give myself the opportunity to get familiar with the place. Didn’t want to be late on my first day.”
The bastard had the nerve to give me this sexy little smirk and I went to wipe it right off his face with, “Yeah, well the next time you just want to help yourself to overtime – do me a favor and don’t. I’m the one who makes that call. Am I clear?”
A muscle in his jaw flexed and he gave a nod, “Crystal, ma’am.”
“And don’t call me ‘ma’am.’”
“Yes, ma’am.” He smiled and I wanted to punch him.
“Where did you get this replacement timber?” I demanded, looking at the neat pile on the ground and pieces in the back of his truck.
“Would you believe I just had them in the back of my truck?”
“No.”
“It’s the truth, I like working with wood. Had a plan to put up some decorative fence line at my twin’s girlfriend’s place but there seems to be a more immediate need here.”
“Oh god, there’s two of you?” I demanded. Fuck, which one did I sleep with?
“After a fashion, Nox, that’s my twin, doesn’t look like me. We just shared the same momma.”
I let that pass, I didn’t much care for his entire family history except to know who I’d fucked in the back of that cheap ass bar the night I’d gotten wasted. It’d been the night that my brother had pretty much told me that it didn’t matter that Mom had just sold me her share of the farm; that I needed to know my place and get on board and just trust that he knew best and sign it over. Condescending asshole.
I’d gone out, gotten drunk, and had decided to take the biker for a ride because I knew just how much it would have pissed everyone in my family off. They hated the dirty little family secret, and this guy had been conveniently there at the right time, or wrong time, depending on how you looked at it. The next morning had been a hangover to remember, and the encounter from the night before? God, it was hard to forget. I still woke up from dreaming about it, sweat soaked and slick between my thighs.
I realized I was just standing there staring at the guy, both him and Renaldo staring back at me waiting for me to say something. I tore my gaze from the guy’s and stared at the split timber resting on the ground nearby.
“How much are you going to want for this?” I demanded.
“Nothin’.”
“What? Why?”
“I got it for free off Craigslist, no sense in charging you for it. Should be just enough with what Renaldo says you have stashed to make the repairs here and you’re already paying me a wage.” He shrugged and I hated him for a moment for upstaging me at my own game.
“How long you think it’s going to take you to fix it?”
“Better part of today and tomorrow, I’d guess.”
“Fine. The sooner the better. This is one of our most used pastures.”
“You got it, boss lady.”
Well I guess it was an improvement over ma’am. I jerked my head at Renaldo and with an amused look he came back over to me and the truck after shaking the new guy’s hand. We got in and he started it up.
“I like the new guy, he’s alright,” he stated and it made me silently fume even more.
“Don’t get too used to him,” I said. “I’m still not sure I like him.”
Renaldo chuckled, “Whatever you say, boss lady.”
I swear to god, I blushed all the way up to the roots of my hair and Renaldo just sat there and laughed and laughed at my expense. Anyone else and I would have given them every shitty job I could think of around the farm, but not Renaldo. He was my most experienced groom and a former jockey. Not only that, if there were anyone on this farm I considered a friend, he was it… hell, he was almost more family than my actual family.
“Shut up,” I mumbled and he laughed some more.
I think the thing I hated most of all was that Renaldo was right and that I didn’t really hate the new guy at all. I just hated who I was when I was around him, which was just about everything my cousin Dray, had professed about hating rich people. Users, full of themselves, and rude as fuck to the people that made them… it’d been a conversation we’d had when we were teens, one of the last times we’d seen each other before Aunt Tilly was murdered.
It’d hurt having my cousin angry at me, and it’d hurt even more that he’d been right. I’d busted my ass to never be that way again, but here we were and here I was, the same thing he’d professed to h
ating all those years ago and I couldn’t exactly be sorry. If I wanted to keep this farm then I needed to play by high society rules and the rules were that the game was cutthroat as hell while still holding a thin veneer of civility.
It was exhausting, but this farm had become my whole life and I wasn’t going to give it up for some fucking subdivision or amusement park, or some shit to go on it. Instead, I focused on keeping the farm making the kind of money that my father would’ve been proud of. Of course, it helped a lot that Blue Hills had the sterling reputation that it did. There wasn’t much my brother could do to ruin that, not with me holding two-thirds ownership of the place.
“When do you want to move Starry to the little barn?” Renaldo asked and I thought about it.
“Under usual circumstances I’d say leave her in the main stable another month but I don’t think it would be such a bad idea to move her early. She’s the only one far enough along to warrant a move though.”
The rest of the ride back to the farm proper was mostly planning and making arrangements for our boarder’s accommodations. Not all of the horses here were owned by us. Most of them were simply on loan or being boarded by their actual owners.
I sighed and sat back in the seat and worried about not only our missing employees but my mangled fence. I knew he wasn’t done. I had the same red warning lights flashing that my mother did. I just didn’t know to what extent my brother would be willing to go to on this one to get his way.
It was food for thought… It was definitely food for thought.
Chapter 5
Rush
It’d taken me a couple of days to finish repairing the fence and that was with me working my ass off to do it almost double time compared to what it would have normally taken me. I was in the main barn, stacking the bales of fresh straw that’d come in when she found me again. It’d been a few days since I’d last seen her up close but it’d never been hard picking her figure out at a distance. It was even nicer up close. What wasn’t as nice was the mouth or the rich bitch attitude Bailey had on her.
Like now, her greeting was a sharp, "What are you doing?"
