Close Range Christmas

by Nicole Helm

  “This...other son?” Jamison supplied.

  “I didn’t know that at first, though he looked like Ace. More like Ace than we do, except he had blue eyes.” Dev could remember all too well. He’d been cocky and stupid and had tried to take down his father on his own.

  Then there’d been another Ace. Same face. Same build. Same sneer, but blue eyes instead of hazel.

  “He stopped Ace. I was in and out. I don’t remember much.” He didn’t tell his brothers the pain had been so bad he’d half wished to die. At least then it would be over. He’d been twenty-two and stupid. So damn stupid. “He gave Ace some song and dance about how killing your own son, even one as shameful as me, was a distraction from what Ace was meant to do. That it might even ruin his karmic reward or whatever Ace was always going on about. I’m not sure Ace was swayed so much as he paused to think.”

  Think about the ways he could torture his son so much better if he were alive—alive and unable to continue in law enforcement. Alive and the weakest link in the Wyatt brothers.

  But that wasn’t what they were talking about.

  “Anth came over and told me his name. Told me we were brothers. He said if I wanted to live, if I wanted my family to live, I had to promise to never mention his existence to anyone. If I agreed, I’d survive. If I didn’t, we’d all be dead.”

  The worst part in telling his brothers was he knew what they would have done. They would have accepted death. Better to die a noble one than lie for Ace.

  “I promised,” Dev managed to say, though it felt like being back in the Badlands, broken and bloody. Failing. “Next thing I knew I woke up in the hospital.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us when Ace died? That there might still be someone out there who wanted to hurt us?”

  “Anth didn’t hurt me. He saved my life, what was left of it. I thought it was over. Whatever or whoever he was.”

  “But it’s not,” Jamison said flatly.

  Dev thought of the notes they’d all gotten. No, the worst part wasn’t knowing his brothers would have handled it differently. The worst part was knowing he wouldn’t change a second of it if he could go back. Even knowing it’d come back to bite him. “No. No, it isn’t over.”

  * * *

  NO ONE HAD EATEN. Even Sarah hadn’t been able to stomach more than a few bites. Despite everything that had happened last year as the Wyatts had navigated Ace and the Sons’ constant attempts to hurt them, she had never seen everyone look so...wrecked.

  No one was going to speak, and even though Sarah had no right, she couldn’t stand this. “Well, I’m sure we’re all glad you made the choice that kept you alive, Dev,” she said, maybe a little too loudly and a little too pointedly at Jamison and Cody.

  She was gratified to see Cody wince and Jamison close his eyes as if physically pained.

  “She’s right, Dev,” Jamison said, opening his eyes and looking right at him. “You did what you had to do to survive. We understand that. It’s... The notes are concerning, but we’d never blame you for doing what you had to.”

  Dev didn’t say anything, just tried to tug his hand away from hers under the table again, but she wouldn’t let him. She held on tight.

  “Besides,” Cody offered. “Now we know. Which means once Brady, Gage and Tucker get here, we can figure out a way to protect ourselves from this Anth Wyatt.”

  Dev looked down at his plate. Then, in a sudden move that finally freed his hand from hers, he scraped back from the table. “Got chores,” he muttered. He stalked outside before anyone could stop him.

  Sarah thought about letting him go. He needed some time to work through this, and Dev best worked through things alone. But he would convince himself he was in the wrong, and she couldn’t let him do that.

  She got to her feet, ready to follow, but both Jamison and Cody hurried to block the door. “This isn’t about you, Sarah,” Cody said.

  She wanted to smack him, but instead she fixed him with her most imperious scowl—one she’d learned from watching Grandma Pauline for years. “You’re right, this is about Dev. Believing he failed you somehow.”

  Jamison and Cody exchanged a glance as though that’s exactly what Dev had done. Her fingers curled into fists, though she kept them at her sides.

  “He did what he had to do to keep himself alive. If you blame him for that, for even a second, you’re nothing but egotistical, self-centered blowhards who don’t love your brother the way you should.”

  “I said we didn’t blame him. Right here at this table. You heard me.”

  “Yeah, you said it. Now, why don’t you work on believing it.” She pushed between them and out into the mudroom, pulled her coat on, and then braved the outside.

  Sarah knew there were only two reasons they’d let her leave without following. One, she was pregnant and they were all treating her with kid gloves, and two, because Grandma Pauline likely stepped in and stopped them.

  She headed right for the stables and wasn’t surprised to find Dev saddling up his horse. He didn’t turn around, though she could tell he knew she was there by the slight pause in his movements.

  “You want to yell at me, fine, but it’ll have to wait until I’ve done the morning rounds.”

  “Yell at you?” Sarah could only stand in confusion as he cinched the saddle and started moving Roscoe toward the door.

  “In fact, don’t bother,” he continued, as if she hadn’t voiced any confusion. “I’m sorry. No amount of yelling is going to make me feel more sorry.”

  “Why would you feel sorry?”

  For the first time he stopped moving. He held Roscoe’s reins in his hand and looked at her like she was the one who wasn’t making any sense. “If you’d known I’m sure you wouldn’t have involved me in the whole...” He waved at her stomach with his free hand.

  Sarah settled her hands over her bump. “You gave me exactly what I asked for. I don’t know why you’d be sorry about that. And I really don’t know why this would have changed my mind.”

  “Ace—”

  “—is dead,” Sarah said firmly, cutting him off. She stepped toward him and took his hand just as she had inside. She needed that anchor as much as she suspected he did. Because the thought of him so close to death... It had been bad enough those ten years ago when she’d been an emotional teenager and visited him in the hospital. Worse now knowing how...he’d survived it. All alone. “You said you had to do it.”

  “No,” Dev said in that voice she remembered from that awful time. He’d spent weeks in the hospital after he’d finally woken up from the coma, but when he’d gotten home it hadn’t been...good. Dev had been like a void. No emotions. No...personality. He’d been a shell. It had taken him years to come back to himself. He still wasn’t all the way there, but this made it all worse again.

  It about broke her heart.

  “I said he saved my life on a condition. It’s not the same as having to do it.”

  “It is to me,” Sarah said quietly, afraid if she spoke any louder her voice and composure might break.

  He shook his head. “Jamison never would have agreed to that deal. That I know for sure.”

  “And Jamison would be dead. That I know for sure. And if he’d died then, Liza and Gigi would probably be dead, too, since Jamison was the reason they escaped the Sons. Heck, maybe all of you would be dead after last year’s troubles. So if this whole thing with Ace and his other son had to happen, then I’m damn glad it happened to you, who’d had the sense to make a deal.”

  He tugged his hand out of hers and she couldn’t hold on to his grasp though she tried.

  “A deal with the devil?”

  “With the outcome that let you live.” Since she couldn’t hold on to his hand, she reached up and touched his face. She wasn’t prone to physical acts of affection, but the thought of life and death had her feeling weepy and desperate.
Or maybe that was pregnancy hormones. She’d happily blame it on that. “You being alive is the most important thing to me.”

  He covered her hand as if to pull it off his face, but she had a flash of a kiss, a murmur. The feelings of their bodies moving together. Something...otherworldly.

  She blinked as he removed her hand and dropped it. Memory or fantasy, hard to tell. And pointless either way.

  “Stop being nice to me,” he muttered. “It’s weird.”

  “It isn’t weird when you’re the—”

  He cut her off with a look. Because she wasn’t supposed to think of him as the father of her baby. Her baby didn’t have a father in that sense, and she’d been okay with that. Grandma Pauline had raised those six grandsons of hers on her own. Turned them into amazing, wonderful men after terrible childhoods stuck in their father’s gang. She’d wanted to do that, too.

  Sometimes she just had a hard time remembering that. Which irritated her, though she wasn’t even sure why or who she was irritated with. Him or herself.

  “It’s Christmastime,” Sarah said loftily. “Peace on earth and goodwill toward men. I’m good-willing you. Get used to it.” She winced as pain tightened her belly. Stupid early contractions.

  Dev was immediately dropping his horse’s reins and propelling her back and onto the rickety bench. “Damn it, Sarah.”

  “It’s nothing,” she said, breathing like the doctor had told her to. “The doctor said so.”

  “No, the doctor said you had to take it easy. Not that it was nothing.”

  “I am taking it easy.” The pain eased, slowly, but it eased. She managed a smile up at him. “See? All gone. The doctor said the contractions should come and go for weeks without any progress. That is why I have an appointment every week until the due date. It’s fine. I promise.”

  “Sarah.” The stark way he said her name had the smile dying on her face as he kneeled before her.

  “This is bad. It’s danger all over again, and one we have less experience with. It’s even more imperative that no one ever suspect...” There was a twist of pain on his face as he looked at her belly—a kind of pain she’d never seen him allow to show on his face like that. This time it was him grabbing her hands. “You need to stay away,” he said resolutely. “Stay on your property. I’ll keep helping out at your ranch for you, but you need to stay away. Stay in bed. Rest, like the doctor said. Please. I’m begging you.”

  She swallowed the lump in her throat. She didn’t know how to do what he was asking, but she also didn’t know how to say no to him when he was like this. Emotional and very close to desperate.

  No, she couldn’t argue with him. “I’ll...try,” she promised.

  Chapter Three

  Sarah spent the morning away from Dev and the Reaves ranch. She took some time off her feet until the contractions were completely gone. People might think she pushed herself too hard, but she was careful.

  Besides, she was only two weeks away from her due date. What would be the harm in the baby coming now? She’d happily bake him a little longer, but labor wouldn’t be the worst thing at this point. Especially on a day when there was no snow in the forecast.

  Once she’d felt better and eaten some lunch, she’d bundled up and headed outside. Dev’s dogs, which he’d insisted on having live at the Knight Ranch since the trouble last year, pranced ahead of her.

  Staying inside made her too antsy and anxious and today, it made her replay Dev’s emotional plea over and over in her head.

  I’m begging you.

  She couldn’t...sit with that. She needed a chore to do, even if it wasn’t labor intensive. She needed the cold winter air and something to do with her hands. She needed the ranch. It had always been her solace, her heart. No one could stop her from seeking that out just because she was going to have a baby soon.

  She smoothed her hands over her belly—even bulkier with the heavy coat on over it. She’d give her baby the space to like and love whatever he wanted, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t fantasize about him feeling the same way about the Knight Ranch as she did.

  What about Reaves Ranch?

  She looked to the west. Dev was the only Wyatt brother who’d shown an actual interest in Grandma Pauline’s ranch. If he didn’t have any kids, what would happen to it? Would the Reaves Ranch be sold off to a stranger?

  She shook her head as if to shake the thoughts away. There would be many, many years of Dev and Grandma Pauline inhabiting this earth before she had to worry about that. Maybe her baby was technically a Wyatt, but right now Dev didn’t want to acknowledge that.

  Not just for his own reasons anymore, but for safety. Because Anth Wyatt apparently existed and was threatening all six brothers.

  It made her want to cry. This was supposed to be over—the shadow of Ace Wyatt on their lives gone. Instead, just as they’d settled into this new normal...here was another facet of Ace haunting them.

  Would that always be the case?

  She knew that was bothering Dev, likely his brothers too. That horrible feeling they’d never be free of Ace even in death. And it wasn’t just them—they’d all married or were in the process of marrying her sisters. Making families of their own.

  Wyatts and her sisters pairing up wasn’t a great thing to dwell on with her hands on her stomach, where Dev’s child grew. She marched forward. Maybe she couldn’t muck stalls, ride a horse or even go around breaking up ice in the troughs, but she could tidy the tools or do a little light sweeping or something.

  But before she could make it to the stables, Duke pulled up next to her in his truck. She knew he’d been out checking fence lines to make sure they were strong enough to survive any winter storm that blew through.

  He put the truck into Park and got out. “What do you think you’re doing wandering around in this cold?”

  She smiled at her father. He was a good man, even if he’d kept his share of secrets from them. He did what was right, and he was fiercely protective of his daughters—biological, adopted or fostered.

  “I’m just antsy. I’m being careful. Promise.”

  He made a noise that was neither belief nor acceptance. Simple acknowledgment she’d spoken and he’d heard it. “Where were you this morning?”

  Sarah wouldn’t let herself fidget even though it felt a bit like an accusation. “Let Grandma Pauline feed me.”

  Duke studied her, clearly not believing that was the only reason she’d gone over there. Instead of lecturing her more, he reached out and squeezed her shoulder.

  “Sarah, I hope you know what a joy you’ve been to me. Not just because you love the ranch like I do, but because you’re a fine young woman with a good head on her shoulders.”

  Sarah blinked. Duke was the best dad in the world as far as she was concerned, but he wasn’t big on emotional heart-to-hearts. Thank God. She didn’t know what to do with...this. “Well, thanks.”

  “I may not be thrilled about the circumstances, but I’ll support you and my grandchild any way I can.”

  “I... I know.” She’d always known that, even if him saying it had a lump forming in her throat.

  “Which is why I feel like it’s pretty important to tell you something, and usually when I tell you something you get that hard head on and do the opposite. So I need you to promise me you’ll listen.”

  Sarah wrinkled her nose. “You fight dirty.”

  “You’re darn right,” he said, smiling at her, his big hand still on her shoulder. Because he was always there.

  “I don’t know that I can promise outright, but I can promise to try not to be contrary for the sake of it.”

  Duke chuckled softly. “Well, I suppose that’s about all I can ask.” Then he sighed, almost sadly, as if the words weighed him down and were far more serious than she wanted to deal with when she was worried about Dev and this new danger.

 
Which she should probably tell Dad about.

  Dad grabbed her other shoulder, gave her a gentle squeeze and met her gaze with his steady one. “Sarah, you can’t save that boy. He has to save himself.”

  That simple statement hit its mark—a mark she hadn’t realized she had. She wasn’t trying to save Dev... She was just trying to...to... “I’m not trying to save anyone,” she insisted, though of course she couldn’t believe it now that she’d felt the weight of how right Duke was.

  Duke gave her a pointed look. “Baby girl, you have been poking that boy back into the living since the day he got home from the hospital. And you’ve done a good job. He wouldn’t be where he is without you. But the rest of that journey is his to make.”

  She thought about Dev’s blankness in the kitchen when he’d recounted Anth Wyatt to his brothers. How could emotional healing be his to do when he could simply shut down like that?

  “I haven’t heard the details yet, but if everyone’s descending on Grandma Pauline’s tonight, sounds like more trouble is brewing,” Duke continued. “I don’t want you involved. You’ve got to take it easy for that baby. I want you to stay away from the Wyatts for a while. Including tonight’s dinner.”

  The knee-jerk emotions that had plagued her this entire pregnancy sprung to life, and she had to fight to keep the tears out of her eyes. “They’re my family. And yours.”

  “Of course they are. I’m not saying it’s their fault they’ve got trouble again. I’m not saying we should all hide and run away. I’m saying you need to stay away from it in your condition.”

  Dev had said the same thing, of course. She understood why, but that didn’t mean she needed to be hidden away. “If there’s trouble, I doubt me staying home by myself is—”

  “Liza will come here with the girls. You two will babysit.”

  Sarah scowled. “While the menfolk have their grown-up conversation.”