by Jane Porter
“We could have been. We could have had a good life, a great life—”
“How? With you on the road? Movie after movie, always setting out, going on location, playing the lead against another Hollywood ingenue?”
His mouth tightened and deep grooves shaped his lips while finer lines creased his eyes. “So this isn’t really about Joy, is it? It was never as much Joy as your own insecurity.”
Alexandra just looked at him, eyes dry, head throbbing, heart in pieces.
“I’ve spent the past months analyzing what the hell happened,” he added. “And I never really understood where it fell apart or why it had to. I loved you. I would have done anything for you—”
“You chose Joy over me!”
“I chose to stand by Joy while she struggled with a brutal disease that could have destroyed her career the same way it destroyed her marriage.”
“But you should have stood by me.”
His expression turned furious. “I did. I’m here. I contested the divorce.” He slugged his fist against the door frame. “Why are you so bloody insecure? Because that’s the real issue, isn’t it? It’s not me making films or traveling and going on location, but you’re afraid of other women. You’re so afraid I’ll fall for another woman that you’re shutting me out, not even giving us a chance to succeed.”
Her eyes opened wide. Her stomach rose, up into her throat.
My God, he knew her. He knew her too well.
He knew exactly what she was afraid of, and that knowledge knocked her off balance.
With trembling fingers Alexandra pushed her mug across her desk. She couldn’t look at him, couldn’t face him now. “It would kill me if I found out through the newspapers or tabloids that you’d found someone else. And, Wolf, it’d happen. Sooner or later. It’s bound to happen—”
“Why?”
“Because I’m ordinary. I’m not like you.”
She felt rather than heard him leave. And his abrupt departure created an even more violent loss than what she’d felt before.
Alexandra was still sitting numbly at her desk when her phone rang. Dazed, she picked it up.
Her brother Troy was at the other end of the line. “Alexandra, Dad’s had a heart attack. Please come home.”
Troy sent his jet for her and she boarded the plane in Burbank, at the executive terminal there. It was a two-and-a-half-hour flight to Bozeman, Montana, and her oldest brother, Brock, was waiting for her at the Bozeman airport to drive her to the hospital where her father was in ICU.
Brock wrapped her in a huge bear hug and kissed her cheek. “We’ve missed you, little girl,” he said, stepping back to look her over.
She nodded around the lump in her throat. “I’ve missed you, too.” Alexandra pushed a long wave of hair back from her face. “How’s Dad?”
Brock shrugged as he lifted her bag. “As good as can be hoped.”
She knew from Brock’s tone that Dad wasn’t doing well. They were walking to Brock’s truck now and she had to practically run to keep up with his long strides. “And the kids?” she asked, referring to his children, fraternal twins Molly and Mack.
“They’ll be thrilled to see you.” He shot her a hard look. “You know, it was hard for them losing you and their mom so close together.”
“Brock, they were babies when I left. And you weren’t even living at the ranch anymore. You and Amy had your own place then.”
He shrugged again. “I’m just saying.”
She knew what he was saying. He wasn’t any different from Troy or Trey or Dillon or Cormac. She was the girl in the family. It had been her responsibility to keep things together. And Alexandra hadn’t wanted that responsibility. She was the youngest. She hardly even knew who she was, and being the only woman nearly smothered her at times.
At the hospital, Alexandra leaned over her father’s bed. He had an oxygen tent around him and tubes and wires running every which way. “Daddy,” she whispered, covering his hand with hers. “Daddy, I’m here.”
For a moment she thought he hadn’t heard her, but then his eyes briefly opened and he looked at her for a second. “Good,” he sighed heavily. “I’m glad you’re home.”
Alexandra sat by his side until twilight, when Dillon, the youngest of her brothers, appeared and told her Brock was waiting downstairs to take her back to the ranch. “I’ll stay with Dad until midnight. That’s when Cormac will come,” he added, giving her a quick hug and a peck on the forehead. “Now go see your niece and nephew. They’re desperate to see Aunt Alex.”
Brock wasn’t the only one in the truck. Molly and Mack were there, too, and they wiggled like puppies as she climbed in the passenger seat.
“How’s Grandpa?” Molly asked, big-eyed in the backseat. “Is he talking yet?”
Alexandra managed a small smile. “Not a lot yet, but he knows we’re there.”
It was a forty-minute drive back to the ranch and dark by the time they reached the two-story stone-and-wood house. Cormac was waiting on the front steps when the truck appeared in the long, dusty drive.
As Alexandra stepped from the truck, he scooped her in another Shanahan death-grip hug. The Shanahans were Black Irish, all tall, dark and rugged, but Cormac was the exception. He was the only blonde one in the batch, and it was Cormac her friends all used to have crushes on.
The housekeeper had dinner waiting. And after dinner, with six-year-old Molly sitting on her lap, Alexandra played Mack—Cormac’s namesake—in a game of checkers. Mack at six could already trounce her, and like a true Shanahan, he crowed with pleasure. Molly looked at Alexandra and made a face. “Boys,” she said with six-year-old disgust.
Alexandra winked. “I agree.”
After she read to the kids and put them to bed, she returned downstairs and walked in on a conversation she obviously wasn’t supposed to hear as Cormac and Brock both went quiet.
“What?” she said, looking from one to the other. “What’s wrong? Is it Dad? Has he gotten worse?”
Cormac shook his head. “No. Dad’s stable. It’s Wolf.” He hesitated. “He’s on the way.”
Alexandra’s forehead furrowed. Wolf? On his way here? To the ranch? “That’s a mistake. How did you hear this? Who told you? Was this in a paper or something?”
“I just talked to him on the phone,” Brock said. “He called to check on Dad.”
Alexandra couldn’t believe it. She looked from Brock to Cormac. “But that doesn’t mean he’s coming here.”
Brock shrugged. “He said he was.”
“When?”
“I don’t know.” He looked at her more closely. “Why? Is there a problem? Wolf said everything was all patched up.”
“All patched up?” Alexandra felt like weeping with frustration. “That’s what he said?”
“That’s what he said.”
In her old bedroom, Alexandra tried dialing Wolf’s cell number, but he didn’t pick up. Each time she called she got his voice mail. “Wolf,” she said on the fifth call, “it’s Alexandra. Brock said you’re coming here. I don’t think that’s a good idea. Please call me back.”
But he didn’t call back, and Alexandra knew that was not good.
She was still sitting on her bed in the dark, clutching her phone, when Brock knocked on the door on his way to bed.
“Did you reach him?” Brock asked gruffly, standing in her bedroom door.
“No.” She cleared her throat. She didn’t want him to know she’d been crying. “I just kept getting his voice mail.”
“He might already be on his way.”
That’s exactly what she was afraid of.
“You’re lucky,” her brother said bluntly. “He still cares about you. He wouldn’t be coming here if he didn’t.”
“It’s not that easy,” she answered, feeling defensive.
“That’s pride talking, little girl. It’s time you did some forgiving and forgetting. He’s just a man, and all men make mistakes.”
Chilled on the inside, s
he wrapped her arms around her knees, trying to get warm. “But he’s not just any man. He’s a star, a huge star, and gorgeous. And I’m nothing like him and I can’t keep up with him or compete with the women who throw themselves at him—”
“So you’re just going to quit your marriage? Just like that?” A contemptuous note had entered his voice.
“It hurts!” She blinked back fresh tears. “And being afraid and worried hurts, too. I hate that feeling. I hate not knowing—”
“But you do know. You know he loves you and you know he wants to be married to you. And, little girl, I hate to disappoint you, but there are no real guarantees in life. There’s just our hearts and our hopes and learning to live one day at a time.” His voice dropped, roughened. “If I’d known Amy was going to die two years after our wedding, do you think I would have married her? If I’d known we’d have two babies who would grow up without a mother, do you think I would have conceived them?”
Even in the dark she heard and felt Brock’s grief. It was still there, five and a half years after Amy’s death. He’d loved her since he’d first laid eyes on her.
“Yes,” she whispered, wiping away a tear in the dark. “She was made for you.”
Brock didn’t speak, and she saw his head bow, his silhouette filling the doorway.
“Yes,” he agreed, “she was made for me. Just like your Wolf was made for you.” Brock reached for the doorknob, started to pull the door closed but stopped partway.
“There’s worse things than being afraid, Alex. There’s losing your heart altogether.” And then he stepped into the hall and quietly, gently, closed her bedroom door behind him.
Wolf had a hell of a time finding the Lazy L ranch. Everyone knew the Shanahans, but that didn’t make locating the property entrance easy. He’d called Brock last night to check on Alexandra’s father and get directions, and while Brock hadn’t told him not to come, he certainly hadn’t been encouraging.
But Brock’s lack of enthusiasm didn’t stop Wolf from flying up first thing the next morning.
Now he was parking in front of the huge split-logs-and-stone house, and as he climbed from the four-by-four Jeep, the front door of the house opened and out trooped three of Alexandra’s brothers. Brock, Cormac and Dillon.
They weren’t, Wolf noted, catching sight of their grim faces, very welcoming either.
“I’m here for Alexandra,” he said, letting the Jeep door slam behind him.
“She’s with Dad,” Brock answered. “In Bozeman, at the hospital.”
Wolf shrugged. “I’ll wait for her here then.”
“She doesn’t want to see you,” Dillon said flatly.
Wolf shrugged. “I’m still waiting.”
Cormac folded his arms across his chest. “Maybe you should wait in Los Angeles. She knows where to find you there, doesn’t she?”
“No, actually. I don’t live in Los Angeles anymore. So if it’s all right with you—” and his smile was predatory, antagonistic “—I’ll just wait here until she returns.”
Cormac’s eyes narrowed. “Maybe you didn’t hear me. She’s not here. And even if she were, she doesn’t want to see you. I suggest you get back in your car and go home.”
Wolf drew a deep breath. It’d been a long morning. It was going to be a long afternoon and night. “I’ll wait for Alexandra.”
The front door of the house opened again and this time Troy and Trey appeared. The twins had come home to the Lazy L ranch, too. Their dad must be very sick for all five brothers to have returned now, especially when three of them lived out of state in metropolitan places like New York, San Francisco and Seattle.
“You’re still here?” Troy drawled, moving to stand next to his brothers. “I thought you were told to leave.”
Any other time Wolf would have admired their family loyalty. Right now he just wanted to see Alexandra. “Your dad’s sick. This isn’t the time for this—”
“You should have thought of that before you broke Alexandra’s heart,” Trey said coldly.
Wolf shook his head. He wasn’t going to get anywhere with the Shanahan brothers using words. “I want to talk to Alexandra and you don’t want me to. What do I have to do to get a few minutes alone with her?”
“Nothing,” Dillon said. “It’s not happening. Not unless you go through me.”
“And me,” Brock added.
Trey stepped forward. “Count me in. That’s three.”
“Four,” Troy chimed.
Wolf looked drily at Cormac. “What about you? Thinking about joining my side, evening up the odds a little?”
Cormac checked his smile, shook his head. “Sorry, Kerrick, I’m with them. That makes five.”
Wolf studied the lineup of Shanahan brothers. “You don’t really mean to keep your sister from me.”
Troy jammed his hands into his jean pockets. “We do.”
Wolf nodded once, slow and thoughtful. “Let me get this right. If I fight all of you, you’ll give me a few minutes alone with my wife?”
“You fight all five of us and you’ll get five minutes.”
Wolf glanced from one brother to another. “So where are we going to do this? Outside or in the barn?”
Brock sighed. “The barn will work just fine.”
As soon as Alexandra spotted the silver rental Jeep parked in front of the house, her stomach tightened up, a flurry of nerves, hope and fear. Wolf. He’d arrived. For a brief moment she considered turning around and heading straight back to Bozeman. Instead she parked. And as she turned off the ignition she thought of her dad—widowed young with six kids, one just entering kindergarten—and her brother Brock who at thirty became a single father to twin infants overnight.
She’d experienced enough loss in her own family to know there weren’t any guarantees, and yet that’s exactly what she’d been wanting: a promise from Wolf that he’d never leave her, couldn’t forget her, wouldn’t hurt her. But that wasn’t realistic or fair. Love didn’t make one impervious, but it did help with the bumps and bruises meted out by fate.
Alexandra also knew it was time to silence that insecure voice inside her head, the one that moved in with her when she’d relocated to L.A. Because that frightened, insecure voice was wrong. Beautiful women with great bodies were not more valuable than smart women with kind hearts. The outsides didn’t matter more than the insides, and maybe she’d finally believe that Wolf loved her if she learned to love and accept herself.
She owed Wolf an apology. Hoped he’d forgive her and hoped he still loved her enough to give them and their marriage one more shot.
Pocketing her car keys, Alexandra stepped from the car and took a deep breath for courage. Time to fix this. Time to make things right.
As the car door shut behind her, she heard a crash in the barn. The loud crash was followed by a hollow thud and then a metallic-sounding bang.
What in God’s name was that?
She glanced around, searching for signs of life. But the house was dark and, except for the crash and slam sounds coming from the barn, everything was quiet. Too quiet.
Where was everyone? Cormac had said the twins were flying in today, which would mean all five brothers should be here. Where were they? Where was even one?
And for that matter, where was Wolf?
And then, as another thud and bang came from the barn, Alexandra’s skin prickled with that sick sixth sense that told her all her questions would be answered once she reached the barn.
Before she’d even gotten the barn door open, she knew from the grunts and groans of pain coming from inside that her brothers were fighting. And with a horrific wave of dread she knew exactly whom they were fighting.
The grunts and groans grew considerably louder as she flung the wide red door open.
“What in God’s name are you doing?” she shouted, watching even as one of her brothers—Dillon?—took a hard swing at Wolf.
Wolf had turned to look at her and he took the blow to the side of the head.
<
br /> Alexandra heard the crack of a knuckled fist against her husband’s head, and furious tears started to her eyes. “Stop this! Stop it right now. Wolf. Brock. All of you. Stop it.”
And miraculously it did stop. Dillon fell back, bits of straw in his black hair, while Wolf swayed, bloodied, in his place. The others simply looked at her, their faces revealing various bumps and bruises.
“How long has this been going on?” she demanded, entering the barn to circle her brothers before ending in front of Wolf. “Hours?”
“Not hours,” Brock answered roughly, the corner of his mouth split and speckled with dried blood. “Maybe an hour.” He paused, touched his tongue to his cracked lip. “Maybe two.”
She couldn’t even look at Wolf. She could already see he’d taken the brunt of the beating. “How? Why?”
Dillon dragged a hand through his hair, knocking the bits of straw out. “It was his idea,” he said, nodding at Wolf. “He said he’d fight us—”
“No,” Cormac interrupted, glancing down at his right hand and gingerly flexing his fingers into a tender fist. “You were the one that said Wolf had to fight each of us to talk to Alexandra.”
“What?” she croaked, taking a step closer to Wolf and staring aghast at her brothers. “You all fought him?” They didn’t answer and that was answer enough. She shook her head in disbelief. “Five against one? For one, maybe two hours?”
“It wasn’t quite like that,” Trey said, grimacing at her description. “We took turns.”
“You took turns?” she whispered, livid beyond measure. Her brothers were fighters, she knew that. Nearly every one had been kicked out of school at one point for roughhousing. But they weren’t kids anymore, they were men. Men. And they’d spent the last hour or so beating up her husband while their father lay in the hospital in an oxygen tent. “If Dad knew what you’re doing …” Her voice faded and she looked at them again. “My God, you’re all out of your minds.”
Dillon made a face. “We did it for you, Alex—”
“Get out!” she snapped, pointing to the barn door. “Get out before I beat each of you—and I won’t use my fist, I’ll use a shovel or a pitchfork!”
