“You think he’ll be upset?”
He looked at her with one sharp glance.
“Of course he will.” She stood up and placed her hands on his shoulders. If it weren’t for her heels, she wouldn’t have been able to reach them. “It’s your life, Ty. Tell him. If you make him feel like you’re keeping it from him, he’ll get upset.”
“He’s going to be upset regardless.”
“Maybe, but if you hide it from him, he’ll be hurt.” She backed off and went around the counter. “I’m glad I hadn’t already made a reservation. The girls can’t wait to go out West.”
“You’ll love it there, Lita. The air is so clean, the people are nice, and there’s a lot for the girls to do. There’s a dude ranch midway between Del Noches and the Lower Fork that offers horseback riding and has a kids program. They’ll hold a cabin for me if you let me know what week you want to come.”
“I’ll talk to your dad after you talk to your dad.”
He slurped up the rest of his milk and rinsed the bowl in the sink.
“Just leave it,” Lita said. “I’ve got to empty the dishwasher.”
“I’ll empty it,” Ty said.
“You could, and I’d appreciate the help, but I think you’d better go to the shop and talk to Jesse.”
“He’s working. He won’t want the interruption.”
“Ty,” Lita scolded. “You won’t be an interruption. Go.” She pushed him out of the kitchen. “Talk to your dad, see your friends, and come back hungry.”
He turned around and flashed a smile. “I’m always hungry.”
The raft shop was quiet, but that didn’t mean Ty had an easy time finding a parking spot. He squeezed his truck next to the trash bin and figured his dad wouldn’t put a call in to have him towed. He didn’t recognize the girl at the reception desk with a nose ring and dreadlocks; she must have been a new summer hire. She smiled and lifted her brows. “Can I help you?”
“Jesse around?” he asked.
“He’s in his office. Can I tell him who’s here?”
“I’ll tell him myself.”
She seemed a little unsure about letting a stranger into the back, but Ty just waved her off and rapped on the office door. His dad looked up from the computer and hopped to his feet. “Ty! I didn’t know you were coming down.”
At 42, his dad wore contentment like a blanket around his shoulders. He’d be hard pressed not to love his life with a beautiful wife, three little girls, and a thriving business. He wore his light brown hair shaggy and Ty spotted a few hints of gray in his day old beard. His uniform of cargo shorts and t-shirts—nearly identical to Ty’s—hadn’t changed in years. The grungy look hid a shrewd businessman with a predilection for making cunning investments. “Figured I’d come by, let you give me a tour of the new building.”
“Now’s a good time. All the groups are out, so the changing area is deserted.” He slapped Ty’s shoulder and led him out of the office. “Did you meet Desiree?”
Ty nodded to the girl. “Sort of.”
“This is my son, Ty. He’s just home for a few days before he heads out to Wyoming to guide on the North Platte.”
“Cool,” she said. “I’ve heard there’s great water on the Platte.”
“I’m a fishing guide,” Ty explained. “The only water I’m interested is the kind where trout like to hide.”
She looked at Jesse and shook her head. “Where’d you go wrong?”
“Beats me,” Jesse said with a smirk and led Ty out the back door. “Here she is.”
The log building was huge and held both the raft storage and changing area. The structure was a big improvement from the original barn.
“I like the way you’ve used the space,” Ty said.
Jesse led him through a door to the back part where rafts were stacked on shelves. “I’ve got this corner saved for the fly shop. You won’t need much space and the arrangements can be done through our front desk or you could set up a counter here by the back door.”
Ty could see it. The fly shop they’d talked about for years, working side by side with his dad building something of his own. He’d spent six years at school getting degrees to hang on the wall and he figured out that what he wanted out of life was no farther than his home away from home. “I love it. Dan did a good job. I really like the open ceiling and exposed beams.”
Jesse slapped Ty on the back. “That was your idea. Saved money, too, except for the beams.” He let out a contented sigh. “Just think, this time next year, we’ll be working together.”
“’Bout time,” Ty said. He peeked his head in the changing area, remarked about the roominess and stall placement before heading back outside. They both turned at the sound of the bus rounding the corner. “Morning group’s back.”
“You’d better bug outta here before they disembark.”
“Dad, I wanted to talk to you about something.”
The bus pulled in front of them and hissed to a stop. “Better hold that thought ‘til later. I’ll be home around seven. Lita tell you about dinner tonight?”
“Yeah, she did.”
“Good. We’ll talk then.” Jesse greeted the guests as they ambled off the bus. “Have a good time, young lady?”
A sloe-eyed preteen hopped off the steps. “The best!”
Jesse winked at Ty and waved him off as he herded the masses toward the changing area while instructing them to drop their wetsuits in the trough by the entrance after they changed.
Damn, he should have pulled Jesse aside when Desiree mentioned the Platte, but he didn’t want an audience for their conversation. If it had to wait until tonight, he’d have even more of an audience.
Chapter 3
Jill Jennings grabbed a towel from the gym’s meager pile and wiped the sweat from her brow. She’d only done two sets and had used the towel break as an excuse to gear herself up for number three. She only hoped her dad didn’t notice.
“Jill?” Gary Jennings called from his station by the leg lift machine. “You coming? You’ve got another set to do before we hit the yoga ball.”
Jill took a deep breath and planted on a smile before turning to face him. Fooling her father into thinking her recovery was going better than expected was quickly becoming as difficult as resuming her training after breaking her leg. Thankfully, members of the Warlock State cross country team started trickling in for their morning workout, and Gary got distracted talking to coach Miles.
“You’re here early,” one of the girls mumbled as she plopped down on the mat to stretch. “I was feeling sorry for myself before I spotted you looking half done with your workout.”
“I wish,” Jill said. “I’m about a third done. I’ve still got pool work.”
“How’s the leg?” she asked.
Jill averted her eyes. She couldn’t tell a lie looking someone in the face. “Better. Getting stronger every day.”
It wasn’t that her leg wasn’t healing; it just wasn’t healing fast enough. Her dad was pushing her hard, harder than anyone else he’d ever trained after an injury. He was still mad at her for breaking her leg and forfeiting a chance at the Olympic trials. He couldn’t have been more upset than she was that she’d tripped and fallen on a rock while running along her favorite mountain trail. A trail he’d continuously discouraged her from running. There are too many obstacles on those trails. You can’t concentrate on your form when you’re always looking down to see what you’re going to step on.
She’d gone anyway, running up and down the winding gravel roads because she loved pushing herself and discovering what was around every twist and turn. She went twice a week, the same days at the same time so she could catch a glimpse of the biggest obstacle in her life: Ty Bloodworth. She wasn’t looking down because she was looking into the eyes of the man who’d intrigued her, saved her, and left town without a word.
She had no right to be upset; they weren’t involved. Hell, they weren’t even friends. But it stung that his boyish charm and th
at easy aura were the reasons for her fall. Nothing ever seemed to faze him, certainly not a skinny runner with more determination than talent and a penchant for being alone.
He was back east where he belonged and she needed to focus on the future. She’d been a long shot runner before her injury. Now, with a broken tibia and fibula, a plate and countless screws surgically inserted and finally removed, her chance of making any Olympic team seemed more like a pipe dream. The pursuit of it, the golden pie in the sky task of training for another four years when all she wanted to do was move on with her life felt like an albatross around her neck.
“Jill,” her dad called from the leg press machine. When he tapped his watch and turned around, she wished for the millionth time in a decade her father wasn’t her coach.
“I gotta go.”
“Yeah,” the girl mumbled.
Gary had the leg press machine set at more weight than Jill’s fragile leg could handle for thirty reps. She changed the weight setting and was met with a stern stare. Did he know how much disappointment he could convey with just that one look?
“You won’t make any progress unless you push yourself.”
“I won’t make any progress if I reinjure my leg by pushing too hard.”
“It’s a fine line, Jill. That’s why you have me, so you don’t have to worry about being pushed too hard or not hard enough.”
Jill began using the machine with the weight she’d set. He couldn’t change the weight when the machine was in motion and the noisy pulley system would force him to yell. Gary Jennings wouldn’t yell at her in public for fear of spreading rumors that her recovery wasn’t coming along as well as he’d led everyone to believe. He signed her up for a race the next month and she’d yet to log any miles in the current one.
She worked methodically through the rest of his routine, concentrating on her breathing and form, blocking out the pain from her leg and the frustration she felt at not being in top shape. Her stamina wasn’t the only thing missing. Her passion for the chase and the thrill of competition had dimmed significantly as the months of recovery stretched along during winter. With the removal of the plate and the screws and the dawning of the summer season ahead, she didn’t know how to recapture her love of the sport. She’d simply lost the fire that had kept her going these last few years.
Gary shoved a bottle of water in her face and nodded with his head toward the college’s indoor swimming pool. “Go change and I’ll meet you at the pool.”
Her only response was a grunt. She knew she’d face a lecture on respecting his role as her coach at some point during the day. She couldn’t muster enough energy to care. She’d agreed to have him coach her and he did a good job before the injury. They skirted around the sticky parts of working together with the solid determination to make the team. It drove them both to overlook the petty irritations and the blurring of the lines between family and coach. Missing the trials and facing a lengthy rehabilitation paled in comparison to the thought of spending the next four years with him on her back 24/7. She didn’t think their relationship or her family could survive the pressure of it again.
She toweled off after forty-five minutes strapped to the flotation belt that let her run in the pool without putting pressure on her leg and made a beeline for the locker room. Her dad caught her arm before she could disappear inside.
“Where are you in such a hurry to go?”
“I’ve got to change and get to work.”
“Work?” Gary asked, his forehead a maze of lines.
“The Golden Tap. I got my old job back.”
He sighed, one long exhalation of breath that said as much as the sneering look on his face. His expression went slack and his shoulders slumped as if she’d tossed a boulder onto his back. “You shouldn’t spend any more time on your feet than you need for training.”
“That’d be great, Dad, if I didn’t have to earn some money. My apartment doesn’t pay for itself and the last time I checked, gas wasn’t free.”
“All the more reason for you to stay at home instead of moving back in with Olivia. You could ride into the gym with me and God knows as much as your brother eats, we wouldn’t charge you rent.”
“We’ve talked about this before. I’m twenty-two years old. I’m not living with my parents.”
“You’ve been living with us the last few months. It hasn’t been so bad.” He stuffed his hands on his hips. “You act like the only kid your age who does it. You’re not.”
“People who move back in with their parents are out of options. Now that my leg’s recovered, I have options. Tommy let me have my job back—the only job I could find that works perfectly around my training schedule—and you think that’s a bad thing?”
“I think you shouldn’t do anything right now that’ll hinder your progress. The less time you spend on your feet, and that includes delivering burgers and beer to your grungy friends, the faster your leg will heal and you can get back to serious training.” He dragged a hand through his hair. “We’ve got to start all over again, Jill. This wasn’t a bump in the road; it was a full-fledged mountain, and we’re not even half way back to where we were before you broke your leg.”
They both knew he’d swallowed the rest of what he wanted to say: that where she was before she broke her leg probably wasn’t good enough to get where he desperately wanted her to go. “Do you really need me to say it again? I’m sorry, all right! I’m sorry I took it upon myself to do some incline training without asking you first. I’m sorry I was stupid enough to fall and break my leg right before the trials, and I’m sorry I keep being a miserable disappointment to you. Believe it or not, I’m not doing this on purpose.”
“You could have fooled me,” he mumbled under his breath before shaking his head as if to wipe away the words that still hung in the air between them. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to go back to work so soon. You just had your last surgery.”
“I’m going crazy sitting around the house all day, and I’m sick to death of you and mom paying for everything. Besides, it’s not fair to pull out of the lease with Olivia just because you don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“Perhaps if you’d asked our opinion before you signed the lease…”
“I’m an adult and I don’t need your permission to live on my own. The only reason I’ve been at home is because I couldn’t use the stairs in the apartment. You control my life for more hours of the day than I do, but I’m not going to let you control everything. Don’t you see how dysfunctional that is?”
“Oh, yes. Poor Jill with parents who love her and care.”
She whirled around and stomped as best she could with bare feet into the locker room, ignoring the stares from the other girls who’d overheard her fight with her father. She felt the angry tears burn the backs of her eyes and rushed to get into the shower stall before giving in and letting them fall. She damned him for making her feel twelve for the last decade of her life and damned herself for letting him do it.
Chapter 4
When Ty walked into the kitchen, Lita was setting the table with plastic plates and cups featuring any and all cartoon characters from his generation and beyond.
“Can I have Captain Firefly?” Ty asked. “He was always my favorite.”
She stood up abruptly and clutched her chest with her hand. Ty felt bad about scaring her. “How does someone so tall walk around so quietly?” she asked before resuming her task. “You get to sit with us in the dining room. You’re too big for the kids’ table.”
He’d never actually sat at the kids’ table, and watching the girls run into the kitchen, with wet hair smelling of strawberry shampoo, to lay claim to their spots, he felt as though he missed out on something pretty special. “Do I have time for a shower? I stopped at Jimmy Helton’s and he wheedled me into helping plant a tree for his wife.”
“Just enough. Your dad is on his way and your mom and Bryce and the boys will be here in thirty minutes.”
“I’ll be ba
ck in ten and you can put me to work.”
Lita wrapped an apron around his waist when he loped back into the kitchen eight minutes later and tied it from behind. “You can cut the bread when the timer beeps and place it in the warmer in the dining room. If you could stir the macaroni and cheese and mix up a pitcher of lemonade while I shower, that would be a huge help.”
“Go.” He shoved her toward the back staircase. “Make yourself even more beautiful. I’ve got this until you get back.”
“You’re a life saver.”
“I’m just a sucker for a beautiful woman who can cook.”
“Like father like son,” she shouted as she dashed up the stairs faster than she should have been able to in her man-killing heels.
Before Ty could fill the pitcher with water, Jesse walked in shouting for his wife. “Angelita?”
“She’s in the shower.”
Jesse eyed Ty’s apron as he set two enormous bakery boxes on the counter. “That’s a good look for you.”
“Your wife thinks so.”
“She can’t help but play dress up with everyone. Thank goodness we have three daughters.”
As if he’d summoned them, Jesse laughed as his girls squealed and charged straight at him. “Daddy!” they wailed in unison.
Jesse lifted all three in his arms, quite a feat considering seven-year-old Ella was no lightweight, Gabby brought Baby along for the ride, and Jesse’s fingers looked tangled in Brooke’s blanket. “How are my girls? Did you have a good day?”
“We had a tea party,” Brooke explained. “I spilled apple juice on Baby and Gabby yelled at me. Mommy sent her to her room and now she’s mad.”
“I yelled at you because you spilled juice on Baby’s new dress,” Gabby said and shoved her three-year-old sister.
Jesse dropped the girls to their feet and stared down at them with disapproval and mischief in his eyes. Those girls had him wrapped around every one of their fingers. “No fighting or I’ll send you both to your rooms.”
Mending the Line Page 2
