by Wendy Vella
The muscles in his jaw bunched, then released. He gave her that this-is-not-done look, before forcing his social smile back in place and facing the man again.
“What can I get you, on the house.”
“A beer, thanks.”
“Bailey Trainer, and this is my husband, Joe, and you’ve met Piper.”
Piper watched Bailey get off her barstool and greet the man. He took her hand and shook it gently. Everyone was gentle with Bailey. There was just something about her that made a person want to be nice.
“Dylan Howard, and I think it’s me that owes you a drink, Joe.”
Piper switched her gaze to her cousin. Incredulity was written all over his face as he returned with the beer.
“Dylan... Jay? Jesus!”
“You always had trouble deciding what to call me,” the stranger said. “How about we settle on Dylan?”
Joe rounded the bar and shook the man’s hand, then went in for a man hug, which included a chest bounce. Dylan Howard wasn’t comfortable with the closeness, Piper saw that in the stiffness of his body, but he handled it, then stepped back as soon as it was polite to do so.
“Dylan then. Hell, what’s it been?”
“Sixteen years,” the man said. “And I never did give you that apology.”
Joe waved his words away. “We were both to blame, bud, no point in going back there. Tell me what you’re doing now? I haven’t heard a thing about you since you left. Ava’s been back in town a while but she hasn’t mentioned you, and I haven’t seen Charlie since she left either.”
“I’m an FBI profiler.”
Joe whistled. “Must be a hell of a job.”
“It can be, but I like it.”
“I’m sure it suits his winning personality,” Piper said before she could stop herself. She wasn’t normally bitchy, but she felt like it around this man.
“Perfectly,” he said, picking up his beer. Contained, Piper thought. Emotionless too. She’d never been able to manage either of those.
“So, you found my cousin broken down on your way home. Have to say I’m glad it was you,” Joe said, “and not some stranger, who could be a—”
“Ax murderer, or escaped convict on the run and desperate,” Piper finished for him. She’d heard this story many times before.
“Well, excuse me for caring.”
“Actually we met before that, in a diner in Bolt,” Dylan said.
“He wowed me with his winning personality.”
“Yeah? You still got that going on, bud?”
The left side of Dylan Howard’s mouth kicked up, but it was the only sign he was amused.
“I remember just getting a smile out of you took work.”
“You weren’t much better.”
Joe leaned on the bar, his eyes suddenly distant.
“No, you got me there, we were both pretty messed up. Good those days are behind us.”
If she hadn’t been watching Dylan, she wouldn’t have seen his jaw clench and release, but she did.
“Nice place, you own it?” he asked Joe. His eyes did a slow survey of Apple Sours
“I do.” Joe smiled, pride in his face.
He loved A.S. because it represented hard work and change. Joe had spent years becoming the man he was today, and this place had been his first solo acquisition when he returned to Ryker Falls.
“So, Dylan, why are you in Ryker? Are your family still here?” Bailey asked.
He was silent for so long Piper wondered if he was going to answer. She had a feeling the line he’d fed her about him being on vacation wasn’t true, she just wasn’t sure why he’d needed to lie to a total stranger. Looking at Joe, she noticed he was busy wiping the bench with a great deal more effort than he usually put in.
“I’m Mary Howard’s son.”
The silence was suddenly deafening. Piper heard the music Joe ran through the system, she heard the rumble of voices, but it was as if they’d suddenly been muted. She dragged in a much needed breath and exhaled loudly.
“Howard.... Jesus, I didn’t put it together,” Piper said. “Mary Howard’s golden boy? I guess you’re not on vacation then.” She sent her cousin a look. “And you’re happy to see him?”
“Leave it, Pip.” Joe’s frown was fierce but she didn’t care. This man’s mother had taken shots at one of the people she loved most in the world for most of his life. In fact, she’d gone after all the Trainers occasionally, but it was Joe who took the brunt.
“Leave what?” Dylan threw her a look. “What am I missing?”
“Nothing. Sit.” Joe motioned him to a barstool, and gave Piper another look that said she needed to keep her mouth closed.
“No, there’s something that needs to be said, and I’d appreciate knowing what it is.”
There was some force behind those words now. Still calm, but he wanted answers and was going to get them.
Piper raised her hands as if to say it wasn’t her place to speak again, then picked up her wine and drank a mouthful so she couldn’t talk.
“Your mom and I don’t get on,” Joe said.
A massive understatement as far as Piper was concerned.
“It’s a thing we have.”
“Thing?”
Piper took another mouthful so she didn’t add anything, and let it sit in her mouth to stop her from speaking.
“We don’t need to get into this, Dylan. Just enjoy your first night home... this is your first night, right?”
Dylan Howard nodded. The expression on his face told Piper he wasn’t about to let this drop. His blue eyes were steady on Joe’s face.
“I went home, visited Dad at the hospital, then came here.”
“I heard about his accident. How’s he doing?”
“Pretty beat up, but he’ll recover.”
Joe pulled out two glasses and grabbed the bourbon.
“Old times’ sake.” He poured two shots. “You look like you need it.”
Piper swallowed her mouthful of wine. “How come he can have one?”
“He’s bigger than you, and a paying customer,” Joe said. “Plus there’s the fact that he’s not a lightweight. In fact, we could handle this stuff at fifteen.”
Piper flipped her cousin the bird, which made the side of Dylan’s mouth kick up again. She had a feeling that was as close as he got to an actual smile.
She watched as they threw back the whiskey without a single wince or cough.
“Weird how your dad skidded out like that coming down Burns Pass,” Joe said. “I mean, he’s driven that road hundreds of times before.”
Dylan nodded. “That’s what I’m having trouble understanding.”
“I guess it happens, and he’s going to recover, which is the main thing.”
“It is. Now about my mother, Joe? If there’s trouble I want to hear about it, especially if I’m the root of it.”
Joe didn’t want to speak. Piper counted to five, then another five and told herself to stay out of it. Bailey got up and left to start playing the piano, and she told herself to follow. Pressing three fingers to her lips, she fought to keep the words inside, but it was no good, they had to come out.
“Your mother blamed him for you leaving, and for that shit that went down before you did.”
“That’ll do, Pip.”
Ignoring her cousin, she continued. “He’s a big boy, and he wants to know, so I’m telling him. Your mother’s spent the last sixteen years making Joe and the Trainer family pay.”
Dylan Howard’s eyes remained steady on Joe for a moment, then he turned them on her with a look that would drop a giant. Fortunately, Piper had lived with men equally capable of just such looks. She wasn’t easily intimidated, even if this one came from one of the most disturbing men she’d ever met.
CHAPTER FOUR
The brunette Dylan now knew as Piper was giving
him a look that suggested he was personally responsible for his mother’s behavior, which he possibly was in a roundabout way.
“I’m s
orry, Joe, I had no idea she was behaving that way.”
“How could you? You haven’t been back since then, and I’m sure she didn’t tell you. Don’t sweat it, man.”
But he was sweating it, because the thought that his mother had held this man accountable for something Dylan had done alone was not a comfortable thought.
“Just to clear the air, I did tell her it was my fault, two years after I left Ryker. She obviously didn’t believe me.” He needed them to know he’d done that, fessed up to his crimes.
“You think?”
Dylan looked at Piper as she spoke, and then back to his old friend because she was sexy as hell, and he didn’t want to feel that little buzz he’d gotten earlier when he’d first seen her. Not now, with this other stuff going on and her wanting to turn him into a eunuch.
Perhaps “friend” wasn’t the right term for Joe Trainer; maybe destruction buddy was a better one. They’d both been trying to outrun demons in their youth.
Tired of not living up to his mother’s high standards for the perfect son, he and Joe, who had wanted to do anything to avoid his father’s abusive behavior, had made an unlikely alliance. They’d been dangerous for each other because neither of them had cared about what they got into, and it had simply escalated with each thing they did wrong. The more dangerous the better, as far as they were concerned. And if it upset Dylan’s parents he was even happier.
“You told your mother that Joe wasn’t at fault years ago, and still she’s treated him like something stuck to the bottom of her shoe? Him, and us.”
As it was Piper talking, he had to look at her again. If she’d been mildly annoyed at him earlier today, now that she realized he was Mary Howard’s son that stick up her sweet ass had lodged itself deeper. Not that he cared. Dylan was a lone wolf, he didn’t care about anyone. It made things simple.
“Pip, that’s enough.”
Like him, Joe had filled out, plus there was now a wife, and if that look he’d just intercepted between Joe and Mrs. Trainer was any indication, they were knee deep in love. Good for him; the boy he’d been deserved some happiness.
“So let me get this straight,” Dylan said. “My mother has made it her life’s work to insult you and yours?”
Joe looked cornered. “She missed you. Let it go now, Dylan.”
Dylan was surprised to feel the slow burn of anger inside him. He’d been an emotional child. Yelled, laughed, and cried often, but when he left military school, that changed. He’d gained control, and that had only strengthened as the years went by. Strong emotions were a weakness he had no time for, which was possibly why he’d never had a serious woman in his life.
Already today he’d felt more than he had in weeks, possibly years. There’d been the feeling of being hit by a runaway train when he first saw Piper, which he was doing his best not to acknowledge, then meeting his family again. Now there was this anger over his mother’s behavior. He’d thought coming back to Ryker would be hard, but something he’d cope with because it had to be done. Now he wasn’t so sure, because suddenly here he was experiencing uncomfortable feelings... something he hated.
“I really am sorry, Joe.”
“I know you are, and as you’re not responsible, how about we leave it alone now.”
Dylan wasn’t really a leave it alone kind of guy, but he did... for now.
As the bar had started filling up, Joe was soon busy, and Dylan was left standing beside Piper. An uncomfortable feeling, it had to be noted.
She looked good tonight. The emerald-and-white-striped top sat off her shoulders, and all that hair was on top of her head. Her eyes looked bigger, which he put down to makeup, and her scent was something soft and floral that danced around his senses.
He could feel her vibrating with the need to speak beside him, which was weird as he usually wasn’t that perceptive where women were concerned. Dylan did silence well, it was something he used often in his line of work, but he guessed that wasn’t the same for the woman beside him. In fact, he’d already worked out she had a lot to say and rarely held back.
“Okay, look. I know she’s your mother, but you have to understand that we’ve had years of trouble from her, especially Joe.”
“Family loyalty is to be commended,” Dylan said.
“I know it’s not your fault, but it’s hard to separate you and your mom, especially as she’s been throwing you in our faces as an example of a fine upstanding citizen since forever.”
“Sins of the mother and all that?”
“Go ahead and make me feel bad.”
“You’re the one with the problem..., which you’ve had from the start.” Dylan picked up the beer Joe had poured him. “I just wanted to share your table, not your attitude.”
Her exhale was loud. She wriggled some more on the seat. Even on short acquaintance he knew this was not a woman who knew how to be still and quiet.
“I’m sorry for that. I was having a rough day, you just got caught up in it. The other stuff with your mom is going to take time... besides, you don’t need me to like you.”
She was right there. Piper Trainer was about as hospitable as a skunk.
“True that.”
“Plus you lied to me.”
“About?”
“You being here on vacation.”
“I am actually, and visiting with my family at the same time.”
She stared straight ahead, looking as comfortable as he felt right at that moment. It wasn’t just the animosity between them, Dylan could handle that, it was this other tension, that could only be termed as sexual.
“Hey, Pip.”
Dylan turned to find three men and a red-haired woman who had some serious curves. The first two men he thought he recognized simply because they had a family resemblance. Jack and Luke Trainer, Joe’s younger siblings.
“Dylan Howard, meet Luke and Jack Trainer, Fin Hudson, and my best girl, Maggie Winter.”
Manners it seemed were important to Piper Trainer, because he knew she’d not wanted to perform the introductions.
They shook his hands.
“Mary Howard’s son?” It was Jack Trainer who added two and two. The scowl on his face was familiar too.
“I am.”
Fin whistled. “Let me buy you a beer.”
“I respect my mother,” Dylan felt he had to say. He didn’t much like her, but he did respect her for raising three kids and providing them with food and shelter. Any love in the household had been supplied by his father and sisters.
“As you should,” Fin added. “But we don’t have to.”
This drew a reluctant laugh from the Trainers. What the hell had his mother done to this family? He had a feeling he would never get all the details.
“Hey, sorry, man. I know your mom’s actions aren’t yours, but it just threw me for a minute there.”
Dylan accepted the slap on his shoulder from the youngest Trainer.
“How’s Charlie doing?” Jack asked. “She was at school with me.”
“She lives in Dallas, works in investment banking.”
“Remember she was good at painting in school,” Jack said.
She was, and his mother had refused to let her pursue her dream. Dylan remembered that too.
“And Ava, you seen her yet?” Luke Trainer asked.
“Yes, she was leaving as I was arriving.”
“Be strange staying in your old room after that long.” Joe had returned. “So if you need some space the bunks are free above the stables if you want one.”
“Joe—”
“Joe—”
The Trainer brothers both spoke at once, and while Joe’s glare said he didn’t like their behavior, Dylan understood it.
“You were raised better than that,” Joe said softly, making his brothers squirm before he looked back to Dylan. “You want that bed, it’s yours.”
“I’ll pass, but thanks.”
“Maggie Winter.”
The redhead stepped forward and stuck
out her hand. Dylan took it, glad to break the tension. The relaxing drink he’d hoped to get had been far from it.
“Don’t mind them, they love their brother, as do we all, but none of us are responsible for our parents’ behavior.”
Her words had Jack and Luke looking down at their beers. Piper, however, was still looking like she wanted to do him bodily harm.
“Sure, but from what I gather, Mom’s been firing barbs at the Trainers for years.”
“She has, but I like to think it’s been character-building for them.” Maggie smiled.
She was sweet and pretty, and Dylan wondered why he felt absolutely nothing when he looked at her.
“So you been gone a while, Dylan?” Luke asked.
“Sixteen years.”
“A lot of changes in that time.”
“I noticed a few when I drove into town.”
“We bought the Trainer land,” Joe told him as he poured a glass of red wine.
“Yup, Bailey’s family owned it once,” Jack said. “Nice she’s come back to it.”
Dylan learned that Fin was the head ranger in Ryker, Luke a fireman, and Jack ran the family business, which included horse trail rides for tourists.
“You don’t say much is my guess,” Fin said.
“I’m more of a listener.”
“Perhaps we’re not the usual company he keeps?” Piper added, her eyes narrowed and glaring.
“Are you kidding me? Who wouldn’t want to spend time with you?”
The males all hooted with laughter at Dylan’s dry words. Piper gave him a look that would have shriveled his balls if he was the type to be intimidated by her... which he wasn’t. What he was, damn his body, was aware of her every move.
“So what do you do, Dylan?” Fin asked.
“I’m a profiler with the FBI.”
“Yeah? I’ve watched you guys in documentaries; it’s amazing what you can figure out.”
Dylan nodded to Luke. “At least you didn’t say one of those crime programs on TV.”
“Don’t get much time for TV,” the youngest Trainer said. “So, Ava, I bet you’ve seen some changes in her?”
“Yes, she’s changed. Are you and she friends?” Dylan thought it wouldn’t hurt to know a bit about his little sister if he was going to be in Ryker Falls for a while.
