She huffed and amended that when she looked at him. They were all deep in some ditch of emotion that was scummed with uncertainty and fear, but Callen was probably deeper in that ditch than any of the rest of them.
“Sometimes people screw up, even when they’re trying to do what they think is right,” Mateo said, causing them to turn in his direction. He definitely didn’t seem comfortable with that attention, either, and some of them—specifically Judd—didn’t seem especially receptive to the opinion.
“Just saying,” Mateo added.
Shelby let go of Lucy so she could punch Judd on the arm and give the boy what she thought might be a much-needed hug. Then she stepped away when she realized that Lucy appeared to need a hug from her brother.
“This is my fault,” Rosy said. That caused another shift in their attention, and this time all of them shifted in her direction. “Buck did this for me, you see.” And with that, she burst into tears.
They all swarmed around her, each of them trying to get in a hug or a comforting pat. It wasn’t easy to get close to her, though, in that dress. It might as well have been body armor.
There were some murmured denials about this being her fault, but none of them denied the second part. Because they knew that Buck had indeed put off telling them so that it wouldn’t put a cloud over the wedding. And now, instead of a cloud, they had a blasted tornado looming overhead.
Rosy cried and was comforted while sequins fell around them. Shelby got her share of hugs and soft whispers, too. Family, friends and a seamstress, all coming together to try to help. Shelby noticed, though, that some were closer—proximity-wise—than others. Lucy, Mateo and, yes, even Callen were holding back some, so Shelby remedied that. She latched on to whatever part of them she could and hauled them closer into the comfort mix.
She heard Callen’s sigh of relief.
Shelby looked up at him, to let him know that while she was more than willing to dole out some comfort, she wasn’t ready to forgive him for keeping quiet.
But she was ready.
Nothing good could come from her holding a grudge against him for that. Well, nothing good other than she might like to wallow in some misery for a little while longer. Still, she couldn’t mentally kick or punch him more than the job he was doing on himself.
The sound of yet more footsteps had them all moving back. Not easily. Since the netting and sequins had adhered to some of their clothes, it was a little like pulling apart a pan of sticky cinnamon rolls. They managed to untangle themselves as Dr. Breland, Buck’s doctor, came toward them. Of course, he got peppered with a bunch of questions that centered around “How is he?” but the doctor just waited until they’d settled before he spoke.
“Buck’s still in the examining room, and his condition is stable. No injuries. From what I can tell, he simply passed out, and since he was seated in his truck, he didn’t hit his head or anything.”
That settled the tornado a little for Shelby, and she refused to think of just how badly he could have been injured had he been driving at the time. Refusing didn’t stop the thought from coming, though, and she found herself muttering one of Judd’s dumbasses.
“Buck figures by now you all know about his tumor,” the doctor went on. “And he knows you’re probably all a little upset.”
“A lot upset,” Judd snapped. “A lot,” he emphasized with a glare at Callen.
The doctor nodded in a calm, unruffled way. “Buck will talk to all of you.” He stopped, frowned. “Most of you,” he amended when he looked at Alice and Havana. “He didn’t mention you two. But for now he wants to see Rosy, Shelby and Callen. Then Kace, Nico and Judd. Judd, he gave specific instructions that he’d box your ears if you came in cussing.”
As if in defiance, Judd cursed under his breath, something that Shelby was betting he wouldn’t do when he got into the room with Buck.
“This way,” the doctor said, motioning toward Rosy, Callen and her.
They followed Dr. Breland down the shiny tiled corridor that Shelby imagined would be shinier if the sequins on Rosy’s dress continued to shed. She started to blurt out something about it being bad luck for the groom to see the bride in her dress, but Shelby figured they’d already met their quota of the bad.
When they went into the examining room, it surprised her to see her father sitting up, and he certainly wasn’t as pale as he had been when he’d been passed out behind the steering wheel. There was actually plenty of color in his cheeks, but she doubted it was from a sudden onset of good health. No. He was embarrassed layered with a hefty dose of dread.
Rosy ran to him. Well, as much as she could run while dragging all those yards of fabric, and she showered Buck’s cheeks with kisses. Buck caught her in midcheek smooch to shift her mouth to his. The kiss he gave her was soft, long and incredibly intimate. So much so that Shelby looked away, her gaze colliding with Callen’s.
“I’m sorry,” Callen said to her, and while Shelby knew he meant it, she didn’t get the chance to respond because her father said those exact words.
“I’m sorry.” Buck glanced at each one of them as he repeated it, and then he held up his hand before they could start bombarding him with protests, whys and more hugs.
God, it was good to see him sitting up like that. Good to see the color in his face. But Shelby still wanted to throttle him.
Her father’s attention settled on Rosy. “You look so beautiful. My beautiful bride in her beautiful dress.”
Rosy managed a smile. “You really think so? You don’t think the dress has too much sparkle?”
It was enough to trigger seizures, but Shelby had to hand it to her father when he said, “It’s perfect, just like you.” He gave both the dress and Rosy an approving look. “I love you, and I didn’t want anything to get in the way of me marrying you. That’s on me, not you. I kept this secret for me. Remember that.”
It was a kind thing to say, especially since Rosy was still crying, but she was also shaking her head as if she was going to continue to take some of the blame.
Her father turned to Callen next. “I was wrong to ask you to keep this quiet. Wrong to put this on your shoulders. I just wanted...needed your help, and I knew you would do it. I knew there’d be a price to pay, that Rosy and Shelby would be upset, but I didn’t figure you’d stay around long after the wedding to deal with their aftermath.”
In other words, he would cut and run. Which Callen wouldn’t have done.
No, Shelby mentally amended.
He would have stayed and faced their anger just as he’d done in the hospital waiting room. Because at the core of it, Callen loved Buck and would walk through hell and fire for him. Or in this case, he’d deal with a crying bride and a pissed-off daughter.
Her dad finally looked at her. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but I’m even sorrier that I mucked up things between Callen and you.”
“Wh-what?” Shelby managed. The first “I’m sorry” she got just fine. She deserved that apology, but the second one led her to believe that her father thought there was something to muck up with Callen.
Something like a relationship.
Callen and she did have one of those. Sort of. After all, they’d had sex and she had almost forgiven him for keeping the truth from her. Maybe she had anyway. But relationship seemed to be something, well, more than sex. More than even onetime forgiveness. It seemed like another step toward that broken heart that was looming like a second tornado.
Shelby didn’t have the heart to argue with her dad. With Callen. Or with anyone else. She felt spent, raw and afraid.
Very afraid.
“What will happen now?” she asked, almost too scared to hear the answer.
But Buck wasn’t the one who responded anyway. Dr. Breland came back in. “I’ll need a word with Buck,” he said. “I have to go over some things.”
“I’d l
ike for them to stay,” her father insisted, and he caught onto Rosy’s hand. Then Shelby’s.
The doctor nodded. “Your blood pressure’s low, and you’re anemic. I think that’s why you fainted. We’ll find a way to fix that, but the tumor is the big fix.” He looked Buck straight in the eyes. “No more delays. I want to keep you overnight and get you scheduled for surgery.”
The room went so quiet that Shelby heard one of the pins from Rosy’s hem ping to the floor.
Dr. Breland shifted to Rosy then. “I’m sorry, but you’re going to need to postpone the wedding.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CALLEN COULD SAY with absolute certainty that he got no sense of accomplishment from lifting hay bales and hauling them onto a flatbed and driving those hay bales out to the pasture, where he had to lift them yet again.
Yes, he could physically do it, but it got old fast when he had to do it repeatedly while he worried about Buck. Still, he knew this was what Buck needed from him now.
Rosy and Shelby, too.
Since Buck’s hospital stay was now in its third day, they should be with Buck, and Callen could lighten their burden a little by helping out at the ranch. Of course, that meant working deep into the night at the inn to run his own business, but burning the candle at both ends had a way of numbing some of the fear over Buck’s health.
There’d be surgery; Callen had learned that much, and that would happen in five days, a week from when the wedding was supposed to have taken place. Now, instead of Buck finalizing whatever plans a groom made, he’d be under the knife and then hopefully recovering. Callen wasn’t exactly sure yet what a recovery would entail, but he’d heard the terms chemo and radiation thrown around.
There had also been some discussion about moving Buck to a large hospital in San Antonio. And that still might happen if things didn’t go well during the operation. There were some concerns about Buck’s blood pressure and how his age would affect his recovery. For now, though, Dr. Breland and one of the other local doctors would be doing the surgery.
Callen drove the tractor in from the pasture and made a check on the horses. Mateo and Lucy had volunteered to do a lot of that particular chore, but the kids were also in the middle of midterms at school. No way did Callen want them to back off on their studying to tend horses or cook meals. Thankfully, pizza had fixed the meal problem.
If only the rest of his problems could be fixed so easily.
In addition to Buck, Callen was worried about Rosy and Shelby. And all the hay hauling and chores weren’t going to make that better. Only the surgery and a clean bill of health could do that.
Callen checked the time. It was almost one o’clock, which meant he’d have time to visit Buck at the hospital before heading to his office at the inn. Shelby and Rosy would almost certainly be with Buck since they’d hardly left his side, but perhaps they’d get good news and Buck could come home while he waited for surgery. That would all depend on his blood pressure and the results from the lab work that had been done on him.
Maybe when Buck got home, Callen could finally sit down and talk to Shelby. He hadn’t done nearly enough groveling for the secret-keeping.
But he’d bought condoms.
Callen wasn’t sure if that made him optimistic, stupid or if it just gave him something to focus on besides worrying and hauling hay. He was leaning toward the stupid.
He grabbed a quick shower, changed into the spare shirt he’d brought with him and was headed down the stairs when there was a knock at the door. A heavy-handed one. Followed by a shout.
“Callen, I know you’re here, and we need to talk.”
Gavin.
Shelby’s ex wasn’t the last person on earth Callen wanted to see, but he wasn’t high on the welcome list, either. Callen went to the door so he could tell Gavin that this “need to talk” would be very short so he could get to the hospital.
That didn’t happen.
The moment Callen opened the door, a fist came flying at him. Quick reflexes had him ducking the full brunt of the punch, but Gavin still managed to get a glancing blow off Callen’s cheek.
“That’s for Shelby,” Gavin declared, and with that handful of words, he doled out a different kind of punch.
Oh man. That was a lot of alcohol on his breath, enough to have Callen needing to take a step back. Gavin must have seen that as some kind of retreat because he swung again, his fist going wide and smacking into the door. He howled in pain. A drunk, slurry howl punctuated with what Callen guessed was attempted profanity. All Gavin actually managed, though, was a few syllables.
“You bastard,” Gavin finally got out. “I love her.”
Callen didn’t have to guess about this part. Gavin was talking about Shelby, and apparently he had decided that he should declare his love to a man who he then wanted to beat up.
“Uh, you broke up with Shelby,” Callen reminded him.
“That was a mistake.” One that he apparently wasn’t going to own up to because he just kept going. “You don’t love her,” Gavin went on. “You just came here to have sex with her and break her heart.”
Callen could have pointed out that according to popular opinion in Coldwater, Gavin was the heartbreaker, but Callen knew differently. Shelby had been fine with the end of the engagement. And while Callen hadn’t come back to have sex with her or do any heartbreaking, he had indeed done the first. Might end up doing the second before this was over.
And yet he’d bought those condoms.
That stupid label was getting harder and harder to ignore.
“You’re not even going to stay around,” Gavin went on, his slurred voice a shout now. “You’ll hightail it out of here as soon as Buck’s better.”
That was the plan, had been the plan all along, but Callen didn’t care to share that with Shelby’s drunk ex with a bad aim. Gavin’s next punch slammed into the jamb, and his howl of pain was even louder than the first.
It wasn’t the only howl, though. Another came from outside, and when Callen looked in the driveway, he saw Silla behind the wheel of her car. So she’d driven her drunk brother to confront him. Either Gavin had been very persuasive in getting her to bring him or else Silla was still holding a grudge. Either way, she was here, and that meant Callen didn’t have to come up with another way to get Gavin out of there.
“Go home, Gavin,” Callen advised him. “Sleep it off. While you’re at it, get your knuckles cleaned and bandaged. You’re bleeding.”
Gavin didn’t take that advice well because another punch came Callen’s way. Enough was enough. Callen came out on the porch so he could shut the door and lock it before he caught onto the back of Gavin’s belt and the collar of his coat. He marched him toward Silla. Well, as much as you could march a drunk man. There was some staggering and weaving going on.
Silla got out, making sounds of outrage and protest, but Callen just gave Gavin a final push so that he landed in his sister’s arms. “Why the heck would you drive him here to do this?” Callen demanded.
Callen thought maybe she would have some clever answer—something about believing Shelby and Gavin were soul mates or such crap. But as she stuffed Gavin into the car, she shook her head and gave Callen a blank look.
“Because he’s my brother,” she said. “He asked me to do it, so I did.”
So, not a clever answer after all, and it wasn’t as if Callen could huff and declare it dumb reasoning since it was uncomfortably similar to what he’d done for Buck. Buck had asked, and Callen had done it.
“Gavin wants Shelby back,” Silla added. “And once you’re out of the picture, it’ll happen. You’ll see. She’ll be so upset when you leave, and she’ll go running back to Gavin. Of course, I’ll talk him out of taking her back because my brother shouldn’t have to settle for Callen Laramie’s leftovers.”
The anger just zoomed right into Callen. Leftovers!
He stopped, trying to figure out how to aim all this dangerous energy zooming and bubbling inside him. He couldn’t beat up a drunk idiot or his equally idiot bitch of a sister. Well, maybe he could beat up the drunk, but that would only delay him even more, and he doubted there’d be much satisfaction in it.
Much.
Reining in his fury, Callen just turned and headed to his truck. When he drove away, he couldn’t resist calling out to them. “Dookie Heads!”
Obviously, he could have come up with a new insult or at least one that was age appropriate, but judging from Silla’s stunned expression, it’d worked.
Callen didn’t speed away. In fact, he took his time, trying to steady himself before he saw Buck. The fight—or rather the attempted fight—with Gavin hadn’t exactly put him in a soothing mood, and he didn’t need to go into Buck’s hospital room like that.
There were already too many other things unsoothed there.
However, it did make Callen wonder if he should talk to Shelby about it. Not to tattle but to give her a heads-up in case... Well, he wasn’t sure what stunt Gavin could pull, but he didn’t want Shelby blindsided. He especially didn’t want her running back to Gavin when he left. Silla was wrong about that.
He hoped.
Shelby deserved a heck of a lot better.
The slow drive worked, some, because by the time he’d parked at the hospital, his steaming anger had mentally moved to the lukewarm burner. Another burner got going, though, as he walked into the hospital and saw Shelby. She was coming out of the hall that led to the patient floor where Buck was staying.
She stopped when she spotted Callen. Clearly hesitating, and while he knew why she had that reaction, he despised it. Just days earlier they’d had sex—great sex!—and now it felt as if there were miles between them. Miles he had put there, so he had no one but himself to blame.
“Good—you’re here,” she murmured. “Dad’s been asking for you.”
“Yeah, I got a little hung up.”
“Ranch stuff,” Shelby supplied. “Thanks for doing that.”
Lone Star Christmas Page 16
