by Somer Hayes
My stomach dropped at the mention of Hannah. I was well aware of her tendency to boss people around when she had no business doing so, but why would she ask two temps she clearly had issues with to help her do something as bizarre as that?
“What did Hannah say about that?”
“Said she didn’t know anything about it. She’s got more than enough space as is.”
This made no sense. “What did the temps say when you confronted them about the equipment?”
“They denied any knowledge, and it’s not like I’ve got any proof.”
“How much longer are they scheduled to be on staff?”
“Honestly, we’re looking good. We can cut them loose anytime.”
“Do it.”
29
Hannah
I pulled a second batch of burned cookies out of the oven and let out an unladylike curse.
What the crap was wrong with me? I almost never burned my desserts anymore. Something was off. I’d felt it in my bones that entire day.
I’d missed spending the night with Tripp last night, and he hadn’t been in for breakfast that morning. He’d sent a quick text apologizing for not being there but was still preparing for his meeting. I’d written him back saying I’d see him later and that had been all I’d heard out of him all day.
Still, that didn’t account for the feeling of uneasiness I couldn’t seem to shake. I’d learned as a child to pay attention to my gut. My father had kept the company of some very unsavory characters, and I felt sure that trusting my bad feelings about some of them had saved me from harm more than once.
So what was going on today? I thought through my day and everything I needed to get done. The bakery was doing well. I was securing new deliveries almost daily. Feedback was great. The only thing I wasn’t loving about my life at the time was knowing I’d run into my father from time to time.
Still, aside from the odd statement about wanting my help for his ‘business idea,’ he’d pretty much left me alone. And I was avoiding him like the plague. It sounded like work on the ranch was almost wrapped up, so I was sure he’d be gone soon.
The hair on the back of my neck stood up a moment before the back door opened and in stepped my father.
Speak of the devil…
“Hope you’re happy with yourself,” he said. And even if I hadn’t been able to smell the alcohol on him, the way he slurred his words would have told me for sure that he’d been drinking. A lot.
“What are you talking about? And what are you doing here? I told you I don’t want to see you, and I certainly don’t want you showing up at my business.” I glanced at the front of the bakery, and the two college-age girls who had ordered hand pies and coffee were still nibbling and chatting seemingly oblivious to the unwelcome guest.
“Got fired from the Maverick place today. Suppose I have you to thank for that.” Even with his ugly accusation, relief flooded through me.
“I didn’t have anything to do with it, though I can’t say I’m sorry to see you go.”
He sneered at that. “Pretty pleased with yourself, huh? Now that you’re with a Maverick, you think you’re too good to be a Price?”
Enough. I’d heard the same thing my entire life. If I tried to better myself or succeed in any way, he would accuse me of being too good for him for the life he’d given me. But I’d had enough of that now.
“I want you to leave and never come back.”
“Maybe I should knock you down a peg. Remind you who you are.”
“If you take one step toward me, I will call the police. How much time would you be looking at if you add a violent offense to all your priors?”
He spit. He actually spit on my clean kitchen floor. Fury flooded my veins.
“None of this changes who you really are. Just remember that.”
Then he turned and left.
I locked the door behind him and pulled in several calming breaths. Then I went back to the front to check on my customers.
I wasn’t going to let him affect me. Not anymore. He’d been fired. I didn’t have to worry about seeing him anymore. I no longer had to worry about what he was up to or how it would affect me.
He was gone, and I prayed it was forever this time.
30
Tripp
That niggling, suspicious feeling had found its way back into my insides. I was missing something, and I was sure it had to do with that unusual temp, the missing equipment, and maybe even Hannah. What would it take for her to open up to me? I decided it was time to find out.
I left the Board meeting, and since I was downtown anyway, I decided to stop at Hannah’s bakery.
I opened the door to the sounds of happy chatter and forks clinking against plates. She was having a busy day.
Bellied up to the counter, quite literally, was a heavily pregnant woman who spotted me and stood. “You’re Tripp, right?”
“I am.”
She stuck out her hand. “I’m Beth, Hannah’s best friend. I’ve heard a lot about you.” She smiled warmly up at me.
I accepted her handshake. “Likewise. It’s nice to meet the person responsible for Hannah’s love of baking.”
She shook her head. “That would be my mom. I never had the patience for it.”
“Either way, I’m grateful, though I’m afraid I can’t say the same for my waistline.”
She laughed at that. “Believe me, I understand.”
“Is Hannah around?”
“She had to go make a few deliveries. I’m just covering the shop for her until she gets back.”
“Tell her I swung by, all right?”
“You bet.”
“Thanks. It was nice meeting you.” I tipped my hat at her and headed back to the ranch.
The feeling of uneasiness increased as I drove, left with nothing to do but think. My mind spun. What was I missing? What wasn’t she telling me?
Almost everything, I realized with a sinking feeling. She had told me almost nothing of herself or her life up to this point. Was she really so ashamed of where she came from? Or was she hiding something from me?
She didn’t seem the type. She was friendly, sweet, helpful. Bossy, yes, but an undeniably hard worker.
I thought back to our first encounter. She’d asked for help, and I immediately gave it to her. Not her, but her business, something against our typical mode of operation.
A week later, I’d hired her as a cook.
A few days after that, I moved her onto Maverick property.
And I’d slept with her at the first opportunity.
I ran a hand down my face and cursed. I’d been caught in the whirlwind of Hannah and hadn’t paused to consider how insane I’d been acting. How out of character.
Had my stupidity and libido cost us tens of thousands of dollars?
Or was I the biggest kind of ass for overreacting?
I was determined to find out.
31
Hannah
I returned to the bakery after making my deliveries, and Beth was waiting for me behind the counter.
“Your boyfriend was here,” she said with a wry grin.
“First, he’s not my boyfriend. Second, what was he doing?”
She shrugged. “Don’t know. Just said to tell you he stopped by.”
“All righty then. I just need to wrap up here and head to the ranch for dinner. I’m sure I’ll see him then.”
“Okie dokie. I’ll see you later.”
“Thanks again,” I said and gave her a quick squeeze.
I decided to close up shop a little early that day. As odd as it was, I felt good and optimistic about the ugly encounter with my father earlier in the day. I felt sure it meant he’d disappear again. Five years had been a blessing. I hoped it would be at least that long before our paths crossed again.
My mind turned to Tripp. He and our amazing dinner had been on my mind most of the day. The meal we’d shared had inspired me, and I had so many ideas for new recipes I wanted to try
. I hoped he wouldn’t mind being my guinea pig.
I happily sang along with the radio for the entire drive, and a wide smile claimed my face when I reached the bunkhouse and saw Tripp’s truck parked there. Maybe he’d missed me as much as I’d missed him.
I grabbed my purse and the three dozen cookies I’d baked for the guys and headed inside. I sat everything down on the counter before I spotted Tripp sitting alone at the dining room table, a beer in his hand.
I was immediately wary. It was highly unusual for him not to be working at this time of day. And why was he drinking in the middle of the afternoon?
I approached him slowly. “Tripp? Is everything okay?”
His eyes lifted to mine and they looked tired. “Why don’t you tell me?”
My stomach sank. Something had happened. But what? “What do you mean?”
He set his bottle on the table and pushed his hat back on his head so he could scratch his fingers through his hair. “I’ve been good to you, right? Honest? Worthy of your trust?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Then why do I feel like you haven’t been truthful with me? Why can’t I shake the feeling that you’re hiding something?”
Because I am.
His eyes searched mine. “I feel like I’m losing my mind. I’m crazy about you, but I can’t keep ignoring the feeling that you’re not being one hundred percent with me.”
I sank into the chair across from him and folded my hands in my lap. “I didn’t know you’d been feeling that way.”
“We’ve all got our demons. We’ve all got something in our past we’d rather forget. You mentioned a rough start in life, and I’ve tried to be patient and hope you’d come to me on your own. But instead, I feel like you’re pushing me away. And I swear to God, Hannah, the things my mind is coming up with on its own has to be worse than the truth.”
He grabbed his bottle and took a deep pull.
“What started all this?” I asked quietly. I needed to know if my father had done something to bring out this side of Tripp.
“We’ve had over twenty-thousand dollars of equipment stolen over the past week,” he said, his gaze watchful.
My eyes dropped to my lap. He didn’t have to say anything else. I knew where this was headed.
“Bill seems to think a couple of the temps had something to do with it. I happened to notice you’ve had a strong reaction to one or two of them specifically. And when they mentioned you by name, it makes a man wonder.”
“That’s understandable,” I said, voice barely a whisper.
“So what is it?”
I kept my head down, unable to look him in the eye. I was a coward. I was too scared to trust him to love me for me, and because of that, I had allowed thousands and thousands of dollars of equipment to taken off his property.
“Are you stealing from me?” he asked, his voice hoarse. My eyes shot to his. “I won’t press charges, but I have to know.”
“Do you honestly believe I could do that?”
His shrug was barely perceptible. “I hadn’t thought so, but the more I think over things, the more twisted my thoughts become. After all, you lived in my building rent- free and didn’t consider that stealing.”
His gaze was unflinching. I thought I might throw up.
“No, Tripp. I’m not stealing from you.”
“Did the temps?”
“I don’t know for sure, but I would say it’s likely that’s who did it.”
He cocked his head. “Why would you say that?”
I clenched my hands in my lap to keep them from shaking. “Because I know one of them.”
“And?”
“And he has a history of stealing. And lying. And scamming people. And hurting people.”
I watched his knuckles go white on the bottle he was holding. “This man hurt you?”
I looked down at my fists and tried not to cry. It was all the answer he needed.
“Dammit, Hannah. Why wouldn’t you tell me something like that? I would never have kept him on grounds if I’d known.”
I shrugged. “Lots of reasons. I didn’t want you to look at me differently. I didn’t want you to think I could be like him. I thought…” my voice cracked, and I had to take a breath. “I thought maybe he had changed, and I could give him the benefit of the doubt for the few weeks he would be here.” I found the courage to look at him. “I’m sorry, Tripp.”
“Who is he to you?”
My chin quivered, but I was done hiding who I was. Trying to cover up my past never seemed to work anyway. And in this case, it had ended up hurting someone I cared for deeply.
“He’s my father.”
I watched his face tighten. “You know, after I found out about the theft, I learned the names of the men who had been here. I looked into Robert Price and prayed the last name was just a coincidence. It’s common enough around here, right? Because surely anyone related to a man with a rap sheet like that would have given me the courtesy of a heads up. Especially after everything you’ve told me about him.”
“I should have told you,” I began, but he interrupted me.
“Yes. You should have. Not just because a career criminal was on my property, and you knew it, but because I thought you cared for me and would maybe mention that you do, in fact, have contact with your father and that the bastard was eating at my damn dinner table.”
His fist came down on the table hard enough to rock the bottle of beer. I jumped.
“So how did it work? Was this all just an elaborate ploy to get in the good graces of the Mavericks? Were you in on it? Are you scamming me, too?”
I was shaking my head vehemently, tears streaming down my cheeks. “No, Tripp, I swear. Everything between us is real. I told him to stay away from me. From both of us. You have to believe me,” I begged. “I want nothing to do with him.”
“Do I?” he asked quietly. And then, “Did you know what he was doing?”
My heart cracked because I knew the moment I answered his question, I would lose him. “He told me he had an idea. He asked me for my help. I told him no, but clearly that didn’t stop him.”
His jaw ticked once, then again. “You could have prevented this.”
“I didn’t know,” I began to protest.
“You did,” he said and stood.
“I have asked for nothing from you. Nothing but the basic human decency to be honest with me.” He walked to the door then turned and asked. “What am I going to do with you now?”
Then he left.
32
Tripp
I slammed the door to my truck and flew down the path back to the house. I was on a rampage, and I didn’t care who knew it. Two of the people I cared about most in the world had let me down that week, and I intended to share my displeasure with them.
Her father. Her father.
If she’d just trusted me enough to tell me I’d have thrown him out on his ass the second she asked me to. What had I done wrong? How had I failed her? Why couldn’t she trust me?
Did I truly believe she knew what was happening? I didn’t know. My thoughts were in such a tangle, I couldn’t sort them all out.
But speaking of fathers…
My own was sitting on the front porch when I slammed the brakes in front of the garage and threw it in park.
“Did you even call HR?” I asked on my approach.
“I called them,” he answered and took a sip of whiskey.
“Then how did we manage to hire criminals?” I asked, accusation dripping in my tone.
“I called them,” he repeated. “And told them to send me the first five laborers they had on their list. I didn’t care who they were as long as they were able-bodied.”
My hands came to rest on my hips, and I chuckled, but humor was absent. “Your give-a-shit attitude really is broken, isn’t it?”
“I’m trying, Tripp.”
“No. You’re not. You stopped trying the minute Mom died. You gave up and picked up the bottle, an
d you let the rest of us figure it out.”
He looked down into his glass, but I didn’t let up.
“We were suffering, too, but you couldn’t be bothered with that. I had a life, Dad. A life I dearly loved and had to leave because you gave up, and we were in a nosedive,” I spat. “I asked you for one thing. One simple task, and you couldn’t even manage to do that much for me.”
He looked up at me then, his blue eyes watery. “I never meant for us to end up here.”
“Then do something about it.”
I got back in my truck and sped away, not exactly sure where I was headed, but after about thirty minutes, I realized I was headed home. To my home, my log cabin on the east side of the property. A place I hadn’t visited in weeks.
I built the place ten years ago. I’d never had any intention of leaving the ranch and had worked under my father’s guidance for years, learning every aspect of ranching necessary to make us successful. It had always been in my blood, and I was a quick study. I loved every moment of ranching even the exhausting and heart-wrenching ones. I felt as though I had always known where I belonged in the world, and now, for the first time in my life, I felt lost.
That alone redoubled my anger. I wanted to yell, throw something, break something. Instead, I let myself in the house.
My mom had insisted on decorating it for me because she knew it would otherwise have contained nothing but the bare essentials. Instead, it was as warm and inviting as she had made the main house. I didn’t think I cared about those things, but as soon as I was in my home, it felt like an embrace. I could still feel my mother’s presence in the rich finishings and lovingly-selected details.
I’d have given anything to have her back with me for even a minute. I needed her calming presence, her sound reasoning, and her trusted advice.
Was I being too hard on everyone? Was this just something that had happened and not what my mind had turned into a conspiracy born of laziness and mistrust? Or was it exactly what it felt like? The last straw.
