Bourbon Springs Box Set: Volume II, Books 4-6 (Bourbon Springs Box Sets Book 2)

by Jennifer Bramseth

  “What do you want, Dad?” Pepper asked in a weary voice.

  Walt took a deep breath and gave his daughter a sad yet determined look.

  “I’m sorry. I thought I did the right thing. But—I didn’t intend for this to be so—public,” he said, casting a look around at the handful of people who had closed in on them as the confrontation unfolded so that everyone was now within earshot, “but so be it. Can you forgive me? That’s all I came to ask, that’s all I want. I’m trying to get my law license back, as you know. But that doesn’t have anything to do with what I’m asking you, except that it’s also part of me trying to make amends, trying to seek some small measure of redemption. And I’m only here because Glenda’s not with us, so I can’t hurt her anymore by merely showing my sorry face in Bourbon Springs.

  “So… Pepper, can you? Can you forgive me?”

  * * *

  Pepper felt Jon’s hand on her shoulder, but she brushed it away and moved toward her father. He looked so much older than she had imagined; time had not been kind to him. His eyes were watery, his skin a bit gray and sagging. His clothes looked old and worn, and a button was missing from his coat, which had worn cuffs. Everything about him bore the traces of hardship, although she knew that burden had been self-inflicted.

  But she also knew that she’d be a hypocrite not to forgive him, especially after hearing that sermon about forgiveness and new beginnings. That had been a message, a challenge.

  Trust was another matter.

  Jon was well down the road to earning that back in her eyes. She could at the very least give her father the same chance.

  One life gone, but her life—and maybe new beginnings with her father and with Jon—could go on. As if on cue, the sun shone briefly through the clouds before hiding itself once more as Pepper opened her arms and embraced her father.

  She said one word, and said it loud enough so that those gathered near could hear it.

  “Forgiven.”

  * * *

  Walt looked so surprised by his daughter’s actions that he was unready, and held his hands awkwardly to his sides. It was as though he couldn’t believe it.

  And although a small smattering of applause rippled through the group, Jon stood by and looked on the scene stoically and with a jaundiced eye.

  Because when he saw Walt’s face, he didn’t see someone genuinely repentant who was reveling in the joy of unexpected and undeserved redemption.

  Jon saw a man shocked that his sly plan had worked and was amused at the gullibility of others.

  Jon caught Walt’s eye and saw the flicker of understanding there, followed by a coldness.

  Jon’s protective instincts boiled to the surface and he wanted to grab Pepper’s arm and pull her away from the cretin. Instead, he had to settle for Walt being the one to break eye contact first.

  He had successfully delivered his message: I don’t trust you and I know you’re up to no good.

  Jon had been there for Pepper over the last week as she began to navigate a world without her precious mother.

  Now he had a new purpose: to protect Pepper from her prodigal father.

  14

  “I can’t believe you actually live here!”

  Walt walked into Pepper’s living room and was immediately drawn to the large bank of windows across the back and the expansive view of the fields beyond.

  After uneasy reintroductions at the cemetery between Jon and Walt, Pepper had invited her father to GarnetBrooke.

  “Neither can I.” She dumped her coat on the leather couch before joining her father as he admired the vista. “After living in Bourbon Springs forever, driving by here for years, and then working up in the accounting office—it’s just surreal to know this is mine.”

  Pepper and Walt started chatting by the window, and she pointed out features on the property while Jon watched from across the room. He’d kept his doubts about Walt’s genuineness to himself during the drive back to the farm. He had seen that Pepper was too upset to talk, and they had returned to GarnetBrooke in relative silence. The only thing Pepper had said which had given him a clue to her state of mind was she hadn’t fully understood why the preacher had chosen that particular sermon until her father’s appearance at the cemetery.

  “I thought the sermon was talking about someone else at first,” Pepper had admitted during the drive. She’d then taken his hand, which had dropped from the steering wheel as they sat at a light in downtown Bourbon Springs. “I’m sorry, Jon. I shouldn’t have been so unwilling to accept your apology.”

  He was grateful for her forgiveness and thanked her. Yet he was also jealous she’d extended that absolution to Walt on the same day. It was like buy-one-get-one-free forgiveness day, and Jon didn’t like being lumped in with the likes of Walt Montrose. He knew it was wrong to feel greedy about something so hallowed as another’s pardon, but small-mindedness had won out over loftier ideals.

  Jon volunteered to make coffee so Pepper could talk with her father—and he could listen in while appearing to look busy. From the few sidelong glances Jon caught Walt giving him, Jon knew the older man was very aware that he was being watched.

  Pepper and Walt retired to the couch where she allowed him to talk.

  “Been working a lot of different jobs since I got out of prison,” he said with an affected sadness. “A lot of retail stuff. I can’t work in a law office at all. There’s a rule against being able to hire a suspended attorney for any kind of work in a law office, so that completely cut me out of being able to clerk or do legal research, which was a decent skill I possessed. For the past few years I’ve been selling cars in Louisville and doing fairly well. Finally got the money together to pay back all the restitution.”

  “It took you twenty years?” Jon asked, flabbergasted that Walt had taken so long to pay off his victims.

  Jon was delivering the coffee to Pepper and Walt on a small tray when he asked the question. He put the tray down on the table in front of father and daughter and looked to Walt for an answer.

  “Well, yes,” Walt said defensively as he took a mug from the tray and refused to look at Jon. “It was a lot of money,” he said as though this fact should cut him some slack. “I actually paid back the fund, not the clients.”

  “The fund?” Pepper asked.

  Walt explained that the bar association operated a fund, to which all lawyers’ dues contributed; clients whose money had been stolen by a lawyer could apply to receive some measure of restitution from this fund. Jon was generally familiar with the fund; he read about it in the state bar magazine from time to time. This fund had apparently stepped in years ago to repay clients, but Walt had only recently gotten around to making full restitution.

  Jon retreated to the kitchen and poured himself a cup of coffee, then occupied himself with putting dishes in the dishwasher as he continued to listen in on the father-and-daughter-reunion conversation.

  After a few more minutes of conversation during which Pepper talked about her plans for the farm, Walt put his mug on the tray, rose, and announced his departure. Pepper urged him to stay, and suggested that the three of them go to The Windmill. To Jon’s relief, Walt rejected the idea.

  “I do need to get back to Louisville. Maybe another time. Thanks though.”

  Jon came out of the kitchen and extended his hand to Walt. Although they had exchanged brief pleasantries at the cemetery after the big forgiveness spectacle, Jon wanted to make sure Pepper saw that he had offered the metaphorical olive branch first.

  “Take care,” Jon said, unable to actually get the phrase good to see you out of his mouth.

  “Same to you. And keep taking good care of her.” Walt dipped his head toward Pepper.

  “I think you forgot I’m a big girl now.” Pepper laughed and guided her father to the front door.

  Jon stood in the hall and watched them as Walt made his good-byes to his daughter. Walt kept shooting looks at Jon; he clearly was not comfortable in his presence.

&nbs
p; And that only made Jon feel more protective of Pepper.

  * * *

  Jon’s hovering presence had not gone unnoticed by the mistress of GarnetBrooke.

  “I’ll walk you out, Dad.” Pepper and her father exited the front door together, leaving Jon to fume and return to the kitchen.

  Once they’d arrived at her father’s car, Walt pointed back to the house.

  “What is it with him? Are you two more than friends now? I always expected you two to end up together, considering how close you were as kids.”

  “No, just friends.” She felt the answer was honest considering the status of her relationship with Jon, even though she knew he wanted more from her again.

  “That man watched me like a hawk.”

  “I know,” she said a little apologetically.

  Walt shrugged and gave a sad smile. “Guess I shouldn’t expect anything different from people around here.”

  “It will take time to change hearts and minds in Craig County.”

  Walt frowned but nodded. “You’re right, of course. Look, I wanted to remind you about my case to get my license back. I don’t know whether the bar has contacted you yet, but I’m just warning you again in case they do.” Pepper revealed that she’d not been contacted. “Well, that’s good, I guess. I was afraid they might drag you into this thing and I don’t want you to have to go through that. I don’t plan to call you as a witness.”

  “Why?”

  “Like I said, I don’t want you to get involved. And, frankly, I don’t want it to look like I’ve come around here now trying to persuade you to help me. Because that’s not what this has been all about. I haven’t asked you for a cent, and I haven’t asked for forgiveness just so I can haul you up before some judge so you can say that. I’m afraid that it would actually come off looking bad, like I’m trying to manipulate you. And with my past, that’s a very real possibility for how things could look to those bar association people.”

  “I understand,” Pepper said, “but if they call, I’ll tell them the truth.”

  “Pepper, I’d never expect anything less of you.”

  She hugged him and hurried back inside; she hadn’t worn a coat and was freezing. The snow had stopped, but the skies were dark and the wind sharp.

  She was so cold that when she reentered the house, Pepper took her coat from the hall closet and put it on. When she walked into the kitchen, Jon was startled by her appearance.

  “Going somewhere?” he asked. “You need me to run to the store or something for you?”

  “No, just cold. Got a chill when I was outside with Dad.” She wrapped her arms around herself tightly.

  Just then, there was a knock on the back door that opened into the garage. Pepper knew who it had to be.

  “Come on in, Rolly,” she called.

  Rolly had returned from the funeral and had already changed clothes. He was wearing boots, jeans, and his weathered black barn coat, along with an Old Garnet baseball cap on top of his bald pate.

  “Sorry to bother you two,” he said, looking apologetically at Jon as well as Pepper, “but I just wanted to come in to offer condolences again.”

  Pepper accepted them quietly and thanked Rolly for attending and serving as a pallbearer. He then told her that he was going into town to get some pears and carrots.

  “Buck forgot to go this morning!” Rolly exclaimed, referring to another farm worker. “And Bubba’s in a fine mood! All feisty and wanting his treats.”

  Pepper moved to her fridge, gently nudging Jon out of her way. She rummaged in the bins and extracted a bunch of carrots, two apples, and three pears.

  “Oh!” Rolly exclaimed. “Bubba’s gonna love you! Could you go give him his snacks? I gotta get to town to get some more carrots and the like.”

  Pepper told Rolly to leave; she’d given a lot of the staff part of the day off so they could attend the funeral. Also, she’d thought she wouldn’t want a lot of people around that afternoon, and had planned to spend some time by herself. But she was getting increasingly strong signals from Jon that he wasn’t leaving until she threw him out.

  Pepper removed her coat and draped it over the back of a nearby chair.

  “We’ll get these chopped up,” Pepper told Rolly, and sent him on his way.

  “Why do we have to do that?” Jon asked as he watched Pepper take out a carving board and find a knife.

  “Easier to feed them small slices,” Pepper said. “They seem to appreciate it, at least Bubba does. I think he likes the attention.”

  Pepper found another carving board and knife and set Jon to work. Soon they had chopped up the food, and Pepper went into the garage and retrieved three small stainless steel pails for the three different treats. She put on her muck boots and barn coat, and then noted that Jon was wearing his dress shoes.

  “You don’t want to go out in those shoes,” she said, pointing to his feet. “You’ll ruin them in the mud and muck.”

  “But I don’t have anything else.”

  She put down the pails and told him to wait while she poked around in the garage. Within less than a minute, she’d returned with a pair of large muck boots for him.

  “Best I can do.” She waited while he put on the boots and tucked his pants legs inside them.

  Bundled up and toting the pails, they were soon trudging up the dirt-and-gravel lane between two fields toward Bubba’s paddock.

  “You do this often?” he asked as he panted to keep up.

  “About every day. Bubba is going to be my favorite, I can tell.” She revealed that the farm was expecting more horses in the upcoming weeks. “I hope they’ll all be here within the month.”

  He shook the pail. “That’s a lot of carrots.”

  “Thanks to the lottery, they can have as many carrots as they can stand.”

  Jon looked behind them and noted a large tabby cat following.

  “You even have your own barn cat now?”

  “Actually, at last count we were up to seven. I seem to be acquiring more and more critters by the day.” She laughed and tossed a piece of apple to the cat before turning and striding up the lane, Jon close behind.

  * * *

  She took his breath away.

  Pepper’s hair was flying behind her like a bright red mane, and she strode confidently with a pail in each hand, seemingly oblivious to the mud, muck, and cold all about them. Even though she’d buried her mother that morning and had experienced what he thought was a stressful reunion with her father, Pepper was beaming, in her element, in the one perfect place she wanted to be.

  GarnetBrooke. Her home.

  Even on this dark day, this land had pulled from her a mood of contentment and love that was remarkable.

  And then Jon wondered whether one could be jealous of a place.

  Because he was feeling the same small stabs of doubt and, yes, resentment that he’d experienced at the cemetery when he saw Pepper forgive her father.

  The germ of his worry was whether he could ever make Pepper Montrose as happy as he saw her right there before him. Jon hoped she loved him in that forever, romantic way, and he knew she’d enjoyed their sexual experiences. But maybe he’d been deluding himself.

  How could he compete with hundreds of acres of perfect Bluegrass and dozens of gorgeous males of the four-legged, equine variety?

  This was a new insecurity he’d not contemplated or confronted and it shook him to his core. Had Pepper’s money changed her?

  No. She was merely happy now and unencumbered by the lack of money. But maybe her money had the power to change his self-image and self-worth.

  Did she need him?

  She’d leaned on him over the past week, but that was all in the wake of grief. Would she want him again?

  The horse ahead in the paddock to the right trotted to the fence and began to snort, raise his head up and down, and drag his front right hoof against the muddy ground.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Pepper said and neared the horse. “I know, I’m la
te, BB.”

  “Late?” he asked.

  “Yep.” She rubbed BB’s muzzle with one hand while handing Jon a pail full of chopped carrots. She dipped a gloved hand into the pail and offered the sweet morsels, palm up, to BB. “I usually come out here shortly before lunch to see him and the others. But always BB first. Right, boy?” The horse snorted and she fed him again. “You are so spoiled,” Pepper cooed as the horse ate out of her hand.

  “And lucky,” Jon added.

  “You bet he is,” agreed Pepper, and reached for some pear slices. “Far too many horses never get this care when they’re no longer useful on the track or in the breeding barn.”

  “I meant he’s lucky to get to spend so much time with you.”

  Pepper turned briefly to him and smiled.

  “Jealous much?”

  “Yes.”

  Pepper held her empty hand under BB’s nose, momentarily taken aback. The horse dramatically snouted her hand and Jon reached into the pail of apples.

  “Here, BB,” he said and proffered a slice to the horse, palm up.

  But BB grunted and snapped just before Pepper slapped Jon’s hand away.

  “Forgot to mention that BB bites if he’s not familiar with you.” She took the apple slice from him.

  “Has he bitten you?”

  “Of course not.”

  She fed BB the apple slice before putting a hand on Jon’s back. The horse took note of the touch and snorted loudly, but Pepper was oblivious to the cause of BB’s consternation.

  “He’s just temperamental with men. It’ll be okay once you get to know each other.” Pepper patted Jon on the shoulder and the horse again responded, this time with an unhappy grunt.

  Pepper moved back from the fence and began to walk away. When Jon thought she was out of earshot, he leaned toward BB.

  “Jealous much?” he taunted the beast in a low whisper.