Lucas must’ve stood at the end of Naomi’s driveway for a good five minutes trying to pull back the reins on his body. He wanted Naomi with an intensity that was getting harder to control, but he knew he damn well better learn to control it because the woman had a ten-year-old daughter, which meant he couldn’t haul her back into the house, strip off her clothes, and do what he’d been waiting a long time to do.
With a last look at the brightly lit living room window, Lucas trudged toward Lance’s place, fully aware that was also a risky prospect. He might interrupt something between Lance and Jessa, but tonight he was willing to risk it. He was too buzzed to head back to Dad’s place. Especially alone.
Gravel crunched under his solitary footsteps—a lonely serenade for the trek up the road. Evenings in the mountains were so still. Heavy and dark. Perfect for reflecting on all the ways things had gotten fucked up over the years. Damn the time that had passed, the things that had changed.
For the first time, he let himself consider what his life might be like if he hadn’t covered for Levi. He wouldn’t have completely lost three years. He wouldn’t have had to start over. He’d likely be in that house right there down at the end of the road holding the only woman he’d ever loved while they made good use of their bed.
Instead, he was walking on a gravel road. Alone.
“I don’t regret it.” He had to say it out loud, to hear it. The truth was, he couldn’t let himself regret it because that would mean his sacrifice had been a waste, that it was all for nothing, and that just might break him.
Like always, he did his best to stifle the uncertainties as he hiked up the porch steps and strode through Lance’s front door. It wasn’t locked, which meant his brother and Jessa were likely decent.
But instead of finding Jessa inside, he found his two brothers hanging out at the kitchen table drinking a beer.
“You look like someone pissed in your punch.” Levi hopped up and hurried to the refrigerator to retrieve another beer.
He didn’t take the bait. “Where’s Jessa?” he asked Lance, taking the seat next to him.
“Evening call,” his brother whined. “Some lost ferret wandering down Main Street. Then she’s headed to Naomi’s for”—he made quotation marks with his fingers—“an emergency book club meeting. Which means I won’t get laid tonight.”
Lucas tried to keep his expression even but he must’ve winced, because Levi whapped him on his way back to his seat. “Why aren’t you getting laid right now? Didn’t you take Naomi out? You’ve got time before all of those women show up at her house.”
“I took her fishing. And I’m not trying to get laid,” he informed him. “Unlike you, some of us actually think of it as more than that.”
“If that’s the case, why didn’t you stay at her place for a while?” his younger brother teased.
“Because she has Gracie.” And he completely supported her decision to spare her daughter the questions of what Naomi and he were up to. Didn’t need to have that conversation with a ten-year-old.
“I’ll babysit the kid,” Levi offered. “Give you two some alone time.”
Lance and Lucas shared a look. There were so many things their younger brother didn’t seem to understand about relationships. Understandable, given he’d never actually had one. “It’s not that simple.” Things had been simple when they were sixteen. But now…
She had a daughter. And he had a history. Naomi might insist his past was no big deal, but the panicked look on her face when her daughter had asked where he’d been all these years proved she didn’t want Gracie to know. And he got it. Prison time wasn’t an easy thing to explain to other adults, let alone to a child. Gracie would see him differently, just like everyone else did.
“A relationship with Naomi means a relationship with Gracie.” He eyed his brother. God help the woman he fell in love with. Wouldn’t be easy to break a wild stallion. “And I’ve got work to do on that front. She doesn’t even want Gracie to know I was in prison. Not yet. And I don’t blame her.”
Levi’s cheeks hollowed with a hard look. “That’s bullshit. You didn’t do anything wrong. You didn’t even belong in prison.”
“But I was there.” It’d changed him, too. He wouldn’t try to deny that. “I served time for a crime. Imagine trying to explain that to a ten-year-old girl.” Actually, he didn’t want to. He’d already earned Gracie’s trust, but once she learned the truth about him, he’d likely have to start all over. “It’ll freak her out. I don’t want her to be scared of me.” If it were up to him, they’d wait until she was twenty to tell her anything about it. Until she could understand a label didn’t have to define someone.
“It’s not fair.” Levi pushed back from the table and stood. He was the tallest out of all three of them, which wasn’t saying much. “You can’t even live your god damn life because of something I did.”
Lucas exchanged another look with Lance. Not only was he the tallest, he also had the shortest fuse on his temper.
Lucas pushed away his nearly full bottle of beer. “It’s all behind us now,” he said firmly, so Levi wouldn’t get any grand ideas about dredging up the finer points of their past. They’d had that discussion and he knew where Lucas stood.
“It’s not behind us,” his younger brother argued. The man had always loved to argue. “It’s not behind you.”
Couldn’t deny that. He’d thought it was behind him until he came back to Topaz Falls. Down in Pueblo, no one gave a damn where he’d been. If anything, his stint in prison made him a “tougher son of a bitch.”
Levi ripped the chair away from the table and sat across from him again.
Lucas had to blink. He saw so much of their mother in that lost, dejected look on his face.
“You saved my life.”
He went to share another eye roll with Lance, but his older brother simply nodded.
“You saved all of us,” he said grimly. “It woke Dad up. Woke us all up.”
Lucas looked away from both of them, searching for a way to change the subject, but nothing came to him. “I’m not some savior.” He’d simply wanted to protect them. Protect Dad.
Levi waited until he looked at him. “I was already drinking. Experimenting with drugs. There’s no telling where I would’ve ended up if you hadn’t done that for me.”
That was what he’d been worried about. Levi had always been extreme, never knew how to manage his anger.
“After they took you away, I got my shit together.”
This time Lucas pushed back from the table. He didn’t do this well. The sentimental stuff. The gratitude party. “You turned out all right,” he said, carting their beer bottles to the sink. Considering those rough few years after their mother had left, Levi could’ve done a hell of a lot worse.
His brother came over and stood in front of him. “I want to fix it.”
“I appreciate that. Really.” But he didn’t need him to. “There’s nothing you can do. I’ll always have a record. You can tell everyone what really happened and it won’t matter. Won’t change the fact that I spent three years in prison.” He sidestepped his brother and glanced at Lance before Levi pushed any harder. “You guys want to get out of here? Go for a beer or something? Maybe I’ll kick your ass in a game of pool…” It might’ve been almost nine o’clock, but he had a lot more energy to burn and sitting around the table talking about the past with his brothers wasn’t cutting it.
“Yeah, sure. We can do that.” Lance didn’t like the sentimental stuff any more than Lucas did.
“Kick our asses?” Levi demanded. It was almost too easy to distract him. “You’re not gonna kick my ass,” their younger brother said, leading the charge out the door. “I was reigning champ at the Low Country Pool Hall back in Tulsa.”
“Nice to be reigning champ in something, huh?” Lance insulted, acknowledging the fact that Levi hadn’t won many sizeable purses.
“Oh, it’s on.” Their younger brother stomped out the door.
And just like that, the Cortez brothers, who’d grown up avoiding every heart-to-heart chat, were back.
* * *
The nine o’clock crowd at the Tumble Inn happened to be on the rougher side than the Happy Hour crowd. Hence the reason Lucas didn’t frequent the place after a certain time of night. These days, he did his best to stay out of trouble.
Tonight, the risk didn’t seem too great. Only a few stragglers sat at the bar, their eyes tuned into a Rockies game. No one he recognized, so that was good. Maybe they were new to town since he’d been gone or maybe they were part of that big construction crew working on the pass outside of town. Didn’t matter. At least they weren’t glaring at him with a silent message to walk his ass back out the door.
Shoulders relaxing, he chalked up his pool cue. He had to admit, it was good to get out. Hanging with Levi and Lance, shooting some pool, sharing some laughs. He was actually enjoying himself more than he’d thought he would. Even with the good beating his brother was currently handing him.
“Who’s kicking whose ass?” Levi asked, giving him a shot to the shoulder with his pool cue.
“Game’s not over yet,” Lucas reminded him, though he didn’t have a prayer. Levi had already schooled Lance in the first game and now he was about to prove he really had been the reigning champ somewhere down in Podunk, Oklahoma, whereas Lucas hadn’t played a game of pool since prison.
“Come on, man,” Lance muttered. “Knock his ego down a few hundred notches.”
That wasn’t gonna happen. “Doin’ my best,” he said, keeping up the façade. Maybe a hot woman looking for a good time would come along to distract their brother and give him a break.
Sizing up his next shot, Lucas bent to study the right angle. He had to put that solid four in the corner pocket. Shouldn’t be a tough one…
Leaning down, he lined up his cue and popped it lightly. The damn ball ricocheted off the side and headed in the opposite direction.
“Nice shot.” Grinning, Levi bumped his shoulder as he skirted past him.
“Just trying to make you look good.” He took a swig of his beer. At least there weren’t many people around to watch him get schooled by his younger brother. “Maybe we should arm wrestle next,” he suggested, knowing that, while Levi worked hard on his abs, he didn’t do much heavy lifting.
Sure enough, his brother ignored the challenge and leaned over to line up his next shot. “Eight ball. Right corner pocket,” he said smugly. And what do you know? He popped the cue ball and knocked that damn eight ball right in.
“Looks like that’s it, boys,” his brother said, strutting over to give Lucas’s shoulder a nudge. “Pay up—”
“I didn’t know it was felon night.”
Lucas didn’t have to turn around to see who’d just ruined his evening. Damn. He should’ve been paying attention to what kind of trash was walking through that door, but he’d been too busy enjoying himself. That’s what he got.
Levi pushed past him, a recognizable fire in his eyes. “What the fuck is your problem, Dobbins?”
Slowly Lucas turned to the man, taking his time to snuff the fuse of his temper. He’d had plenty of practice. And this man was not worth it.
On the other side of the pool table, Lance stood nice and straight, keeping a watchful eye on Dobbins and his two friends.
“My problem is there’s a felon in town. People have to start locking doors,” Dobbins slurred. He must’ve come to the Tumble Inn after getting kicked out of another establishment because the man could hardly stand up straight. His two friends seemed somewhat better off.
“You know what you need?” Levi asked, his jaw locked. “A good ass-kicking.” He lunged a step closer as though he planned to make good on the threat.
Lucas hooked his brother’s arm and reeled him back. “Not worth it. Ignore him.”
Marshal obviously wasn’t about to let that happen, though. He wasn’t about to let any of them ignore him. He strutted closer to Levi with a smirk that could’ve provoked a lamb. “Your brother shouldn’t be here.”
“Neither should you,” Lance said politely. “Why don’t you go on home? Sleep off the booze before it gets you in trouble.”
Dobbins steadied a hand on the pool table, his face crimson. He’d always been a mean drunk. And he’d always gone looking for trouble, too. The fact that he kept harassing Lucas only proved he was the guy who’d messed up his truck. That or he’d sent one of his kids to do it. His oldest had to be fourteen. Plenty mature enough to be vandalizing.
Lucas tossed his pool cue on the table. He’d better give Dev a heads-up. “Think it’s time to go.” He turned away, hoping like hell his brothers would follow.
“You’re trash. You know that, Cortez?” Dobbins spat behind him. “You and that whore of yours.”
The room blurred with a sudden invasion of pure, unsuppressed rage. It spilled out past the barriers he’d put in place. He whirled back to the man, fingertips already digging into palms. He hadn’t used his fists for a damn long time, but he hadn’t forgotten how.
Seeing that he’d gotten Lucas’s attention, Dobbins laughed and elbowed his idiot friend. “She don’t even know who knocked her up.”
Before he knew what was happening, Lucas’s body had lurched into motion and his arm had wound back, ready to let a punch fly. But before he could knock the teeth out of Dobbins’s grin, Levi shoved him out of the way and took it upon himself to throw the first blow.
His brother’s fist connected with Marshal’s jaw in a crack that sent the man reeling backward.
Shaking out his hand, Levi turned to Lucas. “Don’t want you to get busted. Besides, I’ve wanted to do that for a long—”
Dobbins plowed into his brother and sent him stumbling backward into a table. Lucas lunged into the scuffle, trying to get that lunatic off his brother, but the two morons Marshal had brought with him attacked, ripping him away and taking clumsy swings at his face. He ducked easily, knocking one aside with his elbow as Lance jumped into the fray, taking out the other one.
Dobbins, meanwhile, had completely lost it, and was swinging furiously at Levi, spit flying from his mouth as he mumbled insults. Lucas went for him again, but those two other bastards had come back for more.
“Fight!” someone yelled from the outskirts, and he distantly realized this would not end well but there was no stopping it now. Ripping out of one of the thugs’ grasps, he hauled off and shoved him hard. The man went reeling backward, slamming into a chair and breaking it into kindling. Blinded by the pumping adrenaline, Lucas made his way to Marshal. “Get off him.” He tore Dobbins away from Levi and stood him up straight. “This is between you and me.”
With an enraged grunt, Marshal ripped free and socked him in the stomach, which would’ve hurt if the man wasn’t so damn drunk. Still, Lucas hit back, sinking his fist into the man’s gut, which caused Marshal to double over.
There was more yelling from the outskirts, chants and shouts to stop, but Dobbins’s thugs kept right on swinging at his brothers and Lucas couldn’t let that go. He went for the shorter one, plowing into him until they were both on the floor vying for the best angle to land a solid punch. He got one in, then jumped up to go after the other one.
“Enough!” The voice of authority rang out. Officer Dev Jenkins had arrived.
Everything came to a screeching halt. Holding up his hands, Lucas backed away from the man. For the first time, he glanced around at the mess—broken chairs, glass scattered around the floor from their beer bottles.
Shit.
At some point Gil Wilson, the owner of the bar, had come over. “Get ’em outta here,” he said to Dev, looking truly pissed off. Which also meant he was likely to press charges.
Standing right where he was, Lucas waited for Dev to cuff him. Looked like he’d get to see the inside of a cell again after all.