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But her words were all lies.
As she drove down the long driveway, she didn’t have a clue where she was going or what she was going to do.
Chapter Seven
Corbin slowed his brand-new dually truck down to thirty miles per hour as soon as he reached the outskirts of Wilder. As a teenager, he’d hated the speed limit. Now he didn’t mind going slow so much. It gave him time to look around.
When he had left town after graduating, he’d thought he would never return. His ego had been badly stung by the Holiday twins and he’d had no desire to see them or the Podunk town ever again. Then Uncle Dan died and shockingly willed him and Sunny his old trailer and the land it sat on—no doubt because he’d felt guilty about his lack of care when Corbin and Sunny had been living with him. Corbin had planned to sell both the trailer and the land. But when he got ready to put them on the real estate market, something had stopped him.
He still wasn’t sure what.
The trailer was a piece of junk and had been even when he and Sunny had lived there. The land was no more than a half acre of weed-infested dirt. He glanced around at the businesses that lined the one-block main street. His reluctance to sell certainly didn’t have anything to do with this town. Wilder was as dull and boring as every other small Texas town.
And yet, there was some invisible thread that held him tethered. He and Sunny had lived in a lot of places and he cared nothing about seeing any of them again. But this town was different. Maybe it had to do with the townsfolk more than the town itself. He hadn’t formed any bonds in the other places they’d lived, but here he’d had to form bonds. Uncle Dan hadn’t been willing to spend any money on the brats living with him so Corbin had been forced to get jobs so Sunny could go to school looking like the other kids.
He’d washed coffee cups and muffin tins at Nothin’ But Muffins. He’d bussed tables at the Hellhole restaurant and bar. He had swept up hair and cleaned sinks at both the barbershop and the salon. He had stocked shelves and waited on customers at Crawley’s General Store. And he had run errands and been a general gopher for the owner of the town bank. At each job, he’d bonded with the owners: Sheryl Ann, Bobby Jay, Deb Haskins, Joe Marshall, Mr. Crawley, and Fiona Stokes.
Especially Mrs. Stokes.
While ornery and opinionated, the old woman had taken him under her wing and taught him as much as Jesse about money and how to make it. She was a little rough around the edges, but that’s what he liked about her. She never pulled punches.
Which was one of the reasons he’d been avoiding her. Every time he saw her around town, he’d gone in the opposite direction. Like the rest of the townsfolk, he figured she wasn’t happy about him foreclosing on the Holiday Ranch. But he couldn’t keep avoiding her forever.
He pulled into a parking space in front of the bank and got out, wincing when his butt muscles protested. After all the riding he’d done the day before, it was an effort to put one foot in front of the other. He now understood how Belle had felt. And Homer hadn’t even tossed him off.
As soon as he stepped inside the bank, he spotted Mrs. Stokes sitting behind her big maple desk in the back corner of the bank. Her hair was still dyed bright red and she still wore business suits that were fifty years outdated. On the coatrack behind her hung her ratty mink stole that she wore around town no matter the temperature outside. She glanced up, and he wasn’t surprised when a stern frown settled over her wrinkled face.
“Well, if it isn’t the town villain, Corbin Whiplash.” She waved him over.
He complied and carefully eased down in the chair in front of her desk, thankful it had plenty of cushion. “Corbin Whiplash?”
“It’s the new nickname the town has given you,” she said. “Although I guess you’re too young to remember the cartoon character Snidely Whiplash. Anyway, he was a villain who was always tying the heroine to train tracks . . . and trying to take her ranch.”
She had taught him not to show any weakness when making business deals so he didn’t apologize. “I didn’t try,” he said dryly. “I succeeded.”
A smile lit her face, showing off her full set of dentures. He knew this because he’d seen them sitting in a glass once when he’d gone over to her big mansion to help her clean out the attic. It had scared the shit out of him. Of course, seeing her without the teeth had scared him even more.
She snorted. “You always were a cocky boy. It looks like you still are. And you’re right. Business is business. If Hank Holiday was dumb enough to let his feud with Sam Remington make him land greedy, than he got what he deserved.” She pulled a cigarette out of a pack sitting on her desk, but she didn’t light it. She just placed it in her mouth and drew in deeply. “That’s men for you. They think with their egos instead of their brains.” She sent him a pointed look.
“Foreclosing on the ranch had nothing to do with my ego,” he said. “Like I said, it was just business.”
And Sunny.
Sunny was already settling into the Holiday Ranch as if she’d lived there all her life. He’d come downstairs that morning to find her in the kitchen with Darla learning how to make cinnamon rolls. Corbin usually didn’t eat breakfast, but the warm cinnamon rolls drenched in icing were too hard to resist. After sneaking one from the tray, he’d headed to his office with Tay in tow. He’d intended to get some work done, but instead he’d been distracted by the view out his window of Sunny and Mimi working side by side in the garden. Later in the afternoon, he’d watched as Hank taught Sunny how to rope.
Uncle Dan had painted Hank Holiday out to be an arrogant asshole. After what the twins had done to him, Corbin had believed him. Now he realized he’d been wrong. Hank was gruff, but he was also a hardworking man who was patient and kind. He never once got frustrated when Sunny missed the fence post. He just readjusted the rope and had her try again.
As Corbin had watched his sister connect with the Holidays, he’d realized that Sunny would miss the Holidays as much as they would miss their ranch. Letting them stay had been a big mistake. But he couldn’t renege now.
A deal was a deal.
“Don’t try to pull the wool over my eyes.” Mrs. Stokes said. “Foreclosing on the Holiday Ranch wasn’t just business and you and I both know it. I had a front-row seat to your infatuation with Liberty Holiday and witnessed with my own two eyes how hurt you were after your date with her.”
Mrs. Stokes was one of the few people Corbin had told about the twin switch. Sunny and Jesse were the other two. His siblings hadn’t thought it was that big a deal. Mrs. Stokes was more sympathetic.
“And I understand why. No one likes being duped.”
Corbin had been duped. Until the date, his infatuation with Liberty had been all about her looks and popularity. During the date, he’d started seeing the real person behind the beautiful homecoming queen façade. A sweet person who seemed to care about his thoughts and feelings.
