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Annoyingly, he turned and walked away without another word. The back view was just as amazing. Especially that backside of his, filling out those jeans in a way that made the pockets…tempting.
She told herself he was being rude and called after him, but he ignored her, annoying her even more.
But the most annoying thing of all, besides that he managed that dramatic vault again, even holding on to the shirt with the pieces of the broken drone, was that all she could think was that Cody the Coder was dazzling.
Chapter Three
The only tool I see here is you.
Dead drone still wrapped in his shirt—it rattled, she’d so thoroughly destroyed it—Cody mounted Trey and headed home. He filed that taunt away with all the other things she’d called him over the years. Considering how many times they’d been at each other’s throats that file was about a terabyte by now.
“Just forget about it, Cody,” his mother always advised when they had another squabble.
“Wait, aren’t you the same person who keeps bragging my memory is prodigious?” was his standard response.
It had become a joke between them, but there were times—many times—when he wished his memory wasn’t quite so good. Because it wasn’t that he wanted to remember every time Roth had yelled at him, or every word of every angry thing she’d ever said to him, he just did. Like he did most things. It was just the way his brain worked.
The consolation was it came in handy much more often than not, like when he was writing a program or app, or when someone needed to know exactly when this, that or the other thing had actually happened. It had also helped him get through some classes in school that had required mainly remembering events and dates, with little effort.
Some people thought that made him brilliant. He knew better. Because one of those things he remembered vividly was his father explaining it to him, also on that last time home.
“It’s a knack you’ve got, that memory for technical details, son. And it’s a particularly useful one. But don’t go thinking it makes you better than someone who doesn’t have it, because they’ve probably got a different useful trait you don’t. Like your brothers do.”
“But all inherited from your father,” his mother had added, with a look at Dad that had made Cody feel funny inside. Funny, but good. When he’d been older, he’d realized it had been the comfort of the unassailable knowledge that your parents loved each other completely.
And Mom had been right, Cody knew. Keller had Dad’s sense of responsibility, which had helped save them all. Chance had his devotion to duty and country and had made them all as proud as they’d been worried. And Ry was every bit the artist their father had been, although it had taken Kaitlyn to get him to admit it.
And he himself had inherited this, his version of his father’s logistical brilliance, the aptitude for something that happened to be the biggest thing on the planet right now. So their father had left them each something, something that made them who they were.
Something that didn’t even come close to making up for losing him.
Trey let out a sharp snort, giving Cody a split second of warning before the horse danced sharply sideways, jarring him out of his reverie. It was just enough time for him to instinctively settle himself to stay aboard. He looked around for what had set the horse off and saw the tail end of a rattler slithering out of sight behind a rock he’d probably been sunning himself on, taking advantage of the warm almost-spring day.
“Thanks for the alert, buddy,” he said, patting Trey’s neck. “Extra apple for you when we get back.”
Trey nickered in approval of that idea.
The horse’s gait was a bit exaggerated for a few yards, as if he were on the lookout for the snake’s brethren, but eventually he settled back down. And Cody smiled wryly at his mother’s wisdom in assigning him the smart animal. She knew him well.
Maggie Rafferty knew all of them well. How they thought, what they wanted, and often what they needed even before they did.
Like she’d known almost immediately how Sydney would change things for Keller, and all of them. Had known Ariel would bring the healing Chance needed. And that Kaitlyn would reach Ry in a way none of them had ever been able to.
He suppressed a little shiver that seemed quite out of place on this warm March morning, even without his shirt on. Warm, but not hot. Nobody Texas born and raised could think seventy-six was hot. Still, he couldn’t explain the shiver. Except for the feeling he tried to quash, that now that his brothers were settled, Mom was going to turn her sights on him. And he very much did not want to be the one she was focused on. She was too good at getting done what she wanted done.
His only advantage at the moment was that she was so busy with the upcoming Bluebonnet Festival that she didn’t have much time to think about him being the only Rafferty son left footloose and fancy-free. Yet. But given time, it was inevitable. And he wasn’t sure how long he could use being the youngest as a shield. He hoped it would at least buy him another couple of years, until he turned thirty. Maybe.
Thinking of the festival, he supposed he should be glad the pieces he was carrying weren’t from his newest baby, the video drone. He was proud of that one, with the hi-res camera, his new stabilizing system, the long-distance remote control, and above all the edging closer to his holy grail, time and distance flown on a single battery charge. He’d put it together specifically at his mother’s request; she wanted a long, uninterrupted flyover video of miles of Hill Country bluebonnets for the festival website.
Now he just needed the perfect combination of weather and blooms, and as soon as possible, so he could get it posted. Mom said after the winter they’d had, there probably wouldn’t be any February or early March rush of blooms. So given they wanted the video up as soon as possible he wouldn’t have much margin since the festival was the second weekend in April. But he already had it all planned out, mentally. Most importantly, he knew his spot. He wanted that sunrise effect, with the camera capturing how the blue of the early morning sky matched the blue of the flowers, then as the sun rose and flooded the hills the incredibleness of it all burst to life. If he could pull it off, it would be spectacular.
By the time he had Trey back in his stall, he was calmer. In no small part because Lucas, Sydney’s young cousin Keller had taken in after his parents had been killed, was in the barn saddling up to go for a ride and chattered the entire time; it was good to see the kid happy.
But as he walked toward the house and saw his mother standing on the porch by the front door, wariness spiked. Something about her posture was all too familiar. Somebody was in trouble. It obviously wasn’t Lucas, and he was the only other one home at the moment.
And she didn’t wait to let him know. “I’d ask if you were raised in a barn, but you’re usually more careful with the barn doors.”
His brow furrowed as he thought back to the moments after he’d seen the blast that had wiped out the drone. He’d simply leapt to his feet and charged out to the barn, intent on getting over there as fast as he could. It was entirely possible he’d blasted through the front door and not bothered to see if it closed behind him.
