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Well, except in looks.
Britt smothered a groan and let her head loll back on the cushion of the recliner.
Her body hadn’t been the only thing tossed into complete chaos up in those rocks.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Cody watched Keller and Sydney walk out toward the barn, holding hands. The sight gave him that odd feeling of satisfaction and wistfulness again.
It’s the damned air around here lately. It’s infectious.
That had to be it. There was freaking love everywhere. That was what had him so…wound up. It had to be. Didn’t it?
As he watched his eldest brother, the one who had gone from boy to man in the space of one visit from the military chaplain to tell them life as they’d known it was over, he thought of the conversation they’d had when he first got back from Chance’s place.
“You didn’t like Sydney at first,” he’d said.
Keller had raised his brows at him. “As I recall, you were the ringleader on that front.”
“I know I was. And I know I didn’t like her being here for all the wrong reasons. But you took some convincing, too.”
“I had to look out for Lucas. Be sure she was the best thing for him.”
“And she turned out to be the best thing for both of you.”
Keller had smiled. “That she did.”
“When did it change? How did you know?”
Keller had stared at him for a long, silent moment that had Cody feeling uncomfortable. Because it was as if he was looking at him with Dad’s eyes, those eyes that had seen so much, down to the heart of his children.
“I knew when it became too much to fight off any longer,” he finally said. “That’s when I saw who she really was, not who my worry about Lucas was telling me she might be.” He’d paused, then added in a voice full of such understanding it made Cody edgy, “But I didn’t have a lifetime of battling with her to give up.”
A lifetime of battling with her. Only one person fit that description.
I swear, you two. Sometimes I wonder. And then sometimes I’m certain.
What had his mother really been saying? Or rather, not saying?
He gave a sharp shake of his head, turned on his boot heel—he’d gone to his not so often worn cowboy boots since he’d been working over at the Roths so much—and headed back to his lair. Where, because he had to move, he started pacing the main room. For one of the few times in his life not even looking at the monitors, which were all still asleep anyway. He’d been in no mood for gaming, business dealings were beyond him just now, and he hadn’t had a drone up since Sunday, when it had happened.
This was insane. He was only spending all this time with her because she was injured. And because it was his fault. Nothing else.
He spun around and headed the opposite direction.
Isn’t there a borderline psychotic horse involved here somewhere?
Yes, Ghost was exactly that. He knew that firsthand now; the damned mare spooked at a fluttering piece of hay she’d just stirred up herself. But did that really change anything?
Are you going to tell her?
I have to, don’t I?
Only if you want to live with yourself.
So he had to tell her. And soon. She was being so nice. When he told her the truth, that would end. But the longer he waited, the worse it would be; he knew her temper too well. She’d blow up at the idea she’d been nice to him when in truth it was all his fault.
But he had to. Chance was right about that. Tomorrow, he thought. After she got the new cast and was able to do more for herself, then he’d tell her. And endure the blast, because he deserved it. Then he could go back to his side of the line and she to hers, and life would return to normal.
