Page 64 of The Cowboy’s Reckoning

“I recall being shuffled around. A lot of confusion. And that part about my mom not coming back … I did not understand.” He dropped his arm around her. “Then I ended up at this man’s house. Now I hadn’t been around a lot of men, and I wasn’t sure what to make of him, but he had these other little boys, and they were glad to have me there. Wanted to show me all their stuff. I really remember that part because I didn’t have much.” He fell silent. A gust of wind hit the trailer, rocking it a little, and his arm tightened around her. “I don’t know what would have happened if my biological father had rescued me instead of letting me go into foster care. I wouldn’t have had the life I did, and I like this life, but I’m still beyond pissed that he didn’t even try to do the right thing when he obviously could have.” Jordan looked down at her and tipped up her chin with the tips of his work-roughened fingers to give her a quick kiss.

She slid a hand around his neck and pulled his mouth back to hers, claiming him while he was hers to claim.

And the claim ended exactly where she’d hoped, in the trailer’s bunk, with Jordan making her believe in enjoying the here and now. It wasn’t a practical solution for every occasion, but it was becoming her go-to.

Could she walk away right now if she had to?

Of course she could. But why would she? They understood one another.

Lil woke when Jordan stroked the hair away from her face, surprised that she’d fallen asleep, and propped herself up on her elbow. “I need to go.”

Lil thought he was going to protest, but instead he cupped her face with his palm, brought his forehead down to touch hers in an intimately reassuring way that made her throat feel tight.

She started to get out of bed when Jordan’s phone rang, and he reached behind her to retrieve it off the window ledge. He said hello with a note of anticipation in his voice, and she eased back onto the bed next to him.

After listening a moment, he said, “I understand.”

Lil could tell that he didn’t like what he’d just heard.

“Sure. We can tweak things. Yeah.” He kept the phone in his hand as he flopped onto his back. “That was the bank. Apparently, I’m in an unstable employment situation. What sucks is that I am because I chose to be. Even if I managed to snag a contract in the next few weeks, it’d be too little too late.”

“Even with this place as collateral?”

“Foreclosure is expensive.”

“You’re right,” Lil said, having just gone through one. “The bank guy kept whining about their expenses when our ranch went on the block. But I thought that with you being an engineer with a long job history … I guess you actually have to have a job.”

“Landlord isn’t enough.”

She took his face between her hands and gave him a soft comforting kiss. When her lips left his, she slid her hand around the back of his neck and she touched her forehead to his, just as he’d done earlier. She hated that he was fighting this battle.

“I have to go talk to my brothers. We’ll modify the application.”

“What about the time factor?” she asked as he got out of bed.

He slid his legs into his jeans. “There are some things we just can’t change.”

*

“We could swing this if it wasn’t for the time crunch.” Jordan slumped back in his chair.

He and Wade and his brothers had been at the table since he’d arrived, debating different financial scenarios. The one given was that they would not mortgage the Tree Fork. Trev offered to apply for a raw land loan again, as did Wade, but the time factor was working against them.

“In hindsight, I should have started the mortgage process as soon as Jim gave us the heads-up about the property.” Jordan reached for the closest glass.

“Connery’s deal was good,” Wade said. “And if I recall, they didn’t throw that no-tenant thing at you until late in the process.”

“At first, I thought it was because they didn’t know the terms of the lease, but now I think they did and were laying groundwork. Costing Lil and Meg enough money that they’d consider the buyout.” By that time, he was deep enough into the process that it was hard to stop the wheels rolling.

“Don’t worry if someone else gets the Reed property,” Wade said. “They may not want to stay.”

“Why’s that?”

“I have a plan.”

Jordan could tell by the way Trev’s eyes shifted downward that he’d already heard the plan.

“It involves pigs,” Wade said on a satisfied note. “Lots of pigs. It’s time we diversified.”