Texas Wedding (3 page)

“So that takes some of the pressure off you?”

“Yes. Off me and off us as a family, but I can’t promise it won’t swallow some of my time.” Jack had to be brutally honest. Otherwise, he’d be trapping Riley into an agreement on something he didn’t really want.

“Okay,” Riley began, “we start by finding the first of your victims.” He frowned as he said that, clearly uncomfortable with the word. “Then we talk to planners and get this place sorted? Or maybe we should do that first?”

Relief filled Jack. Riley was using the
we
word, and that was good. In fact, Riley was making it sound easy.

“There is one thing, though,” Riley warned. “Not thing, exactly… more person, or people.”

“Liam and Darren,” Jack said.

“Yeah, you need to talk to them about this. They’re part of the ranch now. Liam was another victim, and this is connected to Darren’s fucker of a brother, and Darren’s the first person to want to take the blame on himself….”

Riley knew what it was like to have a bastard for a brother. Unspoken was that Liam was important to them, and Liam was happy with Marcus and would probably want the past left where it was.

“I’ll talk to Liam and Darren,” Jack said. “But just between us here, you’re okay with this?”

Riley looked at him, puzzled. “You sound like you’re asking my permission?” He sounded as confused as he looked.

Jack couldn’t look Riley in the eye. “We already have the kids, and the horses, and the riding school.”

Riley crossed to Jack and held him close.

“I don’t think this will be easy at all. But you have such a big heart, and there’s room for so much more. We’ll manage to juggle it all, somehow.”

Jack hugged him back. “Really?”

“Hell, yeah. So where do we start?”

With that, Riley made everything right.

CHAPTER THREE

“Dad?”

Riley saved the file he was working on and turned to face Hayley. He held out his arms and Hayley immediately came in for a hug. She was still in her school uniform and looked like the thirteen-year-old she was.

“Hey, baby.” Riley held her close. “How was school?”

“I need your help,” she said, her words muffled in his shoulder.

“Is it history again?” Riley was sympathetic. He and Hayley loved math but sometimes struggled with all the wordiness that studying history contained. He generally left history to Jack.

“No.” She pulled back and sat on the chair next to his at the desk. “Aunty Eden e-mailed to say that she and Uncle Sean will be away for another two weeks.”

“I know, something about Sean’s book. Did you need your aunt for something?” Eden was very much the go-to for Hayley’s girly dilemmas. “Is everything okay? Do you need me to call Aunty Anna?” Riley’s sister-in-law was first reserve for all things Hayley.

“No, she’s not who…. Willyouhelpmechooseadress?”

Riley blinked at the run-on words, which he hadn’t quite understood. “Sorry?”

Hayley pressed her lips together and looked a little anxious. “For the Valentine’s dance, will you help me choose a dress?”

“From your closet?” Riley stayed away from Hayley’s closet for the most part. She was thirteen now, and he was the dad here.

“No. From a shop.”

“Me?”

“You.”

“Oh.” Riley didn’t really have any more words. Then he leaned forward. Dress shopping with their daughter seemed like a two-man operation to him. “Can we take Pappa as well?”

Hayley’s eyes brightened. “You think he’ll go?”

Riley shook his head that she doubted it. Jack would do anything for Hayley. “Of course. When do you want to do this?”

“Friday? After school?”

“We’ll pick you up and go straight there.”

“And Dad?”

“Yeah?” Riley waited. Any sentence that started
and Dad
invariably was some other milestone in their daughter’s life that was going to add to his already-spotted single gray hair.

“I’m going with a boy. His name is Cory, and he’s a friend of Logan’s.” She looked directly at Riley with that stubbornly determined expression that he knew damn well she’d inherited from him. Words hovered in his head.
You’re not dating until you’re thirty. What’s his last name so I can go have a quiet word with him? Where does he live?
Worst-case scenarios flashed in his thoughts.

I’m too young to be a grandfather.

Shit, how the hell had he managed to get to that conclusion from Hayley’s innocent boyfriend who probably wanted to hold her hand and kiss her chastely. He should calm himself the fuck down and not ask anything stupid. He could do this. He was a dad.

Wait—something occurred to him from what Hayley had just said.

“Logan’s friend? His
younger
friend?”

“No, he’s in the same year as Logan.”

“But that means he’s seventeen.”

“Sixteen, actually. He was pushed up a year. He’s really clever.”

Sixteen was still too many years older than Hayley.
How do I handle this without looking like an idiot?
“What about Logan?” he blurted out instead.

Hayley frowned. “Dad, you know Logan is who I’m going to marry when I’m old like you. I need to practice first.”

With that, she gave him a pat on the head and left with a smile on her face.

She needs to practice? What the hell?

Riley sat exactly where he was for a good ten minutes. How did their daughter get to be old enough to have a boyfriend at a dance, however innocent, and how the hell did they have a daughter who had planned who she was marrying?

Fear and worry soon gave way to more gentle thoughts of the dress they would choose. Something girly and cute and with a longish skirt, like the dresses Hayley had been wearing last summer. As to the older boyfriend? Jack and Riley together could deal with that. But hell, a sixteen-year-old boy only had one thing on his mind.

He turned back to his laptop and instead of carrying on with what he was doing, he powered it down and closed the lid. The twins would be waking up, and he kind of needed that baby hug to remind himself how little the kids were.

Connor was awake and babbling away, sitting up in one corner of his large crib. Lexie, on the other hand, was still fast asleep. Connor reached up to be lifted, and Riley wasn’t arguing. He held his son close as Connor burbled away in Riley’s arms. Carrying him, Connor took that opportunity to grab at Riley’s hair, which smarted a bit.

“C’mon, bruiser,” Riley said with a smile. He disentangled Connor’s tiny fingers, and shifted his hold so that he couldn’t reach his hair.

“He took ages to go down,” Carol said from behind him.

Riley was used to Carol being around now, and her soft voice didn’t startle him. He could sense she was there the same way he could Jack.

“Is she okay?” He placed the back of his hand to Connor’s forehead. He didn’t seem warm, but Riley was terrified that one day he would miss something. He didn’t stir, a tiny curled-up bundle of princess in bright pink pajamas.

“He’s absolutely fine,” Carol reassured. “He fought being put down and here was me thinking it would be Lexie who was going to be the twin that refuses the afternoon nap first.

“Connor loves his bed,” Riley said. He lifted Connor higher and blew raspberries on his belly. Connor curled into the feel of it and laughed. Riley’s heart expanded with love that extra bit. One day, he was sure it would explode with the love he felt.

“Max is in his room,” Carol added. “He was a little overwhelmed with the noise on the porch, and wanted some quiet time.”

“Is he okay?” Riley worried about their adopted son. Autism made the world he took for granted, a strange and challenging place for Max.

“Do you think maybe he’d want to go visit the horses?” Riley asked. He didn’t need to ask Carol, he could check with Max, but Carol knew everything, even the things Max didn’t say.

“He has his snacks packed with Thomas the Tank and water so I think he wants to go somewhere when you came home. You want me to take Connor for a bit?” She held out a hand, but Riley didn’t want to let go.

“Boys’ trip out.”

Carol smiled at him. “I’ll pack his bottle and some snacks.”

“Can you—”

“I’ll pack some snacks for you as well.”

Riley wrinkled his nose at their nanny. Seemed she knew them all really well. “Chocolate?” he asked hopeful that she had baked his favorite cookies today.

“Double choc chip,” she said.

Ten minutes later, with coffee in a travel cup courtesy of Carol, and two cookies in a bag, they were at the front of the house. They climbed down over wood that was being nailed and pushed into place to create the porch area. Robbie and Liam were working on it after they finished with the horses each day, and Jack was joining in as and when he could. It was starting to look like a porch, and Riley was excited to see it finished. Next on the list was new air conditioning, although Jack had called him on that, saying Riley was happier with the noises the old system made. Riley wasn’t going to admit Jack was right, because he mostly was… about everything.

They left the ranch and headed for the horses, and Jack. Connor was in the fancy all-terrain buggy that Riley had found online, and Max a little ahead. Last he’d heard from Jack was that he’d be up there covering for Vaughn, who had a dentist appointment. Apparently, the big man had been felled by one tiny cracked tooth.

Anticipation rushed through Riley. Last he’d seen Jack had been at breakfast, and that was eight long hours now. After yesterday, with the whole “love in the middle of nowhere” event, Riley wanted some more Jack time.

“Riley!” someone called as he got closer to the horses.

Riley smiled to himself—Eli was here and he hadn’t seen his best friend in a couple of weeks. Eli had been part of a photo shoot in Canada: swimsuits in the snow, or something like that. They hugged, and Eli fussed Connor and fist-bumped Max’s Thomas toy.

They walked companionably to the main barn that had been converted, and skirted the small indoor arena where a lesson was being held. Max separated from them, and Riley immediately followed. Max was confident with the horses, but he was still little, and his world was so different from other kids’ views. He needn’t have worried, though.

Max had his favorite seat—a bale of hay that all the staff knew not to touch, albeit replacing it every so often without Max knowing. He sat there now, right opposite Hatty, the Welsh pony, who was visibly vibrating with excitement at seeing her favorite little boy visiting.

Robbie walked in, nodded to Riley, and sat next to Max. They whispered, Max not looking at Robbie directly, but bumping elbows every so often.

“We’re taking Hatty out,” Robbie announced to Riley, who thanked him with a nod. Max thought the world of Robbie, almost as much as he loved Hatty and Thomas the Tank Engine.

“Porch is looking good,” Riley said.

“Liam’s good at that. I’m the hired muscle,” Robbie admitted with a smile, then left with Max in tow.

That left Riley, Connor, and Eli, to find Jack.

“So where’s Lexie, then?”

“Connor here wanted a boy’s trip out,” Riley said.

Eli stopped the buggy with a hand to Riley’s arm, lifted Connor out, then held him and looked directly into his eyes. “We need to find beers, then, Con,” he said with a smile. Connor burbled something back, and with Connor tucked in Eli’s arms, the three of them took the convoluted way to the office.

Jack was on the phone, his back to the door. “…That’s all I have, really. Gabriel Reyes is nowhere to be found, Danny Flynn has gone MIA, and Kyle is refusing my phone calls.” He turned from where he was standing, his eyes widening when he spotted Riley. He waved Riley in, with Eli and Connor close behind. “Okay … Not Kyle, I’ll … Yeah, okay, thank you. Let me know.” He ended the call and crossed immediately to press a quick kiss to Riley’s mouth, then scooped Connor into his arms.

“Hey, buddy,” he said and kissed Connor on the head.

“Where’s my kiss?” Eli teased. Before Jack could respond, Eli raised his hands in mock surrender. “Kidding. I’m going to find my own man.” With a wink, he left the room.

“Hayley has a boyfriend and he’s sixteen,” Riley blurted out.

So much for talking rationally with Jack.

Jack’s eyebrows raised so high, it was comical. “What?”

“Hayley is going to a dance, and her boyfriend is a friend of Logan’s, and he’s sixteen.”

Jack’s mouth fell open. “Hell, no,” he said.

“Exactly what I thought,” Riley agreed.

They stared at each other. Riley wondered if Jack was thinking the same as he was:
older boyfriend. Sex. Grandfathers in their thirties.

“We need to…”

“…do something,” Riley finished.

“Talk to her.”

“Yes,” Riley said. “You do it.”

“What? Why me?” Jack looked like someone had hit him with a sledgehammer.

“Because she’s too much like me.”

“And that makes me the better person to tell her she can’t go to a dance with an older boy, how?”

“Well, you handle me just fine.”

“Riley, you’re a grown man, not a hormonal teenager.”

They stared at each other, and Riley knew his face held the same horror as Jack’s. Suddenly he couldn’t hold back the laughter. This was so serious, yet both of them were wary of their teenage daughter. “We’ll do it together.”

Jack raised a single eyebrow this time. “Joint assault?”

“Agreed.”

Jack tugged Riley into an awkward sideways hug and released him.

“Who was that on the phone?” Riley asked, wanting to change the subject.

“I have a PI tracking down the two missing from the court case. Guy called Ethan Farrell: young, but he’s an ex-cop.”

“A PI? That’s good, right?”

Jack shrugged. “I tried calling Kyle Brandon. His is the only contact number I have, and it’s his workplace. He’s not interested in talking.” Jack’s shoulders slumped a little, and compassion flooded Riley.

“He’s probably dealing with things on his own. You’ve made contact. He’ll do what needs to be done now.”

“Yeah, I know that, but…”