Over the past two days, she'd used the parts Rick had found them to get one of the tractors, a sixties-era Deere, running. It still needed a paint job, but she was making good progress. Maybe she was working all hours of the day to keep her mind off her ordeal. He wasn't going to argue with her while he'd spent hours working on the fence. He couldn't afford to have the cattle escape again.
Her shoulders drooped. "Fine." She moved through the kitchen and upstairs. He doubted she would go back to bed, so she was probably getting ready for the day.
"You should bring whatever you're working on inside," he called up the stairs. The storm meant she wouldn't be able to work outside today.
And gave Cord an excuse not to find out where Noah lived and go to visit him. Since seeing Jilly at the swap meet, his former friend had been heavy on his mind. Would Noah even talk to him? Doubtful.
He'd work on tearing out the rotted wood in the barn. The drafty building would at least be warmer than working outside. He hadn't had the guts to start on the house yet.
His memories pressed on him in every room. Grandma Mackie's voice griping at him. You failed that math test? Failing now, gonna grow up a failure. Just like your dad.
He'd been an average student. She'd ridden him hard. West, too.
Maybe those echoes from the past were why seeing Molly wrapped around that mutt had shocked a memory loose.
From when he'd been fifteen. West would've been all of thirteen, sleeping with a baby calf in a pile of hay in the barn. Grandma Mackie had been worried about him, looking for him when he'd been missing from his bed.
And then she'd smacked West across the face when he'd dared to tell her he was staying in the barn with the newborn calf that had lost its mama.
Cord rubbed a hand down his face.
He wasn't Grandma Mackie. And he wasn't his dad either.
But that still didn't mean Molly could sleep in the drafty mudroom on the floor.
The phone rang as Molly was scrubbing the last dish from lunch. The farmhouse didn't have a dishwasher, and her hands were pruny from the hot water.
Cord hadn't come in for the noon meal. Wasn't he hungry? And cold? The barn wasn't heated. But he was working hard, like her, to outrun his demons. His seemed to live in this house.
The ringing phone offered a distraction.
And raised her heart rate.
The last time she'd answered her cell phone, it had been Toby's voice coming through the line, delivering a sinister threat.
But Toby didn't have this number.
Still, her hand shook as she picked up the corded receiver from its wall dock. Who even still had a landline? "Hello?"
There was a pause, one long enough that her heart flew into her throat.
"Who's this?" came a male voice, one she didn't recognize.
Not Toby.
Her muscles went weak and she sagged against the wall, still holding the receiver to her ear. "Molly."
"I've been dialing this number for years and never heard of a Molly. Pretty sure I didn't mis-dial. Where's Cord?"
The connection was awful. Tinny and full of static, as if the caller were far away.
"Is this West?" she asked.
There was another pause. "Now you've got me at a disadvantage. I don't suppose my brother brought home a girlfriend?"
He actually sounded hopeful.
"Sorry to disappoint. I'm working here temporarily."
"Well, shoot. I thought maybe he'd done something good for himself for once."
It didn't sound as if he was smiling as he said the words. What had happened between the brothers to cause the tension she'd seen in Cord?
She shook away the curious thoughts. "I'm—I'm sorry about your grandma."
There was a pause. "Thanks. Is Cord around?"
"He's been down at the barn all morning." She stretched the phone cord to glance out the window. No sign of his truck. "I can give him a message. Should he try to call you back?" Was that even allowed?
"He won't." The teasing had completely disappeared from West's voice. "Thanks anyway."
"Wait." She was afraid he would hang up. "Should I tell Cord... how are you doing? Do you need anything? Can we take care of anything for you over here?" She'd never had a close friend in the military. Didn't know if there might be loose ends in the States that needed managing. It seemed like the right thing to ask. Someone needed to care for him, right?
He paused for so long that she wondered if they'd lost the connection.
Then, "You can take care of my brother, if he'll let you. Good bye, Molly-girl."
She stared at the phone for seconds before she hung it up. What a strange thing to say. Cord was a grown man. He didn't need taking care of.
Except... she'd seen the shadows in his eyes when he'd been confronted with both Iris and Jilly. Not a family legacy I want to carry on. He was shut down like a bank vault about Mackie and his years in this house.
And there was that unopened Christmas gift beneath the tree.
Maybe he did need someone to look after him. Not that he'd ask or allow it.
But that didn't mean she couldn't do it anyway.
It was the least she could do after he'd given her a place to hide.
Late in the evening, Cord sat at the kitchen table, listening to chips of ice crash against the window. He had a headache from staring at the papers spread in front of him. Stupid fine print.
He'd had to use the library's computer to print out a copy of the loan documents the attorney had forwarded him.
When the cold had driven him inside from the barn, he'd read through every page. There had to be a loophole somewhere, some clause he'd skimmed that meant he wasn't chained to the No Name.
It was hopeless.
Just like the barn.
He'd spent hours knocking out a few stall walls that were barely
