“Grandma Kate really has it right, you know. Things will turn out the way they’re meant to be.”
Leesa thought so, too. She just hoped that how things were meant to be was exactly the way she wanted them to be.
* * * *
“Wow, J. Coop. You look dumbstruck.”
Phillip’s words brought Jason’s head up. He met his cousin’s gaze then nodded. “Dumbstruck is a good word. Yeah, you could say that.” He’d just come back to the house from a short run out to the grocery store. He’d planned a short trip out for steak then would get busy on getting to work on his client files.
Their home office was the best-outfitted home office they’d ever had. And every single item here, except their laptops, had come from the “family warehouse.” That had been another, as Phillip put it, “dumbstruck” moment.
“I ran into a couple of people at the store. I think you’ve met them. Jordan and Peter?”
“I have. They’re married to Tracy of the amazing cream puffs, aren’t they?” Phillip sat back in his chair, giving Jason his complete attention.
“They are indeed.” Jason didn’t know if he could put into words the emotions that were tumbling through him. “I had been under the impression that their last name was Kendall.”
Phillip tilted his head. “It isn’t?”
“No, they decided to have their names changed for two reasons. First, because each of the men wanted to carry the other’s name, because they are married to each other, as well as to Tracy. And also so that they reflected both men’s paternity for their children. They’re, all three of them, the Alvarez-Kendalls.”
“Alvarez.” By the expression on his cousin’s face, Jason knew he recognized the name and was trying to place it.
Phillip shook his head. “Who did we used to know of by that name?”
“Julián Alvarez. Mega venture capitalist who left New York just as we were beginning to make some headway in our own business.”
“Now I remember! The man who walked away from it all at the top of his game. Is he related to Peter?”
“Julián is Peter’s brother. And apparently, he’s living a couple of hours from here, at the edge of a city called Divine. He owns a ranch, with his best friend, Chris, and their wife, Gwen, whom Julián met when he worked the rodeo circuit.”
Jason was still blown away that the man he’d once seen give a seminar wearing a three-piece Armani suit had worked the rodeo circuit.
“Well, that’s a hell of a coincidence, isn’t it?” Phillip asked.
“Oh, it is. Then I ran into Craig Jessop, and we chatted for a moment. Do you recall that movie we saw a couple of years back? Finesse?”
Phillip’s face split into a huge grin. “It’s still one of my favorites. It won a couple of Oscars, I think.”
Jason folded his arms in front of his chest. “It did. And one of them was for the screenwriters. A set of triplets. I think the tabloids used to refer to them as the three Valentinos. Their names are Paul, Wes, and Lucas Jessop.”
“Jessop? As in Lusty, Texas, Jessops?”
“As in the sons of Craig and Jackson and Anna Jessop, yes.” Jason had been shocked when Craig had said he was getting extra steak because the boys and their wife were flying in from L. A. and were coming to supper. And then told him which boys he meant.
“This isn’t such a sleepy little town after all, is it?”
“It’s not, no.” Jason ran a hand through his hair. Then he sat down and looked at his cousin—his best friend. “I’ve come to the conclusion that everything I’ve believed about how to succeed, how to get ahead…is fucking bullshit.”
“It’s not.” Phillip sat forward. “The only part that might be is believing you had to live that discipline twenty-four/seven or that your way was the only way.”
“Peter told me his brother left New York when his doctor warned he was on a short track to a heart attack. He also said that Julián came to the heart-truth that there was more to life than chasing financial success. Now he’s married, one of two fathers to a little guy, and happy. Very happy, and Peter looked pleased as hell when he said that. I thought that maybe that was a lot of family sharing with someone he didn’t know all that well. And then I began to think.”
“About what?”
“About everything that’s happened since we came here, I guess. Oh, not about being drawn to Leesa and…and how we are with her. But the rest of it. The family part of it.”
“Before you say another word, I have something to tell you.”
Phillip appeared as serious as Jason had ever seen him. He looked, really looked, at his best friend and realized he felt nervous about what he was about to reveal.
“All right. I’m listening.”
“It was something I noticed at the twins’ house that first morning when we had breakfast there. When you told your folks that we were staying in Lusty for a while? They looked...relieved. Like they were really glad you were going to be here and spend time getting to know these relatives.”
“Huh.” Jason had missed that, but he wasn’t the least bit surprised that Phillip had caught it. He’d known, for a long time now, that the main reason they worked so well together was because they balanced each other out. Phillip was more observant than he was, especially when it came to people and the emotional side of things. For his part, he could read trends in the markets and seemed to have a talent for picking winners.
Had his parents wanted him to spend time specifically here? Or had they just wanted him to take some time off? They’d been subtle, both of them, but Jason had understood they thought that he worked too hard and that he was too rigid in his ways.
“I just realized something. I
