Cody’s gaze shifted away. “I don’t think so. I think it’s time I cut the ties to White Pines.”
“But you love it here, more than any of us,” Jordan protested, realizing at last the depths of Cody’s despair. “It’s in your blood.”
“I know,” he admitted, unshed tears visible in his eyes before he turned away to hide them. “Look, you can get out of here now. I’ll be okay.”
“I’m not leaving,” Jordan insisted stubbornly. “Sleep on this. Maybe in the morning things will look different to you.”
“Nothing will change,” Cody declared grimly.
“Just give it until morning.”
Cody tried to stare him down, but eventually he nodded. “If I do, you’ll handle things with Daddy?”
Jordan heaved a sigh of resignation at the renewed note of determination he heard in his brother’s voice. He knew in his gut that Cody wouldn’t be swayed. Under the same circumstances, he probably wouldn’t have been, either.
“I’ll do my best,” he promised. “On one condition.”
Cody regarded him suspiciously. “What’s that?”
“You’ll tell us where you are. You won’t cut yourself off from the family.”
His brother nodded. “If you’ll swear that none of you will ever tell Melissa where I am. I don’t want to ever hear her pitiful excuses for what happened tonight. I don’t ever want to see her again at all.”
Jordan thought his brother was protesting a little too much, but he agreed. “We’ll keep your whereabouts from her, if that’s what you want. I’ll see that the rest of the family agrees.”
“Jessie, too?”
Jordan grinned. Their sister-in-law was a soft touch when it came to romance. “Jessie, too,” he promised.
He bunked out on Cody’s lumpy old sofa. Eventually he went to sleep, still praying that by morning his younger brother would come to his senses. No matter what he’d promised and would do if he had to, he really, really didn’t want to be the one to explain to his father that Cody had taken off.
Harlan Adams had a tendency to fly off the handle and go after the messenger when he got bad news. This particular message was very likely to get him blasted with a shotgun.
6
Cody was gone when Jordan awoke at daybreak. Obviously his brother had managed to find the truck keys in his pocket or he’d had a spare set hidden away that he’d forgotten about the night before in his fury over his girlfriend’s betrayal.
Jordan groaned as he thought about what his father’s reaction was going to be to the news. He worried, too, about whether Harlan could still handle all of the ranch’s strenuous activities. As vital and fit as his father was, he had been depending more and more on Cody to run the day-to-day operations at White Pines. It was something that would have to be discussed, but to be perfectly honest, Jordan dreaded getting into it. His father hated even the slightest hint that Cody’s role at White Pines had gradually become equal to or even more important than his own.
First things first, though. He had promised Kelly he’d be back this morning to offer more help with the fences. She’d probably be delighted if he failed to show, but he wasn’t about to give her an excuse to accuse him of letting her down. Obviously she already had a lot she was blaming him for, garbage from their past he hadn’t even been aware was simmering in her head. The workings of the female mind had always been a puzzle to him, except with Kelly. Now it appeared she was falling into that same incomprehensible pattern of behavior.
With some reluctance he reached for the phone and dialed the ranch. To his vague relief, Dani answered. At least with her, he wouldn’t have to explain past actions.
“Hi, Jordan,” she said so eagerly it made his heart flip over. “Thanks for the pizza. It was scrumpsi-delicious.”
He grinned, despite his mood. “I’m glad you liked it.”
“Did you and Mommy have a fight after I fell asleep in the car?” she asked, a frightened note in her voice. It was the concern of a child who’d already seen her father walk out of her life, no doubt after more than one angry exchange with her mother.
Jordan’s heart thudded dully. How much could she possibly have heard? Why the devil hadn’t they been more discreet? They’d both assumed that Dani was sleeping soundly in the back seat. “Why would you think that, munchkin?”
“Because Mommy looks all sad this morning and she yelled at me for watching a video instead of coming to take my bath.”
So, Kelly looked sad, did she? He’d have to think about what that meant. As for her attitude toward Dani, he was pretty sure he wasn’t the one responsible for that. “How many times had she called you to take your bath?”
“Once,” Dani said.
Jordan had his doubts. “Really? Just once?”
“Maybe it was twice.”
More likely double that, Jordan guessed. “Don’t you think that could have had something to do with why she yelled?”
Dani sighed. “Maybe,” she conceded. “She still looks sad, though. Are you coming over?”
“In a bit. Is your mom there?”
“She’s in the shower.”
The vivid image that appeared in Jordan’s mind could have steamed up the whole state of Texas: Kelly naked, slick with water, her body provocatively covered with suds, his hands sliding slowly over her. He nearly moaned out loud, then caught himself. Thoughts like that about Kelly had never occurred to him in the past or, if they had, he had banished them at once. It was getting more and more difficult now to forget such images.
“Okay, munchkin, would you be sure to tell her I called?” He was proud of the steadiness of his voice when his pulse was still ricocheting wildly. “Tell her I have to spend some time with my father this morning, but I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay? Can you remember that?”
“I can remember.”
“Tell her the minute she gets out of the shower.”
“Okay. ’Bye, Jordan.”
“’Bye, munchkin. See you later.”
Jordan left Cody’s shortly after hanging up.
