Finders Keepers (5 page)

The chaplain was the first to make a noise, even though it
was only a clearing of his throat. “Would you mind sharing how this . . . this
. . . signifies your father?” The poor chaplain couldn’t even bring himself to
say it.

Me, on the other hand, had no problem. A cap of Jack was
home sweet home in my world. “Clay liked to drink. A lot. He also liked
throwing empty bottles at me when I did something that irritated him. Like
brush my teeth before bed. Or eat a package of Saltines for dinner. Or, when I
was still dumb and hopeful as a child, ask for a hug before bedtime.”

I noticed Rowen take Jesse’s hand. It was an easy gesture.
Effortless. Almost like her hand had acted of its own accord.

“The bottle that cap came from was the last one Clay threw
my way. The one he threw at me the night he died. Right before I left. The last
one he’ll ever throw at me. I would have brought the bottle, but it was busted
to shit. Totally unsalvageable. But that right there, the cap to a bottle of
Jack, meant Clay died with the good stuff in him. That meant it was the first
of the month and his disability check had just come in. That meant he had a
couple more days of drinking the good stuff out of a bottle before switching
over to the stuff out of a plastic jug that turned a person’s insides. My dad
died with the good stuff in him. That’s all a person like Clay Walker could ask
from life.”

I was still staring at Jesse’s and Rowen’s entwined hands.
The longer I studied their hands, the more I realized I never had and never
would have that. Someone to stand shoulder to shoulder with and take on life
one day at a time. Someone to know what I needed before I even said it. Someone
who loved me without conditions. Hell, someone who loved me even
with
conditions.
I’d been with a lot of women, so many women I couldn’t tell if it was closer to
dozens or hundreds, and never once had I come close to loving a single one of
them. They’d come about as close to loving me.

Whatever Jesse and Rowen had, what Neil and Rose had,
whatever that was, I made sure to steer clear of it. Most of my life, I’d
considered that a blessing. One or both parties falling in love just made
things messy. Complicated the good thing going on. But standing at my father’s
funeral, where a whiskey cap stood in his place, alone and with no one to take
my hand before I even knew I wanted it held, felt like a curse.

“So this cap signifies freedom? Your father’s departure from
this world has freed him from the clutches of addiction,” the chaplain said
after a while.

“Sure, this cap signifies freedom.
My
freedom from
him.”

The chaplain’s eyes widened—just barely but enough to tell
me that I’d said something to shock him. I hadn’t been going for shock value;
I’d been going for the truth. He was back to being tongue-tied, and the air
around me was thick with dead silence, when Josie nudged closer to me. Her hand
reached for mine, twisting against it until my fist released, letting her
fingers weave through mine. Without realizing I’d been holding it, I could
breathe again.

Without realizing exactly what I needed, I suddenly had it.
A measure of comfort exactly when I needed it. A silent need picked up on and
responded to. It was foreign in the best kind of way. Josie’s hand heated mine,
its warmth traveling up my arm and spreading until no sign of a chill was left
to be found. No sign of the winter I’d lived in my entire life was still
around.

“Would anyone like to say any last words?”

The chaplain’s words startled me out of whatever
hand-holding, dreamy world I’d lost myself in. Good thing because that was a
world I couldn’t be a part of. Not because I wouldn’t accept it, but because it
wouldn’t accept me. I gave my head a shake to clear my thoughts, but even if I
wanted to with all my will—which I didn’t—I couldn’t free my hand from Josie’s.
I’d have to make sure the next time she was close by, I didn’t let her hand get
too close to mine. As good as it felt, it would hurt like hell later when her
hand was holding Colt Mason’s and mine was running over the body of some woman
whose name I wouldn’t remember in the morning. Holding her hand was short-lived
and would do way more damage than good in the long run.

“I suppose I should send a sympathy card to Mr. Baker, the
owner of the liquor store downtown, since his best customer won’t stumble
through his front doors again. He’s probably going to go out of business. Now
that’s a tragedy.” I capped my “last words” with a chuckle, but if I thought
the silence had been thick before, I’d been wrong.

The fact that Jesse wasn’t shaking his head and muttering
jackass
or that Josie wasn’t sighing and elbowing me meant my attempt at humor had been
timed badly. Too much, too soon. But how the hell was I supposed to deal with
it? How the hell was I supposed to muster up some last words that weren’t
depressing as all hell or, as I’d chosen, tongue-in-cheek? There was nothing
heartfelt to be said. Nothing even moderately endearing.

For the second time in a few minutes, the chaplain looked
tongue-tied, positively stumped as where to take the runaway train next. That
was when Neil nudged between Jesse and me, making his way up to the chaplain.
Like his son, Neil was sporting a suit. I’d never seen Neil in anything besides
a pair of jeans.

Clasping his hands in front of him, he searched the sky for
a moment. “I know Clay was a man who left a person feeling conflicted most of
the time. A man like him is hard to know what to make of.” I wanted to mutter
No
shit,
but the chaplain was watching me carefully. Probably knew the exact
words I was biting back. “But I will never forget the first time Garth and
Jesse rodeoed together. It was the summer they were eleven years old. Garth was
out there on an ornery, old steer—stayed on the whole time, too—and took one
hell of a score. Clay was standing beside me, and he nudged me, his eyes focused
on Garth, and said, ‘
That’s my boy
.’” Neil paused long enough to make
sure I was looking at him. He nodded, tipping his hat. “That’s how I’m going to
choose to remember Clay Black. As a man who was proud of his son, as hard of a
time as he had of showing it most of the time.” Dropping his attention to the
whiskey cap, he tilted his hat once more before rejoining his family.

The chaplain took it from there, but if someone had asked me
what he said, I couldn’t have told them. I didn’t hear another word after
Neil’s speech. To say it felt like I’d been hit with the biggest sucker punch
of my life would be an understatement. I remembered that day. I’d taken home my
first championship belt buckle, and I’d been so sure Clay had been passed out
drunk in his truck like I found him later that afternoon. I’d been so certain
he missed one of the few times in my life I actually wanted him to be a part of
so he could see what I was capable of and maybe, just maybe, feel a moment of
pride. I’d believed he’d missed that moment, along with the few others that
might have been worth an ounce of pride in Clay Black.

According to Neil, I’d been wrong. Clay saw me that
afternoon. He’d said . . .
That’s my . . .

I don’t need this shit. Not now. Not ever.
Gritting
my teeth, I emptied my head and managed to stay silent and in place until the
chaplain was finished. It was one of the hardest things I’d done.

As the chaplain passed me, he offered yet another small
smile. “Peace be with you, son.”

“Peace has never been a big fan of mine. Or me of it.” My
words weren’t meant to be argumentative but informative. Peace and I resided on
opposite sides of the universe.

“But like you said, your father’s death has given you a new
freedom. Freedom to be and do whatever you like.” The chaplain patted my
shoulder before heading toward the trail. “Give peace a try. I can guarantee
it’s not as overrated as you might believe.”

“Says the man who says good-bye with
peace
be with
you,” I muttered. The chaplain was out of hearing range, but Josie’s elbow in
my ribs confirmed she hadn’t missed it. “And what are you doing here, by the
way? I thought you had wannabe cowboys to date, and mean ones who picked fights
in bars to avoid.”

“I’m paying my respects,” she replied, refusing to make eye
contact.

I huffed. “You hated Clay almost as much as I did.”

“I’m not paying my respects to him.” Turning toward me, her
gaze shifted from the whiskey cap on top of the rock to me. I’d told myself
hundreds of times, possibly thousands, that I needed to avoid looking into Josie’s
eyes at all costs. Every single time she did what she was doing then—staring at
me, waiting for me to stare back—I forgot all of my warnings and broke my
golden rule: stay away from Josie Gibson. “I’m here to pay my respects to
you
.”

My eyebrows came together and, before I could figure out
what she’d said and what I should say, she threw her arms around me, gave me a
quick squeeze, and hurried back up the trail. But not before kicking off her
heels to run up it barefoot.

Jesse came up behind me. “What was that?”

“Women are mysterious creatures bound to make a man crazy if
he spends too much time trying to decode their every move.”

“Amen.” Jesse chuckled. An exaggerated clearing of a certain
young woman’s throat stopped his laugh mid-stream. “I mean, I don’t know what
you’re talking about at all.”

“Having you gone so much this year, I almost forgot what a
little girl you’ve become.” Spinning around, I patted his cheek. “Thanks for
the reminder.”

“I’ve missed you too, sweetheart.” Jesse shoved my chest lightly
then tilted his chin down the river. “Wanna talk?”

Jesse had been trying to talk to me for the past few days,
but I’d done one of the few things I did best and avoided him. Not because I
was avoiding
him
per say, but because I wanted to avoid anything to do
with talking about Clay, what happened, and the all-important what now? The
first two subjects I could navigate if need be. The last one, though—the what
now?—I didn’t have a fucking clue where to start. So I’d been avoiding,
ignoring, and pretty much hiding from Jess.

“Not even remotely,” I answered him, nodding my
acknowledgement as the Walker family passed me, heading back up the trail.
Truthfully, I was touched they’d come, but hell if I could find the words to
tell them so.

“Too bad.” Jesse kissed Rowen, whispered something to her,
and shouldered past me to head down the river. I knew where he was going. We
used to go down there and skip rocks as kids. As we got older, Jesse came down
to fish during the day, and I brought my girl-of-the-hour down at night. Our
favorite rock-skipping spot was a couple hundred yards upstream.

“You’re going to be waiting a while, Walker!” I hollered
after him.

He kept walking. “See you in a minute then.”

“He is a serious pain in my ass,” I said as Rowen came up beside
me.

“Aren’t you two peas in a pod then?” She watched Jesse until
he disappeared before angling toward me. “I’m not going to ask how you’re
doing, and I’m not going to ask if there’s anything I could do. I know those
are the last questions you want to answer right now, and even if you did
answer, your answers wouldn’t be honest, so I’ll just skip all the standard
protocol if that’s okay with you.”

I smirked at her. “You are a fine woman, Rowen Sterling.”

She promptly returned my smirk. “Flattery gets you nowhere
with me.”

I hitched my thumbs under my belt buckle. “And flattery gets
you everywhere with me.”

Her mouth opened like whatever she wanted to say was on the
tip of her tongue, but she clamped it shut, inhaled, and waited a few seconds.
“You know, Garth, if you want to take some time off and get away for a while,
Jesse and I’d be happy to have you at our place. It’s not much bigger than the
cab of your truck, but the couch is yours whenever you need it. Seattle might
not be your ideal scene, but there are plenty of bars chock full of women who’d
jump at the chance to have a real life cowboy show them ‘the ropes.’”

Ah, hell. That was exactly what I didn’t want—people
treating me differently because my daddy had burned to death. Everyone
tiptoeing around me because who knew when I’d lose it. That Rowen was doing
it—the one I was sure would be the last one to treat me like a walking time
bomb—was a sobering reality.

“No fair. You didn’t warn me that the pity patrol were
coming to town.” I wagged my index finger and tried to act like Rowen’s
transformation into sympathetic when it came to me, was anything but
staggering.

“That wasn’t pity, Garth.”

I laughed one hard note. “If that wasn’t pity, what the hell
was it?”

Rowen stepped forward, her eyes narrowing just enough. “That
was one misfit telling another misfit that she’s got your back should you need
it. That was one misfit telling another that you don’t have to go through
whatever you’re going through alone. That was
me
telling
you
that
you’ve got friends. So lean on them, god dammit. Stop acting like every battle
you face is a one-man-war.” Clearly irritated, Rowen headed for the trail. “It
doesn’t have to be Garth Black against the whole world, you know. Give your
friends a little more credit.” If I wasn’t so shocked, I might have thought
about replying. She skidded to a stop, turned around, put her hands on her
hips, and leveled me with a Rowen look. “And if you don’t go talk to him in the
next two seconds, I am going to spread some nasty rumors about you on the
women’s restroom stalls of every public place in the state. Rumors that will
ensure the only action you’ll get for the rest of your life will be from the
soft side of your hand.”

Lifting my arms, I started down the river. “How can I say no
to a woman who talks dirty to me?”

A smile broke on Rowen’s face before she recomposed herself.
I flashed a salute at her before continuing upstream. I hadn’t been up that way
a while, and I’d forgotten how many damn slippery rocks there were. I caught
myself from wiping out every other step, and my slick-bottom boots only made a
precarious situation lethal.