Sleepless in Montana (8 page)

He looked at his brothers. “I guess there’s
just one thing to do....”

Aaron chafed his hands together, grinning at
Hogan. “Play poker. By the way, old man, Jemma says you never laugh
and that you’re not fun.”

Hogan raised his eyebrows and leered. “She’s
got it wrong. Women like me, boys. I’m a charmer.”

“Oh, man, she’s already gotten to you,” Mitch
said, laughing so hard he rolled off the couch. “She says you’re
the worst caveman of the lot... worse than Ben.”

“I’d think she could adopt another family, or
stand still long enough to make her own. She’s had guys after her,
but she either scares them off, or she’s running too fast for them
to catch up. If she starts that hugging stuff, I’m riding out,”
Aaron promised darkly. “Yeah, Hogan, you’re all worked up, looking
like a thundercloud. She cut right to the chase, didn’t she? Laid
you open and bleeding, and she probably walked away without a
scratch.”

“Back off.” Hogan promised himself that Jemma
wasn’t getting to him again.

With a feeling of grim determination, the
brothers settled down to enjoy their last night before returning to
the Bar K, Ben, and the shattered shadows of their lives.

*** ***

Chapter Three

Ben Kodiak sat in his kitchen, his morning
chores already done. Maxi was busy preparing his six-thirty
breakfast. A branch from the old maple tree outside scratched on
the kitchen window as he drank coffee and Ben slid into his
unsettled emotions. He knew his sons would come—to keep Carley
safe.

He was ashamed of the house and land, the way
he’d let it go. But when Dinah had called, he’d offered it and his
life gladly. Her voice had quivered, coming across the telephone
lines, telling how much she feared for Carley.

Ben’s quick proud smile startled him as he
saw his reflection in the window’s glass and he stared down at his
coffee. That girl was a Kodiak all right. His daughter wasn’t
letting a stalker run her away from her work. At first he’d hated
the idea of faking a terminal illness, of seeing the pain in his
daughter’s eyes, but then the thought of his family all together
under one roof had tempered the blow to his pride. He needed that,
he realized, all his children together, under his roof.

Hell, that roof might blow off with the
tempers flying around— his mostly— because he was feeling ashamed
he hadn’t done better. Ashamed that he’d had to sell off part of
the land, that ended in Hogan’s fist.

Hell, he should have given that land to the
boy, but he’d needed the money, and Hogan—well, Hogan needed
something more....

And it took Jemma to stir the brew, to keep
Carley safe on Kodiak land by Kodiak men. Jemma to nudge Hogan’s
impassive shields until that glitter came into his eyes. She could
be hell or heaven to the man who got her for keeps. But he’d have
to be a fast mover, Ben decided, and one that could hold her fast
from her shadows.

Jemma was shrewd and unafraid; Ben liked and
respected her.

He ran his hand over his chest, the faded
flannel shirt covering the gold wedding ring he always wore on a
chain. Dinah, his wife— the mother of his children— was coming back
to him. He’d always loved her, from the first time he saw her on
that Seattle street corner— a classy, well-dressed blond, not a
hair out of place, as she hurried to pick up her groceries, dropped
on the sidewalk.

He’d stopped to help her, and his heart had
stayed for a lifetime. He’d wanted her to marry again, but it had
hurt when she did. Still, he was glad that someone else could give
her tenderness, financial stability, and a whole body.

Ben gripped his thigh, the part of his leg
that belonged to him, and damned the rest, the prosthesis. Dinah
had been the bright flower of his life— in his heart, where she’d
always be. She’d added to his joy and pride in Hogan by giving him
two more fine children, Carley and Aaron. She’d brought happiness
into the old house that his father had built and ruled with that
iron fist.

Ben took a deep breath and stared out into
the wide Montana blue sky.

He had too much of his father, old Aaron, in
him. He didn’t know how to tell Hogan how he felt. He hadn’t told
Dinah, either, except with his body. Then, after the accident, he
couldn’t bear for her to see him— less than he was.

Lovemaking was impossible; not a whole man
any longer, he’d feared how she would look when she saw him that
first time. A strong man, he couldn’t bear his woman’s distaste or
discomfort, and so he had forced her away.

He’d forced away a soft, tender part of his
heart, and now she was coming back.

Ben looked at the shabby kitchen that Maxi
kept clean, the old appliances barely working, the rugs worn and
the furniture battered.

The old house was too quiet after the boys
left, one by one. Hogan had been the first, soaring off in that
beat-up old pickup.

Ben slapped his open hand on the table,
jarring his coffee mug. Something had happened that summer,
eighteen years ago, and his children weren’t talking. They’d locked
some dark secret inside them, and they didn’t trust him enough to
share it. Carley was at the focus of that night, and she’d become a
shadow of the woman she should have been—
what was it his
children kept from him?

Maxi wiped up the spill, her Native-American
eyes soft upon him. “It won’t be so bad.”

“This place is run-down, and that’s a fact.
Dinah should have better.”

“She’s coming to you to protect your child.
The mother in her knows what is best. The woman in her still wants
you, Ben Kodiak.”

“That was over the day that tractor tipped
over the bank and crushed my leg,” Ben said firmly.

“It’s over the day Dinah says it is, and she
hasn’t said that yet.”

“Maxi, you’ve been sipping that tequila
again. That was thirty-two years ago, and then Dinah married
another man.”

“Cow poop,” Maxi remarked eloquently,
labeling what she thought of Ben’s defense.

Dressed in her nurse’s uniform, Savanna,
Maxi’s daughter, hurried into the kitchen, poured her morning
coffee into a mug, and kissed her mother. She’d stayed the night to
visit with her mother, but her town apartment served her needs for
privacy. “Hi, Mom. ‘Morning, Ben. Are you taking those calves to
sale today?”

Ben hated to let the calves go. They were
prime, pretty little Hereford and Angus cross “baldies,” with white
faces and black bodies. By fall they’d be fat on grazing. “I
may.”

Hell, he ought to go out shopping, buy
stuff, fix up the place, but there was no money for that
silliness....

“Got to go. The clinic will be busy on a
Monday. I think they save the disasters over the weekend, just so
they can make it rough. Susan McRoy had her baby Saturday night. A
boy.”

Savanna patted his shoulder, a brief show of
affection that Ben hoarded in his heart. She was almost like his
daughter, and like Jemma. Like Maxi, Savanna visited Hogan, and Ben
was too proud to ask about his eldest son. He clung to the bits
they fed him about his son— how he looked, if he ate well, the
progress on his remodeling of the house.

The boy wanted his home to be on Kodiak land
and that made Ben proud. The land was in his blood, artist or
not.

According to Maxi, Hogan wasn’t sleeping
nights and had a hawkish, shadowy look. He worked too hard,
sometimes all night, ripping into the house, remodeling it. The boy
always had his demons, and he’d paid for Ben’s inexperience at
being a father.

Ben damned himself for his errors; his own
father hadn’t been a loving one. He knew about sleepless nights,
his memories tangling through the shadows of the old house.

Ben was only eighteen when Hogan was bom.
They’d started out badly, and old Aaron had hated his dark-skinned
grandson. He’d tolerated Hogan because if he hadn’t, Ben would have
taken his son and left the big Bar K forever. The first years of
Hogan’s life were spent in bitterness, as Ben battled old Aaron,
and somehow the pattern continued after Aaron died.

Ben swallowed roughly, remembering his little
baby boy— his first son. He’d held Hogan close against him, a young
teenage father faced with too much and a ranch to run. But there
was no going back. With the Bar K needing him, Ben had pushed Hogan
aside as soon as he could.

Memories of Willow had curled around him,
like the scent of sweet grass, and Hogan reminded Ben of her— his
first sweetheart.

Then Hogan had taken care of him, the roles
reversed after Dinah left. Hogan had saved the Bar K in those dark
days, paying dearly with the loss of his teenage years, and Ben
understood— because he’d done the same for old Aaron.

His pride kept him from talking with Hogan,
the bitterness between them too deep. Echoes of their fights
ricocheted around the kitchen. Ben stared up at the ceiling,
remembering....
“You drove her away, Ben”... “Call me Dad”... “I
will when you act like it.”

Goddammit, he’d been so wrong to treat the
boy like his father treated him....But what was done, was done.

Aaron and Carley were a part of Dinah, his
love and his wife, but Hogan was a reflection of himself and
another time, a sweet good time. Hogan sensed the land more deeply,
the shadows and the scents, the seasons, just as Ben did, drawing
them into himself for solace.

But his son was better than he, Ben thought.
In his quiet, certain way, Hogan had the ability to draw the rest
of the Kodiaks to him.

“The boys are coming in. They called this
morning.”
His boys. His daughter. His wife. A family after all
these years.

His children were grown now and still torn by
storms. Carley had sunk into a shadow of her early self and Mitch
still couldn’t find peace.

Aaron had started drawing women to him early,
but he was restless, unwilling to commit. Ben wanted to see the
reaction on Aaron’s face when he saw Savanna again. She’d been a
thin little thing, all elbows and knees and big, black eyes when
Aaron had come home those times.

Savanna had been off to nurse’s training the
last time he’d been home, and now she filled out her uniform. A
sensible girl, Savanna wasn’t likely to fall for Aaron’s
lady-killer ways. She knew men, liked them, but she wasn’t getting
caught as her mother had, unmarried and pregnant.

In the kitchen’s morning light, Savanna
smiled brightly, her blue-black hair neatly pinned into a twist.
She took the money Ben handed her from his battered wallet. “Mom
and I made the beds. I’ve got the grocery list.”

She studied Ben’s expression for a moment,
saw more than he wanted her to, and quickly bent to kiss his cheek.
“Everything is going to be just fine, Ben. Carley won’t know that
you’re healthy as a horse. Those nursing classes you funded will
pay off, and I’ll help keep you alive for a time. You’ll just have
to go die some other time. She’ll have all the protection she needs
here, with you and your sons.”

He studied the worn linoleum kitchen floor.
“Maybe we should get some things for Dinah’s room, a nice rug and a
little table like she used to have— to put her perfume and such
on.”

Ben loved watching Dinah comb her silky blond
hair at that silly little table, cluttered with tiny colorful
bottles and jars. His hands had been too rough to touch her, but
she had given him everything— looked at him with those clear blue
eyes as if the sun set on him. For a time, he believed they would
make a life despite the harshness he’d gotten from old Aaron.
Together the city girl and the rough-hewn cowboy had made a home
and children and had loved.

His hand smoothed his worn jeans to where his
leg ended and the prosthesis began. Habits, he thought. Old Aaron
had taught him that rawhide-rough way of looking at life.
The
unfit didn’t survive.
Dinah had said his missing leg didn’t
matter, that they could go on as before, but his own pride damned
him.

Ben breathed shakily; he couldn’t bear for
her to see him—
half a man.

Maxi looked at his fingers, sunken deep into
his thigh, and smiled at him. “It’s going to be a home again, Ben
Kodiak, with your family in it. You stop worrying.”

“My boys stayed the night at Hogan’s. He
won’t come home even for a meal. Does that sound like they’re
missing home?”

“Sounds to me as if they needed one last
powwow— the beer-buddy kind. You know where men lament the old
days, and see who can belch the loudest? Maybe they needed to talk
about their Celestial Virgins.”

“That’s a damn fairy story.”

“Some don’t think so. There were Chinese
around here then, railroad workers. It’s been verified by
historians.”

“Hogwash.”

When he was young, Ben hadn’t had time to
explore what other boys did, but he knew that his three sons had
probably done just that. No doubt they’d dreamed about their own
virgins, those first times. The subject of women was always close
to the surface when his boys were together.

He rubbed the ache in his heart and
remembered how they were— strong, young, arrogant— with Hogan
leading the pack in a quiet, but certain way that said he knew who
he was and where he was going.

Ben inhaled roughly and stared into his black
coffee. He’d rarely traveled. There were things out there, beyond
his Montana sky— Internet, cell phones, all sorts of gizmos— a
world of stuff he’d never comprehend.

His sons would find him even more behind the
times than when they left all those years ago.

Maxi smiled and patted his shoulder again.
“Everything is going to be fine, Ben. You’ll see.”

“Well, hell, I’m nervous, Maxi. You two women
stop staring and wringing your hands over this old bear. I’ll mind
my manners and won’t run them off before they eat a bite.”