They had talked, all right. “A written agreement, even on the back of a cocktail napkin, is one thing,” Dan said. “It’s defensible. But a verbal agreement? Unless there are a bunch of witnesses, that’s a much tougher thing to sell. At first blush, I said I didn’t think you could. Now, I’ve looked into it, and I’m going to tell you straight up—you’re wasting your money. You can’t stop this, Luke. You have nothing to file, no standing. Soon as the ranch is out of probate, it’s theirs to do with what they want. You’d be better off dealing directly with them than trying to find some legal maneuver.”
Deep down, Luke had known that. He’d known it the first night he’d sat with his father at the kitchen table. But when he’d left Dan’s office that afternoon, he had accepted that he was truly defeated. He couldn’t come up with the money. He couldn’t stop a sale. It was done.
He’d also stopped in at his borrowed office while he was in Denver and learned there were problems with his house. The plumbing lines hadn’t passed inspection. It had taken him a couple of days to straighten it all out.
And then he’d gone home to collect a few things, take care of a few things. In his mailbox, he’d found the usual stack of bills, but also a letter from his professor telling him that as he had missed the exam, he had no choice but to fail him. He was giving Luke the opportunity to withdraw from class.
Inside his house, things remained as he and Madeline had left them the last time he was in town. There were beer bottles on the hearth and the floor pillows on the floor. It was a stinging reminder of how foolish he’d been to believe that something magical had happened that night. God, he could be such a sorry sap at times.
He drove back to Pine River and Homecoming Ranch in a sour mood. He could scarcely bear to come up to the ranch and see strangers milling about. He’d meant what he’d said to Jackson—this ranch was the Kendrick legacy.
However, he had to grudgingly admit that Jackson was right, too. He knew it was becoming increasingly difficult to turn a profit up here. He knew Dad was between a rock and a hard place. And he knew that if he’d come home a year or so ago, he might have been able to help Dad turn it around. But what about his houses? What about the work he’d put into his degree, into making his brand-new company work? What about all the hopes and dreams that he’d had for himself, that had been steadily picked off, one by one, as his family faltered?
He didn’t know what to do, and the fact that he’d scarcely been able to think of anything other than Madeline had made him crazy. It reminded him of his high school buddy Brad Levitt, a big nose tackle on the football team. When Allison Rangold broke up with him, Brad had moped around for days and had topped off the humiliation of letting a girl get under his skin by crying on the school bus after a big loss. The guys never let him live it down, and Luke had privately thought him weak.
Now Luke knew that he was weak, too. He still didn’t get it completely, didn’t understand how Madeline had managed to capture him like she had, but he had that woman firmly rooted under his skin.
At the ranch, Luke parked his Bronco in its usual spot. He got out and greeted the dogs, who seemed more excited than usual. They hadn’t had this much activity since Mom died and streams of people had driven out for the memorial service, which was held in the meadow.
Luke walked up to the house, almost colliding with a little tomato that went flying by. Inside, he found Libby in the dining room with three middle-aged women. They were studying what looked like a map.
“Luke! Hey!” Libby said brightly when she saw him. To the women, she said, “This is Luke Kendrick. He’s our…” She stumbled there, trying to think of the correct word.
“Hand,” Luke said, and extended his hand to the Johnsons. That’s what he was now—a ranch hand.
The ladies exclaimed about the property, how beautiful it was, how excited they were about the dance tomorrow evening—the first Luke had heard of a dance—and the shopping in Pine River. One of them warned Libby and Luke to be sure and keep an eye out for Uncle Belo, who was known to wander, sometimes without key articles of clothing.
Luke promised and excused himself. He walked into the kitchen and stopped in the middle, looking around. Something was different. He finally figured out what it was—his mother had stitched four pictures of teapots, and had put them up between the cabinets and the back door. Those pictures—along with any pictures of the Kendricks, anything that would say this house had once belonged to them—were gone.
He had to get out of there, and strode out the back door, down the steps, and through the little herb garden on his way to the trail that led up into the woods. He passed the family picnic area, where three tomatoes were sitting at one of the tables with several beer bottles between them, laughing and talking.
Luke stepped onto the trail and turned into the little path that led to his mother’s garden. The trees had begun to leaf out, covering the entrance, and once he stepped through them, he felt alone. He stood on the tranquil patch of earth, staring up at the sky. Mom, what do I do now?