“So you want him to think it’s permanent.”
Ty yanked open the car’s back door and threw the bags onto the seat. The air conditioner blasted not-yet-cold air from the vents. “I don’t want to explain JM’s role in things, is all. Let him think what he wants about us getting married. And divorced.” Just like everyone else.
He shut the back door and opened the passenger door for her. She slid into the seat. He walked around to the driver’s side and slipped behind the wheel, the leather hot, the car still stuffed with stale air. He hit the button to expose the sunroof and pushed up the air-conditioning. It would cool in a minute. “Deal?”
“Sure,” she said with a shrug. “I can play the happy wife.”
He put the car in gear. “Just don’t overdo. Trace may not have a college degree, but he’s sharp as they come.”
*
The low-slung ranch house, with its weed and dirt-spotted lawn, sat back from the gravel road leading off the main highway. Painted what probably once passed for white but was now a yellowed and stained ivory, the main part of the house might have started out as a bungalow, but the hodgepodge one-story additions gave it a cobbled-together look. The driveway was rutted and mostly dirt, though there were enough stones to attest that it originally held gravel. A black pickup, one fender slightly battered, was parked near a dappled-gray wooden barn, evidence someone was home.
Mandy gave a silent sigh as the car turned in. Somewhere inside of her she’d rooted for Trace to have a prosperous ranch, if only to show Ty there were tangible benefits, instead of merely sentimental ones, to protecting one’s heritage. But if the ranch was prosperous, there was no visible sign of it. It wasn’t rundown, just weary looking, as if it were ready to retire.
Ty brought the car to a stop, shut off the engine, and stared out the window, not moving.
Mandy wasn’t sure what to do, so she sat and waited. How long had it been since Ty had been back? By the intensity of his gaze, she’d guess it had been a while.
A figure appeared in the doorway of the barn. Tall, masculine, and lean. Cowboy hat on head. He walked a few paces before another figure, much smaller and female, followed with hesitant steps.
“He has a daughter?” she asked. Ty had never mentioned a niece.
“Not that I know of.”
Ty opened the door and slowly unfolded to stand with the door blocking his body. Mandy exited the car, closing her door behind her.
As Trace lumbered closer, his gate long and rolling, she noted the family resemblance in the color of the hair, the slender but muscular physique, the height, and the long straight nose and chiseled cheekbones. Though a portion of his face was shaded by the hat brim, Trace was a weathered version of his younger brother. Just as handsome but in a rougher, less polished way. Her gaze swept to the little being tailing him. The girl was probably around three or four and had the same dark shade of hair as the Martin boys, cut short and hanging straight in a child’s pageboy cut. A lopsided pink bow was stuck on the right side, and the tip of her ear showed through strands of hair. She had on a pair of pink denim pants and a pink T-shirt, with matching pink sneaks, and in her dirt-streaked arms, she held a stuffed brown puppy against her small chest.
“Ty.” Trace nodded before shifting his gaze to take in Mandy. “Ma’am,” he said in a western drawl. He was close enough now that she could see his hazel eyes, and though tall, he was probably an inch shorter than his younger brother.
“We were just returning from a business trip to Texas when I got your call. Mandy asked to come with me. Mandy Prescott and I were married this past week.” Ty said the words matter of factly, with no display of emotion—not joy, not anger, just a flat voicing of the essential information.
Shock stole across the elder brother’s face. He stared at her finger, where no ring resided, and Mandy resisted the impulse to hide her hands behind her back. His gaze shifted to her stomach in a cold appraisal of the situation. An appraisal she resented. “Mandy Prescott Martin,” she said, extending her hand. “And no, I’m not pregnant.”
His eyes rounded, but he took her hand and shook it, his own hand rough and cold. But still he said nothing in response to the news. Just stared at her.
“Seems we both have some surprises to share,” Ty said, looking down at the little girl who hid behind Trace. She didn’t cling to Trace, or even touch him. She stood stoically behind him, watching with wide eyes.
“Seems we do,” Trace said without offering an explanation. “Let’s go in the house.”