He’d waved as cheerfully as he could manage as she turned out of the back lot, but inside he’d felt miserable. Everything around here was a fucking shambles. Property vultures circling, creeps skulking around. Why couldn’t the chaos look like it usually did—brush fire, rustling, maybe a cougar sighting? Hell, he’d even take a listeriosis scare over all this human drama.
And so it wasn’t until eight that he found himself done for the day. He normally liked to grab a shower before dinner, but when he stepped inside he could smell that his mother had been busy, and suddenly hygiene could wait. He headed for the kitchen, surprised to find Abilene flitting around, not his mom.
“Heya,” he offered, and headed for the fridge, after a beer.
“Hey.” She had a mixer in one hand and a big bowl of steaming, boiled potato chunks before her on the counter. The baby was in her rocker beside the table, those wide blue eyes gazing up at a menagerie of colorful, dangling animals.
“My mom put you to work?”
“Sort of. She seemed stressed-out, so I told her I could make dinner. Well, I mean, she’d already had the meat all seasoned and ready to go. I just put it in the oven and peeled some potatoes.”
She’d done more than that. There was gravy simmering on the range, and when he peeked in the oven there was a pan of vegetables roasting on the shelf above the beef.
“Smells like heaven,” he told her.
“I hope so. Should be ready in about twenty minutes.” She glanced at the oven clock. “I hope Casey’s back in time.”
“Oh right, he’s at his mom’s place, huh?” Miah twisted his bottle open and took a long drink. Goddamn, beer never tasted so good as when you were ready to collapse.
“Yeah,” Abilene said, her voice almost too casual, somehow. “And some other errands, I think.”
“You been feeling okay, on your own?”
She nodded. “I’m not worried about James anymore. If I was on my own all night, I might be anxious, but not for any good reason, you know?”
“Wish I could say I did know.” Miah took a seat. “But this bull with whoever’s been sneaking around has me pretty keyed up myself. One of our hands had to go and stay with her folks until it’s resolved. The whole thing’s got her real uneasy.”
Abilene frowned, dropping chunks of butter in with the potatoes. “I could see that. I mean, the guy was creeping around the bunks, right? And with a camera? Gross.”
“No doubt.”
“Pardon me,” she said. “I’m gonna be noisy for a minute.”
Miah scooted down to the end of the bench, watching the fidgeting baby and sipping his beer while Abilene whipped the potatoes. Man, did this kid have tiny feet. And fingers. And fingernails. Everything, miniature. He wondered how long it’d be before he found himself with a daughter or son of his own. A few years, at least, but he was starting to believe it would still happen, sooner or later. He was over his ex, finally. When he’d still been mired in that heartache, meeting someone new, someone he could love enough to start a family with . . . It had seemed all but impossible.
But time healed all wounds, they said, and he felt ready to move on. Best way to get over one girl is to get on top of another, Vince had told him. That wasn’t Miah’s style. Simply to have a crush on somebody would be a welcome change to his daily life. If only that somebody would turn up. Fortuity didn’t exactly draw the bachelorettes in with its promises of gainful employment and exotic nightlife. He might just be grateful for the casino after all, if that was what it took to bring some new blood to town.
His mom walked in just as Abilene finished with the mixer, followed shortly by his dad. No Casey, but around here dinner waited for no man.
Miah told his folks about Kat’s departure, and about the property scout. The former was sad news all around, and inconvenient to boot, but the latter . . . With a beer cooling his blood and good food in his belly, the whole thing struck him as a touch funny, in retrospect.