The Bronc Rider's Twin Surprise
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Lisa Childs
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15,5K
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21
CHAPTER ONE
“WELCOME HOME!”
“Welcome back!”
The shouts startled Dusty Haven so much that he dropped his duffel bag onto the brick floor of the kitchen. Bits of confetti rained to the ground and onto his hat and shoulders. “What the...”
How had they known he was coming home at all, let alone this early on a Sunday morning? And why would they have thrown him a party?
The shouting stopped and a shocked silence gripped the room, like it gripped him. He couldn’t say anything as he peered around the enormous kitchen at the faces of his family. At least, most of his family...
His oldest brother Jake and Jake’s new wife, Katie, weren’t here. They must still be on their honeymoon. He felt a quick jab of guilt over not making it back in time for the wedding, but they’d only given him a couple days’ notice.
They weren’t the only ones missing. Dale and Jenny...
Dusty’s twin and his wife were gone forever since the car accident that had claimed both their lives ten weeks ago.
How can they be gone that long already?
The wound felt fresh to Dusty, his heart hollow from having them ripped out of his life. But their loss hadn’t affected his life as much as it had everyone else’s.
His young nephews were here, confetti stuck to their hands as they gathered around him. Seven-year-old Miller’s cast was off now, but he didn’t look much steadier than he had when Dusty had seen him last in the hospital over two months ago. And five-year-old Ian’s mouth was open, his hazel eyes blank. Had he forgotten already who Dusty was? Or had Ian confused Dusty with his dad, like he had during those first couple of weeks that Dusty had stayed after the accident?
And Little Jake...
If the two-year-old would have said anything before, he was silent now, staring up at him with big, dark eyes. The other little boy, standing with his nephews, was a stranger to Dusty. He had light blond hair and bright blue eyes that were narrowed with speculation as he studied Dusty’s face. He was the first to break the silence.
“Who are you?” he asked, like this was his house, like Dusty was the stranger.
And maybe he was. He certainly felt strange coming back now, knowing what he’d recently discovered. Ignoring the boy’s question, he looked for his other brothers.
With Jake gone, they’d had to step up to help out on the ranch and with Dale’s orphaned sons. The youngest of his brothers, Baker, stood near the French doors to the patio, as if tempted to slip out of them and run away. While Ben, not surprisingly, had his arm around a beautiful woman. Women had always been drawn to Ben. This one was petite and blond. Was the little blond boy hers?
Grandma was here, with Old Man Lemmon of all people. She towered over the short, white-haired deputy mayor of Willow Creek. Mr. Lemmon offered Dusty a slight wave, and Dusty nodded back in acknowledgment. He couldn’t even look at his grandmother, not right now. Not after everything he’d learned. So he just skimmed his gaze over her where she stood near the hearth of the mammoth fireplace.
His eye caught a long sign dangling from the old barn beam that served as the mantel.
“Welcome back fromyourhoneymoon.”
They must have run out of room on the sign. This party wasn’t for him; it was for Jake and Katie. Trays of cookies and glasses of punch covered the stainless-steel countertop of the long kitchen island.
A young woman, with her dark golden hair bound in a braid, stood at the counter; she was nearly as tall as his grandmother. Another woman with wavy brown hair stood beside the taller woman, or rather, almost behind her, as if she was trying to hide from him.
His heart stopped beating for a moment as shock gripped him. What the...
When his gaze met hers, she gasped and dropped the glass of punch she held. Fortunately, the glass was paper and just bounced off the bricks, splashing red punch across the floor. He’d spent the last eight weeks searching everywhere for her. And she was here.
Seeing her was so jarring, he felt his whole body go stiff. But he didn’t have to ask the question burning in his mind. Because he knew...and he finally met his grandmother’s gaze. Her eyes were as dark as the toddler’s eyes, but so full of knowledge and secrets. Somehow she’d known, somehow she’d done this...
He’d already felt so betrayed and now this compounded that feeling even more, overwhelming him. Before he could say or do anything, a door creaked open then slammed shut and Feisty, the little Chihuahua his grandmother had rescued years ago from a hot car, started barking and raced past him to the man striding into the kitchen, carrying a giggling red-haired woman in his arms.
Feisty tugged at the bottoms of Jake’s jeans, growling deep in her throat. Jake chuckled, and the woman in his arms said, “Feisty, you’ll have to wait your turn. I get to kiss him first!” And she looped her arm around his neck and pulled his head down for a kiss.
Applause broke the silence as the others clapped and cheered. And the greetings were shouted again. “Welcome home!”
“Welcome back from your honeymoon!”
“We missed you!” the little blond boy said.
Katie wriggled down from her new husband’s arms and embraced the kid. Though he didn’t look anything like the petite redheaded, green-eyed woman, this was clearly her son. Dusty should have realized that; he knew her boy was living here now. “We missed you too, Caleb,” Katie said, “so very much!”
The little boy pulled back from his mother’s arms and said, his tone almost accusatory, “We used all our confetti on him.”
Jake laughed, either from his new stepson’s comments or from Feisty licking his face. He put down the long-haired Chihuahua and replaced her with the boy, lifting him into his arms. The little kid slung his arms around Jake’s neck and nuzzled close before pulling back to focus on Dusty again.
“He must be a ghost, or some kind of apparition,” Jake mused. “Because it can’t be who I think it is...”
Dusty grinned then, even as his heart pounded hard in his chest and he forced himself to not look at her. He couldn’t see her now anyway as she and the other woman were crouched over on the other side of the island, cleaning up the punch. He’d spent all these weeks looking for her, and she was here. How long had she been here?
“Funny, Jake,” Dusty murmured.
And, really, the entire situation was funny, in that kick-you-in-the-gut ironic way that made Dusty feel as if the wind had been knocked completely from his lungs. It hurt to breathe, hurt for his heart to beat...almost with the same intensity as when he’d gotten the call about Dale’s accident.
Jake’s call...his deep voice vibrating with emotion...
Dusty had known, the minute Jake had uttered his name in that tone, that something was terribly wrong. Tragically wrong...
And then it had gotten worse.
“Is he a ghost?” Caleb asked. Apparently, he’d interpreted his stepfather’s remark as being literal. Maybe that was why he’d been staring at Dusty with such confusion.
That was probably what Dale’s sons also thought as they continued to silently stare up at Dusty. He was identical to his late twin; with his dark golden hair and hazel eyes, he was the only one of the Haven brothers who looked like Dale. Miller and Ian looked like him too, whereas Little Jake, with his dark hair and eyes, was the spitting image of his namesake, his uncle Big Jake. None of the boys had answered their new cousin’s question. They just stared at Dusty as if they couldn’t believe what they were seeing.
But maybe that wasn’t strange since the rest of Dusty’s family was looking at him the same way, and maybe they couldn’t believe what they were seeing either. They couldn’t believe that he was back.
Of course, none of them knew the real reason he’d been gone, except for Grandma, who’d obviously outmaneuvered him. She’d brought her here...
How? How had Grandma known? Had Dale, before he’d died, broken his promise not to tell anyone?
He tried to peer around Jake toward the kitchen island where the brunette had been hiding behind the other woman, but Jake stepped closer to Dusty, blocking his line of vision. He set the little boy back on his feet.
“Caleb, this is your uncle Dusty,” Jake said as introduction.
The little boy gasped and stared up at Dusty, his blue eyes wide with awe. “You’re the famous rodeo rider? You look bigger on TV.”
Dusty usually heard that comment the other way around, that he looked bigger in person. But here, at Ranch Haven, among his brothers, he was the shortest...now that Dale was gone.
The kid continued, his voice nearly shaking with excitement. “Me and Mommy watched you on TV riding bulls and bucking broncos. Is it true you won Midnight in a bet because you were the only one who was ever able to ride him?”
Dusty’s lips twitched with a smile. This never got old—a kid’s excitement over the rodeo. He’d once been that kid himself, in awe the first time his mom and dad had taken him and his brothers to the rodeo. Then every year it had come to town after that, he’d begged his parents to take them back. That had only happened for a few years; then his dad had died and his mom had taken off.
Grandpa had taken him to the rodeo again, unbeknownst to Grandma. He’d done some other things Grandma hadn’t known about either, like sneaking his cigars.
“Did you?” Caleb prodded when Dusty had yet to answer. “Did you ride Midnight?”
He grinned. “I did, but I think it was only because Midnight let me ride him.” The bronco was sensitive, so sensitive that he must have picked up on Dusty’s distress and let him have the win that last time. During their first encounter, Midnight had definitely been the victor, leaving Dusty with a hamstring injury requiring physical therapy.
Jake groaned and shook his head.
“What?” Dusty asked. What had he done wrong now?
“See, Daddy Jake!” Caleb exclaimed. “I knew if I made him my friend that Midnight will let me ride him too!” He turned his attention on Dusty again. “Did you give him lots of carrots? Is that why he let you ride him?”
“Your horse has the best eyesight in the entire state of Wyoming,” Jake said with a chuckle. “Thanks to Caleb here trying to make friends with him.”
“Midnight is friends with Daddy Jake too,” Caleb said. “And with Uncle Ben.”
Dusty snorted. “The mayor’s been playing cowboy?” he scoffed.
Ben stepped forward. “Somebody had to.” He released the blonde to reach out and pat Dusty’s back so hard that Dusty stumbled forward a foot. “I didn’t think you were ever coming back.”
“None of us did,” Baker said as he finally left his position next to the patio doors and joined them.
“Not none of us,” Grandma’s deep voice carried across the kitchen to Dusty. She sounded smug.
Of course, she would have known he was coming back because she was probably the one person who’d known why he’d really left after the funeral. Somehow, she’d known what he’d been missing, and the manipulative old woman had brought her here. But she’d never bothered to mention that to him when Dusty had called the ranch to check on his nephews. She’d never said a word.
But then, he hadn’t either. He hadn’t told anyone except Dale that he was married. Dale was the only one Dusty had told about needing physical therapy for his injury. Dale was the one who’d pointed out to him that Dusty was obviously falling for his physical therapist, Melanie Shepard. So Dusty had been happy to share the news of his elopement with his twin, knowing that, unlike the rest of their family, Dale wouldn’t judge him. But Dusty had sworn him to secrecy. And it had been obvious at the hospital, after the accident, that Dale hadn’t shared his secret with their brothers, just like when they were kids.
After he’d buried his twin, he’d come home to find his wife gone. He’d been searching for her for weeks.
Somehow, undoubtedly thanks to Grandma’s meddling, she’d wound up here. But when Dusty leaned around Jake and peered at the kitchen island, only the tall blond woman stood there now. The other woman was gone.
Had he once again lost his runaway bride?
DIDN’T THINK YOU were ever coming back...
The words reverberated inside Melanie’s head as she leaned back against her closed bedroom door, her right hand pressed against her chest. Her heart pounded fast and furiously. Felt like it was knocking against her ribs. And not just from how fast she’d run up the back stairwell to the second story of the enormous house. It had been beating this hard since Dusty had first stepped into the kitchen and everyone had yelled welcome home and thrown confetti at him.
Everyone but her.
She hadn’t mistaken the sound of boots against the hardwood floor for Jake’s footsteps. It was almost as if she’d known...and maybe she had from the slightly uneven rhythm. Maybe that was how she’d known it was him. Her husband.
Her hand moved from her chest over her swelling belly.
Their father.
Didn’t think you were ever coming back...
Baker had voiced aloud Melanie’s thoughts—and one of her reasons for staying at Ranch Haven once she’d realized it was where Dusty had grown up. She’d stayed because all of Dusty’s family had thought he wouldn’t ever come back, that he’d fled from a family tragedy just like his mom had after his dad’s death. His mother had never returned.
Why had Dusty?
Melanie had overheard some calls his brothers had made to him over the past several weeks, during which they’d alternated between begging and badgering him to return. But he hadn’t. He’d stayed away for two months.
Why was he back now?
A knock rattled the door at her back and she jumped away from it. Had he come for her?
Her heart beat harder at the thought, but then she shook her head. No. If he’d cared anything at all about her, he would have been honest with her from the beginning.
“Miss Melanie...” a soft voice, cracking with emotion, called out.
Her hand shaking, she grabbed the knob and opened the door to her seven-year-old patient. She’d been hired on at the ranch to help heal his broken leg after the car accident that had killed his parents. Tears streaked down his face from hazel eyes the same combination of green and gold as his uncle’s.
“Miller, what’s wrong?” she asked. “Are you okay?”
He nodded, but clearly he was not. She held out her arms and he rushed into them, burrowing close to her. His small body trembled against her as sobs racked him.
Her heart ached. Miller tried to act so much older and tougher than his seven years. He always denied how much he was hurting, no matter how apparent the hurt was, both physically and emotionally. No matter how strong he pretended to be, he was still just a little boy.
Her arms tightened around him, holding him as close as she could, wishing she could absorb his pain. Since Melanie didn’t usually work with her patients for very long, she tried not to become too attached to any of them. But that had proved impossible with Miller.
Unfortunately, he wasn’t the first patient to whom she’d gotten too attached.
“Uncle Dusty just...” he hesitated “...he looks so much like Dad. I know Uncle Jake was joking, but seeing him is like seeing a ghost...” A shudder passed through him, making his small frame tremble again.
Melanie understood exactly what he meant. When Miller’s uncle had walked into the room, it was like she’d seen a ghost too. But not the ghost of Dale Haven.
The ghost of Dusty Chaps, the man she’d thought she’d known. The man she had married...without realizing that he didn’t actually exist. That he’d never been real...that nothing had been real.
