“The Game of Life,” she announced, grabbing the box off the bookshelf and walking back to the table.
Grandma glared at the brightly colored lid before forking the last bite of cake into her mouth. Ganache or not, she hoovered the slice like it was going to sprout legs and scurry away. “When you get to my age you learn life’s not a game. It’s a joke.”
“Now, now.” Quinn clucked. “Nothing ages a person faster than being set in their ways.”
Grandma snorted. “You’re saying that if I play this here board game, I’ll push back my date with Saint Peter?”
“Who’s to say?” Quinn spread out the board as Wilder picked up a tiny car, frowning.
“What’s this thing do?”
“Jesus, take the wheel,” Grandma muttered.
Quinn refused to lose her grin. These party poopers would have fun tonight or she’d die trying. “You mean to tell me that you’ve never played Life either?”
“I’m with Grandma on this one. Not big into games.”
“That is all about to change.” She gave Grandma a red car. “Now find a little plastic person, either blue or pink. Sorry, this game doesn’t really take gender ambiguity into consideration.”
They both stared as if her neck had sprouted a new head. These two might have different features, but something about the way they held their heads and set their mouths marked them unmistakably as kin.
Quinn pointed to the dial. “Then we spin the wheel and start.”
“And what’s the point?” Wilder asked, sticking a blue man into the driver’s seat.
“To win at life.” She left off the duh part of her statement but it managed to hang there regardless.
“Hah,” Grandma muttered. “There is only one winner in life and that’s the Grim Reaper.”
“Enough.” Quinn slammed her own car down so hard that her little pink stick figure flew across the table in a perfect arc, landing in Grandma’s lap. “I’m adding extra rules. No cynical comments and that includes under-the-breath grumbles. No snorting. No checking your watch. We are going to have fun even if it hurts because today, right now, we are all alive, we are all more or less in good health, and we are all together, so we might as well make the best of it.”
Grandma Kane stared at her with an unfathomable expression. Quinn restrained the urge to gulp and rubbed an invisible speck off the table. She’d gone and done it now, gone too far, the lion was opening its mouth, coming in for the bite . . .
“You have gumption.” Grandma thought for another moment. “Yes, I’m giving you that, missy. More grit than any other Higsby I’ve ever met.”
“Thank you.” Quinn wiggled her feet in a secret under-the-table happy dance. She had conquered the lion. It was giving her a begrudging lick and purr. “Now spin the wheel and let’s see who goes first.”
Chapter Seventeen
IT WAS ALMOST midnight when Wilder drove Grandma back to Hidden Rock Ranch and for once they had actually spoken. Not about anything deep and meaningful—he asked about her hip rehab after it was broken in July and she checked in on the status of his leg.
But it was a start.
“We’re a pair, aren’t we, boy?” she’d said as he pulled up in front of the old homestead she now shared with Archer and Edie. The house she’d taken him and his brothers into after his parents died, the house that never quite felt like a home, at least for him. “Survivors.”
Quinn had made rum-spice apple cider halfway through the board game. He’d declined because he was driving but Grandma had sipped a mug. Maybe she’d snuck another and the tipple was making her emotional?
“Let’s get you inside before you catch a chill.” He got out and limped to her side of the truck. He’d abandoned his stick for the last week and it felt damn good. His gait wasn’t as surefooted as it used to be yet, but it was as if he’d turned a corner, and in the distance was a light, one Quinn had lit. It was like she was his own spitfire guardian angel. She wasn’t the type to hold your hand and tell you everything would be okay. No, she’d kick your ass until sense was knocked into your skull.
He offered Grandma his arm and got her up the front steps, the same ones she had tumbled down. Archer stepped up after the accident, took on the running of the ranch, Grandma, and a serious relationship with his typical easy stride. It wasn’t hard to see why people loved Archer. He knew how to make you feel good, just by being close to him.
Wilder had always been more of a porcupine.
He had the door half open when realization hit him with a jolt.
Quinn was right. He and Grandma were cut from the same cloth.
“Hey. Can I say something?” he said.
Grandma set down her handbag and sniffed. “You smell that?”
Wilder inhaled deeply, catching faint traces of cinnamon, brown sugar, and apples. “Yeah and it’s making me hungry all over again.”
Edie ducked out of the kitchen door, Archer hot on her heels. Her red hair was a mess and she looked suspiciously flushed while his little brother had a telltale smirk.
Jesus Christ.
Wilder didn’t feel any jealousy, just a vague sense of amusement. Plus, Edie’s shirt was on backward and Grandma was going to notice in another few seconds.
“I’m gonna tell you two lovebirds the same thing I told Sawyer.” Grandma shrugged off her coat and hung it on the brass peg. “At my age, my wants are straightforward. Grandbabies, grandbabies, and more grandbabies. But I want it done proper. Children who carry the Kane name.”
“Hold up now.” Archer’s cheeks were a near match to Edie’s. “Grandma, I—”
“And please, for the love of all that’s holy, tell me you didn’t get up to anything on the kitchen table. That’s where I eat my Cream of Wheat.”
“Grandma,” Edie yelped, clapping her hands to her chest. “It’s not what you think.”
Wilder tugged at his shirt, waggling his eyebrows and Edie glanced down, her silvery eyes bugging out of her head as she realized the seams were on the outside.
The front door burst open. “You’re here. Thank God,” Sawyer said, taking a deep gulping breath.
“Course I’m here. This is still my home,” Grandma snapped.
“Not you, him.” Sawyer thumbed at Wilder. “Saw your truck parked out front while I was driving by. You got to come with me, pronto.”
Wilder frowned, the old adrenaline rush setting in, putting his senses on high alert. “Another fire?”
“Oh no,” Edie gasped, grappling for Archer’s arm. “Please not at the bakery again.”
“No. You were right.” Sawyer clenched his jaw. “The fire was in an occupied home this time. Quinn’s home. The call just came in.”
Wilder took a step backward. The room disappeared. The roof caving in. The scream. The damn scream frozen in his head for twenty-five years filled his senses. Smoke choked his lungs. A chill shot down his spine.
“Is she . . . is she . . .”
“All I know is that she was taken to the hospital. One of the firefighters rescued her.”
A hand brushed his arm. “I’m so sorry,” Edie said.
“I’m coming with you.” Grandma marched back to her jacket, slinging it on.
“Grandma, no.” Sawyer held up a hand. “Stay here.”
“Let her come,” Wilder choked out. It had come at last. Payback. He’d taken so much from her.
But when she looked at him, there wasn’t a glimmer of justice or malicious glee. Only concern. “Come,” she said, holding out a hand. “You don’t need to face this alone.”
Archer stepped forward and clasped his shoulder. “We’re coming too. Family sticks together.” He turned to Sawyer. “Edie and I are following behind, man.”
Wilder moved in a daze. His limbs propelled him out into the wintry night but he wasn’t in control, autopilot had taken over. He paused on the front porch, turning to face his family. “The fire spared me this summer, but I’d rather burn a hundred times over than have a single hair on that woman’s head be scorched.”