Trev hoisted Hope’s body out of Noah’s arms before he could complain. The former pro quarterback didn’t even seem to notice her weight as he hauled her up.
“I really can walk.” Hope let her arms drift up around Trev’s neck.
Trev’s mouth was curved up in that perpetually mysterious smile he had. James always thought Trev seemed like he was amused with everything that went on around him. He handled everything with an odd calm, from untangling a terrified calf from barbed wire to dealing with buyers. Trev was always in control. “I think I should just do what Holly tells me to. I make it my goal to never argue with a pretty lady.”
He strode into the house, the screen door swinging behind him.
Holly looked from him to Noah. Her eyes narrowed. “I know your momma is no longer with us, but I remember her, and we mommas stick together. You two boys behave.”
She stalked off, the screen slamming shut again, but with an irritated sound this time.
He was alone with Noah. And Noah’s enormous dog.
He needed to breathe. He needed to calm down. Something had happened, or Noah wouldn’t be standing here. He would still be in New York with his wife. Ally wasn’t with him. Fuck. What had happened? And why was he driving that piece-of-shit truck? The last time James had talked to him, Noah had talked about his new Benz. Something was up with Noah, and he owed it to him to listen. He was the big brother. He had to be patient.
“You want to tell me what the fuck you think you’re doing selling off this ranch?”
Patience blown. “It’s my fucking ranch. You got your goddamn money. You want to tell me how you spent that? And if you have a problem with me, then you should feel damn free to take your ass right back off my land. Get back to New York, city boy.”
He turned and started back in the house, not waiting for Noah or issuing an invitation. His head was spinning. How dare that little shit walk back in here after five long years and start questioning his business decisions?
Noah was hard on his heels. “Hey, I have a right to ask about this. This used to be my home. My father worked here. My parents helped build this ranch.”
Now he remembered his childhood? James turned and stalked into the kitchen. It was one of the biggest rooms in the house. He didn’t remember much about his biological mom. She had died long before he could really know her, but when he thought about his real mom, he saw her in here. She would cook for hours, and he and Noah would sit at barstools hoping for a taste.
He needed to talk to Beth about redecorating.
“And you walked away from it.”
“I got married, Jamie.”
“And left this whole town high and dry. You can’t walk back in and start questioning me. You haven’t been here.”
Trev walked in and went straight for the coffeepot. It was always on these days. Beth or Bo came through every couple of hours and put on a fresh pot. What must that feel like? To have not one but two people who cared enough to check on a coffeepot? All James had was a wayward brother who started harping on him the minute he rolled his ass back into town.
“Well, I have to start questioning you when you make such dumb-ass decisions.” He pointed toward Trev, who was refilling the travel mug he almost always carried with him. “Do you know who he is?”
Trev McNamara had been a tabloid favorite. The bad boy of football. He’d been fired from his pro contract after he’d failed one too many drug tests. “I’m not stupid. I know exactly who he is.”
“Uhm, maybe y’all should leave me out of this.” Trev looked like he wanted to be anywhere but here.
“You sold off part of the ranch to a guy who spends all his time with strippers,” Noah said with an ugly twist of his lips.
Trev shook his head. “I have been stripper free for one thousand eighty-seven days. Certified. Well, professional stripping. Beth has gotten really good. She tends to like hard rock.”
“I’m glad you’re amused, man.” James was actually kind of glad Trev was here. Maybe Noah could see he hadn’t just been sitting around.
Trev sighed. “I’m not really. I’m actually getting a little pissed off at your brother. I don’t like getting pissed off.”
Noah turned to Trev. “Sorry you’re pissed off, but I want to know what exactly you did to get my brother to sell part of the ranch.”
“Half,” Trev said, and the word dropped like a rock. He simply tipped back his mug, but James could tell he was getting riled. His fingers tightened around the mug. Damn it. The last thing in the world he wanted was to cause Trev hell.
“Half?” Noah fairly screamed the word. “You gave away half the ranch our fathers worked to build to some ex-athlete addict? What the hell were you thinking, Jamie?”
“I was thinking I needed the fucking goddamn money. I didn’t give it away. I was thinking if I didn’t find a partner, I would go into bankruptcy. I was thinking I couldn’t hire hands or buy new stock, and damn straight couldn’t pay the vet when my stock got sick. I was thinking I had to save our fathers’ hard work, and I was thinking it all a-fucking-lone.”
Noah backed down, his face turning a little gray. “I didn’t know the ranch was in trouble.”
“Yeah, well, you never asked. You weren’t here after Dad died. You weren’t here during the drought or the wildfire that burned five thousand acres or the sickness that took half my herd a few years back. You weren’t here when my bills got so high I seriously considered bankruptcy. You weren’t here. Trev was.”
Noah took a deep breath, visibly swallowing. “How much?”
God, as pissed as he was with his brother, he didn’t have the heart to tell him. “It doesn’t matter now.”
Noah simply turned to Trev. “How much?”
“Ten million,” Trev replied with hard eyes. “Ten million, and we both formed a loose partnership with a man who knows how to make money in this market. The Circle G is still considered small. We’ve gone all grass fed and all organic. We’re selling to specialty markets and upscale restaurants, and it’s going to pay off. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll take my ex-addict ass elsewhere.”
James felt so fucking tired all of a sudden. “Trev.”
Trev shook his dark head. “No, he needed to know. He needs to know what a little prick he’s being if he’s going to stand half a shot at healing the breach between you. And you tell him to keep a civil tongue in his head when he talks to my wife or Bo or we’re going to have some trouble. I’m going to go check on Hope. Doc should know something by now.”
The room went quiet, a weird, eerie silence that seemed to permeate the walls. He turned and looked at his brother who had gone stock-still. “What are you doing here?”
Noah turned his eyes up to him. “I lost everything. I wanted to come home.”
He stared, not knowing what to say.
The front screen squeaked. “Hello to the house!”
James sighed. Nate. That figured. Oh, well, saved by the bell. “We’re in the kitchen.”
Sheriff Nathan Wright walked in, dressed in casual clothes for once. He was in jeans and a T-shirt that looked worse for the wear. James’s eyes went to a large, nasty-looking spot on Nate’s shirt. He waved James off. “Spit-up. Charlie likes to vomit. A lot. It’s his little hobby.”
Charlie Hollister-Wright was one of Nate, Callie, and Zane’s newborn twins. “Can a two-week-old baby have a hobby?”
Nate nodded. “Yep. The twins’ hobbies are spitting up, hanging on their momma’s boobs just before spitting up, and doing this real cute thing with their legs that makes me not care that I’m covered in baby vomit. Now I heard Hope was murdered by a sand-dune monster.”