Long Lost Winter, page 2
Chapter Two
The Bennet Ranch
Cal Bennet walked around the perimeter of the big ranch house he’d grown up in. It was part of his recovery from the gunshot wound he’d received in August. Physical therapy and lots of walking.
He was almost back to normal, physically anyway. He’d always have a scar—but what was a physical scar to go along with all the emotional ones?
It was a strange thing to feel more himself, more in charge of things, while his body recovered from an injury worse than anything he’d ever been through. Physically.
It was stranger still to feel settled here on the Bennet Ranch, where terrible things had happened. Where not that long ago those mountains in the distance had felt like horrible weights pressing down on his chest.
But right now, in the pearly light of a frozen morning, he felt more himself, more with it, than he had in a hell of a long time. And the sight of mountains on a cold, silent winter morning felt like salvation.
A feeling that wouldn’t last.
That wasn’t even a pessimistic thought, just reality. Recovery—both from the gunshot wound and whatever the hell else was wrong with him—seemed to come in fits and starts. And about five steps back for every one forward.
The gunshot had done one good thing—staved off the inevitable. His boss back in Austin could hardly fire him if he was laid up in a hospital bed.
But even that reprieve was coming to an end, and Cal was coming to the surprising conclusion that he didn’t want to go back to Texas, or his job, or much of anything.
No, he wanted to stay right here. In Montana. With his family. Maybe on the ranch, maybe not, but here.
Not that he knew what a future here would entail. Going through the complicated process of opening his own practice in a new state? Giving up the law entirely? Then what?
It felt like questions he couldn’t answer until his father’s trial was over. Because the trial had the chance to throw everything into flux once again.
So much rested on his testimony, and a jury believing in something called traumatic dissociative amnesia. Sure, there was physical evidence too. There was a lot of evidence, really, and if he were in charge of his father’s defense, he’d be nervous as hell. It was by no means an easy case to wriggle Benjamin Bennet out of true punishment.
Cal didn’t happen to think Dad’s lawyer was as good as he was, which was another plus. It meant even less chance.
Cal wanted to have that optimism. He wanted to believe that it was all over—even if he had to relive it all again on the stand. But he was too much of a lawyer to trust a sure thing. And he was too aware of Benjamin Bennet’s ability to manipulate and skew a truth to think it couldn’t work again.
But most of all, he was too used to the feeling in the back of his brain, that there were still things he hadn’t remembered, still hauntings ready to crop up once they felt like it.
“You’re out early.”
Cal turned his head to see Landon crunching across the frosty ground. He’d no doubt been out doing the early morning chores while Aly put together breakfast and coffee for the both of them.
Cal knew he should probably feel a little bad about being the third wheel to the happily engaged couple.
But he didn’t. He enjoyed Aly’s meals and fussing. He liked being in a house, even this house, that felt like a … living, breathing entity. The ranch around them working like the well-oiled machine it was.
In this moment, it felt better than whatever he’d been doing in Texas, living on his own, working an ungodly number of hours, socializing just about as superficially as a man could.
Superficial had suited him then. He wished it suited him now. And since that thought irritated him, he tried to irritate his brother.
“Maybe I’m getting used to ranch hours again,” Cal said, watching his breath puff out in front of him as he spoke. “Gonna make a cowboy out of me, Landon?”
Landon surveyed him with dark eyes that were impressively blank. But Cal knew his brother well enough to know that perusal was a critical one. Even if the question had been a joke, Landon was considering if Cal was well enough to ride a horse.
He didn’t answer Cal’s question either way.
“The lawyer wants to come by this afternoon. Go over the trial schedule. Well, he wanted me to go into town, but I don’t have the time or the inclination.”
“Avoiding the lawyer doesn’t change anything.”
“Then he can come here, can’t he?”
Cal sighed. Landon might have … unclenched or something since Dad had been arrested, since he and Aly had finally hooked up. Or whatever word he should use for some kind of mature, adult relationship in the midst of all this fucked up.
But no amount of unclenched made Landon someone else. He was still himself. Stubborn. Set in his ways. Dedicated to this ranch for reasons Cal couldn’t quite understand.
But more now than Cal had before, he understood that even if the evil of their father had tainted this land, this house, that stain had come from … Dad’s presence. Dad’s choices.
Without him here, the Bennet Ranch could be something good. Landon and Aly would make sure of it.
That Cal believed. Without reservation.
“It’ll be over by Christmas. And we’ll start a new year with the ghost of Benjamin Bennet in jail forever.”
Cal wanted to agree. Wanted to feel any of Landon’s certainty.
But he knew Benjamin Bennet was a ghost who’d haunt him forever.
*
The house was blessed warmth against the icy chill. Landon had been out doing predawn chores for at least an hour, and he was cold all the way through. He would have handled a few more things, but he’d spotted Cal walking around in the slowly encroaching light and been … worried.
So he’d cut his chores a little short. He’d catch up after breakfast. After he made sure Cal was warm and inside and fed.
Cal looked some better than he had this summer—both before and after being shot. He hadn’t gained much if any weight back and there was still that haunted look about him that Aly fretted over.
Okay, and maybe Landon fretted over too. If silently.
Landon supposed it made sense that with the trial looming over them that Cal might be … worried, in his head, stressed. So much of the trial rested on what Cal remembered—and that memory matching up with the physical evidence that had been found.
Landon had no doubts about Benjamin Bennet being the murderer. He didn’t need confessions. He’d lived within the trauma and manipulations his father had built their family on his entire life. He might have once done whatever he could to earn his father’s respect, approval, love—but he had absolutely no doubts his father was a murderer now.
The mask had been revealed—thanks to Cal, thanks to Nate coming home.
Thanks to Aly being brave enough to love Landon—really love him, not whatever warped versions he’d been told were love growing up.
But Cal kept reminding them—unnecessarily to Landon’s way of thinking—that knowing someone was guilty and convicting them of said guilt were two very different things.
Landon supposed Cal’s experience as a criminal defense attorney meant he had to hold on to that shred of doubt. The possibility that justice—whatever pathetic justice jail time was—would not be done.
Landon, on the other hand, had to believe. The alternative was too fucking bleak. And he’d once trudged through bleak every damn day. But not anymore.
He stepped into the kitchen, Cal trailing behind. Aly was humming over the stove like she so often was in the mornings after his predawn chores. She’d always handled coffee, and occasionally had made breakfast for everyone, but since Cal had come home after being shot, she’d spent every morning making big, hearty breakfasts in the hopes it helped his recovery.
Landon thought it certainly hadn’t hurt. Cal had been losing weight even before the shooting but eating well and physical therapy was putting some muscle back on. He was on a physical upswing.
And everything was starting to feel settled. Real. Waking up to Aly every morning. Sometimes being struck by the fact she wore his grandmother’s ring on her finger. And that come spring she planned on saying vows to him—vows he knew neither of them would break.
It wasn’t who they were.
He liked to think whatever they were building here swept out all the bad left behind by Benjamin Bennet. Because the Bennet Ranch had not always stood for bad. Or maybe it had, and Landon hadn’t known, hadn’t seen it.
But it never would again.
Aly looked over her shoulder and smiled at the both of them. “Morning, gentlemen,” she greeted cheerfully. “Did you tell him about the lawyer coming out this afternoon?” she asked, scooping oatmeal into bowls.
Landon nodded. He went to the coffee machine, brushing his mouth across her temple on the way. He poured three mugs of coffee while Aly divvied up the omelet she’d made to go with the oatmeal and orange sections.
Like a well-oiled machine, they took everything to the table—not letting Cal help. So he sat at the dining room table scowling at them. Landon figured it was for more than just not letting him help.
“You know, they said I was good to go at my last physical therapy appointment.”
“That’s great news,” Aly said, purposefully missing the point of what he was saying.
“Yeah, great. Just in time for the trial. Lucky me,” Cal grumbled, grabbing his mug and taking a sip of coffee.
“What are the chances he isn’t convicted?” Aly asked, straight out.
“Slim,” Cal said firmly. Any of the questions in his eyes outside carefully hidden away for Aly. “Unless the defense finds some groundbreaking kind of evidence or an alibi, it’s a pretty airtight case.”
But Landon didn’t think Aly missed the way Cal pushed his food around on his plate and didn’t eat any more than Landon did.
Because they’d all lived with the things Benjamin Bennet could get away with. And until his father was permanently behind bars, no matter how confident he was that they’d done everything they could, Landon still had a little seed of worry.
He was pretty sure they all did.
Chapter Three
Honor’s Edge Investigations Office
Nate had hoped the meeting with the lawyer would steady him, but he hadn’t been able to concentrate. And he knew Mr. Vanderbilt had gotten frustrated with his lack of concentration when the trial started tomorrow.
But how could Nate just push away that some guy who looked like a Bennet just happened upon Honor’s Edge Investigations the day before a murder trial? Could he really accept that as some kind of coincidence?
“Mr. Bennet.”
Nate turned his attention back to the lawyer who sat across from him in the diner booth. The man’s expression was one of annoyance. Nate could hardly blame him.
“Sorry. I know I’m not doing a very good job answering your questions. Work threw me for a loop this morning, but we’ve been over this before. You know where I stand, and I know what you need from me, Mr. Vanderbilt. I’ll deliver.”
The lawyer made a disapproving kind of noise, but didn’t argue with Nate. “Well, I’m heading up to your ranch to meet with your brother and Ms. Cartwright this afternoon. Maybe you could meet me up there? I thought meeting with you all separately would allow for clearer answers.” His gaze was disapproving. “Apparently not.”
Nate sighed. “I’ll try to rearrange my schedule. Get this … work thing situated. Be more dialed in this afternoon.”
“I’d appreciate it. The four of you might not be on the stand the first day, but we need to be ready.”
Nate nodded, got to his feet. He was in the middle of an Honor’s Edge case but was waiting on a few things before he could move forward with that. He’d hoped to be done before the trial, but unless the Livingston police called him back today, or the surveillance footage came through, he couldn’t really press forward, so meeting with the lawyer up at the ranch wouldn’t interfere.
Maybe being around Landon and Cal would help him concentrate. Or would he obsess even more about a man who looked like him and his brothers?
Frustrated, edgy, Nate moved to leave the diner and came face-to-face with a familiar face.
“Bennet,” Detective Jake Hayes greeted.
Nate resisted a sneer. It wasn’t fair, and it wasn’t born of any professional gripe. Just a personal one that he didn’t have any right to hold.
“Detective,” he managed to say in the same monotone.
There was a weird kind of standoff—like neither was going to be the first to break eye contact or move. He could hear Sam’s voice disgustedly calling it a stupid male pissing match.
Which made him feel ridiculous, so he stepped out of the detective’s way and headed for the door. Not without looking over his shoulder to watch the detective slide into the seat Nate had vacated.
Hayes had been part of the case. Of course he’d be on the stand too. Nothing to be concerned about, the lawyer meeting with one of the investigating officers. Par for the damn course.
He shoved out into the late morning. The bright sun and blue sky were akin to a lie.
God, it was cold. Like tiny daggers across any point of exposed skin. But it made him feel … real. Reminded him a heart beat in his chest, and when he sucked in icy air that felt like more daggers on the inside, he was pumping blood through a body.
This trial was the kind of dread he didn’t know how to deal with. It wasn’t like an army mission—those involved a lot of unknowns, a lot of things out of his control, but he had weapons and training to deal.
He had nothing for this.
But it was ridiculous to be so out of sorts about it when the most likely outcome would be that his father would be convicted—thanks to him, thanks to Sam, thanks to his brothers. Dad would be sentenced to something—and maybe Nate could feel some trepidation of what that sentencing might be. Men never quite paid enough for the damage they did to the world. Didn’t he know that firsthand? The military was a study in not paying. Or paying way too much for someone else’s cost.
And maybe that was the real fear, underneath all these myriads of concerns. No matter what happened in that trial, the cost had already been paid by his mother. And nothing, not even justice, could make that right.
A fact of life. One he was struggling to find a way to step around. It seemed the irrefutable fact that kept him stuck in place. He could take little steps forward, inch closer and closer to feeling like he was building a life here in Marietta.
But he couldn’t step over that very big obstacle to find what was on the other side.
Frustrated with himself, he returned to the office. He looked around for his doppelganger, was relieved when it was just Sam at her desk, alone, tapping something into the computer.
“He gone?”
Sam nodded. “I had him fill out an application. We’ll do a background. See what we can find first, then we’ll go from there. I got some vague details, so I’ll see what I can verify before we dive into the deep end.”
Deep end. Yeah, it felt like a high dive all right. One he wanted to avoid. But that was an old knee-jerk reaction he was trying to find some way to crawl out of. If he let the bad fester, it would only rot.
“He looked like me,” Nate managed to say, watching Sam’s expression carefully. Because sometimes she felt like a guidepost when he did not know how to move forward.
Sam met his gaze. She kept her reaction to that statement guarded, hidden under a quiet, calm exterior. “Shorter. Skinnier. But yeah, he did.”
“What do you make of that?” He supposed he’d needed that morning in the diner to find some point of purchase so he could ask her that without feeling like crumbling.
And he’d consider later, or never, why he felt like he couldn’t crumble.
“A million things, Nate,” she said in that brook-no-argument tone. Because she wasn’t going to let him make this a disaster before they had all the facts. “And since there are literally a million explanations, we’re not jumping to worst-case scenario right off the bat.”
“We’re not?”
“We’re not.”
It eased something inside of him—even if he was already considering a lot of worst-case scenarios. He could trust Sam to be the anchor in this.
He could trust Sam, period.
“The lawyer’s going up to the ranch this afternoon, wants me to come up. Guess I wasn’t the best witness this morning. I don’t have anything pressing on the Kilburn case. Still waiting to hear back on everything.”
“Take the afternoon then,” Sam said with a wave. “You want to meet here in the morning and head over to the courthouse together or are you staying at the ranch tonight?”
“They’re not calling you to the stand tomorrow,” Nate replied. “You could probably skip it.”
She held herself very still. Maybe he’d known that would be her reaction and that was why he watched for it. Maybe for all his anchor feelings, he still had to see if he could cast her out. Float away.
When she met his gaze this time, there was a flash of temper there. “Only you’re allowed to be there for me. Not vice versa?”
Nate didn’t say anything.
“It goes both ways. And I don’t need you to babysit me, Nate. I’ve been getting by just fine on my own for a hell of a long time.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“Guess we’re both having to get used to that not being the case anymore.” Something he’d been drilling into her head since summer.
He didn’t love it being turned around on him.
But it was fair. Fair enough he could admit this wasn’t about the trial or anything but this morning.
“Sam, he feels like a bad omen.”
She held his gaze, not needing clarification on the he. “Yeah, he does. But what else is new? We’ve weathered the last few. We’ll keep doing it.”
Yeah, what other choices were there?
Living, you’re supposed to be living. And he was. He’d even started looking at buying a place in Marietta. Maybe that was partially motivated by Sam’s aunt raising his rental price just about every month, clearly wanting him out without actually kicking him out.
