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Except for some start-up cash that had long since been repaid, he’d never relied on his father’s money. Trent was damned good at what he did. So why was the CEO of said company cooling his heels in Wyoming shoveling literal horseshit?
And why in the hell couldn’t he read the truth in a woman’s eyes? A woman who had stayed in his heart all these years like a bad case of indigestion.
Had Jesse lied? And if so, why? Mac, Sloan, Gage and Trent had doted on the little boy who came along three years after his one-after-the-other siblings. Jesse had suffered from terrible bouts of asthma, and the entire family rallied whenever he was sick. So, yeah—maybe Bryn was right. Maybe they had catered to Jesse’s whims, especially when their mother bailed on them. But that didn’t mean Jesse was a bad person.
Heroin overdose. Trent shifted uneasily in Mac’s office chair. Going through the books was proving to be more difficult than he’d anticipated. Jesse had never been a whiz at math, so God knows why Mac put him in charge of the finances. His youth alone should have been a red flag. And his inexperience.
Already, Trent was uneasy about some ways money had been shifted from one account to another. A heart-to-heart with Mac was in order, but until the old man was a little steadier on his emotional feet, Trent would hold off on the questions.
Which brought him back to Bryn. What was Mac thinking? Why had he brought Bryn back to Wyoming?
Trent shoved back from the desk and stood up to stretch, his eyes going automatically to the magnificent scene outside the window. Wyoming was his birthplace, his home. And he loved it. But it had not been able to hold him…or Gage or Sloan, either, for that matter.
Gage had developed a bad case of wanderlust at an early age…and Sloan—well—Sloan’s brilliance was never going to be challenged by ranching. Had Jesse felt the need to be his father’s heir apparent? It didn’t fit what Trent knew of his baby brother’s temperament, but what else could explain Jesse’s role in running the ranch?
At one time the Crooked S had been the largest cattle operation in a six-state area…back when Mac was in his forties and had a brand-new twenty-year-old bride at his side. Now it was nothing more than acres of really valuable land.
What would become of the ranch when Mac was gone?
Trent waited until he heard Bryn talking on the phone in her bedroom before he went back in to check on his dad. Mac was sitting up in bed, and already his eyes seemed brighter, his skin a healthier shade. Had something as simple as bringing Bryn home wrought the change?
Trent sat down in a ladderback chair near the foot of the bed and hooked one ankle over the opposite knee. He put his hands behind his head and leaned back. “You’re looking better.”
Mac grunted. “I’ll live.” The two of them had never been much for sentimentality.
Trent smothered a smile. “Do you feel like going for a ride? I need to pick up a few things in town. Might do you good to get out for a couple of hours.”
His father seemed to wilt suddenly, as though his burst of energy had come and gone in an instant. “Don’t think I ought to try it yet. But maybe Bryn would like to go.”
Trent stiffened. He wasn’t ready to spend the hour and a half it would take to go into Jackson Hole and back cooped up in a car with the woman who was tying him in knots. “I’d say she’s still tired from her trip. And I can be there and back in no time.”
Mac’s dark eyes, so much like his son’s, held a calculating gleam. “Bryn promised to pick out a new blanket for my bed at the Pendleton store. You know how women are…always shopping for something. I don’t want to disappoint her. And you can have dinner before you drive back. Julio and I are going to play poker tonight.”
Julio was one of the ranch hands. Trent sighed. He knew when he’d been suckered. But he wasn’t going to fight with his dad…not yet.
Moments later, Trent knocked on Bryn’s door. It was slightly ajar, and he waited impatiently until she finished her phone conversation.
Bryn ground her teeth when she realized Trent was standing in the doorway. Maybe she should put a cow bell on him so he’d quit sneaking up on her. “What do you want?” The curt question was rude, but she was still stinging from their earlier encounter.
