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“I really don’t want to put you out…especially not since…”
“Since you just tried to throw me out on my ass from your derby? Yeah, karma is a bitch, isn’t she?” He
shook his head and smiled at me. “Maybe we can pretend that conversation didn’t happen for the time being. And…” he looked around to see if anyone was near enough to hear what he was saying, “my daughter is here, and you will probably see her, so I’d appreciate it if you kept all of that talk to yourself. Between me and you, it’s one thing, but I don’t want any of this getting back to her. She doesn’t need to know about some kind of feud between two old men. She loves her grandfather, and her grandmother meant the world to her. There is no need to tarnish that relationship.”
I frowned at him, unsure of why he was bringing up Sean and Emily Killarny in the conversation, and then I remembered that I had heard of his mother’s recent passing. He must have seen it register on my face.
“Yeah, and my mother was one of the most important people in her life. I don’t want to make my daughter feel like there is anything to worry about or fuss over. And she’s a smart one. She can figure things out pretty damn quick.”
I nodded. “You don’t have to worry about me bringing anything up.”
He chewed his bottom lip briefly as he looked at me. “You’re freezing. I don’t know what we have in regard to clothes that will fit you, but I’ll show you where you can take a shower and change. I’m sure there’s something that will work.”
Pete led me up the stairs to one of the guest rooms, but I could tell that at one point it had belonged to one of the boys when they were all younger.
“My old room,” he said as if he could read my mind. “There’s a bathroom over there, and it connects to another bedroom, so be sure to lock the door…although no one uses that room, so it’s not as if anyone will be walking in on you.” He moved to a dresser and pulled a drawer open. “There’s not much to choose from, but I think you’ll find something that will fit you in here. Sorry, there’s not a piece of women’s clothing in this house.”
I laughed, and that seemed to break some of the tension between us. I also realized that I was feeling some relief at not having to worry about what was going to happen with my car. As irritated and frankly, pissed as I still was at Pete Killarny, I was sure that he would make sure things were okay. As much as I hated turning over control of my situation to someone else, I recognized that sometimes these things came along and I had to roll with the punches if I was going to survive.
Pete was standing closer to me now, and I could feel the heat radiating from his body, penetrating the wet layer of clothing that separated us. I could feel something in my core seize up, a need deep inside me awakening, and I realized just how turned on I was simply by being in this man’s presence. I could smell the sweet musk of him that was like sweat and hay and morning dew, and it was all I could do to keep from falling into him.
“We’ll be having dinner in about an hour. Get yourself cleaned up and make yourself comfortable and I’ll see you down there in a bit.”
He shut the door behind him on his way out, and I let out a long breath. Fucking hell, it had been a long time since I wanted to have someone rip my clothes off and fuck me hard, but that’s what Pete Killarny was doing to me. I struggled to shake the thought from my mind as I stripped down and headed to the shower.
Dressed in an old plaid shirt and jeans that must have belonged to Pete when he was a teenager, I sat laughing at the dinner table with Pete and his daughter, Emma. She was hurrying to finish her dinner since she had a slumber party to get to at the house of a friend who lived on another nearby ranch, so she said her goodbyes early and left me there with her father.
“She’s really smart and sweet,” I said. “You know you’re in for a world of trouble there.”
Pete sighed. “Dammit, I know. I had been warned about having a daughter. You know, it’s the first thing they start saying to you in the hospital. That she’ll have you wrapped around her finger from the first time you see her, and that was the truth.” He shook his head, and I could tell he recalled thoughts and feelings from a much different time. “I hope I have done right by her. My mother was such a help after my divorce. I really couldn’t have done it without her. She had always wanted a daughter, so having that first granddaughter was a real treat for her, and I’m glad she was able to have that.”
I smiled and took a sip from my wine glass. “I’m sure that brought her a lot of joy. I was really sorry to hear about her passing, Pete. It had been a long time since I saw her, but she was always very kind to me, especially after my mother and father’s divorce.”
He bristled and I could tell the subject of divorce was a sore one with him, so I let it slide.
“But you all seemed to have had a wonderful relationship, and I am certain it meant a lot to Emma. She won’t forget that.”
He cleared his throat. “You want to take a glass of wine in the other room? Nights are still a little cold, and I’ve got a fireplace in the study. I like to have a fire and some scotch in the evenings.”
I paused. “Not a cigar though?”
He frowned and shook his head. “No way.”
“Fine then,” I said as I stood up. He poured me another glass of wine and showed me the way to his study, and I wondered exactly where this evening was going to lead.
Chapter 5
Pete
Having a house guest was the last thing I had anticipated. The fact that it was Sara Waters was the craziest thing I had thought of in a long time and the last thing I would have considered happening. It was so surprising and unexpected, but the strangest thing of all was how much I was enjoying her company. She was good at conversation. She was smart and witty and had a great sense of humor, and that was all on top of everything else. We had grown up together, but our lives had drifted very far apart, and our paths had diverged a long time ago. It was strange to be back here now all these years later, talking about memories from back then. It was good though and I was starting to see how much I had been missing conversation with adults who weren’t my brothers…if you could call my brothers adults.
But the thing hanging over our conversation as she sipped her red wine and I polished off the last of a bottle of fifteen year Dalwhinnie, was the whole reason she had shown up at the ranch today. I knew there was more behind what she was saying, but it was clear that she wasn’t ready to talk about or didn’t feel at liberty to discuss whatever private conversation she and her father had had about why they didn’t want a Killarny horse running in their derby this year.
Whatever Sara had to say about the matter, I knew the truth of it. It was a feud between our fathers, one that had grown even more bitter as the years had gone by, at least on the part of Ken Waters. I thought that somewhere along the way my father had given up the enmity he had felt toward his onetime best friend. He must have because he had gone on with his life as if nothing had happened, and I couldn’t imagine him being able to do that if he had operated any other way. Whatever was up with Ken was his own thing, something he was carrying around with him from a time before I was born. There was nothing I could do to change the way the man felt, no matter if I thought the feelings were justified or not.
What wasn’t justified though was the way he was trying to punish the entire family for something he felt toward my father. We weren’t responsible for whatever still stood between these two guys, and I took personal offense that Ken Waters wasn’t man enough to step up and say it himself. The truth of the matter was that had Sara not broken down in the driveway and needed help; I was already considering getting into my truck and driving the three hours to the Waters’ place in Tennessee and giving Ken a piece of my mind. It was unbelievable to me that he would send Sara up here to do his dirty work and then expect us to just roll over and take his judgement like he was some overlord.
The Killarnys were the ones with the power here. We were the family who had been in Kentucky almost longer than anyone around here could remember. We were the people who had made horse racing what it was today, and Ken Waters wasn’t going to take that away or tarnish our name. On the contrary, by attacking us, he was putting
