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“Did you talk Alex into eating chicken again?” she asked casually.
“He’s wavering,” Elizabeth said. “He tells me it’s cheating, and real vegetarians don’t cheat. What made him stop eating meat?”
Kayla took salad makings from the fridge, grateful Grams hadn’t immediately asked about Jackson McGregor.
“Nothing dramatic. Two months ago, his church youth group visited a farm,” she explained. “They fed the calves, hunted for eggs and watched a baby lamb being born. He came home and announced he was now a vegetarian...and that the miracle of birth was really gross.”
Elizabeth chuckled. “How about DeeDee?”
“She wanted steak for dinner.”
“That’s our girl—a tough cookie when she wants to be.”
They worked in companionable silence while Kayla thought about the contrast between her kids. DeeDee loved animals, but she’d visited the same farm as her brother and had returned unfazed about the realities of animal husbandry.
So how would Alex react to another trauma? Hell, he’d run away after learning Curtis had adopted him. It would be awful if Alex got to know Jackson, only to think his birth father was disappointed in who he’d turned out to be.
Honestly, if Jackson hurt her son, she’d have his head.
“Take it easy, darling,” Grams said, breaking into her thoughts. “You’re slicing carrots, not pounding rocks.”
“Oh.” Kayla looked down at the cutting board and sighed. She swept the mangled carrots into the salad bowl. “I should speak with Alex. I’ll be back in a while.”
“No need. The only thing left is putting the meat and veggies on the grill, and they haven’t started the barbecue yet.”
To give him more privacy, Kayla took Alex for a walk and told him the details that she’d covered with Jackson. Predictably, he responded with further inquiries.
“I’ll ask any questions you really need answered,” she assured. “But don’t let them become a delaying tactic. A camping trip is a big commitment, so maybe having a quick meeting with Jackson here in Schuyler would help make you more comfortable with the idea.”
Alex kicked a pebble into the street. “I don’t know.”
“Promise me you’ll think about it. The longer you put off seeing him for the first time, the harder it’s going to be.”
“Okay.”
They returned to the house, where he promptly headed for the family room computer.
Since she wasn’t needed in the kitchen, Kayla went out to the hammocks. As a teen in Schuyler she’d spent hours in the backyard, reading or thinking. Even on hot days the shade was deep and comfortable.
She closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of warm canvas and grass. There was no simple solution for her worries about Alex. All she could do was watch and listen. And remain vigilant with regard to Jackson.
Kayla put a toe down on the grass and sent the hammock swaying.
In many ways Jackson McGregor had cleaned up his act since high school. By all accounts he worked hard, was honest and ran his ranch well. Plainly he didn’t live like a monk, but he remained a determined bachelor who avoided women with marriage on their agenda.
But she obviously wasn’t the only one to find his attitudes about women to be dated. Cora had called him a caveman, though it hadn’t bothered her enough to stop flirting with him, so finding casual partners probably wasn’t a problem for Jackson. And it couldn’t only be because he was so ruggedly handsome—part of the attraction had to be his dark, angry reserve and the feminine urge to be a reformer.
Damn.
This wasn’t helping. Determinedly closing her eyes, Kayla tried to focus on the sway of the hammock and clear her mind of everything else.
* * *
MORGAN STUDIED THE instant message Alex had sent her on Facebook. His mom and her dad had talked about the camping trip and he was thinking he might go. She messaged back. Could be fun. Do you like camping?
Yeah. We take a trip every summer to a different national park. Last year we went to Crater Lake.
Geography wasn’t her best subject. Never heard of it.
It’s a lake in the middle of a mountain where a volcano was. So much rock blew out from underneath that the top fell back inside. Oops, gotta go, Mom’s calling.
Morgan rested her chin on her hand and thought about it. That was how she sometimes felt, as if everything had blown up and she was going to fall back into the strange empty place inside.
Everything was messed up and she didn’t know how to fix it.
* * *
THE NEXT DAY Jackson rode north on Thunder to check on an injured cow his cowhands had found and doctored. He trusted his men, but lately he’d spent less time than usual working the ranch, and he needed to feel as if he was accomplishing something. It certainly didn’t seem as if he was getting anywhere with Morgan or Kayla.
