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“He’s been testing chili recipes for days. He’s trying to beat one of his neighbors in the upcoming cook-off, but it’s never going to happen. Meanwhile, that’s all poor Doc, Felix, and Hudson have eaten for days,” she explained.
“Which one is Felix again?” I asked.
She gestured to a quiet guy sitting off to the side, reading what looked to be some kind of textbook. He was slender with delicate features and dark-framed glasses. Cute, in a massively geeky way. “He’s the one who was raised by Doc and Grandpa. His mom, our aunt Jackie, is a famous actress. Felix hates all the attention from the paparazzi, so he begged to stay here and grow up in Hobie. He’s very shy. Despises attention of any kind. Lord only knows how a woman like Jackie Wilde wound up with a kid like Felix.”
“Jacqueline Wilde is your aunt? Holy shit. She’s one of Doc and Mr. Wilde’s kids? Does she come to town? Do they ever see her?”
“They refuse to now. She got to a point when she only referred to her family to score points with the media or her fans. They hated it, especially for Felix’s sake. Family is everything to them, as you can see,” she said with a smile, looking around the room. Suddenly I remembered the initials. Her name was MJ. “By the way, you know you can call him Grandpa, right? Everyone does. Even Doc most of the time.”
“What’s his actual name?” I asked out of curiosity.
“Weston,” she said with a wink.
I smiled and looked around for the junior version, catching his eye from where he stood offering Griff a wine refill. West cocked his head in question, and I shook mine. My heart was doing stupid flips just at the sight of him. If I didn’t leave town soon, I was going to fall even further for the guy than I already had.
“You like him, don’t you?” MJ asked, leaning in so no one would hear her.
“Yep,” I said on a sigh.
She chuckled. “I take it that’s a bad thing?”
“Yep.”
She stood straight and wrapped her arms around my neck, squeezing me into an impromptu hug.
“Cheer up, buttercup. It could be worse.”
“How’s that?” I asked.
“At least you’re not the only kitten who’s smitten.”
I looked again for the man we were discussing and caught him still gazing at me. MJ removed herself from my person and wandered off chuckling while I stood there staring at the one man in the room who could ask me to strip naked right there in front of everyone and sing a Dolly Parton song, and I’d do it without a second thought.
I was so very fucked.
Perhaps I needed another drink. Or twelve.
Chapter 30
West
By the time the party died down, it was after midnight and most of us had had way too much to drink. My aunts had all disappeared to their rooms ages ago, and many of my siblings and cousins had stumbled across the backyard to the bunkhouse.
When Grandpa’s ranch had been in full production, the bunkhouse had been just that—a dusty old bunkhouse for ranch hands. But when he’d retired and sold off the last of his stock, he and Doc had renovated the bunkhouse into guest rooms and minisuites to accommodate all the friends and family who visited regularly. With a handful of adult children and gobs of grown grandkids now, there were times the ranch hosted over forty of us at a time.
We loved it out there. As teenagers, we’d convinced Doc and Grandpa to let us get a pool table and Ping-Pong table, and we kept the common room fridge stocked with sodas and beer. Our friends always begged us to have them over to the bunkhouse for sleepovers. Little did they know Grandpa and Doc had the surveillance equivalent of a baby monitor in the common area of the bunkhouse so they could spy on us.
At one point late in the evening, Doc had pulled me aside to make me promise I wouldn’t let anyone, including myself, drive home. He’d offered to keep the baby in his room and do the necessary night feedings so Nico and I could get some rest. I think he knew how much Nico needed the break from baby duty, and Doc definitely knew I had to get up and be at work by nine the next morning.
I led Griff and Nico out to the bunkhouse, laughing at the wild drunken shouts of my sisters, Winnie and Hallie. The twins were complete opposites in every way, but when they got drunk together, they turned into the bosom buddies they’d been when we were little.
“I love you, Winnipeg!” Hallie shouted into the night.
“I love you too, Halifax!” Winnie giggled, bumping Hallie’s shoulder and almost sending them both into the scraggly half-dead rosebushes next to the bunkhouse door.
