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Cal sat there stunned at the venom he heard in his grandfather’s voice. The man was malicious. Even though the man had saved his life by taking him in, the thought of what he’d done to the woman he loved, her family, had destroyed his own chances of happiness with her.
Two federal agents walked in the door. They had wired up the boys in the parking lot and now had his grandfather’s confession.
“What the fuck?” his grandfather said.
“You’re under arrest,” the man said handcuffing him to his chair. “Anything you say or do can be used against you.”
“After everything I’ve done for you, you called the feds on me?”
This man was not the loving grandfather he chose to remember. This man was foul and hurt so many people. People Cal loved. How could Lillian ever love him when she learned the truth? How could her family forgive him and accept him?
“Fuck you,” he said gazing at his grandfather. “No wonder my father hated you so much and turned to drugs to forget the kind of man you are. But it all ends right here and right now. The Sweet B no longer belongs to us. It is being returned to the Bradley family. It’s back in the right owner’s hands.”
As they wheeled his grandfather out the door, he cursed Cal and called him every hateful name he could. But things were back in their proper place. Cal would make certain those who had been harmed would have what was theirs once again.
With a sigh, he and Nathan stared at one another.
“I’ll sign whatever I need to sign giving Lillian the ranch,” he said. “Just give me time to pack my stuff and I’ll be out.”
“Don’t you think you should talk to her?”
“Why? I love her, but whatever I say to her now, she’s going to think I just want to hang onto the land. Her family could never accept me because of what my family did to them. Before all of this, I thought we’d found the perfect woman to share between us, but now no matter how much I love her, she could never forgive me. If our places were reversed, I’d have difficulty forgiving her.”
Nathan nodded. “Come on, let’s get out of here. But I still think you should talk to Lillian.”
“And do what? Break down? Cry like a baby because I’m losing both the woman and the land I love? I’m having done to me just what Paul had done to him. And my grandfather is the reason again,” he said, his chest aching with pain. What was he going to do with his life?
How was he going to get over this?
Cal had to get out of this place. He couldn’t stand the way the nurses stared at them, the memory of how it hurt him to put his grandfather in here. And now the feds coming in to arrest him.
Jamming his cowboy hat on his head, he stormed out of the building. Jumping in his truck, he pulled out of the parking lot, vowing never to return to the nursing home.
One more night at the ranch he loved. At the place, he thought would be his forever home.
CHAPTER 16
Lillian watched as they lowered her grandfather into the ground of his beloved ranch. The place felt empty without Cal being here. Nathan was here for the burial, but Cal, he said, had packed up and left.
He left without them talking, without saying good-bye, taking a huge chunk of her heart with him. Nathan had helped her feed the livestock and had hired a man to take care of the animals for a while.
When the service was over, the family went back to the house. Very few people had attended since her grandfather had become somewhat of a recluse after he lost the ranch.
Nathan had handed her the signed deed before the funeral and she didn’t know if that was what she really wanted right now.
After the burial, he’d hugged her and said good-bye. She didn’t know if that was for just today or forever. And her heart grieved with the loss she’d experienced the last few days.
Nothing felt right. Cal was gone. Her family seemed uneasy, and the place she loved wasn’t capable of giving her the comfort she wanted.
“Are you going to move in here?” her grandmother asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Are you going to move in here?”
“No,” her grandmother said. “We have a good home in San Antonio. We’re happy there. There are no bad memories residing in our home there.”
Kenneth came up and wrapped his arms around her. “Mary, if you want to come back to Blessing, we can.”
She glanced up at him and shook her head. “No. It no longer feels like home. It doesn’t feel right and I would see Paul or that bastard Ron everywhere. I can’t believe he’s in jail for murdering his wife.”
