Walker Pride (22 page)

“I’m sorry. Think what?”

“That I should do that topless magazine spread?”

Susan snapped her attention to Bethany with a gasp. “No! And what are you talking about?”

Bethany laughed. “I knew you weren’t listening to me. I didn’t actually say anything about a topless magazine spread. I said that I’m nervous about being around my family since I don’t really know them.”

Susan relaxed against the seat. “Oh. I’m nervous too.”

“I can tell. There are finger marks in the tinfoil on that dish.”

Susan looked down and realized she did have the dish in a death grip.

“What are they going to think of me?” she asked.

“They already know you.”

“As the caterer. They have a lot going on in their lives right now. So does Eric. I haven’t even talked to him. So what if he’s changed his mind? What if they thought I was a great caterer but I’m lousy daughter-in-law material?”

“Daughter-in-law?”

“Just figuratively speaking,” she emphasized with her finger in the air. “But I wouldn’t mind it.”

“You’re in love with him,” Bethany said grinning as they pulled up in front of the house. “You can say no, but I wouldn’t believe you.”

“I think I do.”

“He loves you too.”

“He told you that?”

“I saw it in his eyes when he showed up at your house that first time with me. Only a man who loves a woman is so moved by her art.” She winked as she parked the car, turned off the engine, and climbed out.

Susan contemplated Bethany’s words for a moment. It was going to be a wonderful night, she decided as she climbed from the car.

Another car drove up and parked behind them. A man, one she’d seen at the funeral and the reading of the will, parked and stepped out of the car.

“Hey, Bethany,” the man said.

“Gerald. How are you?” She could hear Bethany’s voice shake, but that didn’t stop the man from walking toward her and putting an arm around her shoulders.

“I’m having dinner at Mom’s and I didn’t have to cook. Things are good,” he joked and looked toward Susan. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Susan managed as she juggled the two items in her hands.

“Let me help.” Gerald took the dessert tray. “You’re the caterer, right?”

“Susan,” she said.

“Right. And you’re dating my brother?”

Susan kept her smile intact as she swallowed hard. “I am.”

“My mom mentioned it. She’s pretty excited about it.” He walked toward the house and the women followed.

Susan’s nerves began to settle. Maybe she wouldn’t have to try too hard to impress.

The house bustled with noise when they entered. Warmth spread to Susan’s chest. This was something she missed, living so far away from her parents and her sister.

Glenda was in the kitchen, an apron wrapped around her waist. She’d dressed for dinner. Suddenly Susan felt as though she hadn’t taken the invitation serious enough.

“Gerald.” Glenda smiled wide when her son walked into the room. She kissed him on the cheek and took the plate from him. “I see you’ve met our guest?”

Gerald turned and looked at her. “Yeah. He’s a lucky guy,” she heard him whisper and her stomach did a flop.

Glenda moved toward her and placed her hands on Susan’s shoulders. She smelled of lavender and vanilla when she moved in and kissed her on the cheek.

“I’m so glad you came.” She looked down at the plate in her hands. “You didn’t have to bring anything.”

“I couldn’t help myself. I hope I didn’t offend you.”

“Of course not. The more, the merrier.” Glenda turned toward Bethany and kissed her cheeks as well. “I’m so glad you were able to come.”

“Thank you for the invitation.”

“You girls are getting along okay together?”

Bethany gave her an enthusiastic nod, which had her red curls bouncing. “It’s like having a sister.” A line formed between her brows. “A sister I know,” she added and Glenda’s face softened.

“I think that’s wonderful.” Glenda’s compassion rang through her words.

Susan scanned the family that gathered in the kitchen and dining room.

“Looking for Eric?” Glenda asked and Susan only answered with a smile. “I haven’t seen him yet. I’m sure he’ll be along shortly.”

But he didn’t come along shortly. Susan had texted him, discreetly, then called. She was aware that his brothers had called and texted as well.

“I’m sure he has a good reason for being tardy,” Glenda said gathering her family around the table. “We’ll just start without him.”

“I can go up and check on him,” Susan said, then remembering she didn’t have her car. “If Bethany will lend me her car that is.”

“No need,” Eric’s voice broke the tension of the air and stopped the voices that mumbled around the table. “I’m here.”

“Oh, good,” Glenda beamed. “Sit. Let’s eat.”

“How about I just stand and say what I came here to say.”

His father stood from the table. “Eric,” he said as if it were a scolding. “Your mother said we’d sit and eat.”

“Funny, Dad. My mother.”

Susan noted the sadness that ripped across Glenda’s face.

“Eric, why don’t we go into the other room?”

“Why don’t we hash this our right here?” Eric said in front of everyone. “Why don’t you share with them the news I received today? Let’s talk about my mother, should we?”

“Let’s go to my office,” Everett said, moving from his seat and toward Eric.

“Does everyone know that my mother had another child? That I’m not her only son?”

Glenda gasped and Susan was very sure that no one knew that—except Everett.

“This is what you want to discuss? You want to tarnish your mother’s name in front of your family?”

“Why did you marry her, Dad? She certainly didn’t seem your type, from what I’ve learned.”

“Stop.”

“Why? I met my cousins the other day and then I find out one of them is a brother I didn’t even know I had. My own mother abandoned him. So how did you get involved? How is it that she ended up only ten miles from home with you?”

Everett looked at his family. “Things happen, Eric. Not every man is made of steel.”

Eric laughed and Susan was quite sure he’d been drinking, by the sway in his body.

She reached for his hand and he jerked away as he scalded her with a look of disdain.

“Why are you here?” he asked and she couldn’t form a thought.

“Glenda invited me. Remember?”

“No. I mean how convenient is it that you show up in my life when my grandfather dies? You smoothly move your way into my family. You take in my cousin when you don’t even know her and you end up in my bed?”

Susan felt the piercing shock of his words, but it was Glenda’s sob that caused her to look away from him.

His father moved to him and took his arm. “That’s enough. Why don’t you go home until you’re sober enough…”

“I am sober,” he said very firmly. “This is anger pulsing through me. Not alcohol.” He looked back down at Susan. “Why were you at the Morgan’s house? What do you and Elias and Lydia have going on?”

Susan bit down on her bottom lip. “How did you know I was…”

“I was parked right behind you when you left today. Are you really going to tell me you didn’t know I was there?”

“I didn’t.”

“You’re a liar.”

Glenda stood from her seat and slapped her hands on the table. “Susan is my guest, Eric. You’re not going to talk to her like that.”

“She’s a traitor. She has something to do with all of this…whatever it is with Elias. The transferring of the land. The moving of my mother. The poisoning of my horse.”

Now Susan stood up. “Excuse me! I have nothing to do with any of that. I would never hurt an animal, especially one that meant so much to the man I love.”

“You’re easy to say that when I’m accusing you. Not when I said it.”

“You told me not to.”

“Why were you there?” He stepped closer and she pushed her shoulders back. She took a breath to tell him, and the swallowed it down. She had a contract of confidentiality and she couldn’t break that or she’d lose the job—the job that would pay off her education.

“None of your business.”

“It is when you’re out to destroy me.”

There was no controlling herself now. She raised her hand and smacked his cheek so hard her wrist instantly ached. “Go to hell, Eric Walker.”

“I think I’m already there,” he said as he turned and walked out of the house.

As soon as they all heard his tires peel out of the driveway all four of his brothers were up and out of the door. No doubt following the ass back to his place.

Susan sat, her hands in her lap as they shook. She could hear her own breath as it moved in and out heavily.

“Everett, do something,” Glenda said.

“I think he’s about to get a visit from four somethings. I don’t think we’ve had this many black eyes and stitches at one dinner table in all the years we had five boys.”

“You can’t let them beat him up,” she defended him.

“I can. I will. They’ll also heal him better than any doctor. What he found out today is quite a blow to a kid who idolized his mother for so long.”

“He’s not a kid. He’s a man and that is much more dangerous.”

Susan lifted her head. “I should go. I will go. I’m so sorry I hit your son. I’m so sorry for…”

Glenda reached her hand to Susan’s shoulder. “You’re not going anywhere.”

“Oh, oh, yes I am,” she stammered. “Not only do I think it’s time for me to leave your home, but I think it’s time for me to go back to mine. Back to Colorado. I can’t do this. I can’t do temper like this again.”

The breath now came in pants and Bethany moved in closer to her. “Honey, what happed with your ex?”

“One time. Just one time,” she cried. “He hit me one time and I left. Why stay?”

“Good for you,” Everett said, his arms crossed over his chest as if this sort of drama happened every night at dinner. “No woman should ever be disrespected by a man.”

“Eric seems to think that’s what I did.”

Everett shook his head. “I don’t believe it. Tell me, what were you doing at Elias’s house?”

Susan swallowed hard. “Sir, I can’t disclose that.”

Everett nodded slowly. “Did you poison his horse?”

“No! Oh, God no. I’d never do something like that. He loved that horse. I took a picture of them. You can see how much the horse meant to him. I didn’t do that. I wouldn’t do that.”

“I believe you.”

Susan rested back in her seat as the two women still held on to her. “Sir, my business is very important to me. When clients don’t want someone to know about something I have to uphold that.”

He nodded again. “Just tell me you have nothing to do with this land swapping or animal killing and I’ll believe you.”

“I swear.”

Everett stood. “Do you love my son?”

The tears turned on and spilled down Susan’s cheeks. “I do. I did,” she whimpered. “I don’t understand any of this. I’d never—ever—hurt him, sir.”

He shifted his glance to his wife. “I’ll go stop them from killing each other. Susan, I suggest you consider what you have with Elias Morgan very carefully. If you want Eric in your life you can’t have Elias.”

He strode out of the room on a huff, pulled his keys from the peg by the door in the kitchen, and disappeared.

“I don’t know who Elias is to Eric. I don’t understand this.”

Glenda handed her a napkin to wipe her eyes. “Elias is his grandfather. His mother’s father.”

“Oh.” She shook her head. “I didn’t know.”

Glenda smiled. “Of course you didn’t dear.”

~*~

The first son-of-a-bitch that came through that front door was going to have a boot up their ass and a fist in their mouth, Eric decided when he saw the cloud of dust traveling toward his house.

He didn’t need a confrontation with his brothers. They had no idea what he was going through. His entire family had betrayed him on both sides and now the woman he loved had too. He was fed up.

Russell’s truck pulled up first with him and Dane inside. Gerald and Ben were in the next truck that pulled up. What could they possibly have to say?

He waited with his fists ready for the first brother to walk in the door, but no one came. What in the hell were they doing? It wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen them.

Eric moved toward the door, but still no one came it.

Swiftly, he pulled it open. No one was on the porch.

He stepped out and looked around the side of the house. The only evidence that his brothers were there were their trucks parked outside. He moved back to the front door. Perhaps they headed up to the barn. But as he walked into the house he found them. There they stood, all four of them, shoulder to shoulder with their arms crossed in front of their chests.