Page 83 of Stockman's Showdown

She was right.

‘What about you? I’m sure you have plenty of war stories about wounded people, considering you made weapons for them.’

‘I’m not sharing them.’ He scowled heavily, hands on hips. ‘Don’t ask.’

‘But—’

‘Bree.’ His voice low, his teeth gritted. ‘Don’t.’

‘I have one question.’

He closed his eyes, knowing it wouldn’t be one question, because it’d lead to a dozen questions and so on.

‘Jonathan told me it took ten years for you and your brothers to get back together, and that was due to you being in the Army for work.’

He barely nodded.

‘But the Army would have given you leave. So why did you stay away from your brothers for that long? Then, when you finally do catch up, you end up buying them a station so you could all live and work together.’

He exhaled, not expecting that question. But when he gazed at Bree, there was no snarkiness, no playfulness, just concern of a different kind. ‘I don’t know.’

She tilted her head at him as if she didn’t believe him. Yet, she never broke eye contact, as if to crack open his bones to the place where he kept his secrets. Some he never wanted to share because he didn’t want to remember.

He raked fingers through his hair. ‘With the patents, I had the means to support my family. I was investing it anyway, I just saw this place as an investment.’

‘You might have at first, but…’ She playfully poked at his chest, but he held her hand there.

‘I needed my family more than they needed me.’

She double blinked at him, just like he couldn’t believe he’d spilled that himself. Only this time it was his turn to step away from the redhead to take a deep swig of his bourbon.

‘Go on.’

Of course she’d keep digging. Dex said she’d dig, Ash and Cap too. That Bree had a knack of digging for what hurt you the most. Great, now it was his turn.

If he told her, would she think differently of him?

‘I needed to feel again.’

‘Eh?’

‘I was designing weapons, focusing on the damage they could do to armour plating, or through other obstacles. I wasn’tlooking at people and the destruction they could create. I’d lost my ability to be empathetic, or have any sympathy, and lost my trust in people.’

‘Hey, I was a people person too, until people ruined it for me.’ Her smile was gentle, soft even, and so was her tender squeeze as she held his hand. ‘When did you realise this?’

‘I didn’t. My superior officer did. He told me to get out, get a life, and that any weapons I designed in the future should have patents on them before I shared them with anyone. Which I did—but waiting on patents to come through takes time.’

‘So that’s why you went to the mines?’

‘A short stint at a diamond mine, until I got onto the oil rigs.’

‘Why?’

‘Because they offered food, accommodation, in a place filled with other hard men, especially on a rig in the middle of the ocean.’ He raked fingers through his hair, admitting this more to himself. ‘I had to take the time to assimilate back into the real world, or I’d have ended up like Laurel’s brother, Clyde, on the streets.’

‘Ryder…’ The way she said his actual name, it sounded like heaven spilling across her lips. ‘I know all about those silent wounds that torment the mind and how they’re the hardest to heal. I’ve also noticed how much you’ve changed since you first arrived.’ She stepped forward to cradle his face in her warm hands, staring deeper into his soul than anyone had ever dared. And with her voice like soft rain falling from a lonely sky he fell for her all over again, with three little words: ‘I get it.’

And he believed her.

---