Page 79 of A Nice Day for a Cowboy Wedding

“Don’t try to hit me, your ma sent me.”

“I wasn’t going to hit you,” Shane grumbled. He rocked back on his heels and sighed. “Who knows? Maybe the dead can hear you. Maybe they can’t. I figure the talking is more for the alive anyway.”

“Huh. You might be right.”

Shane eyed the man, not at all trusting his solicitous tone. “Why did my mother send you?”

Ben raked a hand through his hair. “She’s got me doing all sorts of shit. Help Molly with a lesson. Go shooting with Gavin. Talk bulls with Boone. You know, I fell in love with your mother. Didn’t mean I planned on being some kind of fucking stepdad. I hate kids.”

“You’re literally ten years older than me.”

“Yeah, well,shedoesn’t see you all that way.”

“Why are you here, Ben?” Shane asked, too tired to fight or beat around the bush or whatever this was.

“Deb wants me to be part of this Denver trip you’re all planning for next week. I put up a good fight, but she’s having none of it, and I’m already in the doghouse for . . . Well, none of your damn business.”

Shane tensed. “You’re not—”

“She wants me to go, and I’m going. But I’ll mostly keep my mouth shut.”

“Mostly,” Shane returned wryly. Because he needed BooneandBen up his ass, while he took Micah to a baseball game, while the kid probably still hated him.

Silence stretched around them, just the breeze through the trees and the heavy quiet of the dead.

“You know, I had a brother just like you,” Ben offered conversationally after a while of not taking the hint to disappear.

“Let me guess, you were best buddies,” Shane said dryly.

“Couldn’t stand the prick. Told him and the rest of ’em where to stuff it. Haven’t been back in something like twenty-five years.” He glanced at the gravestones. “Didn’t think I’d ever care if they were dead or alive,” he murmured. “Your mom is one hell of a confusing woman. You think you’re forty-some years old and you’ve got your ways stuck deep down in you, then a woman comes along and messes it all up.”

“Are we having a heart-to-heart, Ben?”

“Fuck no.” He shoved his hands into his pockets. “Hell, maybe. And it’s all Deb’s fault. Always on me about feelings. Opening up. Being a better man. Spent forty years not wanting to be a better man. Then she comes along and . . . fuck.”

Shane didn’t want to be amused, didn’t want to have to see all thishumanin Ben at this particular moment in his life. But, he hadn’t wanted to lose Dad. Hadn’t wanted a lot of things in this life, and yet he had a pretty good one.

“I know you don’t see what I give her,” Ben said, his voice hushed in the quiet solitude of the tree-lined cemetery. “But that’s because she’s your ma. She’s not Deb to you. Just like I’m not the bad seed to her. Labels, good or bad, they make you lose yourself sometimes, and the people who remind you of who you are beyond it tend to . . . Well, it feels good.”

Shane stared at his father’s grave, thought of Cora and Micah and thought maybe he understood that a little bit. Here at the ranch he was the annoying older brother, or the boss man, but he wasn’t often justShane.

When Cora looked at him, hell even when Micah was pissed at him, Shane felt like something other than an automaton or dictator. He just felt like a . . . guy.

Mom had run this family and this ranch on her own for so long, and she’d done it all without ever appearing as a real, individual woman to Shane, or probably any of the kids. She was Mom. She was the boss lady. Maybe Ben was right and she deserved to beDebevery now and again.

“You came to me the other day, and you were upfront and honest,” Ben continued. “I haven’t been around that much in my life, so it’s hard to trust it. Rather have a pissing match, have people think the worst so you can’t fuck it up, but I’m . . . Well, I’m . . . Hell, I’ll never be a good man, but for Deb I’ll at least try. That’s all I’m saying about this shit. You don’t like it, that’s your own damn problem.”

And it was that, the way Ben had let his guard down and flung it back up, just like Boone and even Gavin were forever doing, that really got to Shane. Because guards were for safety, to keep your heart from being bruised or from hurting other people. It was why he’d never told the whole story of Dad’s dying to anyone. It was why he’d only ever told Cora everything about Mattie. A guard around himself.

Ben was certainly not a good man, no, and Shane figured his mother deserved the best. But maybe the best out there was a man who would try, just for her.

Shane cleared his throat. “I want to be the one to tell her, but just FYI, I’ll walk her down the aisle.”

There was a long silence in the fading twilight, and for the first time since the fight with Boone, Shane felt a little peace. Maybe it was for the living to read signs into things, but he’d allow himself to believe it was Dad letting him know everything would be okay.

“I told her I’d sign a prenup,” Ben grumbled, barely audibly. “Oh, she got all up in arms about it, but I don’t want this ranch. Who wants that kind of responsibility? I’d rather shovel shit till I bite the dust.”

“You know, if we’d talked this all out a few months ago, we could have avoided a lot of frustration and arguments.” Shane slid a look at Ben.

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