Page 2 of Heart Like a Cowboy

In this shot, his dad and new bride dressed in blue were in the center, and both were flashing giddy smiles. Ditto for Remi and Blue. Again, no smiles for Cal and Egan since they’d been ten and twelve respectively and were no doubt holding back on the glee to see how life with their stepmom would all play out.

It hadn’t played out especially well.

But then, it also hadn’t hit anywhere near the “hell in a handbasket” mark, either.

If there’d been a family photo taken just two years later, though, Audrey probably wouldn’t have been in it. By then, she’d been in Germany. Or maybe England. Instead of an hour commute, she’d come “home” to the ranch a couple of times a year. Then, as her career had blossomed, the visits had gotten further and further apart. These days, Brigadier General Audrey Donnelly only came home on Christmas. If that.

Egan sent his dad a thumbs-up emoji to let him know he’d seen the pictures, and he was considering an actual reply to ask if all was well, but his alarm went off. He got up, mentally going through his schedule for the day. As the commander of the Fighter Training Squadron at Randolph AFB, Texas, there’d be the usual paperwork, going over some stats for the pilots in training, and then in the afternoon, he’d get to do one of the things he loved most.

Fly.

Of course, it would be under the guise of a training mission in the T-38C Talon jet, not the F-16 that Egan used to pilot, but it would still give him that hit of adrenaline. Still give him the reminder of why he’d first joined the Navy and then had transferred to the Air Force so he could continue to stay in the cockpit.

Egan showered, put on his flight suit, read through his emails on his phone and was about halfway through his first cup of coffee when his doorbell rang. He had the same reaction to it as he had the earlier text. A punch of dread that something was wrong. It wasn’t even seven o’clock yet and hardly the time for visitors. Especially since he lived in base housing and therefore wasn’t on the traditional beaten path for friends or family to just drop by.

Frowning, he went to the door. And Egan frowned some more when he looked through the peephole at the visitor on his porch. A woman with pulled back dark blond hair and vivid green eyes. At first glance, he thought it was his ex-wife, Colleen, someone he definitely didn’t want to see, but this was a slightly younger, taller version of the woman who’d left him for another man.

Alana Davidson, Colleen’s sister.

“Yes, I know it’s early,” Alana sighed and said loud enough for him to hear while she looked directly at the peephole. “Sorry about that.”

Wondering what the heck this was all about, he opened the door and got an immediate blast of heat. Texas in June started out hot as hell and got even hotter. Today was apparently no exception. He also got another immediate blast of concern because there was nothing about Alana’s expression that indicated this was a social visit.

Then again, Alana and he never had social visits.

Never.

Just too much old baggage, old wounds and old everything else between them. Ironic, since she’d been married to his best friend. Now, she was his dead best friend’s widow and bore that strong resemblance to his cheating ex-wife who’d left him just days before Jack’s death.

Egan was no doubt an unwelcome sight for her, too. He was the man who’d not only failed to keep her husband alive, but he was also the reason Jack had been in that transport vehicle in the first place.

So, yeah, old baggage galore.

“Sorry,” Alana repeated, looking up at him. Not looking at him for long, though. Like their avoidance of social visits, they didn’t do a lot of eye contact, either. “But I have an appointment at the base hospital in an hour, and I wanted to catch you before you went into work.”

“The hospital?” he automatically questioned.

She waved it off, clearly picking up on his concern that something might be medically wrong with her. “I’m consulting with a colleague on a chief master sergeant who’s being medically retired and moving to Emerald Creek. I’ll be working with the chief to come up with some lifestyle changes.”

Alana made that seem like her norm, and maybe it was. She was a dietitian, and because as Jack’s widow she still had a military ID card so she wouldn’t have had any trouble getting onto the base. Added to that, Emerald Creek was a haven for retirees and veterans since it was so close to three large military installations. There were almost as many combat boots as cowboy boots in Emerald Creek.

“How’d you know where I live?” he asked.

“I got your address from your grandmother.” She glanced over her shoulder at the street of houses. “I occasionally have consults here, but it’s the first time I’ve been to this part of the base.”

Yeah, his particular house wasn’t near the hospital, commissary or base exchange store where Alana would be more apt to go. Added to that, Jack had never been stationed here, which meant Alana had never lived here, either.

“Full disclosure,” she said the moment he shut the door. “You aren’t going to like any of what I have to say.”

Now it was Egan who sighed and braced himself for Alana to finally do something he’d expected her to do for three years. Scream and yell at him for allowing Jack to die. But there was no raised voice or obvious surge of anger. Instead, she took out a piece of paper from her sizeable handbag and thrust it at him.

“It’s a mock-up of a flyer that Jack’s mom intends to have printed up and sent to everyone in her known universe,” Alana explained.

At first glance, he saw that the edges of the flyer had little pictures of barbecue grills, fireworks, the American flag and military insignia. Egan intended to just scan it to get the gist of what it was about, but the scanning came to a stumbling slow crawl as he tried to take in what he was reading.

“Join us for a Life Celebration for Major Jack Connor Davidson, July Fourth, at the Emerald Creek City Park. It’ll be an afternoon of food, festivities and remembrance as a celebratory memorial painting for Jack will be unveiled by our own Top Gun hometown hero, Lieutenant Colonel Egan Donnelly.”

Well, hell. Both sentences were full-on gut punches and thick gobs of emotional baggage. Memorial. Life celebration. Remembrances. The icing on that gob was the last part.

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