Ryding Through Troubled Waters

Chapter 1.2: HIDE-N-SEEK (part 2)

Neither was Cale.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if Cale hadn’t also split the back of his favorite jeans. Of course Sheriff Miller showed up just as they were coming in for dinner and had to tease him about having his own personal air-conditioning system while his red boxers hung out for everybody and their cow dogs to whistle at.

“Yeah, welcome home, Dad,” Cale muttered. “I’m done.”

If it hadn’t been for Mom’s culinary skills, Cale might not have agreed to oversee the ranch while his parents vacationed. Like I ever had a choice.

Cale forced a laugh and up-shifted. Things don’t work like that. Dad does the commanding … his children and ranch hands do the obeying.

Dad would listen to a reasonable compromise on occasion, but everyone knew he had the final say, except of course, when Mom took him aside and changed his mind.

Cale chuckled. He liked that Dad could be flexible, at least at Mom’s urging—if you could consider a six-foot three-inch length of rebar flexible. Cale had learned from an early age that the quickest way to get on the wrong side of Dad was to sass Mom. So he didn’t . . . mostly.

Life was so much easier on the right side of Dad.

Dad was funny like that—built solid like a refrigerator, and yet he melted like warm butter when Mom smiled.

When Dad decided to take Mom on the honeymoon that they couldn’t afford as newlyweds, he’d been a man on a mission.

The week-long hiking, fishing, and camping trip Cale and his three best friends had planned for fall break did a five-hundred-mile-an-hour header into the dumpster.

And once Dad asked their neighbor to keep Brandi, there would be neither discussion nor going back. The deal was sealed. The only thing left to do was tell his friends to go on without him. Just because Dad had ruined Cale’s plans, didn’t mean he had to ruin theirs.

Leaving Brandi with the Tenneys had been Dad’s only concession. Which I’m okay with. She’s a one-child hurricane. Recalling how his kid sister had almost waylaid the honeymooners’ bliss by hiding in Dad’s over-sized duffle, Cale laughed in spite of his frustration.

It must be good to be “the princess.”

He made a wide arc around the corner of the one-story farmhouse and slammed on the brakes, sliding to a stop on the dirt less than a foot from the sheriff’s black-and-white.

“Again, Sheriff Miller? Three times isn’t enough?” Cale muttered. Remembering the lawman’s teasing smile yesterday revved up Cale’s ire.

He backed up and drove around the sheriff’s car and parked in his dad’s spot. Cale slipped off his leather gloves and tossed them onto the seat.

After putting the keys on top of the visor, he slid out of the cab and bent to offer their blue heelers, Duke and Biscuit, a quick pat. “Back up, Duke.”