The Cowgirl Rides Away (Bluebonnet, TX Book 1)

CHAPTER NINETEEN: Jessa

It was a nine-hour drive to the Texas-New Mexico border. It was a twenty-four hour drive home, give or take, and that was only if we drove straight through. The upside was, Kane and I had plenty of time to clear the air before I had to deal with the rest of my family; the downside was Kane and I had plenty of time to clear the air.

Kane did me the courtesy of waiting until we were out of San Antonio before he started talking. "Leg bothering you?"

The hand massaging my knee stopped. I'd done it again. "No."

"Want to talk about it?"

"Let me know when you want me to drive." I grabbed one of his hoodies from the back and pillowed it under my head. Night was a long way off and I was nowhere near tired, but I'd always done my share of the driving and that meant napping when you can. The problem was my brain wouldn't shut itself off.

"I meant Texas. Do you want to talk about why you were in—"

"No, Kane."

"Well, for what it's worth, you do look better than you did the last time I saw you."

"That's not saying much considering the last time you saw me I was confined to a hospital bed with my leg in traction."

"You know what I mean, Jessalyn."

We rode for a while longer as Gary Allen and Johnny Cash blasted out of the speakers and kept the silence from becoming unbearable. I knew it was too good to last and eventually Kane would want to talk. We stopped in Kerrville for gas and something to drink. No sooner had we gotten back on I-10 and Kane had set the cruise control than he started talking.

"I was eleven when your mama ran off with your dad."

I sipped my drink and waited, my eyes on the sunny day passing by my window at seventy-five miles an hour.

"She was the first girl to ever kiss me and then, three months later, she ran off with your daddy."

That got my attention and I leaned my head back to stare. "She kissed you?"

"On the cheek!" He threw me a quick grin. "All I remembered for the longest time were her breasts. And that she was beautiful."

"Jesus, Kane. TMI?"

"I was a very impressionable young man, and that was the best and worst summer of my life."

Squeezing my eyes shut, I resigned myself to listening.

"She kissed me and then she ran away with some rodeo cowboy. I loved her and she broke my heart, broke her mother's heart, and her grandmother's heart, too."

"I'm sorry." He seemed genuinely sad. Sadder than I'd ever seen or heard him.

"She looked so much like you...except she laughed more. I guess you get all that seriousness from your daddy."

He'd loved my mom and she'd broken his heart by running off with Daddy and having me. Right then I didn't know whether to laugh or what. I scrubbed at my face and focused on the scenery, at a loss for what to say or ask next.

"What was my grandmother's name?"

"Jillian."

"Is she still alive?"

"Gone," he practically grunted. "Passed away years ago."

"So, Granny, your grandmother, was pretty much it?"

"There's some aunts, including my mom, and some cousins."

"What was her name? Your granny. The one who died?" Against my will, my anger softened, diluted by curiosity and our shared history.