Erin's Way. Laura Browning

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      “Go to hell.” It was barely an audible whisper, not her usual high volume bluster.

      Sam raked his hand across his short hair in frustrated patience as he tried to explain. “The only room with a bed that’s made is mine….”

      “Thanks, but no thanks, Sheriff. As you’ve already made clear again and again, you don’t want me there.”

      But he did want to be fairly certain she would still be in his house come morning. “You can have my room, and I’ll sleep on the couch.”

      “Afraid I’ll take off?” she asked, some of her bluster returning, but only for an instant. “No, I’ll sleep on the couch. You’re too big to be comfortable here,” she mumbled. “I’m used to sleeping on a berth on board ship. This is fine for me. Leave me alone. I’ll be all right, and I will be here in the morning. Like I said earlier. I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

      It was the most she had said since he’d found her in the pasture, and it was without an attitude. She still had her back to him, still refused to look at him.

      “Do you need anything?” he finally asked quietly.

      “No.”

      “Well, good night then. I’m down the hall if you need me.”

      She snorted. “I won’t.”

      * * * *

      Stoner parked Sam’s truck behind the house and stepped into the kitchen. Catherine had already gone upstairs. She sat propped in their king-size bed. Seeing her made him smile. That was something else that had changed in the last six months. She had moved back into his bed. It had been a long time, not since they’d taken Erin and gone to Washington. Dear God, that was more than a third of their married life. Their daughter’s teenage years had been rocky not only for her, but for them too. In fact, their marriage hadn’t been on a solid footing since Erin’s birth.

      When Catherine glanced up from what she was reading, he smiled, praying like hell Erin’s sudden reappearance wouldn’t erode what they had rebuilt. Guilt stabbed him for feeling that way. He wanted what was best for Erin, but in the past that had always translated into sacrificing the rest of the family.

      “Did you find the problem?” His wife’s gaze held only mild curiosity. Most of the time loose cattle were the result of a gate left open or a broken wire, common enough occurrences in a rural area.

      “Yes.” Stoner kept his tone casual. “There was an accident. A driver ran off the road and took out part of Sam’s fence. It was his cattle that were loose.”

      “I hope no one was hurt.”

      He smiled. “Just a minor injury. She’s okay. Carter and I helped Sam get the cattle back in and put a temporary fix on the fence.”

      “Well, that’s good.” She was too intent on what she was reading to pay much attention, and he was relieved. After stripping, Stoner showered, wrapped himself in a thick robe, and returned to the bedroom.

      As casually as he could he asked, “Did you ever hear anything back from Erin after you e-mailed her with the pictures of Tabby’s wedding?”

      “No…not a word.”

      “Was she still in the—where was it? The Virgin Islands?”

      “Yes. That job as a cook on the sailing ship must agree with her. She’s been there longer than anyplace so far. Why do you ask?”

      “No reason. Just curious.” As soon as it came out of his mouth, he knew he’d said the wrong thing. Even his casual tone wouldn’t fool her.

      He had her attention now. Catherine was anything but stupid. “Stoner, you said ‘she’ when you mentioned someone taking out Sam’s fence. Would that ‘she’ be Erin?”

      He sighed as he sat next to her on the edge of the bed. They’d promised each other honesty when they’d healed their rift. “Yes.”

      “Where is she, Stoner? Is she hurt?” There was a pause. Disillusionment colored her voice when she spoke again. “Was she drunk…or stoned?”

      “She’s at Sam’s sleeping it off. She was stoned, Catherine. She hit her head, but nothing serious.”

      There was a long silence before Catherine touched his arm. “Stoner… Something’s wrong. She only came back last fall because of Tabby, then immediately took off again. Now she turns up out of the blue?” She shook her head. “Honey, do you think she’s in some kind of trouble? It’s not like her to come back home willingly.”

      The truth of that statement cut him to the core. Stoner knew how much it pained Catherine to acknowledge the depth of the rift between them and their daughter, but it was true. There had always been something about Erin that Catherine had never been able to touch, even when she was a little girl. Stoner might have been able to once, when Erin was small, but as the years passed his relationship with his daughter had gotten even worse than the one between mother and daughter.

      Stoner laughed, but it wasn’t with any true amusement. “When has Erin ever not been in trouble, Katie?” He raked a big hand through his gray hair. “God! She makes it so hard to love her. It’s like from the moment she was born, she took one look at me, and thought ‘what can I do to piss him off?’ I don’t want to feel that way about her, damn it. She’s my daughter.”

      “I know, honey.” Catherine took his hand and stroked the back of it. “Just a year ago, I would have chalked up your worry to concern about how Erin’s behavior would reflect badly on our family, but in the last six months you’ve changed.”

      He took her hand. “How do I get through to her?”

      She shook her head. “I wish I knew the answer. The two of you may be too much alike in some ways to ever have an easy relationship. You’re both hot-tempered.”

      Stoner snorted. “Yes, but where I hang on to a mood for a long time, Erin is a flash fire.”

      Catherine nodded. “There’s a lot to that. She could never understand how you could still be mad at her hours later when she had long since moved beyond whatever it was that triggered your argument.”

      “And I thought she was trying to deliberately provoke me with an attitude that seemed uncaring and unrepentant.”

      Catherine leaned her forehead against his shoulder. “God forgive me, Stoner. I don’t want to turn her away if she needs our help, but I can’t go back and relive what it was like all through her teenage years. It made our marriage nearly impossible to endure, and we weren’t on a great footing to start. We’ve come such a long way recently.”

      She paused and took a deep breath. “There’s a part of me that wishes she would stay away.” When she didn’t say anything more, he looked at her. Her expression pleaded for understanding, guilt and sorrow mixing in equal measure. “Whatever happens, for whatever reason she’s come back, please don’t let it come between us. I need you, honey. I need what we’ve found again. These last six months…”

      “…have been the best we’ve ever had,” he finished with a gentle СКАЧАТЬ