Home Again: A Whiskey Ridge Romance Read online

  “These stiffs want me to move out. Right?” she asked, looking at her daughter with that determined glare only Pauline Moore could give.

  “Yes.”

  “Good. I’m ready to get back to my house.” Pauline looked down at the fish and tossed the last of her crumbled up croutons. “Bye, fishies!”

  “You can’t just go home, Mom.”

  “And why the hell not? I’m a grown woman.”

  “Because you know you were forgetful. And then the car accident…”

  “I don’t have Alzheimer’s!” Pauline would get very defensive about the thought she might have the disease that would steal her memory and eventually her life. So far, doctors just weren’t sure if she was in the beginning stages or it was just a product of aging, so Pauline preferred to think it was just some kind of passing phase that late 60-somethings get.

  “I never said you did. But the fact remains that I can’t leave you in Whiskey Ridge at your house alone. We’re going to have to find full-time care or something…”

  “No. I don’t want some stranger in my house with me all the time. They might steal my stuff!”

  Emmy had to struggle not to laugh at that one. Her mother didn’t have valuables. She had “collections”, and no one wanted them. Collections of doll heads. Collections of tacky handbags. Collections of half-done paintings that were quirky to say the least.

  “Mom, you have to work with me here. I can’t stay in Whiskey Ridge. I have a life back in Atlanta.”

  “Sure you do.”

  Emmy sighed. “And just what is that supposed to mean?”

  “You know, I might be getting a little long in the tooth, but I’m no fool, Emmy Lou.”

  Gosh, how she hated her middle name.

  “What are you getting at?”

  “I know something’s going on with you and Steve.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  “Because mothers know these things. I just have a feeling.”

  “Well, you’re wrong,” Emmy said, trying to hide her face because it always gave her away.

  “Don’t lie to me, child,” Pauline said sternly as she eyed her daughter. Emmy froze in place and then slouched into her seat further.

  “Okay. Fine. We’re getting a divorce, Mom. Happy now?”

  Pauline stood and came to sit beside her daughter. “I’m not happy you’re going through that, but I am happy that you’re getting rid of that bum. He never deserved you, Em. And now you can find someone who is worthy.”

  Emmy laughed. “Yeah, I’m not interested in finding another man anytime soon. Trust me.”

  Pauline took her daughter’s hand. “I want to go home. I know I can be a bit of a pain sometimes, but why don’t you stay with me for awhile? It’ll help both of us.”

  “I can’t.” Even as she said it, she knew the choices were few. But the thought of coming home to Whiskey Ridge and dealing with her mother’s craziness was almost too much to bear.

  “You mean you won’t.”

  “Mom, I have a career in Atlanta. I have a home there, and the restaurant.” No need to tell her about the mess she was really in back in the city.

  Pauline looked at Emmy, and it was one of those rare times she was serious. “Did you know that we get moments in our lives where all of the wrongs can be made right? Not everybody gets that chance, but when you do… well, you should take it.”

  Emmy wasn’t totally sure what that meant, but she knew that the option of going back to Whiskey Ridge suddenly felt less scary than the option of going home and having her problems smack her in the face on a daily basis.

  Chapter 2

  “You know you’re freaking lucky to be alive, right?”

  Nash Collier stared out the window of his hospital room overlooking the Las Vegas skyline. He would much rather be playing the slots right now than sitting in a hospital room with his leg hiked up in the air and his arm in a sling.

  “I’ve fallen off a bull a million times, Deke,” he said to one of his rodeo buddies - actually one of his fellow competitors. He and Deke had traveled the country together for almost ten years now, so he was more like a brother than someone he competed with.

  “Man, I get it. But we’re not getting any younger, and those bulls ain’t getting any smaller or slower. Maybe it’s time to…”

  “Shut it.” Nash didn’t like to hear talk about packing it in and settling down. The rodeo was in his blood and always had been. From his earliest days back in Whiskey Ridge, Georgia, his father had instilled a work ethic in him that never died.

  As the owner of the South’s second largest rodeo events company, Nash’s father had pushed him to succeed. Be the best. Break out of Whiskey Ridge and compete with the big boys. And he had done that for years, winning title after title.

  He’d been the best in the South, and then the largest rodeo outfit out West had “drafted” him, so to speak. Nash’s father - aptly nicknamed Brick because of his towering build - had stopped speaking to him the day he called to say he was signing a contract with another company. It had been years since they’d spoken, and Nash had soldiered on continuing to win titles. Continuing to be the best. Continuing to avoid his father and the memories lurking around every corner of his hometown.

  Until last night.

  The crappy part had been that he didn’t go down in battle. No, he went down in practice when he fell the wrong way and then a bull stepped on him. Deke was right - he could have died. Guys had died that way before him. One inch either way, and he’d likely be paralyzed at the very least.

  He had numerous injuries, some of which even he didn’t understand. The doctor had rattled off a lot this morning, but all Nash heard was “out of commission for at least a few months” and “may be the end of his career”.

  No way was he letting that happen.

  “Mr. Collier. Glad to see you’re awake and alert this morning. You had us pretty nervous last night,” the doctor said as he entered the room with a tablet in his hand.

  “Always good to hear the doc was nervous,” Nash mumbled under his breath. “When can I get out of here?”

  “Where do you plan to go?” the doctor asked with a chuckle.

  “Back to my house,” Nash said, referring to the house he’d been renting in Vegas for the last couple of years. Since most of his competitions were out West now, he’d finally relocated a few years ago.

  Deke looked at the doctor and then rolled his eyes. “Dude, you can’t just go home. Doc says it’s going to be months of intensive rehab. We might be roomies, but you know I have to travel…”

  Hearing Deke say those words - that he’d be traveling on while Nash was laid up like some crippled has been - tore his guts out. He wanted to be on the road. It was who he was. Without rodeo, he had no idea who he was. It calmed him. Made him focus. Kept the memories at bay.

  “Have you called your father yet, Mr. Collier?” the doctor asked hesitantly.

  Nash stared at him and his jaw tightened.

  “No.”

  “Don’t you think you need to?” Deke interjected. “It’s the only option, man. You need help, and out here you’ll be alone.”

  Nash gave the doctor a look that let him know he needed to be alone with his friend. When the doctor had exited the room and shut the door behind him, he turned his attention back to Deke.

  “I’m a grown man, and I’ll do what I want. Understand?”

  Deke sat down at the end of his bed, being careful not to bump his leg. “Stop being a stubborn jackass, Nash. You and I both know you have to go home. At least for a little while. Take some time. Reassess…”

  “Stop preaching at me,” Nash said, leaning back and sighing.

  “I’ll call the airlines,” Deke said as he stood back up. Nash didn’t make eye contact, a sure sign that he was agreeing with his friend but too proud to admit it. “You know, if you’d get a woman then she could take care of you.” His attempt at a joke fell flat as Nash continued being quiet until he left t
he room.

  “This place stinks like a whorehouse!” Pauline shouted as they crossed the threshold into her home. The place had been closed up tight for months now, with not even a nibble in the slow Whiskey Ridge real estate market.

  “Mama, honestly. Can you filter that mouth of yours even a little bit?” Emmy walked around the living room, lifting the plastic mini blinds and then swatting the mounds of dust that flew out each time she pulled on one of the yellowed strings.

  “Why? Nobody can hear me,” Pauline replied as she plopped down in her favorite, albeit ugly, chair. It was an antique and had been beautiful once. But then Pauline had seen fit to have it re-covered in the most God-awful orange and green fabric with these little dancing bears on it. Emmy had no idea where she’d found it, but she planned to get it reupholstered one day. “Why does it smell so bad in here?”

  Emmy looked around and then noticed an empty bottle of Pauline’s tacky perfume lying on the floor. It had seeped into the carpet and probably even into the original hardwood floors underneath it.

  “This maybe?” Emmy said, holding up the frosted pink bottle and pinching her nose with her other hand. Without a word, she opened the back door and tossed it into the woods behind the house.

  “Hey! That was a nice bottle. I can reuse that…” Pauline started to say as she stood up.

  “No. Absolutely not. You are not bringing that back into this house. As it stands, I need to call a cleaning crew out here. And this carpet needs to be removed. It’s old and dingy anyway. We’ll have Abe Kramer come out with his boys and refinish these hardwood floors. That should get rid of this smell…”

  “Jeez, can you calm down a little bit?” her mother said, sighing and leaning her head back against the chair. “You’ve always been too uptight, Em. If we’re going to live together, you’ve got to loosen up.”

  “We’re not ‘living together’, Mother,” Emmy said, using air quotes. “We’re not roomies. I’m simply staying here with you until we figure out a long term solution to this problem.” She walked into the kitchen and looked around, wondering what she could do to spruce the place up so that it was livable to her. Right now, she felt like she’d landed back in the 70s.

  “And just what problem are we trying to solve?” Pauline asked, standing in the doorway of the kitchen with her hand on her hip.

  Emmy drew in a deep breath and turned around. “Mom, you know what problem we have. I have a life, and you can’t stay here alone. And I can’t… won’t… move back to Whiskey Ridge permanently. You’re going to need… care.”

  “Care? And just what in blue blazes does that mean? I’m not some elderly person, Emmy. I just… forget… sometimes. We all do that!” With that, Pauline stomped down the short hallway to her bedroom and slammed the door.

  Nash stood at the edge of the towering deck attached to the back of his father’s sprawling log cabin on the outskirts of Whiskey Ridge. This was the place he’d once called home. The place where he’d had Christmases and played fetch with his dog and shot his BB gun at cans perched precariously on the tree stump out back.

  But this wasn’t home anymore. Growing from a boy to a man hadn’t come without consequences, the main one being that he wasn’t what his father wanted him to be. He’d wanted him to help run the family business, make his money for the good of the family and not just himself.

  But Nash longed to get away from his roots. From memories better forgotten. From painful reminders of things he’d lost. And a raging bull seemed to be the best answer to all of those problems.

  Bulls didn’t care about your feelings. They didn’t care about your past or your future. They cared about getting you the hell off their back, and Nash felt much the same way. His history was like a boulder weighing him down, pushing him lower and lower, and ironically the bulls were the only things that got him back up again when he needed it. Until one stepped on him, of course.

  Coming home to his father hadn’t been easy. Deke had helped as much as he could with a quick trip to bring him back to Georgia before he took off for the next championship.

  There would be no more championships in Nash’s future unless a miracle happened. If injuries didn’t get him, getting older would. His body was already breaking down in ways that men his age didn’t experience. It was only a matter of time before he would have to make some tough life decisions, but not in one of his innermost thoughts did he ever see himself in Whiskey Ridge again.

  It wasn’t like the town wasn’t a beautiful place to grow up, with its expansive blue tinged mountains, its crystal clear streams and its friendly people.

  But then there were also the gossips and the constant reminders of mistakes made, love lost and disappointment. Most of the disappointment was housed in his father’s eyes when he looked at him. At least that’s how he perceived it anyway.

  So far, his father had tiptoed around any arguments with his son, but Nash could feel it boiling beneath the surface. He knew Brick wanted to say things to him, comments he’d probably held in for years. He knew he didn’t want to be the caretaker of the son who’d basically abandoned him years ago. But he had a poker face, and right now he was using it big time.

  “So Deke tells me Avery Blinn won the title with that bull we saw out in El Paso that time? I figured that damn thing was dead long ago,” his father said, trying to make small talk from the log hewn chair at the corner of the deck.

  It was a cool day. Nash wasn’t used to the weather in Whiskey Ridge anymore. Nevada tended to be hot and dry.

  “Yeah. Thought so too.” He often found himself speaking to his father through gritted teeth. Part of it was just not wanting to talk right now, which was most of the time. The other part was past hurts where his father was concerned, and it seemed no amount of trying produced true forgiveness on either of their parts.

  “I use your old room for my office now, but you can have all of the basement. I finished a kitchen off down there last spring. It’s pretty nice. Jack McCormick did the sheetrock. You remember him? He has that farm on Mulvaney Road, the one with the big red barn with the Georgia Bulldogs logo on the roof…”

  “Dad! Would you just please… not talk so much.” Nash took a long drink of his beer and leaned against the deck railing for support. The doctor had at least gotten him upright after a week in the hospital. But one leg was still in a cast, which meant he spent most of his time in a wheelchair or on crutches. He had other injuries too, and that would require extensive physical therapy now that he was “home”.

  His father sighed. “I don’t know what to say to you.”

  Nash felt bad. Right now, he didn’t want to talk to anyone. He wanted to be mad, drink beer with his pain pills against doctor’s orders and just forget everything that had happened to him.

  He sighed and eased himself back down into his wheelchair. “I don’t think there’s much to say, Dad.”

  Brick stood and walked across the deck, looking out over his six acre property. “This wouldn’t have happened if you’d stayed here. You know that, right? I mean, we have a perfect safety record…”

  “Dad, this wasn’t anyone’s fault. Bulls can’t be totally controlled. You have to know that better than anyone.”

  “Nah, they can’t be controlled, but I sure as hell never let one step on me. Where was your helper?”

  “Don’t you start pointing fingers and blaming people. You don’t know a damn thing about my crew!”

  Ah yes. This felt more familiar. He’d never been good enough for his father, no matter how hard he’d tried. And now he was right back where he’d started - defending himself to the man who’d made his upbringing a living hell.

  Brick had provided for his family well. Maybe too well. Nash had had all he ever wanted as a kid. A nice house, vacations to the beach, a four wheeler. The only thing he didn’t have was a happy home.

  Brick and Nash’s late mother, Diane, had fought constantly. His father wasn’t physically abusive, but his words had cut deeper than any knife e
ver could.

  Of course, his mother was no dainty flower either. She’d been a hard charging alcoholic who had a worse cussing problem that even the grittiest sailor at any port.

  But even she had gotten enough of Brick by the time Nash was twelve, and she’d left. She didn’t take her son. Brick gave her enough money, and she’d seen that as her escape. Six months later, Brick had walked into Nash’s bedroom and said “Your mother is dead. Funeral is Tuesday” and walked out.

  Alcoholism is a lethal disease.

  But Nash pressed on, learned how to deal with his father. The only way to connect was to be a rodeo man. Ride those bulls better than anyone else could. Prove himself. Make his father money. Be tougher than he really was.

  And he did. He was the best. He’d beat the best many times. But his father’s face had never changed. Words of praise had never crossed his lips.

  Instead, he’d said things like “Next time, stay on longer. You’ll never beat the big guys with a time like that.”

  One day, when he was sixteen, his life had changed. Someone finally looked at him the way he wanted his father to look at him.

  It was at a local youth bull riding expo where he’d first seen her. Blue eyes that lit up even across a dirty bull riding pen in broad daylight. Long, dark hair swept up into a ponytail that swayed back and forth in the most mesmerizing way when she walked. A smile so bright that he was glad he was wearing sunglasses at the time. And she was smiling at him.

  “You hear me?” Brick said loudly, breaking him out of his biggest happy memory from Whiskey Ridge. His father’s voice was like an unwelcome TV commercial interrupting a sappy romance movie.

  “What?” Nash closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. He just wanted to take a nap.

  “Your doctor sent these prescriptions along with Deke. You better get them filled before the pharmacy closes.” Brick pulled the small papers from his pocket and tossed them into Nash’s lap before walking into the house and slamming the door behind him.