say to him. Hey, everything is great down here. No one had missed her. No one had really even needed her. From the Ground Up ran without her, and she honestly wasn’t sure if that bothered her or made her proud.
Ward would only answer with silence.
How’s the ranch?
He’d say, Fine.
More silence.
Dot shook her head at herself, paying more attention as Tyson too sighed heavily as he sat on the other end of the couch. “What’s going on with you?”
“I have to tell you something, and you have to promise not to laugh.”
Dot stared at him. They’d been close growing up, and he’d started conversations with those exact words before. Not for a long time, as they’d become adults decades ago.
“I can’t promise anything,” she said. “I did that one time you told me about this insane plan you had to breed snakes, remember? But I laughed, and then you got so mad and you wouldn’t talk to me for a week.” She grinned at him, glad when he returned the smile.
“This isn’t about snakes.”
“What’s it about?” Dot watched her older brother squirm, and she had her answer. The only thing that made Tyson even bat an eyelash in fear was a woman. He faced criminals with grit. He could complete a high-speed chase without missing a single beat.
But put a pretty brunette in the room, and Tyson would duck and cover before he’d speak to her.
“What’s her name?” Dot asked as gently as she could. She even looked down at her phone, thinking perhaps Ward would call her. He had a phone, and he could use it too.
“Melanie,” Tyson said with a sigh, and Dot knew she wasn’t headed to bed any time soon.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Judge let the last note hang in the air, the music still moving through his soul. The echo of it lilted through the air, because the ceiling in True Blue, the family gathering barn at Shiloh Ridge Ranch, stretched for at least three stories.
He finally lifted his fingers off the keys the way his teacher from years past had taught him. “Thank you,” he whispered into the silence. He had plenty of thanks to give for his ability to play the piano. Mother and Dad had driven him down through the hills to Three Rivers each and every week, sometimes at great sacrifice to them. Mother had seen and recognized his talent at an early age, and she wouldn’t allow it to be squandered.
Judge had practiced hard to please her, as he still labored to do to this day. “Miss you, Dad,” he said, finally standing. He worked his fingers to get the aches out of them, because he spent plenty of time using his hands around the ranch while he wasn’t playing the piano.
Dad had always encouraged Judge to play for their family nights, after church on Sundays, and before every one of his concerts at school. He had to give the whole troop of Glovers a private concert, because not everyone could make it down to the auditorium to hear him play.
Judge had felt very loved and valued by his father, and he hated that he’d lost that too soon in his life. A wave of missing spiraled through him, making his breath catch somewhere behind his lungs. Dad had been gone for a long time now, and Judge wondered when the hole in his life would stop growing.
“I have a date with June in an hour,” he said, looking up toward the ceiling his father and his uncle had built with their own hands. Bishop had led the restoration of the barn, but he’d kept the roof intact and employed the family motto of reuse, recycle, and repair on the shingles. He’d patched them and tarred them, and Judge could feel his father when he looked at the roof.
“It would be great if it would go well,” he said. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been on a date, and it especially has to go well because it’s June.” He’d been out with her before, but that was over two years ago now. Maybe three. Judge wasn’t sure. Time didn’t seem to register well without June, and he’d been holding onto the hope of this date with tight fingers for so very long.
His heart lifted as he walked toward the wide doorway that led to the door on the front of the barn. Mother and Don should about be ready to go, and Judge wasn’t surprised when he heard Mother calling him