Texas True Read Free Page A

you split up.”
    Tori sighed. She should have known the conversation would go this way.
    â€œWhat happened?” Beau asked.
    â€œWhat has Will told you?”
    â€œNothing. You know Will.”
    â€œDo I?” Tori still wondered about that. She hadn’t been much older than Erin when she’d fallen in love with Will Tyler. But he was older, and he’d paid her scant attention until years later when she’d returned home to Blanco Springs with her law degree. Their passionate whirlwind courtship had allowed them little time to get reacquainted. By the time she woke to the realization that she’d married a stranger, she’d been pregnant with their daughter.
    â€œIt’s past and forgotten, Beau,” she said. “Let’s talk about something else—like you. Any special lady in your life?”
    Beau shrugged. He’d always been the handsome brother, with a runner’s long bones, light brown hair, and a roguish charm that matched his looks. Will, on the other hand, was chiseled in his father’s dark, solid image, and he was just as intractable as Bull had been.
    Bull Junior, Tori had called her husband during one of their arguments.
    â€œSpecial ladies take time,” Beau said. “And they expect things, like being told where you are, who you’re with, and when you’ll be home for dinner.”
    â€œSounds like a passel of excuses to me.” Tori gave him a roguish wink. “You’d make time for the right woman if you found her.”
    Â 
    Beau’s gaze traced the sun-streaked curl that trailed along her cheek. He knew better than to think Tori was flirting with him. They’d been friends most of their lives, but there was no romantic chemistry between them. And even though she was legally free, to him she would always be his brother’s woman.
    â€œMaybe I’m just not the right man,” he said. “The kind of work I do can make you pretty cynical.” He gave the swing another push with his foot. Sex was something he could get any time he wanted it. There were plenty of single, pretty women in Washington, most of them ambitious as hell. For them, a roll in the hay was just a way to let off stress, or maybe a leg up to the next level of wherever they were headed. Beau had long since learned to settle for that.
    An easy silence had settled over the porch, warmed by the afternoon sun and broken only by the creak of the swing and the hum of foraging bees. Beau let his gaze wander over the ranch yard and the big landscape that stretched away from it. Little had changed since he’d left the ranch better than ten years ago. For a moment he let the familiarity of it all, its sights, scents, and sounds, take hold of him. Endless times in Iraq he had called this image to mind, times when the pull of home had been strong. And the pull was strong now, forcing him to admit he’d missed being here and being a part of the ranch’s rhythms.
    Before it could take hold of him, Beau shifted his position on the swing, angling more toward Tori. In the distance, barely visible, a white Toyota Land Cruiser had turned off the main highway and onto the long ribbon of gravel that led up to the ranch house.
    â€œRemember back in fifth grade when Natalie put a garter snake in the teacher’s desk drawer?” Tori asked.
    Natalie again. Beau forced a chuckle. “How could I forget? The teacher went straight to Mr. Warner’s office and quit.” Natalie, he recalled, had fessed up to save the poor snake and got three weeks’ detention for her crime. The little scamp had been unrepentant.
    â€œHow’s Natalie doing?” he asked. “Are the two of you still best friends?”
    â€œSolid as ever.” Tori reached for her iced tea and took a sip.
    â€œLast I heard, she was married.”
    â€œYes, to Slade Haskell. It’s been a few years now. No children. He runs a trucking business out of