The Old Man's Back in Town Read Free

ever in his flannel shirt.
    “I’ve been a little stressed.”
    “How’s your dad doing on his own?” he asked.
    “Coping. He helps out here some nights when the loneliness gets too much.” We made quite a pair—lonely and lonelier.
    “Working with you can’t be easy.”
    “I’m nicer to him than to you.” Dad didn’t choose a career over me.
    His grin came quick. “I mean because you look so much like your mom when she was younger.” He reached out and fingered a strand of my hair. “Especially with your hair the same shade of auburn as hers. I like this longer, wavy cut. Makes you look more bohemian. She’d have approved.”
    My eyes watered, damn it. I couldn’t let him use my momma to soften me up. I blinked away the tears. “What do you want from me, Joel?”
    He released my hair. “I’ve chased you since you wore pigtails, Shooter. Just this once, couldn’t you have chased me?”
    “I have a bar to run.”
    “Buffalo could have filled in. Your sister and dad would have helped. Your brother, too.”
    “It’s not their responsibility. Momma left the place to me.”
    “She didn’t expect you to chain yourself to it.”
    “It’s been in our family since this town was founded over a century ago. You don’t just walk away from that.”
    “Excuses.”
    I growled, pushing away from the desk, needing the room between us to hold my ground. “What was I supposed to do, Joel? Just drop everything in my life to follow you like a puppy, happy for any bits of attention you gave to me?”
    “No.” His gaze bore into mine, all traces of humor and lust tempered. “You were supposed to ask me not to go.”
    Huh? That stole the wind from my world, my tumbleweed of frustration rolling to a stop. “And if I had?”
    He shrugged. “I would have stayed.”
    My mouth fell open. “So this was all some big test?”
    “No test. I was tired of running in place. It was change.”
    I threw my hands up. “Well, you got your change, didn’t you? Was it as good for you as it was for me?”
    He bridged the distance between us in three long strides, catching my hand, tugging me toward him. “A little birdie told me you’re going home alone every night.”
    He had me so discombobulated that I let him pull me into his arms. “Tell your brother to mind his own goddamned business. He doesn’t know everything that happens in this town.”
    “Are you sleeping with someone?”
    “Maybe.”
    “Your pants are on fire.”
    He tended to have that effect on the lower half of my body. “Joel, you can’t just come back here and expect me to fall into your arms.”
    “Don’t fall then.” He leaned in close, his lips even closer. “Walk.”
    I almost danced to his snake charms again. “Stop it.” I nudged him aside and yanked open the door, escaping down the hall toward the bar.
    “Montana,” he called. “Come back to me.”
    “You need to leave,” I yelled back. If he didn’t, I might do something stupid and tell him how much I still loved him.
    “I’m not leaving without you.”
    I shoved out into the dark room and was halfway along the front of the bar toward the door before I fully registered that the lights were off—all of them, even the beer lights I usually left on in the windows.
    “Buff?” My boot toe connected with what felt like a rolled up carpet on the floor. I stumbled to my knees, my hand coming down in something warm, wet, slippery. “What the hell?”
    “Hi, Montana,” a scratchy voice said in the darkness. Fear spider-crawled up my spine. “Aren’t you going to welcome me home, baby?”
    I gasped, my heart hurtling into a full-on panic. My ex was here, waiting for me in the darkness. I shouldn’t have left my shotgun at home.
    “Sweetheart, I’m serious,” Joel said from the swinging doors. “I want you to come with—”
    “Joel, watch out!” I yelled. Then a shot rang out over my head.
    “No!” Scrambling, I tried to get to my feet and run to Joel, but I slipped on the