Hayley was in first, climbing on him and hugging him close, Carol was at home with the twins and Max, but there was his mom and dad, Eden, Sean, Jack’s family. Steadily he was growing more and more tired, and words were getting hard to find. Finally it was just Jack and Hayley, Jack on one side of his bed holding his hand and Hayley cross-legged at the end chatting about another party she wanted to go to.

“Were you scared, Daddy?” she asked out of the blue.

Riley considered the question carefully. He could be entirely honest. He could lie. Or he could just redirect the entire thing.

“Everything happened so fast, I didn’t have time to be scared,” he lied.

Jack squeezed his hand, and Hayley smiled at the answer. She crawled up to kiss him good-bye, then left to go home with Robbie who was outside the door.

“Bye, boss,” Robbie said to Jack. “Good to have you back, Riley.” He left with Hayley, and it was just Jack and him and the emptiness of the white room.

“I know you’re angry. You told me not to go,” Riley began. He was sure any minute Jack was going to leap in with an I told you so.

“Don’t do that,” Jack began. He eased Riley over and managed to wriggle himself next to him on the narrow bed. Anyone looking at the bed would not have put two grown men on it, but somehow they managed it. “I’m not angry at you.”

Riley bit his lip. “You have every right to be.”

Jack sighed and wriggled a little more so that he could get an arm around Riley and pull him close. “I had this friend once, his name was Davy, and he wanted to be in the rodeo. His mom knew my mom, and he’d be over here at the D all the time. I was twelve, he was maybe fifteen.”

Riley couldn’t begin to imagine what the hell this story had to do with his and Tom’s decision to look at a field in cartel country, but never mind, he was happy just to listen to Jack’s voice. And at least it could delay the whole part where Jack was furious Riley had put himself in danger.

“So we’re out on our horses, and we’re practicing these barrel turns, like figure eights, y’know?”

Riley nodded. They’d seen the barrel racing in the gay rodeo they’d gone to. Fast turns on horses that got so close to the ground on the turn Riley couldn’t watch.

“We were competitive, we both wanted to be the best, but his horse went right out from under him and crushed his legs. His mom was screaming at me, crying in the hospital, the fall had damaged his spine, you see, and there was no way he’d ever be in a rodeo. Hell, it was odds-on he wouldn’t walk again. But he did walk again, and the last I saw him was when he moved to Montana.”

Riley waited for the connection. There had to be one. This was typical Jack to have some kind of morality tale that made sense.

“I remember what his dad was saying. Telling his mom that their son was only doing what was right at the time. He was a good rider, took precautions, it was in his blood, he couldn’t know that it would go wrong that day. Same as you. Yeah, I worried, and I said what I thought, but you could have gone down there, all that protection from the government, and been fine. Just bad luck, Riley, bad luck is all.”

Riley closed his eyes and focused on his breathing. “You always say the right thing,” he murmured.

Jack chuckled. “I try.”

“I hate you,” Riley snarked.

“I love you too.”

* * * * *

The journey back to the D was made in Riley’s SUV.

“It’s got the best suspension.” Jack defended the choice. Riley couldn’t muster up the energy to quip back. He was way past talking and well on his way to just sleeping. They were out of Dallas traffic quickly, and Riley settled back in his seat. Jack kept up a general level of conversation, telling Riley things he had missed and quite a bit about how the decision to take on Vaughn at the D was a good thing.

Jack joined the back of slow-moving traffic as they hit the interstate, and Riley realized he was gripping hard to the door handle. He was thankful the car automatically locked when the engine started. Jack cursed when someone cut them off and again when he had to press the brakes sharply to avoid rear ending an idiot in a Subaru.

Riley heard himself whimper but hoped to hell Jack hadn’t. He had every right to be jumpy, but Jack didn’t need to know about it.

When they finally made it back to the D, Riley was never more pleased to see his own bed or to hold the twins or to play Thomas with Max. Hayley was fetching and carrying for him, her sunny outlook on life a balm on Riley’s confusion. When they went to bed, Jack held him like he was made of glass. And that was okay, because Riley didn’t think he could ever be anything else than cold and desperate for touch.

Stupid. Give it a few days.

“You know what we need,” Riley said softly as they drifted toward sleep.

“What?”

“Maybe some more security here.”

Jack hummed his agreement and shifted a little to gather Riley closer. “I’ll look after you,” he said. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“I thought I’d lost you,” Jack added, and his tone was bleaker.

“I thought I was lost,” Riley said. Those words were the most he could offer. When Tom had walked into his hospital room to say he’d been discharged, a scowling boyfriend—Michael?—at his side, he’d said he’d see Riley at work soon.

Riley closed his eyes and settled his breathing to match Jack’s.

Probably be a good idea to think about working from home. It’s safe here.

Chapter 13

Jack worked from one end and Vaughn the other, and they met in the middle where Robbie had marked out the boundary of the first riding area. The white uprights looked clean, and all they needed to do now was attach the railings. Robbie worked his way around, testing each upright, and finally all three men were standing in the middle of the ring and contemplating what came next.

“I’ll get the next one marked out,” Robbie announced.

“I’ll start on the fencing,” Vaughn added.

“Anything I can do?” Liam asked from behind Jack.

Jack turned on his heel. “Can you work with Vaughn?” Liam jogged over to catch up with Vaughn and heft the first of the lengths of white wood that would create the last past of the perimeter.

“Delivery!” Carol called from the side, the twins in a double stroller. She would walk them out each day for air, and it never failed to make Jack smile to see them. Riley had been out of the hospital a week now, and part of Jack wished his husband would also come out and see the work they’d done on the school arenas. Seemed like Riley was hiding in work, with every sentence he spoke starting with Tom’s name or talking about shale and gas and oil and data.

Jack glanced over at the start of a separate barn, which he’d had farmed out to a specialty construction company to build. For a moment he concentrated on that and not on Riley. The barn was all on one level, no stairs to negotiate apart from a small storage space in the eaves. The stalls were wide and the paths in between stalls and riding area smooth. There was even a room set out like a classroom for the care side of the school, learning about horses. Eli was in there today decking it out, although Jack hadn’t seen what he’d done yet. The delivery today was the last part of the building jigsaw—the hoist they’d need for any of the kids who couldn’t get themselves on to the horses on their own.

Since the trial in Laredo, he’d had something else on his mind: the kids who had no where to go, the ones who’d ended up with Hank. He’d checked up on all of them, and they were all at different stages in their lives. They all seemed to be at crossroads of their own, and Jack had put things in place to help them.

If only it was so easy to help Riley.

“Back in ten,” Jack called over to Robbie, who waved in acknowledgment. Then climbing Solo Cal, he made his way back to the house. The school and house were a few minutes apart by horse, maybe ten at a walk, and as he used the new road being created in the dirt, he felt another wave of pride for what the D would be doing. When he arrived at the house, he found a truck with the hoist and two drivers talking to Riley. The one who appeared in charge turned to face Jack as Riley indicated with his hand that was who they should be talking to. Before Jack could dismount, Riley was hobbling back into the house on his crutches. Riley didn’t even wait to say hello or shoot the breeze or, hell, give Jack a kiss.