Page 98 of Kaden & Keegan
Kaden was the one to respond. “He moved to Wyoming to be with his kids and grandkids.”
“Wow. I guess I thought he’d always be part of the landscape. Kinda like the Walkers.”
“He’s gettin’ up there in age,” Keegan explained. “Got some health issues. His kids wanted him closer to them.”
Kaden watched as she tossed around the information.
“That’s hard work,” she finally said. “He runs what? Thirty head of cattle out there?”
“At his high point, yeah, thirty was about where he was,” Kaden told her. “Right now, there’re ten out there. Once we get settled, we’ll figure out what we can and can’t handle.”
“What about Walker Demo? Working a ranch is a full-time gig.”
“It is,” Keegan confirmed. “We plan to let Autumn know we’ll be goin’ to part-time. Won’t leave her in the lurch.”
“Is that what you wanna do?” she asked, again looking back and forth between them. “Be ranchers?”
“What we’ve wanted for as long as we can remember,” Kaden admitted.
A knock sounded on the door and Bristol shot to her feet like someone had fired a pistol in her ear. So much for thinking she was beginning to get comfortable.
“I think she’s scared of us,” Keegan whispered when she carried the food into the kitchen.
Kaden stared after her, though he couldn’t see her because of all the damn walls separating the space.
He wasn’t surescaredwas the right word, but they certainly made her nervous. Then again, he was feeling a bit twitchy himself. You could’ve knocked him over with a feather when she texted to suggest lunch. Now that he was here, Kaden couldn’t help but think this was a bad idea.
“You gonna hold down the couch?” Keegan teased. “Or you comin’ to join us?”
Hell, he hadn’t even realized his brother had left the room.
*
After they ate, as she cleared the table of the old plastic plates her father had favored, Bristol wished she’d taken the time to make a few upgrades to this place. The fact that Keegan had called her out on it had cemented the fact she truly was stuck in the past. Probably one of the reasons she didn’t have people over.
Of course, there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it right now. It was bad enough she’d made the offer to fix them lunch only to realize she didn’t have any food in the house. Seriously, who did that? Certainly not a good host.
“Why don’t you let me handle that?”
Spinning around, Bristol inhaled sharply when she noticed Keegan standing directly behind her.
Before she could argue, he took the plate out of her hand, carried it over to the sink.
“I’ll get to it eventually,” she assured him. “The dishwasher doesn’t work, so I’ll wash them by hand.”
Something she would surely have to fix before the baby arrived. There would be more dishes to contend with then.
“What’s wrong with it?” he asked, his gaze dropping to the dishwasher.
She giggled uncomfortably. “No idea. It hasn’t worked for years.” Bristol took a step back, looked past him. “Where’s Kaden?”
“He got a call. Stepped outside.”
Nodding as though that made sense, Bristol gripped the hem of her sweater, rubbed it between her fingers. Yep, she was feeling a little antsy.
“Do we make you nervous?” he asked, coming to stand in front of her.
“What?” She forced a smile, tried not to fidget, then lied through her teeth. “No. Of course not.”
