Josh caught Katie to his chest and engulfed her in a bear hug. "Hey there, little cousin." His deep, familiar voice and loving embrace brought tears to her eyes. He called her 'little,' but the cousins were within months of being the same age and although not nearly as tall as Josh, Katie towered over Hannah's tiny stature. Katie leaned back, away from Josh, and looked into a startlingly handsome face with eyes as green as her own.
"What are you doing here? Were you waiting for me?" Katie asked a bit sarcastically. She knew for a fact he wasn't here to see her. His attention was a hundred percent focused on Hannah. Katie looked over at Hannah whom she hadn't seen in several weeks. "Hey, Hannah." At Hannah's weak smile, Katie concentrated on Josh again.
Never one to lie or speak an untruth, the complete opposite of the man who'd fathered him, Josh drawled, "Well, I wanted to see you, yeah."
Katie absorbed that noncommittal answer and looked from Josh to Hannah and then back again. A soft blush stole over Hannah's cheeks as she refused to meet Katie's eyes and instead, concentrated on Josh while she bit into a fingernail.
From the rigid way her cousin was holding himself, Katie knew that she'd interrupted an argument.
She thought of the dark specter of Zachary McIntyre and fear made her blood run cold. "Oh my God." Suddenly, Katie felt lightheaded and swallowed deeply, the secret both families had been keeping from Zach suddenly blazing larger than life in her brain. She broke away from her cousin's embrace and stood staring at him in horrified silence. Ignoring Hannah for the moment, Katie's fear made her focus on her cousin. "Are you insane? Are you completely insane? He lives in freakin' Dallas! Thirty minutes away, Josh! He could walk in here at any moment." Turning to Hannah, Katie asked hopefully, "Was he here yesterday?"
"No, just my parents."
Katie put a hand to her mouth. "Does he know? Did y'all finally tell him?" Katie paused, and then answered her own question. "He can't know. You'd be dead. Josh, he'll kill you."
Her cousin lifted himself from his negligent position against the wall and came to his full height of six feet, two inches. Katie studied him and absorbed what working on the ranch for years had achieved. Josh was young, but he was built like a brick wall. His answer was clipped and brutal. "I'd like to see the motherfucker try."
Katie shook her head in denial and glanced over at Hannah who had turned white as a ghost and looked like she was about to collapse.
Katie swiftly turned back to Josh and tried to get through to her cousin again. "Josh, my God, your father ran off with his wife. You cannot be serious. You--"
Josh interrupted her, pain lashing his voice. "The man who ran off with Zachary McIntyre's wife wasn't my father. He was just the sperm donor who gave me nothing but bruises and cigarette burns."
Katie knew well the emotional and physical scars Josh carried from the years of abuse he had endured before her parents had rescued him, though she had no idea if Hannah did. But even if she did know, the situation was upsetting to the younger girl, and at Hannah's pained gasp, the cousins turned in unison to watch her begin to slide to the floor as emotion got the better of her.
Josh lunged for Hannah and caught her just before her knees buckled completely.
He stood still and erect, holding a visibly trembling Hannah in his arms. Katie watched as he ran a steely hand behind the younger girl's back and held her to him with a possession and familiarity that was telling.
Katie felt her face blanch completely when she realized the depth of the clandestine relationship. For some reason, denial perhaps, Katie hadn't thought the two of them were sleeping together. God, she needed to get a clue and start living in the real world. Just because she'd been denying her own sexuality for years, it didn't mean that the rest of the world lived in the same deep freeze that she'd been enduring.
She tried to calm her raging heartbeat enough to understand the details. "Josh, tell me the truth. Zachary doesn't know about the two of you, does he?"
Her cousin's arms noticeably tightened on the girl he held and it was a blatant indication to Katie that he'd never let the younger girl go, no matter what. "No, he doesn't. But only because Hannah won't let me confront him." His voice roughened with accusation. "And that tells me all I need to know about whether or not she's ready for this."
Hannah flinched at that last cutting comment and Katie asked her, "Do your parents know how far the relationship has gone?"
Hannah licked her lips and met Katie's eyes. "They know. They like Josh, they really do. It took my dad awhile, but he's good with it now. Except for . . . except for telling Zach."
"So it's not just me, everyone is afraid of Zachary finding out?" As Katie asked the question, she was aware of the angry, hooded look that came over Josh's face before he shut it down. The conversation was definitely not pleasing him.
"It's awkward, and nobody wants Zach to be hurt by any of this," Hannah replied softly.
Katie didn't have a rebuttal for that, and at her silence, Hannah's top lip quivered. "Please, Katie. Don't be upset. What are we supposed to do? I love Zach; he's my brother and I don't want him upset. He's been hurt so much in the past." The younger girl's gaze drifted away from Katie and down to the strong, masculine hands that were wrapped around her middle as Josh held her. "But I'm in love with Josh; I've been in love with him forever and yes, my parents know," the younger girl reiterated.
Katie wasn't hearing anything completely new, but something about the way Hannah used the word forever made her eyebrows lift in question. "Forever?" A sudden, suspicious thought came to Katie as she studied the younger girl. "Is that the only reason we're friends? Because of my cousin?" Katie felt a slither of pain; the idea hurt, more than a bit.
Hannah's eyes dropped uncomfortably from hers and her reply was hesitant. "I can't deny that I wanted your friendship because being close to you always made me feel closer to Josh when he wouldn't have much to do with me because of my age. But I love you and I'll always love you no matter what happens."
Josh's muscles surged into prominence as his arms clenched around Hannah in a grip that looked as if nothing could ever break it, "Nothing's going to fucking happen."
As Katie witnessed firsthand the raw emotion that her cousin felt for Hannah, she couldn't help but remember Zachary accusing her of using Hannah to get to him. If only he knew the truth. The situation was so twisted; her hand shook as she ran it over her trembling mouth.
She turned her mind away from the hurt she was feeling and tried to focus on the more important details. "So what does this mean? What's going on now?" Katie asked.
Josh answered. "Hannah wants to get married now and not even start college full-time. She wants to get a job at the bank in Redwood Falls instead and start taking online classes. I want her to get her degree in case anything happens to me, because she'll need it. It will also give her time to make sure she's ready for this."
Hannah cried, "I'm ready! I want you. I want you now!"
Josh looked down at the eighteen-year old girl he held within the circle of his arms. A shiver ran along Katie's spine when she recognized the look of naked need in her cousin's eyes.
As much as she wanted to state her opinion on the matter, the two people she loved so much needed to make up their own minds. They were both legally adults and she knew her opinion would only clutter up the point and get in the way.
"I'm going over to the Student union for awhile. Ya'll have things to discuss, so I'll give you some breathing room." She focused on Josh. "Will you text me before you leave? I want to say goodbye." Katie stood hovering at the door, hoping she was doing the right thing by not screaming at Hannah and telling her to listen to Josh.
"Katie," Hannah's soft voice reached her and Katie turned to see pain screaming from the younger girl's eyes.
Katie didn't hesitate, just walked straight to Hannah and took her in her arms for a hard, swift hug.
Hannah's voice came softly again, "I love you."
Katie squeezed her younger friend again and whispered back, "I love you, too." She held Hannah in her arms as she cut her eyes to Josh and back again to Hannah, where they softened on her young friend. "As much as I think this is going too fast, God knows I understand. There's not a better man in this world than my cousin. Believe me, I totally get it."
Katie looked between the two of them a moment more before walking to the door. She turned the knob and let herself out.
As she walked out, a dark, disturbing premonition of an enraged Zachary McIntyre infiltrated her entire being. She had only seen him briefly a handful of times since that dark night when he'd cornered her in the study at the McIntyre ranch. The times she'd spoken to him in the last two years had been sporadic. But each time she was in his radius, she felt like a bug pinned under a microscope. His intense scrutiny never failed to induce a confusing mix of sexual tension, resentment and a slight, unwarranted fear.
At least, she prayed the fear she felt was unwarranted.
Dallas, Texas
Zach McIntyre sat in the corporate offices of McIntyre Oil and Energy and surveyed the Dallas skyline with a scowl. For a man who had it all, he was inexplicably stressed and impatient. What he lacked was time. The last few years had been good to him financially. His determination had made it so.