Something to do? His life’s work was something for Alex to do.
He had honestly never considered his brothers would want to stay in Oregon and work on a dairy farm when there was money on offer. This wasn’t a glamorous life. And as far as Finn was concerned, teamwork wasn’t the road to happiness. Space was. Control.
How the hell they could think any different was beyond him.
“I don’t see the point of dragging me into your career crisis,” Finn said, not particularly caring if he sounded insensitive. “If you want to try your hand at something new, by all means, take what I give you and invest in something new.”
“Maybe I want to get back to my roots, Finn,” Alex said. “Did you think of that?”
“No,” Finn returned. “I didn’t. I honestly thought that between a stack of cash and a life spent getting up at the ass crack of dawn, you’d choose cash.”
“I’m ex-military, Finn. This doesn’t feel like a hardship to me. And anyway...we’re family.”
“Bull. That’s not why you’re here.”
“My reasons don’t matter,” Alex said. “Not even a little bit. What matters is the will and Grandpa’s express wishes. We all have equal share of the ranch if we want it. And I, for one, want it.”
Finn looked around the room, daring the others to turn down his offer. “And the rest of you?”
“I already told you,” Cain responded. “I’m staying. We’re staying. I’ve been working my ass off trying to give Violet a normal life in Texas. But everybody there knows that her mom walked out. As if it wasn’t enough for her to have to deal with Kathleen abandoning her.”
“You mean she doesn’t see her own daughter?” Alex asked.
“No,” Cain said. “She walked out the door one day and neither of us have seen her since.”
An uneasy silence fell over the room. Probably because none of them knew whether they were supposed to express sympathy or not. Another thing they had in common, aside from physical mannerisms. They were deeply uncomfortable with emotions.
“I’m staying too,” Liam said.
Finn looked at Liam. “Because you love this place so damn much?” He could remember Liam coming to work on the ranch when he’d been a teenager. A surly, jackass teenager who had never seemed particularly interested in the goings-on at the Laughing Irish. No, he was much more interested in the goings-on of Jennifer Hassellbeck’s panties.
“Maybe I’ve grown an interest in animal husbandry.” Liam shrugged.
His brother, who Finn knew was actually something of an entrepreneurial genius, most definitely did not have a sudden interest in animal husbandry.
“Right. And I just started a vegan diet,” Finn said. “What does this place mean to you? Why do you want it? I know why I want it. I’ve bled for it, and that’s not a metaphor. So you tell me what reasoning you have for thinking you all having equal ownership with me is fair.”
“Our reasons are irrelevant, as Alex already pointed out. Grandpa left a quarter of the ranch to each of us. Sorry if that puts a burr under your saddle, Finn,” Liam said, “but that’s kind of the least of my concerns.”
“I just want to know what you bastards think you’re getting out of this.”
This time, it was Cain who spoke. “Come on now, little brother. Liam and Alex are legitimate. Only you and I are bastards.”
“Legitimate or not, once they were adults they never came back here. And neither did you,” Finn said. “You can see why I don’t much feel like I owe any of you anything. I’m not sure why Grandpa did.”
“Maybe the old codger was sentimental,” Alex said.
“No,” Finn said, “that is definitely not it.”
He had been hard, but loyal. Protective. Of the land. Of his grandson. Finn had never felt much like anyone loved him. Until the day he’d gotten into a mishap with a barbed wire fence and sliced through his thigh. He’d come back home pale and bleeding, and the old man had nearly lost his mind. Worried, he’d said, that it was serious. That he’d need his damned leg cut off.
That was the only love Finn knew. And it had been everything to him.
“This is all speculation,” Liam said, “and speculation doesn’t mean a damn thing. The fact is we are each entitled to our share of the ranch, no matter how much that pisses you off. But here’s the deal for you. If you can’t handle it why don’t you let me buy you out. You don’t have to stay here. Go start something that belongs to you.”
“This place does belong to me, asshole.”
“Not legally. It belongs to all of us. I guess you could say it’s a Donnelly operation now.”
Finn was pretty sure his head was going to blow clean off, right there in his grandpa’s living room. Then these three jackasses would get the place all to themselves.
“If I walked,” Finn said through gritted teeth, “you couldn’t run this place. I am the only one of us here who could do it. You’re all dependent on me. I do not need any of you. Remember that.”
There was a knock on the door and Alex raised a brow, then his finger, pretending to count all of the people in the room.
“It’s dinner,” Finn growled.
“Hello.” Lane’s voice floated in from the entry.
“In the living room,” Finn called.
“Great,” came the response. “I’m bringing the food into the kitchen because there is a metric ton of this nonsense.”
All of his brothers were looking at him now. “My friend said she would bring dinner,” he said. “Though why I’m feeding you is beyond me.” He wished he hadn’t thought to feed them now, although, rage aside, there was nothing he could do about any of this.
It wasn’t like he could withhold food and walk around the house ignoring them. Well, he supposed he could. But if he knew anything about Donnellys, that would only make them dig their heels in deeper.
Alex arched a brow. “Your friend?”
“Yes,” he said, nearly snarling. “My friend. Because women have brains and personalities, not just breasts, you jackass.”
“I usually just consider the brains and personalities obstacles to navigate on my way to the breasts,” Liam said.
Cain nearly growled. “Watch your mouth. Boys talk like that, not men. As I’ve often told my teenage daughter. Who lives in this house now. And I won’t have you saying shit like that around her.”
“It’s just talk,” Liam said.
“It’s never just talk, little brother. Man up.”
“Dinner,” Finn barked, turning out of the living area and making his way into the kitchen. Lane was already setting up, a giant bowl of green salad with tongs sticking out the top sitting on the counter. Next to it was a silver pan covered in foil.
Lane was nowhere to be seen.
She appeared a minute later with two more tin pans. One that was filled with meatballs and sauce, another that had pasta.
“Did I go overboard?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said, trying to correct his tone.
Lane didn’t deserve his mood.
She clapped. “Good. I would rather have you overfed than underfed.”
“Judging by how good that smells, I don’t think you have to worry about us not eating,” Alex said, walking into the room. Liam and Cain weren’t far behind.
“Lane,” Finn said, noticing that his tone was more than a little bit surly, but not able to correct it, “this is my brother Alex, and my brother Liam. You met Cain yesterday. Kind of.”
Lane waved. “Hi. I hope you don’t mind, but I’m going to eat with you. Because this really is enough to feed a small army.”
“You cook,” Cain said with a crooked smile, “you make the rules. And based on the meal I ate last night, let me just add that you can cook for us anytime.”
“I am fairly amazing,” she said, putting her hand on her chest, her expression turning overly sincere. “Just don’t fall in love with me.” She threw a stack of paper plates next to the food. “And dig in.”
“I’m going to go see if Violet wants dinner,” Cain said. “Though I’d probably have better luck if I texted her.” But he turned and walked out of the room anyway.
They began to fill their plates in silence, and a few minutes later Cain reappeared with Violet, who hung back against the wall. Finn studied her for a moment. She was petite. Short and narrow. But her face was pure Donnelly. From the brown hair that hung into her blue eyes, to the firm set of her jaw and mouth. It almost made Finn feel sorry for his brother. Because Donnellys were not easy people to deal with.
“You remember your uncle Alex,” Cain said, gesturing. “And your uncle Liam.” He said Liam’s name with a slight edge.
“Hey,” Violet said, barely nodding her head.
“That’s teenager for I love you and miss you and thought about you every day since I last saw you,” Cain supplied.
That earned a snort from Alex. Neither of them moved to hug Violet, and Finn had a feeling the teenager was only relieved by the lack of forced contact.
Suddenly, Finn was feeling a little bit embarrassed. That Lane was witnessing all of this. The strange, brittle family dynamic. He felt like he was walking across a lake that had frozen over. The ground cracking beneath his feet, and he was never sure which footstep would send him straight through and down to his freezing watery death.