Stars & Stripes (Cut & Run 6)

“Yeah, we do,” Annie said. She got off her stool and tugged at Mark’s arm. “We’re leaving.”

The others moved away from the table, giving them a wide berth. But Ty and Zane were hemmed in, unable to step away unless the men moved or they went through them.

“What’s the matter, Garrett? You such a big man you got to hide behind your sissy boyfriend?”

“I can’t wait until he shows you what ‘sissy’ means in his vocabulary,” Zane growled.

Ty glanced over his shoulder, silently asking Zane what they should do. They could go through these four men with little effort.

“All right, break it up over here!” a man shouted as he stormed over from the bar. He was carrying a shotgun and waving his beefy hand as if shooing a pack of dogs off his lawn.

Stuart raised his hand, giving the proprietor an insolent smile. “No problems here, Bobby. We’s just making friends.”

They backed away, staring at Ty and Zane with smirks that made Zane want to shoot each of them in the face. It was a good thing Ty had remained calm enough for both of them, or Zane would have been on his way to a jail cell somewhere.

As soon as the door swung shut on the last man, Zane put a hand on each of Ty’s shoulders and squeezed hard. “Thanks,” he whispered.

Ty nodded and looked over his shoulder, his jaw set in a hard line, his hazel eyes flashing green. He was not as calm as he had seemed when facing the other men.

Annie skirted around the table. “Are y’all okay?” She looked just as angry as Zane felt.

“Fine,” Zane said through gritted teeth. “If stupidity was the worst thing we dealt with every day, we’d be golden.”

Ty was still staring at the doorway, jaw set. Annie put her hand on his arm. “Ty?”

He glanced at her and nodded, then looked back at the door. “Who were they? They work on a ranch close by?”

“Yeah, they’re hands over at the Cactus Creek Ranch,” Joe answered.

Ty nodded. “Word usually travel that fast around here?”

“Depends,” Cody said. “Big news can, but not usually. They must have been talking to someone who works on the C and G.”

Ty glanced at Zane and nodded, but Zane wasn’t sure what he was thinking. He put his arm around Ty instead of commenting on it. “Can’t believe you didn’t knock him on his ass,” he said as they filed out of the building into the pleasant night air.

“Would have been rude,” Ty said, and he sounded serious. Mark laughed, but Zane felt like he wasn’t quite getting the joke.

Mark helped Annie into the cab of Zane’s truck. Zane hung back with Ty, holding his hand to keep him there. “I’m sorry about—”

“Zane, don’t.” Ty looked around the parking lot and then at Zane. “Don’t apologize for shit you have no control over.”

Zane stared at him, enjoying the feeling of his racing heart and the butterflies in his stomach as he realized, all over again, just how much he loved the man in front of him.

Ty smiled. “Do I get to ride in the back of the truck?” he asked, a little too eager.

Zane laughed and glanced over as Cody and Joe climbed into the bed of the truck. They were making a mess of it, just drunk enough to be clumsy and not care. Joe tumbled over the edge into the bed and laughed. All they could see was one boot sticking up in the air.

Zane grinned. “Yeah, go ahead.”

Ty gave him an impulsive kiss and headed for the tailgate. Zane pulled himself into the driver’s side in time to watch Ty climb over the tailgate and plop himself down next to Cody. The man held his fist up, and Ty touched his knuckles to Cody’s as he settled in.

Zane shook his head, still smiling. How in the hell did Ty worm his way into a little niche wherever he went? It was amazing. By the time they were on the road home, Zane could hear Cody and Joe teaching Ty how to perform a proper yee-haw.

Annie and Mark were laughing, and soon Zane joined them. It was a clear, free sound—the kind of laugh he was only just recently remembering he could have.

“Zane,” Annie said with a hand on his shoulder. “Go find a state that allows it, and marry that man.”

Chapter 7

Harrison Garrett wasn’t doing any hard labor as he strolled through the barns. His body wasn’t up to it yet. But he loved the smell of the barns: the hay and the leather, the horses and the wood. It brought him peace in a world that had gone crazy. Men were trying to kill him, lions and tigers lived next door, his wife was on the warpath, and his son had brought home a man he loved.

When he reached the far end of the stalls, he stumbled across Ty and Zane just outside the barn door. Ty was perched on a hitching post as he watched Zane rope the horn of a saddle set on a fence rail ten feet away.

Zane tossed the rope, landing it around the saddle horn time and time again. He was trying to teach Ty the proper technique, but Ty wasn’t watching his hands or his posture, or even the rope as it sailed through the air. He was watching Zane’s face.

“You ready to give it a try?” Zane asked, unaware that they had an audience.

“No, show me one more time.”

Zane gave him a tolerant sigh and nodded. Harrison snorted, luckily not loud enough to draw their attention. This Ty Grady had Zane wrapped around his finger. It was almost sweet. And Harrison had rarely seen a man who could go toe to toe with Beverly and come out alive, much less on top and smiling. The more he saw of the man who’d caught his son’s heart, the more he liked him. And the more he saw of his son, the more he realized how close they’d come to losing Zane altogether. Even before his wife had passed, Zane had been a cold and rather distant man. He’d been so much like Beverly. Now, though, there was warmth in Zane that Harrison had never thought he’d see.

It could have been a coincidence that Zane had found new life and Ty at the same time, but Harrison didn’t put much stock in coincidences.

Ty was smoking a thin cigar, holding it in his left hand. He put it in his mouth and knocked on his cast in frustration. “Show me one more time, then I’ll try it lefty. Unless you’d like to cut this off.”

Zane looked him up and down and started to speak, but he stopped himself. Then he rolled his eyes. “You’re stalling.”

“I’m not stalling. I’m learning.”

“You’re bullshitting.”

“Don’t they call it horseshitting down here?”

“Come on, if you’re not going to try this, I’ll show you how to saddle the horse instead.”