He tore onto the highway, driving back toward Bluebonnet. Marlin didn’t answer his phone. Browning was working out at an oil rig in Louisiana for the next six months. Chester was probably still in prison out in Huntsville. Two more years. Berry, then. He called his brother’s job.
“Big Burgers,” Berry said with a familiar drawl. “Can I take your order?”
Fuck his goddamn family. “What’s the deal with Dad and warrants out for his arrest?”
“So you found out about that?”
Colt gritted his teeth in frustration. “Just tell me.”
“Needs to clean up the property. I told him I’d help, but I’ve been working double shifts here at work, you know. He’s waiting for Chester to get out.”
“Chester doesn’t get out for another two years,” Colt growled.
“That’s about right,” Berry agreed.
“I’ll take care of it,” Colt gritted, and hung up the phone. He tossed it into the passenger seat, wishing he could smash it down on the road.
Damn his family. They’d been a thorn in his side his entire life. He’d known that if he came back to Bluebonnet, they’d crawl back into his life again. Lazy, poor, trashy Waggoners. His mother hadn’t been able to stand it—she’d left when he was twelve, unable to handle looking after four Waggoner boys and his father on a supermarket salary. She was tired of working so hard, she’d told his dad. Tired, and she was going to go find herself a nice sugar daddy that would take care of her. That was the last time Colt had seen her. He hadn’t wanted to be part of that family after she’d left. He’d been unable to escape being one of the Waggoner boys. The clothes that were handed down from his dad. The food stamps. The name calling from the other kids in town. The day after he graduated from high school, he’d left to join the marines. He’d never looked back.
And now, he was back and he was going to have to clean up their messes again.
Before they ruined his new life, and his relationship with Beth Ann.
He’d just have to tell her the truth, as soon as he got his father squared away.
Even when Colt was growing up, Henry Waggoner’s home had been a shithole. Colt hadn’t seen it in almost nine years, and wondered if his memories had made it worse than he’d thought.
Nope. It was just as bad as he recalled. The road was little more than potholes—the city wouldn’t maintain this far out. It was up to the residents to have gravel poured every couple of years, but anyone that lived out here couldn’t afford something like that. His Jeep bounced down the rutted dirt road. His father’s old mailbox popped into view down the road, and Colt pulled up next to it and stared out at the yard, his lip curling in disgust.
When Colt and his brothers had been boys, they’d played among the broken-down cars on cinderblocks. They’d collected aluminum cans to bring in a few extra nickels. They’d chased one another through the high weeds and made forts out of scrap metal and old, discarded tires.
Now, when Colt looked across the yard, all he saw was trash. His father owned three acres and had set his trailer back at the edge of the property, away from the junk. But the junk butted up to the trailer now. Colt parked and picked his way toward the trailer. Busted cars, bikes missing wheels, piles of piping lay scattered amid thigh-high weeds. There was a stack of tires that was easily thirty deep. An old tractor that looked as if it should have been torn apart for scraps balanced precariously on two wheels, the other side half buried in dirt and grass. Every inch of his father’s yard was covered in garbage.
A dog barked in the distance. That must be Roscoe. He’d been little more than a puppy when Colt had left, and he’d been furious—once again—that his dad had spent several hundred dollars on a hunting dog rather than fixing the leaking roof on the single wide. “He can help us catch dinner,” his father had proclaimed proudly.
Colt hadn’t understood it then. Hell, he didn’t understand it now. No one in his family seemed to take responsibility for their poor living situation. The money for the dog could have bought T-shirts for his little brothers. But they weren’t mad, either. They’d been thrilled that they had a dog. And that was just one memory out of dozens.
His father had made a living when he was younger selling scrap metal and fixing junkers, or if they couldn’t be fixed, tearing out the useful parts and selling them. People had always dropped their broken shit at Henry’s trailer, and eventually it’d be cobbled and used up and taken away. But it looked as if Henry had let things pile up. Colt was revolted. He pushed to the front steps and noticed several bags of trash sitting next to the stoop. Fucking disgusting.
He banged on the door.
No answer.
Colt knocked again, harder. He could hear the radio on. He glanced back at the road—his dad’s junker truck was there, so he had to be home. He banged on the door one more time, and the dog began to bark loudly.
Colt sighed and pushed at the door knob. It wasn’t locked. He took a step in, then squatted as Roscoe came up to him, dancing with excitement. The dog’s muzzle was gray with age, and he looked a little worn out. Had it really been so long? Roscoe barked a warning, then licked Colt’s outstretched hand.
He smiled, petting the dog on the head. He’d hated the animal when he’d left, resenting the meals and clothing Roscoe had represented. Stupid to hate a dog.
“You need to answer your door, Dad,” Colt warned, then stood. The interior of the small single wide was a mess, too. Ramen noodle cups littered the counter, along with empty beer cans. The fridge was yellow with age, and the lone chair that sat in the living room was covered in masking tape on one corner, the upholstery destroyed.
Colt felt a twinge of guilt. Had his father been living in this heap with no help because Marlin was out driving his truck?
“Dad?”
No response. He thought he heard a thump in the back bedroom, but hell, that could have been trash falling over. Still, he took a step forward and frowned when the entire kitchen seemed to creak under his foot. Damn. The trailer was falling apart. He took another step forward, toward the door shut at the end of the single wide, where the lone bedroom was. He and his brothers had piled into that one room while his dad had slept on the couch. Colt glanced back at the living room. Back when he’d had a couch, anyway. “Dad?”
“Colt?” The sound was wheezing, faint, and made Colt’s heart clench in fear. He pushed forward, wincing when he stepped on a rotten patch and his foot nearly sank through the floor of the trailer. He pushed open the thin door and stared at the mess. The small room had a bed pushed to the corner. His dad was on the floor, covered in blood and bruises. His long, white hair lay stringy across his face, and several days’ growth of beard covered his worn face.
“Colt?” His dad struggled to get up. “I—I’m stuck.”
Underneath him, the floor of the trailer had collapsed in one section, rotted away. His dad had fallen through, his leg trapped somewhere under the trailer. His father winced, in obvious pain, and there was blood on the floor next to him.
Colt moved in carefully, his heart pounding. He knelt beside his dad, gripped his hand. “It’s okay, Dad,” he said softly, guilt and fear crashing over him. “We’re going to get you out of here and take care of you, okay?”
And he pulled out his cell phone and called 911.
The next few hours were a nightmare for Colt. The emergency vehicle couldn’t get close enough to the trailer, so Colt and a few of the paramedics had to haul his father out of the trailer and carry him across the junk-strewn field. From there, he’d followed the ambulance to the closest hospital, thirty miles away. His dad had been taken to emergency, leaving Colt in the waiting room, sick at heart. Berry was working a double shift and would be by when he was done, and Marlin was currently en route to Vegas, and wouldn’t be back for days. Browning was on the rig and couldn’t be contacted.
That left Colt.
Colt, who was racked with guilt. He’d deliberately ignored his father’s requests to see him. He’d been furious at the old man, holding grudges for his upbringing. It had taken a pissing match with Allan to get him to go see his father. What if it had been a few more days?
His father could have starved to death, a prisoner in his own damn trash heap of a trailer.
Colt didn’t like to think about that. He didn’t know what to do, either. He’d called Beth Ann and she’d promised to be on her way as soon as she finished with her customer.
They’d wheeled his dad into a room a bit later. He’d simply been dehydrated from being stuck in the floor. His leg was bruised and the enormous scrapes covering his leg infected, but they’d given him antibiotics and set him up on IV fluids. He could go home in the morning, the nurse had assured him, and then they’d discussed payment. His father had no insurance, naturally. Colt gave them his address to send the bill.
The nurse had pulled him aside and talked to him for a bit longer, concerned about his father. He showed poor nutrition for a man his age, and was suffering from several vitamin deficiencies. She asked what he’d been eating—Colt couldn’t tell her. She also cited concerns about his living conditions, and again, Colt had no answers.
All he knew was that he couldn’t let his dad go back to the trailer. It was not fit to live in, and if he went back, Colt’d just be fishing him out of it within weeks. He couldn’t let the thing fall down around the old man’s ears. They discussed options—the nursing consultant suggested a home, but Colt shook his head. His dad was stubborn. He’d never stay in a home.
It had been one of the longest hours of his life—the nurse grilling him about his father’s care, and Colt having no answers. He felt…ashamed.
Like a bad son.
When he returned to his father’s room, Beth Ann was already there. She sat next to his father’s bed, filing his nails with a pink buffing file. She chatted gaily as Henry looked on with a baffled smile. She’d cut the old man’s hair, too, Colt noticed, and the gray locks had been carefully smoothed down over his head.
“He’s very good at what he does,” she was murmuring to his father. “The entire time we were in the woods, he was never lost at all.”
“He was a smart boy,” his father commented, his voice raspy.
“Oh, honey,” Beth Ann said with a laugh. She called everyone honey. Everyone but him, he realized. “He is sharp like a whip. And never worried a lick about us getting lost, either. He just took care of the situation. We didn’t know which way was north at one point, so he made a compass—”
The door creaked as he pushed it open a bit farther, and both of them turned to look at him. Beth Ann’s gentle smile made his heart stutter with love.
His father’s gaze was wary. “Son.”
“Hi, Colt,” Beth Ann said, and waved her nail buff at him. “I was just helping your dad get cleaned up.”
He nodded, moved to his dad’s side. His throat went dry; he didn’t know what to say. After a moment, he brushed a stray hair off of his dad’s shoulder. “Just don’t let her put a pink streak in your hair.”