Braydon(80)

Brendon heard every word his mother said. She made complete sense, but he was having a hard time grasping the fact that they would eventually go in separate directions. That was the sole reason he’d been so messed up. It was like a part of himself was dying and he didn’t know how to revive it.

He had no idea who might possibly understand the true extent of his connection with Braydon. Hell, he didn’t understand it all that much. But clearly it was stronger for him than it was for his twin. Because if Braydon had been going through what Brendon was, there was no way life would be this hard to deal with.

“I’m just not ready for him to move on. I . . .” Brendon looked up, fighting the emotion that was burning in his chest. “Braydon has found something that I can’t seem to find. I don’t know why.”

“Because you’re holding yourself back, boy,” Curtis informed him. “You think that all women should be willing to accept that there are two of you. But that ain’t the case, boy. You’re one person. Braydon’s one person. The two of you can’t expect to move through life as one. It doesn’t work that way.”

“Why?” Brendon retorted angrily. “Why can’t I, Dad? I’ve lived my whole life with him. Why do I have to let him go now?”

“You don’t have to let him go, Bren,” Lorrie corrected. “He’s still here.”

“For now,” Brendon barked sharply. “What happens when he wants to run off again? Or hell, when he decides to get married and move away?”

“Has he said he’s planning to do that?” Curtis asked, sounding concerned.

“No,” Brendon admitted. “He hasn’t. But it’s only a matter of time.”

“Not true,” Lorrie said. “I’ve talked to your brother. He has no intention of leaving Coyote Ridge for good. He needed time away, but now he’s back. This is something you’ve conjured up, Bren. You need to realize that.”

“I do realize that!” Brendon yelled, pushing his chair back from the table and getting to his feet.

Before he could take a step toward the door, toward fresh air, away from the chaos that was strangling him, his father was right in his face. But when their eyes met, Brendon didn’t see an ounce of anger reflected there. What Brendon saw in his dad’s blue-gray eyes had those damn tears burning his eyelids.

And when Curtis pulled Brendon against him, fiercely wrapping his arms around him, Brendon broke down and bawled like a f*cking girl.



“MOM? WHAT’S WRONG?” Braydon asked his mother when he answered his phone. It was the middle of the afternoon, and he’d just arrived at a job site that he had to check on. His headache was looming and getting worse by the minute, but he damn sure didn’t want to sit at home and worry about his brother or pine away for Jessie while she was at work, so he did the only thing he knew to do. He had immersed himself in work.

“Nothing, honey,” his mother answered. “Your brother came by this morning.”

Braydon wasn’t sure if she was just telling him because this was news or if she was leading into something. Knowing his mother, she was leading into.

“How’d that go?” he asked, making his way back to his truck so he could sit in the air-conditioning for a bit. It was that, or his head might just explode off his shoulders; the pain was getting significantly worse.

“Not as well as I expected. Your father talked to him for a little while.”

“What aren’t you telling me, Mom?” Braydon asked, hoping she’d get to the point. He didn’t want to rush her, but the conversation seemed to be stalled.

“He broke down, Bray.”

“Broke down how?”

“His issues don’t involve a woman.”

“No? Did he happen to mention Cheyenne?” Braydon questioned.

“I brought her up. He didn’t have much to say about her, but honestly, I don’t think this is about her. This is about you.”

Aww, hell. Braydon knew the responsibility was going to somehow rest on his shoulders. And truth was, he didn’t have the strength to carry Brendon’s issues at the moment. “Mom—” he began, but he was quickly cut off.

“Listen, Bray. This isn’t something you can fix, per se. But I do think you need to talk to him.”

“I have talked to him,” he countered. “I’ve talked to him on multiple occasions. His auto-response is that he messed up. There isn’t much of a discussion from that point.”

“Bray,” his mother said, her voice soft yet firm, “listen to me for a minute, okay?”

“Fine,” he huffed, turning the air vent directly on his face.

“We’ve always known that the two of you were close. I’ve told you the story about how Brendon couldn’t bear to be away from you when y’all were little. He was always calmer when you were around. Since the day y’all were born. I don’t know why, and I’ve never really worried about it. Not until now.”

Braydon didn’t want to be rude, but he wanted his mother to get to the point. He’d heard numerous stories about how their baby cribs had been pushed right up beside one another because Brendon slept soundly if Braydon was close by. If his parents had tried to separate their beds, Brendon would cry for hours. Braydon got it. He just didn’t understand how that was relevant to the current issues.