Forsaking Truth (24 page)

He convinced himself
Luke had been referring to their inability to marry and
not
their relationship in
general.

When they pulled up at
the big house Sheilagh ran out of the car. Kelly took several deep breaths and
Luke unlocked the car door. “Wait,
” Kelly said.

Tristan turned. Kelly
didn’t look at either of them. In a low voice he said, “For the record, you
don’t have to justify anything. It’s okay.”

Yeah. Tristan
swallowed.

Luke’s hand hesitantly
lifted and clapped over Kelly’s shoulder. He didn’t
look at his brother, but there was no mistaking the gesture as anything less
than the first acknowledgment Luke had willingly made in the history of their
relationship. “Thanks.”

His door shut and
Kelly let out a slow breath. Tristan looked at Kelly. “Tha
nks for telling him that.”

“He’s my brother. I
love him. I just want him to be happy.”

Tristan nodded. “How
long have you known?”

Kelly shrugged. “I
always knew you were gay.”

His eyes widened in
the darkness. “You did?”

“Yeah. Before I was
married, I got
a lot of the girls you flirted with.
Stories started adding up. You never hooked up with any of them. It took me a
while longer to figure out about Luke. I just thought you guys were tight. But…
then I noticed the rings last year and it all made sense. How
long?”

“Next month will be
our sixth anniversary.”

He let out a slow
whistle. “That’s a long time to keep a secret.”

“You have no idea.”

Kelly turned. “Can I
ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Why doesn’t he trust
the family enough to tell everyone?”

Tristan
shook his head, wishing he had the answer. “I think he’s
scared. He’s afraid if one person knows, the world will know and as much as he
loves you guys, there aren’t enough of you to protect us from all the nasty
people out there.”

Kelly nodded,
accepting h
is answer. “Well, for the record, I’ve
looked at you as another brother for a long time, Tristan.” He held out a hand.
“Welcome to the family.”

Tristan blinked back
tears. Kelly couldn’t know how much his words meant. It was the closest he’d
ever come to k
nowing what it was to have in-laws. He
shook his hand and rasped, “Thank you.”

When he reached the
barn, Luke was sitting at the table, staring at nothing. He didn’t look angry,
like Tristan had assumed he’d find him. His expression was…contemplative.

“Yo
u okay?”

Luke sighed. “Yeah. I
think I am.”

Tristan laughed. “You
don’t seem too sure.”

“I’d like to crucify
Sheilagh, but with Kelly…I’m okay with that.”

“Kelly’s a good guy.”

“You’ll get no
argument from me.”

Over the next while,
Sheilagh sent
away applications and settled on a
school. When she left the following fall, Tristan was sad.

He’d been worrying
about her since he met her. He loved her like a little sister and now he feared
she hated him beyond redemption. With her gone and the rest of
McCulloughs gone off and married, the big house was, for
the first time, quiet.

She’d come home for
Christmas and smiled at him a few times, but it never reached her eyes. He
worried he might have broken the delicate closeness they’d always shared.

It was
n’t something Luke was good at talking about. He had never
liked the fact that his little sister had a crush on Tristan or the fact she
knew things about them they wanted kept private. Kelly was fine with Sheilagh
and told Tristan she called him often. It
wasn’t the
assurance he was hoping for, but it was enough to get him through.

As time traveled on,
their isolated existence from the rest of the family seemed to grate on both of
them. Luke fluctuated. Sometimes Tristan found him turning the ring on his fi
nger with a sweet smile on his face. And other times he
found the ring forgotten next to the sink in the bathroom.

Tristan never took off
his ring and didn’t understand why Luke did. They’d had a couple incidences
with Luke laying it on thick with the guys
at work.
He mostly talked about women like most guys did when those locker room moments
came up, but then he’d started keeping company with a few men Tristan didn’t
approve of. The new guys working the yard liked to break balls and use words
like homo and
faggot. Tristan hated them, but Luke
never seemed to mention them outside of work.

Tristan often thought
about bringing the topic up when they were alone, but those moments were so
rare he hated the idea of dragging the world’s ugliness into their little
sanctuary. He supposed if Luke were hanging out with these
men outside of work it would be more of an issue, but since they were only
co-workers and every job had idiots hidden somewhere among the staff, Tristan
tried to get over it. He learned to ignore t
he guys
at work and eventually tuned them out.

That March, Sheilagh
was due to return home again. Tristan was anxious and determined to make sure
everything was going okay with her. He’d paced all night waiting for her car to
arrive that Sunday, but it nev
er did.

Monday morning he sent
Luke to the big house to see what changed.

“What do you mean
she’s not coming until Wednesday?”

Luke shrugged. “Hell
if I know. She told my mum something about staying to help one of her
teachers.”

Tristan stepped back
and f
rowned. He’d wanted to see her, but Luke was
being his normal emotionally stunted self and already putting up walls at the
first mention of his sister.

The next two days
dragged. He hung out at Luke’s all day Wednesday waiting for her to arrive. As
he hear
d a car pulling up he left Luke alone where he
was playing on the computer and rushed to the door.

When he opened the
door he stilled. That wasn’t Sheilagh’s truck. It was a BMW. Who the hell was
this bozo?

The front door of the
big house opened and Maure
en stepped out. “Oh shit,”
he muttered as she lifted a rifle and aimed it at the fancy car.

Then he heard
Sheilagh’s familiar voice. “Ma! It’s me! Put the gun back!”

“Sheilagh? Oh! I
thought it was some lost drug lord in that fancy car.” She lowered the w
eapon. “Who’s with you?”

The doors of the car
opened and Sheilagh and the driver stepped out. Maureen holstered the gun in
her apron and went to greet them. Tristan held back. The guy with her was old.
Older than Tristan.

He turned and went to
find Luke.
“Luke!”

“Yo!”

He was still in the
office. “Sheilagh’s here.”

Luke’s eyes stayed on
the computer screen, focused on whatever he was doing. “Okay. You going over
there?”

“No. She’s with
someone.”

He turned. “Who? A
guy?”

“Yeah. An
old
guy.”

Luke frowned.
“What?”

“I think we should go
check it out.”

Luke pursed his lips
to the side. “I can hold off.”

Tristan huffed and
went to the window. “Oh, good. Your dad’s back.” He pulled out his phone as it
buzzed. “Speak of the devil.”

He read the text from
Frank.
Th
ere’s some
putz here with Shei.

He looked over and saw
Luke got the same text. It must have gone out to all the guys.

“See!” Tristan
snapped. “Your dad doesn’t like him either.”

Luke rolled his eyes.
“The guy’s been here for five seconds. You don’t know
anything
about him.”

His eyes went back to
the window. “Oh, there he is. I’m gonna go mess with him.”

As he left Luke
yelled, “Stop acting like a girl!”

Tristan ignored him
and rolled up his sleeves. Steeling his face with his hardest
I’m—a—mean—motherfuck
er—from—Texas scowl, he
meandered over to the BMW. He didn’t know why, but he was really bothered by
the fact that Sheilagh was close enough to someone to bring him home and no one
knew who the fuck he was.

Tristan crossed his
arms, showing off his tattoos
, and purposefully
crushed a twig under his boot to get the guy’s attention. The guy turned and
Tristan drawled, “You here with Sheilagh?”

“Are you one of Sheilagh’s brothers?” He
spoke with a British accent, which Tristan wasn’t expecting. Must be one of
those fancy college types. He narrowed his eyes. “She
ain’t my sister.”

Placing the overnight
bag he’d retrieved from the car onto the ground, he extended his hand. “I’m
Alec Devereux, a friend of Sheilagh’s from Princeton.”

Tristan eyed his hand,
but ma
de no move to shake it. This guy was definitely
too old for Sheilagh. He was handsome and that voice was sexy as hell, but
Sheilagh was twenty-four. This guy looked close to forty. Too old for college
and too old for Sheilagh. “What kind’a friend?”

He dro
pped his hand and seemed put out. Hopefully Frank gave him
a hard time as well. “A good friend. Who are you?”

“Just another keeper.
You’ll want to watch yourself.”

The Brit frowned.
“Pardon?”

Tristan twisted his
head slowly, cracking various vertebrae in t
he
process. “Shei ain’t ever brought a man home. You look a bit…old…to be her
friend
.”

The door to the barn
opened and Tristan grinned. If he was intimidating this guy, wait until he met
Luke.

Luke stepped to his
side. He’d removed his shirt and probably
done about
fifty push-up’s real quick so his muscles appeared more defined. “Who’s this?”
he said, tipping his chin. Tristan almost laughed. He knew Luke wouldn’t be
able to resist playing with this guy.

Tristan glanced at
him. He was wearing the Jeff ca
p he’d bought him
years ago. He could gobble him up in that hat. In a monotone voice, he said,
“Sheilagh’s friend.”

“Sheilagh doesn’t have
friends we don’t know.”

The Brit arched a
brow. “I’m Alec.”

“Alec,” Luke said,
testing the word. “Shei brought you he
re?”

The guy nodded.

Luke chuckled and
shouted, “Sheilagh! Get your ass out here before we string up your ‘friend’!”

The door on the porch
whipped open and Sheilagh came barreling out. “Don’t you come up here trying to
intimidate my company. Take your sor
ry asses on home
and come back when you’ve found some manners. Alec, come inside. You don’t need
to bother with them.”

Tristan grinned.
I’ll
be damned.
There
was the fire that had been missing around here.

Luke laughed and said,
“Take a McCullough out of C
enter County, but you’ll
never get the McCullough out of her. I can see that prep school of yours still
has its work cut out for them, Shei-Devil.”

Shei smiled, the
expression slow and full of hidden affection. “No fancy neighborhood’s gonna
change me, Luk
e. You should have known better if you
were hoping to send me away and get some debutant back.”

Luke laughed. “Pretty
brazen bringing a friend back with you, Shei-Devil.”

“Well, you know me. I
like to shake things up.”

She didn’t look at
Tristan. As a
matter of fact she remained on the
porch, keeping her distance. Tristan didn’t like that, especially when he
sensed the new guy taking his measure. Had she told him about them?