“I went home, visited Dad at the hospital, then came here.”

“I heard about his accident. How’s he doing?”

“Pretty beat up, but he’ll recover.”

Joe pulled out two glasses and grabbed the bourbon.

“Old times’ sake.” He poured two shots. “You look like you need it.”

Piper swallowed her mouthful of wine. “How come he can have one?”

“He’s bigger than you, and a paying customer,” Joe said. “Plus there’s the fact that he’s not a lightweight. In fact, we could handle this stuff at fifteen.”

Piper flipped her cousin the bird, which made the side of Dylan’s mouth kick up again. She had a feeling that was as close as he got to an actual smile.

She watched as they threw back the whiskey without a single wince or cough.

“Weird how your dad skidded out like that coming down Burns Pass,” Joe said. “I mean, he’s driven that road hundreds of times before.”

Dylan nodded. “That’s what I’m having trouble understanding.”

“I guess it happens, and he’s going to recover, which is the main thing.”

“It is. Now about my mother, Joe? If there’s trouble I want to hear about it, especially if I’m the root of it.”

Joe didn’t want to speak. Piper counted to five, then another five and told herself to stay out of it. Bailey got up and left to start playing the piano, and she told herself to follow. Pressing three fingers to her lips, she fought to keep the words inside, but it was no good, they had to come out.

“Your mother blamed him for you leaving, and for that shit that went down before you did.”

“That’ll do, Pip.”

Ignoring her cousin, she continued. “He’s a big boy, and he wants to know, so I’m telling him. Your mother’s spent the last sixteen years making Joe and the Trainer family pay.”

Dylan Howard’s eyes remained steady on Joe for a moment, then he turned them on her with a look that would drop a giant. Fortunately, Piper had lived with men equally capable of just such looks. She wasn’t easily intimidated, even if this one came from one of the most disturbing men she’d ever met.

Chapter 4

The brunette Dylan now knew as Piper was giving him a look that suggested he was personally responsible for his mother’s behavior, which he possibly was in a roundabout way.

“I’m sorry, Joe, I had no idea she was behaving that way.”

“How could you? You haven’t been back since then, and I’m sure she didn’t tell you. Don’t sweat it, man.”

But he was sweating it, because the thought that his mother had held this man accountable for something Dylan had done alone was not a comfortable thought.