The Cowboy's Big Family Tree. Meg Maxwell

      His cell phone buzzed with a text. He grabbed it, worried as always that it had to do with the twins, that something had happened.

      But it was Clementine.

      I’ll drop the boys off after the show rehearsal. I need to talk to you.—Clementine.

      No question mark. Not “can” I drop off the boys. Not “can” we talk.

      I will. I need. End of story.

      Didn’t she know it was too hard on him to see her? That she was the first woman who’d interested him since The Liar? Plus, even more so, just the sight of Clementine reminded him of who he’d been before he’d gotten Parsons’s letter: a Grainger. His father’s son. Exactly who he thought he was. Albeit hardheaded and stubborn, fine. But his father’s son. Clementine had been there when he’d gotten the letter. Hell, she’d brought it in from the mailbox, not that that was her fault.

      In her presence, his life had completely changed. Went from one thing to another.

      Maybe. If. He closed his eyes and shook his head, driving himself crazy. Something had to give here. He had to look up the guy or ask someone or find out something, dammit.

      In the meantime, he could text Clementine back a No, that won’t work for me, I’ll pick them up, no time to talk, bye. He’d done that the first month after he’d pushed her out of his life. She’d show up at the house, she’d call, she’d text, and he just cruelly shut her out. He released a deep breath, another gust of cool wind going straight to his bones. Maybe by “I need to talk” she meant she wanted to talk about the twins and how often he should work with Harry and Henry at home on the songs they had to learn for the Christmas show.

      Right.

      This was his mind wrapping around stupid maybes when Logan wasn’t a stupid man.

      Clementine wanted to talk about them. About what happened last August. About why he’d closed the curtain on them before it had even gone up.

      But he didn’t want to talk about it with anyone.

      Thing was, Clementine Hurley knew what it was like to have a birth parent and be raised by someone else. Maybe talking to her would help him sort out some of the wild feelings that were making him crazy.

      He shook his head. He’d talk to her, then he’d feel close to her again, then he’d be kissing her and suddenly he’d be losing his head again in a romance. He liked Clementine—truth be told, he more than liked her in a deep down way he never would allow himself to think too much about. But everything inside him felt like it was made of the same thing his hard head was made out of. Something had closed inside him, period. He was done with women, done with love and romance and thinking about marriage and the future. And as attracted as he was to Clementine, he wasn’t about to use her for sex. He’d hurt her enough.

      But maybe if he finally said something, gave her an explanation without going into specifics, just some general: Got some strange news I don’t want to talk about and can’t deal with, so I’m laying low these days kind of thing. A person on the receiving end of that explanation would have to respect that, right? She’d back off. He could go on trying his damnedest to pretend she didn’t exist.

      That settled, he texted back an Okay.—L and went back to the house to fill up a thermos with strong coffee, surprised to see his answering machine blinking on the house landline. Everyone who needed to get in touch with him had his cell phone number.

      He pressed Play and headed to the refrigerator for the pitcher of iced tea the twins’ sitter had made yesterday.

      “I’m calling for Logan Grainger,” a stranger’s voice said. “I’m from the Tuckerville Post Office. You have been noted on a form here as the emergency contact for the late Clyde Parsons. His PO box hasn’t been paid in two months and will need to be cleaned out by the end of the week or the contents will be turned over to the state.”

      Logan froze. Emergency contact? How dare—

      Logan counted to five in his head to calm himself down, then shoved the pitcher of iced tea back in the fridge, his mind on the key and the money Parsons had written about. Child support. Well, Logan didn’t want anything to do with Parsons’s money or his damned guilt. He hated the final paragraph of Parsons’s letter and had almost ripped the thing to shreds right after he’d read it.

      You’ll also find some photographs in the PO box. There’s one of your mama. To this day I swear she’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. There’s one of us together too that always killed me to look at. I screwed up big. I failed her and you. I just want you to know, most of all, that I’m sorry. I tried not to think of you and did a damned good job of it too. But now that I’m dying, I’m thinking about you a lot.

      —Yours, Clyde Parsons.

      My father is Haywood Grainger, you stinking liar, Logan wanted to scream. His father had been a great dad. He practiced soccer with Logan and Seth for hours in the fields. He’d chaperoned overnights in the woods for Boy Scouts. He’d patiently tutored Logan in chemistry, having to study the textbook himself first to understand it. He’d taught Logan to be proud of the small bit of land they owned, how to raise and care for cattle, how to ride a horse. He’d been the best father and had always made Logan feel okay about himself.

      Because he didn’t know he wasn’t Logan’s biological father? If he had known, would he have treated Logan differently? Or not? Had Haywood Grainger known or not?

      More than anything else on earth at the moment, Logan wanted Parsons to be wrong. He wanted Parsons to have been mixed up. Or that the pregnancy and himself as a father was some fantasy he’d cooked up because his girlfriend, Logan’s mother, had dumped him for a better man—Logan’s father. Maybe Parsons really wasn’t his biological father at all. Logan liked that train of thought.

      Except there were pictures in the PO box. Not that they’d prove anything, but Logan could see what Parsons looked like. If Logan looked nothing like him either, then maybe he could go on forgetting the whole thing. Pretend he’d never gotten the letter, force it from his mind.

      But since the seed of doubt was there, that he wasn’t the son of Parsons, maybe seeing a photograph of Parsons would settle something for Logan either way. Or not. Now he was thinking in circles. Logan was surprised he hadn’t collapsed in a dizzy heap on the kitchen floor.

      That’s it, he thought. Just do it. Get it over with. He grabbed the letter from where he’d stuck it between the side of the microwave and the wall, took out the little gold key and shoved it in his pocket. Then he put on his leather jacket and his Stetson, let his ranch hand know he’d be gone for a few hours, and headed for his pickup.

      Tuckerville was just over an hour away. During the drive, he kept the radio loud to drown out his thoughts. When he pulled into the Tuckerville post office parking lot, he didn’t hesitate; he got out of the truck and went inside, ready to finally do this, to know something for sure.

      He fished the old gold key from his pocket. 137 was imprinted at the top of the key. He found the right box on the last row, stuck in the key and felt his stomach twist with the lock.

      He opened the little square door. Inside the long, narrow box was stacks of money, small bills haphazardly bundled in rubber bands and a bunch of envelopes, some large manila ones, some letter size.

      Logan pulled out the large envelope and reached in. He could feel several photographs.

      He pulled one out. Ellie McCall Grainger sat on the bank of a river in one, grinning in the sunshine. She wore a yellow T-shirt and jeans rolled up to the knees, her bare feet in the water. God, he missed her. His mother was kind and patient.

      He didn’t have to wonder who had taken the picture.

      He turned the picture over. Beauty at the River. With a date, November, twenty-eight years ago.

      Logan was born almost exactly nine months later.

      The next three photographs were also of his mother alone,