Carmen waved that off. “Old water, old bridge.”
Maybe, and while no one ever thought Carmen and Hamish had been madly in love and happy, this had to sting at least a little. But Gabriel immediately rethought that. Once upon a time, they must have been in love. Must have been happy. Ifnot, they wouldn’t have married. So, the stinging had to be more than a little and had likely gone on for years.
“Resentment and bitterness can fester,” Carmen continued as if reading Gabriel’s thoughts. “Hamish couldn’t make the ranch work. I couldn’t have kids. And he didn’t get the respect that I hadn’t known he wanted from marrying a Parkman.”
“I’m sorry,” Rosalie repeated, probably because she didn’t know what else to say.
Carmen stayed quiet a moment and then seemed to pull herself back to her usual cheery self. “I suppose you’ll look for Hamish?” she asked.
Gabriel nodded. He’d also check to see if any laws had been broken. Of course, since it’d been nearly fifteen years, the statute of limitations would apply and likely no charges would stick. Still, he thought Hamish should have to face up to what he’d done.
“Oh, well,” Carmen said on a sigh. “Hamish won’t thank you for that. Resentment and bitterness,” she repeated. Then she looked at them. “You know, Hamish thought you two were repeating our history. He went on and on about how the Parkmans were never going to accept anyone with McCloud blood into their family.”
Rosalie looked at him, the questions and surprise in her eyes, but Gabriel knew he wasn’t having that same reaction. That was because he’d been on the receiving end of Hamish’s rant about Carmen and Rosalie’s gene pool.
And Gabriel suspected Hamish had taken the rants and warnings a step further.
Onehugestep further.
If his suspicions were right, it was even more reason for Gabriel to track down the man and demand the truth. Because he had another suspicion that Rosalie’s caution toward him wasn’t something he wanted to undo. Especially now. He hadbarely qualified as good enough for her when he’d been a football star and a semi-golden boy. There was nothing golden about him now, and he sure as hell wasn’t a star.
“Hamish was wrong,” Carmen said, yanking Gabriel’s attention back to her. “He should have never tried to come between you two. It’s obvious you’re a match made in...” She stopped, chuckled. “Well, maybe not in heaven but a match made in Last Ride, anyway. That’s sort of like heaven.”
Gabriel would have disagreed with that if he could have figured out a way to do it without insulting Rosalie. While he sat there, more than a little dumbfounded, his great-aunt continued.
Carmen smiled again as her gaze skirted around her property. “You should take over the Silver Springs Ranch.”
She’d tacked on that last part so fast that it took a while for it to sink in. To sink in and mentally slug him in the face. “Are you all right? Is this ranch too much for you—”
Carmen gave him a reassuring smile. “I’m fine. Just old, that’s all. I’ve been thinking about moving into one of those little cottages in town that my cousin Evangeline has set up.”
Gabriel remembered Evangeline. A hippie-type do-gooder who’d given away most of her share of the Parkman fortune. “What cottages?” he asked.
“It’s a retirement-type area on Webster Street,” Rosalie provided, setting her beer bottle on the tray. She’d only had a few sips, he noted. “Evangeline bought some empty lots and did fundraisers to build cottages.”
“Sort of like a transition between being at home and assisted living,” Carmen provided just as her phone dinged with yet another text. She smiled when she looked at the screen. “I should go inside and make some calls to let everyone know that I’m not dissolving into a puddle of grief.”
Carmen stood, signaling an end to the meeting, and she kissed Gabriel’s and Rosalie’s cheeks. “Don’t let Hamish get the last laugh when it comes to the two of you,” she murmured, gathering up the tray. “Don’t throw away a second chance because of the likes of him,” she said before heading inside.
Rosalie and he got up as well. “What did she mean by that?” she asked. “How did Hamish try to come between us? And why would Carmen think he’d gotten the last laugh on us?”
Gabriel considered how to respond to that and went with the truth. Well, the partial truth, anyway. “Despite Hamish’s sour nature, he was close to my dad and thought Last Ride wasn’t a good enough place for him, that he’d have more opportunities in a bigger city.” Since his dad had been an electrician, that was possibly true.
“What did that have to do with us?” she pressed as they got into the truck. He turned on the engine and cranked up the AC. It seemed as if Rosalie had been about to tack on another question to that, but she stopped. “Hamish thought if you left Last Ride, then your folks would, too. I mean, since all your siblings had already moved away.”
“Bingo,” Gabriel confirmed. “Needless to say, Hamish didn’t see the town as any sort of heaven.”
“No,” she softly agreed, but there seemed to be a question at the end of her single-word response. A question Gabriel didn’t especially want her to ask. He didn’t want to get into the part he was pretty sure Hamish had played in their past.
“Old water, old bridge,” he grumbled under his breath. It’d been meant as a reminder for him to shut up and move on.
He did the first. Had trouble with the second.
He shut up all right, but Gabriel looked at her and saw she was already looking at him. Studying him. Maybe getting ready to ask that question. Maybe sorting through memories of them.
Gabriel was doing some memory sorting, too, which meant he was doing the exact opposite of “moving on.”
Nope.