Aiden’s mouth was open slightly. “Jesus.” He took a breath. “Mom knows this?”
“Sure she does. They talked a lot, which wasn’t a great idea. Mom loves her. She’d like nothing better than to reel her in.” He shook his head. “Bad idea.”
“Whoa, sounds like she had a rough time. How’s she doing? With the transition?”
He shrugged. “Good, I think. You’d never know it—that she’s been through all that.”
“What was the problem? Not enough money to put the mother in long-term care?”
Luke was shaking his head. “Plenty of money—her uncle wanted to put the mother in a nursing home. But Shelby wouldn’t have it. She was committed. She says her mother was her best friend.”
Aiden was quiet for a long moment. Finally he said, “This sounds like an incredible young woman.”
“She is that. Very mild mannered—hard to guess she could have that kind of conviction. Stubbornness.”
“Strength,” Aiden added. “Commitment.”
“Well, you’d have to be strong to do that, right? Yeah, she’s very strong, but she seems fragile.” Then he grinned. “Unless you see her on a horse. She’s a hundred and ten pounds, and on a horse, she’s Annie Oakley.”
Again Aiden was quiet for a moment, sipping. “What are you going to do?” he asked quietly.
“Do?” Luke repeated. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“She needs to get on with her life. She’s behind. You can relate—I can relate. Remember being set free from medical school after years of no life? What did you do?”
“Married a nut job,” he said, smiling blandly.
“Shelby put in her time, did the right thing, took good care of her mom, and now it’s her turn. She’s going to go back to school. She says she’s going to be a nurse, but you watch—she’ll end up a doctor or something. She’s quiet, but scary smart. She has money from selling a paid-off house—so she can travel all over the world, pay for a dozen years of college. You know how important that is, we’ve been all over the world and it’s worth seeing.”
Aiden laughed. “I hope she sees better parts than we did. You saw a bunch of deserts, I went to sea, medical officer on a ship…”
“But it all counts. Life experience—it’s worth it. She’s young—she has time to look around. I’ll tell you what—that girl’s going to have men hunting her down, she’s that good-looking. She never had that before. In high school she was shy, had a couple of short-term boyfriends, but she lost a lot of shyness, got tougher and more aggressive while she was taking care of her mom and had to go up against doctors and therapists and hospitals and insurance companies.” His eyes glistened proudly. “Believe me, she’s ready now. It’s her time.”
He’s letting her go, Aiden thought. For her, though it’s going to kill him. Aiden leaned back in his chair and sipped his drink. “What if she just decides to stay? At her uncle’s place? Forever?”
Luke laughed. “She’s not going to, that would be a waste.”
“If she did?”
“Look, I admit it—I got a little comfortable. The whole chase is a little boring and it wasn’t exactly a punishment to have a sweet, pretty girl right there, handy. But that’s just convenience, I’m winding down a little. There’s this nice little bar in Virgin River—bunch of townpeople go there at the end of the day—real good people. They have the best food on the planet and the jukebox hasn’t been turned on once since I hit town. A couple of marines run the place, so we connected. It spoiled me for entertainment, I lost interest in noisy, smoky bars with slutty girls looking for a pickup. I’ve been thinking… If I can rent out those cabins…work and live there, grab a beer at Jack’s, hunt and fish…I’m telling you—it’s almost a perfect life. You’ll have to come up sometime.”
Aiden let him think about that for a minute. Then he said, “How old do you have to be to appreciate that as a perfect life?”
Luke laughed. “About thirty-eight, twenty years of army, four wars. But now I’m thinking about staying in one place a while. I might look around for some flying in the area, something like medical-airlift transport or something.”
“Could someone like me get into that? Small town like that?”
“They have a midwife and everyone loves her.” Luke laughed. “You’d have some stiff competition.”