AVERY (The Corbin Brothers Book 2) by Lexie Ray Read Free Book Online Page A

honestly no idea how we’d pay for the thing if we couldn’t even repay the bank.
    Only there was a way to repay the bank, but the solution was marrying Paisley Summers.
    “I don’t see any stragglers, do you?” Hunter asked me as our horses slowed to a trot. He was just as troubled as I was. “When was the last time the count was right?”
    “I honestly don’t know,” I said. “Those cattle could’ve gone missing weeks ago and we didn’t notice. Chance only brought it up to me yesterday, and he’s not out here all the time.”
    “We’ll keep looking,” Hunter said, nodding to himself. He was the man with the plan. “I’ll ride the entire perimeter and see if there are any sections down. We’ll get the entire Corbin calvary saddled and on the lookout for the missing guys. Little rascals. Probably eluding us in the gorge.”
    “We ran by the gorge,” I reminded him. It was a dramatic name for what was little more than an overgrown ditch dividing one of the pastures, but the terrain was problematic. Just a few weeks ago, Emmett had torn ligaments in his knee dragging a calf out of there. Cattle got hung up there all the time, but none of our missing five had been there.
    Hunter and I groped for our vibrating phones at exactly the same time, which could only mean one thing.
    “Family meeting,” we said in unison.
    “Wonder who’s getting the intervention this time,” Hunter muttered, pocketing his device. Last time, it had been him.
    “Who knows,” I lied. “It’s probably about the missing cattle.”
    “Maybe. I’ll race you!”
    He didn’t give me time to respond before spurring his horse into action, leaving me coughing in a huge cloud of dust. If my baby brother had a clue what this meeting was about, he wouldn’t have been in such a damn hurry to get there.
    We met Emmett in the barn, who’d been grooming a horse, trimming its hooves expertly.
    “You ran those horses too hard,” he said without looking up.
    “Have you even done any work today?” Hunter teased. Emmett was sporting a large and bulky brace on his knee from his incident at the gorge. He hadn’t been able to ride — Hadley’s orders — and it was really wearing on him. The only person happier on a horse than Hunter was Emmett.
    “More than you know,” Emmett said. “But we’d better get to the war room and figure out what’s got Chance in a twist this time.” My heart sank. I knew exactly what it was.
    “We think it’s missing cattle,” Hunter said, lowering his voice conspiratorially.
    “Spoiler alert,” Emmett returned sarcastically. “How do you know?”
    “Because there’s missing cattle,” Hunter said, rolling his eyes. “Easy.”
    “Why call a meeting over that?” Emmett wondered. “Just find the missing cattle.”
    “Big ranch,” I said, walking with my brothers up to the house. “Easier said than done.”
    Tucker was already up there, idling on the porch, waiting for the rest of us to get there.
    “You’re not keeping Chance waiting, are you?” Hunter called.
    “Kind of didn’t want to be the first one there, brother,” Tucker said. “Nothing really positive ever happens at family meetings, does it?”
    “Chance should just throw in a couple of nice ones to keep us on our toes,” Hunter said. “Family meetings telling us we’re doing a good job on the ranch.”
    “Yeah, right,” Emmett said, rolling his eyes as he accepted Tucker’s hand to get him up the porch stairs. I couldn’t help but notice Hunter bound up the stairs, testing the limits of his prosthetic leg. Hadley encouraged that kind of horsing around, pushing himself to reclaim his previous range of motion in spite of the carbon fiber length that kept him upright and moving.
    “If some of the meetings were stupid, we’d be less likely to all show up for the important ones,” I reasoned.
    “Maybe, but I just get such dread whenever my phone buzzes now,” Tucker said. “It’s a bummer.”
    “Has Chance always