Someday (Sawtooth Mountains Stories Book 2)

by Susan Fanetti

  She wasn’t alone, though. A few feet off to her left was a family: a grey-haired couple, two younger adult women, one of them holding an infant, and a little boy about three years old. They carried red, white, and blue balloons, and little American flags, and a sign that yelled Welcome Home! in red, white, and blue letters. If a soldier in military dress didn’t come down the escalator soon, Honor would give up her law license.

  Not that that was worth much these days.

  After a long spell of riderless descent, the escalator took on a new passenger, and Honor perked up at the sight of a dark head, but it wasn’t Logan, or the solder. A middle-aged man in a track suit came down, followed closely by a middle-aged woman in an identical outfit.

  Honor shifted on her feet, worried that maybe Logan had changed his mind. His flight had landed ten minutes ago, and these were very likely passengers on the same plane, so it was too early to let anxiety set in. But he hadn’t replied to the text she’d sent in greeting when the board had changed the flight’s status to ‘arrived.’

  The soldier came down—not a soldier but a Marine, in battle dress. The little patriotic band beside her broke into cheers and applause, and the woman holding the infant dissolved into sobs—his young wife, no doubt. That baby was small. Was this …? Yes. A father meeting his new child for the first time.

  While his family—parents, sister, wife and children, Honor guessed—swallowed him up, the man dropped his duffel bag and crushed his little boy to his chest before anything else. Hoisting the boy to his hip, he turned his attention next to his wife and new baby, folding them close.

  Everybody was crying. Honor thought she might cry.

  Distracted by that sweet reunion, she almost missed the very thing she’d waited for. When she turned away from the tearful cluster of strangers and looked up, Logan was halfway down the escalator.

  And what a sight he was. The brown boots she knew so well. Those long, powerful legs and perfect hips clad in faded jeans topped with a brown leather belt and a plain silver buckle. He had a collection of massive, elaborate buckles, prizes for bull riding, but he kept them in a display case on his bedroom wall. Logan was cocky and self-assured, but he didn’t wear his achievements like a billboard.

  His broad shoulders and strong chest were wrapped in a familiar black button-up shirt, open just enough at the throat that she could see a hint of his medallion from where she stood. His heavy winter coat was hooked in one hand, draped casually over his shoulder.

  Damn, he was pretty.

  He wasn’t wearing a cowboy hat, and that was a shame because he looked sexy as hell in a hat, but she hadn’t expected him to wear one. He only did when he was in Jasper Ridge or on what he called ‘cowboy business.’

  But he always wore those boots. He had another pair, identical but more beat-up, that he wore when he was working on the ranch, but the pair on his feet were the boots she knew best. They were practically a metaphor for Logan himself: expensive but unpretentious, good-looking but scuffed, comfortable, and country through and through.

  He’d been wearing a partial smile, an anticipatory lift at one side of his handsome face, but when they made eye contact, that smile broke wide open and filled with light.

  She wanted to meet him right at the foot of the escalator, but her feet had other ideas. They wouldn’t move, so she simply stood and watched him come.

  And he came straight for her—stepped off the escalator and strode with potent purpose right to her. No hesitation, no slowing of his stride, no time for her to think more than she’d already overthought. As if he’d rehearsed the scene, he came for her, dropped his coat to the floor and had her in his arms, his mouth on hers, before she could take in the air she’d need to go under with him.

  He actually bent her over his arm, laid her back, curled over her, and there was nothing she could do—she wanted to do nothing else—but clutch at his shoulders and go with him. As she gave herself over to the moment and focused on nothing but him, the sensual sweep of his tongue against hers, the beloved scrape of his beard on her face, his familiar scent, masculine and warm, Honor settled into his embrace completely. Right now, it didn’t matter what uncertainties still wobbled between them. It didn’t matter what their lives were, their stories or their ambitions. They could have been anywhere in the world, they could have had any past, any future, because nothing mattered but this.

  She eased her arms around his neck and dived head first into loving him.

  Eventually, Logan’s lips closed on hers and he lifted his head, but he didn’t set her back fully on her feet. His beautiful, slow grin eased into his cheeks. “Hey there, counselor.”

  “Hi.” Her voice had become a lovesick teenager, breathy and too high. “I missed you.”

  “Missed you right back. I’m glad you called.” He stood straight and brought her with him, catching her hand as his arms dropped from their embrace.

  “Is your family upset you’re not with them today?”

  He laughed. “I think Emma would have tried to pick me up and throw me all the way here if a flight wasn’t available. I’m not the only one who misses you. And they all think I did something to fuck us up. Again.” The laughter in his voice and on his face dimmed. “Did I?”

  She reached up and brushed her fingers over his beard. “No. This is me. There’s too much about what’s coming I don’t understand, and I’m scared.”

  “But we’re okay, you and me?”

  More than anything, she wanted to be. But her fears hadn’t been entirely assuaged. “I’m still scared, and I still don’t know what I’m going to do to get my career back, but my dad said something that made me think, and what I know is I love you. It’s the only thing I know. I don’t want to lose that.”

  He drew her close and tucked her under his arm. “I like your father already.”

  “They’ll like you, too. Let’s get your bags.”

  He let her lead him toward the baggage claim. The sky beyond the windows had gone dark grey and begun to throw snow at the world in yet another tantrum. They had eight inches on the ground already, and this new storm was supposed to drop another six.

  “Looks like I just got in under the wire,” he said, watching heavy flakes hit the glass. “You okay to drive in a snowstorm?”

  At the carousel, she turned and gave him the contemptuous look that deserved. “I live in Idaho, just like you, and this is Wisconsin, where I grew up. I know how to drive in snow, Logan.”

  “Sorry, darlin’. But tell me you got a truck for this.”

  “I’ve got Justice’s Volvo. It’s four-wheel drive, so don’t worry your pretty little head about it.”

  He chuckled softly and pulled her close again. “Honor and Justice. Still can’t get over that. You think your folks were trying to make a point?”

  “Uh, yeah. You think? Mom and Dad were hippies—the radical political kind, not the San Francisco stoner kind. They’re still kind of hippies.”

  “The Volvo-driving kind.”

  “Exactly.”

  *****

  Thanksgiving in the Babinot house had never been quite like the dinners she’d seen in books and magazines and movies, with the dad at the head of the table, carving a turkey the size and shape of a VW Beetle, and the mom laying down a big bowl of mashed potatoes while all their family looked on in grateful awe.

  Thanksgiving had always been important, and celebratory, but, like everything about her family, it had been just a little bit different.

  For one thing, politics and culture were not only allowed at the table, they were intended for the table. They had always acknowledged the realities of the pilgrims and what they’d done to the indigenous people they’d encountered—not the shiny-apple story they taught in schools, but the reality of oppression, theft, and disease. Rather than a prayer, her father led the people at the table in a lesson and discussion about colonialism. Every year of Honor’s memory.

  For another thing, her mother was an ‘adventurous’ cook
, and the family leaned vaguely toward vegetarianism, or what her parents called ‘mindful eating.’ It meant that while there might be meat on the table—and this year there was an actual turkey—it wouldn’t be the centerpiece of the meal, and it would absolutely be a humanely farmed animal. Which got a lesson and discussion of its own.

  Beyond that, there were usually some pretty strange things on the menu. Authentic indigenous foods, trendy vegan and vegetarian dishes, things like that. And also mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce and sweet potatoes, but not necessarily prepared like other people made them.

  And finally, her father had usually invited at least one, and often a few, of his students who hadn’t been able to go home for the holiday break, so there were often strangers at their family table.

  This year, Logan was the only stranger at their table. They’d arrived only twenty minutes before the meal, barely enough time for introductions and for Logan to put his bag in her room and take a few minutes to wash the travel off. Now, Honor sat beside him and wondered what he thought of the Babinot version of Thanksgiving, his first one away from home.

  While her father did his riff about colonialism—different every year because he inflected it with current events—she watched Logan sidelong. For the first time, her parents’ ritual of enlightenment seemed less like an insightful tradition and more like unbearably smug self-satisfaction.

  She hadn’t told her family that Logan was a registered member of the Shoshone tribe. He himself never talked about it. Though their mother had been half Shoshone, Logan and his siblings all identified as white. Still, she knew they also embraced their whole heritage, so she wondered what he was thinking while he got a lecture on white colonialism.

  His family was itself a dissertation on the topic—the Cahills were descended both from pioneers who’d staked ‘new’ territory and become powerful leaders, and from the Native people who’d lived on the land long before a white foot had stepped on it.

  Then her mother did her thing and described the dishes laid across the table. She got to a Le Creuset dish full of a vegetable stew or heavy soup with a lot of corn. She called it sagamité, a traditional dish of many indigenous tribes. It looked exactly like vegetable stew. Logan smiled, and Honor saw him struggle to stay quiet and finally fail.

  “It’s a real nice spread, ma’am. It all looks delicious and smells even better. But you know, my mama was Shoshone. I know sagamité. I think most tribes have some variation of it, but it’s just corn stew. There’s nothin’ particularly special about it. Mama was brought up on the Sawtooth Jasper Reservation. She was a great cook, but mainly she made fried chicken or pork chops and mashed potatoes just like all the other moms in town. Fry bread’s about the only thing I think of as really different from anything else everybody made.” He gave Honor’s mother his most charming grin, with just the most subtle hint of an edge. “But don’t make fry bread.”

  Her mother blinked, momentarily struck dumb, then recovered. “I thought your people were cattle ranchers.”

  “We are. The Twisted C’s been running since the nineteenth century. My father’s people staked the claim on our land, and they were founders of our town. My mother came from settler stock, too, as well as Native. Nothin you”—he turned his smile on Honor’s father—“or you, sir, have said is wrong. I’m just sayin’ it’s all a lot more complicated and intricate than a history lesson and a bowl of stew.”

  It was rare that either of her parents found themselves on the learning end of a lesson. Honor and Justice both had been relegated to spectators as her parents grappled with this confident man at their table. Justice grinned like he’d just walked in on a prizefight.

  Their father nodded. “You make an excellent point, Logan. But it’s interesting to me that a family with indigenous heritage would run a cattle ranch.”

  “Why? Shoshone are meat eaters. A lot of tribes are.”

  “But don’t they have a respectful relationship with nature?”

  “You can run a cattle ranch and care about the land, sir, and the animals. In fact, I’d say you can’t run a ranch well if you don’t. Not that there aren’t those who try.” Logan set his elbows on the table and leaned in. “The Twisted C isn’t a corporate concern, Dr. Babinot. We’re plenty big, but we’re a family ranch. We run it like it’s our home, because it is. Our beef is grass fed, and well cared for. It’s not respect we feel for nature. It’s love.”

  Honor’s father smiled. Right then, she knew that her father, at least, had decided that he liked Logan Cahill.

  Her mother wasn’t done, however. “What about rodeo? That pendant you’re wearing—does that mean you do rodeo?”

  Logan touched the pewter disc near his throat. Honor found her own fingers toying with her pearls, mirroring him. “I did, yes ma’am. Rode bulls from the time I was a kid until I was about thirty.” He grinned again. “Probably not an argument you could make against it I haven’t heard.” Setting his hand on Honor’s shoulder, he gave her a sweet squeeze. “From your daughter, a few times. My own brother’s against it, and we’ve had plenty of dinner-table talks about it.”

  “And what’s your answer?” her mother challenged.

  “Can we eat while we fight?” Justice asked and picked up the ladle from the stew that had started this whole thing.

  “Yes, please!” Honor agreed.

  They started a circuit of serving dishes, and Logan picked up the conversation. “I say you’re right. There’s a lot of dark sh—dark practices that go on in a rodeo. Some people treat the animals harshly. I won’t try to suggest they don’t. I’ll even give you that maybe it’s most people. But I always rode clean. I took care and never rode a bull that had to get hurt or drugged to want to make my life hard.” Another grin—the man knew how to make an argument feel like a friendly chat. “My bulls were happy to want to kill me.”

  “A bull trapped in a tiny box is happy?”

  “Well, sure, he’d rather be in a field chasing cows. But they don’t live their lives in the chute, ma’am. At the show, they’re stabled until it’s time for the ring. At home, they’re in a field chasing cows.”

  “Okay.” Her mother said, laying a slice of turkey on her plate. “So you’re an ethical rodeo rider. Aren’t you still endorsing a phenomenon that’s known to be abusive? You say you know that a lot of ‘dark practices’”—the audible quotation marks hovered over the table—“go on, and yet you still participate without trying to stop them. Why?”

  Logan took a beat before he heaved a conceding sigh. “I don’t have a good answer to that one, Mrs. Babinot.”

  “Ms. Hinmann,” her mother corrected.

  He acknowledged it with a nod. “Ms. Hinmann. I’m sorry. You’re right. I turned a blind eye. Where I grew up, where I still am, rodeo is just … it’s part of us. My father rode. My sister met her husband at a rodeo, and he’s still involved—now he’s a judge. My friends rode. My bull-riding days are long behind me, but I won’t lie and say I don’t miss it.” He surveyed the beautiful table and then looked around the beautiful dining room—a little bit funky, with hints of Hippie accenting the strong presence of College Dean and Local Artist—and then met her mother’s gaze again, straight on. “Maybe it’s what everybody does in some way or other, if you have the luxury to get what you want. You don’t always see the things that take the shine off what you want.”

  Her mother didn’t answer right away, and the room went quiet in anticipation. Her parents had challenged Logan, and he’d pushed them right back. Having never seen anyone do that before, Honor didn’t know how her mother would react.

  Her first reaction was a simple tilt of her head. “You feel pretty comfortable in your skin, don’t you, Logan.”

  “Yes ma’am, I do. I’m a long stretch from perfect, but I know who I am.” He smirked sidelong at Honor. “For the most part. Every now and then I still get a growing pain or two.”

  Honor’s mother smiled. “Well, it’s good to know who you are, and it’s good to k
now to keep growing. Would you care for some jellied cranberries?”

  “Yes ma’am, I would.”

  “Oh, Horror,” Justice said with a laugh. “You have got to keep this guy. He just bested the Babinot Dinner Roundtable!”

  *****

  The Babinot tradition was that anyone who hadn’t cooked had to clean. Since Honor and her mother had done all the cooking, the men—Logan included—cleared the table, while the women went to the family room, and Honor’s mother opened the double doors of the board game closet.

  Board games had been a big part of their family entertainment. Curtis and Samantha had not wanted to raise children who were addicted to electronics, so they’d enforced strict television-viewing limits and filled the rest of the time with wholesome family activities—outdoor activities and adventures, indoor crafts, games, and books.

  They were a family of traditions, too, and one of their most dearly held traditions was The Playing of the Board Games after Thanksgiving dinner.

  As Honor and her mother discussed the pros and cons of their many options, Justice ducked his head around the corner. “Catan! It’s got to be Catan. Horror brought us an actual settler to play with!”

  Meaning Logan. Her brother was a douche. “Douche!” she yelled as he ducked away.

  It wasn’t a bad call, though. Settlers of Catan was easy to learn but challenging to play. It was kind of a perfect game. “He’s not wrong, is he?” She pulled the game from the shelf.

  “Are you sure about this man, Honor?” her mother asked as she closed the closet doors. “I see the appeal, certainly. But a rancher from Idaho? A bull rider? I can’t imagine your values line up with his. Not the values you were taught, at any rate.”