The Devil in the Saddle

by Julia London

  “Again, I was talking about you,” George pointed out. “Not Hallie. I didn’t know about this thing with her and Rafe.”

  “Same thing in theory.”

  “Well, look who woke up and entered the twenty-first century,” Dolly said.

  Cordelia didn’t know if she even believed what she’d said to Martin and again to Dolly and George, but the thing was, she wanted to believe it. She wanted to believe two good people like Hallie and Rafe could be happy. Who was she, or Martin, to interfere? But that was a parent’s nature, she guessed.

  Run this ranch without Martin? Dumbest thing she’d ever heard.

  Cordelia sipped more of the spiked hot tea. “I guess maybe a person can change after sixty years.” She glanced at the headstone. “I hear you chuckling, Charlie. Cut it out.”

  No one spoke for a moment, until Dolly said, “I am never going to get used to you speaking to a headstone.”

  Cordelia held out her cup. “Top me off, will you?”

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Christmas was a somber affair for the Prince family, the first without their father, the first without the elaborate gifts they were used to receiving. They still had the towering spruce delivered from Colorado. It almost reached the vaulted ceiling.

  Hallie’s mother had brought in her interior decorator to trim the tree. Hallie had offered to do it, but her offer might have been half-hearted. She was in the middle of her move to Austin, and she didn’t want to be bothered, if she were being honest.

  She’d taken an apartment in downtown Austin, and although the drive was only an hour and a half from San Antonio, she’d been trying to establish this new reality for herself. She was trying not to go home every weekend.

  She’d been to the Comeback Center on campus and had talked with Tasha, the counselor with whom she’d corresponded in Aspen. Tasha was enthusiastic. She explained to Hallie that much of the coursework could be done online, and really, there were only two courses that would require her physical presence. “You could do one in the spring, one in the summer, so you could work,” she’d suggested. The other courses Hallie needed would be self-paced.

  Hallie could have her degree by the end of summer. That was exciting. But she found life in Austin to be a little lonely. The city had a different vibe from San Antonio—it had a faster pace and a younger crowd, particularly on campus. At thirty, she felt like a dorm mom walking around campus.

  She didn’t know anyone, either, and didn’t know where to go to make friends. How was it that she was so bad at this? A woman in a coffee bar explained it to her one morning. Hallie had bumped into her, and they’d struck up a friendly conversation as they waited in line for coffee. “Most people move here for a job,” the woman said. “That’s where they start to make friends. You’re in school, right?”

  “Will be,” Hallie said. “I came here to get established before the semester starts.”

  “Oh,” the young woman said. “Well, good luck.” And she was gone.

  Hallie needed more than luck. She walked Sulley along the Colorado River every day. She wandered up and down the eclectic shops on South Congress Avenue. And she read. She read everything from romantic comedies, to self-help, to spiritual guides, to thrillers. She read in the early mornings and the evenings. She got herself an actual library card at the Austin Public Library.

  When it came time to go home for Christmas, Hallie felt almost relieved. She and Sulley had been in Austin a little more than two weeks, and she was feeling a little homesick. But she was also feeling enlightened about a few things. She and Sulley struck out on a pale blue Christmas Eve morning.

  Her grandmother had dug out some of the family treasures—a Santa that had been handed down through generations, but was missing his bag and one shoe. A herd of reindeer for the mantel. Stockings for all of them, which Martin hung. Hallie looked longingly at the stockings hanging from the enormous mantel. They were all there: Grandma, Mom, Nick, Luca, Hallie. And Dad. Grandma had hung Dad’s stocking.

  They all felt the absence of Charlie Prince. Hallie missed her father desperately, but strangely, she did not miss the big-ticket gifts. No state-of-the-art drones. No cars, no motorcycles. No trips to Paris to shop or Louis Vuitton bags or exquisite jewelry. The holiday seemed calmer and saner without those things. From Luca, Hallie got a pair of pointe shoes. She’d complained about being unable to find her old ones, and with Ella’s help, Luca had bought her a pair. From Nick, a pair of cashmere lounge pants to replace the sweats he said he was sick of seeing. From her grandmother, a framed picture of her and her father that Hallie didn’t remember, as well as a new chew toy for Sulley. And from her mother, a triple strand of pearls that her father had given her mother for their tenth wedding anniversary.

  “Mom,” Hallie said. “Are you sure?”

  She smiled and nodded. “He would want you to have it.”

  The best part of the day was the meal. Just the five of them, as well as Ella and George. It was a remarkable meal in the history of the Prince family. For starters, Hallie’s mother had cooked most of it, this time with the help of a cookbook, because apparently, in the two weeks Hallie had been gone, Frederica had departed.

  “It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be,” her mother announced.

  That wasn’t the only difference in her mother. She hadn’t second-guessed Hallie about her decision. When Hallie had told her she was going back to school, her mother’s only question had been, “What does Rafe think?”

  “What does Rafe think?” Hallie had echoed, surprised by it. “Well, he’s in Chicago. So I don’t know.”

  Her mother’s response to that was a single raised eyebrow.

  Hallie wondered if maybe her mom’s grief was finally winding down to normal. Or maybe it was simply that she’d finally accepted that Hallie was thirty years old and was capable of running her own life. And yet, that was a little hard to believe, judging by the lifetime Hallie had spent with her mother trying to run her life.

  Neither had her mother mentioned Hallie’s weight or what she ate. But Hallie was trying to get some weight off for ballet. She wasn’t losing anything in spite of her best efforts, although admittedly, her best efforts were pretty lame.

  Over dinner, Luca asked where Martin was. “I tried to catch him in the office, but he hasn’t been around.”

  “They’ve all gone to Chicago to spend the holiday with the boys,” Dolly announced.

  “So what’s up with that?” Luca asked, but he was looking directly at Hallie. “Is Rico staying up there with Rafe for good?”

  “I don’t . . . no one said anything,” she stammered. She could feel her face flaming. But no one pressed her.

  The day, while quiet, was one of their better days since her dad had died. She was relieved there weren’t a lot of questions for her. Maybe because her would-be wedding day had been planned for New Year’s Eve. Hallie had forgotten it, really, because she was distracted by her obsession with Rafe and trying to start this new, independent life in Austin. But a couple of wedding gifts had arrived, sent by people who had not heard the news, and she was reminded again that just two months ago, she’d been devastated.

  She was convinced that Luca, Ella, and Nick had analyzed her and had come to their own erroneous conclusions about what had happened between her and Chris when he’d come to town. She guessed that they believed Chris was the cause of her distraction. She let them think whatever they wanted—better that than them knowing she was actually grieving Rafe.

  But her distraction was bigger than her broken heart. When she wasn’t daydreaming about Rafe—trying to guess what he was doing or thinking of a text to send him or reviewing that afternoon in the gazebo, debating if she’d come on too strong, or not strong enough—she was working on her idea to open her warehouse.

  Between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, with George’s help, she’d found contractors w
ho’d had a look at the warehouses and submitted estimates for renovating one into a ballet studio. She’d even called Genevieve about that lunch, and had gone into San Antonio, had sat on a porch in a terraced backyard in Castle Hills, watching ducks swim around Genevieve’s pond, and had asked for Genevieve’s help. She didn’t know how to find the kids she wanted to target. Genevieve was more than happy to help, but on one condition. “Let me help you begin ballet again. You have to get over your feelings about your dancing, and I have a studio here to help you do that.”

  “But I’m in Austin now.”

  “That’s okay. I’m in Austin at least once a week to see David’s mother,” she said, referring to her husband. “I could come to your place. It’s a start, Hallie. Come on, let’s see what you’ve got,” she’d said, and had dragged her into her private studio at her house. Standing on borrowed pointe shoes, Hallie went through some poses.

  When Genevieve saw how rusty Hallie was, she folded her tiny little arms and shook her head. “We’re getting together at least once a week until you get it back. And you will get it back, Hallie. You have to believe in yourself.”

  Hallie was working really hard on doing exactly that.

  Mariah put Hallie in touch with a social media marketing expert. “It’s a must, Hallie,” Mariah had said, and Charlotte had bobbed her head along in agreement. “No one does business without a social media presence. You’ve gotta go the whole nine yards. Tell her, Charlotte.”

  “You’ve gotta go the whole nine yards,” Charlotte repeated obediently.

  “I don’t even have bids back on the warehouse yet,” Hallie had said.

  “So?” Mariah demanded. “You have to start building buzz now, Hallie.”

  Hallie rang in the New Year with Luca and Ella, but she left before the stroke of midnight because she couldn’t keep her eyes open. They both gave her sad smiles, which Hallie assumed was because of their assumption she couldn’t face the night that she was supposed to have had her big wedding.

  In all honesty, she hardly gave it a thought. Funny how one could go from complete despair to feeling nothing about it in the space of three months, other than the feeling of deep, deep relief that she had not married Chris.

  She was surprised when she received a text from Rafe just before midnight. She hadn’t heard from him except sporadically, usually when she initiated it. Happy New Year. This was accompanied by a burst of fireworks on the screen. How are you?

  Happy New Year! I’m good. You?

  Good. Just wanted you to know I was thinking of you.

  Her eyes welled with tears. She felt obliged to send him a GIF of fireworks in response. She typed, I really miss you, but then deleted it and typed, Thanks, Rafe.

  He did not text back.

  She left Three Rivers after the first of the year, and headed back to her little apartment high atop the world in the middle of Austin. She and Sulley walked to the big windows with the sweeping view of the interstate—the river view had been insanely expensive, even for her—and both of them sighed.

  She started the first full week of the year with renewed determination. But between a barre class and another stroll around campus, Hallie felt strangely empty. She wanted so badly to tell Rafe about it, to hear what he had to say. This was supposed to be liberating, but she didn’t feel liberated. She felt lonely, and closed off from her family and her friends. And damn it, she missed Rafe like crazy.

  She obsessed about what he was doing in Chicago every day.

  She attended her education class the first day of the spring semester. When she looked around the room, she saw she was ten years older than these people. What had ever made her think she could pick up where she’d left off? No wonder they allowed so much of the coursework online.

  She spent her evenings searching social media to see what Rafe was doing, which was useless, because he didn’t post. She posted pictures she took around Austin on Instagram.

  Halfway through January, Hallie was reaching the conclusion she’d made a terrible mistake. She was not the sort of person who could strike out on her own without anyone around. She liked having people around. She liked being near her family. She liked the ranch, and she did not like the middle of the city. She liked seeing cows and horses, and not a running trail so crowded that she couldn’t make any headway on her pace.

  She wondered what Rafe was reading. If he’d met someone. If Rico was drinking. She would text him, How is everything? And he would eventually text back, Good. How are you?

  That was it.

  She was desperate to know how he was doing, but he’d been so hurt by her and so distant in their texts that she feared his rejection. As the month crept along, Hallie began to think of ways to worm her way back into Rafe’s life.

  Near the end of the month, she was tired a lot, and she felt so bloated, in spite of having reduced carbs to trim some weight. And strangely, she was suddenly obsessed with cheesy Tater Tots.

  Genevieve had been up twice, and they had practiced ballet in front of the view of the interstate. “You really need a studio,” Genevieve had said.

  She really did, but she couldn’t find one that wasn’t a ridiculously long drive across town in heavy traffic.

  What she really needed, she thought to her miserable self, was Rafe.

  The one bright spot in her new life was the warehouses. The contractor she had decided to go with was affordable and ready to start the work. Hallie was excited about what he’d drawn up. Maybe Luca was right—maybe her father had left her these warehouses because he trusted her to figure it out. Hallie would never really know, but at last, she was grateful to her dad for leaving them to her. She was throwing her heart and soul into making it happen, all on her own.

  She started going home for three or four days at a time to work on the warehouses, enlisting her friends to help and making plans for what she wanted to include.

  When she wasn’t studying for class, or taking her online course, she was lying on the couch, looking at the ceiling, wishing her neighbor would turn down the heavy metal, and thinking of Rafe.

  Always Rafe.

  And then she started to think about something else.

  On the day she left Austin for home to choose fixtures for the warehouse, she and Sulley pulled into a pharmacy. She bought four pregnancy tests. One to find out, three to make sure.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Nothing could make a man despise a martial arts gym more than icy cold weather, constant plumbing and electrical problems, and a drain on his wallet. Rafe was losing his drive.

  Between bribes for inspections, and the many required updates that came along with renovating a very old building to modern standards, and the rent hike that had happened before they’d even opened their door, Rafe and his friends were running on fumes.

  “Man, I’ll be honest. I’ve thought about going back to Pittsburgh,” Chaco said over dinner one night. “I had a good job there.”

  “Look, we can make this happen,” Jason said. “But we have to get aggressive in getting kids in the door, you know? And fundraising. My sister is going to help us with that. I told you, she does fundraising for a few nonprofits around here.”

  Rafe thought of Hallie. He thought about Hallie all the time. She knew about fundraising. He tried to picture her here, in this gym, in this neighborhood, raising funds. He didn’t know what that looked like, exactly, but he knew she would be beautiful when she did it.

  “I agree with Jason,” Rico said. “A few road bumps, so what? We need to man up.” He gave a fist pump in what Rafe supposed was the signal to “man up.”

  Rico had taken to Chicago like Rafe could not have guessed. He loved the old neighborhood, the hustle and bustle on the streets every day. He loved the cold. Rafe had long had the impression that Rico didn’t like hard work—he’d complained enough about it at home—and he’d assumed he’d
have to do a fair amount of babysitting and listening to him whine every day. But he was beginning to understand that what Rico didn’t like was ranch work. Cattle and heat were not his thing. Apparently, gyms and cold were. He worked as hard as any of them.

  Because Chaco’s place was tiny, Rico was staying with Jason and his family on that awful couch, and Rafe was sleeping on Chaco’s marginally better couch. Jason’s mom had decided to teach Rico Spanish, and Jason was teaching his little sister and Rico martial arts. Rafe thought Jason’s little sister had a crush on Rico, and at first he’d worried about that, because Rico could be a dog. But Rico was respectful—he didn’t take that bait.

  Sobriety had been a struggle for Rico, especially New Year’s Eve. But Chaco had been through the same thing, and he was a great support to Rico. “Dude, anytime you have an urge, you call me. We’ll go for a run or go get a slice and talk it through.”

  Knock on wood—so far, Rico had remained sober. He showed up every day, ready to work, and had good ideas. Rafe was really proud of him. This had turned out to be just the thing his brother needed, and Rafe was happy that he was able to make it happen.

  But Rafe was beginning to wonder if this was the thing he needed.

  He’d been planning this gym for years now. He’d believed it was the perfect solution for him—doing what he loved, and on the other side of the country from Hallie. It was still the thing he loved to do, and he was still on the other side of the country from Hallie, which was about as far as he could take his hurt. But it wasn’t working. He didn’t feel right here.