by Laura Drake
“Are you all right, young man?” Mrs. Whatever asks, alarm in her eyes.
“I’m okay.”
She stands and hands Sawyer to Lorelei. “I’ll get you a glass of water. Don’t you move.”
My heart beats a tattoo on my ribs. I’ve been going through the motions the past week, wondering why I wasn’t feeling any of the emotion I’d expected. Now I know why. It’s been building like a summer storm that just hit, catching me out in the open. My eyes are watery, and my fingers tighten on the chair arms so as not to reach for her. This baby, my brother’s child, is a St. James. A tiny, beautiful miracle.
“How sweet of you to come visit,” Lorelei’s mother says with a smile, then looks to her daughter. “Do we know this man?”
The lady comes back with a glass of water, and I gulp some and put it down.
“It’s okay, Momma.” Lorelei clutches the baby like she’s afraid someone will tear her from her arms. She frowns down at me. “Do you want to hold her?”
I’m on my feet. “Yes.”
Lorelei leans over the baby, whispers something, kisses her forehead. Then, after a long pause, hands her over.
I don’t know how to hold a baby. But apparently, my arms do. She lies trusting, looking up at me with somber eyes. She’s perfect. Fine brown hair, delicate-as-moth-wing brows over extraordinary eyes the color of the sky on a scorching August day, when the sun is so fierce it washes out the blue. A tiny nose upturned just a bit and full lips. She looks like a cherub in a Renaissance painting.
She’s studying me just as closely.
“I wonder if she thinks you’re her daddy,” Lorelei says. “You being twins and all.”
The lady who brought me the water says, “Twins. Oh, that’s even more sad, if such a thing is possible.”
“What’s sad?” Lorelei’s mother asks.
“Nothing, Momma. Everything is fine.”
“If he’s related to that baby, that makes him family, right?”
“I…I guess so.” She doesn’t look happy about it.
The old lady breaks into a wrinkly smile. “That fixes it, then. You’ll stay for supper.”
“Momma—”
“Oh no, ma’am. I—”
Mary sticks out her chin. “Don’t you be silly. Turn family out without feeding them? Not in my house.”
“But, Momma, I don’t think—”
“You sit and talk.” The other old lady stands. “Come on, Mary, you and I will get dinner on the table.” She pulls a walker from beside the couch and helps Lorelei’s mother up.
Lorelei looks like she was just offered creamed bugs on toast for an entrée.
The baby wraps her hand around my finger, but it’s my heart she’s squeezing. “Hey, Sawyer. I’m your uncle.” Liquid gushes to my eyes, and I blink it back. I know, Bo. Men don’t cry, either.
I needn’t have worried about bonding. I’m already dreading having to hand her back. She sticks out her tongue and gums it. When she squirms, I rock from foot to foot.
“She’s teething.”
“Ouch. I’ll bet that hurts.” She tries to pull my finger to her mouth, but Lorelei is there with a little blue plastic ring.
Lorelei smells of hamburger grease and underneath it, some old-fashioned flower. Roses? Lilacs? I don’t know from flowers, but the scent suits this house, suits her.
“Go ahead and sit. She gets heavy.”
She isn’t, but I settle into the chair anyway, cross my legs, and lean the baby in the crook. It frees up my hands to touch her. Her silky hair, the warm softness of her cheek, her tiny feet. She’s in some kind of unitard made of nubbly fabric. “God, she’s beautiful.”
“She is.” Lorelei looks as helpless as Sawyer.
I find I want to know more about this woman, so different from the ones I’ve known. “Were you close to your sister?”
“I thought I was.” She dips her head and closes her eyes. “I don’t understand why they didn’t tell us. I mean, it doesn’t make logical sense.”
“Had you met my brother?” Carson, in a committed relationship—I still can’t get my head around it.
“No. We hadn’t seen Patsy in…a while.”
She doesn’t meet my eyes. They were together at least the nine months Patsy was pregnant, and six months after. I guess it’s not only my family who had issues. I want to make Lorelei feel better but have little experience with women’s soft feelings.
“I’d give a lot to know why, but I guess we’ll never know.”
I came to town to take Sawyer home with me. I may suck at decoding the mystery of women, but even I can see that’s a hard sell. Lorelei’s a proud, independent woman who loves this baby with everything she’s got.
“Dinner’s ready.”
I’m not exactly sad to be interrupted. But it won’t get easier, putting it off. “Lorelei, would you—”
She stands. “Let’s go. Momma gets fussy if her routine is disrupted.” She takes the two steps to me and reaches for the baby.
I stand. “I can take her in.”
“I’m going to put her down while we’re eating.”
“Oh, okay.” But still, it’s hard to relax my arms enough to let the baby go. The back of my hand brushes Lorelei’s soft breast on the handoff, and my face heats.
I watch the sway of her hips as she carries the baby to a dark room off the parlor, then wander to the kitchen. I shouldn’t stay. I know Lorelei doesn’t want me here. But I can’t seem to leave.
Lorelei’s mother is seated, and the other lady is putting a casserole dish on the table.
“It smells wonderful.”
“Psshhhht. It’s hash.” Lorelei’s mother flops a hand. “You sit right here.” She pats the chair to her right.
“Thank you, ma’am.” I pull out the chair and sit.
“My name is Mary.”
Lorelei walks in just as the other woman seats herself. “I’m so sorry to put finishing dinner on you, Mrs. Wheelwright.”
“No trouble at all.”
Lorelei sits.
Mary extends a hand to me and Mrs. Wheelwright. “Will you say grace…what is your name?”
“It’s Reese, Mary, and I’d be proud to.” My mind shuffles data it hasn’t used in a decade.
Lorelei flushes and offers her hand to me and to Mrs. Wheelwright.
Her skin is soft, but her fingers are calloused. “Lord, thank you for unexpected gifts, sent to fill our hearts. We will do our best to honor that precious responsibility. Please look after those who have gone before us. Oh. And thank you for this food.” The words stumble out. Words I hope are adequate, and probably aren’t. “Amen.”
“Amen.” Lorelei frowns and snatches her hand back.
Dishes are passed. Hash turns out to be hamburger, Tater Tots, onion, and green pepper. There’s a green salad to go alongside.
“Where are you from, son?” Mary watches as the other lady pours iced tea.
“I’m from a little Texan town near the Mexico border called Carrizo Springs.”
“Who’s your family?”
“I just found out that you are.” I glance to Lorelei.
She ducks and her hair curtains her face.
I take a forkful of hash. Interesting, in a greasy-spoon kind of way. “Ma’am—Mary, tell me about this house. Has your family always owned it?”
Her face lights up. “My grandfather built it. My momma was born here, I was born here, and my daughters, too. We used to own all the lands around it, but over the years they were sold off.” She frowns, like she just remembered something. “So now there’s just the house and the acre it sits on.” She looks around the room. “I wouldn’t trade it for all the world’s riches.”
I understand now what she sees. “It’s a lovely place.”
Lorelei slaps her napkin on the table, her face a mask of disgust. “I’ll put the kettle on for tea.”
Mary chatters through the rest of the meal, unaware of her daughter’s temper. Her memory of the past i
s remarkable; it’s when you get to current events that things get muddled.
She’s a happy, charming woman, and I’ll bet she was something in her day.
Finally dinner is over, Mrs. Wheelwright has gone home, and I’m standing at the back door, getting ready to leave. Except I’m not ready. I turn, and Lorelei barely misses bumping into me.
She leaps back.
“If it’s okay with you, I’d like to stay a few days, to spend some time with Sawyer. Can you recommend a hotel in town?”
Her jaw is tight enough to crack walnuts. “We don’t have a hotel.”
“The closest one, then.”
“I don’t think—”
“Look.” I wait until her eyes finally settle on me, then whisper, “I know you don’t like me, and I’m sorry for that. But I’d really like to spend some time with my niece, to get to know her. For just a couple of days.” I put all my hope into my gaze. “Please?”
She lets out an exasperated sigh. “Oh, suit yourself. There’s a budget motel on I-40, five miles out of town, but it won’t be up to your standards. I’ll let Mrs. Wheelwright know to expect you tomorrow.”
She wants to push me out the door, I know. But I don’t want to leave. There’s a vulnerability in those eyes that tugs at something in my chest. It makes me want to unravel this woman’s secrets, in hope of understanding my own. I let out the breath I was holding. “Thank you, Lorelei. Really.”
The line of her jaw is tight, and she doesn’t meet my gaze. “I didn’t do it for you. I did it for Sawyer.”
Chapter 5
Reese
The hotel Lorelei directed me to was one of those old motor motels from the ’60s, long, low-slung, and lousy. The neon sign out front is flaking and flickering like something out of a horror movie. But there’s a light on in the office, and this beats sleeping in my car. I hope.
A buzzer goes off when I walk in, and a sleepy-looking college-age kid steps from the back.
“I need a room.”
“You’re lucky. We just happen to have an open one.”
I’m assuming that’s sarcasm, since I saw all of two trucks parked outside. “Great.”
He pushes a form across the counter. “That’ll be forty-five dollars.”
“I’m planning on staying a couple of days.” I scribble information.
His eyebrows disappear into his floppy bangs. “It’s two hundred dollars a week.”
I pass my credit card across the counter along with his form. “I’ll take it.” I look around the shabby little room, wondering if there’s a by-the-hour rate, but decide I really don’t want to know.
“You’re in number two, our executive suite.”
“Thanks.” I take the plastic key fob with the old brass key attached.
When I walk in, I’m smacked by the smell of cheap disinfectant so strong, it makes my eyes water, but it’s still not enough to cover the stale smell of ancient cigarettes. Bare light bulb overhead, heavy vinyl blackout curtains, nasty avocado shag carpet, and a creaky bed. If this is the executive suite, I’d hate to see a regular room. But given the outside, it’s about what I expected.
The red numbers on the alarm clock read 8:00. Not too late to get some business done. I sit on the bed and fire up my laptop.
Three hours later, I’m lying on top of the covers, trying to sleep. I should be home. The ranch is all my responsibility now. But even this fleabag motel won’t drive me away. Not until I get what I came for.
If only I knew what that was.
I mean, I’m staying for my niece, of course. But like it or not, I have to admit I’m staying for me, too. Since the accident, I’ve discovered a hole in me. A blind spot so dark, I only know it’s there by crawling and feeling around the edges. It’s big. And deep. And it feels like lonesome. Which is crazy, because I’ve always been separate. I was relegated to that growing up, have chosen it since.
Two pair of washed-blue eyes drift through my mind. What if the connection I felt tonight is a clue to what’s missing in me?
I’ve been to therapy (something else Bo and Carson would have laughed at, if they’d known). Guess it’s not surprising I have “commitment issues”—the tendencies fit me better than my astrological sign. Self-sabotaging relationships, attracted to unavailable people, poor communicators.
Check, check, and check.
My track record with women nowadays is shorter than a fifty-yard dash. I hope that won’t be true with little ones of the gender.
* * *
The next morning, I pull the door to the room closed, realizing that Lorelei and I didn’t settle on a time for me to go out to the house. I also neglected to get her cell number. This is so not like me. It seems I’ve been wrong-footed since I rolled into this town. Or maybe it’s just the aftershock of Carson’s death and discovering he had a daughter. I’ll stop by the café and ask. I’ve got to eat, regardless.
The town square looks less spooky but not much better in daylight. Butcher paper curtains many of the store windows, the old-fashioned movie house is showing a month-old release, and a dingy gazebo sits amid weeds in the center square. Unforgiven looks like it died a while back but the townsfolk missed the obituary.
The Chestnut Creek Café seems to be the one exception to the decline. I can’t find a space in front, so I park down the block and walk back. When I open the door, a brass bell jangles against the glass. The booths are full of high school kids, old men in overalls, a few blue-collar workers and businessmen. I walk across the black-and-white mosaic floor to take the last stool at the bar, next to two grizzled old-timers.
“I got ’em both footballs.”
“Manny, you been drinking Sterno again?” the one with crumbs in his gray-shot beard asks his disheveled neighbor. “You can’t get a baby a football for a present. And one’s a girl, you fool.”
“Way I figure it, this way she’ll have what the boys want when she gets outta diapers.”
“Dude, that is so non-PC.” He raises a grizzled brow, and his friend wheezes a laugh.
A petite waitress stops to fill their mugs, then raises the coffeepot my way. I flip the mug in front of me and she pours.
“Are y’all talking about Lorelei West’s niece?”
Their heads swivel my way. “You’re not from around here, are ya?”
I’m beginning to realize Mr. Football is more than a little drunk. “Nope. Texas.”
“Like the drawl wasn’t a dead giveaway. Why’re you here?”
“That’s not polite, you mule-eared idiot.” Mr. Beard Crumbs sticks out a hand. “I’m Moss Jones, and this here is Manny Stipple.”
I shake his hand. “Reese St. James.”
The drunk leans across his friend to offer a hand. “You’re that rich rancher guy. Pleased ta meet’cha. I got nothing against money.”
Moss takes off his dirty cap and puts it over his heart. “Real sorry to hear about your brother.” He slaps it back on his head. “You’re here about the baby, I guess.”
I’m not surprised. Gossip flies fast in small towns. “Sawyer.” I like the sound of her name coming out of my mouth.
“She’s a cutie, that one.”
The waitress is back, order pad in hand. “What can I get you to eat?”
I glance up at the specials on the chalkboard above the serving window. “I’ll have the breakfast burrito.”
“Oh, Nevada does that up really good,” Manny slurs. “Order a side order of her fry bread. She learned how to make it from her live-in, Fish. It’s the best.”
I don’t want to know what a “live-in fish” is, but when in Rome…I nod at the waitress, she jots it down, tears the slip off, turns, and slides it onto the order wheel just inside the window. I glimpse a compact ponytailed blonde cooking at the grill. The back of her T-shirt declares Silence is golden—duct tape is silver.
“I think I like her already.”
“Yeah, our Nevada, she’s special.”
I want to ask about Lorelei and her family
, but I know if I come at it head-on, it will remind them I’m a stranger. “What did this town do to get a name like Unforgiven?”
They light up like football fans walking into a ten-TV sports bar in November. Moss says, “Well, that’s a matter of some debate hereabouts.”
“It’s cuz they strung up Greg Paredes for branding cattle that weren’t his, back in the 1800s,” Manny says, then slurps his coffee.
“Nah, it’s from when—”
There’s a hollow boom. The door to the kitchen swings open and Lorelei walks through. Her gaze circles the room, then lands on me. “What are you doing here?”
The waitress sets my breakfast in front of me.
“A man’s gotta eat.”
“Oh.”
She’s even prettier when she blushes.
“Besides, I realized we hadn’t worked out when I could go by the house, and I didn’t have your number to call you.”
“Right. Sorry.” She jots her number on the back of an order slip and hands it to me. “Anytime after ten should be fine. It’ll give Mrs. Wheelwright time to get Momma’s and Sawyer’s breakfast.”
“And here’s my number.” I hand her one of my Katy Cattle Company business cards with my cell phone number. “Is there anything I can do for you out at the house?”
Her eyes darken when she’s angry. I should know, since it’s about the only way I’ve seen them. “I mean, if there’s anything you need a man to do—”
“I’m perfectly capable of taking care of things, thank you so very much.” She lifts a massive iced tea jug. “And if I wanted a man, I’d have one by now.”
Why is it I can’t see the stupidity of my remark until after it’s out of my mouth? But her blush hints at something she’s not saying.
“You’re in it now, boy,” Moss mumbles out of the corner of his mouth.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insinuate—” But I’m talking to her back, because she’s walked over to the first booth.