by Diana Palmer
* * *
THE NEXT MORNING, when Bodie woke, she was alone. She thought at first that she’d dreamed about Cane holding her while she slept. But then she noticed the empty cup that had held hot chocolate, and saw the dent in her spare pillow where Cane’s head had rested. Impulsively, smiling, she buried her face in it. The spicy scent of his cologne still clung to it. She drank it in.
She got out of bed and then she remembered. Today they were burying her grandfather. All the bright happiness was gone, like a light switch being clicked off. She was going to be alone for the rest of her life. The last living member of her family was dead. She had no home left, because Will Jones had possession of her house. All her things, and Granddad’s, were here in this room or in the Kirks’ storage building.
For some insane reason, she remembered the Christmas tree that she’d cut and paid for, and decorated with such optimism and love. She sat down on the bed and burst into tears.
“Oh, my goodness,” Morie said from the door. She went to Bodie and hugged her tight, rocking her as they sat together on the bed. “I thought it would hit you sooner or later,” she added gently. “It’s all right. Really.”
“My Christmas tree,” she choked out. “It’s such a stupid thing to cry about. It was one Mama planted before she died, so we could have live trees. I cut it down and Will Jones made me pay him for it, because it was on his land…”
“That dog!” Morie muttered.
“It had our old decorations on it. Some of them were my grandmother’s. They’re all gone…!”
“They are not,” Mallory said from the doorway. He walked in, smiling gently at his wife. “Morie remembered the decorations, so we called Tank and had them strip them off the tree. They’re in a box, along with all your other odds and ends, in the barn shed. They’ll be safe. The building is temperature controlled, so there will be no damage to them.”
“Yes, because our prize breeding bulls live there, too,” Morie said.
“Oh, that’s so kind!” And Bodie burst into tears again.
“We’ve got you another dress to wear to the funeral,” Morie told her gently. “Don’t fuss. If our situations were reversed, you’d do it for me in a heartbeat and you know it. Everything’s arranged, even the burial plot in the church cemetery where your grandmother, your father and your mother are buried.”
“You should see the flowers,” Tank said from the doorway. He was wearing a suit and looked very dashing. He had the same dark eyes and hair that his brothers shared. “The church is full already and the florist is stoop-shouldered from carrying them in. You’ll have a lot of things to plant.”
“Yes, and I hope my college dorm will allow me to dig up the floor for that,” Bodie said with faint humor.
“You can plant them here,” Morie said gently. “They’ll be here whenever you can come home, and your room will be here waiting for you.”
She lifted her head and looked at the older woman blankly.
“You’re home, now, Bodie,” Mallory added, smiling. “We had a family meeting.” He shrugged. “So you’re now officially part of the family. This is your place in the world, when you’re not away at college or on digs.”
The tears were drowning her. “I don’t know what to say,” she choked out. “You guys are so sweet!”
“It was sort of Cane’s idea.” Tank chuckled.
“He said you couldn’t live in a motel.” Morie nodded.
“Although we offered to set you up a tent on the road in front of Will Jones’s place and have the local newspaper do a write-up on how he stole your mother’s land from you,” Mallory said with pure venom.
“Which we agreed we weren’t going to talk about, yes?” Morie told her husband with wide, speaking dark eyes.
“Sorry,” Mallory murmured. “Couldn’t resist it.”
“Will Jones will get his just deserts one day,” Tank promised. “The sheriff has some promising leads on a young lady who is rumored to be underage. If it pans out, Will’s going to jail.”
“It couldn’t possibly happen to a nicer man,” Bodie said between sobs.
“We’re also having our attorneys look into the legality of your mother’s will,” Tank told her. “We think there may have been some irregularities, especially since your mother said very specifically that her property was to go to you on her death.”
“He had a will,” Bodie began.
“Wills can be forged, sweetheart,” Morie told her gently.
“It would be nice to have my house back,” Bodie said. “But it’s just a house, you know. When I finish undergraduate studies, I’ll go on to master’s and then doctorate schools. I won’t be around much.” She wiped her eyes on the hem of her shirt. “But thanks for letting me have a space for my stuff.” She managed a watery smile. “We all have to have our stuff.”
They chuckled.
“He’s got more stuff than most people.” Morie indicated her husband, giving him an affectionate grin.
“I’m older than most people,” Mallory said easily.
“Dear old man,” Morie murmured. She got up and kissed her husband’s chin. “We should get dressed. We have to leave soon.”
“Some of us are already dressed, and look dashing,” Tank said, striking a pose.
“Ha!” Cane said from the doorway. “In your dreams. Now, when we speak of dashing men…” He indicated himself, decked out in a navy blue suit with a spotless white shirt and patterned tie.
“Conceit runs in your family, doesn’t it?” Morie murmured again.
Cane made a face at her. “Can I help it if I have so much to be conceited about?”
Bodie laughed.
He gave her a teasing smile. “Tell them. I have qualities.”
“He does,” she had to admit.
“Yes, and it was nice of you to leave the door open,” Morie told Cane. “Some of us had suspicions about your motives for sharing Bodie’s bed.”
“Wicked girl,” Cane shot back. “I was the soul of chivalry.”
Everybody looked at Bodie for verification of that boast. When she flushed, they all burst into peals of laughter.
“Hence the open door,” Cane said with a worldly sigh. He chuckled. “We’d better let her get dressed,” he added, more solemnly. “One last hurdle to get through, Bodie.”
She nodded.
“You have decisions to make, also,” Tank remarked.
“I do?” She thought she’d made them all, about music and the casket and the ministers. She said so.
“No,” Tank clarified. “About how you want us to handle it if Will shows up at the funeral home.”
“He wouldn’t dare,” Bodie exclaimed. “He didn’t come to the wake!”
“Yes, but he lives in the community and there will be some nasty gossip if he doesn’t come to his own father-in-law’s funeral. Usually he doesn’t care for the opinion of other people. But in this case, he just might.”
“I’ll have the funeral director ask him to leave,” Bodie decided solemnly. “Granddaddy wouldn’t like having that man at his funeral. He hated Will.”
“A lot of people hate Will,” Tank replied. “He’s had a hand in every bit of nastiness that ever went down in this community, from what people who grew up here have told us. He’s never been arrested, but he’s been investigated. They could just never find enough evidence to bring him to trial.”
“That can change,” Cane said.
“Yes.” Tank smiled. “Get moving, Bodie. After the funeral, we’ll have a houseful of people coming to help us eat the wagonloads of food our neighbors brought. We live in one hell of a nice place.”
Bodie smiled, too. “One of my earliest memories was of Mama baking cakes and making casseroles for people who had deaths in the family. The whole church always got together. They had a list of members they called who provided meals for the family members.”
“That’s why we love living here,” Mallory replied. “Okay. Everybody out.”
“Thanks
,” Bodie said as they filed out. “Thanks a lot.”
Cane paused at the doorway. “You’d do it for us, honey.” He smiled at her reaction to the endearment, and closed the door.
CHAPTER SEVEN
BODIE CRIED THROUGHOUT the brief ceremony, her eyes on the closed casket, surrounded by what seemed to be mountains of colorful flowers. There were a lot of poinsettias since it was nearly Christmas, red ones and white ones, in profusion. That brought home the realization that she wouldn’t be sharing the holidays with her grandfather, and she cried even more. She was suddenly aware of Cane’s arm around her, holding her close.
“Hold on,” he whispered in her ear. “Almost done.”
She nodded.
There was a final prayer and the pianist played “Amazing Grace” as the pallbearers moved the casket through a side room to the waiting hearse.
As Bodie turned with Cane, she saw her stepfather standing across the aisle from them. Her eyes shot fire at him. Cane looked at the man and jerked his head toward the front door with cold meaning.
Will wasn’t brave enough to stand up to a younger man with evident hostility. He shrugged and moved to the doorway, slowly enough to make Cane want to go after him.
That unpleasantness dealt with, Bodie followed the pallbearers with Cane holding tightly to her hand. He helped her into the limousine and went to speak quietly to Tank and Mallory. Bodie couldn’t hear what was said, but she was fairly certain it had something to do with her stepfather.
* * *
THERE WAS AS BIG A CROWD at the cemetery as there had been at the church. Cane held Bodie’s hand possessively, oblivious to the amused attention of several bystanders, while the final prayers were said.
A blanket of red, white and blue roses covered the casket, a present from the Kirks, acknowledging Rafe Mays’s service in Vietnam as a decorated war veteran. The whole area was covered with sprays and wreaths in beautiful bright colors. Christmas colors. The sky was dark and foreboding and weather forecasts mentioned the possibility of snow. Bodie wouldn’t have minded. She loved snow, despite the hardships it presented for ranchers and townsfolk alike.
With the last prayer completed, members of the community filed by to shake Bodie’s hand or hug her and voice their condolences. It took a long time, and warmed her heart to have so many people come to pay their respects.
She stood alone at the graveside for a few minutes, saying her own private goodbye to her grandfather.
“I’ll miss you all my life,” she whispered. “I love you, Granddaddy.”
Tears stung her eyes. She wiped them away, took a last look at the casket and turned to leave. It was hard to walk away. It was even harder not to look back.
* * *
LATER, AT HOME WITH mountains of food on the dining room table and a buffet line formed because all the cowboys who worked for the ranch also were invited to the feast, Bodie filled a plate with fried chicken and mashed potatoes and peas. She wasn’t really hungry, but it would have been an insult not to eat, when people had gone to all this trouble to make dinner for the family. Since everyone knew that Bodie was living at the Kirk ranch—there were no secrets at all in small communities—they deliberately made enough so that the Kirks and the cowboys could eat, as well. It was a kindness that Bodie acknowledged with humility. She hadn’t realized just how kind her neighbors really were until now.
“That was quite a turnout,” Mallory Kirk said as they sat around the big dining room table, working their way through desserts that included cakes and pies and puddings. “Your grandfather had more friends than I even realized.”
“He was born here,” Bodie reminded him, forcing a smile. “His name is on that big veterans’ monument downtown.”
“We were grateful that he came with the ranch when we bought it,” Tank added, sipping black coffee. “He knew everything about the day-to-day operations, and he taught Darby how to organize the work.”
“Yes, he did,” Darby replied. “He was a good man, Bodie.”
She smiled. “Thanks.”
“He taught me how to swim when I was a boy,” one of the older ranch hands piped in.
“Did he?”
“Yup.” His eyes twinkled. “I told him I didn’t know how. He picked me up and threw me headfirst into a water hole.”
“Good heavens!” Bodie exclaimed. “And you didn’t drown?”
“Well, drowning was a good incentive to learn to swim. I started dog-paddling on the spot. Not that Rafe would have stood by while I died,” he added. “He said he would have jumped in after me if I’d gotten in trouble. Said that was how his dad taught him to swim.” He eyed Bodie and pursed his lips. “Can you swim?”
“Yes!” she said at once.
Everybody laughed.
* * *
Later, WHILE MALLORY and Morie watched the news, Bodie sat in the living room with Tank while he tried out a new piece of sheet music he’d bought online.
“I really like that,” she said when he finished.
“Me, too,” he agreed. He turned on the piano bench. “Any requests?” he inquired with a tender smile.
“Yes,” Cane said from the door. “Stop playing.”
Tank made a face at him. “You’re only jealous because I mastered ‘Rach Three’ and you never could,” he added, referencing a nightmare of a piece composed by Rachmaninoff that very few classically trained pianists could master.
“I could have learned it if I’d wanted to,” Cane returned. But he didn’t fly up at Tank for the memory of an earlier time when he had two hands and he could play almost as well as Tank. All the Kirks were musical.
“No patience,” Tank told Bodie, nodding at his brother. “Mom almost had to tie him to the piano bench to make him listen to the piano teacher.”
“I was always more interested in outdoor activities,” Cane returned. He sat down on the sofa beside Bodie and crossed his long legs.
“Like shooting other boys with BB guns,” Tank pointed out dryly. “Almost landed us in a lawsuit once.”
“He shot me first,” Cane argued. “He just lied about it. I never lie.”
“That’s absolutely true.” Tank sighed. “I asked him to tell a little white lie, just once, to keep a determined woman from pursuing me. He told her I was home and even brought me the telephone.”
“Just helping you out,” Cane drawled. “Running away from a problem never solved it.”
Bodie and Tank almost bit their tongues through trying not to mention that drinking certainly came under that heading.
Cane glowered at them. “I’m turning over a new leaf,” he said defensively. “I set up an appointment with a new therapist and I got Mavie to pour all my aged Scotch whiskey down the drain.” He made a face. “She actually laughed while she was doing it.”
“That’s commitment,” Tank had to agree.
Cane looked down at Bodie speculatively. “I’m working on something a little more addictive than alcohol.”
“Are you?” Tank pretended innocence. “What?”
Cane’s black eyes twinkled. “That would be telling. Weren’t you playing?”
Tank turned back to the keyboard. “In fact, I was. The new soundtracks are nice, but you just can’t beat Rachmaninoff’s ‘Second Piano Concerto.’” He began to play it.
Cane looked down into Bodie’s eyes for so long that she flushed and averted her face. He chuckled softly under his breath.
* * *
THAT NIGHT SHE TOSSED and turned, but she did finally sleep. Her dreams were troubled, though, and she went down to breakfast with dark circles under her eyes.
“Well, you look like death warmed over,” Cane remarked as she sat down beside him and reached for the cup of coffee he poured for her.
“Couldn’t sleep until about three this morning,” she confessed.
“Bad dreams?”
“Fear of bad dreams,” she said quietly.
“They’ll pass,” Mallory said gently. “It only needs time, Bodie.�
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“I know.” She smiled at him. “I’m so grateful to all of you. I wouldn’t even have a roof over my head…”
“Nonsense,” Tank returned. “Half the town offered you that, at the funeral. A lot of people were fond of Rafe.”
“I suppose so.” She toyed with her eggs.
“Don’t turn your nose up at my rare, carefully nurtured cage-free, home-grown eggs,” Mavie said as she slid a platter of crispy bacon and perfectly cooked sausage alongside the platter of homemade biscuits. “I serenade my hens every day to get those eggs.”
“Yes, she does, I’ve seen her standing in the henhouse playing her violin,” Cane said, tongue in cheek.
Mavie brandished a serving spoon. “You’re in enough trouble without looking for more,” she told him.
“What did he do?” Bodie wondered aloud.
“He walked off with a whole platter of cookies I baked for dessert tonight and ate every one,” Mavie said indignantly.
“Lies,” Cane said, tasting the sausage on his plate. “You made them just for me.”
“I did not!”
“You said yourself that I needed feeding up,” he pointed out.
“Yes, but not with cookies! You won’t even eat a good biscuit.”
“I’m allergic to biscuits,” he replied.
“Nobody is allergic to biscuits.”
“I am. Watch this.” He picked up a biscuit and spun it off his plate onto the tablecloth. “See that? I have biscuit apprehension disorder. Very rare. It’s even more noticeable if they have butter on.”
Mavie burst out laughing. “I give up.”
“You might as well,” Tank replied. “Nobody wins an argument with him.”
“I did, once,” Mallory said.
“Well, chemistry isn’t my field,” Cane drawled.
“It wasn’t a chemistry issue,” Mallory replied. He finished his coffee. “I was barely in middle school at the time. You said that methane wasn’t explosive. Tank lit a match and proved you wrong.”