To Believe

by Carolyn Brown

  “And have you figured it all out this past two weeks?”

  “I don’t know but I do know that I don’t hate it nearly so much. Are you really happy here?”

  “I guess that’s a start and I don’t know if I’m happy or not.”

  She carried her magazine to the kitchen and fixed herself a glass of tea. Pondering what he’d said, she tried to think about the last time she was really happy. No strings attached. Just plain happy. She couldn’t remember but it was way back before she went to work for the police force. It might have been the night they eloped and she’d so foolishly thought they’d float around in happily-ever-after forever.

  She went back to the living room. “Okay, I wasn’t completely happy with my job before I met you. No one is. Jobs are means to an end. There are good days and bad days.”

  “Fair enough. What do you want to do with the rest of your life? Run a boarding house? Cook and serve people? Clean the rooms? What would make you wake up in the morning with a smile on your face and eager to jump out of bed to face the day?”

  “I don’t know what would make me that happy. Do you know what would make you jump out of bed all eager to face the day every morning? It’s a difficult question, Trey.”

  “I have been more content, even with your sass and bossiness than I’ve ever been. This place is therapeutic.”

  She popped her hands on her hips and glared at him. “Sass! Bossiness! You haven’t seen sass or bossiness yet, Trey Fields, but it’s coming.” With that she stormed out of the room and down the hallway to her bedroom.

  Jodie was bone tired by the time she got home. Two weeks on the road always did that to her but she loved rodeos. Loved the dust, the thrill, the people. She backed her horse trailer up to the side of the stables and carefully unloaded both of her prize mares. She didn’t stop at the ranch house when she finished cleaning out the trailer and parking it in the shed close to the stables. Instead she drove on up to the lodge to see her sister. She’d talked to Rosy several times in the past two weeks and something wasn’t quite right. She could hear it in Rosy’s voice. She assured Jodie repeatedly that the rescue trip had been a routine job. But still, Jodie’s instincts had never been wrong, and she intended to see just what was going on at the lodge. It was strange enough for Granny Etta and Roxie to up and leave on a trip without more planning. What ever it was, Jodie would find out in the next five minutes.

  She nosed into a parking space in the circular driveway out in front of the lodge at the same time a red Ford pulled up. The lodge must have company. Her brow furrowed in wrinkles. Last night Rosy had said she was free for a few days.

  Roseanna had been at Dee’s place for coffee that afternoon and was just returning when she saw Jodie’s truck and Trey’s car arriving at the lodge at the same time. She pressed down on the gas a little more. Good grief, the world was about to come to a screeching halt.

  Jodie didn’t even look back at the person getting out of the car. She could care less about the guests at the lodge. She was on the second porch step when she heard Rosy brake hard enough to sling gravel. When she turned around to see what her sister was doing driving like a bat out of hades, she was only a few feet from Trey. He carried a brief case, wore gray pleated trousers and a white shirt with a red and black power tie.

  She glared at him. “What are you doing here?”

  What in the devil was Trey doing here? She looked over his shoulder into the yard, expecting to see the familiar limousine with Sam behind the wheel, but there was only a red Ford. Good grief, had he really dropped so low in life as to drive himself in a Ford? Had hard times fallen upon the filthy rich and famous?

  She narrowed her eyes into mere slits. “Get off Cahill property. You aren’t welcome here.”

  He tried to push past her. “Get out of my way, because I’m coming inside. I live here now.”

  She planted her dirty cowboy boots, covered with horse manure and mud on the porch and crossed her arms over her chest. “Oh, no, you do not live here and if you thought you did then I’m changing your mind right now.”

  “Get over it, Jodie. I’m living here until the end of the summer. I’m working for Roseanna while your grandmother is gone.”

  Jodie glared at him but he didn’t back down. “Get off our ranch and out of the state, and don’t quit driving until you get back to the big city where you belong. I’ve wanted to shoot you for years, and let the buzzards tear the lousy flesh off your bones. You set foot back on Cahill property and there won’t be a hungry buzzard around here for a week.”

  “Jodie,” Rosy said breathlessly. “Settle down. Trey lives in the lodge. Granny Etta gave him a room for four months without asking anyone. Then she took off on a cruise to avoid facing us.”

  Jodie’s eyes popped out and her mouth made a perfect little O. “She did what? Why would she do that?”

  “I’ll go on inside and start supper. Do we have to do chores tonight?” He asked Roseanna and ignored Jodie.

  “Roast beef is in the refrigerator. We’ll have hot sandwiches and soup. Want to eat with us, Jodie? To answer your question, I have no idea why she did it.”

  Jodie’s eyes were still huge. “He lives here. With you?”

  Rosy nodded. “Rent free. But he has to help out with chores and what ever needs to be done. He’s really been a lot of help. That first week, I dang near killed him but he didn’t say a word. I’m amazed.”

  “What’s he trying to do? Get back in your bed?” Jodie asked bluntly.

  “I don’t think so. I think he’s trying to find himself.”

  “It’s a big scam, Rosy. He never lost himself. He wouldn’t do that. His ego is the most important part of his being. What ever he’s doing, you be careful. He’s a rattlesnake … dangerous and always ready to strike. He’ll break your heart again.”

  “He’s not going to break my heart because I’d have to be willing to give it to him for him to break it. Done tried that once and it didn’t work. He’ll be gone in July. He’s got a job over in Tishomingo at the college. Teaching business. Starts his real classes the first of June. They’ve got him teaching a six week course in adult education just to fill in the interim right now. He loves it.”

  “Yeah, right. I’m going home to sleep for twenty four hours. When I wake up I’m going to come back down here and …”

  “Apologize for your anger?” Rosy asked.

  “No. Not just no, but hell no! I wouldn’t apologize to that man if it meant standing before a firing squad. I’d just take the bullets and take my chances with that thing about forgiving. He’s always thought he was too good for you and I’ve never liked him. I’m going to sleep and when I wake up I’m coming back up here and tell you about this nightmare and wonder why in the devil I dreamed such a silly thing. Because I know this isn’t real.” She hopped up into her truck and sprayed even more gravel than Rosy had when she brought her pickup to a screeching halt.

  “Get that settled?” He asked when she found her way to the kitchen.

  “She won’t apologize,” Roseanna said.

  He sliced beef very thinly and laid it on a plate. “She’s mean spirited and vindictive.”

  “She’s protective and loves me,” Roseanna told him.

  He was breath taking handsome in his starched and ironed shirt that morning but standing there in a white undershirt pulled out over gray pleated trousers; he looked like one of the Godfather’s sons. Her body ached to slip her arms around his waist and lay her head against the muscular back, to listen to the steady rhythm of his heart. But then, they’d never lacked in the physical attraction area. It was just every other area that they’d had trouble.

  “Why didn’t you tell her I was here? She was surprised to see me, Roseanna. She thought I was coming to harrass you about something. It was more than a little humiliating to be screamed at and it could have all been avoided if you’d told her one of the many times she called.”

  “Would you have told Greta if the situation were rever
sed?”

  It started as a twitch at the side of his mouth, broke into a grin and turned into a deep chuckle, then a full fledged roar.

  “She would have done more than yell at you, honey. She’s meaner than Jodie ever hoped to be and you of all people know it,” he said when he caught his breath.

  The laughter was infectious and she giggled until her chest and ribs ached. “I’ll put my money on Jodie. Greta thinks she’s mean but most of her is bluff and catty. Jodie is pure mean.”

  He handed her two plates and they went about setting the table in the kitchen for supper. “It’ll take a big man to live with either of them won’t it?”

  Chapter Ten

  “You can’t be serious about letting him stay at the lodge all summer?” Jodie whispered in church the next morning.

  “Shhhh and sing,” Roseanna told her.

  Jodie held the hymnal up but she kept whispering. “Tell me he isn’t going to be there today when we all gather up at the ranch for Sunday dinner. Please, tell me I can shoot him if he is. When you came home I told that fool if he ever set foot on our property again I’d use the shot gun. Don’t you make me go back on my word, Rosy. If Granny Etta lost her mind and he’s got a contract to stay at the lodge, that’s one thing, but he’s not coming to Sunday dinner, is he?”

  “You really don’t have to worry about going back on your word, Jodie. He won’t be there. He’ll stay at the lodge all day rather than come out and meet the rest of the family. Remember we were married four years and he never met our older sisters. He only was around Momma and Daddy a couple of times. But just in case he is there, you will be civil. I won’t ask you to be nice, but you can’t shoot him. Now pay attention to the preacher. Besides Daddy invited him to dinner. I didn’t. Take it up with him.”

  “I won’t even be civil,” Jodie hissed.

  Roseanna shot her the meanest look she could conjure up and then attempted to keep her mind on the sermon but she couldn’t. One minute she had herself firmly convinced that Trey would stay away. The next moment she heard him saying those words about searching for happiness. It was all so confusing it gave her a headache.

  Lord, help me. This is the strangest situation I’ve ever been in and I don’t know how to handle any of it. Help me get through the summer and then he can go find some other woman to have happily-ever-after with since I can not believe there’s such a thing anymore.

  A cold knot squeezed the life from her heart and soul. Trey, with another woman, permanently? Maybe even Laura in a long white gown with flowers everywhere in a big church. Tears formed behind her thick dark eyelashes but she willed them to dry up.

  “Rosy, you’re white as flour,” Jodie nudged her. “Except for your mouth. It’s green. Are you sick?”

  Roseanna shook her head from side to side and worked desperately to get the nausea under control.

  It was just after eleven thirty that morning when he parked under the shade trees in the front yard. A black and white spotted dog with one blue eye and one brown one crawled out from under the porch swing and came out to the car to greet him, but that was the only life he saw around the place. She said they all went to church. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in church on Sunday morning. It must have been the baccalaureate services when he graduated from high school.

  He rubbed the dog’s ears and it followed him around the house. “Don’t these people let good dogs go to church with them? They let comedians, rude people and even evil people like Jodie sit in their pews so I don’t think they should be so prejudiced against a little well-behaved hound dog like you.”

  The yard was well kept. The roses trailing up the porch railing reminded him of the extravagance of all those roses he’d sent her in the beginning of their relationship. The white, split-level house, trimmed in a dusty shade of blue was considerably bigger than he remembered from the one time he came with her to Sulphur. They’d driven to Dallas for a Christmas party and she’d talked him into stopping by for a few minutes. It was late in the evening and they’d only stayed a little while, barely long enough to drink a cup of coffee. By local standards, these people were fairly well prosperous. This much land in California or even downtown Tulsa would be worth a considerable fortune to a developer, but then that was California. This was Oklahoma, where land, mosquitoes, heat and lizards were all worth about the same.

  “Dog, let’s go sit on that porch swing. Looks like I got here too early.” He had intended to arrive so early he would be sitting there waiting when she came home from church. If she wanted to play some silly game and think he was too bull-headed to take her father up on his invitation to Sunday dinner, he could prove her wrong. He could be charming, especially when the stakes were as high as they were.

  The dog lay at his feet as he let his thoughts swing gently with his body. A nice breeze flowed across the porch, bringing with it the smell of farm life. Two weeks ago he would have gagged when the rich aroma of the horse stables wafted across his nose but he’d gotten used to it.

  “Dog, this is a crazy world. You know what, you got it made. You don’t have to worry about nothing but whether or not your food bowl is getting filled up. Me, I got to worry about what I’m going to do with the most obstinate woman God ever put on the face of the earth. How I’m going to make her understand how I feel. That I’ve fallen for her in a very real sense, not just a lusty one. Got any suggestions?”

  He saw the dust clouds before all the cars and pickup trucks paraded down the lane toward the house. Five of them in a line, circling the driveway like a wagon train getting ready to settle in for the night. He kept swinging and petting the dog’s ears until he recognized her truck, bringing up the rear.

  Roseanna saw the red Ford and had to remind herself to breathe again. He’d taken up the challenge after all. She’d told him the night before when her father left that he wouldn’t have the courage to put up with Jodie all day. They’d made a bet. If he showed up for Sunday dinner, she had to cook breakfast for a whole week. If he didn’t, he had to. Looked like she’d be cooking next week.

  He stepped off the porch and ignored all the family members, who stared at him like he was an alien from Mars, as they crawled out of various vehicles. He went straight to her truck and opened the door for her.

  “Good morning, Roseanna,” he smiled brightly.

  Bob Cahill reached over and took a baby girl from his oldest daughter. “I’m sure Rosy has told you all about these folks even if you haven’t met them all. They’re all just family and it’s high time you knew them, Trey. Meet Melanie, our oldest daughter and this here is Amanda. Even though she looks like her father’s side, she acts just like a Cahill. Lord, when Jodie was this age she was already trying to crawl. In a couple of months, I’m taking this one out to the corral and set her on a pony, so she can start getting the feel for riding. That would be our next oldest daughter, Vicky, over there with her husband, Matt. Melanie’s husband is Jim. All these younguns chasin’ around here, all six girls, belong to them. In addition to Amanda, we’ve got Sarah, Liz, Lauren, Jasmine and Susanna. Someday one of these girls is going to have us a boy. You’ll get all their names straight before the summer is out. They’re all home a couple of times a month.”

  Trey nodded. “I’m right pleased to make your acquaintances. Forgive me if I forget a name. I’ll have to work on putting names with faces.”

  He kept stealing glances at Roseanna, all decked out in a denim dress with pearl snaps down the front, and a western belt with a big silver buckle slung low on her hips. The summer breeze blew her hair across her face.

  Someone cleared their throat at his elbow and he turned to look his ex-sister-in-law in the eye. He half expected her to throw him down on the ground into some kind of wrestling hold, just to prove she was more man than he was. “Jodie?”

  “I still don’t like you,” she declared.

  “Jodie, it’s Sunday and the family is all here,” Bob chided.

  “I call it just like I see it
.” She tossed over her shoulder.

  Trey sat between Roseanna and Jodie at the dinner table and bowed his head with the rest of the family while Bob gave thanks. “Our father, we’re grateful for this day of rest, and for this bountiful table. We’re thankful for what you bring into our lives to teach us to be better people. Amen,” he said and began passing great platters of smoked ham, homemade bread, and bowls of baked beans and potato salad around the table.

  “Here baby, let Granny make you a sandwich,” Joann said to one of her granddaughters.

  Trey made a sandwich and nibbled on the corner. Ham, of all things, probably loaded with everything to clog his arteries. Then he bit into it and forgot about anything but the delicious taste in his mouth. “Mmmm,” he said just above a whisper.

  Roseanna spoke to him for the first time since they’d pulled their chairs up to the table. “Good food, huh? Don’t find home cured ham like that everywhere. Granny Etta has a special recipe to cure the ham and the bacon in a smoke house up behind the corrals.”

  A lusty howl floated down the stairs and Melanie pushed her chair back and grabbed her plate. “Gotta go. Amanda’s awake.”

  “Finish your dinner, sis,” Roseanna said. “I’ll go take care of her.”

  “May I go, too?” Trey forked another piece of ham and a slab of bread, making another sandwich as he followed her up the stairs without waiting for an answer.

  “How are things with them?” Melanie asked

  “I’m not sure yet. I think their problem in the beginning was that they weren’t friends so I’m hoping they’re working on that,” Joann said. “Love might come along later. Who knows? The bunch of you will be quiet and let them work it out whether it ends up amounting to anything or not. It’s their problem and they’ll have to solve it.”

  “I still don’t like him,” Jodie declared. “He made Rosy cry and he’s still a city slicker and besides he’s egotistical. He’s just being a goody two-shoes until he talks her into leaving with him again. I swear it ain’t happenin’ a second time. He’ll wind up fertilizer for the roses before I let him hurt her again. And one more thing: he’s not getting my share of fries tonight, even if he has to starve to death and go to hell in a hand basket.”