by Sherry Lewis
Since walking away from her aunt Suzette’s house back in George’s Creek, she’d thought of herself as strong and decisive. As a child with a child of her own, she’d had to be if she wanted to get anywhere. But Peter’s death had opened her eyes. She’d lost something during her marriage. She’d started relying on Peter too much, letting him make decisions for both of them, and she’d put herself and her future in his hands.
Well, look where that had gotten her.
Devastated by the disloyal thought, she hitched her purse onto her shoulder and pushed through the door into the office-supply store just down the street from the County Complex. Amanda, whose job it was to pick up the office supplies, had gone out of town for a wedding. Siddah, in a burst of enthusiasm to show what a team player she was, had volunteered to take care of the order while she was on her lunch break.
She had no idea whether this would help her cause or hurt it. Evan seemed pleased by her efforts so far, but she couldn’t say the same for Chris. His lack of confidence in her only made her more determined to prove him wrong.
Stepping back into the late-summer afternoon, Siddah glanced up the street toward her favorite Mexican restaurant. She didn’t often splurge. Money was just too tight. But maybe just this once, she could treat herself to a nice lunch—and some quiet time to think.
Just as she stepped onto the sidewalk, someone came around the corner too fast and directly into her path. Giving a shout of warning, Siddah tried to sidestep him and dropped one of the sacks she was holding.
The man’s head came up and his hands shot out instinctively, gripping her arms and trying to propel her out of his way. Too late, Siddah recognized Gabe, and all coherent thought flew out of her head.
His expression went from irritation to shocked recognition. “Siddah?”
“Hello, Gabe.”
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t paying attention, I guess. Are you all right?”
She stepped away and bent to retrieve her bag, but he moved at the same time and she met him halfway down. He looked into her eyes and something inside cracked wide open. She had the brief, crazy urge to lean forward and kiss him, but that was insane.
She straightened abruptly and tried to pull herself together. She was tired and overworked and responding to his resemblance to Peter, that’s all. But it was hard not to notice the perfect fit of his jeans or the way his pale green shirt lightened his eyes.
“Sorry about that,” Gabe said, grinning up at her as if the tension between them wasn’t as thick as her grandmother’s corn chowder. Straightening, he handed over the package and nodded toward the end of the block. “I should have been watching where I was going, but I had my sights set on the Mexican restaurant down the street.”
Making sure their fingers didn’t brush, Siddah took the package from him. “There’s no harm done. I wasn’t paying attention, either.”
“So are you on your lunch break?”
“I—” The words caught in her throat, but that only made her angry with herself. She wasn’t a child, and he wasn’t Peter. “I am now,” she said. “I had to pick up a few things for the office first.”
“Well, that’s perfect timing, then. Can I talk you into joining me?”
“For lunch?” Sit at a table with him? Alone? She shook her head quickly and backed a step away. “I don’t think so. I really… I need to get back.”
Gabe’s brows creased. “I thought you said you were just starting your lunch break.”
“Well, I did, but—” She cut herself off and tried to figure out a way to explain. She certainly couldn’t be honest. If she told him about the crazy thoughts flying through her head, he’d probably hate her. “I just don’t think having lunch together would be a good idea.”
“Oh?”
She clutched at the only excuse she could think of. “There’s no reason for it, is there? Peter’s not around any longer, so it’s not as if we need to pretend to like each other for his sake.”
Gabe’s smile never even faltered, but she could have sworn she saw the determination in his eyes grow stronger. “Peter’s not around, but Bobby is and so are my parents. And how do you know you won’t like me unless you give me a chance?”
How did she know what would happen if she did? Wanting desperately to keep a safe distance between them, she managed a cool smile. “How many chances do you think one person should get in life?”
He did a little aw-shucks thing with one shoulder and hooked his thumbs through his belt loops. “I guess maybe one more than I’ve already had.”
Siddah didn’t know whether to smile or swear at him.
And obviously he could tell. “Come on. I know you don’t like me, but Bobby does. And don’t you think he’s worth giving me a chance—even knowing I don’t deserve one?” When she didn’t immediately agree, he touched her arm as if he intended to guide her. The shock of his touch burned her, but she wasn’t the only one to pull away. She could have sworn he looked a little less sure of himself. “At least give me an hour. Get to know me a little before you decide I’m really not worth the powder it would take to blow me to hell.”
She knew she should refuse. Really, she did. But behind the sparkle in his eyes there was something she couldn’t read—something that reached right out and connected with the part of her that had once been frightened and uncertain.
“I only have forty-five minutes left,” she said. “I’m scheduled to be in depositions this afternoon, so I can’t be late.”
Relief flashed across his face a split second before that smile returned. “We can set the alarm on my watch to make sure you get back on time. If after forty-five minutes you still think the worst, then at least I’ll know I’ve tried. I’m not the complete waste of humanity my father would like you to believe I am.”
It was hard not to be affected by his easy smile, his self-deprecating outlook, his easy acceptance of the bad things she’d heard. She let out a sigh and chewed one corner of her lip as she looked him over. “No lunch,” she said firmly, “but I’ll give you the rest of my lunch hour. We can walk. You can talk.”
Gabe grinned like a kid with a new toy, and her heart did another little flip in her chest. If he did that very often, she thought with sinking heart, she was going to have a tough time keeping him at arm’s length. But the longer she spent around him, the more convinced she was that keeping a safe distance between them was absolutely necessary.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE FIRST FEW MINUTES were taken up with small talk as Siddah and Gabe strolled through Libby’s streets. They talked about the town and how much it had changed, about the people and their hardy pioneer spirit. But eventually, those subjects ran dry and Gabe linked his hands behind his back and tackled the topic they’d both been avoiding. “So what do you want to know?”
“What do I—?” She laughed and tucked a stray lock of hair behind one ear. “You’re the one who wanted to talk.”
“You’re worried about Bobby, right? Concerned about what kind of influence I’m having?”
“Well, yes, but—”
“So ask me what you want to know.”
His directness surprised her, but she liked it. “Okay. Suppose you tell me what you’re really doing back in Libby after all this time?”
He looked surprised. “I told you. I got Mom’s letter, and I came as soon as I could.”
“But why now? Why not last year? Two years ago? Why not while Peter was still alive?”
Gabe shrugged eloquently. “I wasn’t sure I’d be welcome. I’m not sure I’m welcome now either, but losing Peter opened a door that had always been closed before.”
“You closed that door when you left.”
“I left because it was closed for me,” he said, “or didn’t anybody ever bother to tell you that?”
Was that true? Siddah felt certain she’d never heard that. Or had she just forgotten?
No, surely she would have remembered. “If that were true,” she said firmly, “Peter would have told m
e.”
Gabe’s lips curved gently. “Peter and I didn’t exactly have the same experiences growing up. We might have shared a father, but he was like two different men with us. Besides, if you know Peter at all, you know he had a hard time believing the worst of anybody.”
If Siddah had been granted her wish for more children, would she have treated them differently? She liked to think not, but maybe that was just wishful thinking. She tried to ignore the perspiration snaking down her back, but maybe she should have said yes to an air-conditioned lunch, after all. “It’s true about you, anyway. He never did stop believing that you’d come home someday.”
“He probably never stopped believing that the old man didn’t mean what he said the night I left, either. I always thought of that night as hell on earth. Peter probably thought everybody was just in a bad mood.”
Siddah had always loved Peter’s optimism, but surely he hadn’t been that naive. “Are you serious? You left because Monty made you leave?”
Gabe stooped to pluck a blade of grass. “I left because the old man strongly suggested I get the hell out of his sight and never show my face to him again.” He sent her a wry grin. “Apparently, I wasn’t supposed to take him seriously. Who knew?”
“According to you, Peter did. And I’m sure he would have told you if you’d ever asked him.”
Gabe rolled the blade of grass between his fingers for a long time. “I never said I was blameless,” he said at last. “Just that I’m not the only one who owns some of the responsibility for what happened.” He tossed the grass to the ground and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “So what else do you want to know?”
A thousand things and nothing, all at the same time. “Why don’t you tell me where you were when Helene’s letter reached you?”
“I was in Ecuador,” he said. “A city called Riobamba. Before that, I was in the interior working with a tribe called the Zaparo. There are only a handful of them left on the planet, and I’m trying to help.”
“And how do you help them?”
“We’ve helped them plant gardens, provided medical help to keep their children from dying young, showed them how to build structures that are safer for their children out of their own raw materials. We’ve taught them any number of things that we believe will improve their quality of life without changing their culture in any meaningful way.”
His eyes lit when he talked, just the way Peter’s had when he worked with wood. “Why do you do it?”
Gabe looked away at the mountains visible over the tops of the buildings. “I grew up in these hills,” he said. “All my life, I heard stories about the Sioux, the Crow, the Blackfeet, the Nez Percé…dozens of tribes chased off their land, relocated to worthless places in the desert, even murdered because white men wanted what they had. I hated hearing the stories, and I wanted to change things.” He shrugged eloquently. “It’s a little late here, but it’s not too late in other parts of the world.”
“That sounds like a worthy ambition. Why does Monty object?”
“Because he thinks I’m siding with the enemy, I guess. His ancestors were part of the problem. They drove the natives from their land and then claimed it for themselves. The Kings have made their living off that land for generations and, until I came along, they were all proud of it.”
“But surely that’s not a reason to kick your son out of the house.” She stopped walking and folded her arms across her chest. “I know Monty. He’s not heartless.”
“I told you I wasn’t blameless,” Gabe said. “One argument led to another. Things were said neither of us could ever take back. The arguments stopped being about what I wanted to do with my life and started becoming personal—on both sides. I said things I regret deeply. Things about my father, about his father…” He grinned. “By the end, I was saying some pretty harsh stuff about Kings all the way back to Adam, and I was saying it to anybody who’d listen. I went public, and that was unforgivable.”
“But you’re his son.”
Gabe shook his head and stared down at the toes of his shoes. “You never met Grandpa King,” he said after a long silence. “He died before you met Peter. But he was about a thousand times worse than the old man. Grandpa figured me for a bleeding heart the first time I said anything about how I felt. I was ten, just Bobby’s age, when I heard the story of Chief Joseph and the Nez Percé for the first time. They were trying to escape the reservation by crossing into Canada but, of course, the government wouldn’t just let them go. I never understood why they herded them back and forced them onto land on the other side of the continent. I never understood why they felt it so necessary to kill so many human beings who only wanted to hold on to their homeland. I still don’t.”
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Anyway, Grandpa badgered the old man about it for a couple of years. Dad wasn’t all that happy himself, but Grandpa really pushed him around the corner. After a while, Dad decided that Grandpa was right and I was wrong. Dad told me that a career in any other field was out of the question, and the war began.”
“Peter described your grandfather as a completely different man.”
“I’m not surprised, but Peter never bucked the system, either.”
Siddah started walking again, slowly. “Peter always was more of a peacemaker than a rule breaker.”
“And I was just the opposite,” Gabe said, falling into step beside her. “Anyway, I promised myself that I’d spend my life giving people back their dignity and helping them keep their land. It was a little late to do anything here, but there were places in the world where a guy like me could make a difference, so that’s where I went.”
Though she’d never met Peter’s grandfather, she knew how bullheaded Monty could be, and Gabe’s story had the ring of truth to it. The urge to touch his arm in a gesture of comfort swept through Siddah, but she clenched her hands tightly and willed it to pass.
“So what happened the night you left?”
Gabe didn’t answer immediately. When he did, his voice was low and soft. “I’d been away at the University of Montana in Missoula. The old man had been after me to change my major by offering to pay my tuition and books. Accepting his money might have made getting my education a little easier, but it would have locked me into a life I didn’t want.”
“So you turned him down.”
“Yeah. I turned him down.” Gabe’s face twisted at some memory. “My grandfather went ballistic. Told the old man to give me an ultimatum. Either I had to shape up and do what he wanted, or he’d write me out of his will. What old Calvin never could understand was that the money meant nothing to me. Less than nothing.”
“Why did it matter so much to them? Why couldn’t he just let you make your own decisions? You were an adult, weren’t you?”
“Yeah, I was. And the old man would probably have to answer that question. Calvin was from the old school, where a man was the king of his family, and the patriarch made the decisions for everyone. He saw nothing wrong with clear-cutting forests and destroying natural resources, as long as there was a profit in it. The old man went along with everything he did.”
Siddah shook her head in confusion. “It’s hard to imagine Monty being submissive to anyone.”
“Yeah? Well, only to his father.” Gabe watched a car drive past before he spoke again. “The whole thing came to a head when I found out they were planning to cut up on Smoky Ridge. A group of us had been trying to get that area protected by the government. Calvin decided to clear-cut before we could succeed. I drove home that weekend and confronted them. Told them I hated what they were doing and tried to get them to listen to reason. Neither one of them would listen to me. No surprise there. I guess I didn’t listen to them, either—until Calvin told the old man that getting Mom pregnant with me was the biggest mistake the old man had ever made.”
Siddah gasped in horror. “He said that? In front of you? What did Monty do?”
“He said he knew, but it was too late to undo the dam
age.” Gabe tried to smile, but remembered pain twisted his features. “I said I’d rather be dead than related to either one of them, and the old man told me to get the hell out.”
“Where was Helene during all of this?”
“She was there. Trying to get us all to stop. She tried to keep me from leaving, but I was too pissed. And hurt. This was the last place I wanted to be.”
“And you went, just like that.”
“Not exactly.” The grin crept back into his eyes. “I’m leaving out all the screaming, shouting, swearing, name-calling and fighting. That’s where the story gets boring.”
Siddah stopped again, this time beneath the shade of a large oak tree. “Where did you go?”
“Back to Missoula for a while. Right after graduation, I drove out to Virginia and I never looked back.”
She leaned against the tree trunk and thought back over everything he’d just told her. “So Monty didn’t always disagree with what you wanted?”
“Not always.”
“Then there’s hope that you really can reconcile with him?”
“I’m counting on it.”
She wanted it for him. She wanted Monty to relent. She wanted Helene to completely forgive him. She wanted his family to heal, and she wanted to see him smile without the shadows of heartache in his eyes.
That realization brought her up short. Why did she care whether or not Gabe smiled? Why should she worry about the shadows in his eyes? She could feel things shifting around inside of her, whether she wanted them to or not. “Well, I wish you the best of luck.”
“Thanks. And what about you? When are you going to make some changes and let yourself live again?”
Siddah drew back sharply. “My husband is dead.”
“But you aren’t, and neither is Bobby. You seem like a warm, caring and generous woman, Siddah, but you also seem a little lost. Don’t you think Peter would like to see you move beyond the moment of his death?”