Parable, Montana [4] Big Sky Summer

by Linda Lael Miller

  Two other official cars followed close behind the sheriff’s, while news vans and less impressive rigs of all sorts trailed behind, at a cautious distance, but advancing just the same.

  Casey got to the door before Walker did, even though he was closer, elbowed her way past him and dashed across the porch, down the steps, out into the yard.

  Boone brought his cruiser to a stop nearby, and, through the windshield and the blinding blue-and-white swirl of light, Casey spotted Brylee’s face on the passenger side, pale moon rising. Clare and Shane rode in back, behind the grill, and as soon as Boone put on the brakes, they spilled out on either side of the vehicle, dashing toward her.

  Casey wrapped one arm around each of them.

  Clare cried, while Shane, almost gleeful, seemed to see the experience as an adventure.

  Walker stood at a little distance, painfully separate, while Brylee rounded the car from the other side, heading toward her brother, and Boone climbed from behind the wheel, his expression sober.

  “It was so awesome, Mom!” Shane crowed. “Like one of those action-adventure movies, where Bruce Willis goes after the bad guys, even when he has to walk barefoot over broken glass—”

  Casey winced at the image, but it was Clare who spoke.

  “Oh, shut up!” she broke in tearfully, glaring at her brother. “It wasn’t awesome! It was terrible! And this isn’t one of your stupid Die Hard movies!”

  Shane rolled his eyes, looking disgusted by this display of emotion. “Whatever,” he said in a dismissive drawl. Then, under his breath, he added, “Hormones.”

  Casey gave her son a warning look and he shrugged and ambled off toward Walker.

  She took Clare’s face between her hands. “Honey,” she said, “I know this was scary, but those guys wouldn’t have hurt you—they just wanted a story.”

  Clare pulled free, glared at her. “Oh, yeah?” she challenged furiously. “Then how come the sheriff had to bring us home in a police car, with a bunch of deputies to run interference?”

  How could Casey answer that? Maybe the reporters presented no physical danger, they were just pesky, but Walker had been right—the “freak jobs” who obsessed over every aspect of a celebrity’s life definitely did pose a threat. And they tended to follow the newshounds wherever they went, getting some kind of sick satisfaction out of hanging around on the fringes, watching and hoping to get involved in some way.

  Clare, evidently tired of waiting for an answer her mother didn’t have to offer, pulled away and hurried into the house, slamming the screen door hard behind her.

  Casey, feeling that odd sense of dissociation again, as though she’d split into two people, one concerned, one impassive, walked over to Boone, who tried to smile and failed.

  “Thank you,” Casey told him, putting out her hand.

  Boone took it, gave her fingers a squeeze, nodded ever so slightly. “I can post a couple of deputies at your gate if you’d like,” he said, inclining his head in that direction, “but it looks like the ranch hands have things under control, for the moment, anyhow.”

  Casey swallowed, nodded back. “We’ll be all right,” she assured the sheriff. “Once the excitement dies down a little, anyway.”

  We’ll be all right.

  She and the children? They’d be fine, because a new story would come along any minute, and the stringers would be off chasing some other celebrity, climbing the trees in their yard, harassing their children, peeking through their windows and generally complicating every other aspect of their lives. No matter how juicy the current scandal, there was always another, better, one, waiting in the wings.

  But would she and Walker be all right? As a couple?

  Not likely. Walker was a regular person, those spectacular looks aside, and things like this didn’t happen to people like him. Try though he might to understand, intelligent as he was, he had no frame of reference for the downside of fame. How could he?

  To him, fame meant bright lights, glamorous photo shoots, designer clothes, star-studded parties, limos and private jets and packed arenas all over the world. Thousands of unseen hands holding up their lighters, creating a flickering backdrop of flame.

  To Casey and, by extension, to her children, it meant those things, all right, but there was a whole heck of a lot more to the celebrity lifestyle. It meant taking extreme security precautions, even in places where normal people felt safe. It meant keeping her eyes wide-open, no matter how tired she was, staying alert, even when there were bodyguards on all sides. It meant avoiding malls, popular restaurants and movie theaters, never personally answering a knock at a hotel room door, even when room service was expected. It meant flinching when someone raised a camera or shoved a pen at her, when all they wanted was a snapshot or an autograph.

  Usually, that was all it was. And then there were the other times.

  Had John Lennon expected to be shot dead by a fan, right out in front of his own apartment building? Of course not—the possibility probably hadn’t even crossed his mind. Why should it? He’d been going about his business, that was all. Living his life. Meeting someone for drinks or dinner, expecting to be home before bedtime.

  Except that none of that happened.

  Stop it, Casey told herself. Get a grip.

  Shane and Clare were already inside the house by then, and Brylee was close behind. Casey followed, while Walker remained where he was, talking solemnly with Boone and the deputies.

  In the kitchen, Brylee tossed a fistful of undersize “newspapers” onto the table, while Clare fled to her appointed bedroom and Shane crouched to greet a waggy-tailed Doolittle with an ear-ruffling and a tummy rub.

  “If we had a parrot, we could use these,” Brylee said of the tabloids, “to line the cage.”

  Casey reached for a copy, her hand trembling slightly, and, though she’d thought she was prepared, the sight of Clare, photographed standing beside the piano the day before in her pretty, modest dress, singing the song that was her wedding gift to her parents, struck Casey like a freight train going downhill.

  Clare was fully clad, of course, unlike certain movie stars who’d been captured for posterity sunbathing nude on the deck of some yacht, or British royalty indulging in hanky-panky beside a swimming pool, but there was something too intimate about the shot just the same. It was, Casey decided, the sense of close proximity; the picture might have been taken by someone attending the ceremony, instead of through a window.

  Love child turns songbird, the caption read and, beneath that, in smaller print, But will she fly the coop, now that her famous mama and cowboy daddy have finally tied the knot?

  “Love child,” Casey murmured, shaking her head. She supposed the term was apt enough, if ridiculously outdated. She and Walker hadn’t been married when it counted, that was true, but there had never been any doubt that Clare was loved, and Shane, too.

  Brylee busied herself at the counter, brewing coffee. “Snidely’s still in town,” she fretted. “I thought we’d be going back to your place after we picked up the stuff to make tacos, but—”

  Snidely, Casey recalled distractedly, was Brylee’s faithful German shepherd, and, according to Walker, they went everywhere together.

  “Dad and I will go get him for you,” Shane assured her manfully, getting to his feet and heading for the refrigerator. Growing as fast as he was, he was forever taking on fuel. “Maybe we can bring our dogs out here, too. The cats will probably be okay where they are for a while—”

  Brylee, moving deftly, stepped between Shane and the fridge. “Wash your hands first,” she said.

  “Good call,” Casey agreed, distracted, still leafing through the other “special editions.” There were pictures of her and Walker exchanging vows, then, later, laughing as they fed each other wedding cake, an image of Shane loading Dawson’s wheelchair into the back of Patsy’s van while Walker lifted Dawson himself onto the passenger seat. None of it was offensive, but all of it was too personal, too private.

  Th
e headlines, however, grew progressively worse.

  One rag featured a picture of Walker, crouching beside Dawson’s wheelchair on the ranch house porch, talking earnestly, faces solemn.

  Another of the cowboy’s love children? screeched the inch-high, boldfaced line beneath the photo.

  Shane, meanwhile, washed his hands, as ordered by his aunt, then rooted through the fridge in earnest, coming away with an armload of cellophane-covered refreshments left over from the wedding.

  He and Brylee discussed the plan for dog retrieval in quiet voices, somewhere at the periphery of Casey’s awareness.

  When she thought enough time had elapsed, Casey headed for Clare’s room—once Brylee’s—and tapped at the door, resting her forehead against the panel while she waited.

  “Go away,” Clare said predictably.

  “You know I’m not going to do that,” Casey responded, keeping her tone light. She turned the glass knob, realized that she was locked out. Got her hackles up just a smidge. “Let me in, Clare.”

  “There’s nothing you can say to make this better,” Clare retorted.

  “Let me in,” Casey repeated. When it came to stubbornness, her daughter would find her a worthy opponent. Besides, Brylee could probably come up with a spare key to the room in no time.

  Clare’s sigh was loud enough to come right through the thick wood of that sturdy door. There was a scraping sound as she worked the lock, and then she was peeking out, the crack so narrow that only one of her eyes was visible.

  Casey eased the door the rest of the way open, careful not to push too hard and stub one of Clare’s toes, which were probably bare, since, like her mom, the girl never wore shoes if she could avoid it.

  The room was spacious, though not as big as its counterpart on Rodeo Road, with a window seat and built-in bookshelves and even a small Franklin stove. The closet ran the length of one wall, and the furniture was obviously antique: four-poster bed, matching bureau, chest of drawers and nightstands. A pair of delicate chairs, slipcovered in a muted pink floral fabric, faced the stove.

  A few of Clare’s belongings were scattered around, here and there—the tiny chiming clock she treasured, a stack of books, a framed photo of the three of them—Casey, Clare and Shane—with a remarkably authentic Santa Claus, back when the lie was still working.

  Casey picked up the photograph and smiled, remembering the Nashville party where it had been taken, four or five years before. Was it really that long ago? It seemed like yesterday.

  “That was quite a night,” she reflected somewhat wistfully, setting the photo back on the shelf where she’d found it.

  The bed creaked as Clare leaped into the middle of it and sat cross-legged, the way she liked to do, but her expression was snarky, not nostalgic. “Yes,” she said. “Everybody there was either famous or related to somebody famous, and doesn’t every Santa Claus wear a real velvet suit, trimmed in the best fake fur available, and pass out state-of-the-art iPads instead of candy canes?”

  Casey sighed, let the gibe pass. She saw herself in Clare, recognized the trick of picking a fight in order to establish boundaries. “What, exactly,” she began wearily, “do you hope to accomplish by being so difficult?”

  “I’m letting you know that I’m unhappy,” Clare said pertly. “We’re having a dialogue.”

  “You’ve been watching too many Oprah reruns,” Casey answered, perching on the edge of the bed, not too close, but not too far away, either.

  “You might want to take in one or two episodes when you get the chance,” Clare answered airily. “Oprah was always big on telling the truth.”

  Zing. Shot through the heart. Casey knotted her fingers together in her lap and silently counted to ten.

  “What do you want, Clare?” she asked evenly when she was relatively sure she wouldn’t lose it.

  Clare rolled deftly onto her stomach, cupping her chin in her hands and bending her knees to swing her feet back and forth. She was wearing cut-off jeans and a skimpy top that ended a good eight inches above her waist. Casey didn’t recognize the outfit, and was about to say as much when she spotted the tattoo.

  It was just a tiny rosebud, nestled in the graceful curve at the base of Clare’s spine—not a skull and crossbones, not a gang symbol or a four-letter word—and yet the sight of it stunned Casey.

  “When did you get that?” she asked very quietly.

  Clare looked back over one shapely shoulder, acknowledging the tattoo’s presence with a nonchalant glance, and shrugged slightly. “Last year, in Vegas,” she said blithely. “When you were doing that one-night charity gig at Caesar’s, with Brad and Trace and everybody.”

  “You were thirteen at the time,” Casey reminded her daughter. “Who signed the permission slip?” Even in Glitter Gulch, where practically anything went, minors couldn’t get tattoos without the signature of a qualified adult. In short, a parent or guardian.

  “You’ll be mad,” Clare warned.

  “I’m already mad,” Casey replied. “Who was it?”

  “It was some reporter guy,” Clare said. “I got bored hanging out in the suite while you were rehearsing, so I gave the bodyguards and Uncle Mitch the slip and went out for a walk. This man with a camera came up to me on one of the sky bridges and asked me if I was your daughter. I figured he already knew I was, or he wouldn’t have asked me in the first place, and he looked nice enough, so I said yes. He told me he wrote for a real newspaper, not a tabloid, and we ended up striking a deal. He wanted an interview, and I wanted a tattoo. So we went into this shopping center, where there was one of those places where you can get body piercings and stuff—it was nice, Mom, and very clean, and there were loads of people around, so nothing was going to happen. They had these computers, and all you had to do was scroll through the different designs until you found the perfect tattoo.”

  Casey closed her eyes for a moment, imagining her thirteen-year-old daughter wandering around Las Vegas by herself, talking to strangers, finagling a tattoo. A shudder went through her. Not only had this happened, but she hadn’t known a thing about it—until now.

  Clare, apparently uncomfortable with the silence, launched back into the story. “Anyway, the reporter guy pretended to be my dad. I paid for the tattoo myself, of course—out of my allowance—and it hurt like anything—the tattoo, I mean, not forking over the cash. He asked me a couple of questions and that was that. No big deal. Plus, I was back in the suite before anybody even noticed I was gone.”

  “Excuse me,” Casey said, standing up suddenly. Clare’s new room came with an adjoining bath, cramped but blessedly nearby and, at the moment, it was a good thing.

  “Mom?” Clare asked, sounding mildly alarmed. “Mom, what—?”

  Casey hurried into the bathroom, lifted the lid of the toilet and threw up everything but her socks.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  WALKER WAS PRYING a pebble out of Mack’s right front foot with a hoof pick when he heard his daughter’s voice behind him. He glanced up, saw her standing in the breezeway, arms braced atop the stall gate, watching him.

  “Walker?” she queried. Shane called him “Dad” these days, but Clare was holding out, unwilling to give so much as an inch of ground. It was as if she believed he and Casey could turn back the clock and set everything right, if only they weren’t so all fired determined to make her life as miserable as possible.

  Teenage girls. He hadn’t had to deal with that particular species since Brylee was Clare’s age, but now it was all coming back to him, and the prospect was discouraging. His sister hadn’t even begun to snap out of it until she started college, which meant the snit-storms weren’t likely to let up anytime soon—in fact, they were bound to get worse.

  He sighed inwardly, straightened, lowered Mack’s foot and turned in her direction. He couldn’t blame the kid for being angry, of course—probably would have been pretty damn furious himself, in Clare’s place. Fit to be tied, as his dad used to say.

  “What’s up, shorts
top?” He opened the stall gate, and Clare stepped back so he could pass. His little girl was turning into a big girl and, though it would take a while, he knew it was out there, waiting, the time when she’d no longer need him, or even Casey, in any real way.

  It made him feel, well, optional. And he had nobody to blame but himself—and Casey.

  “Mom just threw up.” Clare looked genuinely worried, and somewhat guilty, too. Her color was high and her mouth was a mite wobbly, as though she wanted to cry and was doing her darnedest not to. “And it’s my fault.”

  Walker frowned. “Your mom’s had a hard day,” he said, trying not to show his own concern. “Lots of stress—the media blitz, getting married, moving to the ranch.” He paused, studying Clare’s face. “How do you figure any of that’s your fault?”

  Clare swallowed, gnawed at her lower lip for a moment. A sheen of tears glistened in her eyes. “I got a tattoo,” she said meekly. “It was a long time ago, but Mom just found out and—”

  “And that tattoo is such an awful sight that your poor mama took one look at it and lost her lunch?” Walker asked lightly. He had his own theory as to why Casey might be feeling a little green around the gills, but it might be wishful thinking.

  A third child. Wouldn’t that be something?

  Clare flushed, but a little grin tugged at the corners of her mouth, and she blinked away the tears. “Mom thinks I’m too young for a tattoo, and that’s just plain hypocritical if you ask me, because she’s got this tiny guitar on one ankle—”

  “You are too young,” Walker said after his daughter’s voice trailed off into an uncertain, shaky-chinned silence. He knew about the little guitar, of course, and the butterfly, too, though that was on a less obvious part of Casey’s anatomy, a place he particularly liked to kiss. “Your mother, on the other hand, is an adult, legally entitled to make her own decisions. How is that ‘hypocritical’?”