by Melissa Tagg
Sara sifted her fingers through the tall pampas grass as they walked toward the main ranch grounds now. She looked so different today than she had yesterday. No flowy skirt or colored scarf. This morning she wore Levis and a simple white tee. Her fiery hair was tucked under a blue bandana.
“You know, I’ve been praying about how in the world I was going to fix this place up while also setting up my therapy practice. I think you might be my answer to prayer, young man.”
The answer to someone else’s prayer. Wasn’t the first time he’d heard it. Annie used to say that the day he walked into her life was the culmination of all her prayers. If only they’d known . . .
In the distance, over the long field and through a line of bordering trees, he caught sight of the roomy red barn that marked the main ranch property. He knew from the tour Sara had given him earlier that several other outbuildings dotted the land, along with at least two outdoor training rings. And farther back was the white farmhouse with forest green shutters where Sara now lived.
When he was a kid, he’d dreamed of living in a place like this, of trading in his family’s cramped apartment for space and freedom and miles and miles of land ripe for exploring. That’d been his and Rio’s favorite game—playing explorers.
He glanced over his shoulder at the weatherworn cabins. For once, a mess he knew how to fix.
“I’m grateful you’re willing to hire me so quickly. And that you didn’t even make me write a résumé or cover letter. Does this count as our interview?”
Sara laughed. “Raegan Walker vouched for you. Good enough for me.”
“Didn’t you just meet Raegan for the first time yesterday?”
“Yes, but my history with the Walkers goes way back.” She glanced over at him. “And now you’re wondering about said history and asking yourself why Case Walker snubbed me the way he did last night, am I right?”
“Nosy Parker isn’t really my style.” No matter how much Raegan might be hoping he’d come back with answers. She’d certainly fished last night. But Case had been tight-lipped, turning in for the night less than an hour after arriving home.
“I think I like you, Bear McKinley,” Sara said, hooking her thumbs through her belt loops. “Now, to make this official, I’ll need to have you fill out a W-4. Probably better do a background check, too.”
Bear’s throat dried up, his steps slowing. His hand found the back of his neck once more. Sweaty again.
“Not that I’m worried you’ve got some sordid criminal record lurking in your past.” There was teasing in her voice.
One Bear couldn’t bring himself to latch on to.
“But I’ve got a financial advisor helping me with all the business aspects of setting up the ranch,” Sara continued. “He insists background checks are part of the hiring process. Along with too many tax forms to count. Seriously, it’s painful.”
Bear came to a full halt, kneeling down under the pretense of freeing a thistle from one of his shoelaces. All the while those two words clogged his brain: criminal record.
He had to tell her. Didn’t he?
“Bear?” Sara stopped ahead of him.
He’d told the church leaders in Brazil—about the felonies, the prison sentence, even Annie—and look where that had gotten him. He ignored the scratchy sting of the thistle, tossed it aside, and stood. “The thing is . . . that is . . . I—”
He stopped, attention snagging on the winding dirt road in the distance that bordered the field where they walked. An old blue Taurus idled at the top of the ditch, the shadowed figure inside turned their way.
“Something wrong?” Sara followed Bear’s gaze.
“Do you know whose car that is?”
“No. Probably just someone looking for wild asparagus. Or rhubarb. I always see people stopping along these rural backroads.”
Possibly. But why was the driver just sitting there? Staring?
And why the unease limping through Bear? It wasn’t as if he recognized the car.
“Bear?”
Probably nothing. Probably just the thought of Rio and their unstable childhood a few minutes ago that had resurrected the wary suspicion that used to cloud his everyday life.
Don’t be silly. You’re in Iowa. Not Atlanta. He lifted his hand and waved.
Immediately the car’s engine rumbled to life and it sped down the lane.
Sara shrugged. “Midwestern friendliness lets us down. Could’ve at least waved back.” She started walking again. “Now, what were we talking about?”
More like what they weren’t talking about—or what he wasn’t going to admit to, anyway. His record. His conscience told him to tell Sara now, not to wait for a background check to reveal the truth. But his common sense reminded him about what had happened in Brazil.
What he wouldn’t give for those felony convictions to disappear the way that car just had. He stared at the fog of dust left behind.
Maybe he’d get lucky. Maybe Sara would forget about the background check.
A man could hope.
The rumble of the train engine drew Raegan to the depot’s boardwalk. Dad was back from giving his last ride of the day.
Which meant he couldn’t avoid her any longer. About time.
Hazy steam billowed around the train as its wheels came to a screeching halt in front of the oblong depot building. The 2-8-2 Mikado steam locomotive, with its black body and red wheels, was Dad’s favorite of the Maple Valley Scenic Railway’s trains. And after helping at the depot off and on throughout high school—and again these past months—she probably knew its specs almost as well as Dad did. It was a 229,280-pound beast that could take almost six hours to start when the engine was cold. Each run of the heritage railway’s fourteen-mile track consumed around 1,500 gallons of water and nearly a ton of coal.
Raegan hefted the wooden box-stairs across the boardwalk, careful not to put too much weight on her right ankle as she moved, and lined it up to the car door where the school kids would spill out any second now. Her gaze drifted to the waves of green extending from the depot grounds that eventually blended into a hillside packed with copses of dogwood and pine. Metal and wood track disappeared into the thicket.
Such a unique little tourist spot, this heritage railroad. Maybe she’d somehow portray it on the mural. That is, if Mayor Milt and the council and all his various committees approved the project.
And if she didn’t lose her nerve.
“Raegan!”
The squeal of a woman’s voice came from the now-open train door. Oh dear. Diana Pratt bounded down the steps to the boardwalk, her platinum hair piled into an updo way too fancy for an afternoon train ride with her gaggle of second graders.
“Hey, Diana.” Raegan knew what was to come before the teacher several years her senior even opened her mouth.
“I’ve been hearing the whispers for days.” Diana drawled the word, eyes growing wide as her students hopped off the train around her. “But your father just confirmed it. Bear. McKinley’s. Back.”
“I know and—”
Diana rolled her eyes and planted her fists on her waist. “I know you know. Already got the man staying in your house and everything. Something wrong with his apartment?”
“Uh—”
“Never mind. Do you know his favorite kind of pie?”
“Not sure.” Kids’ footsteps and laughter clattered over the boardwalk. “Don’t you need to get your students on the school bus?” Raegan’s ankle throbbed. She’d iced it for a couple hours again this morning—Bear’s orders—and the swelling wasn’t nearly as bad as it’d been last night.
Still. Bear would probably have her head if he’d seen how much she was on her feet today.
“You really don’t know? Figured you would what with the way you used to follow him and your cousin around like a little puppy.”
There went this conversation, zipping straight from awkward to unpleasant with impressive speed. “Actually, Diana, maybe you should worry about pies later. To
mmy Jenkins is peeing in our hydrangea bush at the moment.”
Diana gasped and spun. “Tommy!” Her high heels clattered as she hurried away.
Dad’s chuckle came from behind.
Raegan turned, all her weight on her left foot. “That Jenkins kid has nice timing.”
“Let me guess, she was plying you with questions about Bear, too?” Dad closed the train door and pushed the wooden stairs against the depot’s pale yellow siding.
“Wanted to know his favorite kind of pie.”
“Not an unmarried man in this town who hasn’t been the recipient of one of her pies.” Dad tugged off his conductor’s hat. Poor man. He loved his gig at the depot, but the costume-like garb—the blue overalls and matching hat—drove him bonkers. Far cry from the military uniform he’d worn back in his young adult years.
Crazy, sometimes, to think the same Dad who spent his days giving train rides and operating a small-town railroad museum had once served his country in Vietnam and had gone on to a prestigious diplomatic career. She’d heard him say time and again that he’d never once regretted leaving all that behind, moving the whole family home when Mom got sick the first time.
But did he ever wonder what life might look like now if things had turned out differently? If circumstances hadn’t intruded on his own dreams and ambitions?
She knew what he’d say if she asked him, though. Mom was his dream. Raising his children was his ambition. As for any other unfulfilled aspirations, his faith gave him peace that God had him right where He wanted him.
It was a line she’d echoed often through the years when wondering if she’d made a major mistake—turning down those scholarships, never pursuing her art. The difference between Raegan and Dad, though, was that he meant it. He really did feel at peace.
Whereas Raegan . . . half the time she didn’t know what she felt. Other than a numb acceptance that this was her life. This was what she’d chosen. And it was a fine life. A good life. It was enough.
Or at least, it should be.
As for her faith, it felt at times as dim as twilight. As if, after too many unanswered prayers, the sun had set on her days of wholly entrusting her heart to God.
The voices and laughter of the kids faded as they loaded into the bus in the parking lot. “Listen, Dad, about last night—”
“Feel free to take off early tonight, Rae. I know you’ve got a booth to man at the Summer Carnival.” Dad combed his fingers through his silver hair as he strode into the depot.
Raegan followed him in, half hopping, trying to remember when she’d last swallowed a couple Tylenol. Freshly polished woodwork gleamed around walls painted in rich hues of blue and gold. Glass display cases held salvaged railroad relics, and framed town photos adorned the walls.
“I don’t have to be in town until five. I’ve been waiting all afternoon to talk.”
“Rae—”
“I’ve never seen you like that, Dad.” Like he’d been the moment he’d spotted Sara. So . . . hardened. The creases etched into his face stiff and unyielding. Shoulders set and his every feature seemingly on edge.
He started down the narrow hallway that led to his office. “I was tired. I’d had a long drive. I didn’t expect to see her.”
“I met Sara in town. She said I looked like Mom. She told us all these stories—”
“I’m sure she did.”
She didn’t have to see Dad’s face to catch his grimace. “I’m sorry if I shouldn’t have invited her for dinner.”
“Nothing for you to be sorry about. You didn’t know.” He entered his closet of an office, barely large enough to fit a small desk in the corner. The space smelled like Dad, like coffee and Old Spice.
“And I still don’t. I don’t know . . . what it is I don’t know. She said she was best friends with Mom.” And finally last night, just before falling asleep, Raegan had remembered where she’d seen Sara before. “She was at Mom’s funeral—at the graveside service. I saw her standing up the hill, watching from a distance.”
“I know she was there.” Dad glanced at her ankle. “If you’re going to be here for a while, sit down.”
She obeyed, plopping into the chair at his desk. “I just want to understand. Sara’s moving back to town. She’s taking over J.J.’s Stables. Bear talked to her just this morning about a job. We’ll see her around all the time, I’m sure.”
“We won’t. ’Least, I won’t.”
“And you won’t tell me why?”
Dad’s only answer was to hang his hat on a hook beside a slim window.
“This isn’t like you.”
“I’ve got some paperwork to finish up.”
“But—”
“Enough.”
There was a silencing bite to his tone she’d never heard before. Worse, an anguish idling in the background, blunt and undeniable and so very familiar.
And suddenly she was seventeen again, standing unseen behind a tree in a cemetery filled with too much sunlight. Watching Dad fall apart at Mom’s grave. Convinced nothing in the world would ever feel right again.
“Dad.”
He turned just slightly to look down at her. His face was an ashen gray—like it’d been last year when the symptoms took hold. Before the tumor, the surgery. Days of worry when her ever-strong, ever-present father just didn’t seem okay.
“When’s your next checkup?”
He shook his head as he lowered to perch on the edge of his desk. “That’s not what this is, Rae.”
“You had an operation on your brain last fall. And now you’re not acting like yourself. I read the list of surgery risks. ‘Personality changes’ was right at the top. So you can’t blame me for wondering—”
He reached out to squeeze her shoulder. “Believe me, I would’ve had the same reaction to that woman showing up at any time, before or after my tumor. I am absolutely fine, and I will continue to be fine as long as . . .”
As long as he didn’t have to see Sara. “But—”
“Please just let it go. As a favor to me, let it go. Can you do that?”
Raegan nodded, willing away the unsettling feeling that came from the realization that Dad had secrets. Locked-away pieces of his past, of himself. The wind flapped against the building, rattling a loose pane in the window. This wasn’t how their family was supposed to operate. They weren’t supposed to hide.
But then, who was she to talk? She had a secret art studio.
And she could name the date of every panic attack she’d ever had that no one in her family knew about.
One year. Seven months. Nineteen days.
“So tell me about Bear.” Dad’s voice cut in—a rescue, a relief. Protecting her from another tussle with the same old unanswerable questions: Why couldn’t she talk about it—the panic attacks? What was she so scared of?
And why, in a family of dreamers and achievers, did she have to be the one broken one?
She swallowed. “What about Bear?”
“Never fails to amuse me the way all my children feel the need to play coy when I do my snooping-because-I-care father routine.” Gone, just like that, was the angst in Dad’s expression from only moments ago. “For once I’d love to hear one of you say, ‘Wow, Dad. You’re really astute when it comes to things of the romantical nature. Yes, I am in fact tangled up in knots about So-and-So.’ And in case it’s not clear, for you, So-and-So translates to the guy currently camping out in my basement. The one I saw carrying you up the stairs last night.”
Raegan resisted the urge to roll her eyes. But at least this was the Dad she was used to—teasing, prying, affectionate. “Romantical? Is that even a word?”
“You could do worse than Bear. He’s not a bad guy.”
If Dad thought he had to convince her of that fact, he wasn’t as astute as he claimed to be.
Dad tapped his chin. “Then again, he does have that tattoo. And I’ve never been all that keen on tattoos.”
“Well, you weren’t that keen on my eyebrow ring either
. But you adjusted.”
“So you’re saying I should make it a point to adjust to the tattoo? In case of any future developments of the relationship variety?”
“Dad.”
Dad held up his hands. “Fine. I’m only ribbing you. Just know that Beckett’s got an eagle-eye watch on Bear.”
“Believe me, I do. And I realize that as a little sister I’m supposed to appreciate his protectiveness, but as an intelligent, twenty-first-century woman I’m itching to remind him I can look out for myself.”
Jamie laughed.
Jamie laughed.
And Bear felt his insides melt.
Raegan bent in front of the boy atop a stool, paintbrush in her hand, as a lightning bug swooped past her ear. She attempted a scold. “If you don’t sit still, Jamie, you’re going to end up with paint all over your face.”
“It tickles.” Jamie kicked his heels against the stool beneath him.
“Yes, but you see, I’ve got a reputation to maintain as the best face painter in town. And your uncle paid a whole dollar for this. I’d hate to mess it up.” Raegan met Bear’s eyes over Jamie’s shoulder, her dimpled grin enough to prompt a laugh of his own. A blazing sunset cast a halo of color over her hair, and the string of lights around her carnival booth glimmered in her eyes.
“A whole dollar indeed. Extortion.” Especially considering the sign behind her advertised only fifty cents. But he’d have paid fifty dollars to hear that laugh from Jamie, just as he’d already gladly forked over quarters at booths from one end of the lit-up square to the other.
A warm breeze folded around them, carrying the sugary-sweet smell of cotton candy. Erin’s little hands were clasped around Bear’s neck from her perch on his shoulders.
Tonight it really was possible to believe everything would turn out okay. Background check or no, the job at Sara’s ranch would work out. Jamie would keep laughing, finally start opening up, and both kids would thrive during this break from their everyday lives. Rosa would get their living situation sorted and Rio . . .
Bear’s optimism faded. Probably best not to think about it.
So he wouldn’t—not tonight. Tonight was about the kids. It was about making up for lost time.