A Father's Vow

by Myrna Temte

  As far as he was concerned, loving somebody was the equivalent of inviting them to leave him. First his dad. Then his mother. Then his sister. Even Wayne Kincaid. He’d loved them all and they’d all vanished from his life in one way or another. Why would Julia be any different?

  He didn’t love her, of course. And thank Maheo for that. If she didn’t care any more than this about protecting her job, she couldn’t be serious about making a permanent home on the res. She’d probably turn out to be just as tied to the white world as her mother had been.

  But if there was a baby on the way, it was his baby, too, and he would be damned if he would sit back and let her take it away from him. Much as he respected his friend and mentor, he had no intention of acting the same way Dan Talkhouse had twenty-seven years ago. Sam would fight to be a part of his child’s life. His child would not grow up ignorant of Indian ways.

  When Julia left Laughing Horse— A burning pain in the center of his chest cut off the rest of that thought. Frowning, Julia came closer to him, studying his face intently.

  “Sam? Are you all right?”

  “Yeah,” he said with a nod. “Fine.”

  She eyed him worriedly. “Are you sure? You had the oddest expression.”

  He turned away from her, walked over to the table, picked up the pregnancy-test box and threw it in the trash can Julia kept under the sink. “I’m fine.”

  “Then we’re okay about waiting a few weeks to discuss this again?”

  “Sure, no problem,” he said.

  There was a problem, of course, a bigger one than he’d ever imagined until he’d felt the fierce pain a moment ago. He knew that pain and he knew what it meant. How could he have let this happen? It was hard to believe, but all along he’d been deluding himself with a worse case of denial than Julia’s.

  Dammit all, he did love Julia, and when she left Laughing Horse, she would take a huge chunk of his heart with her. Unless he could figure out a way to make her love him back enough to want to stay.

  The next eighteen days whipped by for Julia. Excitement over the new school permeated the whole reservation as the building’s dedication loomed closer and closer. The atmosphere demanded nothing but the very best efforts from teachers and students alike, and the preparations continued at a relentless pace.

  Julia reveled in the creative energies blooming everywhere she went, from her fourth-graders, to her fellow teachers, to her adult furniture-refinishing students, to the tribal-council members who were putting together the program for the dedication and the open house scheduled to follow the ceremony. Only the continued absence of her period decreased her pleasure in the blur of activities. Sam had delivered another pregnancy-test kit, but she hadn’t been able to make herself use it yet.

  She wasn’t sure what to make of Sam these days. As a tribal-council member and the project manager of the school’s construction, he was involved up to his neck in preparations for the dedication ceremony. He’d also fulfilled his promise to come and help her kids paint the bathtub, which they had done in traditional Cheyenne colors and designs.

  One way or another, she saw him nearly every day. He was affectionate and helpful, even solicitous on occasion. To her surprise, however, he hadn’t said another word to her about her possible pregnancy or made any further attempts to convince her to marry him.

  He hadn’t withdrawn his offer, either, but frankly, she’d expected him to pressure her at every opportunity. His failure to do so confused her. Not that she didn’t appreciate the space he’d given her, of course, but she couldn’t help wondering what he was up to. It simply wasn’t like Sam to be laid-back about anything really important to him.

  Was he just biding his time? Or had he changed his mind about marrying her? Did it matter if he had?

  Sam would be a wonderful father. He was a marvelous lover. He had great integrity, a strong sense of responsibility to his community and a successful business—all high-ranking points on most women’s scales of desirable characteristics for a husband. His sense of humor could use some work, but to her knowledge he didn’t have any really bad faults. Her own father liked him. She would even admit to being ninety-eight percent madly in love with him.

  So what was wrong with her? Why was she still hesitating?

  Why wasn’t she taking that second pregnancy test and hustling him off to the nearest church for an immediate wedding? She really didn’t need to take the test to admit she was pregnant. She wasn’t always regular, but she’d never been this late before.

  While it was true that she was perfectly capable of supporting herself and a child financially, she didn’t relish the idea of being a single mother. When he walked into her classroom and the kids mobbed him, when she saw him patiently guiding a child’s shaky paintbrush, when she caught him tenderly drying a first-grader’s tears on the playground, she felt as warm and gooey inside as a toasted marshmallow. And since she had missed having a father so much when she was growing up, she really wanted her baby to have one.

  If Sam was still willing to marry her, shouldn’t she grab him while the grabbing was good, so to speak?

  Thinking logically and practically, there could be no other answer but a resounding yes. But there was a stubborn, idealistic, completely impractical and illogical part of her that kept insisting that she and the baby needed the one thing Sam hadn’t offered to give them. They needed his love.

  Until she convinced herself otherwise, she felt…stuck, completely unable to do anything but wait for new insights or for Sam to force the issue, whichever came first. She would rather be more proactive than that, but for now it seemed the best she could do. Maybe after the dedication, her life would settle down and she could figure out what was best for everyone.

  The big day arrived in the first week of October. Julia and her students worked hard right up to the end, finishing projects and putting them on display for the parents and other visitors who would tour the new classrooms. The last bell of the day rang and the kids had barely scrambled out of the room before the final inspection team from the tribal council arrived to make sure all was ready.

  Julia struggled to maintain a poised facade while the team studied the artwork on the walls, the bathtub, the student stories on the bulletin boards, the learning centers and the folders of each student’s best work lying on the desks. The four inspectors, including Sam and Maggie Hawk, were so quiet and grave at first, Julia feared she had done something seriously wrong or neglected to do something terribly important.

  Then Maggie came over, folded her hands around Julia’s and squeezed them. “This is absolutely perfect,” she said, smiling directly into Julia’s eyes. “This classroom is everything I hoped this school could be.”

  Julia’s throat suddenly felt too tight to speak above a whisper. “Thank you. But I can’t take all of the credit. The children worked very hard.”

  “You can take credit for motivating them to do it,” Rose Weasel Tail said. “Too many of our kids have been underachievers for years in the Whitehorn schools. The kids in this class obviously aren’t.”

  Ernest Running Bull nodded vigorously. “That’s right. Everywhere I look is somethin’ to make a person feel proud to be Indian. These kids, they’re learnin’ white skills like the readin’ and the ‘rithmetic, but they’re learnin’ about bein’ Cheyenne at the same time. You’re doin’ a real fine job.”

  Sam hung back after the others left to finish their tour. Barely a hint of a smile touched his mouth, but his eyes reflected intense approval when their gazes met and held. “I second everything the rest of them said.”

  “Oh, Sam.” Her eyes stung with unshed tears and her voice wobbled on the edge of control. “You really think it looks all right?”

  “It’s better than all right. This room looks fantastic, and I know from the times I’ve spent with your kids that you’re a great teacher.” He tipped his head to one side and studied her more closely. “You’re not going to cry all over me, are you?”

  La
ughing, Julia wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands. “I hope not. This wouldn’t be a good time for it.”

  “No, it wouldn’t.” His lips curving into a full-fledged grin, he stroked his knuckles across her cheekbone. “Wait’ll this shindig’s over, and you can blubber all you want.”

  “What a guy.”

  She gave one of his braids a playful tug, then looked away, blinking hard to force back a whole flood of tears. She hadn’t realized until now how much stress she had been feeling over her job and the open house, or maybe she felt unusually weepy because she was pregnant. Whatever, he had never seemed more dear to her than he did at this moment. She wanted to stop her silly dithering, throw her arms around him and tell him she would be absolutely delighted to marry him.

  “Hey, Jules, you all right?” He slid his hand under her chin, turning it toward him in a silent demand for her to meet his eyes. “Honey, what is it?”

  Inhaling a deep breath, she opened her mouth, but no words came out. Before she could collect herself enough to try again, the room’s combination telephone-intercom buzzed. With an apologetic smile for Sam, she hurried to answer it. It was probably somebody in the office, needing her to do some last-minute something. The school secretary’s voice sounded pleasant but harried when Julia picked up the handset.

  “Phone call for you, Julia.”

  “Thanks, Gert.” There was a click on the line, and the next voice Julia heard was female, but the woman was crying so hard, that was about all she could tell at first.

  “J-Julia, please, please, you’ve got to come help me. I need somebody w-w-with m-me.”

  Alarm skittered along Julia’s nerve endings. The poor woman sounded as if something truly awful had happened to her. “Who is this?”

  “It’s m-me. J-J-Janie.”

  Remembering the discussion she’d shared with Janie at the Labor Day party, Julia suddenly felt guilty. She’d promised to call Janie and get together with her after school started, but it had already been a month and she hadn’t made time for her friend yet. “Janie? Honey, what’s wrong?”

  “I’m at the sheriff’s office. I think they’re gonna q-q-question m-me about Dale.”

  “Question you about Dale?” Lord, Julia wondered, what had Janie’s brother done? “What for?”

  “J.D. said Dale tried to set the barn on fire at the Kincaid Ranch.”

  “Your J.D.?” Julia asked. “J. D. Cade?”

  “Well, he’s not my J.D., now,” Janie said, sniffling loudly. “I hate him and I’ll never ever forgive him for this.”

  “Oh, Janie,” Julia murmured. The poor kid had finally discovered her big hero might not be such a hero, after all. “Was Dale arrested?”

  “No-o-o,” Janie wailed. “In all the confusion, he took off somewhere, and nobody can find him. They think I know where he is.”

  “Do you?” Julia asked.

  “No-o-o!” Janie’s voice rose half an octave, bordering on hysteria. “I d-don’t know what all they think, but I’m all alone and I’m so scared…” Janie’s voice dissolved into a harsh, sobbing sound, grating on Julia’s ears like the yowl of a cat in terrible pain. “Please come, Julia. I need you.”

  “Calm down,” Julia begged, wracking her brain for a single idea that would help her friend. “Is Reed Austin there?”

  “He’s the one who brought me to the jail. He believes J.D.”

  So much for that idea, Julia thought grimly. Tonight was the open house. She couldn’t leave the school. But who else could she call to come and stay with Janie?

  “What if I called Melissa?” Julia asked. She’s lived around here a long time, and her husband is really well-respected. They can probably help you more than I can, and I know they’ll be happy to—”

  “They’re in H-H-Hawaii,” Janie said with another loud, miserable sniff. She sounded more like a lost, terrified child with every sentence she spoke.

  “Okay. Don’t panic,” Julia said, though she was starting to feel panic clawing at her own insides. This was not a good situation. Not good at all. “What about a lawyer? Did the sheriff let you call one?”

  “He said I don’t need one because I haven’t been charged with anything.”

  “I see. Janie, are you sure you don’t know where Dale is?”

  “No! And I don’t know anything about what’s been going on at the damn Kincaid Ranch, either. But Dale’s innocent, I know he is.”

  “Suppose he just got scared for some reason,” Julia said. “Where do you think he would go?”

  “I don’t know! And if I did, I wouldn’t tell anyone. Certainly not the sheriff.”

  “But the only way to clear this up—”

  “Don’t you understand?” Janie shouted. “I could never make trouble for him.”

  “He’s made trouble for you, hasn’t he?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I’m responsible for him. He’s my baby brother.”

  Julia could barely keep the impatience she felt out of her voice. “He’s twenty-three years old. That makes him an adult, Janie. He’s supposed to be responsible for himself.”

  Janie rushed on as if Julia hadn’t spoken. “What if he never comes back? What will I have to live for? I won’t have anyone.”

  The despair in Janie’s voice chilled Julia to the core. She had known that despair once, when she’d stood alone at her mother’s grave, believing she had no family left anywhere. None that would have anything to do with her, anyway. She would have given anything to have someone there to share her grief, but her mother had been a difficult, reclusive woman, and there had been no one.

  Perky, irrepressible Janie had welcomed her at the Hip Hop when another waitress might have resented her presence. They had become good friends in a very short time, and now Janie needed help. There was no one else for the girl to turn to. Julia didn’t see how could she say no and live with her own conscience.

  “He’ll come back,” Julia said, “but right now you need to take care of yourself. I have a good friend who’s a lawyer, and I’ll ask him what you should do, so don’t say anything to the sheriff just yet, okay?”

  “Okay. You’ll come, though, won’t you? Please, Julia?”

  “Yes, Janie. Sit tight, and I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  Julia hung up the phone, then turned back to Sam and recounted the gist of her conversation with Janie. Gathering her purse and coat while she talked, she did her best to ignore his increasingly fierce scowl. She had known Janie’s request would upset him from the moment her friend had spoken the words, but she also knew what she had to do. Heaven knew, she didn’t want to miss the dedication ceremony or the open house, but she didn’t have any choice. Sam would simply have to understand.

  Sam listened to Julia’s explanation with a growing sense of dismay. He’d worked hard to give her plenty of space over the past couple of weeks; he’d bitten his tongue at least once every time he’d seen her since that day she’d taken the pregnancy test. He thought she was starting to come around, too, but he couldn’t believe she was planning to go through with what she’d just promised Janie Carson.

  Hell, he couldn’t let her do it.

  “Are you crazy?” he said, his voice only a hair lower than a shout. “Are you totally and completely nuts?”

  She held up both hands, palms out. “Sam, please, I don’t have time—”

  He had to stick his own hands into his front pants pockets to stop them from grabbing her shoulders and trying to shake some sense into her. “Honey, you’d better take some time and think about this one. You can’t go to Whitehorn now. You just can’t.”

  Her chin rose; her eyes narrowed in warning. “Excuse me? I don’t recall asking your permission.”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  “That’s what it sounded like. I need to go find Jackson.”

  With that, she marched past him, through the doorway and out into the hallway. Cursing under his breath in both English and Cheyenne, Sam hurried to catch up with her. He s
hould have grabbed her and shaken her when he’d had the chance.

  “Okay, I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m asking you, Julia, please, don’t do this. This is the first time since we got locked up on this reservation that we’ve been able to decide for ourselves how our children will be educated. It’s not just a big deal. It’s a huge event for the whole tribe. You have to be here.”

  “Somehow, I think you’ll all survive without me for this one evening.”

  “What about your kids? And all the parents who’ll want to meet you?”

  “I’ve already met most of them, and I’ll make it a point to meet the rest on my own time. As for my kids, they know what they need to do tonight. Either you or Maggie could take my place yourselves or find someone else to stay with them for me. Never mind, I’ll take care of it myself.”

  “Where is your loyalty?” he asked. “You’re really going to choose Janie Carson over your own tribe?”

  Julia speared him with a sharp glance. “I don’t know why you have to look at it that way. It’s an emergency situation. My friend really needs me—”

  “We need you,” Sam said. “You’re one of only six people who are going to be teaching our children. We need you to be here tonight of all the nights—”

  “Emergencies don’t happen when it’s convenient. That’s why they’re called emergencies. People will understand.”

  “No, they won’t understand why you had to go and be with your white friend tonight.”

  “Oh? Then, would it be okay if my friend was Indian?”

  “No, it still would not be okay.” He took a deep breath, struggling to hold on to his patience. “But some people might be more understanding about it.”

  “Well, you know something? That’s really too bad because my friends get the same treatment from me, regardless of race, creed and all that other stuff. I’m what you might call an equal-opportunity friend.”

  “Don’t make me out to be a racist. I didn’t say it was right or fair. It’s the truth as I see it, and I’m just being honest.”