Fences: Smith Mountain Lake Series - Book Three

by Inglath Cooper

  It’s the most direct she’s been about the cracks in her marriage, and I’m not sure where to go with this. I decide not asking is the best course.

  And eventually, she says, “It didn’t start out that way. Jeffrey was kind to me after my dad died. I thought I needed safety, and he definitely represented that. But his mother never accepted me, and, over time, that started to erode whatever good there was between us.”

  None of it is what I expected to hear. “Why didn’t you move out of Stone Meadow?”

  “Jeffrey wanted to stay there. I should have insisted we move to a house of our own, but he felt strongly about it, and I guess I didn’t have the backbone to make it happen.”

  I put my brush back in the can, stir the stain, and say, without looking at her, “It sounds like you’re being a little hard on yourself.”

  “No. I let years of my life slip by without admitting I was living a lie. I don’t think I can be too hard on myself.”

  “What do you mean living a lie?”

  “I knew there was someone else in his life,” she says, her voice low so that it does not carry to where the girls are still giggling as they work.

  I put down my brush, reach out to touch her shoulder. “Hey. You don’t have to tell me any of this.”

  “I’ve never talked about it to anyone,” she says, still not meeting my gaze. “Too embarrassed, I guess.”

  “Why would you be embarrassed?”

  “For the obvious reasons, when your husband loses interest in you.”

  “Couldn’t that have been about him and nothing to do with you?”

  “I don’t think it usually goes that way. It takes two to mess up a marriage.”

  “Did you cheat?” I ask.

  “No,” she says quickly, looking up at me in surprise.

  “Then how did you mess it up?”

  She starts to answer, stops, focuses on the staining, and then says softly, “Things weren’t right between us. After the girls got a little older, we both started becoming aware of the chinks in our relationship. When the girls were little and required so much care, it was easy not to look at the distance growing between us. Jeffrey started to stay at the office longer, working on weekends. That kind of thing.”

  “That doesn’t necessarily mean he was having an affair.”

  “There were other things.”

  “Like?”

  She’s quiet for a long moment, and then, “He didn’t want me anymore.”

  The words hit me with a combined stab of surprise and jealousy. Surprise that any man could stop wanting Jillie, and jealousy at the reminder that Jeffrey had once shared her bed and her body. Stupid, considering that I now know and adore their kids, but then my feelings for Jillie have never been defined by logic.

  “That was certainly his loss,” I manage in a neutral voice.

  She looks up at me, paintbrush pausing on the wall, “Thank you.”

  “Surely, you know that,” I say, surprised at the look of gratitude on her face.

  She stands, dropping the brush on the paint tray, wiping her hands across her jeans without meeting my gaze.

  “Jillie,” I say. “Look at me.”

  She doesn’t right away, reluctant for reasons I can’t identify. Until she finally lifts her head, and I see the look in her eyes.

  “Any man would be a fool not to want you.”

  “Tate, don’t.”

  I reach out and tip her chin toward me. “Clearly, you need to hear it. I have no idea what was going on in Jeffrey’s head, but I’m pretty sure his choices had nothing to do with anything you did wrong.”

  “But it did,” she says on a broken note.

  “How?” I ask, dropping my hand from her face.

  She shakes her head a little. “I didn’t love him the way I should have.”

  “You made a commitment to him, and he made the same to you.”

  “Love and cherish, right?”

  “People have made successful marriages on far less.”

  “I didn’t intend for it to go the way it did. After you left, Tate—”

  She breaks off there, and I find myself asking, “Do you think we would be together if I hadn’t left?”

  She looks up at me then, and I see the answer in her eyes, clear as anything I’ve ever been aware of.

  “I can’t question anything that’s happened, Tate. I have my daughters, and I cannot imagine my life without them.”

  I know she means it, and listening to the sound of their laughter from the far side of the barn, I agree with her. It’s impossible to question anything that resulted in the two of them. “They’re incredible,” I say.

  “Thank you,” she says, and I can hear that it means a lot to her. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.”

  “Why aren’t you married?”

  I suspect she knows the real answer, but I don’t think either of us is ready to hear it out loud. And so I say what I’ve been telling myself every time the question comes up. “I guess I didn’t turn out to be the marrying type.”

  “Ah,” she says.

  “You sound like you don’t believe me.”

  “It’s not that.”

  “What then?”

  “I always thought you did. Seem like the marrying type.”

  “The one I wanted got away,” I say, and the thread of the admission I thought I wasn’t ready to make begins to unravel.

  She goes completely still, snagging my gaze, and asking softly, “Are you saying you never got married because of me?”

  I don’t answer for a notable string of seconds, and then I decide there’s no reason for me to be anything but honest with her. “I’m saying I never met another you.”

  We look at each other for what feels like a long time. Tears well in her eyes, and I’m compelled to reach out and brush away the single one slipping down her cheek. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

  She shakes her head a little, wipes at her eyes and says, “As hard as I find it to believe, you have no idea how good it is to hear that.”

  I cup my hand to the back of her neck, lean in, and kiss her softly on the mouth. I let it go on for a minute or so, and then, remembering the girls, I pull back. “You need to see yourself the way I’ve always seen you, Jillie.”

  “I don’t think the girl you remember exists anymore.”

  “She’s standing right in front of me.”

  “I wish I could believe that.”

  “Believe it.”

  A sudden, high-pitched cry of terror brings us both running out of the stall.

  “Mama!”

  Kala’s voice.

  We bolt down the aisle, Jillie calling out, “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  We reach the stall door, and the answer is immediately clear. In the corner, Kala stands pressed against the wall, frozen with fear. At her feet is a coiled snake. Kala’s left ankle is swelling, angry and purple.

  Realizing the snake is poised to strike again, I grab a shovel sitting near the door.

  Knowing there’s not a second to waste, I ram the shovel underneath the snake and fling it against the far wall. “Run!” I shout.

  Corey bolts into the aisle, and Jillie grabs the still-frozen Kala. She all but drags her to the door and out onto the concrete floor. “Take them outside, Jillie. Now!”

  I hear her leaving the barn with the two crying girls. I see the snake in the corner of the stall, about to slip through a hole at the base of the wall. Before I can get to it with the shovel, it disappears.

  Outside, I find Kala and Corey huddled together. Jillie is running toward the house.

  “Mama went to get the car,” Corey says, her teeth chattering with shock. “She says Kala has to go to the hospital.”

  I try to subdue my own panic long enough to recall what I learned in the military about snake bites and remember that it isn’t advisable to suck the venom from the wound without a device made for it.

  I drop to my knees next to her
and say, “It’s going to be all right, Kala. Stretch your leg out, and be as still as you can. I’m going to call the hospital and let them know we’re coming. I grab my cell phone from my back pocket and do a quick search for the number. I hit dial and ask for the Emergency Room. I tell the woman who answers what has happened, and that we think the snake was a copperhead. She asks how long before we can get there, and I say twenty minutes at best.

  Jillie races down the driveway in her car, slamming to a stop just short of us. I tell her I’ll drive, and she can get in the back with Kala. Corey slides in the passenger seat, and I whip the car around and head for the main road.

  A glance in the rearview mirror shows me the absolute fear in Jillie’s eyes. “Is there anything else I should be doing? A tourniquet?” she asks.

  “It’s actually not advised. Just keep her still. I let the hospital know we’re coming.” I hit the main road and floor the accelerator, painfully aware that every minute counts.

  I glance back to see Jillie pulling Kala into her arms and whispering soothing reassurances to her.

  “It’s going to be okay,” I say out loud. “Hang on, Kala. The doctors will have some medicine that should fix you right up.”

  I catch Jillie’s terrified gaze in the mirror and realize how long it’s been since I’ve prayed. But I haven’t forgotten how, and I do so for the rest of the drive to the hospital.

  57

  Jillie

  I’VE NEVER BEEN so scared.

  Kala’s face is as white as the sheet a nurse has just tucked in around her. She’s holding my hand so tight it’s starting to feel numb. I don’t care though. If I could transfuse her pain and the poison from the snake into my own body, I would.

  Tate is waiting outside with Corey. A team of doctors are working around Kala’s ankle. I try to keep her focus on me, telling her to hang on, she’s going to feel better very soon.

  One of the doctors steps out of the group and moves to Kala’s side, looking at me with serious eyes. “We’re going to go ahead and start the intravenous antivenin. It’s good that you called ahead and were able to get her here so quickly.”

  I nod in agreement, immediately thankful that Tate had used the hazard lights to basically drive us here the way an ambulance would have, passing cars at every safe opportunity. “The medicine should work?” I ask, hearing the subdued panic in my voice.

  “That’s our expectation,” the doctor says, patting Kala’s arm. “And we’ll need to be careful about the risk of infection, of course. We’re getting the wound cleaned up now.”

  A nurse appears just then with an IV bag. The doctor steps aside, saying, “Ellen will get it started it for you, Kala. Don’t worry. You’re going to be okay.”

  Even though his voice is kind and reassuring, Kala’s grip on my hand tightens, and tears slide from her eyes. I lean in and kiss her forehead. “You’re all right, sweetie.”

  Kala nods a little, but she doesn’t let go of my hand, and I can’t help but think it has been a long time since she needed me or at least showed it. I want to pull her into my arms and hug her as tightly as I can, but the nurse is administering the IV in her left arm, so I do the only other thing I can do for now. I tell her how much I love her.

  58

  Angela

  SHE’S SITTING ON the side terrace, reading a book on her Kindle that she can’t seem to get into, when her mother appears in the open French doorway.

  “Apparently, Kala is in the ER with a snake bite,” she says in a tone she might have used in mentioning the current weather pattern.

  “What?” Angela is instantly horrified. Could it be serious? Despite her differences with Jillie, she is fond of the girls in her own way. “Should we go to the hospital?” she asks.

  Her mother’s response is further neutral. “I assume Jillian is there to take care of her.”

  Angela cannot hide her surprise. “But don’t you think we should go see her?”

  “What would be the point? Jillian has removed them from our lives.”

  “Mother. She’s your granddaughter.”

  “I’m sure she’ll be fine,” she says on a flinty note, before turning and walking away.

  For a moment, Angela stands in stunned disbelief. Even given everything that has happened with Jillie, how can a grandmother not be terrified for a granddaughter going through something like this?

  What should she do?

  Normally, there would be no question that she would follow her mother’s lead. Jillie had rejected them, taken her daughters, Angela’s nieces, and moved out.

  But recalling the set to her mother’s grim-faced declaration that Kala would be fine, Angela suddenly feels repulsed by her lack of caring. She pictures herself twenty years from now, hard and emotionless. Is that who she wants to be?

  Does she want to end up in this house with her mother, alone and bitter?

  Without answering the question, she walks past her mother and into the house, retrieving her purse and keys from the armoire near the front door and heading for her car.

  59

  Jillie

  KALA HAS BEEN moved to a private room in the hospital.

  She’s sleeping when Tate appears in the doorway, holding Corey’s hand. Corey looks at Kala, pale and still, and bursts into tears. I open my arms, and she runs to me, sobbing into my shoulder, “Is she going to be okay, Mama?”

  I hug her hard against me and say against her ear, “Yes, baby. She’s just sleeping.”

  “I saw the snake first. But I couldn’t get the words out before it bit Kala.”

  “It’s not your fault, honey. You couldn’t have stopped it from happening.”

  With her head on my shoulder, Corey reaches across and covers Kala’s hand with her own. “Did the medicine hurt her?”

  “Just a little needle stick, and that was all.”

  “Did she cry?”

  “No. She was very brave.”

  “I’m not brave like Kala.”

  “I think you are,” I say, rubbing her back.

  “So do I,” Tate says, walking over to the side of the bed.

  “Thank you for watching after her,” I say, looking up at him gratefully.

  “We watched after each other. Kala doing okay?”

  “Yes,” I say. “The doctors said it was good that we got her here so fast. Thank you for the NASCAR-level driving.”

  Tate smiles at this, and, for the first time in hours, I’m smiling too.

  A knock sounds at the door. We both look up to find Angela standing at the entrance. She glances at me and then at Tate, surprise registering on her face, as if she hadn’t expected to see him.

  “I . . . just stopped by to see how Kala is doing.”

  I’m not sure what to say at first. The thought of Angela being concerned about Kala is completely out of the blue. “She’s going to be okay,” I say, hearing the slightly defensive note in my voice.

  “Oh. Good,” she says. “I’m sorry it happened.”

  She glances at Tate then, dropping her eyes when she says, “Hello, Tate.”

  “Angela,” he says, in a steely voice that I don’t recognize.

  To call the moment awkward would be a vast understatement. They stare at each other for a string of moments, old anger surfacing in Tate’s eyes, something like regret in Angela’s.

  Kala makes a sound and shifts on the bed. She opens her eyes to take us all in with a groggy, “Mama?”

  “Yes, sweetie,” I say, standing to give her a kiss on the forehead. “How are you?”

  “Sleepy.”

  “That’s the medicine,” I say, brushing her hair back from her forehead.

  “Aunt Angela?” Kala squints across the room, clearly surprised to see her.

  “Yes,” she says, stepping farther into the room. “I just wanted to see how you are.”

  “Thank you,” Kala says politely. “How is Munchy doing?”

  “He and Cricket are missing you girls.”

  “We miss the
m,” Corey says, her head on my shoulder.

  Angela nods and says, “I knew you must. Do you have somewhere to keep them?”

  “We do,” Kala says. “We were working on the stalls today when I—” She breaks off there as if she can’t bring herself to remember what had happened.

  Angela nods, saying, “Let me see what I can do about getting Grandma to agree to send them over.”

  The words shock me. My initial inclination is to ask her not to get the girls’ hopes up because I can’t imagine her having any success with Judith, but I stop myself. I can see that Angela is making an effort, and, regardless of our history, I can’t bring myself to ignore the olive branch.

  “They would really love that.”

  Angela brings her gaze directly to mine, and, for a second, I see the flare of an old battle between us. Neither of us looks at Tate, but I’m aware of the triangle of tension.

  “Well,” Angela says, “I hope you’re feeling better soon, Kala.”

  “Thank you, Aunt Angela. And for Munchy too.”

  “I’ll do my best, okay?”

  “Okay,” Kala says.

  Angela turns and walks out of the room. We all absorb a few moments of silence. I see the indecision on Tate’s face, but I’m not surprised when he goes after her. I start to call after him to come back, to leave it alone.

  I don’t really have that right though. His past with Angela is his to deal with.

  60

  Tate

  I CATCH UP with her just outside the front door of the hospital. She’s walking quickly to the parking lot, and I follow her until she hits the remote for her car. “We’re overdue a conversation, don’t you think, Angela?”

  She whips around with a startled look on her face, dropping the keys in her right hand. She quickly stoops to pick them up, opening the car door with the obvious intent of slipping inside without answering me.