But that was one of the impossible dreams.
“I don’t have any money saved,” she’d protested. Just as it had been with her brothers, every penny she’d earned had gone to help pay off her mother’s astronomical medical bills.
It was either that, or stand by and watch her father lose the ranch in order to be able to settle the outstanding account. She couldn’t allow that to happen just because she wanted to follow Cash to California.
“The money doesn’t matter,” Cash had told her with the conviction of the very young. “We’ll find a way.”
She’d wanted to believe him. Wanted, in the worst way, to go with him.
But her sense of honor, her sense of responsibility, had prevented her from impetuously leaving everything behind and following Cash. She just couldn’t bring herself to turn her back on her father at a time like that, even though she knew that he would urge her to follow her heart and tell her that he understood.
It didn’t matter if her father understood. She wouldn’t have been able to live with herself.
And so, she’d had to learn how to live without Cash.
The last night they were together, Cash had watched her solemnly and she remembered thinking that she had never seen such sadness in a person’s eyes. He’d promised her that he would be back for her.
He’d sworn that he would come back for her.
He’d told her that once he had his law degree and was working for a firm, she could stop working and go to school to get her own degree. He’d told her he would pay for it.
She’d hardly heard him. Her heart was aching so badly at the thought of living a single day without him, she could barely stand it. When she couldn’t stop the flow of tears, he’d tried to comfort her. And, as sometimes happens, one thing had led to another.
That was the first time they made love.
He’d left her, with great reluctance, the next morning, promising to be back, to make her proud of him and to love her forever.
Watching him go, his secondhand car growing smaller and smaller against the horizon, Alma had been certain that her heart would break right there and that she would die where she stood.
But she didn’t die.
And her heart only felt broken.
Somehow, she’d found a way to continue. She wrote him every day. What kept her going in the beginning was waiting for his letters.
The wait grew longer, the letters grew fewer. And shorter. Until they stopped coming altogether.
She remembered that now, remembered how she had felt when she finally made herself admit that he wasn’t coming back, not to the town, not to her.
Alma squared her shoulders. “Well, I’ve got work to do,” she told Cash stiffly. “So if you’ll excuse me—”
They sounded like two strangers who didn’t know how to end an awkward conversation, he thought. And that, too, was his fault.
Just like the Douglas murders were his fault.
“Sure. Sorry,” he apologized. “Didn’t mean to keep you from anything. Maybe we can get together later,” he suggested. If there was a note of hope in his voice, it had slipped out and attached itself to his words without his knowledge or blessings.
Alma’s voice was completely flat and without emotion as she echoed the word he’d used. “Maybe.”
When pigs fly, she added silently.
“Nice seeing you again, Alma,” Cash said by way of parting. “Really nice.”
And then he was gone.
Alma didn’t even look up.
“Well, that was awkward,” Larry announced the moment Cash was no longer in the office.
The last thing she wanted was to have a discussion about this—any of this—with Larry. She was fond of the man, but he had a gift for always saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and she wasn’t in the mood to put up with that.
“Larry, I brought brownies in yesterday morning. Why don’t you go and stuff them into your mouth?” she suggested, accompanying her words with a spasmodic smile she didn’t mean. “They’re in the cupboard.”
“No, they’re not,” Larry told her matter-of-factly. There was a touch of sheepishness in his voice when he spoke. Alma eyed him suspiciously and he instantly confessed. “Hey, I was here after hours and I got hungry.”
“You ate them all?” she asked incredulously. Why wasn’t this man fat? Instead, he was as skinny as a rail. “There were sixteen brownies,” she emphasized. She’d brought them in for the others, but then she’d stopped at the diner to see Miss Joan, and Harry had told her about Cash. After that, things were a blur. She’d completely forgotten about the brownies until this moment.
“I know,” Larry answered. “I counted them. They were probably the best brownies I ever had. Thanks,” he added. He had the good grace to look contrite and embarrassed by his apparent gluttony.
“Larry—” She began to complain that he hadn’t left any for the others, but at this point, it was all moot. She just sighed.
“Don’t pick on him, Alma,” Joe said. He scooted his chair to Larry’s desk for a moment. Reaching over, he patted the other man’s stomach. “He’s a growing boy.”
Annoyed, Larry pushed his own chair back, away from Joe. “Cut it out,” he warned.
“All right, kids, knock it off,” Rick ordered, deliberately using the word kids despite the fact that he was only a couple of years older than any of them.
When he glanced at Alma, there was compassion in his eyes. He’d been raised by his grandmother and he’d protectively looked after his little sister during those years. He was more geared in to the workings of a female mind than the average male and he sympathized with what she was going through.
“You want some time off?” he asked her gently.
That caught her by surprise. “What?” Her eyes narrowed. “Why?”
Crossing over to her desk, Rick turned so that while he faced her, his back was to Larry. He wanted to block the other deputy’s view. The office was a fishbowl, but he did what he could to give Alma some privacy.
“I know this is all kind of rough for you,” Rick told her.
“It would be,” she conceded, then said with feeling, “if I wasn’t over him, Sheriff. Really, I’m fine.” Rick had always been like another big brother to her. An understanding big brother who didn’t get off on teasing her the way her real brothers did on occasion. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do but it’s not necessary. I don’t need any kid-glove treatment. I’m the same person I’ve always been,” she assured him. “No need to walk on eggshells or tiptoe around me. Really,” she stressed.
“All right. If you want to stay on the job, look into this for me.” Taking a piece of paper out of his breast pocket, he placed it on her desk in front of her. “Sally Ronson just called, said that she saw the Winslow boys horsing around in the field beyond the high school. They were smoking.” There were two things wrong with that. “They’re underage and this is fire season. Get those cigarettes away from them and put the fear of God into them any way you see fit—just remember, we draw the line at flogging.”
He said it so seriously that for a second she actually thought that he was.
And then she saw the glimmer of amusement in his eyes. “Got you. No flogging.”
Joe, who listened unobtrusively to everything that went on in the sheriff’s office, looked up. “The Winslow boys?” Joe repeated, then asked, “Kyle and Ken?”
Rick nodded. “The very same.”
Joe shook his head. The two brothers were a rowdy handful.
“Good luck with that,” he told Alma. “Those two don’t have half a brain between them.” And then he raised his eyes to hers. “Want company?” he offered.
She knew what he was thinking. What all of them were probably thinking. That the sixteen-year-old twins were strong young bucks and she would need help getting them to listen to her.
“Thanks, but no,” she told Joe. “The day I can’t handle two snot-nosed teenage boys is the day I’m handing in my
badge.”
Rick nodded, relieved that at least some of Alma’s fighting spirit was still intact. For a minute back there, when Cash had walked in, he’d had his doubts.
“Go get ’em, Deputy Rodriguez. And if they give you any lip,” he said, “bring them back here to me.” His eyes met hers. “Understood?”
“Understood,” she parroted. And then she smiled. “They won’t give me any trouble. Don’t go dusting off the jail cell just yet.”
After folding the paper the sheriff had given her, Alma tucked it into her back pocket. She did it as a formality. Everyone knew where the high school was and she was more than acquainted with the field he’d referred to. She and her brothers used to hang out there.
As had Cash, she remembered.
Even just thinking of his name made something twist deep in her belly. It would be a hell of a long two weeks.
Walking out, she silently blessed Rick. She was glad to leave the office on a pretext. Rick’s initial offer of letting her go home wouldn’t have been any good. She didn’t want to go home. Being alone with her thoughts right now was worse than being subjected to an afternoon laden with Larry’s jokes. She needed to keep busy, but being cooped up in the office with Larry unintentionally saying stupid things wasn’t conducive to having a tranquil afternoon, either.
She thought back to Joe’s offer to come with her. She actually wouldn’t have minded his company, but ever since he’d gotten married, he seemed to be slightly more talkative, slightly more prone to commenting on things. It used to be that he kept mostly to himself and spoke only when he had to. Right now, she would have preferred that version of Joe to the new, improved one. One that didn’t feel compelled to offer sympathy or comfort.
All she wanted to do was go on as if Cash Taylor was still on the West Coast. She didn’t want to talk about him or think about him.
Not exactly an easy matter, she realized a couple of moments later, given that his image popped up in her mind every second and a half.
That was because she was still in shock, she told herself. And why not? He’d come on like an apparition from her past, walking right into the middle of the sheriff’s office. Granted, Larry had propelled him into the room but that still didn’t negate the final effect.
Or the fact that her heart had stopped beating and then launched into triple time.
She hadn’t thought it was humanly possible for someone as good-looking as Cash to grow better looking over time, especially since she assumed that he had had a sedentary life since he’d left Forever.
But he had.
Those were muscles beneath his custom-made jacket. Firm muscles. They went well with his flat stomach and his taut hips.
As for his face, he seemed to have taken on a more chiseled look. Certainly his cheekbones had become prominent. All in all, it gave his profile a somewhat haunting look.
There was that word again, she thought. Haunting. She might as well admit that was the way she felt right now.
Haunted.
Haunted by Cash’s memory, by his presence—and by the thoughts of what might have been.
The next couple of weeks were not going to be good. She would just have to resign herself to that and make the best of it.
Easier said than done.
A lot easier said than done.
Chapter Three
The area just beyond the back of the high school couldn’t actually be called a park. It was a clearing with several sun-bleached benches scattered about and a lot of grass in between. Summer evenings invited couples seeking a private moment or two. During the day, children occasionally still brought their imaginations and played timeless games that didn’t require electricity.
Today the clearing was empty. Except for the Winslow twins, as had been reported. And, also as had been reported, they were both smoking. Each had staked out a bench and was sprawled out, sending smoke rings up into the hot wind.
Parking her Jeep close to the clearing, Alma got out and crossed over to where the twins were sitting. Her eyes swept over them and she nodded.
“’Morning, boys.”
Startled, one of the twins—Ken, the slightly shorter one—sat up straight. “’Morning, Miss Alma,” he responded somewhat nervously.
His twin, Kyle, said nothing. He merely glanced in her direction and nodded. Kyle had always behaved as if he thought himself to be the cooler one of the two. She’d come to favor Ken herself.
When she regarded the latter, he appeared not to know what to do with his cigarette.
Alma kept her voice friendly but firm. Her best asset when dealing with teenagers was that she could vividly remember what it was like to be that age. And how she had felt being chided by an adult. It helped temper her words.
“Put them out, boys,” she told the twins. “You know you’re too young to be smoking cigarettes, even if they were good for you, which they’re not.”
In defiance, Kyle took another long drag from his cigarette, then slowly blew out the smoke. As it swirled away from him, he smirked as he slanted another look at her.
“You gonna tell us that smoking cigarettes is going to stunt our growth?” The suggestion made him laugh. At sixteen, both twins were close to six foot six, like their father and older brother.
“No,” she said, walking up to Kyle and physically removing the cigarette from his hand, “I’m going to tell you that smoking cigarettes at sixteen is against the law.” She snubbed out the cigarette against the back of the bench.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Ken was about to throw his own cigarette on the ground and step on it to extinguish it. He wasn’t being perverse, like his brother, she realized. He just wasn’t thinking.
She relieved Ken of his cigarette, too, and put it out the same way. “And besides, it’s fire season,” she reminded the brothers. “You have to be extra careful that a stray spark doesn’t hit something flammable.”
Satisfied that both cigarettes were out, Alma looked at the two offenders. Most likely, this had been Kyle’s idea. He was the persuasive one of the pair. Ken would always follow him, afraid not to.
“Okay, I don’t want to see you smoking for another two years and, if you’re smart,” she added, looking at them pointedly, “never.”
Kyle bristled. He’d never liked being reined in. “Ain’t you got anything more important to do than to come by and make us put out our cigarettes?”
“Not at the moment,” she answered honestly.
Ken looked at her sheepishly. “You gonna tell our old man?”
Dan Winslow was known to be strict with his sons and there were no second chances. First offenses were dealt with quickly and harshly.
Alma saw no point in involving the man if she could get his sons to stop.
“Not this time,” she told Ken, breaking the cigarettes in half and then dropping them into the trash after she checked to make sure that the unlit ends were no longer warm. “But if I catch you at it again, then yes, I will. And he’s your father—call him that. Not ‘old man.’ He deserves your respect.”
Kyle laughed shortly. “You’ve never seen him getting out of bed in the morning.”
“No, I have not,” she readily agreed. “But just remember, we’re all going to get there someday including you—and that’s if we’re lucky.” She could tell that Kyle was eager to see her leave. I’m not stupid, boy. “Oh, and one more thing,” she said in her most innocent voice, “I’ll take that pack of cigarettes you have in your pocket, Kyle.”
She saw Ken flush. Kyle moved back, as if distance could prevent her from taking the pack. “It’s not ours,” he protested.
Good. At least she wouldn’t have to lecture the grocery store owner about carding his underage customers when they tried to buy cigarettes. “Oh? Then whose is it?”
“The pack belongs to our dad,” Ken blurted out even as his brother gave him a dirty look.
That means you’re going to get busted, she thought. She remained standing where she was, hol
ding her hand out and waiting.
“If he misses them, tell him he can come by the sheriff’s office and get them anytime.” With pronounced reluctance, Kyle dug into his shirt pocket and surrendered the pack of cigarettes to her. She nodded and smiled. “Have a nice day, boys. And remember, keep your lungs clean.”
Alma got into her vehicle and drove away. In the rearview mirror, she could see the twins arguing with each other. Probably trying to decide what to tell their father when he questioned them about the missing pack of cigarettes.
Alma smiled to herself.
Having resolved the situation to her satisfaction for the time being, Alma was about to head back to the sheriff’s office, then changed her mind. It wasn’t lunchtime yet, but it was close enough to noon for her to take an early lunch. She decided that for once, she’d give in to herself.
Besides, she needed the sight of a friendly face.
The thought of stopping by the diner and seeing Miss Joan appealed to her.
The diner was like a second home to her, after the great many hours waitressing there. Granted, she wasn’t very hungry—seeing Cash had tied her stomach into a knot and killed whatever appetite she might have had—but she could do with the company. Female company.
She loved her father and brothers dearly and had done her best to keep up with the lot of them. For the most part, she’d succeeded and if they suddenly weren’t around, she would miss them more than words could say.
That being said, there were times when she found it nice just to let her guard down. Just to be a softer version of herself without having to prove anything to anyone—or feel as if she had to.
That involved talking to a woman. An understanding woman. And Miss Joan, despite the crusty exterior she liked to project, fit the bill to a T.
As usual, Miss Joan was behind the counter when she walked in. The woman looked up the moment she opened the door. One glance at her unlined face—remarkable considering her age—and Alma knew that Miss Joan knew exactly what she was going through. And why she was here at this hour.
“C’mon in, girl. Take a load off,” Miss Joan called out, beckoning her over to the counter. She glanced around and instructed the waitress closest to her, “Julie, go get Alma here a tall, frosty glass of lemonade, please.”
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