He closed his eyes, waiting for the thud-crack of incoming enemy fire, waiting for the agony of metal slicing through him.
But as he lay paralyzed, his mind swarming over all sorts of things a soldier should do at a time like this, the sound began to change. Now it wasn’t quite right.
He lay with his cheek pressed against the earth, unable to stop shaking, as he listened to that sound, which grew stranger as it grew louder.
It was still familiar, but not artillery fire at all. No, not at all.
It was the sound of rubber tires rolling slowly along the rocky road, a sound as recognizable to him from the war as it was here at home. The roads in Italy were dirt and rock—barely roads at all until they’d been worn down by the hundreds of tires of advancing troops.
He looked up and saw the black hood of Ivan Potts’ Chevrolet skimming above the hedge of sumac growing along the roadside.
Before the car could reach the clearing and all the passengers could see him lying in the dirt like a whimpering cur, he scrambled to his feet. Shaken by his reaction, he brushed as much of the dust as he could from his clothes, then limped quickly toward the front porch.
How could he have lost his senses so totally? He’d heard stories of shell-shocked men coming home from the war, but he’d never realized how completely convinced he could be that he was back in Italy, like that bad nightmare coming back to tap him on the shoulder in spite of the sunlight streaming from the sky.
He was standing on the steps, watching the road, when the car came into view. His gaze shot to the shining blond hair of the woman in the backseat.
Bertie. His beautiful Bertie. He couldn’t look away.
Even when she stepped out of the car, he couldn’t do anything but stand there staring. She wasn’t a figment of his imagination this time—not wishful thinking. Bertie was here. He’d thought about this moment, longed for it, ever since he’d seen her last, crying at the train station.
He wanted to run to her and touch her face, catch her in a hug, tell her she was even more beautiful than he’d told the guys. He wanted to tell her that she’d saved his life. She was the reason he’d fought so hard to stay alive. She was what kept him going. Her faithfulness. Her sweet letters. Just knowin’ she was there…he wanted to tell her all that, but he just kept staring.
She looked up at him, her face filled with all the spirit she’d written into her letters to him, and her hand raised in a wave. She took a couple of quick steps to circle the car, her eyes filled with sudden, wild joy.
Then her gaze dropped to the cane in his left hand. She gasped, and looked back up into his eyes, her own eyes widening. The joy vanished, and the expression that replaced it stabbed at him. The disappointment was obvious. The hurt. Her lips parted, and he heard a soft cry.
Bertie grabbed the car fender and held on to keep herself from falling over. That cane! Red wasn’t just holding it, he was leaning on it. Heavily.
Dozens of thoughts leapt through her mind, and to her shame, some of them were not sympathetic. She realized those thoughts were plain on her face, because she saw Red wince.
Fancy that. A man who had experienced the horrors of war for three years made anxious by one small woman with hurt and anger in her eyes.
This was why he hadn’t written? Would he have ever contacted her again if not for her father’s death? No one had even told her he was coming home.
Was she nothing more than a goodtime girl to him? The fears she had confessed to Dr. Cox, had they come true? Maybe Red didn’t want her hanging around now that things had gotten tough. Maybe he didn’t think she was woman enough to handle it.
All this time, she’d thought she meant more to him than that.
Stop it, Roberta Moennig. He’s been wounded. Think about someone besides yourself.
And yet…when had he been wounded? Why had no one told her about it?
She shot a look over her shoulder at Lilly and Ivan through the windshield of the car. Neither could hold her gaze. She looked at Edith, and found strength in her calm dark eyes, encouragement in her gentle nod.
Bertie nodded back at her friend, who was silently communicating with her eyes: You can do this. This is why I came with you.
Bertie had never known a dearer, more stalwart friend than Edith Frost. As the world seemed to shift and crash, Edith understood because her own world had crashed three and a half years ago.
Odd how those folks Bertie had known and trusted the longest had let her down, while someone she’d known for only eight months could be so solid for her now.
But that wasn’t the whole story. It couldn’t be. Bertie knew she was overreacting.
Just yesterday, as they sat watching the countryside go past them on the train, Edith had said, “Grief’s a strange beast, Bertie. Sometimes you’ll think you’re through with it, that all is well and you’ve dealt with your loss sufficiently, and then it will come back, stronger than ever.”
“Well, we won’t have to worry about that yet,” Bertie’d said. “I don’t feel recovered in the least. Fact is, I feel smothered with sorrow, wonderin’ if it’ll ever end.”
Problem now was that the sorrow just seemed to expand to include everyone in her life.
Gripping his cane, Red stepped down from the porch and came toward her, limping, leaning hard on that metal support. She could see the pain in his expression, but she didn’t know if it was physical, or emotional, because he felt exposed, walking in front of her like this—she, from whom he’d tried so hard to keep this secret. But why?
Except for the cane, he almost looked like the old Red, in his worn blue-denim overalls and red-and-gray plaid shirt. Work clothes, covered in dust. No sign of the Army uniform.
She ached to run to him, to put her arms around him, to ask what had happened—but since he hadn’t told her about it, he obviously didn’t want to talk to her about it.
Even after all their years of friendship, she wasn’t an important enough part of his life to be told about an injury. He could tell her how much he missed her, and talk about home all the time, but he couldn’t share this.
He drew closer, his steps awkward. The lines of fatigue in his face, the circles under his eyes, became more evident.
She swallowed hard when he reached her. She hadn’t seen him in a year, and even at that time they’d had only short stolen moments together each evening, busy as he’d been helping his mother around the guesthouse, busy as Bertie’d been helping her dad with haying and tending the cattle, garden and house after her regular job at the Farmer’s Exchange.
As she studied Red closer, he seemed…hardened somehow, his physique more corded with tight muscles. There was a new darkness in those blue eyes she’d caught only glimpses of last year. Here was no farm boy. There was no boyishness left in this man.
She searched his eyes for the twinkle she’d always known. It was gone, as if it had never been.
“Hi, Bert,” he said.
She swallowed again, nodded, suddenly unable to find any words, unwilling to look at the cane.
“Hi, Red.” Her voice betrayed her, quivery and hoarse. She knew anything she said would make it sound as if she pitied him. He’d hate that.
“Done with your hunting, Charles Frederick?” Lilly called through the window, her voice a little high-pitched, revealing tension.
Bertie glanced over her shoulder at the woman, and saw the concern in her eyes. Of course, Lilly had read Bertie’s reaction. Who could miss it? What must Red be thinking?
But what was he thinking when he decided not to tell her? She didn’t believe she’d’ve been more stunned if he’d backhanded her across the face.
Overreacting. I’m overreacting. This is the shock over Dad’s death that’s influencing my emotions. I’ve got to get over it.
“Got all I need for now,” Red told his mother.
“Well, then, why don’t you sit in the back with the ladies and ride to town with us?” Lilly said.
“Wait,” Bertie said. �
��I have to get the recipe I promised you.” She swung around Red like she was changing partners in a square dance and rushed toward the front porch.
Though she heard Red’s uneven steps behind her, she didn’t slow down, but barreled ahead and pushed through the front door into the living room, where her footsteps echoed through the house. Strange to be pushing through an unlocked door. Usually, she and Edith kept the doors to their apartment locked at all times. In Hideaway, though, few doors even had locks.
In the middle of the room she stopped and caught her breath, overwhelmed by the scents that sharply recalled her father’s presence: his pipe tobacco, the lingering aroma of onions, potatoes and ham, which was what he cooked most often when he was by himself.
Her father should come walking into the living room from the kitchen any moment.
The room smelled dusty, too. Dad never dusted, so it would have built up for the past eight months, mingling with the smoke and ash from the woodstove.
She sniffed the scent of old wood smoke as she closed her eyes. Oh, Dad. How could someone take you away from me like this?
Chapter Fifteen
Red tried not to make noise as he entered the front door of the Moennig home behind Bertie. How many times had he done this over the years when he and Bertie were growing up? Of course, most times he and Ivan and John had come through the back door with Bertie, like family.
Cecil and Dixie Martin, John’s brother and sister, were usually with Bertie’s brother, Lloyd, and all together they formed a rowdy gang of kids who loved to play in the Moennig barn because it was bigger than the others and far enough from town so their yells and screams didn’t bring out a posse of parents. The hay was always deep in the Moennig barn, perfect for kids swinging from rafter to floor on the rope that Joseph had hung for them.
Bertie’s mother, Marty, always had enough cookies and candy to feed the army of youngsters who flocked to their farm.
Red closed his eyes, choking up at the memories. Sometimes this place had seemed more like home than his own, where he had to keep his things picked up and his manners polite because of the lodgers. There were times a fella just needed to be himself, without all the strangers to consider.
He glanced at Bertie, who stood in the middle of the room, her shoulders slumped—Bertie’s back was usually ramrod straight. Her hands covered her face.
The front door, its wood swollen from recent rains, thumped against the frame as it attempted to close behind him. Bertie stiffened, half-turning, her face pale.
Red cleared his throat. “I shouldn’t’ve yelled at you over the telephone.”
“No, you shouldn’t have.” Her voice was still quivery, hoarse.
“I could’ve kicked myself ten ways to Christmas for doin’ that,” he told her.
She straightened her shoulders.
“But you shouldn’t’ve hung up on me without giving me a chance to explain,” he said.
Her lips pressed together in a firm line. She turned to face him as she caught and held his gaze, her eyes narrowing.
He stared back.
She spread her hands out to her sides. “Well?”
He blinked at her. “Well what?”
“There’s still time to explain, if that’s what you’ve a mind to do. What’s going on around here? Nobody wants to tell me anything, like I’m some weak sister who doesn’t have a brain in her head and will fall apart with one wrong look or word.”
He sighed. “Nobody’s sayin’ you’re weak, Bertie. You’re one of the strongest people I know.”
“Then treat me like it.”
“But I had good reason to want you to stay away for a while.” If only she knew how badly he wanted to protect her, how it tore at him to see her hurtin’ like this.
“Because you didn’t want me to get in your way while you were investigating my father’s death?”
The woman sure knew how to rile him. “You think you can do it all yourself?”
“Did I say that?” Fire shot from her eyes. “Stop putting words in my mouth. I think I can help.”
“The sheriff isn’t even letting me help. I’m doin’ this on my own. I don’t even know what I’m gonna do next, much less how you can help.”
Her gaze burned into his, but the annoyance gradually faded from her expression. For the first time he noticed the darkness beneath her eyes, which was more noticeable because of the paleness of her face. Sorrow replaced her irritation.
“And you might not think it’s important,” she said, “but I had to be here to say my final goodbye.”
Red swallowed hard. Why couldn’t she understand that it might not be safe for her here? “Funeral’s tomorrow at noon, so you’ll be able to say it then. Farm’s being taken care of, and the sheriff won’t be helpin’ anybody investigate Joseph’s death, since he don’t think there was anything suspicious about it.”
“I know that much.” She glanced quickly at his leg, then away, as if looking at his injury was painful to her. Havin’ her see it was sure painful to him. Was she seein’ him as a cripple?
“Then I don’t know what it is you think you can do about it,” he said. “Bertie, you need to catch the train out of here as soon as you can and go on back to California. It’s the best place for you right now.” It was the safest place, too. For both of them.
Red could stick to his resolve more easily without her nearby, muddying up the waters, making him wish for something he shouldn’t have.
She set her hands on her hips, and he could tell what she thought about his advice. “What would you say if I told you I didn’t want to go back to California?”
What would he say? He wanted to tell her to stay, to never leave again. But he couldn’t do that. She had too much power over him.
He scowled at her. “My mother said something to me the other day that stung, but she was right, and you could use a good dose of her wisdom.”
Bertie matched his scowl with one of her own. “What did she say?”
“Something about how stubborn pride ain’t a pretty sight. She oughta know, because she knows me. But it isn’t any prettier on a pretty woman than it is on a stubborn, ugly ol’ red-headed soldier.”
She blinked at him, and her eyes suddenly glimmered with moisture. With another quick glance at his cane, she turned and walked toward the kitchen.
Red wished then that he could’ve kept his mouth shut.
She would not cry. She must not cry. She pulled the recipe drawer out and fumbled through the messy stack of handwritten notes until she found the black-walnut recipes. Several of them. If Lilly wanted black-walnut desserts, she’d get enough to feed the whole town. While Bertie was working on the desserts, she’d copy each recipe down for Lilly so she’d have her own set.
The front door opened and closed in the other room. Red had obviously left the house. After telling her again to leave, then insulting her, he’d left the house without another word.
She shoved the drawer shut, hugging the recipes to her, staring around the large kitchen. The long oak table had seen so much laughter and happiness in the past. Bertie and Red and their friends had spent so many hours at this table, eating Mom’s cookies, laughing, playing games and teasing each other.
She had thought, when they were growing up, that she’d known Red so well. How could she suddenly feel as if she didn’t really know him?
All this time—three years—she’d thought she was falling in love with one of the sweetest, kindest, funniest men in the state.
She’d shared her heart with this man. She had thought she would be willing to share the whole rest of her life with him, and now it had come to this.
“Oh, Red,” she whispered into the empty kitchen—to that long ago memory of his smiling face at the dinner table, “What’s happened to us? Didn’t we promise each other we’d never let anything break up our friendship?”
For one moment she considered stepping to the front porch and waving for Ivan to drive on to town without her. She had a perfe
ctly good bicycle in the barn, and it would take only a few minutes to ride it to Lilly’s guesthouse. It would mean she’d have her own transportation. She wouldn’t be dependent on anyone.
Then she looked down at her skirt, and shook her head. Of course, that would be unthinkable. Down deep, she knew the real reason she didn’t want to ride in Ivan’s car was because she would be sitting beside Red. She’d wanted so badly to throw herself into his arms and kiss him and tell him she loved him.
How far different her dreams were from reality.
She walked back through the house, her footsteps echoing on the hardwood floors, through the only home she had ever known—the home no one wanted her to return to.
By the time she reached the car with recipes in hand, Red was sitting in the middle of the backseat. She slid in beside him, noticing that his overalls and shirt had a thin layer of dust over them, as if he’d been rolling in the dirt. She wondered why.
She swallowed hard and forced her voice past the growing lump in her throat. “Been gardening?”
“Not today.” His deep voice held a new quality that she’d never heard in it before. There was a sharp edge, almost of anger, or some other deep emotion.
She glanced at his shoes. “Herding cattle?”
“Nope.”
She looked up into his tight face. He wouldn’t meet her gaze. She studied the curve of the cane at his side, resenting his attitude.
Not everything about him had changed. He was still the same Missouri mule when he wanted to dig his heels in about something, and he obviously wanted her gone.
She could be just as stubborn.
Red sat staring straight ahead, miserable and not knowing how to fix things. Maybe he shouldn’t try. She was mad at him now, and maybe she needed to stay that way. Thing was, he’d never figured on losing a friend when he decided against the romance. This wasn’t what he’d had in mind.
Ordinarily, Bertie would be nagging him about getting his wound seen to by a doctor or demanding he take one of her treatments with crushed onions or tree leaves or some other such concoction that she believed would help him heal.
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