Hideaway

by Roberts, Nora

  Sweat gleamed on her face, on her really excellent calves as she pushed herself to match the beat of the music.

  Always fashionable, she wore compression capris in a swirling pattern of blues and greens and a blue support tank that showed off damn good arms and shoulders.

  It had Cate making a mental note to use the facilities more regularly herself.

  With one last grunt, Lily closed her eyes. She swiped at her face with her wristband—green—then, pushing herself up, spotted Cate.

  “Oh God, I want to kill myself with a hammer. You know what most women my age are doing right now? Turn off that damn music, will you, my sweets? I’ll tell you what they’re doing. They’re playing with grandkids or knitting or they’re curled up with a book or getting a facial. What they’re not doing is sweating blood on a damn torture device.”

  Picking up her water bottle, Lily gulped some down while she scowled at the rest of the circuit machines, the dumbbells, the rolled-up yoga mats, the stack of floor mats.

  “That’s why you’re ageless.”

  “Hah.” On another long breath, she stood, then considered herself in the wall of mirrors. “I do look pretty damn good for an old broad.”

  “My word’s amazing.”

  “I’m going to hold on to that because I’m only halfway done. Dear God, Catey, what made me think I could go back to Broadway, keep up that pace?”

  “You’ll kill it.”

  “If it doesn’t kill me first. Well.” She lifted her water bottle again. “What a way to go. And what’re you up to?”

  “I stopped in to see if you and Grandpa—or either of you—wanted to go with me. I’m going to pick up some flowers and go by Horizon Ranch.”

  “I’d love nothing better than to do that instead of this. But I have to stick. Then I have to shower and make myself presentable. I’m videoconferencing this afternoon. Technology’s made it impossible to take a meeting in your pajamas.”

  Picking up a towel, Lily dabbed at her throat. “Tell Consuela to have the car brought around for you.”

  “G-Lil, I can handle the garage. I can handle it,” she repeated.

  “Of course you can. Say hey to everybody for me. Oh, and tell Maggie we need to have another In the Bag Night.”

  “ ‘In the bag’?”

  “A couple of old bags drinking wine and talking about their misspent youth.”

  “Old bags, my butt, but I’ll tell her. Want the music back on?”

  Lily sighed. “Yes. Damn it. Hit it.”

  Cate hit it, walked up to the side door and out.

  The sun beamed and gleamed on the mountains. From somewhere close, she heard the small roar—a trimmer or edger one of the biweekly gardening crew worked with.

  She crossed the patio, started down the stone path, well remembered, to the garage.

  Maybe a flutter of unease, she admitted, but wasn’t that normal? No panic, no terror, just the unease of old memories.

  After it happened, she’d heard her grandfather talk about cutting down the tree, and had begged him not to.

  She’d thought, such a young girl, the tree didn’t deserve death. It hadn’t done anything wrong.

  So it stood, as it had, old and gnarled and simply wonderful.

  She walked to it, laid a hand on the bark, rough against her palm. “Not our fault, right? And here we are, both of us. She couldn’t knock either of us down.”

  Satisfied, steady, she hit the remote for the garage door.

  When she parked at the ranch with her armload of fall flowers, she saw changes. Julia had told her they’d built a house for Dillon. She saw it on the far side of the stables, noted they’d made use of the space and location to give him privacy and a view. She judged it about the same size as her house, minus the second story.

  She saw the goats, some sheep dotting the rising hills, cows on the flatland, horses in pasture and paddock.

  And Dillon working with a horse, a young one, she thought, on some sort of line. With the distance and his focus on his work, he hadn’t heard her drive up.

  The dogs had, raced from where they’d romped among the cows to greet her. She took a moment to give them a rub while she watched Dillon.

  With a gray hat low on his head, he urged the horse to circle at a light trot. Some sort of training, she supposed. She knew how to ride, how to groom a horse, but didn’t know much about raising one, training one.

  He clearly did, as—somehow or other—he had the horse turning, trotting in the opposite direction.

  The dogs decided to herd her toward the house; she decided to let them.

  Julia walked out of a barn.

  It struck Cate that Dillon got that rangy build from his mother. She moved at the same ground-eating stride, her dark blond hair under a rolled-brimmed brown hat, work gloves tucked in the back pocket of her jeans.

  A dozen twinges—longing ones—spread inside Cate when Julia spotted her and smiled.

  “Caitlyn! You look like a photograph! Young Woman with Flowers.”

  She moved straight to Cate and without hesitation wrapped her in a hug. “Oh, it’s been too long! Come inside. You look just wonderful.”

  “So do you.”

  With a laugh, Julia shook her head. “This is as good as it gets after afternoon milking.”

  “I’m sorry I missed that. Really, I’ve never seen a goat being milked. When I lived in Ireland, I saw cows milked a couple times. It’s been awhile.”

  “Three times a day every day, except for the nannies and cows still nursing. We take those down to one or two milkings. So you’ve got plenty of opportunities to see how it’s done.”

  As they walked, Cate looked around. The silo, the barns, the spread of the farmhouse. She echoed Dillon’s thoughts. “It’s like a different world.”

  “It sure is ours.” Julia scraped off her boots at the door. “I hope now that you’re living here, you’ll come into it more often.”

  Inside, the fire simmered. They’d changed some of the furniture, gone for blues and greens to mirror the sea and pastures. But so much was, comfortingly, the same.

  Did they still leave a light on low at night, she wondered, in case some lost soul wandered in?

  “Come on back. Mom and Red should be in the dairy kitchen.”

  “Dillon said you added on.”

  “There’s a good market for farm-made butter, cheese, cream, yogurt.”

  “I can see why, as I’ve been using some of yours myself. In fact, I need to get some cream, some butter, and . . . You remodeled.”

  Julia glanced around the main kitchen, the commercial range, double ovens. The big table remained, but they’d added more work space for baking days.

  “It needed it, and we needed to step up to commercial grade. And now Mom and I don’t bump into each other when we’re working in here. Let me take those flowers—which are gorgeous—and your jacket.”

  Gleaming stainless steel, shelves of important-looking tools that were beyond her comprehension, the massive, shining vent over what looked like a massive range. Yet a fire still simmered in the little hearth, pretty potted herbs thrived on the deep windowsill.

  “It looks professional, but it feels the same.”

  “Then it’s a success. Mom and I debated, argued, and occasionally came close to blows over the design and layout.” Julia crossed over to lay the flowers in a prep sink as she talked. Then went through the mudroom door to hang the jackets.

  Cate moved through, trailing a hand over the table where she’d sat, where Julia had tended her cuts and bruises so long ago.

  She stood, fascinated, in the wide opening that led to another kitchen. Not altogether a kitchen, she thought, though it had the range, the sinks, the work counters.

  Bags of . . . something hung from wooden rods and dripped into glass bowls below. Big glass jars of—she supposed—milk stood on counters. Gram, orange braid bundled back, ran water in the sink, her shoulders moving as she pushed down. Red—yes, that was Red—poure
d milk into a small, shiny machine.

  Through the big window over the big sink, Cate could see Dillon and the young horse.

  Julia stepped up. “You won’t get fresher butter and cream.”

  “Red’s starting the last of the butter,” Maggie said without turning around, “and I’m rinsing the last of the last batch. Check the curds on the stove.”

  “Will do. We’ve got a customer.”

  “Just have to wait until—” Still pressing, she looked over her shoulder. “Well, look here, Red. Somebody’s all grown-up.”

  He switched on the machine, turned. “She sure is.”

  He walked over, held out a hand. Cate ignored it, hugged him. “It’s good to see you, Sheriff.”

  “Just Red now. I thought I retired, but these women work a man to death.”

  “You look pretty healthy for a dead man.”

  Maggie cackled at that. “It’s about time you came by, girlie. Once that last batch of butter churns and we finish it up, I’m ready to take a break.”

  Cate eyed the machine. “That’s a butter churn?”

  “You think we use a wooden bucket and stick?” Maggie cackled again. “We’ve come a ways since Little House on the Prairie.”

  “These curds are ready. Cate, why don’t you have a seat, and we’ll all take a break as soon as we’re done here.”

  “She’s got two hands, and we can use them. Are they clean?” Maggie demanded.

  “I—”

  “Wash them up anyway. You can help me wrap this butter.”

  “No one escapes,” Red told her.

  Curious, Cate walked to the sink, looked in. “Is that butter?”

  “One more rinse and it will be. You’ve got to get the buttermilk out. Use the sink over there.”

  A half hour later when Dillon came in to grab a cup of coffee, he found Cate, wearing a big apron, her hair pulled back in a tail, wrapping rounds of butter.

  “Don’t you bring ranch dirt in here,” Maggie warned him.

  “I washed up at the pump. Hi.”

  “Hi.” Cate smiled as if she’d just won the grand prize in a raffle. “I helped make butter. And mozzarella.”

  Transferring wrapped rounds of butter and cheese to the refrigerator, Julia saw her son’s eyes, what was in them. Sighed a little inside.

  “Why don’t you help Red clean up the churn, and we’ll get something going for lunch? Do you still eat meat, Cate?”

  She’d only meant to stay an hour. Work waited. But . . . Well, she’d work tonight, she decided. “I do.”

  She sat down to leftover chicken stew with fresh dumplings.

  “I saw you outside,” she said to Dillon, “with the horse going in circles.”

  “Lunge line. It’s training, and communication. That was Jethro. It’s how they learn to switch gaits on command, to switch directions, stop, go.”

  “It takes skill and patience,” Julia added, “which Dillon has in abundance.”

  “I’d love to see the horses next time I come.”

  “I can take you around after lunch.”

  “Workday for me—or should’ve been. Who knew I’d make butter? You can really do it just by shaking a mason jar?”

  “If you’ve got the arm and the patience for it. I made it that way the first time when Julia was just—hell, about three, I guess.”

  “We used to use a tabletop churn—it’s back there on the shelf. But we had so many people asking for it, we went higher tech when we expanded. Same with the cheeses. Remember, Mom?”

  “My arm does. Now that this one’s always underfoot?” Maggie elbow-poked Red. “He has to earn his keep. He’s a half-assed rancher, but half an ass is better than none.”

  “She fills my life with grief.” Red spooned up more stew. “And damn good dumplings.”

  “I need that soda bread recipe.”

  “I’ll write it down for you.”

  “I know the basics, but there was something just a little different. A little sugar, right?”

  “That’s right, but the real secret is working the butter in with your fingers.”

  “With your fingers?”

  “Mrs. Leary swore by it.”

  “Surprised you have time for all that,” Red put in. “Hugh says you stay busy, in demand.”

  “Multitasking.” Dillon shot her a look. “She gave me a heart attack last week when she’s kneading bread and screaming.”

  “He gave me one back when he burst into the house ready to rumble. I do scream dubbing.”

  “That’s a thing?” Red wondered.

  “It is. Does anybody watch horror movies?”

  Three fingers pointed to Maggie.

  “Love them. The scarier the better.”

  “Did you catch Retribution?”

  “Vengeful ghosts, ramshackle house on a cliff, troubled marriage they try to patch up by moving to a new place. It had it all.”

  “Anytime you heard Rachel—she was the mother—scream?” Cate tapped her throat.

  “Is that right? I’m watching it again—I’ll listen for you.”

  “I’m surprised any of you have time to watch anything. Milking and training and feeding and making and baking.”

  “If you don’t take time,” Julia said, “the work’s just work instead of a life. More stew?”

  “No, thanks. It was great. Everything was great. I have to get back and voice a snooty French swan for an animated short.”

  “What’s that sound like?”

  Cate angled her head at Dillon. “I think, it’s along the lines of . . .”

  As he watched, she changed posture, sort of lengthened her neck, and looked down her nose. And hit a snooty French accent on the nose. “ ‘Alors, the duck, he is the disgrace, non? We have no room for so foul the fowl on our lake.’

  “It’s a sweet little story on bigotry and acceptance of the different. And I really have to get to it. Can I help with the dishes?”

  “Red’s got that.”

  “See?” He jerked a thumb at Maggie. “Works me to death.”

  “Let me put your order together.” Julia rose.

  “How do we do this? Do we run a tab, do I pay you now?”

  “Your grandparents run a monthly, and you can do the same. But in this case, you earned the dairy.”

  “I’ll take it, thanks. I’d love some of the mozzarella. Next time I break out a frozen pizza, I’ll grate some on it.”

  There was a distinct hush.

  “Ix-nay on the rozen-fay izza-pay,” Dillon muttered.

  “What?”

  “She speaks like five languages, but doesn’t get pig latin. It’s too late for you.”

  “You don’t know how to make a pizza?” Maggie demanded.

  “Sure I do. You take it out of the freezer, put it in the oven. Or when I lived in New York, you pick up the phone and it magically arrives at your door.”

  “Next lesson, how to make an actual pizza instead of settling for processed sauce on cardboard.” Maggie shook her head. “How do you expect to survive the zombie apocalypse if you can’t make your own pizza?”

  “I never thought about it that way.”

  “Better start.”

  “Dillon, take this out for Cate.” Julia handed him a bag a child could’ve carried. “Her jacket’s in the mudroom. You come back soon.” She gave Cate a hard hug.

  “I will. I hope you, all of you, come over to my place sometime.”

  Julia waited until she heard them go out, heard the door shut before she let that inner sigh out.

  Maggie just nodded. “Yep, our boy’s more than halfway gone.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Past smitten, rounding third, headed for home, Red. Didn’t you see how he looked at her?”

  “She’s a knockout.”

  Now Maggie shook her head. “Men are just simpleminded about half of everything.”

  “She dazzled him,” Julia murmured. “Not like any of the other girls—women—he’s had an inter
est in. This one will either break his heart or fill it.”

  Outside, Dillon made sure they were well out of earshot. “You know the pizza that shall not be named? I keep one—hidden—in my freezer. For emergencies.”

  “For pizza emergencies?”

  “They usually happen late at night.”

  “I can see that.” She glanced back toward the house. “I was going to stay an hour, maybe have some coffee, tea, whatever. They pull you in. This place, your family, they pull you in.”

  “And before you know it, you’re wearing an apron and working dairy.”

  “I’m not sure where making butter fits on my résumé, but I hope to work it in.” She took the bag from him, set it on the floor of the passenger seat. “I really would like to see the horses, well, everything. And take that ride.”

  “Anytime.”

  She circled around to the driver’s door. “I don’t think ‘anytime’ works on a ranch like this. Is there a day you’re not going from one chore to the next?”

  “We try to slow it down some on Sundays.”

  “I could make Sunday work.”

  “Good. Around ten?”

  “I’ll be here. With my riding boots on.” She hopped in behind the wheel. “I’m going to have a pizza emergency tonight. Don’t tell Gram.”

  “Your secret’s safe with me.”

  “See you Sunday.” He closed the door; she started the engine.

  She drove down the ranch road smiling to herself. She’d made butter.

  Then as she turned on the highway she began a series of tongue twisters to limber up for her afternoon work.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Her father came for Thanksgiving. Under Consuela’s watchful eye, Cate made her first pumpkin pie. While she’d never again use the phrase “easy as pie,” it turned out well.

  Best of all, she walked Aidan down to her cottage, showed it off, showed off her studio before sitting with him in front of the fire.

  They sipped whiskey after a long, happy day.

  “I was going to feel guilty about nudging you to come back when I stayed in L.A. But it not only seems to be a good move for you, it feels like the right move.”