Wild Montana Skies

by Susan May Warren

  He shut the door behind him, his entire body burning with Hollie’s words.

  “You gave your heart to the stage long ago, and you’re fooling yourself if you think you can leave it behind.”

  He clutched his guitar and strode out of the building to the back parking lot, the cool wind swilling down from the hazy black outline of the mountains. Overhead the stars winked down at him, and he inhaled the sweet scent of pine.

  He put his guitar in the truck, then pulled out his cell phone, hoping for a text.

  Nothing. He put his truck into drive.

  She hadn’t texted by the time he pulled up to her parents’ home. He got out of his truck, wishing he knew which window was hers.

  But he wasn’t a high school boy sneaking around anymore.

  He walked up to the porch, his heart banging.

  Why did you leave?

  The words practically breached his mouth even before the door opened, riding on a wave of adrenaline.

  His words stopped short at the sight of Judge Fairing in the frame, dressed in his jeans and a flannel shirt, as if he might have been waiting up.

  He opened the door. Stepped outside, onto the porch, his jaw tight.

  Ben drew in a breath, stepped back.

  “What are you doing here, Ben?” the Judge said in his quiet, reasonable voice. The one that had convinced Ben that leaving town was the best possible course.

  Last time.

  “Is Kacey here?”

  The Judge shook his head. He didn’t elaborate, just met Ben’s eyes with his own, bearing a dark challenge.

  Fine. “I love her. I never stopped loving her.”

  “That was never in doubt. But the question was—and still is—is that enough? You have a big life, Ben. A superstar life. One that doesn’t have room for Audrey and Kacey. Or are you going to give that up?”

  And now it all made sense. “That’s why you invited Hollie to the party, isn’t it? Because you thought by bringing her here, I’d get sucked back into that life.”

  The Judge just stared at him.

  “Maybe I don’t have to give it up,” he said, surprised at his own words. Because, really, being a performer didn’t mean he couldn’t have a family.

  “And that’s the problem, isn’t it? You don’t see the big picture. Never have.” The Judge shook his head. “You only see what you want. Not what is best for Kacey, or Audrey.”

  “I’m what’s best for Kacey and Audrey.”

  The Judge tightened his mouth into a grim line, and the disapproval could choke Ben if he let it. Finally, “Go home, Ben. If Kacey has left you, it’s probably because she’s finally come to her senses. If she wanted to see you, she would have told you where she was.”

  He closed the door behind him as he went inside, leaving Ben standing on the porch. The lights went off inside the house.

  He pressed a hand to his knotted chest as he got back into the truck. He pulled out his cell phone, hoping for a text. Nothing. But he sent another.

  I missed U tonight. Sry if I did something wrong. Call me.

  She hadn’t texted by the time he pulled up to the ranch house.

  “She’s finally come to her senses.”

  The swing on the deck called to him with the urge to just sit, watch the starlight glisten on the wet rocks, feel the night air cool on his sweaty skin.

  He didn’t hear the door open until he heard the thump of his father’s walker, the click of Jubal’s nails on the porch. He turned, alarmed.

  “You’re not supposed to be up walking without supervision.”

  Chet ignored him, easing down on the swing next to him. Jubal lumbered down at their feet, put his head on his paws.

  His father stared out at the water, the shape of the faraway mountains. He rubbed his chest. “Got a little indigestion, can’t sleep. How was the concert?”

  Ben shrugged. “I invited Kacey, but she didn’t stick around.” He tried to keep the hurt out of his voice, but it hitched, betraying him.

  Chet nodded.

  “I went to her house. Her dad said that . . . he said that I only wanted what was good for me—not her. I do want what’s best for her. But what if it’s not me?”

  Chet just sat staring at the sky. “Your mother and I used to come out here at night, especially near the end, and she’d look up to the heavens and reach for my hand. Squeeze it. I used to think she was afraid, but as we got closer to the end, she told me that she wasn’t afraid of dying. Just of leaving me. Anticipation—that’s what that squeeze was. Because once she knew the doctors had done all they could, she set her focus on following her heart home.”

  He pointed upward. “She’d long ago given her heart to God for safekeeping. Her hopes, her trust, her dreams—all in his embrace. People think that faith, especially as we face our fears, or hold on to our dreams, is for the weak, the pitiful. People who are afraid or indecisive. But in fact, having faith is the bravest thing we can do. It’s the unwavering confidence that God loves us. That although we can’t see the road ahead, we can see God. A God we know, a God that loves us—so much that he won’t give up on us. Won’t let us get lost, even when we think we are. Real faith takes everything you have—throwing your life, your heart, everything you are with complete abandon into the embrace of God.”

  Ben sat in silence next to him, the night shifting around them in the tang of the grasses, the rush of the river. He thought about his mother. The fact that he wished he had her kind of faith.

  Maybe he simply wasn’t brave enough to trust God with his and Kacey’s future.

  Finally, “You’re supposed to let me help you with your rehab. It’s dangerous for you to be shuffling around on your own—you could fall.”

  “I know. I just can’t abide sitting in that chair. And you’re busy.”

  “That’s why I’m here. To help. I don’t understand why it’s so hard for you to let me step in—”

  “Because I’m not weak, and I don’t need help.”

  “But you do! Sheesh, Dad, you were in a helicopter crash. You nearly died. And it’s okay to need help—”

  “From God, sure. But not from you.”

  “Why not?”

  Chet looked away, and suddenly the drape of the moonlight etched out his wrinkles and grooves, frailties.

  He sighed then. “Because I can’t bear for you to see me as less than I was. I used to be your hero, a soldier, the man who taught you how to rope and herd cattle, to throw a football. When you rescued that hiker, I thought—he learned that from me.”

  “I did. You taught me how to survive in the wilderness.”

  “But now when I look in your eyes, I see a doddering old man.”

  Ben pressed his mouth tight. He wanted to correct him, but the reality of his behavior over the past few weeks reached up for a choke hold.

  Yeah, he might have made his dad feel that way.

  Chet finally reached out for the walker, eased himself forward, up.

  Ben rose, ready to catch him.

  Chet found his feet without help, though. Glanced over at him.

  “Don’t stay out too long,” his dad said. “It’s getting cold outside.”

  He’d been out for so long, he was used to it.

  “I’ll be in soon,” he said quietly.

  13

  Kacey just knew that letting Ben King into her life—her daughter’s life—would only break her heart.

  Ben simply didn’t have room for a family—and maybe the best thing for all of them would be for him to walk away. Kacey stood at the door to the deck of the PEAK ranch, drawn by the lure of the ribs in the hickory smoker, the sounds of laughter in the yard, where her daughter stood with Ty, who had decided to forgive Kacey for taking his job and to teach Audrey how to rope the imaginary steer attached to a hay bale.

  Miles played with his three-year-old, chasing him, scooping the little bull rider up, tossing him over his shoulder, grabbing his arms to fly him around the yard. Miles’s cute pregnant wife, Ke
lli, sat in an Adirondack chair, a hand on her rounded belly, and talked with Chet, who sat rubbing his arm as if he might have a stiff muscle.

  Pete tossed out a Frisbee for Jubal to catch in a flying lunge. Gage and Jess filled the cooler with ice and tossed in cans of soda.

  The perfect Sunday afternoon arched high and bright, the sky so blue she could dive in, the mountains in backdrop standing sentry and majestic over their day.

  She could hardly believe that two weeks ago, they were wading through floodwaters and rescuing kids off mountaintops, with her trying to find her footing after discovering thirteen years of betrayal.

  But maybe this team could provide a new kind of camaraderie—the kind she’d found in the military, only closer to home, with Audrey in her life every day. The place to build something safe. With these people, she didn’t need Ben to move forward.

  “Ben just pulled up,” Sierra said from behind her. She held a bowl of potato salad and was heading outside, but nodded toward the front drive. “Just giving you a heads-up.”

  “I figured he’d show up sometime.”

  “It’ll be okay. Just tell him that you had a headache—”

  “I’m not going to lie to him, Sierra. He deserves to know, to move on. We just don’t fit into each other’s lives anymore.”

  Sierra shook her head, but Kacey cut her off. “We make much less sense than you and Ian do.”

  “Not true. Ian sees me as his employee—he always will. More, what is a hippie’s daughter doing with a billionaire? Like that would ever work. He saved us both—”

  “He kissed you!”

  Sierra glanced outside, back to Kacey. “Ix-nay on the issing-kay. I don’t want the team to know. Besides, trust me when I say it was just a moment. He didn’t mean it.”

  “But you did.”

  Sierra lifted a shoulder, a contrast to her slightly reddened, still swollen eyes. “Again, imagine if he hadn’t cut this off before he became my entire world.” She made a face, something of horror in it, and Kacey laughed.

  “Okay. Whatever. But Ben has never been my entire world—I made sure of that.”

  “And now who’s lying? He’s been your everything since you were thirteen. You’ve just been living in denial for so long you think you can live without him. Or maybe you think you don’t deserve him.”

  Kacey ignored that. “I can live without him. I have you, and”—she gestured to the team outside—“these guys.”

  Ben came up on the porch holding a couple bags of chips, and the sound of his boots made Audrey turn.

  “Yes, you do,” Sierra said. “But what about—”

  “Mr. King!” Audrey exclaimed. “I didn’t know you would be here.”

  “Audrey,” Sierra finished quietly.

  “I don’t know yet,” Kacey said. “I agree she should know, but I don’t want to disrupt her life. You know she’s going to want him to stick around . . .”

  And she couldn’t help but wince as Audrey came up on the deck and actually put her arms around Ben’s waist. He responded with a quick hug, and Kacey’s heart just about tore in half.

  Sierra, too, said nothing. Sighed.

  Audrey leaned back, looked up at Ben. “Can you teach me that guitar lick? I brought my guitar.”

  A quick no died in Kacey’s throat when he nodded, and Audrey headed inside to retrieve her guitar.

  Sierra stepped back to let her inside, and Audrey shot her mother a wide smile, her eyes shining. “Benjamin King is here!”

  “Yes, he is.”

  “Do you think he’s here to see you?” She grabbed her guitar case from where she’d parked it near the sofa. “Did you have fun last night?”

  Audrey had been asleep on the foldout in the family room when Kacey sneaked back to Sierra’s house last night, her heart in her hands. And this morning she’d successfully dodged any questions as she helped Sierra prepare for today’s barbecue.

  Now, she found a smile. “Great concert.”

  “But the after party—did he try and hold your hand?” Audrey held her guitar like she might a teddy bear, one arm around the neck, the other hand on the handle.

  “No, honey. I told you, we’re just friends.” The words came out almost without a hitch.

  Audrey frowned, a shadow of disappointment across her face. Then, “It’s okay if he teaches me, right?”

  Sierra’s eyes on her made Kacey nod.

  And when Audrey opened the door, Ben turned, his blue eyes fixed on Kacey. No welcoming grin, no warmth in his eyes. Just a tiny twitch of his mouth, as if he wanted to say something.

  Anything.

  She gave him a tight nod, aching. But this was for the best.

  Sierra went outside, and Kacey walked over to check the cookies Sierra had baking. The house smelled like something out of a storybook—homey, comfortable.

  Ian was an idiot to push a woman like Sierra out of his life.

  Kacey donned her hot pads and pulled the cookies from the oven. She felt ultra-domestic as she scooped them off the tray.

  Jess came in as Kacey was finishing with the cookies. “Have you tried roping yet? Ty’s giving lessons. Ben already showed off. I didn’t realize he could rope.”

  “He used to work as a hand on his grandfather’s ranch,” she said, not wanting to think about the cowboy in Ben, the way he seemed just as natural on a horse as he did onstage.

  What didn’t he do well?

  As if in answer, she heard the sound of a guitar, and she spotted Ben outside sitting on the deck, leaning over the instrument, his fingers flying over the fretboard.

  She watched as he handed the guitar to Audrey. He leaned over her, positioning her fingers, one at a time, picking out the pattern for her on the strings.

  “She bites her lip the same way he does,” Jess said quietly, also watching the pair. “How are they getting along?”

  Kacey hearkened back to her conversation with Jess in the dim light of their bunk room. “I haven’t told her yet.”

  Jess glanced at her. “I know it’s none of my business, but why not?”

  “Well, look at him. He’s a big star. Has fans everywhere, and a life in Nashville. Imagine if you suddenly found out your father was someone famous. You’d feel like you’d have to compete with his fans, wonder if you were enough, if he’d choose you. And then there’s the fact that he would be in and out of your life, bringing chaos and media attention when that’s the last thing you’d need to live a normal life. Not to mention the fact that if he did pick you, you’d always know that you’d held him back.”

  “Hmm,” Jess said. “I guess I’d think, ‘Wow! I have a dad.’ But you’re probably right.” She picked up the plate of cookies. “I think the ribs are ready.”

  Perfect. Kacey turned off the oven and followed Jess outside, pasting on her game face. She didn’t have to make a big deal about last night—maybe Ben had already figured out that their worlds didn’t mesh.

  From the sound of it, Audrey was catching on to the lick. Ben’s hands were now off the strings. He didn’t look at Kacey as she came out.

  Fine.

  Jess set the cookies on the picnic table covered by a red-checked tablecloth. Chet rolled up the ramp, with a friendly push from Pete. Gage carried the tray of ribs.

  Miles propped his three-year-old on his neck, holding his legs. Ty came over, coiling up his rope.

  Sierra took the ribs from Gage, added them to the table already filled with potato salad, watermelon, cookies, chips, and a cake with “Welcome Kacey!” in the center.

  A truck pulled up behind them, and Kacey spotted Sam Brooks getting out. He waved a hand as he walked toward the house.

  “I invited Sam because he’s just as much a part of us, now that we’re working with the Mercy Falls EMS,” Sierra said.

  Kacey didn’t miss the flare of disapproval from Pete. He stuck his hands in his back pockets, looked away toward the mountains as Sam greeted everyone. Huh. She would have thought they would have gotten closer af
ter the death of their father.

  Chet cleared his throat. “It’s a new season, with Kacey joining us at our weekly barbecue. But it’ll be a good season, and until I’m back on my feet and Ty is back at the helm, she’ll be running operations alongside Miles.”

  She smiled and maintained her military bearing when Ben glanced at her, his face blank.

  “We don’t pray for dinner—we praise.” Chet gripped the arms of his chair, his voice rising. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters . . .”

  In unison the team recited the familiar psalm, and the words awakened inside her, just like they had when Howard had spoken them. Now, as then, she found her mouth moving with the rest of the team.

  “He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.”

  She glanced at her daughter standing next to Ben, the words innocent on her tongue.

  “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

  She closed her eyes against the picture of God, the Good Shepherd, using his weapons to protect her.

  It might not have felt like God was with her on that mountain in Afghanistan, but she had discovered a measure of comfort—he’d brought her home, deepened her relationship with Audrey.

  And she had survived the mountain, hadn’t she? That thought settled deep.

  “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.”

  Yes, maybe she’d request a release from active duty, move home during her reserve term, and get on with building a life here in Mercy Falls.

  Because this was more than enough, really, if she were to look around at the team, the friends she’d already made.