Reaching toward a branch that obscured her view, she bent it back, looking closer, her mind filled with questions and wonder. How often as a child had she tried to imagine how the awful McCutcheons must live? She’d pictured them reigning over a mud-caked yard with angry dogs chained about, but this was nothing like that. An orange-and-white kitten hopped down from the porch steps, pouncing on a sleepy grasshopper.
Elise stifled a giggle.
“Ever wonder what terrible kind of people must live there?”
Startled by the deep voice behind her, Elise spun around to see Cutch approaching her from the road. She could feel her face turn scarlet, and she tried desperately to think of some excuse as to why she’d be peeking through his bushes. “I-I was just—”
“Spying?” Cutch offered, crossing his arms across his sweat-drenched T-shirt. He’d obviously been out for a run, as well, though from the looks of it he’d made it farther than she had. “I suppose it’s understandable. There are rumors I might be involved with making drugs, and a person can’t be too careful these days. And you never can trust a McCutcheon.”
She felt wrenched by his words, especially when she saw the pain behind his eyes. Okay, so she was mostly guilty of thinking those things. “I was just out for a run,” she faltered.
“Want to come inside?” Cutch’s offer surprised her. “Check things out? I can even let you search the barns. I promise you, Elise, I have nothing to hide from you.”
“Oh, really?” He might have had a point about the spying, but his antagonizing words were more than she would stand there and take. She crossed her arms and faced him in a posture identical to his. “Then why don’t you ever give me straight answers when I ask you questions?” Granted, he’d shared a little with her the day before when they’d been hiding out, but that had been the first time ever. And he’d practically run away rather than answer her questions the evening before.
His tired eyes winced slightly, and Elise knew her words had hit home.
“You want answers?” He stepped closer to her and cupped her elbow with one hand. “Come on.”
Startled, Elise thought about fighting him, but she didn’t nearly have it in her. And besides, she was curious to see the inside.
They stepped past the frolicking kitten and made their way up the front porch steps. The front door turned smoothly on its hinges, and Cutch led her into the open front room, where houseplants bloomed amidst antique wooden furniture and lace curtains let in plenty of light through the broad picture windows. Framed photographs of a younger Cutch and his little sister Ginny were clustered around Hummel figurines on the crocheted piano runner.
Though the farmhouse wasn’t fancy, the place was a lot cozier than the home she’d grown up in. But then, her father wasn’t much of a decorator.
Cutch kept to the braided rugs as they crossed the gleaming wood floor and made their way through the dining room to the kitchen. “Can I get you something to drink?” Cutch asked quietly as he opened the fridge. “I’ve got orange juice, tea, milk. My mother has some grapefruit juice in there, but I’ve never been convinced that’s potable.” He looked up at her with a drawn expression, but she caught a faint twinkle behind his eyes.
Elise rubbed her arms, feeling really, really stupid for spying on Cutch’s house and getting caught and now for being dragged through her “investigation” by a man who was so cordial, so charming.
He brushed his hands back through his sweaty hair, leaving it standing at odd angles.
So cute.
“Water’s fine.”
He nodded and set about pouring her a glass. “Have you had breakfast?”
She shook her head.
Cutch handed her the glass of water before pulling a carton of buttermilk from the fridge. “You like pancakes?”
Thirsty, Elise took a long drink before answering. Was Cutch going to make her pancakes? From scratch? “You’re not thinking of cooking me breakfast, are you?” she asked.
Lifting out a package of bacon, Cutch met her eyes over the fridge door. “I thought that would be the civilized thing to do. But since I’m a McCutcheon, maybe I don’t understand how these things work.” He set a carton of eggs next to the bacon on the spotless counter.
The tearing in her heart was more than just guilt, especially after the verbal jabs she’d thrown his way. She fidgeted with her hair, but it was already tucked behind her ears, and no amount of retucking was going to make her feel any better. “Maybe I should just go.”
Cutch had her shoulders in his hands before she finished her sentence. “Elise, it’s okay. I’m not mad at you. Just let me make breakfast, and then I’ll give you those straight answers you’ve been looking for.”
Answers? She could hardly believe it. But then, she could hardly think at all. Cutch was standing way too close. And no guy had any right to look so good in a sweaty T-shirt with a day’s worth of stubble on his chin. She looked at the ingredients he’d set on the counter. “Are you going to cook the pancakes in the bacon grease?”
“That’s the way I like them.” The twinkle returned to his eyes.
Elise felt herself smiling, though she told herself she knew better than to get her hopes up. “The higher they fly, the harder they fall” was another one of her father’s aphorisms. “Can I help you with anything?”
Cutch told himself not to get his hopes up. Just because Elise stood next to him tending the bacon while he stirred the pancake batter didn’t mean they wouldn’t be fighting again in a minute. But it felt so right to work next to her in the kitchen. They worked in contented silence except for a couple of questions, like when she wanted to know how he liked his bacon or when he asked if she preferred her pancakes thicker or thinner.
They both liked crispy bacon and thick silver-dollar cakes.
Maybe McCutcheons and McAlisters weren’t so different after all.
And, overly optimistic as it may seem, he wondered if it wasn’t more than just a coincidence that Elise had appeared at the farmstead mere hours after Cutch had finally broached the crucial subject with his father. Their conversation the evening before had been a long and difficult one. Out of respect for his father’s delicate condition, Cutch had finally left the issue unresolved, but he felt optimistic about the progress they’d made.
He’d just flipped the first batch of pancakes when he heard his mother’s distinctive footsteps in the hallway above them, headed for the stairs. A moment later, Anita McCutcheon stepped into the kitchen and gasped.
“Oh!” She threw her hands into the air like he hadn’t seen her do since his father had been cleared of cancer the first time. This was a good sign.
He glanced over at Elise. She looked scared.
His mother made a beeline for Elise and wrapped her in her ample embrace. “Oh, praise the Lord, praise the Lord!” She cupped Elise’s face in her hands and pranced in place. “I have prayed for this day!” She gave her another hug.
Elise looked over his mother’s shoulder at him. Her expression said help.
He grinned back at her and continued flipping the pancakes.
“Oh, how I’ve prayed for reconciliation between our families,” his mom went on, squeezing Elise’s cheeks. “And God is good. God is so good. He brought you here.” Her voice caught. “Just in time,” she whispered.
Cutch looked up to see tears forming in his mother’s eyes. They both knew his father only had a few more weeks, at best. Was there still time to work things out before he died? Cutch looked back at Elise. Her eyes were full of questions.
“Want to join us for breakfast, Mom?”
“No. I’ve already eaten. But I tell you what. I’ll get your father up and dressed. And then maybe he’d like to join you for breakfast.” Anita gave Elise another squeeze. “Oh, God is good,” she said, patting Elise’s forehead a couple of times before she hurried back up the stairs.
Cutch grinned at Elise. She looked a little dazed but not upset.
“Breakfast is ready,” he inform
ed her with a smile.
Elise couldn’t recall when she’d ever had a breakfast that tasted so good. She looked around the cozy kitchen as they ate at the worn oak table and wondered how she could feel so at home in her enemy’s house. She was more at home than she often felt in her own house, especially after the grilling her father had given her when she’d arrived home the night before. He was worried about her, and she couldn’t blame him for that. She just wished he’d stop being so overprotective.
Cutch ate in companionable silence opposite her. She was on her second pancake and he on his third when she heard the floorboards creaking above them, and soon after, she heard a shuffling on the stairs.
It had been years since Elise had seen Henry McCutcheon III, or Old Cutch, as everyone in Holyoake referred to Cutch’s dad. Still, she couldn’t believe how much he’d changed. Gone was the powerful stature, the stout figure, the thick salt-and-pepper hair. The man who made his way toward the table looked thin and frail, with faint wisps of white hair swaying across his otherwise bald head.
She’d spent all of her life fearing this man. Now she wondered what she could possibly do to help as Cutch jumped up to assist his father into a chair. Apparently the rumors about his poor health were more than true.
As Cutch fixed his father a plate, Old Cutch reached across the table and patted Elise’s free hand where it rested near her napkin. She looked up into his clear blue eyes.
Even his voice sounded weak as he asked her slowly, “How do you feel about my son?”
Elise didn’t know how to respond. She looked at Cutch for guidance. His wide eyes met hers as he set a plate in front of his father. “Dad, I don’t think—” he began.
But Old Cutch cut him off. “It’s okay, son. I want to hear what she has to say.” He turned his attention back to Elise. “You can think about your answer for a minute.” He folded his hands over the steaming food and mumbled a few words of thanks before digging in.
Still unsure what to say, Elise finished her second pancake slowly and tried to think. What were the McCutcheons up to this time? Was it another trick? If she claimed to have feelings for Cutch, would his father use that information to embarrass her again?
“Well?” the old man prompted as he finished off his pancake.
Elise gave him the most honest answer she could. “He makes me angrier than anyone I’ve ever met.”
Both men startled a little at her response, and Old Cutch gave a weak chuckle. “Well then,” he mused, looking pleased. “Is that the truth, is it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And how do you suppose he feels about you?”
Elise looked to Cutch, but he turned away and carried their dishes to the sink. While Elise was still struggling with what to say, her cell phone rang from the pocket of her windbreaker. Old Cutch nodded at her to take the call. Wondering who could be calling so early in the morning on the Labor Day holiday, she answered it quickly.
“Elise? I need your help,” Uncle Leroy said. “Rodney didn’t show up to work today.”
TEN
Cutch tried not to listen in on Elise’s phone conversation, but he could clearly hear her uncle Leroy’s gruff voice carrying over the phone. He had a crop dusting job for her—one that had to be done that morning, before the heat of the day sent the pesky grasshoppers deep under the canopy of leaves, shielding them from the insecticide she would spray. Cutch understood how these things worked. Elise had to hurry.
But he had to talk to her, too. His father’s line of questioning had clearly shaken her. Even if he couldn’t explain everything, he had to at least try. He couldn’t let her walk away from him again.
“I have to go,” she informed him as she closed her phone. “Thanks for the breakfast.”
“I want to come with you,” Cutch offered.
Elise froze. She opened her mouth, and he knew a refusal was on the tip of her tongue.
“You’ll need a ride anyway, unless you plan on jogging back to your car.” He watched the truth of his words sink in and mustered up the courage to take a step closer to her. Dropping his voice, he explained, “Besides, I still owe you some answers.”
Hope filled him as she looked him full in the face. She didn’t smile, but she didn’t frown, either. “I’d appreciate that. But we have to hurry.”
“Just let me grab my jacket.”
“I’ll wait outside.”
Cutch ran to the hall closet for his windbreaker, knowing that the cool morning would seem even colder once they were flying through the sky. As he darted for the back door, his father intercepted him.
“Tell her,” Henry McCutcheon’s firm voice belied his frail condition.
“But last night, you said—”
His father cut him off. “It’s time.”
Cutch didn’t know what to make of that but nodded and headed for the door. Elise was waiting for him. She climbed into the truck, and he tried to sort out where to start—eight years of secrets and misunderstandings spread backward in a tangled time line. He grasped for a thread. “My father has cancer,” he announced as he put the truck into gear.
“I wondered,” Elise buckled her seatbelt. “Is he doing all right with it?”
“He’s in home hospice care.”
Elise looked at him. Cutch would have liked to return her gaze but felt he should keep his eyes on the road. “That means he’s not going to get better.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
“Nobody knows—no one except the doctors and nurses in Omaha. Dad hides out at home and hasn’t let us tell anyone.”
“So, why are you telling me?”
Cutch took the corner for the airfield, warring inside on what to say. There was so much more he needed to explain, but he knew Elise would need to focus her full attention on her flying, and their conversation was sure to be more than distracting. It would be unfair to her and even unsafe to distract her with any more information now. “It’s time,” he answered with the words his father had given him, the only explanation he had. Until Elise finished spraying the field, that would have to be enough.
Twenty minutes later, they were in the sky with the load of spray Leroy had prepped for them. The cockpit noise inside the yellow two-seater plane made it impossible for Cutch to say any more to Elise; besides, he wanted her to be able to focus on what she was doing. Crop dusting was dangerous work, and a single miscalculation could bring the plane down. Even good pilots died that way, including Elise’s own grandfather. Cutch’s respect for Elise soared as she maneuvered the plane through a series of tight turns just above the tops of the plants.
“Done?” he asked as she brought the plane up at the end of the field.
“Done with that one,” she explained. “Unless Uncle Leroy has another job for me. I wonder if he was able to get in touch with Rodney.”
“That man worries me. What do you think he’s up to?”
“Rodney? I can’t say, but I agree with you. He drives a red truck, and I can’t understand why he wouldn’t tell anyone about his barn burning down unless he was trying to hide something. And now he’s disappeared?”
Cutch felt relieved that Elise agreed with him on his suspicions regarding her coworker. “We could swing by and see what he’s up to. I know where he lives.” As county assessor, Cutch knew where everyone lived—or at least where they owned property.
“Excellent idea,” Elise agreed, shifting their course in the open airspace. “I know where his place is, too. And if he asks later, we’ll tell him it’s a courtesy wake-up call.”
“True enough,” Cutch agreed. If the man was innocent, he might as well get back to work so Elise wouldn’t have to take up the slack. And if he was guilty, they needed to know. He watched out the window as they headed north toward the old Miller farmstead. Like many of the smaller Loess Hills farming operations, the Millers hadn’t been able to make a steady go of farming and had sold off much of their land over the years. Now Rodney lived alone in the old farmhouse at th
e northern end of the county. Cutch hadn’t realized before how close the place was to his pecan grove.
Suspiciously close.
He kept his eyes trained on the familiar checkerboard of fields below them as they left the flatter, more fertile land of the Nishnabotna River valley and neared the Miller place in the hills. The loud cockpit muffled outside noises, so Cutch didn’t notice the approaching plane until it entered his peripheral vision.
“Elise, watch out! There’s a plane on your left!”
His stomach dipped as Elise pulled the little yellow duster high up out of the path of the passing plane. It swept past below them, creating turbulence in the air with its disturbing bulk.
“What was that?” Elise asked as she glanced back in the direction the plane had gone.
Cutch craned his neck to see through the narrow windows of the tiny cockpit. The larger blue-and-white plane made a wide arc behind them. “They’re coming back around!”
Elise gunned the engine and took them low this time, angling to her right. Cutch couldn’t see the oncoming plane as well from that position, but he knew Elise could. They skirted the topmost branches of the windbreak below, and Cutch braced himself as the bully plane swept near. He was sure they were headed for a direct hit.
But Elise followed the tree line as it dipped away. The windows rattled as the bigger plane buzzed by, landing gear all but grazing them as Elise flew the duster dangerously close to the ground.
“Try to get an ID on that blue jay,” Elise said as she pulled the duster back up. Then she got on her radio, “Sky Belle to Big Bird. Sky Belle to Big Bird.”
Frustrated, Cutch tried to get a closer look at the plane while Elise quizzed her uncle on who might be sharing the airspace with them. Leroy didn’t know anything about the larger plane.
Nor could Cutch make out any sort of identification mark other than the decorative blue swish along the white sides of the plane and some pinkish-red smudges on the underbelly.
Out on a Limb Page 11