“If my having a beer now and then is going to upset her like this, it might be best if I found another place, Virgil.” Tom spoke with reluctance. It wasn’t what he wanted, but the cautious part of him kept urging that he put distance between himself and Zelda, and this was the perfect opportunity. After all, she’d all but kicked him out.
Virgil’s shoulders slumped, and he suddenly looked shrunken and old. “It’d likely be easier someplace else, I can see that,” he said with dignity. “But I’d be much obliged if ye’d stay, Tom. Truth is, with me not workin’ steady money’s a mite short, so your board is much appreciated.”
He looked down at his tea, embarrassed at having to admit his own frailty. After a moment he added, “There’s another thing, too. That boy of mine could use a young man’s guidance now and again. I know fer a fact he’s right fond of you.” He sighed and shook his head. “Zelda don’t realize it, but Eli’s been skippin’ outa school lately. Hirin’ himself on as gofer boy around the mines, real secret, like not realizin’ I’d hear of it straight off.” His craggy face was sober and worried. “I’ve not told Zelda. She’ll take a strip off the lad when she hears. She’s dead set on him gettin’ an education, see, but you can’t force a boy that age. He’s gowin’ up fast, and some of her notions don’t sit too well with him.” He waggled his head and sighed. “We’ve always gotten on, Eli and me, but lately he ain’t sayin’ much. Mebbe he’ll talk to you, long as you’re here.”
Tom felt as if he’d stepped into quicksand. The last thing he was suited for was advising a teenager about anything. But Virgil looked frail and old and ill, and Tom’s own chest ached in sympathy when Virgil coughed on and on in the night.
“Sure, Virgil. I’ll do what I can,” he heard himself saying, and his reward was the relief and gratitude in the older man’s eyes.
Breakfast the next morning was strained, despite Virgil’s valiant efforts at small talk.
Zelda fried the eggs until they were like rubber and methodically burned the toast. She was exquisitely polite when she had to speak to Tom, but she avoided his eyes and was careful not to so much as brush against him when she served him.
Eli had gotten up at dawn to go fishing with his friends, so there was only Tom and Virgil and Zelda at the table. By the time he’d managed to swallow his first bite of breakfast, Tom wished fervently that he’d stayed in bed and nursed the hangover that was making his head pound and his stomach roil.
When the knock sounded at the back door and Jackson came in, Tom felt enormous relief.
“Thought you might like to take a stroll along the river, Tom,” Jackson suggested after he’d greeted Virgil and Zelda and accepted a cup of coffee.
Tom raised his eyebrows. Jackson detested walking.
The sun beat down on the valley, and the town lay basking in the first real warmth of spring. The surrounding Rockies had snowcapped peaks all year, but the snow on Turtle Mountain was disappearing day by day.
“Thing I hate worse than almost anythin’ about bein’ in this place is not havin’ a truck to ride around in,” Jackson grumbled as they made their way through the quiet Sunday streets. “Let’s just find us a nice bench or somethin’ flat to sit down on.”
There were no benches, but a wide, flat rock near the river provided a seat.
“Last night, this mornin’, more likely, the owner of the Imperial offered me a steady job as bartender,” Jackson began after they were settled. “Room and board at the hotel goes with the job, and the pay’s almost enough to live on.”
“So you’re moving over there?” Tom felt a peculiar sinking in his stomach. He and Jackson had lived and worked together for years. This was the first time either of them had taken a job that didn’t involve them both.
Jackson nodded. “Can’t afford not to.” He sighed and shifted to a more comfortable position. “Y’know, Tom, living at Isabella’s is makin’ me crazy. I like her well enough, and the kids are cute little shavers, but, hell, I know myself. There’s gonna come times when I want to bring a woman to my room, or to spend the night at hers, or get pissed and not go home at all, and there’s no way I can do any of those things, living there. Hell, Isabella was waitin’ up when I got in at two this morin’, not that she said a word about it, but I felt guilty as hell for keepin’ her from sleepin’.” He blew his breath out in a rush and shook his head. “It’s just too much like bein’ married, Tom, with none of the perks.”
Tom gave a rueful grin. “Zelda was waiting up, too, and she took a strip off me, gave me a lecture about the dangers of demon rum. I thought I was going to have to move back out to the barn for the night.”
Jackson chortled. “Serves you right, downin’ all that free beer. I figured she was kinda huffy this mornin’.” He sobered and added, “Only thing that really bothers me about this job is leaving Isabella and those kids in a tight spot. I told her I was movin’, and her face fell a mile. I know she needs the rent money real bad, and I wouldn’t want to see her get some bad-ass guy in there who’d maybe take advantage of her. She’s a real sweet little lady, and she’s smart, too. She’s learning English real fast. So I got to thinking. You figure maybe Lars Olsen might want to move in? He seems a decent sort, the kind you’d trust with your sister. If you had one. I sorta sounded Isabella out at breakfast about him, and far as I could see, she’s willin’ if he is.”
Tom considered it. “It would be one hell of a lot better for him than living in that tent. You could put it to him and see what he says.”
Jackson looked uncomfortable. “Well, see, I kinda figured you know him better than me, what with drinkin’ all that beer I brought over last night. So I thought maybe we’d both go over there now and you could sort of put it to him?”
Tom grinned at his partner. Jackson would fight a half dozen men bare-handed rather than have anything remotely resembling a business discussion with them.
The camp was just waking up when they arrived. Lars, with no trace of a hangover, sat cross-legged in front of his tent, shaving with his straight razor and a small basin of water he’d heated on an open fire.
“Coffee?” He rinsed out two tin cups and poured an inky brew from a fire-blackened pot.
Tom explained why they’d come.
“Yah,” Lars said slowly when he’d heard all about Isabella. “Yah, I think that vould suit me yust fine. This camp, it is not so goot.”
Tom figured that was the understatement of any year. The wind had shifted, and the smell from the latrines blew over them, making his stomach heave. A short distance away, someone who’d drank too much the night before vomited in the space between two tents.
Nervous at the thought of meeting Isabella, Lars dug through his trunk and put on a clean, wrinkled white shirt, an equally creased pair of good trousers, and a worn, green suit jacket he’d somehow outgrown. It was in danger of splitting down the back if he so much as drew a deep breath.
In spite of the jacket and the difficulty Lars and Isabella had communicating, that first meeting was a success. Isabella was nervous, and most of her English deserted her, but Lars was sympathetic; he’d gone through the same struggle with English himself, he told her, his own Swedish accent more evident than usual.
His kind face split in a delighted grin when he met Eddy and Pearl. It was obvious he considered them a bonus. Within moments, he’d shed the constrictive coat and was down on his knees helping Eddy construct a house with wooden blocks.
By noon, it was all settled.
“Come on over and inspect what’s advertised as the best two-dollars-a-day room in Frank,” Jackson urged Tom. “Steam heat, electric light, and plastered throughout. Fodor’d be downright fired up over this baby.”
“Guess the plastered part refers to the bar,” Tom quipped. “I’ll come visit in a day or two.” He knew it was ridiculous, but he’d never felt more alone in his life. He watched Jackson, carrying his meager belongings in one small paper bag, limp off down the road toward the hotel and his new job.
&
nbsp; Zelda was just coming out of the house, her ragged old straw hat perched on her head and a spade in her gloved hands.
“Is there a problem at Isabella’s?” She was still formal and distant with him.
Tom explained about Jackson’s job and Lars moving in. Zelda listened and nodded, thawing a little.
“It’s kind of you and Jackson to find someone else suitable to board with Isabella.” She hesitated a moment, then tilted her chin up, and looked him straight in the eye.
“And will you be moving out as well, Tom?” The words were challenging, but he could detect the uncertainty in her eyes.
He held her gaze and said softly, “Is that what you want me to do, Zelda?”
She dropped her eyes and shook her head. “No, I don’t,” she said in a stiff voice. “Dad insists I was too harsh last night. I---I apologize.”
Tom could tell that the words almost choked her, and he found himself relishing her discomfort. After all, he still had to try and clean the gravy off his pants and shirt.
But he might have known Zelda wouldn’t eat crow for long.
“You realize, however, that I still have strong feelings about liquor,” she added immediately, her chin tilted skyward, her brown eyes flashing.
He had to laugh. She was indomitable, and for some reason that delighted him. “I sorta gathered that. You were pretty vocal about it last night.”
She flushed, transferring the shovel from one hand to the other.
“What are you planning to do with that?” Tom pointed his finger at the spade.
“This?” She glanced at it as if she’d forgotten all about it. “Oh, this. I’m going to dig the garden. Dad always plants early in May. He’s having a sleep, and I thought I’d get it done before he wakes up. Otherwise, he’ll be out here digging, and the doctor expressly said he’s not to do anything physically demanding.”
“Let me do it.” Tom took the shovel from her and headed over to the garden area. He’d never dug a garden, but the soil had been carefully prepared the previous fall, and turning over the rich black loam proved easy and enjoyable.
Zelda joined him, picking out stones and roots and using a rake to smooth the earth after Tom turned it over. The sun was hot, and the yard was peaceful, filled with the songs of birds and the laughter of Eddy and Pearl, playing in Isabella’s backyard.
First he rolled his sleeves high and pulled his shirttail out of his pants. Finally he shucked it off altogether, enjoying the sun on his bare flesh almost as much as the glances Zelda shot at his naked torso whenever she thought he wasn’t looking.
He was as bad as she.
“Do you like to garden, Tom?” She was bending over, her bottom stuck in the air and a layer of white petticoat showing beneath the hem of her skirt. He studied her from the back, trying unsuccessfully to assess her exact shape and size through the maddening layers, longing for the advent of short shorts.
“Never done any. Never stayed in one place long enough to plant a garden. “
One thing about it, the outfits women wore here left absolutely everything to the imagination. It was depressing.
“Not even when you were a child?” She straightened and turned quickly, and he pretended to be obsessed with the clods of earth he was turning.
“We had no backyard to plant anything in, and even if we had, my parents weren’t exactly the gardening sort.”
“Where did you grow up?” She leaned on the rake, her chin propped on the back of her hands, unaware that this was a subject he definitely didn’t want to talk about. But short of outright rudeness, there wasn’t any way around it.
“In Idaho, in a coal mining town not too different from this one.” The similarities haunted him. “My stepfather was a miner.” What had made him volunteer that?
Her surprise was evident. “You never said a word about coming from a mining family. Dad’ll be beside himself. Did you ever work underground?”
He grunted. ‘Oh, yeah. For all of a month, when I was fifteen. I hated it. I left home and hit the road, never went back.”
“Fifteen?” Her expression was troubled. “Oh Tom, that’s so young. That’s Eli’s age. I can’t imagine a child of fifteen being on his own. Your parents must have been sick with worry.”
Tom shook his head. “Not likely. They were probably relieved as hell to see the last of me. I’d started having some terrific fights with the old man before I took off.
He upended a particularly stubborn chunk of soil and chopped it to bits with the tip of the spade, putting a lot more energy into it than the job needed. “They fought, they drank. They were the kind who should never have kids in the first place.” He put his foot on the shovel and pushed hard, welcoming the strong resistance of the earth.
“Did you have sisters and brothers?” Zelda’s rich voice held a world of compassion, and it annoyed him. He didn’t need pity. He’d made out just fine on his own.
The questions were becoming more difficult for him to answer, and he wished she’d just drop it. “Two stepbrothers, both quite a bit younger than me.” He didn’t have to answer, but for some reason he couldn’t stop himself. “Ryan was seven when I left. Billy was four.”
Sometimes he still remembered exactly how they looked, but sometimes their features were blurred in his memory. Right now, he could see them as clearly as if they stood right there in the garden, Ryan with his gap-toothed grin, Billy’s chipmunk cheeks. Weird how in his mind they never got any older, when in reality they’d been adults for years now.
He drove the shovel viciously into the earth.
“Are you close to them?”
“Nope.” His voice was curt. “I’ve never seen them since the day I left. I don’t know where they are.” It was an old sore, one that he tried never to think about, and he resented her for making him do so now.
He glared at her, daring her to comment. She looked shocked, and again he felt compelled to explain. “I’ve tried to locate them, but my parents’ died in an accident shortly after I left home. The boys were taken by a social agency and adopted. Their names were changed, the agency went out of business, and all their records were lost.” He dug still faster, sweat dripping off his nose and running down his chest.
He’d tried. He’d hired a private investigator a few years back, but the records were sealed. “Wherever they ended up had to be better for them anyhow.” It was his only consolation. He couldn’t believe it when he heard himself blurting out, “I’ve always blamed myself for walking out on them.”
“Oh, Tom.” She moved close and stripped off her glove, then put her hand on his arm. “I’m so sorry.” Her big chocolate eyes were shiny with tears, her fingers on his bare skin seeming to burn a pattern where they touched. “I only have Eli, but if I somehow lost him, I don’t know what I’d do.” The emotions she felt made her voice tremble.
He looked down into her face, studying each feature as though it were a puzzle he was going to be tested on, sun-kissed cheeks, straight, freckled nose, wide mouth, long, graceful throat, uneven hairline. What made this particular face so special to him? What made him look at her and suddenly find her heart-stoppingly beautiful?
She had a smudge of dirt on her temple where she’d shoved her hair back and there was a fine beading of sweat on her forehead. Her special scent, sweet and intimate, filled his nostrils and he wanted more than anything to gather her into his arms and hold her tight, crush her against his chest.
What was it about this woman that drew him so powerfully?
Her breathing quickened, and he could tell that she sensed it, too, this irresistible magnetism that existed between them. His fingers closed over her shoulders, leaving dark smudges on the pristine white cotton of her blouse. But before he could draw her to him and kiss her the way he needed to, she shook her head and moved back, stumbling a little on the clods of dirt.
“Not here, Tom,” she breathed. “Everyone can see us.” She gestured with her hand, and he realized that Eddy and Pearl were hanging over t
he fence, watching with somber, dirty little faces and saucer-wide eyes. In the yard on the other side, an old woman with a black scarf tied over her head was bending over her own garden, but it was obvious her attention wasn’t on the roses she was pruning.
He swore under his breath. “Where then, Zelda? For God’s sake, where?”
In the house, Virgil would awaken at any moment. There was the barn, and Tom was beginning seriously to consider dragging her into its dusky privacy.
With her lower lip caught between her teeth, she studied him for a long, silent moment. Then she seemed to make up her mind.
He had a feeling that something momentous was being settled between them.
“I’m going for a walk in a little while, to take photographs,” she said, her husky voice a little breathless. “Would you care to come along?”
He only nodded, but there was a wealth of feeling in that nod.
There wasn’t time to heat enough water for a bath. So she took a steaming kettle, a basin of cold water, and a small container of vinegar up to her attic room.
It was going to be an oven up here when summer came. Even now the unfinished space was stuffy and close.
She stripped off her skirt and blouse, undid her petticoats, and let them fall in a heap. She removed her chemise and drawers, grateful that she’d burned her stays several years before after attending a lecture by a female doctor who attributed many of the common ailments women suffered to the cruel stricture of corsets. She’d been much more comfortable ever since, and she tried not to allow the scandalized glances she sometimes received to bother her.
Now and Forever: Time Travel Romance Superbundle Page 75