The Banty House

by Brown, Carolyn

  “I think she looks exactly like Martha Belle Baker,” Sloan said.

  Kate smiled and nodded. “That’s a good solid name. I’m going to teach her to make moonshine when she’s old enough.”

  “And you’re not going to teach her to grow pot.” Connie shook a finger at Betsy.

  “Okay, ladies, time to go.” Doc Emerson broke up the impending argument when he came into the room. “We should have her in a room within the hour. Why don’t y’all go on home or get something to eat?”

  “I would like to get out of this dress, but how can we leave this baby?” Betsy asked.

  “She’s not going anywhere,” Ginger said. “Would you bring me some of those cookies we made when you come back? I’m starving.”

  “Not yet,” Doc said. “First you’ll get some liquids—broth, juice, and Jell-O—then at supper you can have some light food. Tomorrow you can get back on a regular diet. You just had surgery, young lady. You need to take it slow.” He motioned for the ladies to leave the room.

  “Thank God I’m living in your house,” she said when she and Sloan were alone. “I love them all, but they would smother me.”

  “Honey,” he chuckled. “It don’t matter where we live; it’s going to happen.”

  “My arms are so tired,” she said. “I hate to ask, but just for five minutes . . .”

  Sloan ripped the robe he was still wearing right down the front, unbuttoned his shirt, and took the baby into his arms. When he laid Martha Belle against his chest, she looked up at him with soul-searching eyes, as if she were studying his face.

  “Hello, punkin,” Sloan said. “Welcome to the Baker family.”

  “We may be a strange family, but we are one, aren’t we?” Ginger said.

  “Yes, darlin’, we are.” Sloan nodded.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Ginger dressed Martha Belle in a frilly little pink dress for church that morning and put the band with the bow that Sloan had bought around her head. She had just finished putting a pair of booties on her when Sloan came into the bedroom.

  “Happy Mother’s Day,” he said. “I forgot to tell you that this morning at breakfast.”

  “Thank you. It is my first Mother’s Day, isn’t it?” She kissed the baby on the cheek. “And you are the reason I get to celebrate this day, you sweet little doll.” She turned her attention back to Sloan. “Are the presents and the diaper bag ready to go? I’m so eager to get out of the house for a few hours. It’s only been eight days, and I know that we’ve had company every day, but I’m ready to get out, get a ride somewhere in the new vehicle.”

  “The gifts are in the back of the SUV, all ready to deliver to the Banty House ladies after we have dinner, and the diaper bag is right behind the passenger seat. Honey, we can go anywhere you want,” he said.

  “I still can’t believe that you went out and bought an SUV,” she said.

  “If the ladies hadn’t let us borrow their car, we’d have had to hire a taxi to get us home. Besides, you’ll need it when you go back to work. I can take the truck to San Antonio, and you and Miz Punkin can use the SUV.” He picked the baby up and settled her into her car seat. “I’m not sure the world is ready for all your beauty this mornin’,” he told her as he gripped the handle with one hand and crooked his other arm for Ginger.

  She looped her arm into his, and they went out into the bright sunshiny morning. “I’m glad Edith dropped that restraining order so we can go to our own church.”

  “Flora said that James told her to drop it or else he’d have to leave town and find a church that he could afford to preach at,” Ginger said.

  “I bet the ladies got a kick out of that.” Sloan took care of getting Martha Belle’s car seat clicked into the base, and then he opened the door for Ginger.

  “Kate said that she laughed so hard that she got the hiccups and that Betsy said she’d go back if Edith apologized to her in public at church in front of the whole congregation. Connie wanted her to stand on the altar and ask God Himself to forgive her for judging their mother. Flora convinced them all that it would do more good for them to be ladies than to demand stuff like that,” Ginger explained.

  Sloan laughed at the visions in his head of the old gals making Edith do all that, but he was most interested in Ginger that morning. “You sure look cute this morning in that dress.”

  “Thank you. I’m glad you like it. I did some online retail therapy for it, like you taught me. It just came in yesterday. I wanted me and Martha Belle to wear the same color on Mother’s Day. It may turn out to be a tradition, like Easter at the Banty House.”

  Sloan made his way around the SUV and got behind the wheel. “Then I’ll be sure to take a picture of the two of you before the day is over. You can put it in the book that you’re making for her. Maybe we can talk Kate into taking one of the three of us.”

  “I’d like that.” Ginger had to say what was in her heart or else she was going to flat-out explode. “I love you, Sloan. I think I fell in love with you that first day when you came to the Banty House to work for the sisters. I don’t want you to think I’m saying this because of a new car or what all you’ve done for me this past week since the baby was born. I couldn’t ask for a better friend, but I want you to know that I love you”—she stopped and took a long breath, then blurted out—“for more than just a friend.”

  The way he whipped around and looked at her made her wonder if he’d even heard her. Finally, just when she’d begun to think that he was trying to figure out how to let her down gently, he said, “Are you sure about that?”

  “We can stay just friends. I guess everything depends on what you want. I have no right to ask for more. I was eight months pregnant when we met, and all we’ve shared is a few kisses,” she answered.

  “Well, honey, those few kisses about knocked my socks off, and I’ve dreamed about you every night.” He started the engine of the new SUV.

  Her heart fluttered like it might jump right out of her chest. She laid a hand on his shoulder. “Me too. What are we going to do about us?”

  “Well, I could make a suggestion, but you might think it’s too soon. After all we’ve both been through, I don’t believe in wasting time. We’re living together, and we’re getting along really, really good.” He drove from the house to the church and found a parking spot not far from the door. “Except when you get all stubborn with me about Ferris wheels and how much work you can do after surgery.”

  “You can’t expect to live with someone twenty-four hours a day and not have a few arguments,” she told him. “I bet you and your granny even had words at times.”

  “Oh, yeah.” He smiled, turned off the engine, and faced her. He took both her hands in his and gazed into her eyes. “This isn’t a very romantic time or place, and church starts in ten minutes so we’re a little rushed for time. But here goes: Ginger Andrews, I love you. I don’t know what the future holds, and I’m willing to wait until you are ready, but will you marry me?”

  “Yes!” She unfastened her seat belt and leaned over the console to seal her answer with a long, passionate kiss that left them both breathless.

  Epilogue

  Twenty years later

  Ginger dressed in a cute little pink sundress and matching sandals. She’d just finished running a brush through her shoulder-length blonde hair when Sloan came into their bedroom and slipped his arms around her waist from behind.

  “Happy early anniversary,” he said.

  “Thank you, darlin’.” She wrapped her arms around his neck. “It hasn’t been a good twenty years. It’s been a wonderful twenty years. Did you calm our oldest daughter down?”

  “I tried, but she’s pretty nervous. It’s a dream come true for her and Kate both. I swear she was marked from birth. I wanted her to go to college, but oh, no, she and her Nanny Kate had different plans.” He kissed Ginger on the forehead. “We’d better round up the crew and start moving in that direction.”

  “I just have to get my purs
e,” Ginger said. “You get the SUV started, and I’ll yell at the girls. You know, we could try one more time for a boy. I’m not quite forty yet, and more and more women older than I am are having babies.”

  “No, thank you,” Sloan chuckled. “I’m happy with our three girls. In a few years, they’ll probably all be living at the Banty House and we’ll finally have time just for each other. When we get Lizzy and Annie raised, I’m going to retire, and we’re going to do some traveling.”

  “That sounds exciting, but, Sloan, I don’t want them to be old maids like the nannies were. I want them to have what we’ve had all these years,” she said.

  “Don’t worry, honey.” He brought her hand to his lips and kissed the knuckles. “They’ll find their way, just like we did. If we don’t leave pretty soon, I’m going to lock the door and crumple up that pretty dress you’re wearing.”

  She shoved him out the door with a giggle, picked up her purse, and yelled down the hallway of the new addition they’d built onto the house when the twins were born.

  “All right, girls. The wagon train leaves in two minutes.”

  Martha Belle came out of her bedroom with a worried look on her face. At almost twenty, she looked more like Sloan than she did her mother. Even though he wasn’t her biological father, her blue eyes were almost the same color as his. She was six inches taller than Ginger and built with curves in all the right places.

  “Mama, you’ll be where I can see you when they interview us, won’t you? I’m so nervous that my hands will be shaking.” Martha Belle slung her arm around Ginger’s shoulders.

  “I promise that your daddy and I’ll be standing right behind the cameras so you can see us both,” Ginger told her. “You’ve got this. You’re as strong as all three of your nannies put together.”

  “I’m so glad that Nanny Kate and Nanny Betsy are here to see this day.” Martha Belle sighed. “But I miss Nanny Connie so much.”

  “Don’t you dare start crying,” Ginger scolded. “You know I can’t let anyone cry alone, and tears will ruin our makeup.”

  “Who’s cryin’?” Lizzie asked, coming out of her bedroom. Even with three-inch wedge heels, the seventeen-year-old wasn’t as tall as her older sister. Her blonde hair was pinned up in a messy twist, and she wore a bright-yellow dress that skimmed her knees. “Don’t any of y’all dare start that crap in front of Nanny Kate. She shouldn’t cry on her birthday. And if she cries, so will Nanny Betsy.”

  “Or on the day that our sister launches her first legal batch of moonshine.” Annie joined them. If it hadn’t been for the fact that she and Lizzy had such different fashion styles, few people could have told them apart. Ginger smiled at Annie, who reminded her of all three of the sisters that day. Her daughter had chosen a long white dress for the party like the one Connie had worn on the festival days. The hot-pink cowboy boots that peeked out from under the lace at the hem definitely had come from Kate. And Ginger would bet that her daughter’s hot-pink fingernail polish was the same color as Betsy’s.

  “That’s right,” Ginger said. “Now go get in the vehicle. We’re all going together.”

  “Ahhh, Mama.” Lizzie pouted. “I wanted to take my own car.”

  “Not today,” Ginger said. “Today we’re going as a family.”

  Change was a good thing.

  Kate remembered thinking that was a bullshit statement twenty years ago, when she and her sisters drove down to Hondo to their new hairdresser’s place.

  “I was wrong to argue with those words,” Kate told herself as she got dressed that morning in a pink pantsuit that Martha Belle had picked out for her. According to her granddaughter, they needed to wear the same color for the television crew. Today, she and Martha Belle were cutting the ribbon on the brand-new building back behind the cornfield that was their artisanal moonshine business. It was a dream come true for both of them, and Kate was glad she’d lived long enough to see the time come. Martha Belle was being hailed as the youngest entrepreneur ever to start such a business. Of course on paper it belonged to Kate, but as soon as Martha Belle turned twenty-one, it would all shift over to her.

  While she waited for Ginger and the whole family to arrive, she picked up the picture book that her mama had started a hundred years ago and flipped through it. She and Betsy had lost Connie ten years ago to a heart attack. Kate was thankful that it had been quick and that Connie had died with a dustrag in her hand.

  “Poor little Martha Belle, Lizzy, and Annie,” she whispered. “They took it so hard. Betsy and I couldn’t have gotten over it if it hadn’t been for those girls being here with us so much.”

  She touched the next picture and smiled at the expression on Connie’s face. “The house ain’t as clean as when you took care of it, sister, but you trained Lizzy and Annie well. They’ve each bought a car with the money they saved from helping me and Betsy out in this old house. You’d be proud of them. I’m glad you went fast and doin’ what you loved to do. I hope I have a heart attack just like you did when it’s my time to go. Or that I drown in a vat of moonshine,” she giggled.

  “Nanny Kate! Nanny Betsy! Are y’all ready?” Martha Belle yelled as she entered the house through the kitchen. “I saw the television van drive past just when Daddy parked out front. Get your cane, and let’s go tell them all about our new moonshine business.”

  “I was reminiscing about Connie.” Kate picked up her cane and followed Martha Belle outside.

  “I was doing the same thing.” Betsy came from the living room with a cane in her hand. “I hope she’s lookin’ down from heaven and smiling today.”

  “I miss her so much,” Martha Belle said.

  “I tell you one thing,” Betsy said as she headed outside. “Heaven ain’t never been cleaner. I bet she’s got some kind of fancy stuff that even shines the angel’s wings. When I get there, I just hope they let me grow weed.”

  “They ain’t goin’ to give you no lip about it if you do.” Martha Belle helped Kate into the SUV.

  “Why’s that?” Kate asked.

  “Because,” Annie said from the back seat, “Nanny Connie already got them under her thumb with the cleanin’ business, so if her sister wants to grow weed, ain’t nobody goin’ to say a word.”

  Kate laid a veined hand on Martha Belle’s arm as she got into the back seat of the SUV. “I love all of you, and I’m so glad that your mama came into our lives when she did.”

  “Hey,” Ginger said from the front seat, “that goes double for me. The Banty House was my salvation.”

  Sloan looked over at her and smiled. “And it’s where I met the love of my life.”

  Acknowledgments

  Dear Readers,

  Kate, Betsy, Connie, Ginger, and Sloan, all characters in the Banty House, have stopped talking to me now that the book is finished. I have to admit that we became pretty good friends during the writing process, and I really do miss them. More than once one of the older women would wake me up in the middle of the night to fuss at me because I didn’t get her part of the story told just right.

  I’m grateful for the voices in my head and for the ideas that come from everywhere and anywhere. I often tell folks that my love for storytelling comes from my Grandmother Gray, who could mesmerize me with her stories. As I was writing, I could imagine her as mother to Kate, Connie, and Betsy, and that’s why this book is dedicated to her.

  Speaking of being thankful, sometimes it’s difficult to express just how much I appreciate my readers who listen to or read my stories. I want to thank you all for buying my books, reading them, talking about them, sharing them, writing reviews, and sending notes to me. Please know that each and every one of you holds a special place in my heart.

  I’m a very fortunate author to have such an amazing team at Montlake. They take my ideas and help me turn them into a finished product for my readers. From edits to covers to publicity, they are all amazing, and I appreciate them more than words could ever express.

  Special thanks to my edito
r, Anh Schluep, who continues to believe in my stories; to my developmental editor, Krista Stroever, who always manages to help bring out every emotion and detail in my books; to my awesome agent, Erin Niumata, and to Folio Literary Management; and once again, my undying love to my husband, Mr. B, who is and always has been my number-one supporter.

  Until next time,

  Carolyn Brown

  About the Author

  Photo © 2015 Charles Brown

  Carolyn Brown is a New York Times, USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author and a RITA finalist with more than one hundred published books and more than five million sold. Her novels include romantic women’s fiction, historical, contemporary, and cowboys and country music mass-market paperbacks. She and her husband live in the small town of Davis, Oklahoma, where everyone knows everyone else and knows what they are doing and when—and they read the local newspaper on Wednesday to see who got caught. They have three grown children and enough grandchildren and great-grandchildren to keep them young. Visit Carolyn at www.carolynbrownbooks.com.