by Liz Isaacson
“Sounds good.”
The call ended, and Mal took a few moments to just soak in the silence. She examined how she felt about Skyler, and she knew he was easily the most important person in her life right now. Probably ever.
She had other people she’d been friends with before their fake marriage, but she hadn’t spent as much time with them since quitting her job and retreating to the top floor of this apartment building. She didn’t want to lie to them, and she didn’t want to tell them she’d married Skyler. So it was easier to simply stay away.
It had been fine, because she had Skyler, and they’d been relying on each other, especially since Christmas. Mal was used to being on her own, and she didn’t mind spending time with herself, her projects, and the things that were important to her.
But Skyler had given her the space she wanted—and some she didn’t. They were still getting to know one another, she rationalized, and then she went to get the fabric that she’d bought and left in the kitchen as she carried the sewing machine down the hall and around the corner.
As she measured and cut and started to sew, she thought about Skyler and the embarrassment he’d been shouldering all alone. She understood on a deep level, because she’d come to this country to make something of herself, and she hadn’t quite done it yet.
Soon, she promised herself. She leaned back and looked up at the ceiling, imagining she could look through it all the way to heaven. “Soon,” she promised the Lord.
Hours later, Skyler walked in the apartment a few minutes after Mal had started a movie. She immediately paused the show and got up off the couch. She rounded it and met him at the door, stepping easily into his arms.
“I missed you,” she said, holding onto the width of his shoulders. He was strong, and steady, and sturdy, and she sure did like that. She sure did like him.
She tilted back and looked up at him. “Skyler, I think you’re an amazing man.”
He gazed back at her, and Mal smiled, tipped up on her toes to take off his cowboy hat, and kissed him. Skyler kissed her back, and he moved with a bit of that wild, unbridled passion that had existed in their first kiss.
“I’m trying to do the right thing,” he said. “I’m trying to be smart.”
“I know that,” she said. “I feel the same.”
“Do you think we’re doing the right thing?”
“I can’t even imagine doing this by myself,” she said. “You’ve been such a big help.” She knew a lot of that came from his money, but she only felt a blip of guilt steal through her.
“How do you—I mean, how do you feel about us?”
“Honestly?”
“I thought we’d decided to be completely honest with each other.”
They had, that was true. But he’d just barely revealed a lot about his past. Mal reasoned that she didn’t need to know everything up front with her other boyfriends. Of course, Skyler had never really been her boyfriend.
He’d gone straight to husband.
Mal looked into his eyes and employed her bravery. “I’m falling in love with you.”
Skyler smiled slowly, and he was the most handsome man Mal had ever laid eyes on.
“I’m falling in love with you too.” Skyler dipped down and kissed her too, and pure hope filled her, because maybe they had a chance of making it through this hearing.
But more importantly, she suddenly felt like she had a real opportunity of spending her life with someone she loved.
“I love coming home to you,” he said, sliding his lips along her neck.
“I like that too,” she said, clinging to those strong shoulders. But really, she loved being that sense of home for him. And she wanted him to be her idea of home too.
Thursday morning, Mal stood in front of the mirror in her bedroom, and she hardly recognized herself. She wore a classy navy blue dress with a white collar and white cuffs on the sleeves. She’d bought a pair of blue pumps, and she’d spent an hour on her hair and makeup. She was amazed at what money could do, and she tipped her head back.
“Thank you, Lord,” she said, glad Skyler had brought up the topic of religion a couple of weeks ago. “Bless us that today will go well.”
She didn’t know what else to say. She’d been praying steadily all week, and she knew Skyler had too.
“Bless Skyler that this will not cause any more problems for him.” He’d confessed to her on Tuesday after he’d returned that he was worried as the immigration authorities looked into their marriage that they’d go back to the issues he’d dealt with in Dallas.
Mal hadn’t known how to reassure him, because there was no reassurance. She couldn’t control what someone looked into, or what they thought about it. They had John coming with their files. He’d texted last night, and he was very good at reassuring them that all would go well. She was so glad to have someone in her corner who knew what to expect at the hearing, and she couldn’t wait to meet up with John.
She turned away from her reflection and went into the kitchen. Skyler stood there, wearing his shirt and tie that he wore to church. “Hey,” he said, smiling at her. He did a double-take and then his gaze slid down to her heels and back to her face. “Wow.”
“Wow?” She grinned at him and cocked her hip, putting her hand there. “You like this dress?”
“I super like that dress.” He stepped over to her and took her into his arms, smiling at her as his eyes broadcasted his desire for her. Mal liked that she could make him want to touch her, and she ran her hands up his chest.
“Well, I super like your tie.”
He leaned down and kissed her, and there was definitely some charged energy between them. Mal felt the anxiety, and she tried to get rid of it by keeping up with him stroke for stroke.
He finally broke their connection, but he kept his forehead against hers. “I’m wondering….” His eyelashes brushed his cheeks as he kept his eyes closed. “I’m wondering if you’ve thought about sharing—” He cleared his throat. “Moving into my bedroom.”
Fear and joy, worry and excitement, filled her. She stepped away from him, her heart pounding, pounding, pounding in her chest. “I’ve thought about it,” she said. She’d have to be a robot not to think about doing more than just kissing Skyler Walker.
“Okay,” he said simply. He opened the drawer in the island and picked up his keys. “We better get going. John said to be there thirty minutes early.”
She nodded and followed him out, and it felt like a new companion had joined them. She wanted to talk more about what sharing his bedroom would be like, but she didn’t. She’d slept in the same bed with him before, and thinking about anything else only increased her anxiety.
John waited in a chair on the third floor of the federal building downtown, his phone stuck to his ear. He spoke in rapid Spanish, and while Mal didn’t speak the language daily like she’d used to, she still understood everything he said.
And he was telling someone that he’d put in the proper paperwork, and that he was supposed to have heard on a naturalization ceremony on Monday and hadn’t. He wrapped up the call fairly quickly, stood, and shook their hands.
“They’re on schedule,” he said. “Which is pretty much a miracle. We’ll wait here until they call us in. There are four cases, including ours. I’m going to try to go first, since I have to be in court at noon.”
“Sounds good,” Skyler said, sitting down next to John. Mal sat next to Skyler, and silence ensued. He was deep inside his mind, and Mal didn’t blame him. She really didn’t. She just wanted this hearing to go well.
Please, please, she thought.
The minutes passed slowly, and she watched more people gather in the waiting area, all of them with lawyers like John. Finally, someone opened the door, and a man dressed in a uniform stood there, welcoming people in. John got to his feet like a shot and approached him. They exchanged a few words, but Mal was still trying to catch up so she didn’t hear what they said.
Inside the room, a couple
of tables sat between rows that looked very much like the pews they sat on at church. Up front, raised up, was where the judge would sit.
John went all the way to the front row and sat down, Skyler following. Mal managed to get though the other people entering the room, and she sat beside the two men that felt like her only lifeline at the moment.
Only minutes later, the door in the corner opened, and a woman came through, followed by another in judge’s robes. The first woman took a spot in the box to the side, and the judge climbed a couple of steps and sat behind a microphone.
Mal watched her, feeling like this woman with an outdated hairstyle held her very future in her hands.
“Are we all here?” the judge asked. Her name plate in front of her read Judge Andrea Andreas. Mal found it humorous that she only had one letter different between her first and last name, and she wished she could text Skyler. He’d like it too.
“All four have checked in,” the man who’d stood at the door said, moving through the room toward her. He handed her the clipboard, and she looked through the bottom of her glasses to read the paper.
“Mister Castle? Let’s start with Mallery Viera and her improper filing status.” She looked up. “Are you both here?”
“Yes, your honor,” John said, standing. He motioned for Mal to join him, which she did. She drew a deep breath, though her head spun slightly. The room rotated, and she blinked, trying to get her bearings.”
The woman in the box read something, and the proceeding started. John spoke about how Mal had simply filed the wrong form, with the wrong supporting document. “She was a student at West Texas A&M, working two jobs, one of them in a managerial position. She didn’t realize her ten-year green card would take so long to process, and she applied for an extension on August eleventh when she realized. The wrong paperwork was given to Miss Viera, who has since been married to Skyler Walker, also a student at West Texas A&M and businessman with strong family ties in nearby Three Rivers.”
He looked down at his papers. “We have the correct paperwork here, and request that Miss Viera be permitted to have a conditional green card, which can be updated to a permanent green card, and eventual naturalization, which is her goal. She wants to work and go to school, and she wants to participate in her new life with Mister Walker.”
“You have the paperwork?” the judge asked.
“Right here.” He handed it to the uniformed officer, who walked it up to Judge Andreas. She studied the paperwork, and the silence in the courtroom felt like it had been hooked to a live wire.
“Is Mister Walker present?” She looked up over the top of her glasses.
“Yes, your honor,” John said, gesturing for Skyler to stand. He did, tugging on the ends of his sleeves. He stepped up to the table, and Mal slipped her hand into his.
“Mister Walker, you and Miss Viera got married on November eighteenth?”
“That’s right, your honor,” he said, and he sounded strong and sure. This was nothing like what Mal had envisioned, and she was so glad. She’d thought she might be taken into a white room without windows, where she’d be questioned ruthlessly by two officers, one Good Cop and one Bad Cop.
She wasn’t even talking, and she didn’t think she’d need to. Having John Castle in her corner had been invaluable, and she squeezed Skyler’s hand. He didn’t look at her, but maintained eye contact with the judge.
“And this is a real, nurturing marriage?”
“Yes, your honor,” Skyler said.
“She didn’t coerce you into the marriage so she could stay in the country?”
“Your honor,” John said. “Miss Viera and Mister Walker have known each other for two years. They are happily and legally married, and it has nothing to do with Miss Viera’s green card status. She simply filed the wrong paperwork. She didn’t get married to stay in the country.”
Mal wondered if she could’ve hired John and gotten the results she wanted without having to marry Skyler. She didn’t know—and she’d never know. Because she didn’t have the money required to hire someone like John Castle. She’d have gone to the immigration office and begged to know what to do.
Skyler had taken control, and the first thing he’d done was marry her. Then he’d hired John.
The judge leafed through a couple of papers. “Her conditional status has been renewed for the time period of one year.” She handed the paperwork to the woman in the box. “And Mister and Mrs. Walker, be prepared to visit with immigration officers in the next twelve months to determine whether or not this marriage is real. Your next hearing will determine if you can receive a permanent green card, which will then lead you to naturalization.”
“Thank you, your honor,” John said, and the judge didn’t even look at him. He herded Skyler and Mal away from the table in the front and someone else stood up to take their place as the judge called their names.
Mal left the room, barely able to feel her legs. Out in the hall, the air went down into her lungs in huge gulps. She’d been granted another year. Conditional, yes, but so much could happen in a year. And she had John now.
And Skyler, she thought, watching him shake John’s hand, both of them made of smiles.
“Let’s go celebrate,” Skyler said, facing her. And he looked so full of joy that Mal finally realized what had just happened.
She wouldn’t have to leave the country.
“Yes,” she said, feeling that same joy. “Let’s go celebrate.”
Chapter Thirteen
Marcy barely had time to cut the engine before she bolted from the cockpit and bent over, not even trying to get to the bathroom before she threw up. Her morning sickness had been particularly bad the past few weeks, and she’d take a hose to the dirt after she finished her flights.
She’d been working longer than normal, because she had to come down and throw up a couple of times each morning. She put her hand on her stomach, which still hadn’t started to get bigger, and said, “You’re causing Momma a lot of trouble.”
But she wouldn’t trade the baby for anything. She already felt a terribly great connection to the life growing inside her. Wyatt’s surgery was only four days away. Their anniversary was only four weeks away. Skyler and Mal were moving into the house in Church Ranches that afternoon.
In fact, they might have already left Amarillo. Marcy wasn’t sure, as Wyatt had been handling all of those details.
Drawing a deep breath, Marcy turned back to the plane. She climbed into the cockpit and took off again, stealing comfort and strength from the same place she’d always gotten it—the sky.
She flew south and west toward Shiloh Ridge and got one field dusted before she saw someone on the ground, waving her down. At this rate, she’d never get her day’s work done, and she tried not to think about the mountains of paperwork, maintenance, and cleaning to do back at the hangar.
As she landed on the long, wide, dirt road that led up to the ranch, she remembered that she’d hired two people to help her. Agnes was the new office manager, and she worked around the hangar full-time now. She’d have the place clean, and she’d do all the paperwork. Marcy liked the business side of Payne’s, but really, she just wanted to fly. She’d hired Joel Barlow to help her dust the fields, and he was handy with a wrench too. So she’d definitely have time to stop and talk to Bear, who was walking toward her plane.
Marcy took a moment to let the propeller slow, and then she got out of the cockpit for the second time that morning. “What’s goin’ on, Bear?” she asked. Usually when the tall, burly cowboy bachelor wanted to talk to her, he set something up in her office. He had been known to wave her down once before, when he’d had a large infestation of grasshoppers.
“Mornin’, Marcy,” he said, ducking under the propeller. He wore a smile today, and that gave her a good hint that he wasn’t upset with her. Or anything much, really. Bear seemed to have two sides—well-fed or grizzly.
Marcy shook his hand, definitely thinking he was on the well-fed side of the
bear today. “What can I do for you?”
“I’ve decided to cultivate fifty more acres this season.” He turned and looked over his shoulder. “Out on the west side. The dormant fields out there.”
“Okay,” she said. “You want pre-treatment?”
“Yeah.” He looked at her again. “And we’re putting corn out there for my herd, so I want the completely organic mix.”
“You got it. I’ll tell my new office manager when I get back to the hangar. I think she’ll probably call you, and she can email over the new contracts.”
“All right.” Bear didn’t ask how much it would be. He had new fields that needed work, and Marcy did the work. Besides, Bear Glover seemed to have a bank account like Wyatt’s—deep and never-ending.
“I also wanted to say thanks for the recommendation on Sammy. She’s been doin’ great.”
“Oh, I’m glad,” Marcy said, smiling. “She’s great.”
“Yeah.” Bear nearly transformed into a grizzly right in front of her. “Anyway, that was all. I saw you, and I thought you might have a second to land.”
“I do.” She smiled at him, shook his hand again, and got back in the cockpit. She finished dusting Shiloh Ridge, got over to Wade Rhinehart’s, and returned back to the hangar.
Embarrassment funneled through her as she taxied to a stop, because Agnes stood outside with the hose, cleaning up after Marcy. She cut the engine, gathered her clipboard, and climbed down.
“Agnes, I was going to do that,” she said. “I’m sorry.” She approached her new manager, and the dark-haired woman waved away her apology.
“It’s fine, Marcy. I’ve had three kids. I get it.” She turned off the hose and reached for the clipboard. “Your husband stopped by and brought breakfast for everyone. Joel radioed in and said he’s on his way back.”
“Great,” Marcy said. “I need to look at his plane when he gets back. Oh, and Bear Glover has an additional fifty acres with organic pre-treatment.”