Almost A Family

by Marilyn Tracy

  And he looked as if he wanted to say something to her. Something that might explain his curious admission earlier that morning?

  “Thanks for the warning,” she told her aunt, and hung up the phone in time to answer the door. It was Doc Jamison, there to collect the boys for their community service.

  He shook hands with Steve and the two men exchanged quick background information before Doc herded her crew to his mobile clinic.

  The instant they drove away, the house seemed to fall into a tense, watchful silence. Taylor suddenly felt more than alone with Steve Kessler, she felt nakedly alone.

  He cleared his throat.

  She smoothed her jeans.

  He ran his hand through his hair.

  She chewed on her lower lip.

  “I like your kids,” he said.

  She didn’t know quite what she’d expected him to say, but it wasn’t this. Not in the wake of last night’s kiss and this morning’s statement of hard fact.

  “Their eyebrows move—just like yours are doing.”

  It wasn’t a compliment exactly, just another of his rhetorical comments. “I know,” she said anyway.

  The doorbell rang.

  “Damn,” he said, as if they’d been interrupted from a serious discussion.

  Taylor couldn’t help smiling as she headed for the door. Why was he so upset? He’d made it perfectly clear he didn’t want any part of what they had to offer in this “one-horse town in the middle of the high plains.” What difference could it possibly make to him if it was chaotic or peaceful?

  Though she’d smiled sweetly enough before she moved to the front door, Steve had caught enough of her raisedeyebrow censure to be reduced to about the same age as Taylor’s sons. As she greeted the people standing outside the dusty screen door, he found himself smiling. Taylor Leary-Smithton wasn’t quite as vulnerable as he’d thought; she could pack a heck of a wallop with a single look.

  So as not to eavesdrop, he went into the kitchen, ostensibly searching for a cup of coffee. He settled for what was left of the lemonade Taylor had poured all over the counter the night before. Before he’d kissed her a second time.

  Before he’d drowned in that kiss.

  He gulped at the cold liquid and stared at her infinite view out the back window, hoping one of the neighbors in this one-horse town in the middle of nowhere would find something. Something to keep him around just a little longer.

  Taylor’s unexpected company was her sister-in-law, Carolyn, her new husband, Pete Jackson, and Taylor’s nieces, Shawna and Jenny.

  “We thought we’d come to see how the crime squad is doing,” Carolyn said as she brushed Taylor’s cheek with a kiss and moved into the living room.

  “Anything new?” Pete asked after a brief hug.

  Taylor murmured a negative as she pulled the two girls, roughly the same age as her sons, in close for a quick snuggle.

  “Did the boys really find a dead guy?” Shawna wanted to know.

  “Nearly dead,” Taylor said. “But he wasn’t there when we went back to check it out.”

  The girls exchanged knowing glances. “Told you,” Jenny said.

  “Oh, no,” Taylor quickly corrected. “We’re fairly certain there was a scuffle of some kind. Whatever else the boys concocted—” she thought about their admission of planting sandwich bags of baking soda behind the school work shed “—they really did see a man wounded out behind Mr. Hampton’s barn.”

  “What about the Texas Ranger...Steve Kessler, was it?” Carolyn asked. “We met him last spring, didn’t we? Tall man? Is he already gone?”

  “No,” Taylor said, remembering his derisive words about Almost on the phone that morning. Why couldn’t she just be angry at him for his snobbery and hustle him out of town with a firm wish that some vaguely humorous evil would befall him? Why should an even smile and a pair of warm brown eyes make her anger melt as quickly as it rose to the surface?

  Carolyn was looking at her strangely. Taylor tried a smile. The two women hadn’t known each other all that long, despite being sisters-in-law. Carolyn had married Taylor’s brother, Craig, and except for the rare holiday, they’d stayed in Dallas. Until Craig was killed in a car accident and Carolyn packed her daughters up and moved into the old ranch house where Taylor had been raised.

  Taylor still didn’t know all the details surrounding Carolyn’s obvious poverty after Craig’s death, but she suspected her brother had lived his married life much as he’d done during his growing years, as recklessly and as thoughtlessly as possible. Luckily, shortly after moving to Almost, Carolyn had found Pete Jackson, a former FBI agent, and he’d brought the bloom back to her cheeks and, after saving Carolyn’s life, he’d saved her heart, too.

  The two women were close friends now, closer even than Taylor was to her own sister, Allison, she thought wistfully. But even that closeness wouldn’t allow her to reveal how thoroughly shaken she was by Steve Kessler’s presence in her home. Especially not in front of Pete and the girls.

  “Sammie Jo did call to warn you about this, didn’t she?” Carolyn asked, then turned suddenly. “Oh, girls, I forgot the deviled eggs. They’re out in the truck.”

  The girls pelted out the door, looking so much like she and Allison must have as children that Taylor found herself holding her breath.

  “We’ll stay young forever, won’t we, Taylor?”

  “As long as we can, Allie.”

  But Allison hadn’t been home in twelve years. She’d never met her nieces and nephews. She’d never met Carolyn or Pete. She hadn’t even come home for Daddy’s funeral. Or Doug’s.

  “Where are the boys?”

  Taylor grimaced, but was glad to be brought back to the present. “They’re out with Doc. They’re doing community service again.”

  Pete chuckled. “The guy at the paint store in Levelland can send his kids to college on what those three cost in paint.”

  Carolyn smiled. “Almost has the best-dressed porches in West Texas, thanks to their service.”

  Taylor shook her head. “They, of course, are vastly proud of themselves for having the foresight to have considered murder and mayhem in Almost before it even happened.”

  Pete frowned. “Does Kessler think it’s related to what happened last spring?”

  “I’m not sure—oh, here he is,” Taylor said.

  Steve had come into the living room from the kitchen and was soon standing too close to her for any degree of comfort. She glanced up at him and thought she could read a measure of apology in his gaze. A slow flush stained her cheeks as she recalled her telling glance, her embarrassment at hearing what he thought of her beloved little town. And a deeper blush flared across her face as she realized just how thoroughly she’d revealed that she’d been eavesdropping, and how deeply his constraint around her troubled her. It should have made things easier, she thought, but it didn’t. Not at all.

  To cover her discomfort, she introduced everyone, despite the fact they’d already met before.

  The men shook hands and Pete repeated his question.

  Steve shrugged. “It’s hard not to make a connection. We certainly didn’t collar everybody in that little roundup we had. But without a body, without anything really, all I’m doing is playing guessing games.”

  “If I know the boys, they’re driving Doc crazy, searching for the body in every nook and cranny in the county,” Carolyn said.

  “They’ve got the right idea,” Steve said, smiling, “Spread the word we’re missing our nearly dead guy and maybe someone will find him.”

  Carolyn gave him a speculative look. “You don’t seem terribly daunted by the boys.” And she laughed aloud at the mock look of horror he gave her. “Oh, you’re hooked already.”

  Taylor didn’t know which of them she wanted to hit first, her sister-in-law or the Texas Ranger, who seemed to be able to manage her sons with a single raised eyebrow yet pretended he couldn’t tell them apart.

  The girls returned with Carolyn’s fam
ous deviled eggs, accompanied by their Aunt Sammie Jo and her husband, Cactus Jack, who was carrying a huge Dutch oven filled with barbecued brisket.

  “Everybody in town will likely be dropping by this afternoon to hear what’s going on around here,” Aunt Sammie Jo said, kissing Taylor and sizing up Steve with an appreciative stare. “So we brought a little something to fill their stomachs. Cactus, did you remember the paper plates?”

  Cactus hadn’t. The girls were dispatched to run to the car and collect them.

  Sammie Jo was right. Ten minutes later, Mickey Sanders dropped by with a Crock-Pot filled with beans. “It’s so hot outside I considered bringing a salad, but the way I figure it, beans go with anything. Now, Taylor, shall I just take them in the dining room? I know a few other people will probably be dropping by and I might as well get dibs on the plug-in.”

  Mickey Sanders and Sammie Jo were both right. Less than five minutes after Mickey got the Crock-Pot situated where she wanted it, Alva Lu Harrigan made her careful way up Taylor’s steps with a sheet cake covered with aluminum foil. “It’s a 7 Up cake,” she said, holding the pan over the girls’ heads, apparently not trusting them with it, and handing it to Taylor directly. “Don’t set it on the table without a hot plate, it’s still warm.”

  Taylor hid her amusement as she accepted the offerings and directed the girls to dig in her buffet cabinet for hot pads and warming plates. If they had this much food already, by five the table would be covered.

  The girls were in fine fettle, enjoying the responsibility of hostessing. Darting in and out of the dining room, greeting neighbors and family, they happily arranged the table, peeked beneath Tupperware lids and peeled back aluminum foil wrappers with all the glee of children at a holiday party.

  As people continued dropping around, Taylor’s house did take on the atmosphere of a fully planned party. The last time she’d had so many people in the house was a reception she’d thrown for Carolyn and Pete’s wedding. And the time before that had been minutes after Doug’s funeral.

  On the first occasion, conversation had centered around congratulations to Carolyn and Pete, and on the second, commiseration on the loss of her husband. The group now gathering in her living room, talking with the ease of old friendships and enmities, and swelling with each passing moment, was there for one purpose only: gossip.

  Homer Chalmers leaned his cane behind the front door and handed Taylor a bag of shelled pecans. “From my trees,” he said as he walked past her to shake hands with Steve. “Met yesterday out at Charlie Hampton’s. Found that fellow yet?”

  Sam Harrigan brought a case of soda and took some time on the front porch moving the cans into a large cooler filled with ice. He handed Steve a chilled can and said, as if their conversation the day before had never ended, “Could be that fella the boys saw downed was that fancy-dressing salesman that comes round selling fertilizer. Comes by about once a month. Fancier duds, I never did see.”

  Cactus Jack sent the girls running to the Almost Minimart for a box of cigars he’d been keeping in the cooler for a special occasion. “Somebody showing up nearly dead then going missing warrants a cigar all around, don’t you think? And don’t go getting in the cash register, hear?”

  Taylor felt a rush of gratitude for her family and friends. These were real people, men and women of heart. They would gather this way if someone’s house had burned, if someone died, someone married, someone had a problem that needed solving, or if the sky turned cloudy and promised rain. Food, one of the basic human needs, would be mounded on empty tables, and conversation would smooth away all woes.

  Sure, they were curious, but mostly they wanted to support her, make her feel nurtured by her fellow humankind. Every laugh, every bit of food consumed, every touch on her arm conveyed their love for her, their concern that she and the boys would be safe and happy.

  Aunt Sammie Jo asked Carolyn, “Doc has the boys with him?”

  “Community service,” Carolyn answered with a grin.

  Sammie Jo rolled her expressive eyes. “My porch has been five different colors in as many years.”

  Charlie Hampton picked up Sam Harrigan’s speculation about the fancy-dressing salesman. “That salesman fella sells fertilizer for an outfit by the name of ChemCon. Probably got his card somewheres. What’s that you say?”

  Homer nearly shouted, “Foreign-sounding name.”

  Charlie nodded and glanced up at Taylor with a wink.

  Sam Harrigan asked if anybody had “seen that fella that runs the antique store? Martha Thompson was telling Alva Lu yesterday that she dropped by with something to sell and said nobody answered the door.”

  Alva Lu nodded. “Maybe that was him the boys saw—what’s his name, Sam?”

  “Jose. And it couldn’t of been him. The boys said the man had fancy clothes on. Jose Caldrerros don’t have enough money for basics, let alone frills. Never seen him outta coveralls and that yellow shirt in the three years he’s been here.”

  “Think we’re gonna get some rain?” Dallan Sanders asked Pete, pointing out the front door.

  “God knows we need it,” Pete said, giving the one and only proper response.

  Cactus Jack asked the farmer he was talking to, “What’s the world coming to when a quiet little old place like Almost has drug dealers and killings?”

  Sammie Jo turned around from her position behind an easy chair, where she’d been telling Mickey Sanders about the latest Brad Pitt release. “Now, Cactus, we don’t know for sure anybody’s been killed.”

  Sam Harrigan said, frowning, “You know, now I come to think of it, Jose goes out of town a lot, buying stuff for his store. That’s probably where he is.”

  “Seems strange he goes and buys stuff when he don’t sell a blessed thing.”

  “Martha Thompson bought a doodad for her sister’s birthday at that store just last month.”

  Homer said, “I did see a stranger in town the other day. Yesterday, maybe the day before. Don’t remember. Saw him buying gas at Sammie Jo’s.”

  “That wasn’t a stranger, that was my nephew up from Midland to pay his respects,” Alva Lu said, and sniffed. “He’s in the oil business, you know.”

  “Not Jimmy. I know Jimmy. Known him since he was knee-high to a fence post. No. Somebody else. In a white four-door Chevy. Think it was a ninety or ninety-one model. Hard to tell nowadays. So many danged makes and models.”

  “Must’ve been some teacher going out to talk at the Pep Alternative School.”

  “When are you going to put another bathroom in this place, Taylor? You know how I hate to stand in line. Never mind, I’ll just go home and use the facilities there.”

  “Well, I should think so,” Alva Lu said. “You live next door.”

  Steve felt as if he’d strayed into some bizarre universe. Possible murder, missing wounded, and the entire town of Almost had turned up at Taylor’s house to discuss the matter. And the weather. And anything else that crossed their minds.

  He watched with a renewed sense of having fallen through the looking glass as elderly women with carefully arranged hair and flower-print dresses over support hose and stocky shoes set out steaming casseroles in the dining room, instructing Taylor to fetch a pie server or a slotted spoon or a knife. Younger women, wearing jeans or shorts, followed the directions of their seniors and stacked paper plates and napkins on the table and went searching for plastic flatware and paper cups. One of the older women directed a young girl of about twenty to dust off a lovely cut-crystal punch bowl.

  “I remember Taylor’s mama using that bowl at Extension Club meetings. That was...oh, a thousand years ago. Taylor! Do you have any orange sherbet? Wasn’t that what your mama used in her punch? That and ginger ale. And something else...”

  “Pineapple juice,” Taylor called out from across the room.

  “Now, Trixie, set that bowl at the far end of the table. Careful. Good. Now, why don’t you run down to Sammie Jo’s and get the things we need. Just leave this five-d
ollar bill on the counter. That should more than cover it.”

  The men, both young and old, gathered in the living room until the Leary-Jackson girls returned with Cactus Jack’s box of cigars, then moved as one to the front porch.

  By the time Taylor’s living room clock chimed the fifth hour of this strange afternoon, some fifty or sixty people were crammed into every available space both inside and outside the house. And Steve had met each and every one, shaken every hand, had tried answering every question, no matter how rhetorical.

  Charlie Hampton walked past him, heading out to the shade of a broad elm for a chew of tobacco, and as he passed, he gave Steve a slap on the back. “Good to have you here, boy.”

  The words and the gesture were executed in exactly the same way his grandfather had slapped him on the back when he was a kid. The same way he might slap a fellow Ranger on the back after a particularly hard case...a bit of sympathy, a bit of bracing up and a lot of fraternity.

  Gullible Steve stared after him, feeling adrift, his furious adherence to caution and self-pity evaporating a bit more. He liked it here. He really liked being around these people, their warmth, their friendliness. Yes, he liked these hardworking, caring folk.

  Cynical Steve shook his head. He had the sinking feeling he’d made the biggest mistake of his entire career by coming to Almost to follow up on a poorly written letter hinting at trouble in the small town. The place and all the people in it were a vortex of some kind, sucking him in.

  A trill of laughter attracted his attention and he swiveled to see Taylor across the crowded front porch, laughing at something her sister-in-law was saying. She was the strongest magnet of them all, he thought. Not just for him, but somehow for everyone in Almost. She seemed to embody the warmth of the town, the heat of the summer day.

  All eyes seemed to linger on her and, regardless of West Texas geniality, no one seemed to miss an opportunity to touch her, to stroke her arm or lean against her shoulder for a moment. Women reached sun-scarred hands to adjust her hair or pet her cheeks. Men drew themselves up a little straighter, sucking in their bellies when she walked by or looked their way. She couldn’t turn to walk anywhere without an elbow being held out for escort.