Some things she liked, other things she would have to get used to. The constant flow of people from table to table, the myriad conversations flying overhead, and the atmosphere of camaraderie mixed with a barely contained undercurrent of jealousy, hate, and small portions of love—all conspired to make her sense of anticipation grow stronger.
“What would you like to do now?” Gwen asked.
“Now?” Heather replied as she touched her watch. It was almost ten. The strain of the long day was weighing down her mind. “Go to sleep?” she asked in a low voice.
“That’s not too bad an idea,” Gwen replied as she stood.
“The check?” Heather asked as she reached for her purse.
“I’ve already signed it.”
“But….”
“No arguments. We’ll settle everything when the time comes. Don’t forget, I’m going to make a lot of money from your show.”
“Maybe.”
“Definitely. Now, shall we get some of the sleep you just mentioned? We’ve got a big day ahead of us tomorrow.”
“Definitely,” Heather mimicked with a smile.
NINETEEN
Heather threw herself completely into the new world she’d entered. By day, she worked on preparing her show: by night, she was Gwen’s shadow.
Again, on the second night out, Gwen did not introduce her to any of the people who came to the table. Gwen had told her, at home on the first night that it was all a game to make the other gallery people work hard at finding out what she had up her sleeve. If she had introduced Heather, their curiosity would not grow. She wanted Heather to remain a mystery until opening night.
Heather had joined in the game, and whenever anyone came to their table, she studiously ignored them, pretending to look elsewhere.
But, at night, when she was in her bed waiting for sleep to overtake her, her thoughts drifted to Nevada, to the ranch, and to Reid. No matter how hard she tried to avoid it, she couldn’t.
The first two weeks passed quickly and, too soon, Heather realized that within a few days the opening would occur. It was still like a dream in her mind—a scary, wonderful dream come true. If only, she thought, the rest of her dream could come to life with it, she would be content.
Heather sat on the edge of the bed, tired from another long day yet feeling no need to sleep. Again tonight, she and Gwen had gone out to dinner. Once more Heather stepped into the whirlpool of nightlife, with its forced gaiety and charged atmosphere. However, tonight she’d realized she was tiring of it quickly.
It was not a life style she enjoyed, and she wondered how the artists who lived this hectic way were able to sustain the quality of their work. After two weeks of riding this merry-go-round, Heather felt drained.
Polaris laid his head on Heather’s lap, bringing a smile to her face. “Are you getting tired also?” she asked him as she scratched behind his ear. She heard him exhale deeply, as if in agreement, and dropped her cheek to rest on his soft furry head. When she lifted her head, she heard the doorbell ring, and a moment later heard the echo of Gwen’s front door closing.
Standing, Heather went to her door to close it so that both she and Gwen could have their privacy. With her hand on the doorknob, she froze as a chill of recognition ran the length of her spine. Polaris heard the voice, too, and tried to go to its source.
It couldn’t be, she thought as her fingers dug into Polaris’s fur, holding him back. With her breath turning shallow, she listened to the voices arguing only a few yards away.
“You had no right!” came the deep authoritative voice she thought belonged to Reid Hunter. She listened, stunned, as he continued. “You had no right to go to him!”
“I had every right. He’s my brother. He’s your brother, too. You needed his help, but you wouldn’t ask. You wouldn’t ask me or him, so I did it for you,” Gwen replied, her voice as loud as his.
“So you went to him in order for that high-and-mighty bastard who walked out on us ten years ago to come back and throw it in my face?”
“Stop it! You sound like a child.”
“I don’t care how I sound. Do you know how it feels to work day in and day out, to do everything you can, and find that what you’ve worked so hard to build is falling down around your feet?”
“If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have gone to him,” Gwen defended.
“I bet he’s laughing right now. Do you know what he did? Of course you do. You signed the damn papers, didn’t you?”
“Patrick, will you please calm down.” Heather heard the name and her mind reeled with the impact. Patrick, Gwen had called him. Not Reid, but Patrick. He sounded so much like Reid she hadn’t been able to tell the difference. Except thinking about it now, she’d never heard Reid raise his voice—ever.
“Why? After ten years Reid comes back, walks into the house, hands me a piece of paper, and says he’s sorry I’m having troubles. Then turns around and tries to leave.”
“And of course you stopped him. You told him to take his paper and to—.”
“That’s right. It’s exactly what I told him. I don’t need his arrogance. I don’t need help from someone who walked out on his family.”
“He didn’t walk out. Pat, you pushed him out when he wanted understanding. We both did. He didn’t want to leave, not permanently. You gave him no choice. But you knew that, which is why you didn’t give him back the paper.”
“I gave him plenty of choices. He picked the wrong one. Now he has the audacity to come to me and try to help me. Do you know what he did?” Patrick repeated.
“Yes,” Gwen replied. “He gave you our permission to mortgage the ranch. He gave you a way to raise enough money and to prevent you from selling any more of Broadlands’ land. But you can’t handle that, can you?” yelled Gwen, taking the offensive now.
“No,” she continued, her voice growing stronger as she pressed on, “When it was Reid who was available to take the blame for things, you let him: you can’t face your own mistakes. You made one bad decision— just one—and when we offer you help, you can’t handle it.”
“Help? Do you call what he did help? He walked into the house, looked at me, and said he was sorry to hear I was having trouble. Then he handed me the paper and told me it would be a good idea if I went to the bank. He said it would be best not to sell off any more land. Then he turned around and walked out,” Patrick finished.
“No he didn’t,” Gwen stated. “I know you both. You’re both stubborn. Reid waited for you to say something, anything. But you didn’t, did you?”
“I had nothing to say.”
“You could have said thank you,” Gwen told him in a low, tear-filled voice.
Heather was staggered under the wealth of information pouring into her mind. She needed time to accept and understand it. What was happening? What?
Heather couldn’t move. She was rooted to the spot. Suddenly the voices stopped and she heard the front door slam, followed by Gwen’s footsteps on the tile floor of the hallway. She knew Gwen was coming toward her, but still she could not move.
“Oh! Heather!” Gwen said, stopping within inches of her. “I...I’m sorry you had to hear that.”
Stunned, Heather could find no words to answer Gwen. She was shocked and hurt. She had been deceived by Reid, and by Gwen also. The tension and stiffness in her body made her rigid. Slowly, she willed order into the confusion that was her mind, and gradually, over an eternity, she began to breathe again.
“Heather,” Gwen began.
“No,” she said immediately, the word cold and cutting as it echoed in the hallway. “Right now all I want is the truth. No more lies, no more stories. I thought you were my friend. I trusted you. I’ve taken your advice and I’ve listened to you. Now I want some answers, and I want the truth!” she demanded, rage filling her mind.
“Heather, I promised Reid.”
“I don’t give a damn about what you promised Reid!” Releasing her hold on Polaris, Heather crossed her arms on her chest.
She fought away the emotions of betrayal and kept her anger in check, waiting.
“All right, Heather, but can we at least sit down? It’s not a short story,” she sighed.
Once seated in the living room, Gwen began to speak. She spoke for an hour, and when she was done, her cheeks were soaked with tears.
“And that’s why things turned out this way,” shefinished.
Heather was silent, trying to put it all into perspective; but, incensed by Reid Hunter’s pride and his deceit, her anger would not allow logic. Slowly, Heather rose. She took a deep breath before she spoke.
“You do know about Reid and me?” Heather asked. She received silence. “Gwen?” Gwen’s light laughter, bordering on the hysterical, filled the room. “Gwen?”
“I’m sorry. Yes, I know,” she said, and told Heather about what she and Tom had seen.
“Why did Reid tell me we could never have a life together because he was just a cowboy and I owned a ranch? Why did he lie if he loves me?”
“He didn’t lie. He doesn’t own any part of the ranch. I told you he signed over his rights to the ranch when he left ten years ago. Well, he did, but he did not give up his inherited ownership of the ranch—only the monies derived from it.”
“I understand,” Heather said, still controlling the hurt that kept burrowing deeper into her heart. “But it still means he lied to me.”
“Yes and no. When he went to Albuquerque and saw Patrick, he gave Patrick something from both of us. He gave Patrick a legal agreement, deeding to him sole title to Broadlands. In order to get Patrick out of the trouble he was in, Reid and I agreed to relinquish all claims to Broadlands. In effect, we signed over title so he could mortgage the property. Our father put a stipulation in his will, which declared that as long as more than one sibling retained ownership, the land can not be mortgaged. Reid felt there was only one way Pat could get out from under, and we both agreed.
“When Reid returned to your ranch, he had nothing left of his past life. He had just given up the only thing that might possibly have salved his pride enough to bring himself to marry you,” Gwen finished.
“What makes you or him think I would even consider marriage,” Heather spat suddenly. “Marriage means trust! You can’t love and marry someone who lies to you.”
“He didn’t think he had any choice,” pleaded Gwen, still vainly trying to defend her brother.
Suddenly Heather needed to be outside to breathe the sweet, fresh air of the night. With Polaris at her side, Heather strode from the living room. She walked to the rear of the adobe house and out the back door. Stepping into the cool New Mexican night, Heather walked to the bench that was in the center of Gwen’s garden. She needed to be alone and to try and understand what had happened to her life. She desperately needed to bury her love so she could rid herself of the awful pain tearing her apart.
TWENTY
Reid sat on the split-wood fence, which surrounded the original Strand homestead. His attention fixed on a rabbit twenty feet away. The rabbit sat up; its eyes searched the area around it warily. It bolted suddenly as Reid lit a cigarillo. His hazel eyes tracked the animal until it disappeared behind the pointed tufts of a small clump of sagebrush.
Reid’s focused on the spot where the rabbit had disappeared, but he didn’t see the sagebrush; he saw nothing at all. His mind had not registered what his eyes had seen. Reid’s thoughts were miles from Nevada.
It had been two weeks since he’d last seen Heather, he thought as he took another deep inhalation of smoke. Then, as he exhaled, he hopped down from the fence and forced away the thought that came chasing on the heels of his first one. He walked, trying to think about the camp that would be here next summer and tried to picture the children who would be here, learning, playing, and enjoying life.
It didn’t work. He wanted to enjoy life too. He wanted to ride this land, not alone, as he had today but with the woman he had ridden with months ago to this very spot.
Reid pictured Heather as she rode the gelding, her head bent close to the horse’s neck urging him along the plateau on that clear and cloudless day. The smile, which had radiated over her face, had filled him with unspoken joy.
Then Reid remembered the last times he and Heather had talked—fought, actually. He had tried to make her understand what was driving him, but she would not listen. When in desperation he told her he’d leave, she wouldn’t let him do that either. “You’re not walking out on this ranch or your promise, Reid Hunter!” she’d said. Her face had been set in grim lines of determination and Reid had known he would be unable to go.
Those last words she’d said to him bothered him more than anything else. “You have the one thing that is more important,” she’d told him. Reid had spent the last lonely weeks trying to figure out what she’d meant.
Stopping himself from further thought, Reid crushed the cigarillo beneath his boot and turned around. Slowly, like a drill biting into rock, he started to comprehend what Heather had meant. He walked purposefully toward his horse.
Reid untied the horse from the fence, but before he mounted, he looked back at the old house built by one of Heather’s pioneering ancestors. In the five months he’d been here, Heather Strand had turned his well-ordered life around and made him question the basic commitments relentlessly driving him.
Yes, suddenly Reid knew what it was he had been searching for all these years. He knew what he wanted and where it was. He had known it on the first night he and Heather had spent together, the night they had shared themselves with each other and become one. But, until now he had not permitted himself to think about it, or believe it would be possible.
Slipping his foot into the stirrup, Reid mounted his horse. With a flick of his wrist, he turned the animal and started back to the ranch and his office.
Reid Hunter had a phone call to make.
~~~
Heather sat on the cotton-weave couch in Gwen’s living room, sipping iced tea and fighting to keep her mind focused on the path she had set. Last night in the garden, she’d sat for many hours, thinking, crying, and reassessing her needs. What she learned last night had nearly devastated her.
The words Patrick Hunter had spoken and the truth Gwen had revealed took from her the one hope she had been nurturing since she’d stepped onto the plane in Nevada—her hope that Reid would not give up on their love. Last night she had realized he would give it up. Their love, founded on lies, half-truths, and deception, could not grow.
Heather knew she had to do what she’d always done—keep her life going. At one point last night, Gwen had come out to the garden and sat next to her. Reid’s sister had been silent for a long time, but finally she had spoken.
“I am sorry, Heather—more so than you can imagine. I’m sorry you had to learn about Reid in this way. He…he’s my brother and I love him. In the short time we’ve known one another I’ve grown to love you also. I don’t know whether you believe me or not, but hiding the truth from you was tearing me apart. I despise dishonesty, but I kept hoping it would be Reid who would tell you the truth.”
Heather had not replied right away. She had listened to what Gwen had to say and had thought about it. She remembered the instant sensation of friendship she’d experienced and the trust her instincts had told her to place in the woman. Had that, too, been because of her feelings for Reid? No, it had been because she liked Gwen Hunter as her own person.
While she had sat there thinking, she’d heard Gwen take a deep breath, stand, and begin to walk away.
“Wait,” she had called. “Gwen, you’re not to blame. I know you were caught in the middle and I know you’re my friend.”
A moment later, she had felt Gwen’s arms go around her, pulling her into a close embrace. “I wish I could help you,” Gwen had said in a choked voice. “I wish I could.”
Strangely, Heather had begun to feel worse for Gwen than for herself. Her arms had gone around her friend and she had comforted the tall woman. There had been no need for w
ords. A few minutes later, Gwen had drawn away and left Heather to her solitude.
She’d spent a good portion of the night sitting on the bench, unresponsive to the cold night air, while Polaris had lain uncomplaining at her feet. Finally, her mind had settled and she had started to block out some of the hurt. It would take time, she had realized—time, work, and effort—to rid herself of the love she felt for Reid Hunter.
She had also taken the time to reinforce her resolve to build her career. From this moment forward, she would not make the same mistake. She had given herself twice, and was rejected twice. She would accept no more rejection. From this point on Heather would dedicate herself to her art, and give all her love to it.
“You must be exhausted,” Gwen said as she sat next to Heather, bringing her mind back from last night.
“I’m not allowed to be. We have another night of dining and partying awaiting us,” Heather remarked, trying to bring some humor into her voice.
“We did, but I thought you might not want to because...”
“Because?” Heather prompted at Gwen’s hesitation.
“Well, after last night I didn’t think you’d be in a very sociable mood.”
“Thank you—you’re right. But I think I do want to go out,” she said, preferring a crowd to a lonely room.
“You’re not too tired?”
“An elephant would be tired trying to keep up with you!” Heather declared.
“But it was for the best, wasn’t it?”
“I’m still mad at you for sneaking in that interview.”
“Be mad, but smile, because that interview is going to make you a lot of money. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some calls to make.”
“Tom?” Heather asked.
“First Lauren—I have to check on the final details of the party. We only have until tomorrow at seven to have everything ready. Then Tom.”
“Will many people come?” Heather asked. She still couldn’t believe her first showing would draw the crowd Gwen had said it would.
Cry Mercy, Cry Love Page 17