Could he bring himself to come back then and see Violet swollen with their child?
He swore and slammed his hand on the steering wheel.
“Dad?”
“Sorry. I didn’t realize leaving would be this hard. It sucks.”
“It really does.” He heard no criticism in her voice. Maybe his declaration that this was hard for him, too, made her realize that he wasn’t leaving this town unscathed. He cared. God, did he care.
He pulled onto the shoulder and got out.
Sam approached the fence, drinking in every detail of the half-revived fair.
The magical carousel ride gleamed in the sun. He should be here to take a ride when it was running, especially with his daughter. It would be amazing.
Would the ladies bring Gramps here so he could see it? Probably. They liked him. They respected him. Now that Sam knew them, he understood they would do right by Carson Carmichael.
* * *
FROM THE CORNER of her eye, Violet noticed Rachel enter the diner with her two girls.
Tori’s eyes were red, her little face puffy.
So, Sam and Chelsea had left.
Why hadn’t Violet felt it, like having the breath sucked out of her? But no. Outside, it was a normal sunny day. Inside the diner, customers placed orders and expected service.
She approached Rachel’s table. “They’re gone, aren’t they?”
Tori started to cry. Violet sat in the booth and gathered the child into her arms. “You’ll be okay, sweetheart. It will take a while but we’ll all be okay.”
If only she could believe that in her heart. Sure, she would do all of the right things. She would put one foot in front of the other day after day, but a piece of her was now missing and she wanted it back. That wasn’t going to happen.
A heart, once given, could not be taken back.
“You love him,” Rachel said. “For the first time since I’ve known you, your face is an open book. You love that guy already. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t have given him so much of your attention and time and emotion, even anger, since the first moment he arrived in town.”
“I don’t know why I love him.”
“I do. He’s a decent man. Even though he came here dishonestly, his motivations were good. He wanted to protect Carson. He loves him even more than we do. I can’t fault him for that.”
“That doesn’t mean that he loves me.”
“When you enter a room, he lights up. His eyes never leave you.”
“That only means he’s attracted to me physically.”
“I’ve had that man in my house for the past three weeks. He’s deeper than that. He cares.”
“But not enough to stay.”
“No. Not enough to stay.”
* * *
SAM LEANED HIS arms on the top of the fence. Chelsea joined him, crying as though her heart was shattering.
Maybe it was.
His heart sure felt that way.
“Chelsea, I don’t understand. You were raised in New York. You’re urban through and through. You have a bunch of friends.”
“Yes.” She nodded and hiccupped. “So?”
“So why do you like it here so much that you want to live here? I assume you’re crying so hard because you’d like to stay here indefinitely.”
“It’s special, Dad. There are really nice people. There’s no noise. There are animals everywhere.”
“You don’t think maybe it’s just the novelty of being in some place different?”
“No, Dad.”
“You don’t think it might wear off?”
“No. I really like it here.”
Was it truly that simple for her? Could she make the change so easily?
After a while, Sam noticed a man watching them. He stood beside an old ride with a toolbox in his hand.
Sam glanced at him, did a double take, then stared.
“Chelsea?”
“Yeah?”
“Dry your eyes for me, possum, and check out that guy standing beside the carousel. What do you think of him?”
“What do you mean? He’s just a guy.” She pulled a tissue out of her pocket, dried her tears and looked again. “Oh! Dad, doesn’t he sort of look like you? A lot? Like not exactly, but it’s like you could be brothers except that his hair is dark.”
“I was thinking the same thing. He looks hostile, though. Wonder why?”
The man approached and asked, “You’re a Carmichael, aren’t you?” Actually, it was more a statement than a question, and his tone was definitely hostile.
Sam nodded. “Who are you?”
The guy didn’t respond. He looked maybe five years older than Sam.
Sam had an eerie feeling that some things were starting to fall into place. “What’s your mother’s first name?” Sam asked, remembering the story of his dad leaving town because of a woman.
“Candace.”
Sam’s eyes widened. That had been her name.
“So he mentioned my mom, did he?”
“By he, I assume you mean Carson II?”
The man’s belligerent chin jutted forward. “That’s right.”
Sam smiled but grimly. “No, I’m afraid he didn’t. Sorry.”
“Figures.” He stalked away.
Sam had a half brother he’d never known. This, he, was what Sam’s father had left behind. He was a responsibility Sam’s father had run from.
So what had happened? Dad had gotten Candace pregnant but had refused to give up his dreams of an Ivy League education out east? Had Dad run from her rather than take responsibility? Or had he not believed the child was his?
Sam could tell him that he was, beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Had Dad been nothing so much as a coward? Sam had never thought so, but he’d left a child behind without a second thought. Had he at least sent financial support? Sam didn’t think so. That guy had been bitter and angry and ready to spit on anyone with the last name Carmichael.
How had Gramps not known he had a grandson here in town? How did the whole town not know of it? Had Candace left town and come home later with a child and maybe a new husband? Someone had said she had been married.
All of these years of being an only child, Sam could have had a brother. He could have known his half sibling.
He would have liked that.
He glanced at Chelsea quietly sniffling beside him. Sam was about to do the same thing to her. How like his father was he?
All of his life, Sam had striven to please his parents because he thought kids were supposed to. Dad had been cutthroat in business—the acquisition of more and more money important to him.
Sam realized now, looking back, how much he’d been like his dad at times, and how his parents had nudged him toward Tiffany.
Look how it had all turned out. He’d done everything his parents had asked of him, and all he had left to show for it outside a healthy bank account was a need for revenge that was maybe ruining his character.
His phone rang. He checked the number. John Raven. Tired of his new business partners checking in, Sam took the call, but nothing John said made sense. He might as well have been speaking gibberish. Sam’s ears rang. His head ached.
He asked John to repeat himself, but Sam still couldn’t process it. He realized why.
The business didn’t matter to him. It no longer meant a thing. None of it mattered because revenge was a hollow aspiration.
Success is the best revenge.
Yes, but did it have to be measured only financially? Couldn’t success be measured by the amount of love in your life? By the quality of your friends? By the outstanding beauty and generosity of your lover?
He hung up on John. He couldn’t stand another s
econd of useless chatter. He turned off his phone so the man wouldn’t call back.
What he really wanted to do was chuck the thing as far across the fields as he could and never have any contact with his partners, his business and his lawyers again.
He wanted peace. And happiness. And Violet.
Chelsea leaned her head on his shoulder. She must be really upset to seek comfort from him even when she was so angry with him.
He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her around to stand in front of him. She watched him with a puzzled frown.
Cupping her face in the palms of his hands, he kissed her forehead, leaving his mouth to rest there for a moment, inhaling the essence of his daughter. He would know her anywhere.
He pulled back and stared into her eyes. “You have been the best thing that ever happened in my life. The absolute best. Better than any business success. Better than any money. Better than anything.”
Chelsea’s eyes filled with tears.
“I love you with all of my heart and soul.”
“I love you, too, Daddy, but I don’t want to leave here.”
“Neither do I. Should we go back and I’ll get married to Violet and get to know our baby and make more babies?”
“Do you mean it?” She looked afraid to hope.
“From the deepest corner of my heart.”
“Yeah!” She ran for the car. “Hurry, Dad! Hurry before Violet starts to hate you so badly for leaving that she’ll never love you again.”
Sam started the vehicle and pulled away from the shoulder. “You do understand that you’ll have to work your butt off this summer?”
“At the fair?” She looked hopeful.
“Nothing that much fun. I’ll hire a tutor and you’ll have lessons every day. You’ll do homework and you’ll write essays and tests and do whatever else you have to do so you can enter the correct grade here in town in September.”
“Okay.” She sounded docile and he liked it, a good change from ’tude girl.
“I shouldn’t have taken you out of school and dragged you across the country.”
“Yes, you should have, Dad. I know I was in a bad mood, but it’s the best trip I’ve ever taken.”
“Really?”
“I’m so angry about Mom’s behavior and on some level I think I blamed you, too. Maybe if you’d kept her happy she wouldn’t have gone to another man.”
He’d wondered that himself.
“But that’s not true. Mom made her own decisions. If she’d wanted more happiness in her marriage, she should have worked harder. I think a lot of the time Mom coasted.”
“I think so, too.”
“You’re never getting back together and it’s time for me to accept that.”
“Great growing-up wisdom, possum. I’ve had growing to do, too, and there’s still more to be done. At some point, I’ll have to forge a relationship with that guy who’s my half brother. I’m determined to fix my father’s mistakes.”
He grinned at his daughter. “I have a brother and you have an uncle. Woo-hoo.”
Sam’s foot hit the gas pedal. “Let’s go propose to Violet.”
They broke the speed limit on the way back to town.
Ears ringing, Sam rehearsed what he would say to Violet. How could he win her when he’d already said goodbye?
On Main Street, he thought he heard a siren but kept driving.
Pulling into a parking spot in front of the diner with a squeal of tires, he jumped out of the vehicle and raced to the front door.
“Hey,” someone yelled. “Stop right there.”
Sam ran into the Summertime Diner. Everyone stopped eating and turned to stare. No one spoke.
Where was Violet?
“Where is she?” he asked, frantic. Now that he’d made the decision to live here and to be with Violet forever, he needed it to happen now.
Someone pointed to the kitchen.
“Violet,” he called. “Get out here this minute.”
She came out, one haughty eyebrow raised as though to say “Nobody bosses me around.”
God, he loved her. He loved every single thing about her.
Someone grabbed his arm and tried to whip him around, a man in uniform, but Sam could take his eyes from Violet for only a moment. Now that he was here, all of the lovely things he’d rehearsed in the car fled his brain.
“You just sped into town like a maniac. License and registration, now,” the man said.
Sam pulled out his wallet and handed it to the man.
The cop wouldn’t take it. “Sir! Remove your license.”
Instead, Sam took out a wad of bills and held them out. He thought it might be about five hundred bucks.
“Are you trying to bribe an officer of the law?”
“That’s for the speeding ticket,” he murmured while he watched Violet walk toward him, every nuance of her beautiful body dear and familiar to him.
“You can’t—”
“Cole, be quiet.” It sounded like Honey’s voice. “I want to hear what Sam has to say.”
Sam dropped the money and his wallet, took Violet’s hands and urged her closer.
Wrapping his arms around her, he untied her apron and gently lifted it over her head.
“Will!” he yelled.
“Yeah?” The voice was surprisingly close.
Sam glanced over. Will stood on the other side of the counter. Sam tossed Violet’s apron to the man.
“Take over for a while. Violet’s taking a break. Make my daughter a banana split. And anything else she wants.”
Will grinned so widely dimples showed in his usually stoic face. A female nearby sighed. Will frowned.
“Violet, come upstairs with me.”
Before she could answer, Chelsea said, “No, Dad, you have to stay down here.”
Sam laughed. He kissed the backs of Violet’s hands.
“Some things are meant to be private.”
“Daaad. You can do all of that smooching later. First you have to ask her. You have to do it here. I want to hear all of it.”
Sam spoke from his heart. “Violet, I’ve been a fool. I came here all wrong. I should have been honest from the start. Here is my honesty now. From the first second I laid eyes on you, I knew you were special. I love you. I want to marry you. I want to start our family together. I want to do it here in Rodeo. I want to stay.”
“That was great, Dad, but you have to actually ask her.”
“Chelsea, I can do this without your help.” He smiled. “Violet, will you marry me?”
“Yes.” Then Violet Summer burst into tears.
“Stop. Don’t cry. What’s wrong?”
“I’m happy. I’m really, really happy.”
“Me, too!” Chelsea said and a roomful of people burst into laughter.
Sam looked around. Apparently, word had spread like wildfire, or else him screeching through town had brought people out.
As well as the people seated in booths, there were others crowded in the doorway, including Honey and Nadine with huge smiles on their faces.
Petite, gorgeous, misty-eyed Honey Armstrong grasped one of the sheriff’s arms in hers. Tall, handsome Cole Payette stared down at her, wonderment in his expression.
“Okay,” Chelsea announced. “Now you can go upstairs and get up close and personal.”
“Chelsea!” Sam protested. “You’re only thirteen.”
“Going on forty,” Violet said, her voice still sounding damp.
“I’ll stay down here to celebrate with a banana split. Or two.” Chelsea giggled and threw herself into Sam’s arms. “I’m so happy. I love you, Dad.”
Taking the small souvenir purse out of his pocket, now thick with quarters, he gav
e it to his daughter. “Knock yourself out, possum.”
She grinned and sat at the counter.
Life was perfect, better than perfect. It was sublime. Sam’s success included a child he adored, a woman he loved and an unborn child to get to know.
He planned to be there every step of the way, through every doctor’s visit and every breathing exercise. He’d missed these things the first time around with Chelsea because of building a new company.
He didn’t have that to worry about now. There would be something for him to do in his future. He hated to be idle, but an answer, an opportunity, would show itself in time.
Rodeo needed more than just a rodeo every summer to keep it going. It needed industry. Sam knew a lot of people, men and women with influence and money. He could do something for this town.
At the moment, though, all of his creative focus was locked on Violet and celebration.
He took her hand and got out while the getting was good, the townspeople stepping aside and making a path for them to go celebrate their love.
Once outside on the sidewalk and heading to the apartment door, Sam noted Maxine rushing toward the diner.
“Is it true?” She ignored Sam and asked Violet, “Are you getting married?”
There was no happiness in her tone, only belligerence and a vague disappointment directed toward Violet.
What had happened in her past? A bad marriage? A betraying spouse?
Sam understood, but with the blazing light of the newly converted, he also knew that bitterness and single-minded revenge could rob a person of the joys of love.
“Max...” Violet started, but Sam interrupted, intuiting that Max had powerful negativity going on that had nothing to do with either of them.
He sensed how to distract her so she wouldn’t ruin this moment.
“I need to talk to you.”
Max ignored him.
“About the rodeo.”
She glanced his way.
“And how to make it different and unique.”
He had her full attention.
“Polo.”
“What?”
“A polo match.”
She started to turn away but halted when Sam continued, “I have friends with more money than they know what to do with. They would donate horses, stable staff, time and money to an event like this.”
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