One True Thing

by Marilyn Pappano

  All those maybes added up to one thing—trouble. She was trouble in its most dangerous form—walking, talking, smiling. Sweet, delicate, pretty, tempting.

  So tempting he was at risk of forgetting that he’d sworn off trouble for good.

  Rolling his shoulders to ease the tension there, he changed the subject to one that hopefully couldn’t lead them into unstable territory. “Did your research into the area tell you how Heartbreak got its name?”

  She shook her head.

  “In the early 1900s, there was nothing around here but a few cattle ranches and some oil fields until an oil man by the name of Philbert Stephens—Shay Rafferty’s great-great-grandfather—turned it all into a town, named Flora in honor of ol’ Bert’s fiancée. Once he’d made his fortune and built a grand house, he brought Flora out from South Carolina for the wedding. She took one look around and decided no way was she going to live in such an uncivilized place and hightailed it back East, breaking Bert’s heart in the process. The townsfolk, who were none too fond of the name to start with, renamed it Heartbreak to commemorate the event.”

  “Poor Bert had to live with that reminder the rest of his life, huh?”

  “Nah, he got over it pretty quick. He married three times, produced fourteen children and died at the ripe old age of eighty-three.”

  “So his heartbreak was short-lived but the name stuck anyway. I would have called it Heartbroke, though. It sounds more Oklahoma-y and cowboyish and small-townish. Isn’t there a country song about being heartbroke?”

  “Only about a million,” he said with a snort. “If you listened to the music instead of turning your nose up at it, you’d know that.”

  “I don’t turn my nose up at it. I’m not a snob.”

  Again he snorted. “You’re the one who assumed I didn’t go to college because I’m a dumb, lazy cowboy.”

  “I didn’t—!” She cut off the protest with a deep breath. “I never said you were dumb or lazy, though I plead guilty to calling you a cowboy.”

  “You said I lack ambition.” He baited her.

  “You said it first. You’re obviously very intelligent, and God knows, you’ve got enough curiosity for any ten people. And as for being lazy…” She opened her mouth a time or two, but found nothing to say. As he broke into laughter, she clamped it shut.

  “Okay. We’ll strike the dumb, disagree about the cowboy and ignore the lazy.” Immediately, though, he disregarded his own words. “I’m not really lazy. These past few months I’ve just been…”

  “Recuperating?” she suggested when he fell silent.

  He gave her a sharp look. “What makes you think that?”

  She responded with a shrug. “You’re obviously intelligent. You haven’t isolated yourself out there at the lake for nothing, and you’re obviously not a loner by nature. Presumably you’re out there for a reason, presumably getting over something that happened, presumably last winter.”

  He remembered the curiosity she’d shown at Shay’s café when the past winter had come up in the conversation. You answer all my questions, he’d told her, and I’ll answer yours.

  Neither of them had gone for it.

  “Is this a writer thing—observing people, analyzing them?”

  The mention of her work had the desired effect—made her back off. She gazed out the window, realized they were approaching Reese’s driveway and said with fake cheer, “Saved from having to change the subject again, aren’t we?”

  For the moment, he thought as he turned into the drive. But maybe not much longer.

  The Founder’s Day celebration was held in a small park bordered with woods on one side, baseball fields on another and tennis courts on the third. The street on the fourth side was clogged with cars on both sides, which Reese drove past to the park entrance. Being the sheriff and on duty entitled him to a space near the center of activity, Cassidy assumed as they climbed out of his SUV.

  Neely, in her sleeveless cotton dress with its muted floral print, fit in perfectly with the women in the park. Except for Reese and the half dozen deputies wearing the Canyon County Sheriff’s Department uniform, most of the men wore jeans and work shirts, the majority of them with gimme caps or straw cowboy hats. Cassidy and Jace, each in tailored shorts, a T-shirt for her, a polo shirt for him, looked like tourists who’d taken a wrong turn somewhere. He didn’t seem to notice, though, and she…well, she was accustomed to being the odd one out.

  Without today’s festival, the park would have little to offer in terms of entertainment. There were a few picnic tables scattered around beneath giant oaks, two swing sets that were each missing one or more swings, a merry-go-round and a teeter-totter with the ground worn away underneath in such a way that it would turn to mud when it rained. Mostly there was grass, lots of it, nowhere near manicured but mowed, and lots of big, shady trees. For imaginative kids who made their own fun, it was a great place. For kids who relied on structure and guidance, it wasn’t.

  Today, though, there was plenty to do. Grills and smokers were set up to one side to provide the barbecue, and flanking them, long tables groaned under the weight of the accompaniments. They headed that way first, to drop off Neely’s and Cassidy’s contributions to the meal—a large container of tabouli from Neely and Cassidy’s own favorite cream cheese/caramel/pumpkin spice cake. Then they strolled toward the booths that faced each other across a wide, grassy aisle, the women leading, the men following.

  “Are you a crafty person?” Neely asked as they stopped to examine the items at the first booth.

  Cassidy glanced up sharply, feeling the sting of the question, only to find the other woman holding up an adorable hand-painted flower pot. “Oh…uh, no. I’m not.”

  “Me, either. I look at these things and think, ‘I can do that.’ It’s just a clay pot, some paints and some sponges. But either I never try, or if I do, it turns out awful. I have no artistic sense whatsoever.”

  “Me, neither,” Cassidy murmured as she returned her gaze to the display of goods. She wouldn’t have been so quick to read Neely wrong if Jace hadn’t so casually confronted her on her propensity to lie—and to do so badly, in his opinion. She didn’t care if she was a bad liar—preferred it, in fact. She rarely stuck around long enough for people to realize how seldom she told the truth, and even if they did realize it, so what? They could either live with it or keep their distance. Whichever they chose didn’t matter to her.

  Those options were open to Jace, as well, and his choice didn’t matter, either.

  Not very much.

  They examined jewelry, ceramics and paintings on every surface imaginable. There were myriad angels and puppy dogs, cow-spotted foot stools and chairs and pot holders, horsey things, toys and dolls. There were dozens of things she was tempted to buy, but in the end she didn’t open her purse for any of it. If she had a home of her own, that would be one thing, but there was no point when she might have to flee on a moment’s notice. Given five minutes to load her car and hit the road, she would grab clothing and her computer, not a cow foot stool or a whimsically decorated wicker basket.

  Though some part of her yearned for those meaningless decorations to clutter up her life. More accurately, she yearned for the sort of life that allowed for decorative clutter.

  “Are you normally this controlled when you shop?”

  She glanced over her shoulder at Jace, who was standing close behind her, while Neely debated the choices for a gift for her mother. “I can spend money with the best of them.”

  “But not on handmade crap like this?”

  Her gaze narrowed as she moved away from the booth and strolled past the next one, a fish-to-win-a-goldfish game, to the one beyond that. “I like handmade stuff.” Then she glanced at the Southern belle dolls, their long crocheted skirts concealing toilet paper rolls or tissue boxes, and amended that. “A lot of it, at least. But I have to make room in the car for anything I buy, and then I have to find room for it in my apartment when I get home. So, yes, I tend to
restrain my buying impulses.”

  She picked up a carved wooden bowl, little bigger than her fist, and ran her fingers over its smooth surface. “I take it other women you’ve brought—” No, bad choice of words. That implied an invitation supported by a desire to share her company. Though he’d claimed he would have invited her given the chance, the fact was, Neely’s order had taken away his choice. “The other women who have accompanied you to these events haven’t been as appreciative of the selection.”

  “What makes you think I’ve brought other women?”

  “I assume previous experiences are causing you to expect the worst of me, or maybe you’re still laboring under the delusion that I’m a snob.” She gave the delicate bowl one final caress before regretfully replacing it. It was gorgeous, but thirty-five dollars for a bowl whose sole function was to be gorgeous was a bit pricey for her. And that—money—was the real reason behind her restraint. She had a nice little stash, thanks to Phil, but who knew when she might need it? When she might regret every penny she’d spent on nonessentials?

  She turned to leave the booth for the one across the aisle, but paused a moment, facing him. “Or maybe you’re just determined to be mean to me,” she remarked before taking advantage of a break in the crowd to reach the other booth.

  The booth was being run by Olivia Harris, a true Southern belle who’d planted her roots in Heartbreak. At the organizational meeting, Neely had given Cassidy the short version of Olivia’s history—finding herself flat broke after her husband’s death, forced to uproot her daughters to move halfway across the country, making a new life for herself on the Harris ranch, marrying Guthrie, giving him two sons in addition to the twins and living happily-ever-after. She was lovely, serene, the easy, drawling way she talked matching the easy womanly way she moved. She greeted Cassidy as if they were really friends, making her wish fervently they were, making her wonder how foolish it would be to pretend, just for a while.

  They’d chatted for several minutes before Jace joined her. “I haven’t been mean to you,” he announced defensively.

  She responded with a sniff and started to move on, but he caught her arm. “You were right. When I brought Julie to the barbecue a few years ago, she was condescending and rude. She called all these people hayseeds and made fun of the crafts and criticized the food and insulted just about everyone she met, thinking her put-downs were so clever and they were too stupid to recognize them. And when Amanda spent last Thanksgiving with us, she said she’d come and done what was expected of her, and I’d better not ever ask her to do it again.”

  Julie and Amanda, Cassidy mused. So that was his type—shallow, none too bright, wrongly convinced of their own superiority. Beautiful, for sure, and probably city girls, with that disdain so many city dwellers felt for small towns.

  Where had Jace hooked up with two city girls? Did he seek his fun in Tulsa or Oklahoma City, only an hour or so to the east or west? Or had he lived someplace else and neglected to mention it?

  Gee, wouldn’t that be a surprise? she thought dryly, considering all the little things she’d neglected to mention.

  “Julie and Amanda.” She couldn’t resist shading the names with a bit of her own smug superiority. “Let me guess—tall, anorexic, beautiful, IQs smaller than their bust sizes, sexy, great in bed, material girls. Am I right?”

  He looked rueful. “Close enough.”

  “You have lousy taste in women.”

  His fingers tightened around her hand. “It’s improving.”

  Her breath caught in her chest and her skin warmed as if someone had turned the sun overhead to full strength. He didn’t mean anything by that, she warned herself. Couldn’t mean anything. He valued honesty in a relationship, and knew she was nothing but lies. He was a laid-back sort, while danger followed wherever she went. He was home, and she had no home.

  No home. No permanence. No family. No friends. No kind of life.

  Gently she pulled free of him, called goodbye to Olivia, then resumed her browsing. She was acutely aware of him right behind her, but he did nothing to force her attention to him and she did everything to keep it away from him.

  They’d made it through about half the booths when Neely and Reese caught up. “My poor baby’s starving,” she announced, giving her six-foot-plus baby a sympathetic glance. “You guys ready for lunch, or do you want to meet us later?”

  Jace looked to Cassidy to answer. All it took was one deep breath filled with the smoky aromas of ribs, brisket and sausages to decide for her. While Neely claimed a newly vacated picnic table in the shade, Cassidy and the two men got in line. She filled her plate with small samples of everything and still wound up with way too much, she lamented when she slid onto the concrete bench across from Neely.

  “It’s once a year. You’re allowed to overindulge,” Neely said with a laugh. “Besides, Guthrie Harris was right the other day. These women sure can cook. The barbecue sauce is Aunt Rozena’s specialty—that’s Jace’s mother. I’m sure she’ll come wandering over to meet you as soon as she gets a chance. The ribs and brisket are Hallie’s contribution, though she left the smoking to others. If Brady couldn’t cook, the Marshall family would live in starvation mode.”

  “I heard that,” Hallie retorted as she passed by, a baby in a sling against her chest and a tall, handsome, stern-faced man at her side. He wore a sheriff’s deputy’s uniform with a large pistol on the gun belt—not necessary at all, Cassidy was sure. He could intimidate the most hardened crook with nothing more than a look from that hard, dark gaze.

  The gaze that softened tremendously when he glanced down at his wife and daughter.

  “Hey, Cassidy. Having a good time?” Hallie asked.

  “Yeah, I am.” The lukewarm tone of her response reminded her of a conversation with Jace the weekend before, when he’d told her about the festival. Sounds nice, she’d remarked, and he had dryly responded, Now there’s a big endorsement.

  She really was having a good time. This very well might be the most comfortable and relaxed she’d gotten in public in three years. The only times she had looked over her shoulder had been to locate Jace or Neely and Reese. She hadn’t scrutinized the faces of every farmer, cowboy or deputy for familiar features, hadn’t scoped out hiding places or the quickest exits. She had simply enjoyed.

  And that was a habit she couldn’t fall into. She had to stay alert and ready. That and luck were the only things keeping her alive.

  Jace and Reese delivered three overflowing plates to the table, then left to get drinks from a nearby booth. When they returned, they took a few minutes to make a good start on their meals, then Reese shifted his attention to her. “Paulette tells us you’re from Alabama, but Jace says it’s California and Ginger says South Carolina.”

  Lie like a dog—that was her motto, and she did so with a smile. “Actually, I’m from Maryland, but I live in Southern California now. Maybe Ginger heard the southern and confused California with Carolina, though I don’t know where Paulette got Alabama. I don’t believe I’ve ever been there.”

  Underneath the table, Jace bumped his leg against hers. His idea of a subtle warning?

  “And you write historical romance novels, right?” Reese continued.

  “Oh, no. That’s way too much work for me. You have to research every little detail of life—clothing, speech, food, everything. I prefer to stick to my own time, where I know those things automatically.”

  “Do you write under your own name?” That came from Neely as she cut a slice of tender brisket.

  “No.” Cassidy knew they were waiting for more, but she politely ignored them and cut her own meat into bite-size pieces.

  “She’s probably the only writer around who doesn’t want people to know her pen name,” Jace said at last before glancing her way. “Which I could understand if you were writing porn—”

  “If I were, it would be erotica.” Not that she had a clue how to go about that. She liked reading steamy books, but she didn’t have
the imagination to write hot, kinky sex scenes—especially considering how long it had been since she’d had even lukewarm, sleep-inducing sex.

  “Then you would have to hide behind a pen name,” Neely said, “to keep your mother from freaking out.”

  “Exactly,” Cassidy agreed. “And she would freak.” Along with a few other people.

  “Except—” Jace’s gaze narrowed as he stared at her a long, still moment. Then he blinked, let the tension ease and stabbed a piece of smoked sausage on his fork.

  He’d been about to say, Your mother is dead. Instead he settled for eating, no doubt to keep his mouth full so he wouldn’t call her a liar in front of his cousins.

  “I read romances when I get a chance,” Neely said, either not noticing Jace’s reaction or being kind enough to ignore it. “Maybe I’ve read some of yours. Please, please—” she went into wheedling mode “—tell me your pen name.”

  Cassidy pretended to consider the request while, in reality, she was mentally sifting through all the names she’d used in her lifetime, settling on two she could easily remember. “Okay…but I would really appreciate it if you wouldn’t tell anyone else.” She waited for Neely’s nod, took a breath, then announced, “Shauna Cassidy.”

  “Hmm…it doesn’t sound familiar,” Neely said apologetically. “But I’ll definitely be watching for it in the future.”

  Could she be lucky enough that there might really be a Shauna Cassidy out there writing romance novels? Probably not. But that was okay. Before long, she would leave Oklahoma, just as she left every place, and soon after Neely would forget she existed. They all would, including Jace.