Kathleen O'Brien - [Cowboy Country] - Texas Wedding p.02

CHAPTER ELEVEN
TRENT BUNKED on Susannah’s sofa that night and didn’t sleep much, even though
Zander sent a text around five to say that he’d personally driven Eli into
Austin and bundled him onto a Greyhound back home to the Panhandle.
Good riddance.
Still, Trent felt edgy, plagued by a vague sense that being unconscious might be
a mistake. He lay there, trying to figure out what had him so restless, but
nothing made much sense. Lots of little glitches had come along, from the
vandalism at the cottage to the mess with Nikki and Eli. But nothing that
warranted a twenty-four-hour vigil over Everly.
When the sun finally struggled up over the horizon, revealing the beginnings of
another beautiful day, he accepted that he was single-handedly turning innocent
molehills into mountains. He had work waiting at the Double C, and he might as
well get to it.
On the way off the property, he stopped by Zander’s office and asked him to keep
an eye on things. Thankfully, the older man didn’t ask why, since Trent didn’t
really have a good answer. It just made him feel better, that was all.
When he reached his own office at about seven, he instinctively breathed a
metaphorical sigh of relief. The ranch manager’s building, an attractive brick
structure shaded by the orange-yellow flowers of a cassia tree, looked like an
oasis.
It would be nice for a change to work with the best tools, equipment and men.
The Double C was the best-run ranch in central Texas, not because Trent was such
a brilliant manager, but because the Claytons had a zillion dollars and no
passions to blow it on except their land and their horses.
As he got out of the Mercedes and fingered the key ring to lift free the one
that opened the office door, he heard another car pull up behind him.
He turned, hoping it was Chase, because he was the only person who wouldn’t take
offense if Trent ordered him to get lost.
Was it too much to ask for a few minutes of privacy? He didn’t want to socialize
with the vet, he didn’t want to mediate a dispute between ranch hands, and he
damn sure didn’t want to buy a new copy machine from some eager beaver
door-to-door type.
Just let it be Chase.
Of course, that would have been too easy. It wasn’t Chase. Instead, it was
Trouble. Capital T.
It was Missy Snowdon.
From the forgiving distance of a few yards, she looked damn good. She still had
that amazing body and crazy blond hair that looked pretumbled, as if she’d just
climbed out of bed and couldn’t wait to get back in it. With you.
But as she came closer, with that undulating walk he remembered so well, he saw
that the years had strangely altered her angel face.
A whole decade had passed, of course, since they’d met face-to-face. People
aged. None of them, not even Susannah, had been floating untouched in fairyland.
But this was different.
Missy’s skin was taut and shiny, as if she had scrubbed and peeled and frozen it
in place so often it was more like plastic than human flesh. Her sensual lips
were almost comically swollen now, like the mouth on a cartoon vixen.
The effect wasn’t ugly, but it was too artificial to be even remotely sexy. It
was almost as if her face had been taken apart and then put back together just a
hair wrong. He wondered for a moment whether she might have been in some kind of
accident, but then he realized what had really happened.
She’d begun to wage the war on aging so early and so compulsively that she’d
lost sight of the natural beauty she’d been blessed with. At only thirty. Good
God.
“Well, hello, stranger.” She hitched her slouchy purse over her bare, bony
shoulder. She wore what looked like riding jodhpurs and a white shirt tied off
at the midriff, exposing a hollow stomach and ribs he could count.
She’d lost a hell of a lot of weight. She’d always been trim, but now everything
on her was angular, except for the helium-balloon breasts and the blowfish lips.
Poor kid. She’d always had self-esteem issues, hadn’t she? Probably that was why
she had enjoyed stealing boyfriends—it made her feel powerful. He’d been such a
horny moron he had thought she actually had the hots for him, which had,
pathetically, played right into his own self-esteem issues.
What a couple of desperate losers they had been, pretending to be so cool.
He fought the urge to look away. It wasn’t her fault she reminded him of a Trent
he was ashamed to have been.
“Hi, Missy,” he said. “How are you? It’s been a long time.”
“Too long.” She licked her lips. “But we can fix that.”
“Missy—”
“What do you say we go for an early-morning ride? I know some quiet places along
the creek. We could…get to know each other again.”
He shook his head gently. “I’m married, remember? Any riding I do these days
better be with my wife.”
“With her? Or on her?” She smiled, catlike, blinking slowly. Her eyelids didn’t
quite move in sync. He belatedly registered that her perfume was mixed with
another scent.
Only seven in the morning, and she was already drunk.
He tried to keep the disgust off his face, but he must not have been completely
successful. She tossed her hair across one shoulder and chuckled. “Don’t be such
a bore, Trent. If that coldhearted nag is your only mount these days, you’re
missing all the fun.”
The vulgarity didn’t even make him mad. Ten years ago, he’d thought the bitchy
put-downs that issued out of her rosebud mouth were perversely sexy. He—and all
the other boys—had encouraged her, had made her believe that rich little beauty
queens who acted like sluts were the ultimate turn-on.
“Missy, listen to me. I want to make this very plain. I’m not just playing
hard-to-get here. I cheated on Susannah once, and made an unbelievable mess of
things. I’m not going to do it again.”
She narrowed her eyes and tilted her head. “Have you forgotten how good it was,
Trent?”
“No, but—”
Suddenly, more like a monkey pouncing than anything else, she jerked forward,
took his head between her hands, and pulled him down for a kiss.
If this was her idea of seduction, she’d completely lost her touch.
She ground against him for a few seconds, trying to get a response. She pushed
her tongue into his mouth. He could taste the liquor as well as the mouthwash
she’d used to try to hide it.
Gently, he eased her away. He didn’t want to hurt her. It was clear she already
was hurting about as much as anyone he’d ever known.
“Missy, come on. You don’t really want to do this. You are so much better than
this—”
She reached up and slapped him.
Man, she packed a punch. His cheek was going to sting for a while.
“How dare you?” she said. “How dare you give me that sanctimonious crap?”
She was breathing hard, and her eyes were lined red, though her facial muscles
were so rigid from BOTOX or whatever that she wasn’t able to crumble like a
normal woman.
“Don’t you dare tell me what I want. How can you know anything about it? I do
want this.” She gulped for air. “I want someone. Everyone wants someone, Trent.”
She began to cry. Heaven help him, this wasn’t an act. There was no attempt to
ration diamond tears daintily, to pluck any chivalric strings he might still
possess.
It was bizarre, watching fat, painful streams fall when her brow remained
unfurrowed. The tears ran down her shiny cheeks and pooled in the corners of her
twisted mouth.
And great…now they had an audience, as the ranch came alive for the day. Cowboys
and ranch hands strolled to and from the stables. Even that damn copier salesman
Trent had predicted had arrived and was standing beside his open car door,
looking uncertain.
Missy put her face in her hands, rested her head against his chest and continued
to cry. Loudly.
Goddamn it.
He’d rather deal with a dozen Eli Breslins than one sloppy-drunk ex-lover.
Still, much as he might want to, Trent couldn’t just pour her back into her car
and hope the tears and the booze didn’t send her careening into a tree—or worse,
into some unsuspecting mom ferrying her kids to school.
Goddamn it.
What a day! He enjoyed a beer like any other red-blooded Texan, but if he ran
into one more person all liquored up and out of control, he was going to join
the Temperance League.
Waving the salesman away with one hand, he put his arm around Missy and led her
toward his office.
As he reached the door, he saw Josie coming up the sidewalk, carrying a carafe
of hot coffee and a bag of muffins. She must have seen his car. They often had
breakfast together these days, so that Trent could teach her about her new
husband’s ranch.
About ten feet away, she hesitated. Her eyes widened as she looked at the
sobbing female in Trent’s arms. She started to rush forward, automatically
assuming the woman must need help.
Trent shook his head emphatically. Missy had never liked other women, and she
didn’t look as if she’d embraced the Girl Power Sisterhood over the past few
years. God only knew what kind of scene she would stage if Josie said something
she considered patronizing.
Josie stopped again, frowning. She watched him, clearly waiting for a signal.
Thank God for smart women.
Call Chase, he mouthed over Missy’s head.
And then, praying he wasn’t making the second-biggest mistake of his life, he
unlocked the door and ushered her in.

AN HOUR LATER, when Chase put Missy in his truck, started the engine and eased
off down the drive, Trent finally let go of the breath he didn’t realize he’d
been holding.
She was gone, and Chase had done such a good job of sweet-talking her that she
probably wouldn’t ever come back. Heck, Chase had been so charming that by the
end Missy had been crying all over again, this time for Trent and his poor
broken heart.
When she’d left, pumped full of black coffee and Chase’s ego-soothing baloney,
she’d even apologized for kissing him and wished him good luck with his
marriage.
Trent opened the door to his inner office, glad that he wouldn’t eternally have
to carry the picture of Missy Snowdon sitting on the other side of his desk,
weeping without moving a single facial muscle. Chase had worked his miracles in
the anteroom, where Trent’s secretary would have been sitting, if Josie hadn’t
phoned her and warned her to come in late.
Trent flicked on his computer and took a sip of leftover coffee while he waited
for it to boot up. Too bad he didn’t have Chase Clayton IV’s magic touch with
women. His problems with Susannah would have disappeared in a puff of happy-dust
years ago.
But Trent was not Mr. Sunshine. And Susannah wasn’t as simple, or as sad, as
Missy Snowdon.
Besides, there was no telling what would happen once Missy was back at home and
free from Chase’s mind-altering bliss-vibes. She’d probably pick up another
vodka tonic and drink herself back into the same mess by midnight.
Only maybe this time she’d start stalking Chase, instead. Trent smiled as he sat
down at his desk. Now that would be funny.
He worked in idyllic silence awhile, letting the ranch business fill his mind
with easy problems that had neat, predictable answers.
But after about ten minutes, he heard something odd.
He listened. And then, in the silence, he felt a subtle movement by his feet.
The hair on the back of his neck prickled.
Something was in the knee well of his desk.
Using an instinct developed from years of interacting with the land, he went
completely still. So did the thing at his feet.
Barely turning his head, he surveyed the room, looking for a weapon. Something
long…like a shovel. He wanted to be wrong, but the primitive part of his brain
had already processed what the mysterious movement had to be.
The snake that lay coiled at his feet might be completely innocent, a black
racer trying to escape the heat, or a harmless garter snake who had mistaken the
darkness of the desk for a makeshift cave.
Or it could be a killer. A rattler or a copperhead, with fangs full of venom and
an instinct to attack.
For another second, he continued to scan the room, hoping. But Trent’s quarters
weren’t part of a barn office, like Zander’s, and no heavy tools lay around,
waiting for repairs. His was slick and civilized, and the closest thing to a
weapon was a quartz paperweight his dad had given him when he’d come home from
California.
No good. Useful for bashing in the head of a human intruder, maybe. But he’d
never get the thing near a snake before its fangs were buried in his flesh.
He had only one choice, and it was a crummy one. But it got crummier with every
second that passed, so he didn’t wait.
He took a deep breath, and then he slid the chair back slowly, so slowly it
hardly seemed to be moving.
Once again, he found himself holding his breath. But nothing flashed from the
knee well. Nothing sank into his calf.
When he was completely free of the desk, he eased up from the chair and stepped
back, making no noise, jostling no furniture, ruffling no papers, until he was
at least ten feet from whatever lay beneath.
First he began to breathe again. Then he used his cell to make a call to the
stables, and quietly told the answering ranch hand to send Boss Johnson over
ASAP with a snake pole and a net.
Finally, he pulled out his pocket flashlight and aimed its beam into the
shadows.
Cold fingers played up and down his spine.
The hourglass shape was unmistakable. Coiled in the corner of the knee well was
a twenty-inch copperhead.
Its tail was vibrating, so it wasn’t a happy fellow, but apparently Trent’s
caution had kept it from feeling molested enough to strike.
After a few seconds, the door opened, not loudly. Boss Johnson stuck in his
head. “Where is it?”
“Under the desk.”
“What is it?”
“Copperhead.”
Boss Johnson came quietly around the desk. Trent moved his flashlight once again
over the shadows.
The older man whistled. He looked at Trent, his eyes squinted into slits. “Did
you sit at that desk?”
“Yes.”
“How come you’re still alive?’
“Dumb luck, I guess.” Trent took the pole from the other man. They’d relocated a
dozen snakes together since Trent had taken over as manager, and they made a
pretty good team. “Ready?”
But the trainer’s eyes were still narrowed. He scanned the room, much as Trent
had done earlier, but they both knew he wasn’t looking for a weapon. He was
looking for an opening. A broken window, a compromised door. A cracked attic
vent, a piece of rotting wood.
But nothing like that ever existed on the Double C.
“Damn it, Maxwell,” the man said in a low, troubled voice. “We’re asking the
wrong questions.”
“And the right one is?”
“How the hell did this guy get in here?”

SUSANNAH HAD TO EAT some serious crow to get the school director to let Nikki
come back. But she’d succeeded. Now if she could only get Nikki to cooperate.
“It’s just another month,” she said as she slid into the driver’s seat of her
car and inserted the key into the ignition. She rolled down the window. “You’ll
be home by late July.”
Nikki laid her hands on the window frame and tilted her head down to peer into
the car. She scuffed the dirt with her shoe.
“A month,” she said, “is a long time.”
Frustrated, Susannah looked at her watch. She’d stayed several hours, touring
the school and trying to make Nikki feel better about staying. She wasn’t about
to let all those tuition dollars go to waste, and she wasn’t about to bring
Nikki back to the sizzling cauldron of emotion that Everly had become since
Trent moved in. So she’d met her sister’s friends and spent at least an hour
looking at her portfolio of watercolors, which were actually quite good.
Some of the paintings were of places on Everly property and sentimentally
rendered. Susannah was amazed that Nikki loved anything about her home enough to
recreate it from memory.
However, the shadows from the school’s spreading oaks were long now, stretching
across the pretty adobe mission buildings. If Susannah didn’t leave in the next
half hour, it would be dark when she got home, and she still had a hundred
things to do.
She sighed and ran her hand through her hair. “A year ago you insisted you’d die
if you didn’t come to this school.”
“And you said we couldn’t afford it.”
“We couldn’t. But I found a way, because you said you couldn’t bear to hang
around for my farce of a wedding.”
She was glad to see that Nikki had the grace to look embarrassed about that. It
had definitely been one of her brattiest moments.
“The money’s spent now, Nikki, and we can’t get it back. So you might as well
enjoy the school. See if you can learn something, so it’s not a total waste.”
The words weren’t meant to be harsh, just realistic. But all of a sudden, in the
sharpening light, Nikki’s eyes looked oddly wet.
Damn it. Why, just when they seemed to be making a little progress toward being
buddies, did Susannah always have to return to the role of The Enforcer? She was
only fourteen years older than Nikki. She didn’t have all the answers. God, her
own life was an even bigger mess than Nikki’s was.
Susannah forced herself to stay strong. She was the only parent figure Nikki had
ever known, except for the cold, sternly distant presence of their grandfather.
Susannah had clung to the job of mothering her little sister when it was easy,
refusing to accept that Nikki could ever need anything more. If she gave up now,
just because Nikki had hit the squalls of adolescence, then she really would
have done her little sister a profound injustice.
Susannah’s cell phone, which she’d dumped on the passenger seat, rang. She
looked at the screen, hoping it would be an Austin area code. She had put a call
in to the SuperPantry headquarters, checking to see if their Eastcreek locations
could handle any more peaches this season.
She needed them to say yes. She was desperate for outlets.
It was the difference between salvation and wretched failure. Please, let it be
the store, and let them say yes….
But it wasn’t Austin. It wasn’t the miracle she’d been praying for.
It was Nell Bollinger. Immediately, Susannah’s conscience sent up a guilty
signal. Darn it. She, Nell and Josie had been planning to assemble donation
baskets of peaches for the local nursing homes and hospitals. It wouldn’t put
any money in the Everly coffers, but it would be a worthy cause.
And anything was better than letting the beautiful fruit rot.
Caught in the mess with Nikki, Susannah had forgotten entirely, hadn’t even
phoned to cancel. She groaned inwardly, but let the call go to voice mail. Nikki
always complained that she couldn’t have a five-minute conversation with
Susannah without Everly orchard business interfering.
Susannah would focus on Nikki now. Then, as soon as she got on the road, she’d
phone Nell and make her apologies.
“Nik, honey. I really do have to go.”
Nikki nodded. “I know. It’s just—” she squeezed the door frame so hard her
knuckles paled “—I feel bad. Obviously you need all the help you can get. With
the peaches, I mean.”
Susannah let one corner of her mouth ride up. They both knew Nikki hated picking
peaches and found imaginative ways to get out of it nine days out of ten.
“I know what you’re thinking.” The younger girl blushed, which surprised the
heck out of Susannah. Nikki had probably been about five years old the last time
Susannah had seen her show real shame about her behavior. “I’ll do better this
year, really. I promise.”
Susannah put her hand over Nikki’s. “I appreciate that, kiddo. But July and
August are always hectic, and the Jersey Queens are going to go crazy this
season. Believe me, there will be plenty to do when you get back.”
Nikki nodded again, obviously recognizing that she had run out of ways to
postpone the inevitable. She squared her shoulders, then leaned in through the
window and kissed Susannah quickly on the cheek.
This time it was Susannah’s eyes that grew moist. She fiddled with the steering
wheel, trying to swallow the lump in her throat. She couldn’t remember the last
time Nikki had kissed her.
They said goodbye. Susannah thought about telling Nikki she loved her, but
decided not to push her luck. A blush, a kiss and an offer to pick the
Dixielands…that was a lot for one day.
As she turned onto the highway, her heart felt lighter than it had in months.
Yes, there were a hundred things to do, a million bills to pay…but she’d get
through. She always did.
The trees looked a little like Nikki’s watercolors, blurring slightly as they
streaked past, the golden sunset gilding the summer green. It was a gorgeous
day, and maybe, before it was over, she’d get that yes from SuperPantry.
She glanced at the phone. Oh, yeah. It wasn’t all bliss and optimism. She still
needed to call Nell.
She decided to listen to the message first. It wouldn’t hurt to know exactly how
ticked her friend was. Nell did, after all, have the infamous Bollinger temper.
The woman’s first words didn’t sound furious, which was a good sign. Nell didn’t
mince words…or anything else. When she was mad, she knew how to light into you
with a vocabulary that would make the toughest ranch hand cringe.
“Susannah, honey, this is Nell. I hope everything’s okay. Josie and I were
waiting for you for quite a while, and…Well, here’s the thing. When I went to
pick up Josie at the Double C, I…”
Several seconds of rustling noises filled the airwaves, and then came the sound
of Nell clearing her throat.
“Well, damn it, I’m just going to say it. I saw Trent standing out there, in
broad daylight, with Missy Snowdon, old Roger Snowdon’s oldest, you know, the
trashy one. And…I guess I thought you ought to know. He was kissing that girl
like a pig eats an apple.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
IT TOOK HER FOREVER to find him.
She checked the Double C first, but his car wasn’t there, so she didn’t even
stop. The last thing she needed was to run into Chase. Loyal to a fault, he’d
make up a hundred ridiculous rationalizations for anything his best friend might
have done.
And Susannah was sick of excuses.
From there, she went by the Snowdon spread, though it dragged her another ten
miles east, which was not smart. It was getting late. The night, like a cloudy
bully, had already shoved the sunset down into one narrow stripe of the sky.
The Snowdon mansion dominated a small hill, from which velvet green paddocks
spread out in all directions. The front driveway circled a gushing fountain, at
which the Snowdons’ luxury vehicles were parked, modern-day black stallions
nosing up to the trough.
If Trent’s Mercedes had been among them, Susannah would have seen it a quarter
mile away. But it wasn’t. And under her fury she could feel the tiny wash of
relief, which only made her mad at herself, as well as at Trent.
Was she such a fool that even now she was hoping it wasn’t true?
She turned for home, driving a little too fast, partly due to angry adrenaline,
partly to a desire to beat the darkness and rain.
The minute she arrived, she saw his car. He’d come home, then. And why not? He
had no idea his infidelity had been witnessed…or reported. He might even be
hoping that, having played the knight in shining armor so well for the past few
days, he could reap his reward tonight.
Well, he wasn’t completely wrong. If she had anything to say about it, he was
going to get exactly what he deserved.
Before she exited the truck, Zander loped up, dodging the first of the fat drops
of rain.
“I was just heading home,” he said. “We put a couple of extra guys on today and
got most of the ripe fruit off the trees. Everything else is still pretty green.
The rain may pass over, but even if it doesn’t, I don’t think it will hurt us
much.”
“Thanks,” she said, though, for the first time in a long time, the future of the
peaches was not her first priority. “Have you seen Trent?”
“Yeah.” Zander wiped his face with his handkerchief. “He picked with us most of
the afternoon. You think he’d be worn-out, but after that he went out on the
western border.”
That was not what she’d expected to hear. “Why?”
“Trim some trees, he said. I thought I’d heard wrong, but he took the key for
the shed.” He shook his head. “He’s still not back. Did you guys fight or
something? He’s been like a prickleburr all day. And asking every few minutes
whether I’d heard from you.”
“Thanks.” The heavily treed western border, which used to be a windbreak back
when those outermost acres were producing, was too far to walk. She turned over
the ignition and pulled away, leaving Zander watching, obviously confused.
She was pretty confused, herself. Why on earth would Trent have decided to
tackle such a tough job so late in the day? She knew that a lot of the old
Ponderosa’s loblollies, elms and oaks needed cleaning up, but Zander was right.
No one in his right mind would start such a task after an afternoon picking
peaches in the heat.
But maybe a man who wanted to be alone would.
Or maybe alone wasn’t the right word.
Maybe private would be better.
She growled, ripping the truck over the unpaved shortcut, her teeth knocking
together as the old shock absorbers tried to manage the bumps. If Trent Maxwell
was using the woods on her western border to make wild outdoor love to that
dirty Missy Snowdon, Susannah would…
Well, she didn’t know what she’d do. But it wasn’t going to be pretty.
She parked at the toolshed, a half-dilapidated structure where they kept some
old equipment. The shed was unlocked, the door half-cocked.
When she looked inside, though, she saw nothing but an old mower, a tiller and a
couple of bags of organic fertilizer that had begun to smell pretty rank.
She wrinkled her nose. Even Missy Snowdon would probably draw the line at making
love here.
Susannah backed out, shut the door and walked toward the trees. As she did, she
heard twigs cracking and leaves being brushed about. She hesitated briefly,
wondering whether she might be about to confront a wild turkey, or a fox or a
deer, instead of the more common pest—the cheating husband.
So what? She began moving again, following the noises, not caring what they
turned out to be. In this mood, she could burst in on a grizzly bear, and the
bear would be the one who ought to be afraid.
She almost missed him. He was working on a dead pine stump, about five yards off
the path.
In there, the thick overhead canopy of branches almost completely shut out the
blue-and-purple twilight. He had taken his shirt off, and the bronze gleam of
his chest was the only part of him visible in the shadows.
The chain saw lay on the ground beside the stump. He was dragging a large
loblolly branch toward a pile of broken twigs and needles, and he clearly hadn’t
heard her arrive.
Missy wasn’t here. Once Susannah knew that, she didn’t stop to think. She picked
her way past the low-hanging branches and met him inside the wood.
When he saw someone coming, he looked up from his labors, his sweaty, bare
shoulders tensing. But even when he recognized her, he didn’t fully relax.
“What is it?” His voice sounded harsh. “Is something wrong?”
She folded her arms, grabbing her elbows. “Oh, yeah, I think you could say
there’s something wrong.”
He dropped the heavy branch onto the pile. As it crashed into the others, it
sent up a gust of pine-scented dust and mulch. He wiped his gloved hands on his
jeans. “What is it? Are you okay?”
That was cute. Was she okay? No, she was far from okay. She hadn’t been okay in
eleven years, not since the first time he did this to her.
“I don’t need to tell you what it is, do I? I think you know.”
He looked at her hard for a moment, a deep furrow between his eyebrows. Then he
wiped a trickle of sweat from his forehead, leaving behind a dirty smudge.
“Susannah, I cannot tell you what a crappy day I’ve had. I am not in the mood
for mind games. If you’ve got something to say, say it.”
“All right, I will.”
She squared her shoulders. All the way out here, she’d been forbidding herself
to cry. She wasn’t a weeper. Now that she was actually in his presence, though,
she didn’t feel the least urge to shed tears. It would be far more satisfying to
punch him in the nose.
“What’s wrong is that you’ve started seeing Missy Snowdon again. What’s wrong is
that you’re humiliating me in front of everyone I know. What’s wrong, Trent, is
that if you think I’m going to let you cheat on me again, after all these years,
with the same boozy tramp, then you’re as dumb as that loblolly stump.”
He listened to the whole thing patiently, seemingly unfazed by her fury. When
her tirade was over, he shook his head slowly. Then he took a moment to lazily
arch his back, as if his muscles hurt.
When he straightened, he gave her a lopsided smile, nodding slightly.
“The grapevine has been busy, I see. I wonder which one of your friends it was.”
He extracted a pine needle that had found its way inside his glove. “Hey, you
don’t happen to know a copier salesman named Pete, do you?”
“What difference does it make who told me?” A momentary weakness pinched at the
back of her eyes, making them threaten to water. “Obviously you’re not denying
it.”
He shrugged. “What good would that do? Would you believe me?”
“Not for a second. Not for a millionth of a second. I didn’t come out here to
see if you’d deny it. I came out here to tell you it’s going to have to stop.”
“Oh, really?” He smiled again, but this time she sensed a tension beneath the
carefully orchestrated posture of nonchalance. She sensed something
slightly…dangerous.
“Really. I’m keeping my end of the bargain, and by God, you’re going to have to
keep yours. I’m giving you—”
She frowned, distracted by the way perspiration teased tiny glistening tracks
through the wood chips and dirt on his chest. “I’m giving you—”
“What?” He rubbed a palm over his stomach, wiping the moisture away, apparently
utterly unaware of how sexy the gesture looked. “What are you giving me?”
“I’m giving you everything you asked for. First in the cellar, and then, the
other night, in the shower, I—” she tightened her arms across her chest “—I’m
giving you everything you want.”
“Everything I want?” He laughed, and the sound echoed in the dome of trees. “You
can’t possibly believe that, Susannah, so don’t even say it. I told you. I’m not
in the mood for more games.”
“I’m giving you all I can.” She heard a low ferocity thrumming in her voice.
“How could I ever…completely…”
He waited, as still as one of the trees around him, for the rest of her
sentence. She could barely make out his features now, as darkness claimed the
wood.
“Why would I make any part of myself, body or heart or soul, vulnerable to a
bastard like you?”
It was frightening, waiting for him to react. It was as if civilization was
slipping away…not only his, but hers, too.
“Why?”
He cursed once, low, under his breath.
“I’ll tell you why.” Without warning, he reached out and grabbed her arm with
his rough-gloved hand. He pulled her toward him, up against his bare chest. She
was so close she felt wood chips scrape her skin.
Not knowing, or more likely not caring that he was transferring the earthy dirt
from his body to hers, he bent his head and touched his lips to her throat. Her
heart beat its wings and tried to fly away.
“You’ll do it because, bastard or not, you want me.”
She lifted her chin, searching for air, but all her lungs could find was Trent,
a sensual potpourri of sweat and dirt and danger.
“I don’t. I don’t want you.”
“Maybe not,” he growled. “But you need me.”
He grabbed one edge of her blouse, a stretch-cotton fitted dress shirt that had
looked so crisp and sensible at the school meeting this morning. With one deft
twist of his wrist, he pulled free the long row of snaps.
Nothing tore, no fasteners clattered to the ground, but the act was a
statement—a thrilling declaration of intent. And then, with those gloved hands
that felt so strange, he reached inside her bra and found her aching breast.
“You need me as much as I need you,” he said. “We’re through keeping score and
playing games. This isn’t about Missy Snowdon, and it isn’t about Paul. Tonight,
it’s about you and me. Tonight, it’s about the truth.”
She opened her mouth, but she never uttered a word. His mouth swooped down and
closed over her lips, owning the very breath she exhaled.
This was more than a kiss. It was more passion, more unleashed need, than she’d
ever known in her life. Her desire rose to meet his. His lips demanded, and her
lips obeyed. His hands stroked, and her body wept with pleasure.
She didn’t even try to stop it. It was like standing at the edge of a forest
fire, too paralyzed, too hypnotized, to run.
The trees and the rain seemed to fold around them, locking them in a wet
darkness that was both primitive and powerful. As if they were two savages who
possessed no words, who required no explanations, he pulled her to a clear
space, where the ground was crudely carpeted with green and brown needles.
She lay down, hot and hungry and oddly unashamed.
He pulled off his gloves, and as he undressed her, she tore at his jeans,
desperate to feel the heat and the power her body remembered so well.
Finally, she was naked, and he was naked, and his hands were everywhere. She
began to shiver, and he lowered himself over her, stopping just inches from her
skin. His wet hair fell in her face as he kissed her breasts, and she clutched
his arms, her fingernails digging into his skin.
He pressed himself against her, pushing once, then twice, teasing the secret
part of her that melted and begged to be breached.
“Yes?” His eyes gleamed in the darkness.
“Yes,” she answered. “Yes.”
He lifted her hips, completing the puzzle with a slow, deliberate thrust. She
cried out in the voice of the trees. Night birds lifted to the sky, startled.
He waited, giving her time to accept him. But soon she shifted her body, seeking
more. And then finally, he was moving inside her, filling that fiery, aching
emptiness that she had endured for so many years. She couldn’t get enough. She
held on to his hips, trying to take him deeper, trying to erase the line between
her flesh and his.
He belonged inside her, rigid and full against her pulsing warmth. With him
there, all the things she thought she had lost returned to her.
Suddenly she was whole again, a woman on the edge of a miracle.
“Help me, Trent,” she said, and his body answered. His rhythm was masterful,
slowly building. She began to pant as something coiled inside her.
“Yes,” she whispered, as he pulled her breast into his hot mouth. His hips moved
faster, then faster still, plunging the light and the fire into the deepest,
most secret places she possessed.
This was the truth he had been talking about. The truth about her own body, her
own soul. He had come through the darkness, and he had found her. She was a cave
of melting diamonds. She was a million sparks, helplessly flashing and
glittering, held together only by his hands.
He lifted her legs again, higher, braiding them around his neck, and it was
almost too much. She heard herself whimpering, felt herself pulsing and pushing
and arcing.
And finally, oh, yes…going up in beautiful flames.
When it was over, her mind cleared slowly. The starlight in her body dimmed,
eclipsed and finally grew cold.
He lay on his back beside her, his breath still heavy and loud in the silence.
She stared up into the pines and found a single faraway star between the clouds,
and waited for him to speak.
But he didn’t, though she waited until long after his breath began to ease. She
waited until a cloud smothered the star. Until the damp earth against her back
sent a shiver into her soul.
Of course, her aching heart told her. Of course he didn’t speak.
What was there to say? He had won. After all her foolish resistance, after all
her silly contracts and insults and pathetic attempts to appease him with half
measures, he had broken past her defenses anyway.
He had forced her to do the one thing she’d sworn she’d never do.
Forced her? Even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t true. She had wanted this.
She’d been starving for this all her life. For him.
She turned her head away. She didn’t want to meet his eyes, didn’t want to see
that lift of his eyebrow, the glimmer of triumph, maybe even the hint of
disappointment that the victory had been a little too easy.
Too much like Missy Snowdon.
“Susannah,” he said finally. She wondered if he might have been waiting for her
to speak first, too.
“Sue, I’m sorry.”
“No.” She shut her eyes. “Don’t say that. Don’t say anything.”
He lifted up onto one elbow. “Look, I know you didn’t—”
“No,” she said again. “Please, don’t.”
“We should talk.”
Awkwardly, she stood. “No. It happened, that’s all. You win. There’s nothing
else to say.”
Trying not to imagine him watching her, she found her clothes and put them on.
She couldn’t do much, but she brushed a few crushed blades of grass out of her
hair and wiped her hands on her grass-stained slacks.
And then, without so much as a backward glance, she left him.

SHE STAYED AT A HOTEL in Austin that night. She’d never run away from any
challenge, any threat, any man, including her crazy grandfather. But she ran
away from this.
She didn’t run merely because she’d lost their battle. She didn’t run because
she’d revealed her physical need for him, which had survived eleven years of ice
and anger.
She ran because, God help her, she had realized she was still in love with him.
She wondered if he knew that, too, just as he had known everything else.
She washed all traces of him away in the nameless hotel shower. But even when
she was scrubbed clean on the outside, on the inside the love remained.
Wrapped in a scratchy white towel, she sat up on the bed all night, trying to
talk herself out of it. Trying to make it not be true.
How could any passion be so powerful, so irrational, so impossible to
annihilate? Paul’s death hadn’t destroyed this love. It hadn’t died when Trent
left her, or when he married someone else. His indifference, his sarcasm, his
power trips…none of that had killed it.
If love survived all that, she was doomed. She’d carry the hopeless thing with
her like a stone for the rest of her life. It would weigh her down, make her
lonely, make her old. It would stand between her and any other love.
The night was long. But when dawn finally came, nothing had changed. She stood
at the sealed window and looked down onto the city streets, aching, body and
soul. She hadn’t felt this frightened and lost since…
And then, with a fierce pang, she remembered.
Today was the anniversary of Paul’s death.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
SHE STAYED IN AUSTIN most of the morning. She bought a new dress on sale at a
department store, tossed her grass-stained clothes into the bag the dress had
come in, and dumped them in the trunk of her car. Then she did a dozen errands
in a trance.
Because she’d already wasted the gas to get to Austin, she stopped by the
corporate headquarters of SuperPantry, to find out whether they had reached a
decision about her peaches. But she might as well have skipped it. The buyer
apologized. They had already contracted for all the peaches they could move this
year.
Susannah didn’t even try to persuade him to change his mind. She didn’t have the
energy. Funny how everything was relative. Yesterday, the rejection would have
felt like the end of the world. Today, it barely registered.
She called Nikki; she shopped for new hand tools; she checked out a new brand of
peach bin. Eventually, though, she ran out of reasons to avoid going home.
Trent wasn’t at Everly when she returned. Naturally, he would have to be at the
Double C, which was his real job. He’d given Chase short shrift lately, focusing
instead on helping out at Everly.
And, of course, he wouldn’t really want to see her. Not for a while, anyhow.
Not till he needed another round of sex.
The house was quiet, still gleaming contentedly after the party preparations.
She leafed through the mail, which was nothing but bills. She stared into the
refrigerator, but nothing looked good. It was all peaches, in one form or
another.
She decided to take another shower. She imagined she could still smell pine
needles in her hair, and the musky odors of earth and rain, of hard work and
sweat. Every time she took a breath, she remembered Trent moving inside her, and
it was more than she could stand.
Climbing the stairs was torture, and she entered her bedroom slowly. It was as
if all the strenuous, body-racking work of the past few weeks caught up with her
at that very instant, and she could barely move without pain.
Her bed was still neatly made up, the white coverlet glowing in the sunlight
that streamed in through the western window. She glanced at it, then stopped.
Someone had left a piece of paper on her pillow.
Oddly, her first thought was of the graffiti scrawled on the walls of Trent’s
cottage. A chill tingled on her shoulder blades. Could this be some kind of hate
mail, prompted by the anniversary of Paul’s death?
But that was ridiculous, a specter summoned by her own guilty conscience, no
doubt.
She picked up the paper. At the top was the printout of an e-mail Trent had
received from someone named Catherine Overland at the Fresh Olive Markets in San
Antonio, a company Susannah had never heard of.
Apparently, Catherine Overland would be delighted to talk to Ms. Everly about
the peaches, if they were as good as Trent described. No, she had not yet signed
any agreements for her new stores, and she could probably buy all Everly could
provide.
She included a telephone number and said she’d wait to hear.
Susannah shook her head, disbelieving. She thought she’d come to the end of the
road. She hadn’t considered the possibility that Trent, too, was trying to work
a miracle on her behalf.
And the thought that he might actually have succeeded…
She couldn’t absorb it right away. The implications for Everly were just too
big, and her mind was too tired.
She looked at the bottom of the page, where, below the e-mail, Trent had
scrawled a few words in his spiky, decisive hand.
Let me know you’re okay. Be careful today.
He’d signed it just T.
And then, below that, as if on impulse, he’d added these words.
No one wins, Sue. Not unless we talk.
She called Catherine Overland first. Even a prolonged business negotiation that
would decide the future of her entire season sounded easier than calling Trent.
What would she say to him, anyhow? “Yes, I’m okay. And by the way, even though I
still hate you for breaking my heart, I do appreciate your trying to save the
orchard.”
To her amazement, Catherine Overland took her call immediately. The owner of the
Fresh Olive Markets sounded extremely interested in handling Everly’s peaches.
In fact, she was downright excited—they made an appointment to hammer out the
details in person the very next day.
It seemed almost like one of her dreams. Susannah tried to remain cautious, but
in spite of her best efforts she felt a shimmer of hope. Was it possible that
the long, anxious struggle had really come to an end?
For several minutes, she sat on the edge of her bed, with the sunshine warming
her back, and stared at her cell phone, squeezing it as if to convince herself
it was real.
She had to call him. She had to thank him, although she wondered if she could
find the words to thank someone for dropping a miracle in her lap. Maybe she
should send him an e-mail….
No. That was the coward’s way out. Besides, if he felt edgy about the
anniversary date, especially after the vandalism at his house, she should let
him know she was all right. She couldn’t keep putting it off.
Slowly, she punched in the number for his office at the Double C. She held her
breath, but luck was on her side. It went to the machine after several rings. He
must be out on the property.
“This is Trent. I’m not available right now…”
He sounded so businesslike. That helped, but even so, the sound of his voice
slid into her and stirred something deep in her midsection.
“Hi,” she said after the beep. “I just wanted you to know I got your note. I
just talked to Catherine Overland, and it looks quite promising. Thank you very
much for setting that up.”
It sounded stiff, and the level of gratitude was obviously not proportional to
the service rendered. She hesitated and then tried again. “Really, it is a
wonderful development. Thanks a lot.”
Should she mention his postscript? She couldn’t imagine what she’d say, so she
just hung up.
She took her shower, then, about twice as long as usual and as hot as she could
bear. When she got out, she wrapped herself in her white terry robe, put her
hair in a towel, and wondered whether she could just climb into bed, wet hair
and all, and sleep away this strange, unsettling day.
But from her bedroom window she could see the front driveway. And Chase’s truck
was out there.
He must have been knocking while she was in the shower, because she heard the
sound of the front door opening. He must be anxious, because he never used his
copy of the key.
“Susannah? Susannah?”
He started taking the stairs two by two, just as she came hurrying down to greet
him. They nearly collided on the landing.
“Damn it, there you are!” He took her by the shoulders, obviously frustrated.
“For God’s sake, give a man a heart attack, why don’t you? Your car’s out there,
but you don’t answer the door, you don’t answer the phone…”
She put her hand on his chest to slow him down. “For heaven’s sake. Do I have to
check in with you when I take a shower now?”
“Today you do. You haven’t forgotten what day it is, have you?”
“Of course not.” She tied the belt of her terry robe tighter. “But why is
everyone so uptight about that this year? Is it because of what happened to
Trent’s cottage?”
Chase scowled. It was such a rare expression to see on his sunny face that
something inside her fluttered nervously.
“What’s going on?” She remembered, abruptly, the tension in Trent’s posture when
she’d showed up in the woods last night. Almost as if he’d been on guard,
waiting for trouble.
“What?” She jiggled her hands against Chase’s chest. “Tell me. Has there been
something else, too?”
“He didn’t tell you?”
“I guess not. Damn it, Chase. What?”
He hesitated. “Maybe he didn’t want to…” He glanced up the stairs. “I don’t see
his car out front. Has he been here and gone already?”
“No. I thought he was at the Double C.” The flutter inside intensified. “Isn’t
he working with you today?”
“He was. About an hour ago, though, he said he was going to come back here, to
see if you’d shown up. That was a pretty stupid stunt you pulled last night,
actually. Taking off without letting anyone know where you were going.”
She saw that now, but she couldn’t turn back the clock. “I know. It’s just that
he…that we—” She tried to read Chase’s face. But it looked so stern. “Did he
tell you what happened last night?”
“No details. He just said that you were mad as hell, and that he’d pretty
royally screwed things up.”
“Did he tell you about Missy Snowdon?”
Chase grimaced. “He didn’t have to tell me. I was there. Man, you should see
that woman, Sue. It’s creepy, and kind of sad, actually. She used to be smoking
hot.” He held up his hands. “Sorry, I know you hated her, but she was hot.”
Susannah didn’t bother to dispute that. She was still hung up on the first part
of his answer. “What do you mean, you were there?”
“I mean, I was there. When Missy showed up at his office, all drunk and
blubbering, he sent an SOS by way of Josie. I came flying over to do an
emergency blood-sucking-stalker extraction.”
He chuckled, clearly amused by something in the memory. But then his face
sobered again. “Wait a minute. You weren’t thinking that…”
She took a breath and lifted her chin.
Chase groaned. “Oh, Goddamn it, Sue. Is that what this fight between you two is
all about? Are you out of your mind? Missy Snowdon?”
“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time, would it?” She fought the rising anxiety
that told her she’d been a fool, and done something truly stupid.
“Trent kissed her, Chase. Nell Bollinger saw them, and she called me, because
she thought I ought to know.”
“Nell Bollinger is a Puritan busybody. If there was any kissing going on, it was
Missy kissing Trent, not the other way around. She was drunk, and desperate,
and—”
He ran his hand through his hair, obviously exasperated beyond his power to
express.
“And frankly, Sue, you should know by now that Trent just isn’t a cheater. Yeah,
yeah, I know he did it before. But you really need to let go of that crap from
eleven years ago, sweetheart. None of us are the same people we were then.”
“I—”
“No, not even you, Sue. Especially you. Trent is a man now, not a boy. He was
immature back then, and maybe he was insecure. He isn’t either one of those
things anymore. You need to wake up and see who you’re really married to. Before
it’s too late.”
She looked at Chase’s face, misery swarming through her. He had been her friend
longer than anyone, longer even than Trent. He had never lied to her.
She wanted to believe him.
In fact, she suddenly realized that she did believe him.
She didn’t really think that Trent was a liar or a cheater. She thought he was a
smart, gorgeous, loyal and highly sexual man. Though she would never have
admitted it, she had chosen him for a temporary husband because she believed
that he, of all men, could be trusted to treat her fairly.
And she’d chosen him because, deep inside, she still loved him, still wanted
him, still longed to be his wife…even if just for a little while.
Why hadn’t she been willing to see all this before? The person she didn’t trust
was herself.
She didn’t trust that she could be woman enough for a man like Trent.
She expected him to cheat today for the same reason she’d expected him to cheat
back then. Because she had no faith in her ability to keep him satisfied.
And blaming him was less painful than blaming herself.
She pulled the towel off her hair, and let it all cascade, wet and snarled,
around her shoulders. Someday she would admit all this to Chase and, she prayed,
to Trent. But right now there wasn’t time.
“Chase, did you say he left an hour ago?”
He nodded. He pulled out his cell and punched one of his speed dials. He
listened quite a while, and then he spoke. “Trent, give me a call, okay? Sue’s
fine. It’s you we’re worried about now, so let me know where you are, okay?”
When he hung up, Susannah’s heart was pounding. “He’s not answering?”
“No. That doesn’t feel right, because he always answers when he’s working. It
could be something urgent. It could be one of the horses. Damn it.” He beat the
phone against his palm. “Can you think of anywhere else he might have gone?”
“He doesn’t tell me much. He sometimes is gone on the weekends, but I have no
idea where—”
“Oh, that’s Peggy. Almost every weekend he helps her with stuff around the
house. But I don’t think that today of all days—”
“Peggy? Peggy Archer?” Could this be Trent they were discussing? She felt as if
she were talking about a man she’d never even met. “What do you mean, he helps
Peggy?”
Chase tilted his head, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. His eyes
narrowed, their expression judging her and finding her unworthy. It hurt more
than she could have imagined.
“You don’t ever even talk to him, do you, Sue? No wonder you don’t understand
what kind of man he is.”
He put his phone back in his pocket and turned to go down the stairs. At the
bottom, he looked back up at her.
“He left us once before, because you refused to forgive him. I know it was hard
for you, but did you ever think that it was hard for the rest of us, too? We
loved him, too. And we lost him for years. And now…Damn it, Sue. If you’ve
driven him off again…”
He didn’t finish the sentence. He didn’t need to.
She nodded slowly, acknowledging all of it. The weight of it felt heavy on her
heart.
“We’ll find him,” she said. “And if you get to him before I do, will you give
him a message for me?”
“What?”
“Tell him I’m ready to talk.”

THE HALF AN HOUR it took Susannah to drive to Peggy Archer’s house in
Darlonsville seemed endless. She kept her phone on her lap, and alternated
calling Peggy’s house and Trent’s cell, over and over and over.
But each time the calls were answered by machines.
She heard once from Chase, and the news wasn’t great. He’d been everywhere he
could think of, including Paul’s cemetery plot, and turned up nothing. Trent
still hadn’t returned his call.
When she finally parked on the street in front of the small white house with the
blue door, she let the engine idle while she double-checked the address.
She’d never seen Peggy’s new home before, and this looked awfully modest for a
woman who used to preside over a ten-thousand-acre ranch with a five-thousand
square-foot main house.
Hadn’t Peggy received anything in her divorce settlement?
Susannah was just stalling. Of course this was Peggy’s house. A gold Honda sat
in the carport—and if it weren’t Peggy’s that would have been a coincidence too
huge to swallow.
The truth was she just didn’t want to face the woman again. But if there was any
chance Peggy knew where Trent might be…
Susannah killed the engine, went up to the small front porch and knocked on the
blue door.
It took so long that Susannah wondered whether Peggy might simply have decided
not to open it. Or maybe, since she hadn’t answered her phone, either, she
really wasn’t home. Maybe she was out with a friend, in another car.
Susannah’s heart beat a little faster. She wasn’t sure where to go next.
But then the door opened and Peggy stood there, holding a light sweater closed
with one fist. She looked exhausted. Her red, wavy hair needed cutting, and
brushing wouldn’t have hurt, either. Her eyes looked sunken in swollen
red-rimmed sockets.
On the other hand, Susannah knew she didn’t look all that great herself. She had
come out with wet hair and no makeup, wearing the first pair of jeans and
T-shirt she could grab.
“Mrs. Archer. I’m sorry to bother you, but I wondered if you might have spoken
to Trent today.”
Peggy stared at Susannah, not answering. It probably lasted only two or three
seconds, but it was extremely uncomfortable. Susannah had the feeling she was
being judged, down to her socks and her soul.
“Trent always calls me on Paul’s anniversary.” Peggy blinked slowly, and
Susannah wondered whether she might have been popping those pain pills again.
“Always. First thing in the morning.”
Which was more, her tone implied, than Susannah had ever done. And Susannah
couldn’t deny it. It felt strange to face the fact that, though she had always
accused Trent of running away from the tragedy, she was the one who really had
done so.
She might have stayed in Eastcreek physically, but emotionally she had retreated
into the cold fortress she’d created inside herself. She had shared her feelings
with no one, mourning Paul only in private.
But Trent had found the courage to reach out, open up…expose himself to the
pain.
Susannah nodded. “But you haven’t heard from him since then?”
“No. Now, if you’ll excuse me…”
Susannah put out her hand to keep the door from falling shut. “Mrs. Archer,
please. I’m worried about him. We don’t know where he is, and he doesn’t answer
his telephone.”
The corner of the older woman’s mouth rose. “Maybe he just doesn’t want to talk
to you.”
Susannah wondered how much Trent had told this woman about their marriage. Her
cheeks felt hot, as she realized that there was very little he could have said
that was even remotely flattering.
“That’s possible,” she admitted. “But he isn’t answering Chase’s calls, either.
And there have been some strange things happening. I’m just…worried.”
Peggy’s expression sharpened. “What kind of things?”
“Nothing big, really, nothing that couldn’t be explained away, I guess. He had
an accident when he was working at Everly—a broken ladder. That might have been
nothing, but a couple of days ago someone spray painted the word murderer on his
house. And Chase told me that yesterday morning, Trent found a copperhead in his
office.”
She felt her heart begin to thump as she enumerated the episodes. Together, they
sounded more sinister. And if she had known about the snake, she would have run
to him instantly. Maybe she could have stopped him from…
From doing whatever he’d done. From going wherever he’d gone.
Or from falling into whatever trap had been laid for him.
“Maybe it’s just coincidence, but you can see how strange it seems—”
“Oh, God.” Peggy staggered slightly but managed to use the door for balance.
“Oh, God, I was afraid of this.”
Susannah frowned. “Of what?”
The older woman stepped away from the door. “Come in, Susannah,” she said. “We
need to make a telephone call.”
Susannah followed numbly as Peggy limped through a neat, elegantly decorated
living room, all the way to a tidy blue kitchen. She picked up a cordless phone
and began to enter numbers rapidly.
“Who are you calling?” Susannah tried to see the numbers, but the older woman’s
fingers were flying too fast. “Do you know where he is?”
“I hope not,” Peggy said cryptically.
She got no answer at the first number, so she tried a second. And then, with a
muffled oath, a third.
And then she started slightly, as if she hadn’t really expected this number to
get an answer. “Nora? It’s Peggy. I need to talk to Harrison.”
Susannah put her hands on the countertop. The cool granite soothed her hot
fingers.
“Damn it.” Peggy’s jaw tightened. “Where is he? Exactly?”
She made a frustrated noise. “Well, how long has he been gone? I need to know,
Nora. It’s important. Why? Because this is the anniversary of Paul’s death, and
he’s been acting crazy. I’m afraid he might be about to do something stupid.”
For a long time, Peggy just listened. As the seconds stretched on, Susannah felt
herself growing more anxious than ever. What did Peggy know about Harrison that
made her so sure this was the call they needed to make? And what was she hearing
now, that made her already-exhausted face seem to crumble down to dust?
“Peggy, what is it?” Susannah couldn’t just sit quietly. She took the woman’s
arm, which seemed to be trembling.
“Oh, my God,” Peggy breathed into the phone. “Nora, I’m so sorry.”
More listening. Susannah didn’t let go of the older woman’s arm. Tears had begun
to stream down Peggy’s face, though she wasn’t making any sobbing noises. She
wasn’t making any sounds at all. Susannah couldn’t even hear her breathing.
“All right, Nora, look. Here’s what I want you to do. Call Harrison’s cell.
Don’t stop calling it, even if he doesn’t answer. It might help him just to
remember you’re still out there.”
Susannah began to breathe lightly and rapidly through her mouth. She noticed a
blue-and-white-checked porcelain rooster on one of the corner shelves. She
remembered that rooster, from the years when she used to play at Paul’s ranch.
It was the only thing in this house that seemed at all familiar.
Once, when they were about ten, Paul had taken one of his father’s rifles and
pointed it at the rooster, pretending to shoot it. The memory sent a shiver
through Susannah’s torso, and for a minute she couldn’t figure out why.
Then she understood. It wasn’t the rooster that scared her. It was the rifle.
“No, Nora, I’m not sure where he is. I don’t have anything more than a hunch.”
Peggy wiped her brow with a trembling hand, but she kept her voice admirably
steady, as if she didn’t want to alarm the other woman further.
“I think it’s just barely possible he went to the pool. No, you don’t know it,
it’s just a place where he and Paul used to fish. No, I don’t want you to go
there. If you’re at your mother’s house you’re too far away anyhow. You keep
calling him. Susannah and I will go to the pool.”
Susannah grabbed her purse and began digging out the keys. Her hands were
shaking, too.
The rest of Peggy’s conversation was a blur to her. Her feet were tingling, as
if they couldn’t bear standing still, as if they needed to run. She held the
keys so tightly the metal grew warm in her palm.
Finally, Peggy hung up. She turned to Susannah. Her face was all tears and ashen
strain.
“What is it? Peggy, what happened? Why are you crying?”
“Harrison is dying,” she said, the simplicity of the words sharpening their
impact. “Nora says he has pancreatic cancer. They can’t stop it. They told him
he has only a few weeks to live. He won’t…”
Her voice broke slightly for the first time. “He won’t make it to Paul’s next
anniversary.”
Susannah tried to absorb the information.
“I’m sorry, Peggy,” she said, well aware that her condolences would mean little.
She wasn’t even sure why Peggy cared so very much, since Harrison had always
been a difficult man, even when he was her husband. He hadn’t been a real part
of Peggy’s life for almost ten years.
She didn’t want to be insensitive, but she was confused. Was this merely
heartbreaking personal news that had erased everything else from Peggy’s heart?
Or was it somehow tied to Trent?
“We need to go to Green Fern Pool,” Peggy said. She glanced around, her eyes
still streaming with tears. “I don’t know where my purse is.”
“I’ll drive.” Susannah put her hand on the older woman’s arm again. “Help me to
understand, Peggy. The fact that Harrison is sick…does that have anything to do
with Trent?”
Peggy looked at her through those dazed, flooded eyes. “Of course it does,” she
said. “Surely you knew he always wanted to make Trent pay for Paul’s death. He
always said that someday he’d get revenge.”
No, Susannah had not known that. She had, in fact, believed that Harrison had
recovered nicely. That his heart was now totally invested in his new family.
But then she remembered his gray face when he’d shown up at the peach party. His
stiff posture that had said he almost couldn’t force himself to stay…
“But even if he wanted to hurt Trent…why now, after all these years? Why today?”
Peggy shook her head. “Can’t you see? This is the day Harrison has been waiting
for.”
“What day?”
“The day he has nothing to live for. The day he has nothing to lose.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
GREEN FERN POOL was so well hidden that, although it was probably the most
beautiful spot in Eastcreek, it was practically a secret, even from the locals.
Technically, it was on Double C land, but so far out on the extreme edges of the
property that it felt like another world.
Geographically, it was just a wrinkle in the meandering path of Clayton Creek.
Right there, the creek followed the contours of the land into a small ravine,
bubbled out into a fifteen-foot-deep swimming hole, then narrowed up again and
burbled into the next county in its usual lazy way.
You couldn’t get to it by car. The Fugitive Four used to walk from Chase’s
house, mostly, but that was the long way. Today, not knowing whether every
second counted, Susannah couldn’t risk it. She pulled her car onto the shoulder
of the closest county road, very near where she’d changed Peggy’s tire.
She turned to the older woman now. “That day, when you said you were following
me—”
“I was following Harrison,” Peggy said simply. “He scared me. I knew something
was wrong. And he had been following you.”
That had happened at least a week ago. And Peggy hadn’t warned anyone? “You’ve
known that long?”
“I haven’t known.” Peggy shut her eyes and shook her head wearily. “I still
don’t know. I have no proof. All I have is fear. I wanted to be wrong.”
Susannah understood that all too well. On the way here, they’d both been trying
to persuade themselves that the fear was unfounded, that Trent was simply angry
and looking for some time alone.
Susannah had phoned Chase, but the call had gone immediately to voice mail, as
if he were on the other line. She left a message, just the bare bones
information that Harrison was gravely ill, and that Susannah and Peggy were
going to take a quick look at Green Fern Pool.
She was sure he could fill in the blanks. If he hadn’t found Trent yet, he’d
probably join them here within a very few minutes.
If he had found Trent, maybe they’d all meet here. She hoped that they’d have a
good laugh, teasing Susannah and Peggy for allowing the situation to become so
melodramatic.
She tried to visualize the day arriving at that happy ending. She tried to make
it come true just by believing in it with all her heart.
The land tilted toward the ravine here, so she put on the manual brake and the
hazard lights.
Then she turned again to Peggy. “I can get there faster if I go on ahead. You
can come at your own pace. Do you mind?”
“No. I understand. My leg’s so bad, I’d stay here, but…” She looked out the
window, as if she might be able to see all the way down to the swimming hole,
though the only view was of deep green oaks and silvery pines.
“I should come,” she said. “If they are there, I might be able to get through to
Harrison. I’m the only one who really knows what this day can do to you.”
The sadness in her voice touched Susannah. “Maybe they won’t be there,” she
said, as they’d each said a dozen times on this trip.
“Go.” Peggy put her hand on Susannah’s arm. “Maybe it’s not too late. Harrison
doesn’t really want to hurt anyone, you know. He just wants his own pain to
stop.”
Susannah nodded, got out of the car and quickly walked back to where the head of
the sandy path fed out onto the road. She was glad her tennis shoes had been
closest to hand when she got dressed. If flip-flops or stilettos had been
nearby, she would have chosen them, and then this twisting path would have
spelled disaster.
Even with sneakers for traction, she held on to branches as she made her way
down. The vegetation formed a thick wall around the hole, so she couldn’t see
anything that mattered.
She tried to be quiet, but, as she drew near the black gum trees that formed
Heaven’s Gate, she slipped, making a terrible racket as pebbles skidded away
from her shoes.
“Don’t come here,” a man’s voice called out angrily. “Whoever you are, stay
away.”
For a moment, Susannah’s heart stopped. The voice was thick, altered by emotion,
but she was almost certain it belonged to Harrison Archer.
She didn’t let herself think it over. She simply ducked between the branches,
dashed through the few yards of growth that sheltered the hole and emerged,
breathless, on the other side.
It was like walking right into a nightmare. Before her lay the exact scenario
she’d been playing in her head all the way from Darlonsville.
Just about twenty feet in front of her, Trent stood on the boat launch rock,
with his back to the water. The crisscrossing shafts of sunlight spotlighted
him, as if this was a theatrical performance, and he was the star.
Harrison Archer was planted, legs spread for balance, a few feet above them
both, on the low edge of the southern limestone wall.
A patch of wild red phlox grew at his feet. He appeared to be standing in a pool
of blood.
He had a long, black rifle in his hands. It was pointed at Trent.
“Sue, get out of here,” Trent said, his voice calm. He turned his head halfway,
so he could look at her while still keeping Harrison in his peripheral vision.
“He won’t try to stop you. Just go.”
“The hell I won’t.” Harrison stared at Susannah, though the rifle remained
trained on Trent. “Stay exactly where you are.”
Susannah didn’t let herself move. Everyone in Eastcreek knew that Harrison
Archer was a lifelong hunter, a stalker with nerves of steel. He held all the
local records for marksmanship.
She’d made a mistake by coming in here, but it was too late to change that now.
If this man decided that Trent or Susannah, or both, would die here today, then
they were probably going to die.
And yet, somehow, it didn’t seem possible that this was really happening. It was
such a beautiful day, and the blue water sparkled beside them, as if it were
encrusted with diamonds. The trees waved gently in the balmy air, and somewhere
not far away a tree swallow was twittering.
As if answering the bird’s song, a cell phone suddenly started to ring. She
glanced at Trent, who shook his head.
“In the pool,” he said softly. She understood. Harrison had thrown—or made Trent
throw—his cell phone into the water.
Which meant that it was Harrison’s cell ringing.
Nora, following Peggy’s instructions.
Though Harrison didn’t answer it, the noise seemed to hold his attention.
Susannah prayed that Peggy had been right. Maybe this reminder of the outside
world, and the living, breathing people who had just as much claim on his heart
as Paul did, might prevent him from pulling that trigger.
When the ringing stopped, Harrison’s gaze swung back to Trent. They might have
been continuing a casual conversation.
“Do you know what I talked about, the last time I saw Paul? You. Isn’t that
ironic? We were right there, where you’re standing now, and I asked him why he
couldn’t get better grades. Like you.”
He made a low, growling sound, like an animal in pain. “The last time I was ever
going to see my boy whole, and I told him I wanted him to be more like you.”
The cell phone began to ring again. He touched his pocket, either to smother the
noise or to tenderly connect with the source. It was impossible to tell which.
When the ringing stopped, the man started to sob openly.
“Get out of here, Sue.” Trent’s voice was calm but insistent. “Right now. Just
go.”
She looked at him. She was terrified, but not of being shot. “I’m not going to
leave you,” she said.
“Shut up,” Harrison barked, shaking his head. He breathed heavily and let out a
tortured sob. “This isn’t about the two of you. This is about Paul. My boy. My
boy died believing that I thought you were a better man.”
“He didn’t think that, Harrison.” Trent sounded reasonable and completely
unafraid. “He knew you loved him. And he loved you, too.”
But Harrison didn’t seem to hear him. The cell phone had begun again and he just
kept shaking his head, as if to flick away the noise that fractured his
concentration.
He seemed to be struggling to hold on to a train of thought. “I damn sure don’t
think you’re the better man now, Maxwell. I think you’re a murderer. You don’t
deserve any of the happiness you’ve had. You don’t deserve anything. This
bullet’s too good for you. You ought to have to suffer, the way my boy did.”
The disjointed sentences showed a mental state even more disturbing than
Susannah had imagined. It was unlikely that pure logic would hold much sway over
this tormented mind.
She remembered the months Paul’s parents had kept a vigil by his bedside,
knowing he couldn’t recover from his burns but unwilling to turn off the
machines that kept the body breathing. She had wondered then how any parent
could survive the experience with sense and soul intact.
She knew now that they couldn’t. Harrison’s broken heart had broken his mind, as
well.
“Mr. Archer,” she said impulsively. “Paul’s death really wasn’t Trent’s fault.
It was mine. I’m the one who caused the whole terrible thing.”
“Susannah.” Trent’s body seemed coiled with tension. “Be quiet.”
“It’s true.” She kept going, hoping that, at the very least, she could buy
enough time for Peggy to call the police. Surely by now the older woman had come
close enough to understand the situation.
Peggy was smart—smarter than Susannah. She wouldn’t join them, giving Harrison
one more sitting duck to pick off. She’d climb back up to the car and telephone
for help.
If only she didn’t move so slowly…
“Trent had done something to hurt me, and I wanted to get even. I asked Paul to
help me make Trent mad. I asked him to flirt with me, to dance with me.”
She wasn’t sure whether this might backfire. Her facts were correct, but her
logic was faulty. She had set the tragedy in motion, yes, but it had been
Trent’s fist that slammed into Paul’s face, knocking him over the table, causing
the kerosene lamp to ignite the hay.
Ironically, Paul’s face had been the only part of him untouched by the flames,
so that Trent’s damage was easily identified. The broken nose, the blackened
eye…such little problems compared to the burns.
But his parents had kissed that bruised face every day, praying for a miracle
that didn’t come.
Could a father ever forget who had done that to his son?
Harrison still wept, but he seemed to be listening, which meant he wasn’t
shooting. So she kept talking.
“It was all my fault,” she said. “It was such a stupid way to deal with my pain.
If I’d had the courage to just go to Trent and talk to him, instead of using
Paul—”
“Yes, you did. You used him.” As if the information had just sunk in, Harrison
moved the rifle’s barrel. He stared at Susannah now, and for the first time
aimed his weapon at her. “You bitch. You used him, and you killed him.”
“She’s lying.” Trent’s voice was suddenly as loud, as authoritative as
Harrison’s. He made a small move, just enough to startle the older man, causing
him to swing the barrel back in Trent’s direction. “She had no part in it. The
fight was between me and Paul. No one else.”
“Shut up, both of you.” Harrison’s cell began to ring again, and he looked as if
he might explode from all the mixed signals. “Do you think I care which one of
you killed him? He’s dead. He’s dead.”
Miraculously, his mind seemed to clear. And his focus returned.
He lifted the rifle, tilting it so that he peered down the barrel, which pointed
straight at Trent’s heart. He looked like the consummate hunter he was.
Susannah started to shift her feet. She had to do something, even though it was
obviously hopeless. Maybe she’d die for Trent, and maybe she’d die with him. But
either one would be better than living without him.
Before her brain could send the signal to her legs, the sound of running feet
broke the terrible green silence.
A boy’s voice cried out frantically.
“Dad!”
Finally, Harrison lost his focus. The barrel of the gun dropped, and he looked
around wildly, as if a ghost had called to him.
“Dad!”
Susannah and Trent turned simultaneously, and she knew that, for both of them,
it was a heart-stopping moment. A little red-haired boy, maybe eight years old,
the spitting image of Paul Archer, came slipping and skidding down the slanted,
mossy walls of the swimming hole, barreling toward his father.
“Dad, don’t!”
Behind him, Nora Archer was running, too, her younger son clasped firmly by the
hand. A few yards behind the frightened family, Peggy limped toward them.
Susannah looked up at the man on the wall. For a moment she feared the others
had come too late. Harrison seemed too far gone, too committed to his plan, to
let anything, even the horror on his son’s innocent face, stop him from exacting
his revenge.
“Go home, Sean.” Harrison’s voice was so choked with tears the words were almost
in another language. “You don’t understand. This man…he killed my son.”
The little boy froze in place, just ten feet away from Trent. He stared at his
father, his mouth working, his eyes filling with tears.
Finally he spoke, his high-pitched voice clear in the quiet air.
“But what about us, Dad? We’re your sons, too.”
Harrison looked down at the boy, whose red hair gleamed like copper in the
sunlight. Under the freckles, the small face was white with terror.
The man made a strangled sound, as he faced the impossible dilemma of choosing
between the child he’d lost so long ago and the one who stood before him now.
“Sean,” he said.
The one word carried the sound of ultimate defeat.
A warm gust of wind penetrated the trees. When it kissed Susannah’s cheeks, she
realized they were streaming with tears.
And then, as sirens began to wail in the distance, Harrison bowed his head. The
rifle fell awkwardly from his limp fingers. It clattered over the edge of the
limestone wall, slid down a shaft of sunlight and sank without a splash into the
pool below.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
UNTANGLING the tragic story at the sheriff’s office took hours, even though
Trent thought it should have been fairly easy.
Harrison openly admitted everything. He explained that he’d hired Eli Breslin to
vandalize the cottage, but when Trent fired the boy, Harrison had been forced to
deposit the copperhead in Trent’s office himself.
By then, of course, he’d been given the news that he had only a few weeks to
live anyhow. So the risk of handling the poisonous snake hadn’t bothered him at
all.
The ladder…well, that was just a rotten ladder. But Trent’s suspicion of
something more sinister had probably been his subconscious trying to tell him to
beware.
The police wanted to know whether Harrison had wanted to kill Trent. Harrison
answered that one slowly. He’d thought he did. But from a distance the concept
of killing seemed easier.
When he had found himself face-to-face with his victim, it hadn’t been quite
that simple. He hadn’t been able to make himself pull the trigger.
Peggy had been horrified to find that Harrison had tried to divert suspicion to
her. And he’d succeeded. He’d lured Trent to Green Fern Pool by pretending that
Peggy had Susannah cornered there. Primed by Harrison’s earlier comments, Trent
had swallowed the bait instantly.
The deputies went over everything a dozen times. Trent remembered this strategy
from the night of the fire. No matter how cut-and-dried a situation seemed, the
authorities liked to cross every T, then come back and cross it again through
another witness’s official statement.
All the people involved—Trent, Susannah, Harrison, Peggy and Nora—were
interviewed separately. Only Sean, who seemed to have aged ten years in that one
afternoon, was allowed the moral support of another person, and clung to his mom
like glue.
Perhaps the police were just being diligent, but around midnight, when Trent
passed Susannah in the hall and saw the exhausted circles under her eyes, he
decided enough was enough.
He was going to take her home. If the deputies wanted another statement, they
could get it in the morning.
They left her car at the station, and Trent did the driving. Good thing he did.
About halfway there, she fell asleep.
As Trent pulled into Everly’s drive, he saw warm, welcoming lights burning
everywhere. Chase and Josie must have stopped by, aware that, after such a
harrowing day, it would be grim to return to a cold, dark house.
He sent a mental thanks to the newlyweds.
He didn’t get out of the car right away. He hated to wake Susannah, and he was
tired, too. The climb to the porch seemed like scaling Mt. Everest. So he
reclined his seat and watched the stars bob silently in the liquid midnight sky.
After a few minutes, Susannah stirred. She made that small purring hum that had
always signaled the end of a catnap.
She opened her eyes. “Are we home?”
His chest tightened. He realized that, though he couldn’t pinpoint the moment,
he had begun to think of Everly as home.
But was that a mistake? They hadn’t had a minute alone since the police had
arrived at the pool. They hadn’t exchanged a single private word. He had no idea
how she felt. About him. About them. About anything.
When she’d stood beside him out at the swimming hole, refusing to leave in spite
of the danger, he had thought that perhaps…
But at that moment, all emotions had been artificially heightened. It was as if,
while they were facing death, hidden in that eerie green nook, they had been
under a temporary enchantment. A spell woven of fear and danger.
The spell was broken now. They were back in reality. And the rules were
different here.
“Yeah, we’re home. I was just enjoying the night. It’s nice, lots of stars.” He
smiled. “Looks like one of Nikki’s kindergarten art projects.”
Susannah shifted so that she could see the sky, as well. “Yeah,” she agreed,
trying to smile while she stifled a yawn. “Nikki always did have a heavy hand
with the glitter.”
He touched her shoulder. “Come on. You’re exhausted. Let’s go in.”
She nodded and yawned again. “Still,” she said with a smile, “I’m pretty sure
it’s better to be exhausted than dead.”
He laughed, more because he loved her spunk than because the joke was
particularly funny.
It had been terrifying, watching Harrison swivel the rifle toward Susannah.
Trent had already been out there, facing that same weapon, for at least fifteen
minutes before Susannah arrived. But that was the first moment he had felt true
fear.
He had been fairly sure that, as long as nothing spooked the man, Harrison would
never work up the courage to fire. Killing Trent wouldn’t bring Paul back, and
somewhere in his gut Harrison knew that.
But “fairly sure” wasn’t enough, not when it was Susannah the man had in his
sights.
“You were amazing,” he said. He wanted to reach over and scoop her into his
arms, but he didn’t. “I might be dead if you hadn’t arrived when you did. You
may well be the gutsiest woman I’ve ever met.”
“Are you kidding? I was scared to death. You know that woodpecker you thought
you heard? That was actually my knees knocking.”
“Oh.” He chuckled. “I thought it was mine.”
She took a deep breath that turned into another yawn.
“Trent.” She turned to him with a somber gaze. “Do you think he would really
have done it? If Sean and Nora hadn’t showed up when they did?”
“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “I was telling myself he wouldn’t. But
when I made my calculations, I didn’t know about the cancer. That could have
changed everything.”
They were silent a moment, and he knew they were thinking the same thing.
Everything could have ended today. But it hadn’t. They still had lives to live.
And decisions to make.
“Come on,” he said again. This time she got out of the car without demur. They
made their way up the porch steps slowly. He stood back and let her unlock the
door.
“Are you hungry?” Trent glanced toward the kitchen.
Susannah shook her head. “I should be, but I guess I ate too many of those
horrible crackers at the station. I think I just want to go to bed.”
“Okay,” he said, trying to sound as neutral as possible. He obviously wasn’t
going to put any pressure on her tonight, and he hoped she knew that.
A good night’s sleep, and a little distance from the nightmare of today, might
improve his chances anyhow. Right now, she was exhausted, drained.
Or so he told himself. But the truth was simpler. He didn’t want to ask her how
she felt, because he was afraid she might tell him she felt nothing.
She waited at the foot of the stairs while he circled the first floor, turning
off all the lights Josie and Chase had left burning. He checked the doors and
windows, too, just in case Susannah still felt a little nervous.
Of course, they both knew the danger was over. Harrison had been checked into
the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation. Trent’s bet was that the poor guy
would go straight from there to the medical wing, and from there to his final
resting place beside his firstborn son.
But he didn’t want Susannah’s sleep haunted by dreams of snakes and rifles and
pain-mad men who cried “murder” in the night. If she dreamed at all, he
selfishly wanted her to dream of him.
He joined her where she waited, and the two of them quietly climbed the stairs
together.
Her bedroom was at the top of the staircase, and the door was standing open. The
four-poster bed beyond was turned down, the night-light gleaming, casting
honeyed shadows on the sheets.
He knew he had to let her go. But damn it. How was he supposed to find the
strength to walk away?
He loved her. That’s where his strength had to come from. He loved her enough to
let her decide, without any pressure.
He’d tried to fight his way into her heart, and he’d tried to seduce his way in.
Neither had worked.
Maybe it was time to stop trying. Maybe it was time to leave her in peace.
He tightened his resolve.
“Good night, Sue,” he said. He touched her cheek with a knuckle, knowing that if
he allowed any more contact than that, he’d be sunk. “Thank you for saving me
today.”
She looked embarrassed. “I didn’t—”
“Yes.” He put his finger across her lips. “You did.”
She smiled, and he let his hand fall rather than feel the soft warmth of her
mouth move against his skin.
“Well, if I did, it’s only fair,” she said softly. “You’ve saved me, and Everly,
too.”
Oh, hell, he had to get out of here. He was so tired he could hardly remember
his name, and yet he wanted to take her into that room, lay her onto those soft
white sheets, and make love to her until the stars went out in a blaze of dawn.
“Good. I’m glad.” His voice sounded as if it came from a wooden puppet. But it
was difficult to force the polite phrases out when all he wanted to say was,
Please forgive me, Sue. I love you.
He turned, looking at the long hall that led to his own room. The one that had
once belonged to her grandfather. She would never come to him there.
“Trent—”
Her hand reached out and gently wrapped around his forearm. Her fingers were
tanned, from the hard orchard work she did every day of her life. And yet they
were cool and smooth and graceful. He remembered how they had felt as they
stroked him.
“What is it, Sue?”
“I was hoping…You see, I don’t really want to be alone tonight.”
Instinctively, his body reacted. Heat gathered in his loins.
“What do you mean?” He looked back at her. “I don’t want to misunderstand. What
exactly are you asking?”
She tilted her head and her hair, so sensual in its unstyled freedom, glowed
under the hall light. “I’d like you to stay with me tonight, but…”
“But?”
Her eyes were serious. “I have a document I’d like you to sign. I wrote it while
we were waiting at the station.”
Something painful stabbed through his heart.
“Something to sign?” He almost laughed, except that it hurt too much.
He shook his head, defeated. “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t wait around,
dying inside, while you try to decide how much punishment is enough. I love you,
Susannah. But if we can’t let the past go now, after everything that’s happened,
then we really do have no future.”
He moved, but she wouldn’t let go of his arm.
“Please,” she said, digging in her pocket. “Read it.”
She pulled out a scrap of paper, and searched his face with her earnest gaze. He
wondered if his expression looked as hard and discouraged as he felt.
“Please, Trent.”
He nodded numbly and took the paper she was holding out.
She must have found it on one of the desks at the station. It was a torn piece
from a pink While You Were Out pad.
He unfolded it and began to read.
I, Trent Maxwell, promise that I will love and cherish my wife forever,
He looked up at her, wondering if this was a joke, some new torture…
She raised her eyebrows. “There’s more,” she said. “Go on.”
Because, even though she’s been proud and judgmental and—
He had to turn the paper sideways, as Susannah had run out of room.
—and kind of a bitch…
He turned the paper again. His heart was suddenly lighter, pumping hard again in
his chest.
…she loves me very much.
He stared at the paper, afraid to move for fear the words would swim away, a
mirage all along.
Could it possibly be true? Could her love have survived the anger, buried
somewhere under the resentment and pain? After all these years, could
forgiveness have finally arrived?
He looked up again. “Sue—”
“No,” she said firmly. “You’re just getting to the important part.”
He turned over the paper, and found one last scrawl.
PS—I also promise to refer all future visits from that nasty tramp Missy Snowdon
to aforementioned wife, who will kick her pretty little—
“I ran out of paper.” Susannah smiled. “But I’m sure you get the idea.”
“Yes.” Trent could barely think, his heart was beating so fast. He looked at his
brave, beautiful, stubborn wife and tried to believe this moment had finally
come. “I’m…well, I’m getting quite a few ideas, actually.”
“Excellent,” she said with a satisfied sigh. She patted his chest with her
fingers. “But I do think we need to hurry, Trent, because I wouldn’t want to
fall asleep right in the middle of one of them.”
“Oh, no, Mrs. Maxwell.” He laughed for joy as he scooped her into his arms. “We
have almost eleven years to make up for. I can guarantee—in writing if you
like—that no one will sleep in Everly tonight.”