She’d love Wade McMillen to her dying day, Amy decided right then and there, for declaring himself Sarah’s father.
“I promise to think about it,” she told him. For now, that was all she would do. Think. Try to figure out what was best for her and for the baby.
And what was best for Wade.
GRADY, CAL AND GLEN MET ON the border of Grady’s property and the Pattersons’ ranch, in the same spot they’d often congregated as teenagers. Those days were long behind them now.
“What’s this all about?” Cal asked, dismounting as he spoke.
“I assume there’s a reason you wanted us to meet you here,” Glen added, sliding down from his horse, a high-spirited gelding who pranced in place.
While he might sound like he was complaining, Grady could see that his eyes were alight with interest.
Grady grinned at his two best friends. “Actually there is an important reason. I want the three of us to return to Bitter End.”
“But why? We were there not long ago. Wade was with us, remember? We had a little ceremony, prayed and everything. I’d hoped that was the end of it.”
“This is a joke, right?” Glen said irritably.
If Grady hoped to get his friends’ attention, he’d achieved his goal.
“No joke,” he insisted. “The three of us need to go back.”
“I’d like to remind you again that we were just there,” Cal muttered.
Grady knew what his friends were thinking, because the same thoughts had been going around in his mind for a number of weeks now.
“Prayer or no prayer, I’ve seen enough of Bitter End to last me a lifetime,” Glen said. “Far as I’m concerned, someone should burn that place to the ground before anyone else gets hurt.”
“Then cover it with sulfur,” Cal put in.
No one had come away from Bitter End with pleasant memories, not in more than a hundred years. Through research and a good deal of luck, Nell and Travis had uncovered the source of the trouble. Together they’d learned that Bitter End had been cursed by a preacher whose son had been wrongfully hanged. No one had paid much attention to the preacher, but then the town was beset with plagues of the sort brought down on Egypt thousands of years before. The citizens of Bitter End had endured it all—drought and locusts, sickness and hail—until the death of their firstborn children, and then they’d scattered in panic. A number of families from Bitter End had become the founders of Promise.
“Bitter End is a piece of Texas state history,” Grady told his friends. “It’s a part of who we are, as well.”
Neither Cal nor Glen was as quick to argue now, and Grady knew it was because they recognized the truth of what he’d said.
“You want us to go back and…and confront the past, don’t you?” Cal asked.
“That’s my thought,” Grady admitted. “I want us to stand in the center of that town and face whatever’s there.” Grady felt instinctively that this was necessary, although he couldn’t really say why.
“We stood there with Wade,” Glen pointed out.
“I know…but this is different.”
“How?” Cal demanded. Even as he argued, he remounted Thunder, ready to follow through with the idea.
“I want to declare this land free of the curse.”
“Like anyone’s going to listen to us,” Glen said.
“Anything, in this instance,” Cal added.
“Whatever.” Grady had thought long and hard about this moment. He’d been one of the people who stood with Wade McMillen in the center of Bitter End. One of the men whose roots were buried deep in the history of this forgotten settlement. He wanted whatever was there, the curse, to leave.
They rode in silence, the three of them, like gunfighters heading for a high-noon shoot-out.
The town lay nestled in a small valley below a series of limestone outcroppings. Buildings, both stone and wood, stretched on both sides of the main road. The tallest structure was the church with its burned-out steeple. The wooden two-story hotel, rotting from years of abandonment, leaned precariously to one side, as if the next windstorm would send it toppling. His brother had nearly died in that hotel not many months ago. A sadness came over Grady when he thought of Richard, but he refused to allow his plans to be sidetracked.
By tacit agreement the three men stopped outside the building that had once been the mercantile. The horses shifted restlessly, their acute senses responding to the mysterious atmosphere.
“It’s dead here,” Glen commented. Nothing grew in town. Bitter End had died all those years ago.
“Do you feel anything?” Cal asked, whispering.
“I’m not sure,” Grady said in a normal voice. He refused to give in to whatever was here, refused to bow to his fears.
Glen just looked around, his horse making an abrupt circle as if to check behind himself.
As boys, when they’d first happened upon Bitter End, they’d felt a sense of great sadness, a sense of unease, a tension that manifested itself in the physical. The oppressive silence had frightened them so badly it’d taken them twenty years to venture down these streets again.
The horses seemed incapable of standing still. All three men had trouble restraining them.
“I don’t know what I feel,” Grady reported. The first time around there’d been no question. The sensation had been overwhelming, unmistakable.
“That feeling of…grief. It’s still here,” Glen said, glancing over his shoulder. “But not nearly as strong as before.”
“I feel it, too.” This came from Cal.
“Are you ready to go back now?” Glen’s question was directed at Grady.
He nodded, wishing he knew what to do. He’d hoped…hell, he wasn’t sure what he’d been hoping for. He supposed he’d wanted to find something different, discover that the town had miraculously changed. That it had—somehow—come back to life.
WADE HAD BEEN LOOKING FORWARD to this for two weeks. Grady and Caroline had invited Amy and him to dinner at the Yellow Rose Ranch. Unfortunately he suspected that if they hadn’t already agreed to this, Amy would’ve found an excuse to decline.
She hadn’t been herself since the confrontation with Louise Powell and Tammy Lee Kollenborn in the Mexican Lindo. For the past few days, she’d been quiet and withdrawn, and he knew she was disturbed by what had happened. He didn’t blame her.
It didn’t help that his marriage proposal had come about the way it had. He’d been trying to work out the best approach all week, but then the incident at the restaurant had forced his hand. It wasn’t how he’d wanted to ask her—and he couldn’t help feeling some resentment, unchristian though he knew that was, toward those two meddling women.
He glanced at Amy as he drove to the Yellow Rose Ranch. She looked half-asleep, and while he knew she was tired, he also knew she was using her fatigue as an excuse to avoid a certain subject. His proposal. He’d waited a long time to find the woman he wanted to marry, and now that he had, he wanted to marry her. The sooner, the better, for the baby’s sake, as well as his own.
He wouldn’t pressure her into a decision. When she was ready, she’d tell him; until then he’d be patient.
Amy straightened when he turned off the highway and into Grady’s long drive. “We’re going to have a good time tonight,” he promised, leaning over to squeeze her hand.
Amy smiled. “I hope Caroline didn’t go to a lot of trouble.”
Wade knew Amy’s due date was only a week earlier than Caroline’s. The two women had become friendly and often met for lunch. He was well aware that Amy admired Caroline and relied on her advice, which Wade saw as a good thing.
Grady stepped onto the porch when Wade steered the Blazer into the yard, and Caroline appeared at her husband’s side almost immediately afterward. She hugged Amy, then greeted Wade with real warmth. He gave her the flowers he’d brought in appreciation for the dinner. No wine, not until after the babies were born. He hoped there’d be many more such evenings—some of them
at his house. His and Amy’s.
It would be just the four of them tonight, since Maggie was spending the night with Savannah.
“Everything’s ready,” Caroline told them, “so we can eat anytime.”
“I’m dying to see your nursery,” Amy said.
The two women disappeared, but Wade wasn’t fooled. Amy might want to look at the baby’s room—he was sure she did—but the real reason she’d gone off with Caroline was to talk to her, perhaps seek out her advice about his marriage proposal.
Wade trusted Caroline to encourage Amy to marry him. If she mentioned what had happened with Louise and Tammy Lee, then Caroline would tell her those two didn’t speak for the community. With few exceptions, the entire town had rallied around Amy. Caroline knew that as well as anyone.
In every problem is a gift, his grandfather had told him years ago, and Wade remembered it now. The gift Louise and Tammy Lee had given him was the courage to admit, openly and publicly, that he loved Amy.
Dinner proved to be both relaxing and fun. Caroline was an excellent cook and the prime rib, accompanied by garden fresh broccoli, a green salad and mashed potatoes, was one of the best Wade had tasted. This night out was exactly what he and Amy needed. Conversation was mostly light and entertaining, although they talked about Bitter End and answered Amy’s questions. She asked about visiting the town, but both Grady and Wade discouraged that.
While Caroline and Amy cleared the table, Wade and Grady had time to talk privately on the porch.
“Speaking of Bitter End, I was there this week,” Grady surprised him by saying.
“What made you go back?” Wade asked, taking a sip of his coffee.
Grady shrugged. “I don’t know, but I felt I had to—that there’s something unfinished there.”
“What?”
“I don’t know,” Grady said. Then he changed the subject abruptly. “How are things between you and Amy?”
“I love her.” Wade had already admitted it once and found it easier the second time.
Grady gave him a slow satisfied smile. “I guessed as much.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“’Fraid so, Preacher.”
“I’ve asked her to marry me,” Wade confessed.
“Is she going to?”
“I don’t know.” Wade had promised himself he wouldn’t pressure her, but he had a feeling deep in his gut that told him the longer she kept him waiting, the less likely she was to agree. His chest ached at the thought of what his life would be like without her. Every conscious reflection included her. She’d become a big part of his world, of the way he planned his future.
Grady commiserated, but had no advice to offer other than “Don’t give up.”
At the end of the evening, Amy hugged both Caroline and Grady to thank them for dinner. “I’ve enjoyed myself so much,” she said with such sincerity that no one could doubt her. Least of all Wade.
“Dinner was superb,” Wade told Caroline. “Great food, terrific company.” Because he was single, he was invited out to dinner quite a bit. No fool he, Wade often accepted. But this evening had shown him what his life would be like if—when—he was married.
Wade waited until they were back on the road before he broached the subject of marriage. “I wasn’t going to say anything,” he began, keeping his eyes on the road.
“About what?” Amy asked, then turned to him, eyes filled with alarm. “If you let me sit through the entire evening with a piece of broccoli stuck between my teeth, I swear I’ll never forgive you.”
Wade chuckled. “It isn’t that.” His humor quickly faded. “I wanted to ask if you’re still thinking about…”
“If I’ll marry you,” Amy finished for him. “That’s what you want to know, isn’t it?”
“I love you, Amy. I want to marry you.”
She was silent for so long he wondered if he’d blown it entirely. “Say something,” he urged, trying not to sound as anxious as he felt.
“His name’s Alex Singleton,” she said, her voice low. “We met, of all places, in the grocery store.”
Wade gripped the steering wheel hard. He wanted to tell her it didn’t make a bit of difference who’d fathered her baby. It wasn’t a detail he considered necessary. He loved her and he loved her baby. That was the only fact she needed to consider.
It hurt, too, to hear about another man wanting her, making love to her. But he kept his mouth shut, knowing Amy needed to tell him. In some ways this wasn’t for him as much as it was for her.
“He asked me out for coffee. I said no, but he was charming and funny and persistent, so I agreed. The store had a deli, and we sat there. We…talked so long that the ice cream in my cart melted.” She smiled at the memory. “He was sophisticated and wonderful. I thought I was in love that first day.”
Wade found that listening was more difficult by the minute.
“Because he often went away on business, we weren’t able to see each other more than once a week. I…I lived for those weekly dates. Regular as clockwork, he arrived every Wednesday evening and took me out to dinner. We ate at the most wonderful restaurants. Small upscale places.”
“So he had lots of money.”
“Oh, he had more than that, Wade.” Her voice hardened. “He also had a wife and two children.”
CHAPTER 8
THURSDAY AFTERNOON, Ellie Patterson left the feed store early. George, her assistant, would close up and Amy would help him. Amy had been taking on more responsibilities of late, and Ellie was grateful. She hadn’t been feeling well the past couple of afternoons but suspected she knew why—especially since the home pregnancy test had been positive. Seeing her sister-in-law would confirm what she already knew.
Jenny Bender, Jane’s receptionist, was just leaving when Ellie entered the health clinic.
“Jane’s in her office,” Jenny told her, motioning beyond the reception area.
“Thanks.”
Sure enough, Jane sat at her desk making notations on a chart. She glanced up when she heard Ellie come in, and her tired face brightened. “Hi, there.”
“Hi.” Ellie threw herself into the chair nearest Jane’s.
“Long day?” Jane asked sympathetically.
“Exceptionally long.”
“You’re looking a little peaked.”
“I feel a little peaked.”
Jane studied her. “Do you think you picked up a bug?”
A slow happy smile came from deep within. “The nine-month variety.”
Surprise showed in Jane’s face. “You’re pregnant?”
Ellie nodded. “The little stick turned blue.”
Jane clapped her hands in delight. She closed the chart she’d been working on and relaxed in her chair. “Does Glen know?”
“Not yet.” Ellie hadn’t meant to keep it a secret from her husband, but she didn’t want him to be disappointed if it turned out, for some reason, to be a false alarm. “I thought I’d have you verify my condition first.”
They chatted for a few minutes, laughed about the things they always did and made plans to spend a weekend in San Antonio later in the month. They talked with the easy familiarity that had developed between them since they’d married the Patterson brothers. Not until after Jane had examined her did Ellie grow quiet.
Jane didn’t press her, but Ellie knew her sister-in-law was waiting for her to speak. “I’m afraid, Jane,” she confessed. Her emotions had never been this muddled. Intertwined with the joy were all the fears she’d tried to ignore and couldn’t.
“It’s normal to be anxious. This is your first child, and your body’s experiencing quite a few changes, right now. That can be confusing and stressful. Let’s talk about it.”
Ellie took a deep breath. “Mostly I’m worried that I’ll be like my mother. She didn’t have an easy pregnancy with me—that’s basically why I’m an only child. And she never seemed to like having a kid around.” Ellie hadn’t been close to her mother, but the bond she’d shared with her fath
er had been strong and special. It was the reason his death the previous year had shaken her so badly.
“You’re not your mother,” Jane assured her.
Ellie relaxed a little. “In other words, don’t borrow trouble?”
“That’s a good place to start.”
Ellie nodded. “You’re right. And I don’t think my mother ever wanted a child, whereas I do.” She gave Jane a tremulous smile. “Glen and I talked about starting our family soon. That’s the reason I went off the pill when I did,” she confided, “but we didn’t think it’d happen so quickly.”
“So you’re not sure you’re ready for this.”
Ellie thought about that for a moment. “No, I’m ready,” she said decisively. “I just hadn’t expected to be this…fertile.”
“I imagine Glen’s going to gloat to Cal,” Jane said with a manufactured groan.
“Have you and Cal decided when you’re going to get pregnant?” Ellie felt it would be nice if their children were close in age. Her own cousins, who’d lived in Brewster, were twins, two years older, and when they were around, it was almost like having brothers. Her mother blamed her tomboy attitudes on Rick and Rob, both of whom had gone on to make the military their career. They’d missed her wedding, but had written to congratulate her and Glen.
“Before Cal and I can think about a family, I need to fulfill my contract here at the clinic,” Jane said with a show of regret. “Don’t misunderstand me, I love my work. It’s just that we’re eager to become parents. We’re hoping I’ll get pregnant about this time next year.”
“That’d be wonderful.”
“Mary’s going to be pleased when she hears your news,” Jane said, referring to their mother-in-law.
Glen’s parents were looking forward to becoming grandparents, and it went without saying that they’d be ecstatic.
“I want you to start prenatal vitamins right away—”
“Jane, Jane.” Ellie held up her hand. “Don’t treat me like a patient. I’m your sister-in-law.”
Jane laughed. “You’re right. Congratulations!” She stood up and hurried over to Ellie to share a heartfelt hug.