Her honesty had come as a surprise. She’d admitted that she’d taken the teaching position to escape an unhappy relationship. He didn’t want to think of Lindsay with another man. He didn’t want to think of her at all, and yet she was constantly on his mind.
“Where’s Merrily?” he asked in an effort to turn his thoughts away from Lindsay.
Buffalo Bob shook his head sadly. “Gone.”
“Again?”
His friend nodded and got himself a beer. “She left me a note this time.”
“Did she say where she was going?”
“I doubt she knows herself.”
“I’ll miss her.” Merrily had a soothing manner, almost as if she’d seen people at their worst and accepted them anyway. She never tried to force conversation, never pried, but was friendly and open. Stopping at Buffalo Bob’s for a beer was sure to mean a laugh or two whenever she was around.
“I’ll miss her, too,” Bob said, his look sober.
“She coming back?” Gage knew it was her pattern to leave every now and then, but in the past she’d always returned.
“I don’t know,” Bob told him. He took a deep swig from his glass of beer. “Can’t see why she should.”
“Why wouldn’t she?”
“Look around you,” Buffalo Bob muttered, with a sweeping gesture of his arm. “I’m not exactly in need of crowd control, am I?”
Gage had to admit that was true.
“I won’t be able to stay open much longer if this keeps up.”
Gage nodded. “I heard the Hansens put the grocery up for sale.”
“I know. If it’d been up to Marta, they would’ve left years ago. You staying?”
The question took Gage by surprise. “Of course I am.”
Buffalo Bob grinned crookedly. “That’s what I figured. You’re like me. Too damn stubborn to know when you’re beat.”
Until that moment Gage hadn’t thought of himself in those terms, but perhaps his friend was right.
“How’re you gettin’ along with the new teacher?”
“What do you mean?” Gage demanded, not liking the turn of the conversation.
“I heard you were—you know, sweet on her.”
Gage frowned. And lied. “You heard wrong.”
Buffalo Bob arched his brows as if to say otherwise. “Well, speak of the very devil. Look who’s here.”
Gage swiveled around in his chair and watched Lindsay stalk into the bar. She was dressed in jeans and a dark blue sweatshirt and covered with fine white powder. Must’ve been working on that fireplace again.
“Welcome,” Buffalo Bob greeted her.
She blinked hard and stared at Gage.
“Can I get you a beer?” Bob asked.
She hesitated. “No, thanks. I came looking for some help at the house.”
“You got it,” he told her. “Gage here will be happy to lend you a hand.” He winked in Gage’s direction.
“Would you mind?” Lindsay asked Gage.
“I’ll do what I can,” he told her. This was what he’d wanted, what he’d hoped would happen, but he suspected he was getting in deeper than he should.
She left with the same sense of purpose that had taken her into the bar.
“Well, go on,” Buffalo Bob urged. “I mean, I hate to send away customers, but don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”
Gage gulped down the last of his beer and hurried after Lindsay.
She waited until they were inside the house before she gestured weakly toward the fireplace. She’d managed to pry quite a few bricks loose, with no apparent rhyme or reason.
“Your…remodeling project?” he said, curious about what she was doing.
Lindsay brushed the hair away from her face. “I’m so frustrated I could scream.”
“Don’t you think it’s time you told me what’s going on?”
She groaned and fell onto the sofa. “There’s a moving brick in this fireplace. I saw it when I was a kid and I want to find it.”
“A moving brick?”
“Well, I didn’t actually see it move, but I heard it. It made a scraping sound.”
“How old were you?”
“Does it matter?” she asked curtly.
“No, but sometimes we allow things to grow in our minds and—”
“I know what I saw.”
“I believe you, so don’t get all bent out of shape.” He wasn’t going to argue. “Did you think to ask your father where it might be?” he asked, figuring that might be a helpful suggestion.
“Yes, and he doesn’t know anything about it.”
“But—”
“As far as I can tell, only one other person knows, and that person is dead.”
“Okay.” He tried to think of another question.
“I probably shouldn’t be talking to you about this, but I’m so damned frustrated. I know it’s there, Gage! I know it. “
“Do you remember roughly where?”
“If I remembered that, do you think I’d go through all this, digging out one brick at a time? I’ve been at it for weeks and I don’t have a damn thing to show for it except a bunch of broken nails.” She splayed her fingers as evidence.
“What would you like me to do?”
She inhaled sharply. “Get a sledgehammer and tear down the whole damn thing.”
“Ah.” Gage hesitated. “Have you considered the structural damage that might do to the house?”
“No,” she said, “but I don’t care anymore.” She sounded tired and angry. “As it is, I’m going to have to bring someone in to repair what I’ve already done.”
Gage glanced at the fireplace and then at her. “Have you had dinner yet?” he asked.
“No.”
“Me, neither and if we’re going to tear down a whole fireplace and risk having a wall collapse on us, I’d prefer to do it on a full stomach.”
She shrugged as if it didn’t matter to her one way or the other. “I’m not much of a cook.”
“We could take our business over to Buffalo Bob’s.”
Once again, she made a halfhearted gesture. “I suppose that’d be all right—but it’s not a date.”
“Most definitely not.” He found it difficult to hide his amusement. “If you insist, we could sit at separate tables.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
He gave up trying to suppress his smile. “I just want to save you from any unwanted gossip.”
“I appreciate the effort, but it isn’t necessary.”
When they walked into the restaurant, Buffalo Bob looked pathetically grateful for the business. He brought out menus, then proceeded to explain each entrée in far more detail than necessary. An hour later—after roast beef and tomato sandwiches and glasses of beer—Gage walked Lindsay back to the house.
“I have a confession to make,” she said as she opened the front door.
“Should I phone for a priest?”
“Don’t mock me, I’m serious.”
“All right, I apologize.” He forced a solemn look.
“When I went over to Buffalo Bob’s tonight, I knew you were there.”
“You did?”
She nodded.
Well, yeah. He’d told her he’d be there, hadn’t he? And Lindsay had come to him for a date. Because she was a woman, she had to be clever about it and a little understated, but Gage didn’t mind. In fact, he was pleased.
“You aren’t going to say I told you so?” she asked.
“Is that what you want?”
“No.”
“Good. Then let’s see if we can find that brick.”
Eight
Sarah Stern pulled the pickup truck into the service station and leaped down to pump her own gas. Dennis was outside immediately, eager to help her; he’d removed the handle from the pump before she’d even reached it.
“It’s good to see you,” he said. The words were casual but his voice said how much he’d missed her.
“You, too.”
br /> “You haven’t called since the night of the town council meeting,” he reminded her, concentrating on his task, eyes focused on the moving numbers of the pump.
Sarah was just as aware of how long it’d been. She’d missed him, needed him, and had tried to be strong. But she couldn’t do it anymore. Filling up her father’s truck was an excuse to see him, and they both knew it.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, standing beside her.
“What makes you think anything’s wrong?” His ability to read her thoughts unnerved her a little.
“Because I know you. Because I love you.”
“Oh, Dennis, please don’t say that.” Sarah cursed herself again for being weak, for her inability to stay away from him. She tried, she really did, but some days she got so lonely it was all she could do to keep her sanity. Her quilt business helped, but at night, when she crawled into bed, reality returned to stare her in the face.
She was living under her father’s roof. It mortified her that at the age of thirty-four she couldn’t seem to make her own way in the world. And here she was, Calla’s role model. She’d made so many mistakes through the years. Now, despite her efforts to live a decent and honest life, she was using Dennis. She loved him, but she couldn’t impose her troubles on him anymore.
“Tell me what’s wrong,” he urged gently.
Sarah lowered her head. “Calla got a postcard from Willie,” she finally said. She hadn’t meant to tell him, she really hadn’t….
Dennis was quiet for a few moments. He knew without her having to say it how much any contact with her ex-husband upset her.
“It’s about time she heard from her dad, isn’t it?” he asked in a neutral tone.
“But now she’s all excited about seeing him at Christmas.”
“Is that what he told her?”
Sarah shrugged to hide the hurt. “Apparently. Calla wouldn’t let me read the card. He’s in Vegas and the picture’s of some fancy hotel, supposedly where he’s staying. I couldn’t believe how excited she was. She doesn’t hear from him for months at a time, he forgets her birthday, doesn’t even send her a Christmas gift—and then she’s doing cartwheels because he mails her a postcard.”
“He is her father.”
Sarah bit her lip. While it was true that Willie had fathered Calla, he’d never shown much interest in her. He hadn’t paid the court-ordered child support, nor had he made more than a token effort to keep in touch with his daughter. Every five or six months he sent her a five-dollar bill in an envelope—usually without so much as a note. What irritated Sarah most was how willingly Calla made excuses for him.
“Willie isn’t going to pay for her ticket and I can’t afford to buy her airfare to Las Vegas or wherever he’s living now,” Sarah protested. “And even if I could, I wouldn’t.”
Dennis finished with the pump and led her inside the station, where he rang up the total on the old-fashioned register. “You’re afraid Calla’s going to accuse you of taking her father away from her.”
“You’re right—I am.” Her daughter’s attitude seemed ridiculous to Sarah. “He ignores her, abandons her emotionally and financially and is completely worthless as a father, yet Calla thinks he walks on water.”
“That’s fairly typical, I’d think.” He reached for her hand, holding it between his own. “He’s her father. It’s obvious she’s built Willie up in her mind as this wonderful, caring father figure. She needs to see him that way, otherwise she’d have to deal with the rejection she feels when he ignores her.”
Dennis was pretty wise about people, and Sarah knew he’d figured out the reason for Calla’s behavior. But that didn’t make living with her daughter any easier. She found it almost impossible to say nothing while Calla went on and on about what a fabulous father she had. She talked this way to anyone who’d listen. She’d even taken the postcard to school with her to show the new teacher.
Ironically, Calla’s attitude toward Sarah was hostile. When Sarah had recently confronted her about it, Calla had insinuated that the failure of the marriage must have been Sarah’s fault. If she’d been a better wife, none of this would have happened. If she’d tried harder, loved him more, they could still be a family. Her daughter simply didn’t know the facts, but Sarah couldn’t tell Calla about her father’s neglect and infidelity; she felt she had no right to place that burden on a fourteen-year-old. Besides, it was her problem, her history, not Calla’s.
“How’s it you’re so smart?” she asked, squeezing Dennis’s hand, grateful for his unflinching support. “You should’ve been a psychologist.” She smiled at him, loving him more than ever.
“If I was so smart, I’d have found a way to convince you to marry me.”
“Dennis, don’t, please.” She closed her eyes, unable to cope with any additional pressure, especially from him. Not when marriage was impossible.
“It’s crazy for us to go on like this,” he argued. “You know how I feel about you.”
“Yes—I know.”
“You’re thirty-four and I’m twenty-nine. Big deal.”
“It isn’t only that,” she said, resisting the urge to cover her ears. She hadn’t come to him to fight, especially when the subject was one they’d already covered so many times. She needed comfort and reassurance, not pressure.
Refusing to discuss it further, she slid a hand inside her hip pocket for her cash and counted out three fives to pay for the gasoline. She put the money on the counter.
Dennis ignored it. “I love you, Sarah.”
The best thing to do, she decided, was change the subject. “I went out to see Jeb on Sunday.”
“Are you saying you prefer not to talk about us?”
“Yes.” Unable to meet his eyes, she looked away.
His sigh revealed both frustration and defeat. “All right,” he said. “How’s Jeb?”
“Disagreeable as always. I brought him some biscuits and gravy. Made them myself, just the way Mom used to.”
“I imagine he scarfed them down fast enough.”
Sarah smiled. “Between growls.”
Since the farming accident that had claimed his leg, her brother, who’d never enjoyed social situations, had become a real loner. Jeb’s entire life now revolved around his bison, and his only social activity occurred when his family and friends made their infrequent trips out to the ranch.
“Did Calla go with you?”
“No.” Her daughter was uncomfortable around Jeb, uncertain how to act. Most of the time, Jeb was gruff and unfriendly, even to Sarah and his father. When Calla was there, he tended to ignore all three of them. Every once in a while, her daughter would agree to accompany Sarah on the long drive, but not often. When she did make the trip, Calla spent her time looking at the calves.
“He’s going to be all right, you know.”
“How can you say that?” Sarah cried. Dennis knew she worried about her brother, knew that everyone did. “It’s been three years. I’d hoped—I assumed that…” Her voice trailed off.
“We all did,” Dennis said with such gentleness that she raised her eyes to meet his. “Don’t let yourself worry so much about him.”
“I can’t help it.”
“Then let me help you.”
Without realizing it, Dennis made everything so much more difficult. “I can’t do that, either.”
“Try…Let me take you to dinner Friday night. Just the two of us. We’ll give Buffalo Bob’s karaoke machine a try.”
“I can’t sing.”
“You can. I’ve heard you!”
Once more she attempted to change the subject away from the two of them. “Did I tell you I sold another quilt? A lady in Dickinson saw that sunflower quilt I made and phoned and ordered one for herself.”
Sarah was passionate about quilts and took real pride in her small business. She bought muslin and colored it with natural dyes, which created subtle tones and interesting, often unusual effects; no two bolts of cloth ended up looking exactly the sam
e. Then she worked out designs, using the traditional patterns as a basis. Her sunflower quilt, for instance, was a variation on the classic “Dresden plate” design. That quilt had taken first place in the State Fair in Minot two years earlier and sold for an incredible one thousand dollars. Her second and third sales came within four months of each other and she’d been selling consistently since. It wasn’t enough money to support herself and Calla, but it made a difference.
“Thanks for the dinner invitation, but I’d better not. I have to finish that quilt for my new customer.”
“You can’t stop sewing long enough to eat dinner?” Dennis asked wryly.
“Dennis, please, I don’t want to go through this again.”
“Have dinner with me,” he said. “Friday night. Please.”
“I can’t.”
“You can sleep with me, but you can’t go out with me and—”
“Shh.” Embarrassed, she looked around, fearing someone might have heard him.
“And,” he went on, “it’s perfectly fine to come to me when you need something.”
“I shouldn’t. I know I shouldn’t.”
“Don’t use me, Sarah. This can’t just be on your terms, you know.”
She hung her head, not knowing what to say. “All right, we can go out to dinner,” she whispered. She knew he was right; she did use him and when she didn’t need him, she avoided him. Dennis deserved better.
“Good, and when we’re done eating, we’ll drive over to my house and you can have your way with me.”
“Dennis!”
“You think I’m joking? It’s been July since we…”
“That’s all?” It’d seemed much longer.
To her surprise, Dennis burst out laughing. His hug was spontaneous and she found herself smiling.
“We’re going to do the town,” he insisted. “Kick up our heels and let down our hair. Just the two of us. No more secret meetings. I’m not ashamed to let everyone know you’re with me.”