“It does.” Tracy gathered several bowls with the different ingredients in them. “For the restaurant, I’d plate these, but for the family, I make them fix their own. They get what they want that way.”
Marti hurried into the kitchen then. “What a day! I put in applications all over town.” She took a seat at the table. “I’m bushed. What’s everyone else up to?”
Heather waddled into the room then. “I’m eating for five. That’s what I’m up to!”
“Five? Why are you eating for five? Are you trying to tell me that no one else gets to eat tonight?” Marti asked.
They all laughed as Heather explained. “Quadruplets. Do you believe?” She shook her head. “Michael is going to flip out!”
“I’m sure he is.” Marti stared at her sister as if she had three heads. “I can’t believe you sound so happy about it.”
“Well, I do love kids, and I already knew I was pregnant.” Heather shrugged. “Four blessings from God!”
“All at once, though! I’d take seven blessings if they weren’t all at once!”
After the meal, they left Marti to do the dishes, much to her dismay. “But I was putting in applications all day. I’m tired!”
“I’m putting my feet up for five!” Heather retorted.
“I’m going to be a grandmother of four,” Barbara said. “That takes some getting used to.”
“I cooked!” Tracy said.
“I worked all day,” Steve said.
Bob ignored them all as he went to his study to work.
Marti grumbled, but she did the dishes by herself, while the rest of them sat in the living room, talking to each other.
“About time she did her share,” Tracy whispered to Heather.
Heather nodded emphatically. “Mom, you’re going to have to make four baby quilts. It’s time to get out the sewing machine!”
Barbara grinned. “My fingers are already tired just thinking about it.” The look on her face told everyone how excited she was. “I’m going to fly up there and help out when they come. You’re going to need an extra pair of hands.”
“Thankfully I’ll have Michael’s mom as well. It’s going to take a village to raise this litter.” Heather patted her belly happily. The about face she’d done made Tracy want to giggle, but there was no point. It would just offend her sister.
Shortly after that, Steve and Tracy headed out. Tracy had ridden with her mom, so she had asked Steve to take her home. “I’m glad we have a little time together tonight. It feels like it’s been all family all the time for the past few days,” Tracy told him.
“It really does,” he said. “But I think your family is pretty amazing, and since I didn’t grow up with siblings, I’m just not complaining one little bit.”
“I’m glad you don’t mind. I’m ready for a little time with just you, though. I hope you didn’t mind sharing our evening with family. After Heather found out it really was quadruplets, and then she wanted my nachos, and, well, I couldn’t tell her no. She’s craving for five, you know.”
“I do know. She commented on a lot of things she’s doing for five.” Steve shook his head. “Mind if I come in for a little bit?”
“Not at all. Just know that I’m not watching a movie. I have a ten-hour shift again tomorrow, and I’m only staying up for another hour.”
“That’s fine. I just want some time with you. I don’t much care what we do.”
“Aw. You’re being so sweet. Is there something you want from me?”
“Oh, you really don’t want to go there . . .” Steve grinned at her, parking in her driveway.
Once they were inside, Tracy switched to hostess mode. “Do you want something to drink? I have Coke or water. Or I think I might have some sweet tea . . .”
He caught her wrist and pulled her to him. “I don’t need anything but you.” Lowering his head, he kissed her for the first time in what felt like months. “When you always have family around, I don’t get enough time to kiss you.”
She laughed softly, leaning against him. “It felt like forever, didn’t it?”
“It did. I almost bought a flyswatter and started hitting them, but I wasn’t sure how you’d react.”
“Well, you can’t hit Heather, because she’s breathing for five, but you could swat Marti if you wanted to!”
He grinned. “I could, huh? How did she like the creepy-eyed doll?”
“She loved it. She’s got it on a shelf in her room with her others. She’s always collected dolls, but there’s something about the Cabbage Patch Kids that creeps me out.”
“Oh well. They make gift giving easy, right?”
“I hadn’t thought of it that way, but they really do.” Tracy took his hand and pulled him over to the couch with her, sinking down onto it. “Life’s been crazy. So this week is all Heather all the time. When I’m not working that is. Friday night we have a girls’ night here at my house. We’re all going to act silly and watch some musical. Maybe Grease 2. And then Saturday at two is the wedding. You’ll still be my date?” She didn’t want to go to that wedding alone. She wasn’t sure why, but she felt like life was passing her by as all her sisters married.
“Of course, I will.”
Tracy sighed contentedly and rested her head on his shoulder. “My hero.”
Chapter Nine
Friday evening all the sisters gathered as planned, filling Tracy’s tiny house. They watched Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and danced around singing and laughing. Lillian, their cousin Peter’s wife, joined them for the pre-marriage festivities.
Halfway through the song “Going Courtin’” Heather got up and danced, her lithe body still bending in ways the others couldn’t. When she finished, she curtsied for the others. “I’m dancing for five now!”
Marti threw popcorn at her eldest sister. “You’re doing everything for five! We get it. You’re having more babies than anyone should at one time!”
“You’d better be glad that didn’t make me cry, Marti McClain. Or I’d have to call Michael to come down here and chew you out!” Heather lifted her glass of raspberry lemonade in a toast to her sisters. “May you both find as much love as I have with my Michael but hopefully not be quite as fertile!”
Gaylynn shook her head. “I think Zach would have a heart attack if I came home one night and told him I was having quadruplets. I think one at a time is good for anyone.”
After the others were gone, Tracy cleaned up the mess left and thought about her Steve. After just two weeks of dating, she felt as if their lives were hopelessly interwoven. She thought of him first thing in the morning and last thing before she fell asleep at night. She was in love with Steve, her buddy from high school. Her first crush. Her everything.
On Monday morning, Tracy took Heather back to the airport, hugging her goodbye. “I swear you’ve grown in the ten days you’ve been here.”
“I’m growing for five, you know!”
“I know! I know!” Tracy couldn’t help but laugh. “I wish I could see Michael’s face when you told him.”
“Me too! It’s going to be amazing!” With those as her last words, Heather kissed Tracy’s cheek and hurried into the line to get on the plane.
Tracy watched her go with both sadness and happiness. Sad she was going to be missing her sister, but happy for her, because she was so darned happy for herself. Happy and doing everything for five.
That afternoon was filled with signing papers to close on the property for the pub. Tracy was excited even as her hand shook signing the papers. As soon as she was finished, she met with her contractor, giving him a copy of the key to the building. As the two of them walked through together, she explained exactly what she was looking for and what she needed.
“I really want to preserve the look of the building. Instead of being an ice cream parlor, it will be a pub, but the bar will remain in the same place. I want booths throughout and high-top tables. I want a mirror along that wall behind the bar. The bathrooms need to have a European feel.”
She nodded. “Probably more often than that. You’ll work Monday through Friday?”
“Yes, of course. If necessary, we can work weekends, but I’d have to ask for extra.”
“As long as you can have everything done and have it ready for me to train my people by the first of August, we’re good.”
“I can do that with no problem.” Frank shook her hand before leaving her there alone, looking around her. This was her place now. Soon it would be filled with everything she’d dreamed of for so long. It was her place, and it always would be.
She turned when she heard the door open behind her, surprised that anyone would try to come in. It was Steve, and he had a grin on his face. He walked to her with two bottles of Coke, the caps already off. He handed one to her, and raised his bottle in a toast. “To McClain’s Irish Pub. May it be everything you’ve dreamed it will be.”
Tracy clinked her bottle against his and took a sip. “I wasn’t expecting you.”
“You said you were meeting the contractor here after the signing, so I called your real estate agent and had her call after you finished. Are you happy?”
She nodded. “I’m so happy! I can just picture exactly how I want everything. I’ve started designing the menu. This place is going to be my dream come true.” She took another sip of her Coke, looking at him over the bottle. “Thank you for supporting me. Even if it’s a mistake and I go under, I’ll never forget how you stood by my side through the whole thing, encouraging me every step of the way.”
“You won’t fail.”
“What makes you so sure of that?”
“Marti would be taunting you with your failure before it ever happened if you were doomed. And she keeps saying how great it’s going to be.” Steve winked at her.
She laughed. “You’re absolutely right. There’s no one who is more likely to throw a future failure in my face than my youngest sister. Who still doesn’t have a job. I think Mom is making her do her own laundry now, though. She has to make quilts for a whole lot of grandbabies.”
He wrapped his arm around her waist, holding her close. “Heather’s on her way home?”
She nodded. “She should be with Michael in Salt Lake City by now. She promised she’d wait until she got home to tell him it was quads, though, because she didn’t want to deal with him passing out.”
“That’s very smart.” Steve shook his head. “I cannot imagine being in his shoes.” He could imagine her being pregnant, of course, because he loved the idea of having children with her, but not four at once. No one needed four at once. “Do you want to go to Comida and celebrate?”
“Is there queso involved?”
“Always if you want there to be.” He led her toward the door, taking the key from her and locking it up for her. “I think you’re going to love doing business here. It really is a good location. I wonder why no one ever bought it.”
“I think most people in town are looking to lease a commercial property, not buy it. This one was never for lease, always for sale. So I’m the one who got to snatch it up. It’s mine, mine, mine, all mine!”
He laughed. “I remember you saying that in high school. You’d get a good test back, and you’d say that.”
“Yeah, I was always a little bit odd. I wasn’t a scholar like most of my sisters. I always knew I wanted to do something different with my life. Be an entrepreneur. But I didn’t know until my trip after high school exactly what I wanted to do.”
“I’m glad you figured it out.” He led her to his truck. “Let’s have some good Mexican.”
“Sounds wonderful.”
After dinner, they went back to her place, and while she worked out a schedule of the things she wanted completed by when, he flipped through channels on the television. It felt very comfortable to her, sharing a space with him but not having to actually be interacting all of the time.
Finally, she closed the calendar she’d been writing in and walked over to the couch, snuggling down beside him, her head on his shoulder. “I’m so tired, but it was a good day. I feel like everything is going my way.”
“That’s how it looks to me as well.” He kissed the top of her head, thinking about the ring in his pocket. He thought about pulling it out there and then, but he wanted that day to be all about her closing on the property and getting the ball rolling for her future instead of their engagement day. She deserved a day all to herself.
A few minutes later, she walked him to the door. “I’m going to be working tons of hours again this week. I probably can’t see you.”
“Friday night?” he asked.
“I work Saturday this week again. How about Saturday night?”
He frowned but finally nodded. “I’ll call you every night.”
“That sounds good.” She stood on tiptoe and brushed her lips against his. “See you soon.”
“Talk to you every night.” With those words, he jogged to his truck and drove off, leaving her staring after him.
He seemed to think she was pushing him off by not having time for him in the evenings, but the truth was she was too busy. She was exhausted when she finished work every evening.
She would have to worry about it later. He would understand soon enough, she hoped. If they were meant to be together, then he would. If not, he wouldn’t.
Suddenly she realized she’d never asked Heather about their auras. She thought for a minute about calling her to ask, but she knew her sister would be dealing with her husband, who may or may not be having a heart attack at that very moment. No, she’d wait a day or two.
Every day that week, Tracy stopped by the pub on her lunch hour. Sometimes she’d just pop her head in, and sometimes she’d take her lunch so she could watch magic happen while she ate.
Every night, just before she fell asleep, Steve would call her, and they’d chat about their days for a few minutes, and she’d go to sleep, still hearing his deep voice in her mind as she drifted off.
It wasn’t until Friday evening that she finally had a bit of time to call Heather. “Hey, you!”
“Hey, Tracy. What are you up to?”
“Well, I wanted to call and see if Michael survived your news first of all.”
Heather laughed. “He didn’t know what to think. At first, he was sure I was joking, but then I showed him the sonogram picture that Tina gave me, and I counted heads for him. He sat in shock for a good ten minutes before he could speak again.”
Tracy grinned, picturing Heather’s big rancher husband reacting exactly that way. “Have you seen your GP yet?”
“Yup. There’s no obstetrician in our little town, so I’m having to make a thirty-minute drive each way, but I’m lucky to have one that close. They’re watching me closely, but I’m doing everything I should be. I’m healthy, and so are the babies. They told me they’ll be putting me on bed rest before the summer is up, but for now, I’m okay to keep doing everything I usually do.”
“Did you tell him that you usually do handstands and pirouettes?” Tracy wasn’t sure any doctor would let a woman pregnant with quadruplets do those things.
“Doc said my normal level of activity, whatever that means to me. I told him I teach dance and I’m always on my feet. He said to keep it up.”
“Then I guess you need to keep it up.” Tracy smiled, thinking of her sister dancing around with her huge stomach. “I forgot to ask about auras while you were here. How’s mine with Steve?”
“Do you really want to know? Doesn’t that take some of the fun out of things?”
“Does that mean it’s bad?”
Heather sighed. “You were meant for each other. A truer violet I’ve never seen.”
Tracy let out a breath. “Thank goodness. I’m head over heels in love with the man, and I was afraid you were going to tell me we were all wrong for each other.”
“No, I didn’t know that. Thanks for telling me now.” Tracy smiled as she sat down, staring at the dishes she needed to wash from her supper. “I appreciate you, big sis.”
“Love you, Trace.”
“Love you, too.”
For the rest of that evening, she wore her Walkman, playing a mixed tape she’d made for herself. It was mostly Journey, with a little Styx and Air Supply. She was in the mood for some soft music that made her feel like she was in love, and she definitely was. Laundry and dishes were easy as she danced around to her music.
Finally, she put the Walkman down and got ready for bed. She was tired, and she had one more day of work to go and then two glorious days off. She wished she could go ahead and quit working at the dealership so she could just concentrate on her pub, but that wasn’t possible. It was too important that she earn as much as she could between now and the restaurant opening. The money was necessary to see her through the lean months at the beginning. Too many restaurants went under in the first five years, but McClains would not.
As she was drifting off to sleep, she realized that Steve hadn’t called her that night. It was the first night since they’d started dating that he hadn’t called when he said he would. Maybe he was losing interest in her. She hoped not, but she couldn’t let go of her dreams just because she was in a relationship. It wasn’t who she was at all.
Steve looked at the clock and realized it was too late to try to call her again. He’d made over thirty calls to Tracy that night, and she hadn’t answered at all. At first, it had just been busy signal after busy signal. But after that, it rang and rang. She didn’t have an answering machine, so he couldn’t even leave her a message.
As he undressed for bed, he worried. Had she lost interest in him? He set the ring he carried around on his nightstand. Why was she dodging his calls? Surely, she’d known it was him calling all those times. She must not have wanted to talk to him for some reason.
Tracy (Seven Sisters Book 5) Page 7
