Rocky Mountain Shelter

by Vivian Arend

  Becky shooed him away, smiling after he’d left.

  Between the walk to and from work, because there were no rides this week, and full days helping Hope, and hours going though stuff at the house, Becky fell into bed every night exhausted, but happy.

  Friday morning at the store turned out to be insanely busy. The small warning bell rang again and again until both Becky and Hope were turning toward the door with a laugh each time it happened.

  “I’ve never seen such a rush,” Becky said when they finally had a moment to breathe. A calm in the middle of the storm.

  “I hope we don’t see the end of it,” Hope joked. “Days like this help the store survive the winter snowstorms when everyone curls up and stays home. I swear, last year I got to hate the weather forecast—”

  The bell sang out, interrupting her story. Hope’s face lit up with delight even though it wasn’t more customers slipping through the stacks of fabric. It was her husband who hurried forward to meet her before she could take more than a couple of steps.

  “Hey, beautiful.” Matt tucked his fingers under Hope’s chin and tilted her head back so he could press a kiss to her lips.

  It was a proper enough public greeting, but at the same time Becky’s toes were ready to curl just watching them. He finished with a caress of his hand over Hope’s cheek as if he hadn’t had enough of her, and the way he gently slid a hand around her waist to keep her by his side spoke of an intimacy that ran deep.

  Hope let out a happy sigh. “Well, I was going to say it’s nice to see you in the middle of the day, but that was far better than nice.”

  “I was about to grab the fire extinguisher,” Becky teased, fanning a hand in front of her face.

  Matt offered a smile to both of them before tilting his head toward the cash desk where he’d left a paper bag. “I picked up lunch for you girls, since I was in town. For when you have a moment to eat.”

  “Are you joining us?” Hope asked.

  He shook his head regretfully. “I promised Blake I’d be back as soon as I could. I had to drop off blades to be sharpened. And…” He turned to Becky, his smile brightening further as he reached under his jacket and pulled out a slim envelope. “I checked the post office. Your landlord got in touch with me.”

  His expression meant everything was fine, but she still needed it said out loud. “And I can keep working here?”

  Matt nodded. “We’ll still need your identification once that comes through, but in the meantime, we’ve got your back.”

  Becky fought for control, but sheer relief hit harder than expected. She buried her face in her hands to hide the tears that rushed to escape.

  “Hey, this is supposed to be good news,” Hope said, dropping an arm around Becky’s shoulders and hugging her.

  “I’m happy, really I am,” Becky insisted, the words a little tangled and tight.

  “Don’t worry,” Matt teased. “Hope is pretty much a watering can these days with pregnancy hormones. I know crying women are happy.”

  “Hey,” Hope warned. “Watch it, bucko.”

  Their loving banter was as wonderful to witness as their earlier passion.

  “You don’t know how much this means to me.” She wiped tears from her eyes and offered Matt another smile. “I know I haven’t shared everything that’s going on, but the fact you were willing to take a chance on me—it really is changing my life.”

  Matt pressed a kiss to Hope’s temple where she’d slipped back into his arms for a brief moment, the two of them looking at her with kindness in their eyes.

  “Oh, by the way, I have a feeling you’re going to see a lot more of a certain someone in the coming days. If he’s too big of a pain in the ass, tell him to go fly a kite, okay? Just because he’s your neighbour doesn’t mean he’s got any rights to you.” Matt shook a finger at her. “You decide who you hang out with, even if that means telling my overeager cousin he’s not welcome.”

  Matt left. More customers came in. She and Hope ended up trading off to sneak bites of their lunch between working.

  The whole time Becky pondered how her life could have changed so much in such a short time. She certainly hadn’t done anything to deserve all the good things coming her way.

  Didn’t mean she wanted any of it to stop. Not the job, or the house. Maybe not even having someone dance attention on her. Although he’d been so good about her request to slow it down.

  Trevor made her feel…

  Well, that was the point. He made her feel. She’d never had a relationship with a man that hadn’t involved a lot of ice-cold sensation in her gut, or worse.

  She was daydreaming about him, in fact, as they got ready to close the shop at the end of the day.

  “I’d tease you about your dreamy expression, but I don’t want you to take it the wrong way and stop.” Hope nudged her with a shoulder as she hurried past. “I’d like to keep that smile on your face. You look good happy.”

  “So do you,” Becky teased. “You should have seen your face when Matt showed up here at lunch.”

  Hope clutched the fabric she was tidying to her chest as if she’d forgotten it was there, her eyes going hazy with pleasure. “That man is a wonderful, terrific husband, and I’m very lucky to have someone who gets me as hard as he does.”

  A shot of something raced through Becky, and she fought to identify the emotion. It wasn’t covetousness. She was honestly glad that Hope had Matt.

  She didn’t think it was jealousy, wanting what the other woman had. Right now freedom and a future were pretty potent highs to wallow in. Having someone to share the joys with—she could handle that.

  It was the wide, gaping chasm between Hope’s life and her own that made her hesitate. Hope had Matt, and the Coleman family, and her own family on the way. Becky had…

  Herself.

  At least for now, that was it.

  She wanted more, but without the demands more would put on her, and that wasn’t fair to anyone.

  Sadness crept in. She liked Trevor, but it wouldn’t be fair for him to get involved with her as more than a friend. Knowing that changed things.

  She was still delighted with the good news the day had brought, and she wouldn’t hurry to change their relationship, but at some point she would have to make the situation clear. She had a future, but it was one where she’d be alone, and that was fine.

  Or at least, she spent the walk home trying to convince herself of that.

  The evening they finished seeding the fields, as many of the Moonshine clan as possible gathered together around the family table to raise a glass to another successful start to the season. Now they had to wait until the fall to see how things would turn out.

  Typical rancher’s life—work like crazy to find out if their dreams would be met, or dashed to pieces by bad weather or a million other disasters. Maybe it was a smart thing to celebrate every single success along the way, because there were no guarantees.

  His mom was a firm believer in the celebrate life philosophy, which is why everyone, except for Melody who’d been called out on a veterinarian emergency, was in the room. Food vanished, plates wiped clean by the hungry crowd as they visited and laughed.

  His dad was the quietest of the lot, his food picked over like it had been for the last year. Indigestion had been the first complaint, and now Randy was having troubles with his joints. He absently rubbed his hand and wrist with his other hand as he listened to the family squabble, complain and brag about what they’d accomplished.

  The volume in the house was enough for a dozen people, but when any group included his brother-in-law Mitch and his younger brother’s partner, Rachel, gatherings tended to get a little loud. The two of them were like oil and water, in a good way. They didn’t fight, but they never let the other get in the last word.

  Trevor found the changing family dynamics fascinating.

  He sat beside Lee at the table in their old spots, the ones their mom had put them in so she could keep an eye on them, as
if they weren’t well behaved all the time growing up, or something.

  Trevor gestured across the table to where Rachel was poking Mitch in the arm as he pretended to not hear her, his smile twisted into a smirk. “You want to lay odds on them breaking into a fistfight?”

  Lee chuckled. “Rachel won’t punch him again like she did last time, she promised. I bet you a case of beer, though, that in the next five minutes, someone proposes they arm wrestle.”

  “You’re on.” Trevor snatched the peaches from under his mom’s hand before she could take them away. He poured the last few into his bowl then handed her the empty jar. “I don’t want them to go to waste. I’m surprised you have canning left on the shelf.”

  Kate lifted a brow as if he’d insulted her. “What kind of comment is that? Of course I still have stuff left in the pantry. It’s only June.”

  “Except you’re all out of bacon,” Trevor’s oldest brother muttered under his breath.

  His dad gave his Steve the evil eye, but it was too late.

  Kate turned on her husband. “I thought we talked about you raiding the freezer. Hands off the back bacon.”

  “I haven’t touched it in months,” Randy insisted. “Honest.”

  “That’s because he finished it months ago,” Lee said quietly to Trevor.

  Chaos. It was all chaos, and it was perfect…except for the way his thoughts kept drifting back to wondering what Becky was doing for supper tonight on her own. He’d missed her the past week, which was crazy to admit, but the truth.

  “Thank you, Kate. That was delicious, as usual.” His dad blew a kiss at his wife as he rose slowly out of his chair. “You all deserve a cheer for getting the job done, especially since I slacked my ass off most of the time. So—” He raised both arms in the air and gave a shout, shaking his hands as if he were waving pompoms.

  Steve snickered and ducked his head.

  Dad laughed. “There we go. I’m not doing my job if I haven’t embarrassed one of you every family dinner.”

  “Never embarrassed, Dad, just making sure you don’t signal for us all to join in.”

  Randy patted Steve on the shoulder. “I’m going to watch a little television. Don’t break the house, kids.”

  He moved gingerly toward the La-Z-Boy recliner he’d spent a lot more time in lately than years before. Whatever was wrong was turning him old ahead of his time.

  On the other side of the table Mitch and Rachel were pushing their chairs aside, a burst of laughter going up from Anna.

  “What’s going on?” Kate demanded. “Don’t you dare start a food fight, or break any of my dishes this time.”

  “It’s not my fault,” Anna exclaimed as the two in front of her squared off like Lee had predicted, lifting their hands into position for an arm wrestle. “Blame Rachel for this one. Mitch was being good.”

  “That’s open for debate. We’re using left hands,” Rachel insisted, wiggling her way forward to place her elbow on the table as she made a face at Mitch. “And Anna holds your elbow in place.”

  Mitch offered her a silent mocking grin, flexing his flame-covered biceps a few times as he eyed her less-than-pumped upper arms.

  How the heck had Lee known?

  “You cheated. Somehow, you cheated.” Trevor jabbed his brother as Anna stepped behind Mitch, curling her arms around his body and pressing her lips to his neck in what had to be a very distracting manner.

  “Don’t think that’s gonna help Rachel win,” Mitch grumbled, amusement in his voice. He loosened his grip on Rachel’s fingers, adjusting to allow her into a better position with her shorter forearms. “You have no chance of taking me down. Glutton for punishment.”

  Rachel and the rest of them laughed, while Kate kept gathering plates, headed for the kitchen. “I swear none of you are grown up yet. I still have a parcel of kids to wrangle every time you get around my table.”

  Steve moved into position to referee the match. “Ready? Three, two one—”

  Anna set her teeth into Mitch’s earlobe right when Steve said go, and Mitch sucked in a breath of air.

  Rachel nearly got the back of his fist to the table before he recovered, steadily powering their hands back to vertical. “Anna Thompson, I’m going to smack your ass if you don’t stop.”

  Trevor couldn’t see what else was going on, and he didn’t want to because it had to be something dirty—his brother-in-law’s face was turning red, and it wasn’t from exertion. The muscles in his tattooed arm barely popped as he carefully controlled his strength and took Rachel to the table to win.

  Anna relented, leaning over his shoulder to plant a final kiss to his cheek. “Sorry, Rach, I tried to help.”

  “I’m still right, even though you won,” Rachel said as she made her way over to the opposite side of the table and bumped Lee’s chair until there was enough room she could crawl into his lap.

  Steve took off to join their father, and Trevor decided he’d clear the table instead of sitting around chatting with the two couples like a fifth wheel.

  The kitchen smelt glorious, even with his stomach more than comfortably full.

  “Did you want take some leftovers home?” Kate asked.

  “I’ll never say no to that.” Trevor snuck over and offered his mom a hug because she seemed to need one. “How’re you doing?”

  She glanced over her shoulder to make sure they were alone. “I’m doing good, but your dad’s having a tough week,” she confessed.

  “I saw that. When’s the next set of tests?”

  “Never.”

  Shit. “What do you mean?

  Kate shrugged. “Your dad said he’d had enough of being poked and prodded. Said trying to find a cure was worse than suffering through whatever’s wrong. He’s being stubborn, and I don’t agree, but it’s like arguing with a brick wall. I don’t have the energy to do it anymore.”

  Trevor stood there feeling hopeless and helpless. His mom never spoke like that, her tone one of despair. “Is there something else they can try?”

  “There’s always something more they can try, but it means going to Calgary or Edmonton for testing, and you know your father.”

  Trevor nodded. “And you know me. Mom, why didn’t you say something earlier?”

  “Because it’s his decision,” she said softly. “It’s the wrong decision, but I’m not going to bully him into doing something he doesn’t want.”

  “Then I will,” Trevor declared. “Don’t worry, I’ll go to work on him, and see if we can find out once and for all something that’s gonna help. In the meantime, let me know if you need anything.”

  She nodded, a big sigh escaping her. “You are helping a lot, you know. You boys, and Mitch, and the girls—it’s been good to have you all around more often, pitching in on more than the chores.”

  It’s what family did. They took care of each other.

  And looking out for each other was something you did for a friend, as well. “Do you have any extra canning, or things in the freezer you might not get through before this coming harvest?”

  Kate looked thoughtful. “Probably. I’d have to look. Do you want anything specific?”

  “It’s for my neighbour. In the rental, on the west quarter.”

  His mom’s eyes widened.

  “She’d really appreciate it,” he said. “Anything you’ve got.”

  “I’ll look.” Her tone of voice and expression changed to curiosity. “So, getting to know someone new?”

  “Don’t start, Mom,” he warned with a laugh, moving to the sink as Steve stepped into the room behind them.

  “Dad informed me I needed to get my butt in here and send you out—there’s some documentary starting up he said you wanted to see.”

  Their mom dried her hands as she gave Trevor a meaningful stare. “I will be asking more questions later,” she warned him. “Don’t forget to wash the pot on the stove.”

  Trevor and Steve looked at each other. “Heads or tails?” Steve asked, hauling a coin ou
t his pocket.

  “Heads.”

  Trevor got stuck washing—his least favourite task. But with a little conversation, time moved along quick enough.

  And Steve took the opportunity to share the good news. “Matt said everything’s okay. Got a letter from Becky’s landlord, and that thing that I warned you about, you can forget it. It’s nothing.”

  He still didn’t have a clue what Steve had been implying in the first place. He was more interested in the other bits of information. “So her job is okay?”

  “Hope said she’s doing really well, and in the end, that’s the part that’s most important.” Steve dried another pot and placed it on the table behind him. “I guess the landlord asked for a list of things that need to be done around the place to fix it up. We thought maybe you’d like to give her a hand putting that together.”

  Interesting. “So you’ve gone from warning me off to trying to matchmake?”

  Steve gave him a startled look. “Of course not. Only she seems to trust you, and we don’t want to make a big deal out of this and involve a lot of people. She didn’t seem your type, actually.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  His brother shrugged. “She’s young, that’s all.”

  “Hey, I’m not the one on the wrong side of thirty,” Trevor said.

  “Wait until your next birthday—you hit the big three-oh this year, don’t you?”

  “That’s just a number. I’m much more mature than you, yet young inside, old man.”

  Steve snapped the drying cloth, the sharp sting on his thigh drawing a shout from Trevor’s lips.

  Which brought in the rest of the clan, which turned into a water fight that only stopped when Kate kicked them all out after they’d mopped up the mess.

  Trevor stopped to offer his dad a goodbye handshake. “Want to ride the fence line with me tomorrow before we bring in the herd from the east fields?” he asked. “If you’re feeling up to it?”

  His dad’s eyes lit up. “Want to ride horses or quads?

  “Horses.” They couldn’t talk as easily on the quads, and there was a whole lot he wanted to bend his father’s ear about. Luckily, horseback was the method he knew his dad would prefer.