Lonestar Angel

by Colleen Coble

  Silence echoed on the other end of the connection. “Brianna? I hadn’t heard that one. What kind of trick is he pulling on you now?”

  “No trick. She’s here. We’ll figure it out in just a few more days.”

  “Then what?” His voice softened, grew lower.

  Was he hoping . . . ? Surely not. “Then we try to rebuild our lives. To help her get over whatever has happened to her.”

  “You’re not coming home?” His voice was sharp again.

  “Not now. Brianna is all that matters.” The reminder of her priorities strengthened her. She rose and leaned against the wall, wrapping the cord around her arm.

  “I see. Of course. I was never important. I keep trying to find some way around that truth.”

  The silence on the other end was so long she thought he’d hung up on her. “Daniel?”

  “I’m here.” He sighed, a long, drawn-out sound. “I went by your apartment. Doesn’t look like you forwarded your mail. Your box was full so I took it inside.”

  “Thanks.” Where was this going?

  “There was a letter from the court. I opened it.”

  “You opened my mail?”

  “It looked important.”

  She couldn’t be angry. She’d always shared everything with Daniel. “What was it?”

  “Your birth mother is trying to find you.”

  Of all the things she might have guessed, the thought wouldn’t have crossed her mind. “What does the letter say?”

  “Just what I told you.”

  “My birth mom.” She couldn’t take it in. “What if I don’t want to see her?”

  “Nothing will proceed unless you agree. I tried to call them to get more details, but the receptionist said you’d have to call yourself. I’ll text you the phone number.”

  Eden couldn’t think past the pain squeezing her chest. After all these years, her mother was trying to find her. Why? And did she even want to see the woman after all these years? What good would it do? But even as she tried to talk herself out of it, the desire to ask her mother why she’d been abandoned welled up.

  “Send me the number,” she said.

  “I said I would. Then we’re square. Good-bye, Eden. Don’t call me again.”

  The connection broke in her ear. She stared at the phone stupidly. Her best friend was gone. Maybe it was for the best. She’d been so blind. What else was she wrong about? Everything?

  14

  THE MOON SPILLED IN THROUGH THE WINDOW AS EDEN TIPTOED BACK INTO THE BEDROOM. Her nose was still clogged with tears. As she reached her side of the mattress, the moon went behind a cloud and plunged the room into darkness. Feeling her way, she pulled back the sheet and quilt.

  Clay’s side of the bed was much too quiet when she eased between the sheets. The springs squeaked and she winced. She was cold, so cold. Mostly because she knew what she was going to do. Tomorrow she would call the office and say she wanted to see her mother. Then what? Did she expect her mother to rush to her with open arms? To ask for forgiveness? And could Eden even give it if her mother asked?

  Shivering, she pulled the sheet up to her chin. It was hot outside, but the air-conditioning was too cold. Or else it was stress. Clay’s warmth radiated out from him, and remembering how safe she’d felt in his arms earlier, she wished she could curl up against his back.

  Clay’s deep voice came out of the darkness. “Is your brother okay?” His voice was derisive. He rolled in the bed, and the springs protested.

  “I . . . I don’t know what to think,” she said. To her horror, her voice shook. He wouldn’t understand her quandary. He’d go see Eden’s mom, tell her she was worthless, then never see her again. Good riddance. Eden should feel that way too, but she didn’t.

  “Hey, what’s the matter?” He scooted closer, and his arm came around her. His breath stirred her hair. “Did you have to cover yourself from head to toe?” he asked, a smile in his voice. He didn’t wait for an answer. “Tell me what’s upset you.”

  The musky scent of his skin left her motionless when she should have moved away. His warmth seeped into her. He pulled her closer and she didn’t protest, though every nerve shouted the danger to her emotions. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  His fingers tangled in her hair, and he pulled her so close there was no room down the full length of her body. Danger!

  “It’s dark. You can tell me your secrets and I can’t see your face.” His lips brushed her cheek.

  The desire to talk to him swept over her. What could it hurt to unburden her soul? There’d been so few times in her life that she could tell anyone how she felt. Even when they were together before, she was always sure he’d married her because she was pregnant.

  What was different now? She couldn’t define the difference, but she knew it was there. There was a special bond now that had never existed before. The wariness that had held them apart was gone.

  She turned her face against his neck and inhaled. “My mother wants to see me.”

  His hand smoothed her hair. “So tell her to come down. There’s room here in the bunkhouse.” His warm chuckle came from the darkness. “I’d like to see your foster mom sharing a bathroom with the kids. She’ll be in there and one of them will come flying in yelling at her to get out of the way.”

  She should laugh, but nothing felt funny. “You don’t understand. My real mother.”

  His arm seemed heavier across her midsection. His muscles hardened too. His hand quit petting her hair. “After all these years?”

  She nodded her head, though she knew he couldn’t see it. Her throat thickened. She hated to cry. Strength, not weakness, was admirable. “I want to ask her why she abandoned me. But I don’t want to face that rejection all over again.”

  His lips brushed her brow in the darkness. “I’m sorry, sweetheart.” His breath stirred her hair, then his lips trailed down the side of her face. “You don’t have to see her if you don’t want to.”

  She held her breath and nearly turned her head to press her lips against his. What was she thinking? This was much too dangerous. But she was too languorous to move, her muscles too heavy with desire. They’d always had this chemistry between them. She never should have agreed to this charade. But all her internal protests weren’t enough to make her move.

  She pulled away a fraction. “I think I want to see her. Is that crazy? She doesn’t love me, but I still love her. She entertained men, and those were awful nights. But I also remember the evenings we watched TV and ate pizza together.”

  “It’s perfectly understandable.”

  “Is it?” she whispered. “To love someone who doesn’t love you back?”

  “Maybe she realizes her error. She might have found God too.”

  Was that possible? She’d prayed for her mother. Somehow it made the pain of rejection better. Clay touched her cheek and turned her face toward him. She was helpless to resist him.

  “I’ve missed you, Eden. So much.”

  His lips trailed across her face to her lips. She couldn’t help the way her arms came up and pulled him closer. Why not? They were married. It was perfectly natural. But even as the thought crossed her mind, she heard a tap at the door.

  “Miss Eden?” Madeline’s voice. “Paige wet the bed and it got on my nightgown.”

  Clay groaned and his arm fell away. “I thought five was too old to be wetting the bed.”

  “They’re still babies.” She felt cold without his arms around her. “I’ll be right there,” she called, swinging her legs out of bed. It was just as well. Making love to him would have led to endless complications when the time came for their lives to separate.

  The bedding had been changed and the girls settled. Clay still detected the faint stench of urine, but the apple candle Eden lit was quickly chasing the odor from the room. The candle’s flickering light illuminated five eager faces turned toward where they sat on the edge of the bed with Katie and Paige.

  “Sing to us,” Madeline demande
d. “Do you know ‘Amazing Grace’?”

  Clay didn’t want to look at Eden’s expression, but he had to. He’d overheard her singing in the shower a time or two, but she never sang when she thought someone was listening. She was biting her lip as she tucked the blanket under Katie’s chin. The air conditioner hummed.

  “I know the song,” Eden said. “But you need to go to sleep.”

  “I have to hear it,” Madeline insisted. “I tried to play it on the CD tonight, but it’s scratched.” The other girls chimed in with their pleas as well.

  Clay saw Eden physically wilt at the plaintive tones in the girls’ voices. “I’ll sing with you,” he said.

  “You can sing it by yourself,” she said.

  “He can’t sing,” Lacie said, over in the next bed. “I heard him in the barn today. He sounded like the cow.”

  Clay grinned. “Just for that, you might have to be tickled.” He wiggled his fingers at her, and she squealed and huddled under the covers. He looked at Eden. “I don’t think you can get out of it.”

  She sighed and stared at Madeline’s determined face. “Then you have to promise to go to sleep. Mr. Clay and I are tired. It’s nearly eleven.”

  “We will,” the girls said in a chorus.

  Tension radiated from Eden’s slim shoulders, clad in pale blue cotton. He could still feel the texture of her pajamas under his palm from earlier. Probably just as well they were interrupted. She had no intention of working on the marriage. Any entanglement would make the ultimate breakup even more painful. He would not think about how right she had felt in his arms.

  “You start,” he said. “I’ll chime in.” He waggled his brows at Paige, who giggled and pulled the sheet up to her chin, then sneezed.

  “‘Amazing grace, how sweet the sound.’” Eden’s voice was a little choked but sweet and even.

  “‘That saved a wretch like me.’” His raspy voice blended with hers.

  “‘I once was lost but now am found. Was blind but now I see.’” His eyes stung when he saw the way the girls listened. Did they feel lost as they went from foster home to foster home? Only a couple of them had stayed in the same place. The hunger in their eyes made him want to gather every one of them in his lap and never let go.

  And Eden. She’d had the same experience they had. He saw the sheen of her eyes and the way she gulped down her emotion. What would have happened to them all but for God’s grace? His gaze met Eden’s across the bed as the song ended. The pathos in her eyes told him she saw it too. The hunger for love in these little girls.

  “Time for sleep, kiddos,” he said. He and Eden made the rounds, brushing kisses across every cheek. “Love you, honey,” he told each little girl. The starved way they wrapped their arms around his neck brought a lump to his throat. Katie didn’t want to let loose of Eden, and he watched her hold the child close.

  He followed Eden back to the living room and dropped onto the sofa. “That was hard,” he said. “They need love so badly. Every one of them.”

  Her eyes were moist when she turned to stare at him. “You love kids so much. Why didn’t you just sign the divorce papers and remarry? You could have had two or three more by now.”

  “God hates divorce. So do I.” His voice shook, and he tugged his boots off. There were so many things they’d never told each other about their past and how those things had shaped the person they’d become. “My parents divorced when I was seventeen,” he said, wincing when his voice showed his pain. “I always thought it was my fault. They were always arguing about something, and usually it involved me. Whether I would be allowed to stay out late the night of homecoming. Whether I should have a job. I realize now I was just a convenient excuse to show their dislike for each other.”

  He glanced up to see sympathy in her eyes. Was there any hope of tearing down the walls between them? He was willing to try.

  She sat beside him on the sofa. “You’re worried about Brianna and how growing up with us divorced would affect her.”

  “Aren’t you?”

  “Of course. She’s been in a foster home, without the security and love of her own parents. We don’t even know what kind of circumstances Brianna has been in, but looking at the girls’ reports, not one has been in a place I’d want our daughter to experience.”

  He tried to read her expression, but she kept her gaze on the clasped hands in her lap. “Do you still have any hope left, Eden? Hope for that perfect little family we dreamed about once?”

  She raised her eyes to his. “Sometimes. But I’m afraid, Clay.”

  His pulse leapt at her admission. “You think I’m not? I failed you and Brianna once. I want to be here for you both and never let you down again.”

  Something flickered in her eyes. He wanted to believe it was the beginning of a bit of trust and hope, but before he could nail it down, one of the girls let out a heart-stopping scream.

  “Get away, get away!” the child’s voice shrieked.

  Clay leaped from the sofa and rushed for the bedroom. Eden was right behind him. They spent the next hour soothing Katie from her nightmare, but watching Eden’s face, he wondered if she was thinking about what he’d said.

  15

  EDEN’S EYES WERE BLEARY FROM LACK OF SLEEP. SHE’D TOSSED AND TURNED MUCH OF THE night with the words of the old hymn echoing in her brain one minute and the thought of what she would say to her mother the next. She sat sipping her coffee with Allie and Della at the kitchen table while Rita bustled around clearing away the breakfast dishes. Beyond the window, Clay and the children were out with Rick and Zeke, headed to the corral for another riding lesson.

  “I needed coffee this morning,” Della said, taking another swig. “One of the girls was throwing up all night.” She nibbled on a piece of toast.

  “Eden, you’re pensive,” Allie said, dumping more Cheerios in Matthew’s bowl.

  Eden felt she didn’t know Allie well enough to bare her soul about her mother. Or God. “Paige wet the bed last night. And Katie had a nightmare. By the time we got the bedding changed and all of them settled down again, it was one.”

  Allie winced. “That was one of our fears when we agreed to take kids this young. We had plastic mattress covers put on all the beds.”

  “Good decision. She soaked everything. I’ll bring the laundry over after a while.”

  “Tepin will get it,” Rita said. “Won’t you, Tepin?” she asked the quiet worker who was washing the dishes.

  Tepin nodded. “When breakfast is over, I get it.”

  “I hate to cause you more work,” Eden said.

  “It is my job,” the woman said.

  “I want to watch Barney,” Matthew demanded. He banged his spoon onto the table and began to slide down from the chair.

  “I’ll turn on the video,” Rita said. “Madeline will be sorry she missed it. And I made her some peanut butter fudge. I was hoping she’d hang around this morning.”

  “She’s glued to Clay,” Eden said. “All five girls think he’s Superman.”

  Rita smiled. “I’m making him the hero of my novel. He’s enough to make all my readers swoon.”

  The other woman’s focus on her novel was cute. Eden took another sip of her coffee. “The girls have all had such a hard life. It’s heartbreaking.”

  Allie’s smile faded. “That was the hardest thing to get used to while running this camp. We love them for a little while and try to make as much difference as we can. Eventually we have to let them go, though. The only way I can get through it is to put them in God’s hands.”

  “Why would he let them go through something so awful?” Eden asked. “I’ve never figured that out.”

  Allie’s forehead wrinkled. “Life is hard, Eden. For everyone. We all have different challenges to face. All those hardships strengthen our faith and form us, though. I suspect God has great tasks in mind for some of these children. They’ll need great grace to accomplish those tasks, so great trials are needed.”

  Eden frowned. “Y
ou believe trials change us?”

  “Don’t you? Have you ever had a trial that didn’t?”

  When it was put that way, Eden supposed she hadn’t. “Some changes aren’t always for the better.”

  Allie shrugged, then stood and picked up Matthew’s bowl. “Only if we allow ourselves to be bitter and resentful over our lot in life. Sometimes we have to ask how we can allow this to make us a better person. There’s always a choice in how we react.”

  Della sat listening quietly. “Was that you I heard singing late last night? I thought it was ‘Amazing Grace.’”

  Eden smiled. “Madeline insisted. It’s her favorite song and she claimed she couldn’t sleep without it.”

  “Sounded to me like you knew the song pretty well.”

  “I do.” Something squeezed in Eden’s chest. She stood and walked to the door. “You need me for anything, Allie? I have to make a call.”

  Allie shook her head. “I’m going to check on Matthew, then take Betsy over to play with Gracie’s daughter, Hope.”

  Rita came back into the kitchen and called after Tepin, who had slipped out the back door. “Bring those soiled linens and don’t dawdle. I’m doing laundry today.”

  Eden grabbed the portable phone from the wall and took it outside, where she settled onto the porch step. The breeze brought the scent of the desert to her nose. Some sweet smell from the wildflowers blooming on the hillside. The purple and yellow blooms fortified her for what lay ahead. She dug the number Daniel had given her out of her pocket and punched it into the phone. Her gut clenched as it began to ring on the other end. The pen in her fingers slipped to the ground and she picked it up.

  The phone was answered by a woman with a gravelly voice that made Eden assume she was at least fifty. Or a smoker. Eden cleared her throat. “This is Eden . . . um . . .” Should she say Larson or Davidson? “Davidson,” she said. “Eden Davidson. Someone from your office sent me a letter to tell me that my birth mother is asking for contact with me.”