Kate caught and held her, whispering against her ear, “You owe that man an apology, honey. You pack a mean punch.”
“I thought you were dead,” Jenny sobbed. “I thought you were gone.”
“I’m sorry,” Kate said.
“I told you no good comes of this damned draw,” Jenny said, stepping back, but not letting go of her sister. “Why don’t you ever listen to me?”
“Because I’m your big sister,” Kate said. “It’s in the rules. Read the fine print.”
In spite of herself, Jenny laughed. Mandy stepped up beside them and said, “Hi, Katie.”
Kate looked at her with tears in her eyes. “Come here, you,” she said.
Mandy stepped into the embrace, held tight by both of her sisters. “Can we go home now?” she said, her voice muffled and tired.
“Yes, Baby Sister,” Kate said. “We can go home now.”
Epilogue
True to his word, Joe drove straight to the Wilson’s that night and brought Phillip Baxter and Sissy and Missy to the ranch. The little girls ran to Mandy like lost puppies and fell asleep wedged close against her. When Joe came to sit on the edge of the bed, he said quietly, “It’s not the way I would ever have wanted it to happen, but we’ll make a family for them.”
“You’re a good man, Joe Bob Mason,” Mandy said. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” he said. “You want me to stay with them while you go talk to Phil?”
“Would you?” she asked.
“Of course,” Joe said. “They’re my little girls now, too.”
Mandy slowly extricated herself from the girls’ grasp, pulling the covers over them, and smoothing their hair against the pillow. She turned at the door and looked back at Joe sitting in the moonlight watching over them, and was filled with gratitude for his presence in her life.
She found Phil Baxter sitting on the patio. He stood up when she came out and said, awkwardly, “Uh, hi.”
“Hi, Daddy,” Mandy said.
A look of utter joy came over Phil Baxter’s features. “You called me Daddy,” he said, a note of wonder in his voice.
“That’s okay, isn’t it?” Mandy asked.
“Oh, honey,” he said, opening his arms to her. “It’s more than okay.”
They talked long into the night, falling asleep in their chairs on the patio, only to awaken the next morning and take up where they left off. When Kate came down to check on them, she stood with Joe at the kitchen window and watched Mandy and Phillip in animated conversation.
“Look at them,” she said. “It’s like they’ve always known one another.”
“They’re like two peas in a pod,” Joe said. “They finish each other’s sentences already.”
“How is she ever going to stand it when he goes back to Marfa?” Kate asked.
“Well,” Joe said. “We need to talk about that. Do you think we have room for one more house on the ranch?”
“Oh Lord,” Kate laughed. “Yes, of course we do. The more the merrier.”
On the day that they gathered for Rick and Jolene’s funeral, Mandy led the girls down the center aisle at the Methodist Church. Unexpectedly, Missy broke away and reached out for Phil Baxter. “I want you to sit with us, Uncle Phil,” she said. “Please?”
Phil looked at Mandy, who nodded. When they sat down in the pew, Missy crawled into Phil’s lap, burying her face in his shoulder.
After his opening remarks, the minister invited Mandy to speak. She squeezed Joe’s hand, and when she stood up, Sissy scooted over and took Phil’s hand.
When Mandy climbed into the pulpit, she looked down at her family. Kate and Jake sat with Lura Lee and Bill Wilson, offering support and comfort. Josh had his arm around Jenny. And there was her father, Phil Baxter, comforting two scared, grieving little girls.
Mandy took a moment to collect herself.
“We’re here today because we’ve lost so much,” she said. “Jolene was my best friend. When I came back to this town, she and Rick opened their home to me as I was grieving the loss of my own father.”
She cleared her throat and looked down at Phil. “But I’ve now learned that I’ve been blessed with two fathers. Jolene gave me that gift as well, and I will never be able to thank her enough for that.
“We’ve lost the core of a wonderful family with the passing of these two good people, but like the amazing friends they were, even in death, Rick and Jolene have given us all the seeds of a new beginning.
“It’s not the path we would have chosen, but it is the one we will embrace out of love for and in honor of our friends. Jolene told my father that she could rest in peace because she knew her girls would be safe.
“They will be safe, Jolene, and they will be loved, because that’s what you and Rick were to us, pure and honest love. Go with God my beloved friends.”
THE END
Part V
Book 5 - Irene’s Gift
92
Boston 1975
Amanda Northrup stared out the window at the deepening snow. Behind her on the sofa her sister, Irene, waited for an answer to her question. Finally Amanda turned and said, “Father is not going to be happy.”
“When is Father ever happy with me?” Irene asked.
“You’re planning to run away to Texas,” Amanda said, “with a would-be politician from the wrong party.”
Irene let out an exasperated sigh. “For heaven’s sake, Father knows George Fisk. He was an associate at the firm.”
“A junior associate,” Amanda said. “These things matter, Irene.”
“Not to me they don’t,” she said stubbornly.
“But, Texas!” Amanda said. “Is that even part of civilization?”
Irene arched an eyebrow. “They joined the Union quite some time ago, Amanda.”
Her sister laughed and came to sit down beside her. “I know, darling,” she said. “I’m teasing you. Of course, I will take up your case with Father, but you know I won’t be here much longer to do that for you.”
A cloud passed over Irene’s face. “But I thought the new treatments were helping,” she said.
“They were,” Amanda said, “but the disease has returned. I haven’t told Mother and Father yet.”
“Then I have to stay,” Irene said. “I can’t possibly leave you.”
“No, my dear,” Amanda said, “you have to go, now while I can still help you. Go build a life in this strange place called Texas, but promise me one thing.”
“Anything,” Irene said.
“Name one of your daughters after me.”
September 2015
September in Texas. Maybe it wasn't as sweltering as August, but it was still damned hot and she had gotten spoiled to the milder Napa Valley climate.
Dusty closed her eyes and felt the weight of the air on her skin. It was cooler under the spreading branches of the old pecan tree. An occasional breeze touched the fine sweat on her face. The best course of action was to just sit still. But she couldn't do that for much longer because she had an appointment to keep.
At the moment, what she really wished she could do was walk across the street and into the lobby of the bank. She wanted to hear the loose threshold on the front door clank as the cool blanket of air in the lobby wrapped around her.
She wanted to walk past the teller's windows with their brass cages and exchange pleasantries with her daddy's secretary on the way to his office.
She wanted to see her father grin when he looked up from his papers, half-glasses perched on the end of his nose. She wanted to smell his aftershave when he stood to embrace her.
She wanted to lean back on the edge of the desk and tell him about her day.
But to do any of that, Dusty would need to turn the clock back fifteen years and more. An old line from Gone with the Wind crossed her mind. “Asking ain’t getting.”
The man who sat behind her father’s desk now would throw Dusty right back out on the street. In fact, she doubted she'd ever be able
to walk through those front doors with their antique gold lettering again.
Thank God there were two banks in town or she’d be hard pressed to even open a checking account. As annoying as that might be, however, what really hurt was being shut out of the one place where she could still feel her father's soul.
He lived in every polished inch of oak and every cool marble surface in the building. The fact that she was denied those physical remembrances hurt Dusty someplace deep in her spirit, in a place far beyond tears. She would carry that denial long beyond any healing passage of time.
With a merciless act of will, Dusty drove those thoughts back down. No one in this town, at least not anyone on Main Street at 2 o'clock in the afternoon on a workday was going to see Dusty Jackson sitting on the courthouse fence crying.
"Can I help you, ma’am?"
She smiled and opened her eyes. It had been a long time since someone had offered to "hep" her. A hefty man long past middle age blocked her view. The badge on his chest matched the gun belt sitting south of an ample gut.
Dusty stood up and allowed a long unused drawl to return to her own voice, "Hidey, Sheriff."
The man relaxed when he heard the familiar accent. "Deputy Sheriff," he said. Adding conversationally, "Mighty hot to be sitting out here on the courthouse fence."
"It is warm," she agreed mildly. "'About what, 120 in the shade?"
"Naw, 115 tops," he grinned. "Buck Miller," he said, sticking his hand out.
She took the man's hand, noting the slight widening of his eyes when she returned his grip with one of equal strength. He waited for her to give her own name. Well, it had to happen sooner or later.
Meeting his gaze directly, she said, "Lauren Jackson."
Real surprise registered on his face then. "Frank Jackson's girl?"
"Yes, sir."
"So that's why you're sitting out here staring at the bank," he said.
"Did you reckon I was planning on robbing it?" she asked, settling back down on the rail.
Miller sat down beside her. “No room in those jeans for a .45," he grinned.
Dusty grinned back. "A .22 might do the job," she said speculatively.
"Too little," he replied, taking a pack of Winstons out of his pocket. He shook one out and offered it to her. She hadn't smoked in years, but she accepted the cigarette anyway, dragging deeply to ignite the tobacco from the flame of his lighter.
"Lester Harper still the Sheriff?" she asked as she idly watched an old pickup lumber up Main Street.
"Yep," Miller said.
"Let me guess," Dusty said, "he's at the river fishing."
Miller laughed, the rattling sound of his humor betraying how long he'd been keeping company with his Winstons. "Texted me after he ran his trot lines. Said he was gonna stay out on the South Llano awhile longer and wet a hook."
They both laughed and then sat together in a companionable nicotine silence that Dusty finally broke. "Well, Buck, have I lived down my reputation in this town yet?"
"Nope," he said. "Can’t say as how you have."
"Well, no surprise there," she said. "People have a long memory for the damnedest things."
"That they do," Miller agreed. “Am I gonna have to haul you in for starting any bar fights down at the Bloody Bucket?"
Dusty snorted derisively, "I never actually started a bar fight at the Bucket. That was just a rumor."
"Good to know," he said amiably.
Across the square, a lanky cowboy reeled out of the pool hall and staggered toward a horse tied up in the shade. "Damn," she said. "Do you mean to tell me Red hasn't drank himself to death yet? That old pony of his still know the way home?"
"Yeah, if Red can get in the saddle, Tooter will get him home," Miller said. Then he cleared his throat and said, "I don't reckon it's any of my business, but what are you doing back in these parts?"
"You're right," she agreed flatly. "It isn't any of your business."
"Ms. Jackson . . . ,” he began, but she cut him off.
"People around here used to call me Dusty," she said, her eyes still on the old drunk hauling himself into the saddle. The moment his jeans hit leather, the man passed out over the saddle horn. With the reins dragging in the dirt, Tooter began to patiently plod toward the bridge leading out of town.
"Dusty," Miller said, "only reason I'm asking is that sooner or later your brother is gonna hear you're in town and then I'm gonna be hearing from him. No offense, but your brother can be a real pain in my ass."
"None taken," Dusty said. "I know Rafe is going to expect I'm here to cause trouble. I'm not."
Miller shifted on the railing and said, "I knew your daddy. Frank was a good man and he set store by you. Rafe is just too much like your mama."
"Amen to that," she agreed.
"Well, then help out a fat old man and give me an answer to give to Rafe."
"I'm here to go to work for Katie Lockwood."
Miller's eyebrows shot up. "Doing what?"
"I imagine you best ask Katie that," Dusty said. "When I sign on with an outfit, I ride for the brand. I'm not going to sit here on the courthouse square and talk Rocking L business with you, Buck, even if you are the law."
She stood up and stubbed out her smoke on the stone post. "I have to be up at the café in half an hour, so I best get to walking."
"Walking?" he asked.
"Came into town on the noon bus," Dusty said. "Left my stuff at the depot."
"Can I give you a ride up to the café?" Miller offered.
"If I get in a sheriff's car with you," she said, "folks will sure enough figure that I got myself arrested for something. I'll walk it."
"And by the time you get up there," he pointed out, "every old bat in town will be on the phone spreading the news that you're back."
She laughed. The low, throaty quality of the sound and the way a sudden breath of air lifted her hair stirred something in Miller's blood. He might be fat and old, but he was still a man, and from where he was sitting, Dusty Jackson wasn't just any woman.
"That's more or less my plan, Buck," she said. "Have you ever heard anyone in this town call me a coward?"
"People say you're not scared of the devil himself."
Dusty looked him square in the eye and said in a level voice, "Lucifer sure as hell does not scare me."
Curious and intrigued, Miller asked, "What does scare you?"
Dusty plucked a pair of Wayfarer sunglasses out of the neck of her shirt. Before she put them on, her blue eyes met the lawman's with full force, "God Almighty and coming back to this town."
As her eyes disappeared behind the dark lenses, Miller watched attitude leach up through her tall, lean body. "And you're not gonna let nobody see that, are you?" he asked.
"Would you go into a gunfight letting the other guy know you're scared?"
"No."
"There you go," she said, turning to walk away.
"Dusty?”
"Yeah?" she said, looking over her shoulder.
"You holler if you need anything," Miller said. "I played poker with Frank. He was a good man."
"Did he take your money?"
"Every damn time."
"That's my daddy," she said, grinning.
Buck Miller watched her cross the street with easy, loping strides. He'd seen the pictures in Frank's wallet, but they didn't do justice to the woman herself. Dusty was anything but hard on the eyes.
Whenever he took those pictures out, Frank Jackson had always run his index finger absently over the cracked portrait of his daughter as a young high school girl with dark hair falling down around her shoulders and said, "That's my wild one."
But Frank wasn't here and Dusty wasn't a little girl any more. She was very much a grown woman. Buck hoped she wasn't scared of the devil, because once her brother found out she was in town, she'd be getting her fair share of hell
93
Jenny and Mandy sat under the cabana by the pool watching Sissy and Missy splashing happily in th
e crystal water. Their red hair lay plastered against their pink faces and they were currently taking turns cannonballing off the dive board.
“You all put on more sunscreen,” Mandy called out.
Dual calls of “yes, ma’am” floated back from the pool as both girls dutifully climbed out and began to slather on more of the waterproof lotion.
“They mind good,” Jenny said.
“Lord, Jolene would . . .,” Mandy faltered and her voice caught. She paused to regain her composure and then said, “Jolene would have had their hides if they’d ever been sassy. They’re good girls.”
Jenny reached over and took Mandy’s hand. “How are they really doing?” she asked.
Mandy’s eyes tracked back to the two eight-year-old twins. “Sissy has nightmares,” she said quietly. “Missy doesn’t like it when Joe lights the grill; she’s afraid of the fire. And she asks every day when Phil is coming back from West Texas.”
“Poor babies,” Jenny said sadly. “They’ve been through so much. Thank God they have you and Joe Bob.”
Mandy sighed. “Most of the time I just thank God they have each other,” she said. “All that stuff you read about twins being bonded? That’s all true. Joe went into town and got all their stuff from Rick and Jolene’s house. We gave the girls the two front bedrooms with the connecting bath. They’ve never had rooms of their own before.”
“Were they excited about that?” Jenny asked.
“Yes,” Mandy said, “but pretty much every morning I find them curled up in bed together.”
“The three of us slept in Katie’s room for months after Mama died,” Jenny reminded her.
“I know,” Mandy said, still watching Sissy and Missy. “Somehow it just all gets worse at night, doesn’t it?”
Jenny studied her sister’s gaunt face. In the six weeks since her miscarriage and the crash that killed the twins’ parents, Mandy’s physical strength had returned, but she retained only a shadow of her perpetually sunny disposition.
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