Hidden in a Heartbeat (A Place Called Home, Book 3)

by Patricia McLinn

  But acceptance ended. It had limits. And conditions. That’s what he’d learned long ago. And that’s what had taught him not to care about acceptance.

  He retreated from the touch first, not opening his eyes until he’d twisted back to face the truck’s dashboard, giving the key a hard twist in the ignition.

  “Luke ...?”

  “Time we get back. I’ve got work.”

  He dropped his foot heavy on the accelerator, pulling back onto the interstate.

  “Luke. What’s wrong?” The question was soft, but the way she said his name told him she wasn’t going to let this pass without an answer.

  “Just don’t go looking for anything from those people.”

  She stiffened beside him. Even though he’d broken the connection and was looking straight ahead, he knew that. He should have been glad.

  “You mean because they don’t have the means the Dahlgrens do?”

  Saying yes would push her away. He should say yes. “Is that what you want from them?”

  “Of course not. If that’s what I wanted – ” She’d knuckle under to her grandmother. “I hope, someday, I’ll be accepted by them. That’s what I want. Family,” she finished softly.

  His curse was succinct. “That’s exactly what I’m saying. You get all doe-eyed and misty thinking they’re family because you share some blood. Blood, a name – family. None of it makes any difference. None of it’s anything to count on. So don’t go making that mistake. And don’t blame me for driving you up here if you do make that mistake – because you’re just the type who will – when it blows up in your face.”

  The silence left him plenty of time to wish he didn’t know she was studying him despite keeping his attention firmly on the wide, straight road. It also left plenty of time to curse himself a half dozen times for not keeping his mouth shut.

  “This has to do with Polly, doesn’t it. Your cousin who died.”

  Bull’s-eye. And it felt like it had gone right into his chest.

  He looked over his left shoulder, as if he didn’t already know the way was clear, and moved into the left lane. Not to pass another vehicle. Just for something to do.

  “You must have been very close to her,” she said so softly she could have been talking to herself. “Polly didn’t grow up on the ranch, though, did she? I would have heard about her from the others. She wasn’t part of the group of you that spent summers.”

  “No. Later.”

  “After you father stopped being foreman at Far Hills.”

  “Yeah. My uncle – my mother’s brother – had a development firm down in Denver, and he offered my dad a vice presidency. He needed someone who knew ranchland to talk ranchers and farmers into selling their land so Uncle Jim could subdivide it and rake in more money.” He tried to keep it neutral. “So we moved.”

  “To Denver,” she filled in.

  “I hated it from the first day.”

  “It never got any better?”

  “For me, no. My parents were thrilled, though. Every time Dad and Uncle Jim pulled off another big deal, there’d be some new thing they’d buy – new, fancier clothes; new, bigger TV; new, more expensive car; and if the deal was big enough, we’d move to a new, better address. I wasn’t in any school long enough to make real friends even if I’d wanted to. But Polly ... She was a year younger than me.”

  “She taught you about music,” Rebecca prompted.

  “She wasn’t trying to improve me or anything. She was sharing what she loved. And she listened to me, when I talked about Far Hills – about ranching. God knows we didn’t have anyone else to share with, either one of us. She had a brother and sister who wanted all the new, expensive stuff even more than their parents, and she had a set of cousins on her mother’s side that were just like the rest of them. We’d go to these family parties – always with a slew of potential clients or helpful contacts – and Polly and I would spend the whole time in her room or my room, hiding out.”

  “What happened, Luke?”

  “I grew up. She grew up. I escaped to college. And one day I got a phone call that something terrible had happened, and it was vital that the family stand together, otherwise the scandal could hurt business. Polly had killed herself, and that’s what they were worried about.”

  “Oh, Luke ...” Her fingers rested lightly against his sleeve. He felt warmth from the touch on his skin, into his flesh, muscle and bone, through his blood. Deeper and deeper, like a rock falling into an old, hollow well.

  “Don’t feel sorry for me. Feel sorry for them, the miserable – “ He swallowed the profanity, but not the anger. “No, don’t feel sorry for them. They deserve the worst. They’ve spent their whole lives worried about what someone else is thinking, even when they should have been thinking of Polly. But you can feel sorry for Polly, because that cost her her life.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Under her fingertips she could feel Luke’s tension, like a headstrong horse that might bolt any second. Fighting against the urge to bolt was his stubbornness. And something more. Something she prayed she wasn’t imagining. Something whose existence she would never know for certain if she didn’t test it now.

  She forced all the questions swirling in her head into one, quiet sentence.

  “How did it cost Polly her life, Luke?”

  “They knew she’d had these ... thoughts. They didn’t do a damned thing. They were too worried about what people would think. God forbid that the family would have to admit to being anything but perfect – big smiles and shiny cars and new houses. Couldn’t have someone depressed ruining that snapshot. Couldn’t have someone saying she hurt too much to keep living. Not when she had everything money could buy. A teenager’s moods – that’s what they called it.”

  “Maybe they didn’t really know, Luke. Maybe they were too close to see it.” A need to explain, to excuse them pushed the words out. She wasn’t sure she believed them.

  A phrase in Luke’s voice came back to her then.

  You can drive yourself nuts with maybes.

  “Counselor at Polly’s school told them. Hell, she told them. She told – ” The last word seemed to be wrenched from his gut. “ – me.”

  If she mishandled Luke’s rare trust now, would he ever let her see inside him again?

  “Luke, let’s pull over. Please.”

  He complied, then sat facing straight ahead, silent.

  “When did she tell you, Luke?”

  “All the time. She’d talk about ... endings. About the relief of not trying anymore. I told her not to talk crazy.” His mouth twisted, and he grunted in self-derision. “Great advice, huh? Hell, what did she need a psychiatrist for when she had me, right? That’s what my idiot uncle said. Keep it all in the family. Much better that way.”

  “You told your uncle you thought Polly should see a psychiatrist?”

  “I should have made sure she did.”

  “Luke, you were what? Eighteen? Seventeen? What – ”

  A slice of his hand cut off her explanation. “She called me. Three days before – ” His throat worked, but he wouldn’t spare himself. “ – Polly killed herself. She begged me to come back that weekend. Begged me. But I was having too much fun. I told her no.”

  ‘You can’t know that you could have changed anything, Luke. You said she’d been talking about killing herself even when you were around, so how could you possibly have known she really would – ?”

  He spun on her, skin drawn tight over the bones of his face. “I should have known.”

  The first heartbeat she was frozen. The second she recognized his rage. She’d felt it. She knew it. It was the rage that tore at her soul sometimes that she hadn’t been able to make things different. That she had failed.

  She reached to touch his cheek. He turned away, so her hand came to his rigid shoulder.

  “They didn’t even call me until the next day. Too busy getting their cover story out. About a tragic, undetected heart defect that interacted with s
ome cold medicine. Like anybody cared. Like anybody they knew gave a good damn about Polly, living or dead.”

  He let out a short breath, drew in a long one. His shoulders dropped. She could almost see the sorrow settle around him.

  “And then, after they finally got around to calling me, they said I didn’t need to come home, because it was going to be a very quiet service. Private. Because that’s how Polly would want it.”

  The bitterness in his words stung Rebecca’s own throat, making it hard to swallow.

  “By the time I hitchhiked back it was over. Raw dirt over a grave, that’s all I saw. Until I went to my uncle’s. They were all there, my parents, her parents – all of them and their business associates. I shouted some things at them. They started hustling me out, saying I was embarrassing the family.” He rubbed his right palm over his left knuckles. “That’s when I punched the glass door out.

  “They backed off then. Afraid of another loony in the family, I guess. Hitchhiked back to school with a bloody towel wrapped around my hand.

  “So, I lied before. I did go back once after I left for college. One time.”

  * * * *

  The rest of the trip back to Far Hills was strained.

  Luke wouldn’t talk about his cousin any more. Not about her death, not about his estrangement from his family. Especially not about his emotions on either subject.

  That left Rebecca to her own uncomfortable thoughts.

  The most uncomfortable was the one that in a sense, Antonia Dahlgren’s actions matched those of Luke’s family. Faced with an uncomfortable situation they had done their best to make the problem conform to socially acceptable parameters. For Polly’s family that had meant ignoring the seriousness of her symptoms and passing them off as teenage moods. For Antonia that had meant ensuring that her problem became a social asset instead of a liability by training her granddaughter to do her bidding.

  No, no she was being too harsh. Polly’s tragic suicide and Luke’s pain naturally made her own reactions more highly charged. She had to be fair to Antonia. To be reasonable.

  And that’s where the other uncomfortable thought came in as they turned off the highway onto Far Hills Ranch land. Could it be that she was doing the same thing the adults in Luke’s family had done – trying to preserve the facade of a family’s image by ignoring what was really happening?

  “Something’s up.”

  Rebecca looked up as they drew to a stop near the main house. A half dozen vehicles of various descriptions were parked in the area. She recognized Kendra’s, Daniel’s, Ellyn’s, Grif’s and Fran’s.

  “Luke! Luke!” Emily came tumbling out the back door, charging toward the truck.

  She knew Luke’s short exhalation was relief as he recognized Emily’s excitement and joy. He scooped up the girl who trustingly leaped toward him.

  “Slow down, Em. Slow down. You’re all noise and no sense,” he was saying when Rebecca joined them at the front of the truck.

  “Mama’s coming home!”

  “Now that’s cutting to the chase,” Kendra said with a laugh as she followed Emily at a more sedate pace.

  “I’m a big sister,” Emily announced. She spotted Matthew, and wiggled to get down. As she ran toward him, they could hear her bragging. “I’m a big sister, and you’re not!”

  Luke turned to Kendra, “Marti’s lined up her return? When?”

  “Try six o’clock tonight.”

  “She was supposed to call from China. Is the baby – ”

  “Fine. Marti said the baby’s fine. She said she wasn’t sure when they would leave until they were actually on the plane. Then she and the baby rested up a day in Los Angeles, and saw a U.S. doctor – and apparently Robert was there to greet them,” she inserted with a significant lift of one eyebrow. “I think that’s getting serious. Although what they’ll do about the geography ...? Wyoming to Washington, D.C., is one heck of a commute. Anyway, she called not more than half an hour after you two drove out. When she couldn’t get you, she called me. We had a nice long talk. She called Grif and Ellyn, too.”

  Kendra’s gaze came to Rebecca for a moment, then back to Luke before she continued. “They’re flying into Sheridan and Robert will rent a car and drive them down, with an expected arrival around six. We thought we’d spiff up some, make sure the nursery’s ready, put up balloons and such. Besides, we didn’t think you’d have the refrigerator stocked for what Marti’s lining up tonight, so we’re fixing some things.”

  Luke looked wary. “What?”

  “Oh, lasagna, and that taco dip everyone likes and some – ”

  “Not the food. What’s Marti lining up?”

  “I don’t know exactly, but she says she’s got some things to tell us. She wants everyone here tonight, including you, of course,” she said to Luke. Then she turned to Rebecca. “And she asked especially if you could come, and she said she particularly hopes that you’ll bring your grandmother.”

  * * * *

  Antonia was once more at Rebecca’s apartment when she arrived.

  “I’m glad to see you, Grandmother.” Rebecca smiled, forcing down objections to Antonia invading her private space. “We’ve been invited to Far Hills Ranch tonight. It’s a welcome-home supper for Marti Susland – I’ve told you about her – and the baby daughter she’s just adopted in China.”

  A controlled wave of Antonia’s hand dismissed that as unimportant. “Where have you been today, Rebecca?”

  “I have professional obligations and – ”

  “You went to meet those people at an Indian reservation. And that man took you.”

  A small town and Helen Solsong were a lethal combination for secrets. Rebecca moved to the dresser to retrieve clean underwear, a soft yellow long-sleeved T-shirt and her best jeans.

  “Yes, I met some of my father’s relatives. Luke was kind enough to drive me to the Crow reservation. And now I’m going to take a shower and change clothes for the supper at Far Hills.”

  “I have no interest in a hoe-down at some ranch. As for today, you are being extremely foolish.”

  “I am going to continue to see my father’s relatives as long as they accept my visits. But right now I am taking a shower.”

  She closed the door on Antonia’s glare.

  The automatic motions of showering and changing let her mind shift into a strange, empty hum. It was only as she combed her hair into a chignon that anything as solid as a thought formed.

  Luke liked her hair down.

  She dropped the pins on the shelf below the mirror, listening to the soft pings with satisfaction, and turned to the door.

  Antonia cast a brief, disparaging glance over Rebecca’s attire, then went right to the point.

  “I had a higher opinion of your good sense, Rebecca. You had demonstrated that you are a more reasonable individual than your mother, and here you are following the same path she did. If you will remember that even Suzanne in the end came to see that a man like your father would not have fit in with her life, you might spare yourself difficulty.”

  Fit in with her life? What life? Drinking herself to death in her room?

  “You must recognize that this man, this ranch foreman, would be entirely out of his element in your life as a Dahlgren of Delaware. It is foolishness to give a man such as him any opportunity to embarrass us.”

  She could tell Antonia that Luke wanted nothing to do with the Dahlgrens of Delaware, wanted no part in her life. She couldn’t get out the words.

  “You not us. I would never be embarrassed by anything Luke Chandler did. His manners aren’t based on what people think of him, but what he thinks of himself. And when he does think of other people, he’s not wondering what they’re thinking of him, he’s worrying about how they feel. That’s a true gentleman. That’s a true man.”

  “You are spouting nonsense,” Antonia Dahlgren intoned coldly.

  “Grandmother, I am going to Far Hills Ranch.” She picked up her keys. “If you want to come, fine. If
you don’t, then I will see you tomorrow.”

  * * * *

  Rebecca had a raging headache.

  The dispute at her apartment planted the seed. It budded with their silent drive to the ranch.

  They arrived as Marti was preparing to put little Sarah to bed, so she had a chance to oh-and-ah over the baby. An opportunity Antonia pointedly did not avail herself of. That didn’t stop Marti from approaching her.

  “We’re so glad you could come, Mrs. Dahlgren.”

  “You have interfered in my granddaughter’s life, Ms. Susland. I am here to see that your interference encroaches no further on us.”

  “Grandmother!” Rebecca’s headache burst to full bloom.

  “No, it’s all right, Rebecca. Your Grandmother should say what she thinks, and so will I. I don’t see that I interfered at all. I opened a couple doors, Rebecca chose to walk through them. I made sure she got word of the job at Fort Big Horn. She applied – and the committee vote was unanimous to hire her. I gave her the research I’d found on her family, but she’d already been looking. I just had an advantage because I started from the other end, so the tracks from Clark Pryor to her weren’t as well hidden as they were when she tried to trace back from her to her father.”

  Antonia stiffened, but Marti was going on.

  “The one thing Rebecca might find fault with me on is not telling her at the start that I knew her connection to Far Hills Ranch.” Worry shaded her eyes as she faced Rebecca. “I wanted you to get to know us as people before you got hit with family. And I wanted you to get to know the ranch without all that history hanging over you. If that was wrong, I’m sorry.”

  Rebecca took both her hands. “No, Marti, it wasn’t wrong.”

  “Good.” She smiled. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to put my baby to bed.”

  “Rebecca – ”

  “No more, Grandmother. Please. We’ll talk later.”

  The fact that Luke spent this entire time leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest and his eyes watching everything did not help the state of Rebecca’s head. She tried to smile at something Ellyn said and thought her head might split.