by Brenda Novak
Callie wondered if she’d be alive to see what happened the day Phoenix returned to Whiskey Creek....
“Maybe she’s not as bad as we all think.”
This comment came from Sophia, which seemed to surprise more than just Callie. Sophia hadn’t been one of them in high school. She’d had her own group, most of whom were as mean as she’d been.
“She caused Lori’s death,” Eve said, obviously exasperated.
“I know but—” Sophia turned her cup in a circle as if she was hesitant yet driven to speak up “—she’d been drinking. Sometimes people do really stupid things when they’re drunk.”
There was no arguing with that, but everyone was so firmly on Riley’s side that this comment didn’t bring her the positive attention she’d been looking for since trying to become part of the group. Gail was about the only one who’d been able to forgive her. Maybe it would be easier for the others to do that, too, if she hadn’t done so many catty things. Actually, at times she’d been more than catty.
“Regardless, what happened happened,” Ted muttered. “Like I said, she should leave Riley and Jacob alone and build a life elsewhere.”
Sophia shot Ted a steely look. “When you’re a mother, accepting the loss of a child is easier said than done.”
Putting his elbows on the table, Ted leaned forward to make his point. “If Phoenix hadn’t killed Lori, she wouldn’t be in this situation.”
“You don’t know what was going on inside her head when it happened!” Sophia retorted. “How can you judge? It’s easy to think you know who’s right and who’s wrong when you’re looking in from the outside.”
Ted slammed down his cup. “So what are we really talking about, Sophia? What you did to Scott?”
There was a collective gasp as she blanched. Then her face reddened and she stood. “I—I’m sorry. I don’t seem to be very good company today. Excuse me.”
They all gaped at Ted as she left.
“Wasn’t that a little harsh?” Noah asked after the door swung shut.
Given how much time had passed, Callie thought it was. They hadn’t mentioned Scott’s name since Sophia had started coming to coffee. Once the best basketball player to attend Eureka High, he’d been killed in a drunk-driving accident that most people blamed her for causing. Even though she wasn’t in the vehicle with him, it was her actions that had led him to take the risk.
“She’s the only mother among us,” Cheyenne said. “Of course she’s going to feel bad for a woman whose actions have cost her her child.”
“Forget about her. She has no business coming here, anyway,” Ted grumbled, but he slumped morosely over his coffee, as if he regretted what he’d done.
“Gail says she’s not so bad anymore—” Cheyenne started, but Noah grabbed her arm.
“Let it go,” he murmured, and she did. They all knew that Ted was probably still in love with Sophia. That was why he couldn’t get past how she’d wronged him.
“There are better things to talk about than Sophia or Phoenix,” Baxter said.
“Like?” Eve asked.
He wiggled his eyebrows. “Callie’s got something interesting going on in her life.”
A flicker of fear raced through Callie—until she realized that Baxter wasn’t about to give her away. He was referring to the fact that she had a guest at the farm.
“Oh, yeah!” Noah said. “Tell us about this drifter.”
Obviously, Baxter had mentioned Levi to Noah. Or Kyle had. Maybe they’d all talked about him, because no one asked, “What drifter?” Anything of note spread quickly among them.
“There’s not much to tell,” she said, when all eyes turned to her. “His name’s Levi. He needs work—and I need labor.” She shrugged, hoping to convince her friends that his being in her life wasn’t a big deal. “So we’ve worked out a trade.”
“How long will he be staying with you?” Dylan typically didn’t do much of the talking. Until he’d married Cheyenne, he hadn’t been a member of the group. But he’d been a far more welcome addition to coffee on Fridays than Sophia, even though she’d been coming a lot longer. Their first loyalty was and always would be to Ted.
Callie met Dylan’s gaze. His eyes were too pretty to belong to a former MMA fighter, she thought, but his crooked nose betrayed him. “A week or so.”
Kyle’s scowl grew so dark, several people shifted as if he was making them uncomfortable.
“You don’t like that he’s there, Kyle?” Cheyenne asked, calling him on his reaction.
A second rush of panic, this one for an entirely different reason, had Callie curling her fingernails into her palms. If Kyle wasn’t careful, he’d give them away. She already felt as though she had the word guilty emblazoned on her forehead.
“I’m just worried,” he replied. “She doesn’t really know him, doesn’t know what he’s capable of.”
Eve looked perplexed. “Hasn’t he been there a few nights already?”
“Doesn’t mean anything,” Kyle insisted. “It takes longer than that to earn trust.”
Callie rolled her eyes. “He’s not going to hurt me.”
When Baxter spoke up, Callie was grateful to him for drawing some of the scrutiny away from her. “I think having a man on the farm might be a good thing.”
“Why do you think that?” It was Kyle, of course, who challenged him.
“You never know.” He cradled his cup. “That means she’s got help on hand, if she needs it. From what she’s told me, this dude can fight.”
Dylan might’ve spoken up. He knew all about professional fighting. But Kyle was having none of it. “She’s got Rifle to protect her.”
“True,” Baxter said, “but the owners of those killer pit bulls are blaming her for the fact that they’ve been impounded.”
“Those guys are renters,” Kyle argued. “They won’t be in town long. And they’ll calm down and forget about her once he leaves.”
“What if they don’t?” Baxter asked.
“Then we’ll protect her. I don’t care how good this guy can fight. No one can fight better than Dylan.”
“What’s his name again?” Dylan asked.
Someone told him “Levi McCloud” and Dylan said he’d never heard of him, but Callie had stopped paying attention. Her chair scraped the old wooden floor as she shoved it back. Kyle was driving her crazy. “Look, I’ll do what I want, okay? We’re not taking a vote.”
Startled by the edge in her voice, everyone looked up, including Kyle. She’d sounded far too impassioned, but she couldn’t stem the emotions that threatened to come bubbling out of her. For some reason, she wasn’t really enjoying this morning. She had too much on her mind. She just wanted to get back to Levi.
“I’ve got to go.” She hurried to her car and pulled out of the parking lot before anyone could catch up with her. She wanted to return to the farmhouse, but she drove to her parents’ instead.
* * *
“Mom?” Callie let herself in the front door and stood in the entry.
“There you are!” Her mother rolled down a hallway that had recently been widened to accommodate her wheelchair. “Too bad your father’s not home. He’s been asking if I’ve heard from you.”
Boone Vanetta sold life insurance. Although Callie had a fifty-fifty chance of finding him at home on any given day, his truck wasn’t parked in its usual spot out by the flagpole. Callie guessed he was at his office in town. At sixty-six he still worked but he’d gone part-time since her mother’s health had begun to deteriorate. Fortunately, he was the only State Farm agent in Whiskey Creek and had a very loyal clientele.
“You’ve been so quiet lately.” Her mother didn’t sound pleased; her next few words explained why. “It seems like you hardly ever call.”
The guilt Callie was already feeling became more intense. She checked in fairly regularly, but she’d meant to do it more often. She’d just been so preoccupied after Levi arrived. And Diana’s pointed questions made it hard to lie—about a
nything. Since being diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver, Callie had squirmed through every conversation.
Forcing a smile despite the anxiety slamming through her like a million gallons of rushing water, she bent to kiss her mother’s cheek. She hated seeing Diana in a wheelchair. A relatively new addition to their lives, it was proof that her mother would have more difficulties to face as her own disease progressed. “I’m sorry. I’ve been so busy.”
“At the studio?” The chair’s motor whined. “I thought you were taking the summer off. That’s what you said when you moved out to the farm. That’s why I thought we’d see more of you.”
“I’m still helping at Reflections when I can. I have my garden and some other photography to keep up with. And it’s taking time and effort to put the farm to rights.” She considered mentioning Levi. She had to tell her parents about him, too. But she figured she’d save that for later. She had more pressing news.
“I hate to sell that place,” her mother said. “I loved growing up there.”
Callie adjusted her purse strap. “Maybe we should keep it.” She came back to that again and again, even though the amount of care a farm required didn’t make owning one very practical for someone who didn’t plan to work it. And what would her parents do with the property after she was gone? They’d just have to sell it. So why not do it now?
“It’ll be smarter to liquidate. Then we’ll have the money we need for our retirement, and you’ll inherit the rest.” Her mother rolled back a few inches to take a good look at her. “You’ve lost weight.”
Callie cleared her throat. “A few pounds.”
“Come on. Some homemade lasagna will fatten you up.”
“But it’s not even noon yet.” And there was no way that was on her diet.
Her mother was already rolling into the other room. “Then you can take some home with you.”
Reluctantly, Callie followed Diana into the kitchen and sat at the table. She wanted to tell her mother what she’d come to say, to get it off her chest, but she didn’t know how to start. “You been feeling okay?” she asked instead.
“About the same.” Her mother maneuvered around the kitchen with surprising dexterity.
“How’s dad been managing his diabetes?”
“His glucose numbers haven’t been as good as they should be.” She tossed Callie an exasperated grin. “I think he’s sneaking sweets.”
If he was eating her lasagna, he was getting plenty of carbohydrates without sneaking sweets.
“He doesn’t seem willing to change his diet as much as the doctor says he should,” her mother complained.
More likely, Diana was cooking the way she’d always cooked. But she didn’t see the correlation.
“He needs to stick with lean proteins and vegetables,” Callie said. “That’s what you need to make for him, okay? Not pasta or potatoes or breads.”
“When you get as old as we are, you deserve some enjoyment out of life,” she said, slightly insulted.
But they had to take care of themselves since Callie likely wouldn’t be around to do it. “So...” She hesitated, trying to decide how to segue into her diagnosis.
“What?” Her mother gave her a strange look.
“I came by today because—” she could hear her pulse thumping in her ears, which was as annoying as it was distracting “—there’s something I need to tell you.”
An expression of alarm settled on her mother’s face, but the sound of a car pulling up outside distracted both of them.
“Oh, good. Your father’s here.”
Callie wiped sweaty palms on her denim shorts. “What’s he doing home so early?”
“He’s taking me to get my hair done.” She checked the clock. “We’ve only got fifteen minutes before we have to leave.”
Of course. Her mother had a standing appointment with Lola Leidecker at Shearwood Forest every Friday. How could Callie have forgotten? Fifteen minutes wouldn’t give Diana enough time to recover from the blow she was about to be dealt. Once she broke the news, Callie doubted her mother would feel up to leaving the house.
“Callie?” Her father came through the garage door bellowing her name.
“Hi, Pop.” Obviously, he’d seen her SUV out front. She hugged him but he was so eager to talk he barely squeezed her in return.
“What’s this I hear about you taking in some drifter?” he demanded.
Her mother’s eyebrows immediately assumed their “I’m displeased” position. “I hope that isn’t what you were about to tell me,” she said. “You haven’t taken in a stranger, have you? You know better than that!”
“He needs help,” she hedged.
“So you’re risking your life to give it to him?” Her father’s voice nearly shook the glass in the windows. A bear of man, Boone could be intimidating. But Callie knew he had the softest heart imaginable and hardly flinched when he raised his voice.
“He was attacked by dogs, Dad. I had to help him. You should’ve seen the blood. You would’ve done the same.”
“I’m not a single woman!”
“It’s not like he was some stalker or peeping Tom. His motorcycle broke down and he got bitten. Now he’s fixing the roof on the barn to pay me back for fronting the money to repair his bike.”
The fact that she wasn’t giving ground made her father pause. But he soon rallied. “Chief Stacy doesn’t like him. Says that boy’s up to no good.”
Chief Stacy had talked with her father? At least Godfrey hadn’t ratted her out.... She appreciated her neighbor’s discretion.
“What are you thinking?” her mother asked.
“Chief Stacy’s suspicious of any stranger,” she said. “You know how distrusting this town can be when it comes to new faces. But Levi’s lived at the farm for three days. He just wants some space to be able to get his head on straight.” She focused on Boone. “You fought in Korea, Dad. You know what war is like.”
He leaned a hip against the counter. “He’s a vet?” he asked, already showing signs of bending.
“Yes.”
“What some of those boys go through,” he said with a click of his tongue.
“It’s terrible,” Diana agreed.
Callie rested a beseeching hand on her father’s folded arms. “Levi needs a temporary safe haven, Dad.”
When he shifted his weight and harrumphed, she knew he’d accepted her explanation. And that reminded her of one of the many reasons she loved her father so much. Maybe he could appear ferocious, but he was every bit a gentle giant. She’d seen him take similar risks, stopping to assist folks stuck on the side of the road, or picking up a hitchhiker. Whether he wanted her following in his footsteps or not, he understood that helping someone in need sometimes called for a certain amount of risk.
“It scared me when Chief Stacy made it sound so foolhardy,” he said. “I don’t know what I’d do—what we’d do—” he gestured at her mother “—if something ever happened to you. Lord knows it was hard enough to get you here.”
His words caught Callie like a bullet to the chest. She stood there, instantly disarmed. All the things she’d planned to say, the admission she’d put off for so long, swirled through her mind, but she couldn’t bring it to her lips, couldn’t break her parents’ hearts. It’d taken them ten years to have a baby. Only after months and months of fertility treatments had they conceived. Callie knew, had always known, that she meant a great deal to them. Her father was already facing the decline of the woman he’d married forty years ago, the only woman he’d ever loved. That was bad enough.
“I’m glad I let him stay, Dad,” she managed to say. “It...it’s helped me.”
He might’ve asked what she meant by such a strange comment but her mother interrupted.
“We’ve got to go, Boone. I can’t miss my hair appointment. You know how busy Lola is.” Diana moved her wheelchair closer to Callie so they could touch. “You be careful with that man around. Keep your eyes open,” she warned, gripping Callie’s
hands. “And call us nightly.”
Callie stifled a sigh. “I will.”
“You don’t think...you don’t think he’d ever—” her mother lowered her voice as if she couldn’t bear to say the word “—rape you, do you?”
Considering the bustier episode, which could’ve been taken as an invitation to have consensual sex, Callie might’ve laughed. But nothing about this situation was funny. “Definitely not.”
“Okay.” Seemingly satisfied, her mother nodded. “Don’t forget to check in.”
“Maybe he should stay here,” her dad mused, still reluctant to trust her safety to an unknown person.
Callie shook her head. “No. You and Mom have enough going on. And I need his help on the farm. I feel safer with him there. I promise.”
“Okay.” When he pulled her into his arms, he almost swept her off her feet. “Love you, Callie girl.”
Callie choked on the lump rising in her throat. She couldn’t tell them she was going to die. Something had to change.
“I love you, too,” she murmured against his shirt. Then, after they left, she sat in her car crying as she watched their taillights disappear down the street.
12
Callie bought Levi another shirt. She’d needed to distract herself so she could calm down and get her emotions under control before returning to the farm. And she liked shopping for him, liked picturing him in the clothes she found. Telling herself that she was fulfilling a need—he had practically nothing—and that he’d be wearing that shirt long after they parted company, somehow brought her peace. Maybe he’d think of her occasionally when he wore it....
She knew he’d find it odd that she was so keen on devoting her resources to him, since he was leaving in a few days and they’d probably never see each other again. But so what? She was going to do whatever she had to in order to cope with life as she currently knew it. If shopping for Levi buoyed her spirits, she’d shop for Levi. It might cost her a few bucks, but it wasn’t as if she was buying him a sports car.
