The driver tied down the reins and jumped down from the curve-sided sleigh. Logan.
As she put her car into Park and got out, he turned.
“Well, well. Sarah Westerveld has decided to stop in at the Carletons’,” he said, his mouth tipping up into a smile that could be construed as either mocking or teasing. “What brings you here?”
“I’ve brought Billy his books. He left them at practice.”
“You could have brought them to church this morning.”
Sarah shrugged. “I could have, but I didn’t go.”
Logan let that slide as she walked over to the horse closest to her. Sarah stroked his large neck, surprised at how quiet he stood. “They’re beautiful.” The horse she was petting slowly turned his head, then nudged her lightly.
“They’re a perfectly matched team. They run very well together.”
“I didn’t know you had a sleigh.” She stroked the horse again. “Must be fun sitting behind them when they’re pulling.”
“You’ll have to try it sometime.”
“Thank you for the invitation” was her response. “Did you train these yourself?”
“My father raised them from colts. He trained them.”
“You’ve got more horses than these...”
“You never did come riding when we were...”
They spoke at the same time, but Sarah noticed that Logan’s voice dropped just before his pause, as if unsure of how to identify their previous relationship.
“No I didn’t,” Sarah said, remembering precisely the day Logan had extended the invitation to her.
It was early fall when he’d asked her to come riding with him and she’d imagined any number of romantic scenarios, usually involving a quiet place overlooking the river and a picnic blanket, with horses grazing contentedly in the background while leaves fluttered down from the trees above.
And Logan. Looking at her the way she remembered best. Smiling the secretive smile that only she saw, his eyes glowing with unspoken promises.
But basketball season was in full swing and Sarah wouldn’t have time until the new term in January. So they had made plans for later.
And later never came.
“Life got in the way.”
“You left pretty quick. After.”
“After Marilee, you mean.”
“Yeah. I do. It must be hard being in the house after all this time. Being reminded of what you lost.”
A familiar pain lanced her heart. “I lost a lot more than a sister that Christmas,” she said, the words spilling out from a place she had kept hidden for so long.
But as soon as the words left her lips, she wished she had kept them in. It was as if each time she and Logan were together, threads of the past kept getting tangled in the present.
Logan tipped his head to one side, seemingly digging deeper into her memories. “What do you mean?”
She lifted her hand, as if dismissing the question. “I’ll give you Billy’s books and then be gone.”
“I have to put the horses away. Just take them up to the house.”
Sarah wasn’t so sure she wanted to face Donna Carleton again, but it seemed rude to simply hand Logan the books and leave. He had other things to do.
“Okay. Well, I’ll see you around.”
“Oh, I’m sure you will.”
She wondered what he meant by that, but then left it.
She got back in her car and drove it the rest of the way to the house.
Donna answered the door after Sarah rang the doorbell. She had a flour-sprinkled apron on, and Sarah caught the scent of baking rolling out of the house like a wave of comfort. Woven through the scent was the relaxing sound of Christmas carols playing over the stereo.
This was a home, Sarah thought, nostalgia and yearning drawing her in.
“Hello, Sarah,” Donna said, wiping her hands with a cloth. “What can I do for you?”
Sarah held up the books. “Billy left these behind after the game.”
Donna stepped aside. “Just set them on the empty chair there. I’ll tell him you stopped by.”
As soon as Sarah stepped inside, she was enveloped by warmth. “Smells good in here,” she said, trying to make some semblance of conversation.
“Christmas baking.” Donna closed the door behind Sarah, but not all the way, as if anticipating her quick departure.
Sarah set the books on the chair but felt awkward just leaving immediately. She didn’t know Donna well, but, living in the same small town, had seen her from time to time. Though after Jack’s trial, Donna had disappeared from town life.
Her father thought as little of Donna as he did of her husband, often speaking of her with as much contempt as he assigned to Jack. Sarah never knew why. It was simply one of those things relegated to the adult world. As a teenager she had tried as much as possible to keep her and her father’s worlds from intersecting.
Until she started dating Logan.
“I...I was sorry to hear about your husband,” Sarah said, slipping her hands into her coat pocket. This would be the time to say something appropriate about his character, but the truth was the only things Sarah knew about Jack Carleton had come from her father. “I’m sure you miss him.”
“He was a good man.” Donna looked down at the cloth she was twisting in her hand.
An awkward pause followed her statement and then Sarah took a step toward the door. “I’ve taken up enough of your time. Thanks for making sure Billy gets his books.”
“I’ll do that. I’m sure he’ll be very glad to get them.”
Sarah threw Donna a questioning glance, then caught a surprising glint of humor in her eyes.
“I know how much Billy hates studying,” Donna said with a wry smile.
“If he’s going to go to college, he’ll have to get used to it.”
Donna shrugged. “We’ll tackle Billy’s life one step at a time, I think. For now I just want him to finish high school.”
Sarah frowned. “So the college dream...”
“That’s Logan’s plan. Sure I’d like Billy to get out of Riverbend as well, but I’m not as fanatical about it as Logan.”
“And he sees basketball as Billy’s ticket out.”
“That he does.” Donna gave Sarah an apologetic smile. “Don’t take it personally. I know what you meant to him...”
Sarah’s breath caught in her chest. Donna knew as well?
“Well, that was a while ago.”
“Yes. Things are a lot different now.”
Sarah didn’t want to know how different. Logan’s life was none of her business.
But as she said goodbye and drove past the barn where Logan was unharnessing his horses, she thought of the few moments of connection they had shared in the past few days.
And she surely didn’t know why those thoughts gave her heart a peculiar lift, and why she didn’t want to examine them too closely.
Chapter Ten
“Yes. I agree, Trix. The boys haven’t been winning like they used to.” Logan tucked the phone under his ear while he ran the figures from his bank account through the calculator. He frowned at the total and started again. “Have you talked to Mr. Berube? And he’s willing?”
As Logan spoke, an image of Sarah tearing up the gym came to mind. The intensity on her face, the way she handled the ball. She had skill. No one could argue with that.
And behind that, the image of Billy, dawdling his way through that last game, a complete contrast to Sarah’s playing on her own. Logan had watched Billy play enough times that he knew when his brother was putting forth effort and when he was simply putting in time. Much as he hated to admit it, Sarah was right.
“You’ve got a parent meeting with Morris set up already?”
He punched in the numbers again, then scowled at the figure. Exactly the same as last time. “Isn’t that a bit drastic?” He wrote the figure in his company checkbook, as Trix continued her tirade against Sarah, then scrawled the date Trix had given him on another scrap of paper.
“Okay. I guess I’ll be there.”
He dropped the phone in the cradle, then sat back in his chair, tapping his pen on the ink blotter on the desk. Business cards and scraps of paper with phone numbers were tucked into every corner. He really had to get a bulletin board.
And a loan.
Too many things on his mind. Now he was getting roped into a parent meeting to deal with Sarah’s coaching. He wished he hadn’t even started with that.
His emotions weren’t entirely stable when it came to Sarah Westerveld. One moment she made him angry, the next frustrated and the next...well, if he were honest with himself, she still held the same fascination for him that she used to.
And then he had to go and invite her to come on a sleigh ride. Thank goodness she had treated it like a bit of a polite joke.
Logan blew out a sigh, then put thoughts of Sarah aside as he hunched back over his bookkeeping. He had to focus on the here and now. And here and now his business wasn’t as healthy as he had hoped it would be. Once he finalized the deal on the contract that Crane held with Westerveld Contracting, the bottom line would look worse in the short term but actually be much better over the long run.
Which reminded him. He reached for the phone again and dialed Crane. They were supposed to get together to work out a final deal on how the contract was going to be transferred.
“Hey, Crane. How’s it going?” he said when the phone was answered on the other end. He nodded, making himself smile as he listened to Crane’s usual litany of complaints. He’d read somewhere that if you smiled while talking on the phone you sounded happier. And when it came to Crane, he needed a full-time grin.
After a long, roundabout conversation they finally got down to the reason for Logan’s call.
And the more Crane spoke, the harder time Logan had keeping his smile intact. “We agreed on the price. What is happening in the oil patch shouldn’t make it worth more,” Logan insisted.
Logan spun his chair around, glaring at his reflection in the darkened window of his office. “I’ve got the financing in place, I’m in the process of buying another truck to put under that crusher. I can’t squeeze out more for that contract.”
There was no way he could pull any extra money from his operating plan and he was pretty sure the bank wasn’t going to let him stretch any further. But Crane kept talking, and soon Logan couldn’t even pretend to smile.
“I need to talk to my banker.” Logan dragged his hand over his face. “Give me a couple of days. I’ll call you back.” Logan hit End and tossed the phone onto his desk.
He grabbed a calculator, punched in the numbers and then the calculator followed the phone. At one time he’d had it all figured out. He’d had a plan. And now that plan was falling apart.
He heaved a sigh and leaned his elbows on his desk. He’d been too eager to grab the contract. Too eager to prove a point to Frank Westerveld. Too eager to be in his face. To eager to pay Frank Westerveld back for his past actions.
A light knock on the door pulled his attention away from his immediate problems. His mother came into the office and sat in the chair in the corner. “You look troubled,” she said.
“It’s nothing. Just a blip in my plans.”
“Well, you know the saying. Men make plans and God laughs.” Donna laced her fingers around her knee and leaned back.
“Then I seem to be giving God a lot to chuckle about lately. It seems like all my plans are getting tossed around. I just finished talking to Crane.”
“Not having any luck getting your father’s contract back?”
Logan rocked in his chair, looking past his mother. On the wall behind her hung an aerial photo of the farm taken ten years ago. Before his father’s life fell apart. Jack Carleton had inherited the farm from his father but had never made a living from it. Up until the trial, the family’s main income came from working as a contractor for various road construction crews. The farm had always been rented out. Logan preferred farming to running equipment, but the reality for him was they needed that off-farm income to help pay the farm mortgage.
“I thought I had it, but Crane upped the price on me.”
“But I thought you were doing okay without it?” Donna’s voice had gotten quiet. Wistful almost. “Ever since you started dealing with Crane you’ve been stressed and uptight. Do you really need it?”
Unfortunately, it wasn’t simply dealing with Crane that was getting him tied up in knots lately. He banished the faint thought of Sarah teasing the back of his mind. “Frank should never have taken that contract away. I am going to get it back.”
“But at what cost?”
“What do you mean?” Logan frowned at his mother, surprised at the change in her tone. “You’ve always wanted justice for Dad. I’m trying to get it.”
“Maybe I was wrong.”
“What?” Logan sat up, leaned his elbows on his desk and stared at his mother. “Where did that come from?”
“The minister said something this morning that caught my attention. And the same thing came to mind when Sarah came to the house after church.”
Logan waited, surprised that his mother would even say Sarah’s name. When he and Sarah were going out those many years ago, he had never told his parents. His father wasn’t doing very well and he knew his mother would simply get too upset about him consorting with the enemy, so to speak.
But keeping the relationship quiet had seemed juvenile and petty. So after a few months he had told his mother. She had said that as long as he was happy, she would be happy for him. But he knew that she was waiting, hoping, he would break up with Sarah.
When she found out that, at the behest of her father, Sarah had broken up with him—over the phone—she was furious. Furious with Frank but also with Sarah for not standing up to her father.
Donna pulled her legs up, hugging her knees. “The minister was talking about anger and how it can eat at you, do you remember?”
He nodded. How quickly he had forgotten though.
“He said that anger can be so satisfying, at first. Gorging on injustices done and pain felt. But that in the end, the carcass at the feast is yourself.” She bounced her chin on her knees in a curiously childlike gesture. “I can’t get that idea out of my head. I’ve been angry so long and it has taken up so much of my energy....”
“What do you mean?”
Donna laid her cheek on her knee, looking away from Logan. “I started going to church because I heard Frank wasn’t going anymore. I don’t know if you knew, but I just couldn’t face him. I was glad when you started coming with me. But when I saw that young girl walking toward us, I didn’t want to talk to her. Didn’t want to have anything to do with her. I was angry with her for your sake and I was angry with her because of what her father did to Jack. I knew it was childish and I knew it was wrong, but there it was.”
She shook her head, then laughed a humorless laugh. “Then, a couple of days ago I went to your father’s grave. That cold day? Anyway, I walked through the graveyard and I passed that young Westerveld girl’s grave. Marilee. I stopped and read the headstone. She was only sixteen. And for some reason, for the first time since that accident, I realized that Frank Westerveld had buried a child.”
She stopped, shaking her head again. “No parent should have to bury a child. No sister should have to stand by her own sister’s grave. Then when Sarah came by today and I talked to her...”
“So what are you saying, Mom?”
Donna looked over at Logan, her eyes troubled. “I’m tired of being angry all the time. And I don’t want to be
angry with that young girl, that’s for certain.”
Logan should have felt happy about that. But he wasn’t sure himself anymore how he felt about Sarah. She confused and puzzled him.
“I’m glad, Mom. I’m glad that you’re finding some measure of peace.”
Donna got up, walked to his side and stroked his hair. “I want the same thing for you, Logan. You know that.”
“I don’t know, Mom. The peace you want for me seems as elusive as a win for Billy’s basketball team. I know things...”
Donna frowned. “Tell me.”
“You’ve just found peace, Mom. I can’t tell you.”
“If it’s keeping you from finding that same peace, I want you to tell me Logan. I want you to trust me.”
Logan sighed. “I overheard Frank saying that he should have testified for Dad. Should have been his character witness.”
Donna turned to lean back against the desk. She looked away from Logan, frowning. “That doesn’t surprise me.”
Was that all she could say? “He’s a prominent member of the community, Mom. He could have made a difference for Dad. How can you act so casual about that? Think of the trouble he could have saved us!”
“Frank Westerveld’s coming forward as a character witness might have helped, but he never would have done it then, no matter what he says now.”
“Why not?”
Donna crossed her arms over her chest and, as she leveled him a steady look, Logan sensed another secret looming. “Frank was punishing me through Jack. Because I wouldn’t accept Frank’s money. Or his gifts or his attention.”
* * *
Pete Kolasa stood up, his hands on his hips, his plaid shirt straining at the buttons. “How many more games do the boys need to lose? They’re almost at the bottom of their league now!”
“If they don’t pull up, they’re going to be matched against those boys from Beaverlodge again. Toughest team in the league,” seconded Beth Sawchuk, her corkscrew curls bobbing as she glanced around the other parents in the classroom.
A Family-Style Christmas and Yuletide Homecoming Page 28
