The Other Brother

by Janis Reams Hudson

  “No,” she whispered, pressing her fingers over his lips. “No. This problem is in me, not you. I know there are no guarantees. I know that. I just need to stop being afraid, and I don’t know how to do that.”

  “You need to believe in yourself, and I don’t know how to help you do that. In every other part of your life you don’t have a doubt in the world about who you are and what you want or where your place is in everything. I don’t understand why this, us, you and me, is any different, but I know for you it is. All I ask is that you be honest with me, tell me what’s going on. If you’re unsure or afraid or angry or anything, tell me. I might not be able to help, but I want to know. Need to know.”

  Melanie trembled at his words and the depth of meaning behind then. He wasn’t asking for mere words. He was asking her to make herself vulnerable to him.

  Let me in. That’s what he’d said the day they’d made love. That’s what he was asking now. That she let him in. Inside her heart, her head.

  Did she have the courage to open herself to him that way, make herself completely vulnerable to him? Give him that kind of power over her again, only more so this time?

  “Why does the thought of being honest with me scare you so much?”

  “Who says I’m scared?”

  “Hell, you should see your face. You can’t hide it from me. I don’t understand why you think you need to try. You’re an honest person. It’s not like you make a career out of lying. Talk to me, dammit.”

  “What do you want me to say?” She threw herself across the cab to the passenger’s side. “That you’re the one person in the world who can hurt me? Is that what you want to hear? That if I don’t protect myself from you you’ll be able to tear me apart?”

  He turned sideways and leaned toward her. “My God, Melanie, what is it you think I’m going to do to you?”

  “See?” she cried, panic seizing her throat. “You tell me to talk to you, to be honest about what scares me, and when I am, you don’t want to hear it.”

  Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew she was being irrational, she simply couldn’t stop herself. All her thoughts and fears and outrageous hopes swirled inside her in ever-tightening circles until she feared she might implode.

  “I notice,” Caleb said after a long moment, “that you didn’t answer my question.”

  Her breath came in fast little pants. “Take me home.”

  More than stunned, Caleb leaned back against the driver’s door and stared at her. He’d never seen her like this. She was like a wolf caught in a trap, trying to gnaw off its own foot to get free. And he couldn’t bear to see her suffer this way.

  “All right,” he said, his dreams turning bitter on his tongue. “All right, Melanie, you win. I’ll take you home.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “Holy smokes!” Ralph gaped at his daughter the next morning across the breakfast table. “What the devil happened to you? You look like you’ve been rode hard and put up wet.”

  “Ralph!” Fayrene scolded. “What a thing to say to your own daughter. Comparing her to a horse. Although,” she added, giving Melanie a closer look, “you do look a little rough around the edges this morning, baby. What’s wrong?”

  Rough around the edges, Melanie thought, was putting it mildly. She’d seen herself in the mirror. Her face was blotchy, her eyes swollen, her lips puffy. She looked as if she’d been crying all night. Probably because she had been.

  “I didn’t sleep much,” she said to her mother. “I might be coming down with a cold.”

  Fayrene pursed her lips a moment, then said, “If you say so. If you ask me, you’re complicating this whole marriage thing way too much.”

  Melanie blinked her swollen, gritty eyes. “What?”

  Fayrene stood next to Melanie’s chair and smoothed a hand down her daughter’s hair. “I know you, baby. You’re worrying too much. It’s only prewedding jitters, that’s all.”

  Melanie sniffed. “It’s just a cold.”

  “You’re just a little nervous at the thought of suddenly sharing your life with another person. But this other person, baby, is Caleb, and he adores you. All you have to remember is that when you love somebody, you want that person to be happy. You,” she said, pointing a long, manicured nail at Melanie, “love Caleb. You want him to be happy. You are the only person he’ll ever be happy with. It’s simple, see? Marrying him will make both of you happy.”

  “As happy as a couple of clams,” Ralph chimed in.

  Melanie sneered. “Clams don’t get happy, they get steamed. Then they get eaten and disappear. They no longer exist.”

  “Oh, baby.” Fayrene smoothed Melanie’s hair back again. “Is that what you think is going to happen to you? No wonder you won’t settle on a wedding date.”

  “No, Mama, I was just running off at the mouth. I don’t think I’ll disappear if I marry Caleb.”

  “Whew. That’s good. For a minute there…” Then Fayrene laughed. “But how silly of me. Of course you’re not calling off the wedding.”

  Melanie swallowed. Technically, her mother was absolutely correct. Melanie was not calling off the wedding. Caleb had pretty much taken care of that last night. At least, it seemed that way to her.

  Of course, last night had been a complete disaster all the way around. She had ruined everything. She had tried to do what she thought was right, what he had asked of her. She’d tried to be honest and explain her emotions, her fear. But in doing so she had hurt him deeply. Maybe even angered him. Surely insulted him.

  After all of that, there had been no need for her to call off the wedding. She had asked him to take her home, but his answer, when he’d said that she had won, had been about much more than her request to go home. He had given up. On her, on them.

  “No, Mama,” she said. “I’m not calling off the wedding, but I’m afraid Caleb might.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” her mother cried. “That boy is crazy in love with you.”

  “I know he is.”

  “And you’re crazy in love with him. Any fool can see that.”

  Melanie nodded without speaking. “But I hurt his feelings last night.”

  “So?” her father said. “Apologize. Kiss and make up. Hell, making up is some of the most fun there is in life.”

  Apologize. Could it possibly be that simple? Melanie didn’t see how. An apology wouldn’t keep her irrational fear from turning her into a raving lunatic again.

  “I don’t mean to sound harsh, baby,” her mother said. “But it seems to me you need to make up your mind once and for all. That’s a fine man you’ve hooked up with. You need to either marry him or cut him loose.”

  Cut him loose? The words jarred Melanie. She felt as if someone had just jerked her chair from beneath her and left her hanging in midair. Like the coyote racing off the edge of a cliff into midair. Then he looks down, realizes the ground is gone, and plunges.

  Of course, after he crashed to earth he picked himself up and carried on. You could do that in cartoons. In real life, things were different. The ground was much less forgiving.

  “A man like Caleb,” her mother went on, “needs a wife and family of his own. And he’s not getting any younger. If you’re not going to marry him, let him go so he can find somebody else to marry and spend the rest of his life with.”

  Somebody else? Caleb, married to someone else? Melanie couldn’t conceive of it. But what else could she expect? He had proven to her last night that he wasn’t going to put up with being hurt and insulted and neglected for long.

  Dear God, what had she done with all her waffling, her whining, her stupid fears?

  “I’ve got to go.” She jumped from her chair, grabbed her keys from their peg by the back door and dashed out.

  In the quiet wake of her leaving, Ralph chuckled. “Cut him loose? So he can find somebody else? Oh, Mama, you’re a mean one.”

  “Well, it’s past time somebody gave her a shove. She’s dillydallying too much for my taste. I want a we
dding. Grandbabies. We leave it up to her, it’ll be years before we get either.”

  The sun was barely up when Melanie tore up the gravel driveway at the Cherokee Rose and skidded to a stop in front of the barn. Rose and her grandsons should be pouring out of the house any minute and heading out to work for the day.

  Sure enough, just as she climbed out of her rig and started across toward the side door of the house, that door opened. But it wasn’t Caleb who came out, it was Sloan.

  He was on the third step down from the porch to the sidewalk before he spotted her. He drew up short.

  “Mel. What are you doing here this early?”

  “I need to talk with Caleb. Thought I’d better catch him before he headed out for the day.”

  “Good idea. And yes,” Sloan said darkly, “I think you do need to talk to him. He thinks the two of you are doomed, that you don’t love him enough to marry him.”

  A huge, painful lump rose in Melanie’s throat. “He said that?”

  “He didn’t have to. It was written all over his face when he came home last night. Came home much too damn early for having spent the evening with the woman he’s getting ready to marry.”

  “Look, Sloan, this is between Caleb and me. I appreciate your concern, but—”

  “Oh no you don’t. Don’t you dare tell me to butt out. Not after the way you stuck your nose in last summer with Emily and me.”

  “You needed it.”

  “I did. Yes.”

  “You were being pigheaded.”

  “You’re right, I was.”

  “It’s different with Caleb and me.”

  “I’m sure it is,” Sloan admitted. “I’m not sure what’s going on. I don’t think I need to know. I just want to remind you that you’ve looked all your life for a man to love you the way he does. I’m sorry it couldn’t have been me, but that’s behind us. No one knows the two of you better than I do and I’m telling you that you and Caleb belong together. So whatever this trouble is, fix it.”

  “Fix it? That’s you’re great advice?”

  “It’ll do. Fix it, kiss and make up, get married. You’ll never regret it, Mel. You won’t find a man better than him and you know it.”

  “Dammit, I’m not looking for a man better than him.”

  “That’s a relief to know.”

  At the sound of Caleb’s voice behind her, Melanie gasped and whirled. “Where did you come from?”

  “I was in the tack room. I thought I heard someone drive up.”

  He looked so good to her in the early-morning light. In any light. “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Caleb cocked his head to one side. “For what?”

  He wasn’t going to make this easy. Fair enough. She didn’t deserve easy. “I’m sorry…” She peered out the corner of her eye. “I’m sorry that we don’t seem to have any privacy.”

  Sloan tossed his hands in the air. “All right, all right. Sheesh. I’m going.”

  “Let’s walk,” Caleb said. He turned and headed toward the creek beyond the house.

  Melanie followed, not sure what to make of the lack of emotion in his voice and on his face. Then again, she’d known facing him wouldn’t be easy.

  Beside an old cottonwood at the edge of the creek, Caleb stopped and turned toward her. “I admit I’m surprised to see you.”

  “I guess you would be, after last night. Caleb, I hurt you last night, and that’s the last thing I ever want to do. I’m so sorry.”

  “I asked for honesty, you gave it to me. You’re afraid I’m going to hurt you, so you’re keeping me at arm’s length.”

  Melanie crossed her arms and glanced back toward the barn and corrals. “That’s pretty much what I said. Dumb, huh?”

  “Not to you it isn’t.”

  “Dammit, Caleb, stop it,” she cried.

  “Stop what?”

  “Stop being so damn nice, so understanding. What, are you bucking for sainthood? Saint Caleb, so understanding. Or maybe it’s martyrdom. Maybe that’s what you’re after. Just let me walk all over you. Stand by your woman no matter how much of a bitch she turns in to.”

  “Pardon?” This, Caleb thought with a tingling along his spine, did not sound like a woman afraid of being hurt.

  “Pardon,” she mimicked. “Don’t go all sarcastic on me. I didn’t mean to hurt you last night. I haven’t meant to hurt you however many times I’ve hurt you in the past couple of weeks. I’d rather cut off my right arm than hurt you.”

  When he didn’t say anything, she started pacing back and forth in front of him, waving her arms wildly in the air.

  “I’ve been a basket case, all right? Out of my mind trying to figure out if this marriage thing can possibly work. Not for me,” she added with a wave of her arm. “Hell, all I have to do is get within ten feet of you and I’m happy. But I figure you might want a little something more than that from me, and I’m not sure I know what that is.”

  “Okay, hold it.” Caleb held a hand up to stop her. “You think I want something you can’t give, and that scares you. You think I’m going to hurt you, and that scares you. Have I got this much right?”

  Wary of his dark tone, she nodded. “That’s right.”

  “Then what,” he asked tightly, “are you doing here? Why are we even having this conversation? Why haven’t we just gone our separate ways?”

  “Is that what you want? For us to go our separate ways?”

  “Of course it’s not,” he offered earnestly. “But if you think I’m going to stand around and be the cause of you tearing yourself to pieces out of fear of what might or might not happen, then guess again.”

  “Would you listen to the two of us?” Melanie scrubbed both hands up and down her face, then dropped her arms to her sides and faced him. “We’re both out of our minds. When we were friends we never even argued. No strife, no stress, no tension. Just friendship. Somebody to count on.”

  “You don’t think you can count on me anymore?”

  Her small smile nearly broke his heart. “Of course I can count on you. Always. You told me so, and I believed you.”

  “Do you want to go back to being friends again?”

  “You mean just friends?”

  “Yes.” If she agreed, it would kill him.

  She shook her head. “It’s way too late for that, Caleb. I do want us to be friends, but we can’t be just friends when we love each other this much.”

  Caleb felt his heart simply stop. Then it started again with a hard thud against his ribs. “Then what is it you do want?”

  “I want to feel like a sane person again, and the only way I can do that is if you help me. I love you, Caleb. Right now I’m a little bit wacky. I’m hoping that’ll pass, but if it doesn’t, then you’re stuck with a crazy woman. If you think you can’t handle that, then just say so.”

  Caleb placed his hands on the balls of her shoulders. “If I knew what to do so you wouldn’t be afraid, I’d do it in a heartbeat.”

  “Then marry me.”

  “What?” He stared, dumbfounded.

  “A week from Saturday. If the church isn’t available, we’ll try the VFW hall, or the rec center, or the barn for all I care. Just marry me.”

  A slow smile spread across Caleb’s mouth as the weight of the past two weeks drifted away. “How come I had to get down on one knee and you don’t?”

  In that instant, Melanie felt the icy fear that had been lodged in her gut for two weeks melt away. She felt like herself again. She was in love with Caleb Chisholm, and he was going to marry her. Just as soon as he got his pound of flesh.

  All right, then, she thought. After what she had put him through lately, he’d earned it. She lowered herself to one knee. “Caleb Chisholm, will you marry me?”

  “Say yes!” came a shout from the back of the house.

  “Say yes!” came another from the corral.

  “Say yes,” Melanie nearly growled, “so I can get up and go kill your brothers.”

  He didn’t say y
es. Instead, he pulled her up into his arms with a fierce “Come here to me.”

  Melanie had feared many times in recent hours that she might never know again the feel of his arms around her. The sensation of warmth, of welcome and safety, overwhelmed her. “Is this a yes?” she whispered.

  “This is definitely a yes.” He squeezed her tightly against him.

  Melanie thought she had cried herself dry during the night, but suddenly she was wracked with deep, hard sobs.

  “Oh, Mel, don’t cry. Please don’t cry. You’re tearing me up.”

  “I’m sorry,” she sniffed. “I’m so sorry for all of this, Caleb. I love you so m-much, and I almost ran you away.”

  “You couldn’t run me away at gunpoint,” he assured her.

  She sniffed again. “Honest?”

  Caleb kissed the tip of her tear-reddened nose. “Honest.” He kissed her cheek. “A week from Saturday, huh?”

  “Is that a problem?”

  “Not for me,” he swore. “But I guess we better go tell our families so they can make a big fuss. Oh, and I’ve been told to inform you that if we need any flower girls for the ceremony, I have a couple of new nieces who have experience in that area and who would be more than willing to help us out.”

  Melanie laughed and hugged him. “This ought to set a few tongues wagging.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Me, marrying you, with Sloan’s daughters as my flower girls. The gossips are going to love it.”

  With his arms around her, he clasped his hands together at the small of her back and studied her face. “How is that gossip going to sit with you?”

  “I could care less,” she said airily. “I know which Chisholm brother is the right one, and I’ve got him all to myself.”

  “That you do.” He lowered his lips toward hers and kissed her. “That, you do.”