Just as Stubborn

by Jeanne Arnold

  “You’re saying she was on drugs?” Gabe asked.

  Mr. Halden sat up straight and set his hands in his lap. “Sara had a mood disorder. Yes. She was taking prescription drugs.”

  Caleb spit his words. “So she caused an accident, you made Eli cover for her, and then you sent her away?”

  “Your mother needed help, son. She and your brother decided at the accident to allege he was driving and in turn removed your mother from all legal ramifications. They were driving a company vehicle. We were a private business at the time. Eli was young enough that I could seal his records. Your mother agreed to leave and get help.”

  “A man freaking died and Eli got blamed. He had to live with that for years.” Lane sounded disgusted. “I thought he was older when it happened.”

  “I’m not proud I went along, but it was the best way to protect the family and the business from a potentially ruinous situation.”

  “You stole mom’s half of the company and sent her away to have our baby sister on her own,” Lane’s voice rose. “Weren’t you with Meggie then?”

  “Sara and I were trying to work things out. Margareta and I had separated for some time.”

  “So you dumped your mistress to work it out with the mother of your four kids so you could steal her family business? No offense, Josh,” Caleb said. “Why in the dang flip did you have so many damn kids?”

  Mr. Halden held himself together well. “Your mother didn’t have siblings. We both wanted a large family.” He dropped his head into his hands.

  “To run your freaking oil empire,” Gabe mumbled. “And now we know why you gave us our own outfits out of the blue.”

  “Sure do. He needed to butter us up and soften the blow when we discovered all of his lies,” Caleb added.

  “No. We wanted a family enterprise, run and owned by family. Sara didn’t tell me she was pregnant. I didn’t know if she…if you were my child,” he said as he set a hand in the center of the table to acknowledge Deliah.

  “She’s yours alright,” Caleb said. “Just look at her.”

  “That’s for sure,” Lane agreed as he gazed at his sister’s face.

  “I got a call from Tessa that your mother gave birth. Over the course of a year, she sent me photos. I knew.”

  “You know Tessa? You knew her, but she never told me?” Deliah asked.

  He nodded. “Your mother wouldn’t speak to me. She and Tessa had been friends since their childhood. I’ve always dealt with Tessa over such matters.”

  “Matters? Christ. You talk about your daughter like she’s a business deal. She’s a girl, sir. Look at her. She’s one of us. You missed her entire life. You kept us from knowing her,” Caleb yelled as he circled the table. “You could have gotten her and brought her home! Mom didn’t even take care of her.” His face blazed with anger. He looked as if he could punch a hole through a brick wall. He scared me a little.

  “I’m not proud of that, son. I could hardly parent all of you. I didn’t know how to explain what happened to your mother, let alone bring a child into your life.”

  “You can hardly parent cuz all you give a damn about is oil,” Gabe sneered.

  “What about Josh? So you thought it best to lie and not tell us the kid we played with every summer was our brother?” Caleb asked.

  “We wouldn’t know any of this if it weren’t for Av’ry. She figured that one out. You were never going to tell us anything, especially not about Josh,” Gabe said heatedly. “You didn’t tell us where our mom was or why she left. You let us think it was our fault. You made Eli lie. You made Meggie freaking lie.”

  “I don’t believe mom just turned over her assets and wiped her hands clean of HalRem,” Lane told his father. “It’s worth a fortune. You twisted her arm with something.”

  “That’s what Leon said,” Deliah shared.

  “There are matters that are private. There are some things you do not need to know about,” Mr. Halden said in a tight voice.

  “Yeah, says you,” Gabe blurted. “You’re a coward.”

  “Now, Gabriel, it doesn’t concern you,” drawled Mr. Halden.

  Gabe set his hands behind his neck and puffed his chest. “All this concerns me, sir. You still can’t tell the truth.”

  His father stood up fast. “I found out your mother was seeing Hunter Barrett’s father from the beginning of our union. I was away quite often before I left the service.”

  I drew my eyes around the room without trying to hide the fact that I wanted to see everyone’s reaction. I couldn’t believe my ears. I was sure Gabe was dying inside.

  “Your mother continued seeing that rat on and off for years. He knew about the accident. He manipulated her at opportune times. I feared he was trying to use your mother to exploit the mishap. Halden-Remington was lifting off the ground, and I needed to support my family. I questioned the baby girl’s paternity. Sara was not in her right mind half of the waking day. She willingly removed herself from HalRem in an effort to focus her attention on her recovery. I fully supported your mother’s intentions toward her health,” he spoke in a speedy southern accent as if he was trying to be done. “She has always been financially secure.”

  “Feed me some more bull with that crap, why don’t you,” Caleb said. “Don’t blame Barrett. You had Meggie on the side since way back. I’m not that slow.”

  “I watched Barrett for years, son,” replied his father. “He’s had it in for me from the get-go. I employ a handful of specialized private investigators.”

  “Obviously your private eyes suck at their jobs, sir. Leon had a guy working right under Caleb’s nose,” Gabe said. “Same time he was down here and broke into the cabin.”

  He neglected to mention how he severed the security system so we didn’t have to camp out.

  “We were on him, thanks to Joshua and Deliah. I’ve been tracking calls from the Memphis area. I was aware that Deliah made a connection and that she attempted to access her bank accounts. Your mother and I spoke for the first time last week. We discussed concerns over Leon LeRoulx. I offered for Sara to visit our home. I suggested we all sit down and discuss this together. I was concerned about Deliah’s safety, your safety. I’m deeply sorry to each one of you for your loss.”

  Silence settled over the table.

  “I’m under the impression your mother purchased a bus ticket. I fully intended to continue my investigation up north. However, there was a breach at the farmhouse. I didn’t feel it was safe for any of you to be working without knowing my current state of affairs. That’s why I arranged for Margareta to relocate and for y’all to gather for a meeting at my center of operations.”

  I began to understand why Mr. Halden needed me to go home.

  “Hey now, what did Josh have anything to do with this? You said Josh was to thank,” Caleb said.

  “I screwed up,” Josh said in a small voice behind Mr. Halden. “It’s sorta all my fault.”

  “What’s all your fault?” Gabe asked. “These got anything to do with it?” He slapped a pack of cigarettes on the table.

  Josh’s eyes widened. Caleb snatched them up. “Don’t you know anything? Girls don’t kiss boys that stink. Man, you got a lot to learn.”

  “You lost me,” Lane said as he lifted his cap and ran his hand through his hair.

  “I stole job site keys and HalRem computer files and gave them to a guy with a funny accent and he was gonna pay me mega bucks. Like enough dough to buy my mom a new house or a new truck without using Joel’s money. I got suckered big time.”

  “You did not,” I said in disbelief. Then I realized I wasn’t part of the conversation. When I first arrived in Williston, Meggie told me a laptop had been stolen from her office. Leon had been working on his scheme, and apparently my cousin, for months.

  “Don’t tell my mom anything about any of this,” he warned.

  Mr. Halden leaned back and stuck his thumbs behind his belt buckle. “Your mother and I are not keeping secrets, son.”

 
Josh crumpled his forehead. Did that mean Meggie knew about Deliah all of this time? Did my mother know about Deliah? I couldn’t imagine there were any more lies until Josh piped up again.

  “Then I’m not keeping yours,” Josh replied to his father. “Max told me everything.”

  “Whoa there, Joshua boy,” Caleb said comically. “What’s this all about? Max Taylor? Molly’s brother?”

  Mr. Halden’s spine stiffened. “Boys, may I have a word with Joshua?”

  “No, sir. Hold on a minute,” Lane said in an angered tone and slapped the table. “What other secret?”

  Gabe slid behind me. I experienced an immediate need to get up and run.

  “You can tell us, Josh,” Lane said. “But let me guess first. It’s got something to do with Molly’s vanishing act.”

  Caleb’s eyes widened across the table. I watched him bite his top lip and scowl.

  Josh took a deep breath. His throat bobbed and he swallowed hard.

  “That’s what I thought. Now, tell us all what he did,” Lane said. “Spill it already.”

  Josh glared sideways at Mr. Halden. I couldn’t see Gabe, but I felt his electricity at my back.

  “Max says Joel paid his sister Molly to go away and not come back even if one of you begged her. He said he didn’t want Molly or a baby scandal complicating the family.”

  “What a hypocrite!” Caleb shouted at the ceiling. Then he addressed his father. “Are you freaking kidding me? You’re not even married to Meggie.”

  I bit my tongue. I thought Gabe’s father liked Molly Taylor. Josh had to be mistaken.

  “He don’t want us getting in a paternity war or going off and leaving the business to chase girls like her. That’s what it is,” Lane replied. “Just matters that Haldens work for Haldens, and we look like a big happy family. It kills him that Meggie won’t marry him after all these years, so he wants us miserable too.”

  “Well, ain’t that a doozy?” Caleb said. “Outstanding family values.”

  Mr. Halden stood unruffled. Not even a bead of sweat formed on his forehead. His motivation for controlling everything baffled me.

  “I quit!” Gabe stepped back from my chair and shouted. His words rung in my ears. “I quit work and I quit this family.”

  I got out of my chair fast. I had a feeling Gabe would march out the door barefoot and drive off into the night to never be seen again.

  “I quit too,” Caleb said.

  I watched him curiously as he walked into the living room and tugged the shot-up Texas flag out of the broken picture frame on the mantel.

  “I need something to remember, legs.” He shook glass shards off of the priceless cloth. “This’ll do for now.”

  Mr. Halden remained cool and collected. Gabe was right when he said he could bounce a quarter off his father’s chin and he wouldn’t flinch.

  “There will be no quitting in my family or in my business. I expect you boys to return to North Dakota and resume your positions onsite effective immediately after the holiday. I will not tolerate this antagonistic behavior. You will show respect. You have obligations and contracts.”

  “Aw, screw your contracts.” Caleb stepped up to his father, swung the priceless antique over his shoulder like a cape, and removed his HalRem cap. He dropped it on the floor with dramatic flair and drew his eyes up to meet his father’s stare.

  I stumbled back. Mr. Halden didn’t move a muscle.

  “You’ll have to take up your objection with the United States of America, sir. I enlisted in the Army.” He stomped on the hat and lifted his nose. “That’s for mom.”

  * * *

  That evening, I learned that the pipes froze and burst throughout my high school, and classes were canceled until the first week of December. It was the luckiest thing to ever happen to me aside from meeting Gabriel Halden. My mother told Meggie the news, and Meggie told me when she called the cabin to find out what had happened to all of us in the waiting room. I apologized for running off before I could congratulate her and see how she was doing. She said she was going to be fine and I needed to focus on taking care of Gabe. I didn’t mention the intervention the brothers forced on Mr. Halden.

  Meggie didn’t pester me to make arrangements to go home after Thanksgiving when I made myself an invaluable help with baby Emmeline. Mr. Halden insisted none of us tell her what happened at the cabin while she was in the hospital. That went double for telling my mother. For that, I was grateful to him.

  My mother took Mr. Halden’s jet from Texas to New York during a fleeting thaw on the same day Meggie and Emmeline were discharged from the hospital. I didn’t answer her calls after our brief encounter in the hospital, and then my phone service was shut off. I knew it was the beginning of a long line of punishments my parents would try to enforce.

  The Halden boys were giving their father the silent treatment. Gabe and Caleb drove back and forth every other day from Paris to Benjamin to search the mansion’s remains for personal items, monitor the excavating, and fend off media pests. Gabe was an exhausted mess, a ticking time bomb as long as he was forced to work in the vicinity of his father. He wasn’t giving up on finding Eli’s guitar, but I feared the moment he did, he’d vanish.

  Deliah twisted her hands in the hem of her Red’s T-shirt as I folded a pile of tiny clothing on my lap on the couch in the cabin. “I think it’s great that you want to live with Meggie and Josh in Williston and help with Emmeline. I like how they used Eli’s name in her name. Speaking of names, Gabe said his father wants you to change your last name to Remington-Halden. I think Deliah Remington is perfect the way it is. I don’t get why you would want to be called Mona?”

  Josh sat beside us watching TV. He’d been glued to the couch for days.

  “There’s this boy I really like who goes to the all-boy academy, and I thought he liked me until he started calling me stupid names like Feel-ya Deliah. I told everyone I officially changed my name. Mona was my grandma. She used to write music. I couldn’t think up anything really bad that rhymed with Mona.”

  “Boys call girls names when they like them,” I said as I held up a pink onesie. “They’re usually insecure, and that’s the only way they can talk to us.”

  “Like Caleb calls you legs all the time?”

  My cheeks warmed, and I turned away to hide my blush. She started folding laundry.

  “My mom isn’t getting buried in the cemetery with Eli,” she said under her breath. “Mr. Halden says he’s going to plan something in Williston because that’s where she’s from.”

  “Thank you, girls, for taking care of the clothing and wash,” Meggie interrupted. Her hair was pulled into a frizzy bun. Baby Emmeline slept in her infant seat on top of the coffee table where I organized the laundry into stacks.

  “Josh, are you going to watch football all day or can you carry down those boxes? And keep the news off. I don’t need to catch any more of the demolished mansion on TV.”

  Josh didn’t answer. The TV’s volume increased.

  “Boggles me why they continue to show footage of you kids walking toward the mansion. It’s devastating enough that the boys are reliving this each day.” She shook her head in disgust. “Thank goodness you girls are here to help me. I feel like the walking dead. This bundle is a night owl. Aren’t you?” She softened her voice and spoke sweetly to the baby.

  “Having a baby in a tornado must have worn you out,” I told her.

  “Worn out, who me? Avery, can you check the dryer for the last load? I’m amazed at what clothing the recovery team was able to salvage. Half of the nursery was buried. Luckily it stopped raining after the tornado hit.” She took some time to think. “Uff-da, did I just say tornado like it was nothing?”

  “I never got to see the big house,” said Deliah. “Gabe told me some funny things about growing up there.”

  “Oh dear me, I’m so sorry, Deliah. That was terribly insensitive of me to say,” Meggie said. “You know what? That wasn’t a house. It was a museum, and it was
suffocating to live in all that big space. You will have a home in North Dakota with me and your dad when he gets it through his thick skull that I’m not supporting a rebuild in Texas. You’re our family now. I can’t replace your mom, but I’m here for you.”

  “Is that why you haven’t married him?” Deliah asked. “Because he’s stubborn? Tessa calls me that all the time.”

  Meggie and I raised our eyebrows in unison.

  “Oh gosh, he’s not stubborn,” she said and laughed at her own humor. “You’re pretty quick. I love the man, but it’s so rare these days to find a partner that you want to give yourself completely, absolutely, and unquestionably to—without any reservation. You both have to want the same thing for the relationship to thrive.”

  I found that kind of love in Mr. Halden’s son. I wanted to give Gabe everything he wanted, all of me. I loved him unconditionally.

  “Holler up if she cries. Isn’t she just extraordinary?” Meggie said as she took the stairs without making a sound.

  “Lane wants to marry the girl named Molly. He told me she’s pregnant and he loves her. He drove back to Minnesota to tell her. Do you want to marry Gabe?” Deliah asked. Lane hardly stuck around the cabin an hour before he took off to find Molly.

  The front door shut with a bang. The baby grunted and followed with a single, whiny cry before settling back down. Neither of us made a sound until she stilled.

  “I didn’t catch that, Mona,” Gabe drawled. “Man, my ears are ringing.”

  He hadn’t mentioned quitting HalRem, his mother’s accident, or the anniversary of his brother’s death either. He was angry with his father, his mother, and the entire human race.

  “Shhh. She’s sleeping, Gabe,” I whispered.

  I studied his stride as he crossed the room to wash his hands. Then he stooped over the infant seat. “She’s mighty tiny,” he said and slid one hand under her neck and one around the blanket. He dared to lift her.

  “Gabe, she’s sleeping,” I exclaimed.

  He made eyes at me to relax. I didn’t think he had any experience holding a newborn like I had from taking care of my sister. He kicked out a side chair with his boot and sat down. My heart slid back into place as he gazed at her with wonder. He looked amazing holding a baby. I didn’t think I could possibly love him any more until that image was burned into my mind. There was something about the cowboy hat and the look of utter adoration and curiosity in his eyes.