by Mia Ross
“I’m just full of surprises,” he countered, startled to hear the teasing tone in his own voice. He was a fairly serious person, and he took his responsibilities just as seriously. That he felt comfortable enough with the young art teacher to joke around was surprising, to say the least. Remembering his manners, he stood and met her near the boundary of the yard. “What brings you over to this side of town so early?”
“It’s a beautiful day,” she replied as if the reason should have been obvious to him.
He’d been admiring it himself, but he didn’t see the connection. “True enough, but what brings you here in particular?”
“I take a walk every morning before school, as long as the weather’s decent.”
During his short time in New Hampshire, Rick had learned that the locals’ definition of decent weather was different from his, and he chuckled. “What exactly does that mean? I’ve been wondering ever since I got here.”
“No lightning, hail or blizzard,” she explained, ticking the hazards off on her fingers. Then she added a sassy grin. “For me, it also can’t be too windy. I’m pretty light, and I don’t want to end up in Oz.”
He laughed out loud. He seemed to be doing that more and more lately. Usually, it was his girls who set him off that way, and that Emma seemed to have a knack for it baffled him. Considering all she’d been through, her lighthearted approach to life was amazing. Maybe he could take a lesson from this soft-spoken but determined woman. “Good plan.”
“I think so. I’ve never seen you around during my strolls. Are you playing hooky today?”
Hardly, he scoffed silently. Sloughing off that way got you precisely nowhere, his father had told him from the time that he was old enough to understand the concept. Hard work and dedication had taken Philip Marshall to the top of the banking profession in his native Charleston, and his ongoing guidance was doing the same for Rick. He had no intention of taking his foot off the gas now. “Caitlin’s home sick, so I’m combining work time and dad time today.”
“I hope it’s nothing serious. She loves school, and she must hate missing it.”
“She does,” he confirmed with a sigh. “She even tried to convince me to go to work, but I vetoed that idea.”
“Good for you. It was brave of her to try, though. She must get that soldiering-on attitude from you.”
“Actually, that’s all Sarah,” he said before he realized what he was doing. It wasn’t like him to share personal details so easily, but now that he’d started, he couldn’t deny that it felt good to open up just a bit. “Even near the end, she kept on going, doing everything she could until even the little things got to be too much for her. I still don’t know how she did it.”
“Because she had people counting on her,” Emma answered, adding a gentle smile of understanding. “Taking care of you and the girls was important to her.”
In the compassionate response, Rick caught another, more subtle, meaning. After thinking about it for a moment, he said, “I get the feeling you’re talking about yourself, too.”
She nodded. “My family and my students kept me going, even on the worst days. Chemo is awful, but when you have someone to focus on besides yourself, it really helps. A strong dash of faith doesn’t hurt, either.”
There it was again, Rick thought, the easy reference to religion that he’d picked up on from so many residents of this small town. Down-to-earth and hardworking, people here seemed to have a strong dedication to their religious beliefs, which was something he’d never developed. He and his attorney sister had been raised to be smart and successful, and they’d both done well in their respective fields. But while his parents had stressed education and hard work, he couldn’t recall them ever mentioning the value of cultivating a relationship with God. Apparently, they just didn’t believe that it was necessary.
Rick had shared that attitude for most of his life, until he met Sarah. Her devotion to the faith that eluded him was sweet, and while he hadn’t truly understood it, he’d gone through the motions for her sake. She’d felt that it was important for Caitlin and Aubrey to attend Sunday school, and he hadn’t objected. Quite honestly, he didn’t care all that much one way or the other.
He enjoyed their quiet Sunday mornings, sleeping in and then making a huge stack of pancakes in whatever shapes his daughters asked him for. But now he found himself wondering if they’d like to join the local Sunday school and save their pancakes for after church.
“So,” he began, feeling awkward around Emma for the first time. Her curious expression prompted him to go on, and he forced himself to sound casual. “I noticed that there are three churches in town. Which one do you and your family go to?”
“The oldest one,” she replied, pointing to the modest white chapel on the far side of the town square. “My ancestors, Jeremiah Calhoun and his two brothers, built it back in the 1820s, and the family has gone to services there ever since.”
“Those are the blacksmithing brothers who founded the town and put the bridge across Liberty Creek, right?” She nodded. “I got a history lesson from Sam and Brian when I stopped in at the forge over the winter,” he said.
Mention of her big brothers made her beam proudly. “They’re very proud to be carrying on the family business, and we’re thankful that they’ve decided it’s worth the effort to keep those old traditions going. When our cousin Jordan gets here this fall, there will be three Calhouns working around the forge, just like there were back in the beginning.”
The symmetry of that appealed to Rick for some reason, and he smiled. “It sounds like things are coming full circle for Liberty Creek. It’s not easy for villages like this to keep things moving forward. I’ve seen a few that are just a few steps short of becoming ghost towns.”
“Having our own school is an important part of our future,” she commented in a quiet but determined voice. “They’ve talked about merging with Fairfield, another small district near here, but so far we’ve been able to avoid that. Others haven’t been so lucky, and while I’m sure that it makes sense financially, it’s tough on the people who lose that part of their community.”
“I can only imagine.”
Behind him, he heard an upper window creak open and glanced back to find Aubrey framed in the girls’ window. “Daddy?”
“What is it, sweetie?”
“Caitlin just threw up. She was trying to get to the bathroom.”
It didn’t take a genius to fill in that blank, and Rick turned back to the delightful visitor who’d brought an unexpected ray of sunshine into his morning. “That’s my cue. Thanks for stopping to chat.”
“Go on,” she replied, waving him off. “Give Caitlin a hug from me and tell her that I hope she’s feeling better soon.”
“Will do.”
As Emma continued her walk, Rick hurried back inside to take care of his sick little girl. It wasn’t his favorite type of dad duty, but when his daughters needed him, he knew that his place was with them. Sarah, through her quiet courage and unending love for them all, had taught him that.
And now that she was gone, he was grateful for the wisdom she’d left behind.
* * *
Friday morning Emma turned the corner near the Marshalls’ rental house and got the surprise of her week.
There, next to the wrought iron gate that led to the front walkway, stood Rick. Holding a paper plate of what looked to be her Gran’s famous orange-cranberry muffins and a coffee mug that read “World’s Awesomest Dad,” he grinned as if this was something he did every day. “Morning. Mind if I walk along with you?”
She couldn’t have been more shocked if he’d starting turning cartwheels in the middle of the deserted street, but one thing she’d learned during her career of working with kids: no matter what happens, just roll with it.
“This is a free country,” she teased as he fell in step beside her. “You can wa
lk wherever and whenever you want.”
He looked taken aback by her response, so she added a bright smile to make sure he knew she was teasing him. She reminded herself that he was a solemn person by nature, and she didn’t want to do anything that might make him feel self-conscious around her. Why that mattered, she wasn’t completely sure, but her instincts had never led her astray before, and she wasn’t about to start ignoring them now.
“Thanks,” he said in a relieved voice. “Some people would rather have their solitude, so I wasn’t sure you’d be open to company so early in the day.”
She laughed at the thought. “Oh, I’ve been up for hours. I like to paint when it’s quiet.”
“I like to sleep when it’s quiet,” he confided, clearly trying to swallow a yawn. “When you’ve got two busy girls, you have to grab a few winks whenever you can.”
“Sounds smart to me. How is Caitlin feeling?”
“Better, but now Aubrey has that bug, and Cait wanted to stay home to take care of her. So I’m playing hooky, too. I figured since it’s Friday, there was no harm in us making a long weekend for ourselves.”
“Is Mrs. Fields not available?”
“No, she’s there. That’s not the same as being there myself, though.”
His voice had drifted in a pensive direction, and she wondered what he was thinking. Rick had struck her as a nose-to-the-grindstone kind of guy, and everything from his sleek laptop to his mirror-polish shoes marked him as the stereotypical ambitious banker. It seemed odd that he’d relax those rules for a simple childhood illness. Her intuition told her that there was more to it than fatherly concern, but she recognized that his reasons were absolutely none of her business.
Because she didn’t know how else to react, she simply said, “That’s true.”
They fell silent, and she suddenly felt awkward strolling through town with the newcomer who’d caused such a stir since arriving in Liberty Creek during the winter. He’d arranged funding for Liberty Creek Forge when her brother was struggling to reopen their family’s vintage blacksmith shop and make it profitable. She’d also heard that Rick had signed off on some refinancing arrangements to keep local families from losing their homes due to the poor economy. Then there were folks who insisted he was a heartless Scrooge who valued dollar signs more than human beings.
Chances were, like most people, he was a blend of many qualities, good and bad. But so far, she’d seen a lot more of the former, and she was inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. Reaching over, she grabbed a muffin from the paper plate and took an enormous bite. Humming in appreciation, she swallowed it and sighed. “I’ve been eating these my entire life, and I still don’t know how she does it.”
“Lard,” Rick answered, chuckling as he took a bite of his own. “That’s all she’d tell me, though, and she winked when she said it.”
“That means there’s a lot of it in the batter,” Emma explained with a laugh. “Gran doesn’t worry much about cholesterol. She firmly believes that God has already mapped out your lifetime for you, and however long it is, you should enjoy everything to the hilt.”
In between bites, he made a noise that she took as agreement. Then, to her surprise, he quietly said, “Sarah was like that, too. I’m more cautious, I guess. The day she decided to stop her chemo was the worst day of my life.”
Halting in midstride, Emma stared up at him in disbelief. “She did what?”
He fixed Emma with a helpless look. “There was nothing I could do. I argued, pleaded, yelled, threatened. In the end, it was her decision. So I took her home from the hospital and brought in the best full-time nurse I could find. Three months later Sarah was gone.”
The agony lining his face told Emma that there was more to the story, and she debated whether to push him any further. But he’d opened up to her so much already, she thought it might help him to get it all out. “That must have been incredibly hard on all of you.”
“The girls were younger, and they knew their mommy was sick,” he replied in a voice barely above a whisper. “I was at a major meeting one afternoon, and the nurse called to tell me Sarah had taken a bad turn. I broke every speed limit to get home in time.” After a long breath to steady his shaking voice, he finished. “I didn’t make it.”
“Oh, Rick.” Overcome by the emotions radiating from this very pragmatic man, she rested a hand on his arm, hoping to comfort him a bit. “How awful for you.”
“I can never go back and change that,” he said, his voice now flat with resignation. Straightening his shoulders, he seemed to almost shake off the past in a gesture Emma knew only too well. “So now, when one of the girls is sick, I stay home. I know the flu isn’t leukemia, but it makes me feel better knowing that I’m there if they need me.”
“They always need you,” Emma reminded him, rubbing his arm in sympathy. “Even grown-up girls need their daddies. I can tell you that from personal experience.”
Rick’s stony features softened into a genuine smile totally unlike the practiced one she’d seen so often from him. “I met your father over at the forge. He was helping Sam and Brian frame in that new display area Lindsay wants to use for their ironworking demonstrations. Steve seems like a good guy.”
“The best. He and my mother, Melinda, were high school sweethearts, and they taught us all about how precious a strong family is. I never would’ve gotten through my treatments without their support, and they’ve been great during all this upheaval at school over my job. I don’t know where I’d be without them.”
“Family’s nice,” he agreed as they resumed their circuit of the village. “Mine is scattered around, but we get together at my aunt and uncle’s place on Martha’s Vineyard every summer. It’s a lot of fun.”
“I love it there. Between the beautiful scenery and all those colorful people, I could paint every single day and never run out of things to capture.”
“I’m not the creative type,” he told her again, adding a chuckle. “Mostly I enjoy being on the beach, sailing out on the ocean and fresh lobster.”
“I did a painting of a sailboat regatta they held one time when I was there. I’ll show it to you sometime and if you like it, it’s yours. You can hang it on that big, blank wall opposite the landscape you already bought. It’ll help brighten up your office.”
He slanted her a boyish grin that she wouldn’t have believed he was capable of if she hadn’t seen it with her own eyes. “If it’s as good as I think it is, I wouldn’t waste it on the bank. It’ll go in the living room.”
Stunned, she blinked a couple of times, trying to regain her composure. “Well, I guess you can hang it wherever you want.”
“I’ll do that. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Speaking of the bank, though,” he continued as they turned onto Chestnut Street, “I had an idea yesterday that I wanted to run past you.”
She wasn’t exactly a financial wiz, so no one ever asked her opinion on anything even remotely related to money. His request caught Emma by surprise, but she did her best to appear as though she was fine with it. “Okay. Shoot.”
“The situation at the school is more complicated than just shifting funds from one place to another to cover the positions that are in jeopardy. I was hoping you and the others involved might have some suggestions on where we can look for solutions.”
Emma’s jaw dropped, and she carefully closed it before asking, “You want our input?” When he nodded, she frowned in confusion. “But we’re teachers. You’re the numbers guy.”
“True, but I don’t know how things work there day-to-day. It may be that you’ll be able to highlight opportunities I wouldn’t even think of because I’m not an employee.”
She recognized the professional-speak he’d slipped into from their first meeting at the bank, and while she followed his general meaning, she was concerned that his usual mode o
f presentation would be sorely lacking for regular folks. “I think it’s a good idea, but I have a couple of suggestions for you.”
“Okay. Shoot.”
He added a grin that told her he’d intentionally echoed her earlier comment, and she couldn’t help smiling. For all his boardroom appearance, apparently Rick Marshall still had a playful side. She wondered what it would take to get him to loosen up and let it out more often. Not that she was the one to be doing that, of course. It was just a matter of curiosity for her.
“First—” she ticked her forefinger “—you need to keep it simple. I think it’s easy for you to get into the details and forget that you’re talking about people’s lives, not just numbers on a spreadsheet. They’re scared about losing their jobs and their incomes, so you’ll have to be sensitive about that.”
“Got it. What else?”
“Lots of people view going to consult with a banker as a step above a root canal. If we do the meeting at the bank, they’ll be half terrified before they even get there. I think we should have it at my house some evening and serve plenty of snacks. Everything goes down better with one of Gran’s yummy desserts.”
He thought it over then said, “Excellent suggestions. Now I have one for you.”
“What’s that?”
Stopping in the middle of the sidewalk, he smiled down at her. “Have a good day.”
“What?”
Their running conversation had kept her so preoccupied, she hadn’t noticed that they’d finished their tour of the town and had ended up in front of her house. Feeling more than a little foolish, she laughed. “I totally lost track of where we were.”
Cocking his head in an inquisitive pose, he asked, “Is that a good thing?”
She considered that for a moment, then smiled. “Yes, it is.”
“Good, because I enjoyed it, too. I can’t remember the last time one of my mornings started out so nicely. Thank you, Emma.”
“You’re welcome.”
Watching him stroll away, she found herself wondering what on earth had just happened. Apparently, the well-starched, tightly wound banker had a softer side that he’d chosen to share with her.
