“Oh, I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“It’s okay,” he mumbled, a bit groggy. “I’m still alive?”
She grinned. “Yes, sweetheart. You wouldn’t expect to die and find yourself in a place like this, would you?”
He turned his head slightly and looked around. “You never know.”
“How are you feeling? Your shoulder?”
“It still hurts like hell, but I don’t feel as sick.”
“Granny Mae came in last night and tried another poultice. Moldy bread.”
“Damn, doesn’t she have remedies that aren’t so disgusting?”
Now she knew he was better, groggy or not. His voice was rough from fever and disuse, but he had his sense of humor back.
She heated more broth and spooned it into him. This time he ate more before he fell asleep again.
By then, Jessica had come downstairs, dressed but looking as tired as the rest of them. At least she’d had a chance to tidy her hair and change her apron. Susannah had been sleeping in her clothes for hours. “How’s he doing?”
“I really think he’s better.”
“Temperature?”
“Ninety-nine.”
“That sounds a lot better. He’ll be sore for a while. I guess Granny Mae wins another one.”
“Now Jess, you don’t mind, do you?”
“Heavens no, I’m grateful! But don’t tell her I said so.” She gave Susannah a mischievous smile.
• • •
Since Tanner was doing better, Susannah had gone to Jessica’s office to take a nap for an hour, actually lying down. Now she roused her stiff body from the sofa and went to check on him. He slept as well. His color was better and when she felt his forehead, it was still cool.
Grabbing the coffee pot from the worktable, she was about to go to the sink when she saw Wade and Joshua lurking in the hallway. “Hi, you two. Did Granny Mae give you breakfast?”
“Yes, and she said to tell you she’ll be over pretty soon. Do we have to go to school today?” Josh said.
Susannah had to do a quick check in her head to remember what day it was. Friday. “This is family business and I think we’d like to keep you close by. Besides, maybe the weather canceled school.”
“Aunt Susannah, did Uncle Tanner die?” Wade asked.
“Goodness, no! Is that what you thought? Didn’t Granny tell you he’s much better?”
“But we saw Mr. Hustad take away someone covered with a sheet last night. We thought maybe it was him.”
Oh, dear. No one must have told the boys what was happening. It was hard to blame anyone. So much had happened. “That wasn’t Uncle Tanner. Come and see. He’s probably sleeping, so let’s be quiet. But he’s going to be just fine.”
The kids tiptoed in and peeked around the screen. Tanner was awake. He turned his head and smiled when he saw them. His voice was a little weak but he knew where he was. “Hey, cowboys, how have you been doing?” Wade took one look at him and burst into tears, and buried his face against Tanner’s sheet-covered thigh.
He glanced up at Susannah and put his free hand on Wade’s head. “Damn, do I look that bad?”
“No, no. I think they’ve been really worried, that’s all. With everything that happened last night, no one had a chance to tell them much.”
He stroked Wade’s auburn hair and said, “Hell, I’m too tough to get carried off that easy.”
The boy lifted his face from the blanket. “Promise?”
Tanner tweaked his chin. “Sure, I promise.”
“We didn’t like what happened yesterday,” Josh said.
Tanner huffed out a chuckle. “Trust me, I didn’t like it either. But it’s over with and the bad guys won’t bother us anymore.”
Susannah produced a handkerchief for Wade and said, “Let’s let him rest for a while, all right? You’ll be around so you can visit with him later. Shall we check the fire in the waiting room and see if it needs tending?”
“Aww, okay.”
She turned them both around, and with an arm on each one’s shoulders, walked them toward the front. At that moment, they heard footsteps on the stairs and looked up. Emmaline Bauer was coming down. Jess was behind her. The woman stopped and stared down at the boys, her face suddenly ashen. She turned slightly, as if poised on the brink of flight back to the second floor. But Jess, pregnant enough to be an obstacle, stopped her. Susannah looked at her, puzzled, and then down at Wade and Josh with their red hair. At that instant, she felt as if she’d been kicked in the chest.
“Ohh, dear God.” All the pieces, or at least most of them, suddenly fell into place.
Jessica gaped at Susannah and she too wore an astonished expression.
“Go on down, Em,” Jess urged in a quiet voice, regaining some composure. “You need to meet them again.”
“This was never supposed to happen! I never wanted them to know.”
The boys shrank back against Susannah. They’d had enough shocking experiences over the past two days to last them for at least a year. And they didn’t even know about Shaw yet.
Jessica put her hand on the woman’s shoulder. “Think about everything you went through yesterday, bad and good. Your life is about to begin all over. You’re getting a fresh start.”
She gripped the railing with both hands and came down the stairs one at a time, as if facing a judge and jury and her legs had turned to rubber. She wore a clean dress Mae had managed to scrounge up for her, and her hair was neatly braided and wound into a chignon. Except for the bruise on her face, she could pass for any housewife a person might see at Bright’s Grocery or at the dry goods store.
Susannah felt her throat tighten like a vice. “Boys, come and say hello to this nice lady.”
“How do you do, ma’am,” Joshua said.
Wade was a little shy. “Hi, ma’am.”
She crouched in front of them. “I don’t suppose you remember me, do you.”
“No, ma’am.”
She glanced at Susannah with what was almost an apology in her eyes. “I’m your mama. We used to be a threesome, you two and me.”
“Uncle Tanner said you were sick and that you could never come home.”
“That’s what I thought too. But now…” Her voice quavered here. “Now I’m all better. Isn’t that right, Dr. Braddock?”
Jess, who’d been watching from the bottom step, jumped in. “Yes, she is. Your mother is all better and she’s going to be just fine.”
“This is probably a lot for you boys to take in. We’ll talk with Cole and Uncle Tanner too,” Susannah said, and fortunately, Em agreed.
“She’s right. But I’ve missed you so much all this time and I’d like to get to know you again. Would that be okay?”
They nodded, plainly overwhelmed.
Just then, Granny Mae opened the door, carrying her basket of food and potions. She took in the scene with raised gray brows and a smile. “Well, the excitement around here never stops, does it?”
Véronique watched from her window as Édouard and a few men from surrounding farms finished constructing a small addition to her ruined house using the materials left over from the shelling. Blessed with a stretch of dry weather, they had spent four days on the project, and it looked better than she had expected when Édouard first told her about it. In exchange for the men’s help, he would assist them with preparing their fields when it was time.
This was where Édouard would now sleep. She would continue to use the bed near the kitchen because it was warmer, and when the baby was born that would be especially important. She had agreed to him moving here mainly because since the theft of her sheep she no longer felt safe. It was also true that homeless, displaced people wandered the countryside now, and she did not want to be alone here without a defender. There had been a couple of minor incidents, men asking for a meal or water, but she was not sure what else might have happened had Édouard not been there.
They had received a bed
and a small bureau from one of the relief agencies to furnish the room. He had told her of plans he had to continue to rebuild the house, so apparently he was planning to be here for a long time.
Poor Christophe. He had wanted to do this for her, but given his physical limitations, she doubted that he would ever have achieved the strength to see it through.
Édouard had not again volunteered to marry her, but she knew that his offer still simmered beneath the surface of their relationship, which in her mind, was one of convenience, protection, and companionship. But he was a good man, and although she had to read what he told her, she knew much more about him now than she had when he first arrived.
His dog, Chien—an unimaginative but apt name—did a good job of minding the sheep and was sweet tempered as well. Strangely enough, the dog’s name was one of the few words that Édouard did not stumble over. He could call the animal with no trouble whatsoever. Her own name, though…the first letter stuck in his throat and he nearly strangled trying to utter it. And still he failed. It was too painful to listen to him try, so she always told him to stop.
They had also been very fortunate to receive a large roll of paper, the type that shopkeepers used to wrap parcels for their customers. The Croix Rouge had worked through their channels to obtain this for them, along with two more pens and several bottles of ink.
In all, it was not an ideal life, nor one that she had envisioned for herself. But they were alive, they had food and wine to put on the table, and it was nice to have company, even if that company could not speak. And in April, when the child was due, he would be able to summon a midwife to tend her. Even he conceded that he had not gained any obstetrical skills during his tenure as a medic in the army. Still, it was better to know that she would not be alone during those long hours before the midwife arrived.
In just a few weeks spring planting would begin and they would see what they could coax from their poisoned soil this year.
• • •
“I believe I speak for all of us in saying that Shaw has gone on to a happier place than this earth.” Hollis Mumford, the man Shaw had often referred to as an idiot, stood beside the old man’s grave in the cemetery. They’d had to wait two weeks for a break in the weather before the hole could be excavated. During that time, Fred Hustad had embalmed him and put him under a tarp out behind his building to “keep,” as he’d put it. Although others would have come—most probably the old man’s drinking buddies from Tilly’s—the family had decided to keep the event small. Now just the Braddocks, the Grenfells, and Granny Mae Rum-steadt were present for the few words that Mr. Mumford spoke over him. Wade and Josh looked at the coffin in the hole with wide eyes, and only Mae mopped her eyes and honked her runny nose into her handkerchief.
After the short funeral in the cemetery behind the high school, Mae said, “I fixed a big lunch. You’re all welcome to come over and share it. It seems like we ought to do something in Shaw’s memory. I closed up for the day anyway.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Cole said. “That’s nice, Mae. Thanks.”
Riley mumbled, “We should go if only to celebrate the fact that he won’t torture us anymore.” Susannah heard him and it took a monumental effort on her part to keep from agreeing with his remark. She felt no regret at Shaw’s passing, but she felt free. No one in the house would ever again address her as “sister,” order her around, or insult her. The man she’d hoped would at least be a father-in-law to her had turned out to be one only by title.
And he’d paid two men to kill her husband. It was only by sheer luck that they’d failed.
At the café, Jess and Cole were able to scrape up enough amusing anecdotes about the departed to take their minds off the grief he had given them over the years. In addition, Granny Mae fed them the first really decent meal they’d eaten since this all had begun the day that Tanner was shot. After they ate, the boys were sent off to finish the school day. When they were gone, Tanner and Susannah sighed.
“I guess Emmaline is going to take the kids back when she marries Whit,” he announced. He still wore a sling for his right arm, and Jess had told him he’d probably have to keep it on for another two or three weeks. But he was much better than he’d been in those early days of his recovery. He shrugged his left shoulder. “I’m not surprised—she’s lived without them all these years and she didn’t expect to ever get them back.” He had already told the family the story of how he came to be their guardian years earlier. “But she also said that she wants to ease them into their new life. They’ll spend some of the time with her, and some with us. And they’ll visit us whenever they want.”
Susannah poked a fork at the chicken leg on her plate, her appetite fading at the mention of them. “I didn’t expect it either—I didn’t even know about her until two weeks ago. And they don’t remember her. I thought they’d grow up with us.”
Tanner and Susannah were both taking this hard, but Tanner, stoic as ever, managed to hide the hurt most of the time. She wasn’t as good at it. They spoke of it only at night in the bed they had originally shared. Now that so much had happened, he’d moved back into the house. Riley had moved to the bunkhouse only last night. It wasn’t necessary—after all, half of the place was his and none of it was theirs. But they hadn’t tried to talk him out of it, either.
“I hear she raised some eyebrows when she checked into the hotel,” Granny Mae said, passing around a bowl of mashed potatoes so wonderfully rich and buttery they might have been served at the White House. “But there’s only so much life to gossip. Whit made it a point to ensure the boys were never connected to Bauer when the news about the shooting got around. No one knows yet that she’s their mother.”
Susannah put her fork down and pushed her plate away. Her gesture was lost on no one, but she couldn’t help it. The thought of losing them after all this time was heart-wrenching for her. And yet, she knew that it had been even worse for their mother. It wasn’t that Emmaline was thoughtless or ungrateful to them for all they had done for Wade and Joshua. But of course, she would want her own children with her again now that she could manage it.
As soon as it was reasonably polite, Tanner signaled that it was time to be getting back, and the gathering broke up.
Cole had work to do, so he was staying in town. Riley, Susannah, and Tanner took the wagon back to the farm. She hated riding in that wagon now. Climbing into the box, she saw the bloodstain Tanner had left on the bottom boards, and the memory of that day, still so fresh, made her feel like a hypocrite for even attending Shaw’s funeral.
When they reached the house, Tanner said, “I’m going to let you handle unhitching the wagon, Riley. I’m not up to full speed yet.”
Riley nodded in acknowledgment. Things would always be tense between them, she knew. Tanner handed Susannah down and signaled her to come inside.
“I’m glad that’s over,” he said, throwing his hat on the kitchen table. “I didn’t want to go through the motions of that damned funeral to begin with.”
She helped him out of his jacket and hung it on one of the coat hooks. “Oh, God, I didn’t either, but even though everyone knew what happened and we would have had a good excuse to stay home, I couldn’t figure out a way to avoid it.” She tied on her apron and began washing the breakfast dishes, which she’d put off so they could go into town.
“I wouldn’t have had nearly as much trouble getting out of it, but we’re guests in this house.” He rubbed his sandy hair and his forehead, then sat down at the table. “I guess we went for Cole’s sake. Of us all, he probably had the least trouble with that old son of a bitch, and we know he got his share too.” He paused for a moment, then said, “Susannah, leave that and come sit down. We need to talk.”
Her hands stilled on the plate she held, and she looked over her shoulder at him. Her sense of doom must have shown on her face.
“It’s nothing bad.”
She wiped her hands on her apron. “Well, I’ve had enough things go wrong la
tely to be suspicious.” She sat down across from him and he stretched out his hand. She took it, and he looked into her eyes.
“First of all, I want to thank you for being my wife. Like I told you before, you’re the best thing that ever happened to me, and I don’t know what I did to deserve a woman like you. But I’m glad every single day, and I love you with all my heart.”
Her own heart swelled with joy and relief, and she smiled. “I’m surprised to hear you say it. I love you too, Tanner. There have been times over the past few months when I wondered if you were sorry you married me. When I needed you most, you pulled away from me.”
He glanced at the tabletop and then lifted his eyes to hers. “I was as wrong as I could be to do that. I guess it took a brush with death to force me to realize we never know what’s coming. Things left unsaid—” He shook his head. “I won’t make that mistake again.” He leaned over and kissed her hand.
“I made a mistake too. I still regret the way I handled the situation with Riley. I just didn’t know what—”
He held up his hand. “We’re not going to flog that one anymore. No one could have seen that coming. I’m grateful it got straightened out.” He gave her a wry look. “And that I kept the right to call you my wife. But here’s the thing. After everything that’s happened and since it looks like we’re going to lose the boys—”
She sighed heavily at the thought.
“I’m wondering if it wouldn’t be best for us to leave. There won’t be anything holding us here.”
Startled, she sat up straighter in her chair. “Leave—where would we go?” They had touched on the subject briefly that morning before he was shot. Of course, a lot of things had changed since then.
“Maybe someplace where we can start a new life that won’t always be reminding us of the old one. We don’t have a stake in this farm. It belongs to Riley and Cole. Neither one of us is related to them.”
“What would we do?”
“I’ve been thinking about this for a while, but I don’t have a firm answer to that yet. It’s not like we’d be leaving next week or next month. We can make plans. How do you feel about it?”
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