Behold the Stars

by Fanetti, Susan

  They were out of the meth trade, and they needed to stay out. If they could get the town to earn a straight dollar, then Lilli and Isaac could raise their daughter in safety. No more attacks, no more kidnappings, no more torture, no more death. Just a life. Quiet and full.

  She heard the roar of a Harley and pushed away from her desk, hoisting herself out of her chair. Her belly wasn’t colossally huge, but her center of gravity had certainly shifted. She didn’t mind. She’d spent the first half of this pregnancy in a horrid mental dungeon and had only been able to really enjoy what was happening inside her for the past couple of months. Now, with Gia doing acrobatics routinely, Lilli felt fully connected. She would almost be sad for her daughter to be born, when she’d have to share her with the world.

  She came out of the office, past the little front desk, with its antique bell she’d found on eBay, through the lobby/parlor area, and out the door. The hotel was ready to go. She needed someone to get the permits arranged. Three more interviews this afternoon, after lunch. Lilli sighed.

  Badger had pulled up the gravel drive on his new Dyna. Well, not new. The club had given him Erik’s bike as sort of an award, or a token of appreciation, for taking a bullet when Ellis’s men took Lilli. Erik had given his life in the Ellis affair. It had been a very hard year for Horde Prospects—another Prospect, Rover, had died on duty before the Ellis business had kicked into full swing.

  Badge dismounted and set his helmet on the handlebars. He was looking pretty good. He’d been shot in the back, but since he’d recovered and had started helping out here, he’d been putting on some muscle. He was still a skinny shit, but he had some definition in his arms, some broadening in his shoulders. Hope for him yet.

  She stepped off the porch, making sure not to waddle. There would be no waddling in this pregnancy. “Hey, buddy. How’s everybody doing?” He’d been up at the rescue ranch, checking on their adoptees. Lilli had already adopted the animals and was paying for their upkeep until the barn went up and passed the gajillion inspections it needed to pass.

  “They’re good. Gypsy—Lilli, she’s the shit. Damn, that’s a fine horse. Got some spirit.” He grinned sheepishly. “I was thinking she’d make a great lead horse.” Gypsy was a big, black Tennessee Walking Horse.

  Lilli laughed. “Meaning you want her, right?” He blushed. “Hey, bud. That’s your call. You’re the livestock manager. You want Gypsy for your ride, that’s fine with me.” His grin spread across his whole face then. He was cute. Someday, another year or two removed from his adolescent battle with acne, some time spent hauling fifty-pound feed sacks and giant hay bales, he might even make it to hot.

  “Hey—I was headed to the kitchen for some lunch. There’s meatball sandwiches and macaroni salad. Want to join me, update me on the rest of the furbabies?”

  “Sounds great.” They turned and headed back into the house. Lilli resisted the urge to pop him a good one when he took hold of her elbow and helped her up the porch steps.

  ~oOo~

  After lunch, Badge, good boy that he was, helped her clean up, and then they headed back out to the lobby. Lilli was not looking forward to the afternoon interviews. Only one candidate so far had seemed remotely worthwhile, and that one, a woman maybe ten years older than Lilli, had seemed a lot less interested once Lilli had explained that the bikers everywhere were a permanent feature. Signal Bend was a biker town. Lilli was a biker old lady. They were around. And they weren’t politically correct.

  The candidates who were there for the bikers—they were trouble of a whole different sort, and Lilli was not interested in them.

  Badger was in the lead as they came through the swinging kitchen door. He stopped short, and Lilli, her head already deep again in work thoughts, ran right into his backside, belly first. Gia gave an irritated little kick and rolled at the impact.

  Lilli was irritated, too. “Dude. What?”

  Badger jumped. “Sorry, Lilli. Um…” He trailed off, looking embarrassed, then turned back to the lobby, continuing to stand in her way like a lump. Lilli looked around his shoulder. Oh. There was a woman in the lobby. Lilli checked the clock behind the front desk. It was fifteen minutes before her next interview, but she’d wager that this was the candidate, sitting on one of the new sofas.

  “Badge. Can you get out of the doorway, please?”

  He jumped again. “Oh! Sorry. I’ll…um…I’ll…yeah.”

  “Show and Isaac are in back, working on the gazebo. You were going to talk to Show about the feed order, right?”

  “Right—yeah, okay.” Finally, he moved, turning to head out the side door.

  Lilli came through into the lobby. As she approached, the woman stood. She was tall—at least as tall as Lilli—five-nine or five-ten. Maybe a little taller. In the heels she was wearing, substantially taller. And she was gorgeous. No wonder Badge’s brain had shut down. Rich, red, shoulder-length hair (had to be colored—nature didn’t come that perfect), clear, pretty, intelligent face, and good God, a Marilyn Monroe body. Boobs and curves that were practically aggressive. Lilli, tall and extremely fit, confident in her looks—but seven months pregnant—had a disorienting moment of insecurity. For a half-second, she felt dumpy.

  The woman wasn’t dressed especially provocatively. She was wearing a very nice, well-fitting suit, a forest green damask with a pencil skirt. Simple navy shell under it, navy peep-toe pumps. Nice. Not Lilli’s taste, but more stylish, she thought, than the basic navy blue uniform look she’d already seen repeatedly during these interviews. It fit her very well, so that the conservative nature of the clothes did nothing at all to camouflage the va-va-voom underneath.

  Lilli’s first impression was no way. A woman built like this was a very bad fit for the job. She’d never survive the Horde’s attention, and Lilli was fully aware how little control she’d be able to keep over her Neanderthal family. The last thing she wanted to deal with was a fucking sexual harassment suit.

  But she couldn’t just turn her around and march her right out, so she flipped through her mental files and pulled the name of her next candidate up. Holding out her hand with a smile, she said, “Shannon?”

  Shannon smiled back and took Lilli’s hand. Her grip was confident. “Yes. I know I’m early—sorry about that. I guess I didn’t estimate the travel time from Tulsa so well. But better early than late, right?”

  “Right. No problem. You’re not that early, anyway. You want to go ahead and get started, then?” Lilli indicated the door to the office. Shannon nodded, and they went back.

  ~oOo~

  Well, shit. Shannon was perfect. She had the credentials, the experience. Her references, if they stood up, were great. She was smart. She had a dry wit, and she’d used it. Lilli appreciated the risk—showing one’s sense of humor in a job interview struck Lilli as something that could backfire. Not that she had a lot of job interview experience herself. Shannon asked good questions about the plans for the place. And hallelujah, she had contacts with the state.

  They’d been talking for almost an hour. At some point, the interview had stopped being a question and answer session and had become a conversation. So Lilli brought up the problem of the Horde.

  “One thing about this place. It’s deep country. You know, you drove it—we’re a ways from almost anything that resembles civilization. So we get a little insulated. I mean, I’m new here myself, not quite a year, so I’m still getting used to a lot of it. But this is a biker town.”

  Shannon smiled. “Hard not to know that. Signal Bend was in the news a lot recently.”

  Lilli nodded. “Yeah, true. But my point is—these guys are amazing. This town is something really special. But things here aren’t like things anywhere else. We’re sort of caught in a time warp. People around here think of things like political correctness as “newfangled.” They still talk about “that women’s lib garbage.”

  “Ah. You know, I was raised in Karville. You know where that is?” Lilli didn’t, so she shook her head. “D
eep in the Missouri Bootheel. I know country folk. I get what you’re not saying, and I know how to handle a redneck. Lots of experience.” Shannon leaned back and crossed one leg over the other.

  As well as this interview was going, and as great as Shannon seemed to be, Lilli was on alert. “I have to be straight, Shannon. Your resume is great. You’re clearly smart and on the ball. My antennae are up, though, because this seems like a strange fit for you. You’re leaving a second-in-command position at a luxury hotel in a city. For an eight-room B&B in the boonies. I have to ask how that’s a good career move. If this is a fangirl thing, hoping to be around if a movie gets made here, then no.”

  Shannon was quiet for a few moments, and Lilli got the impression that she was forming her answer. When she spoke, her blue eyes were serious. “My references are strong—and they include my current boss. My resume speaks for itself. As for why I’m looking for this kind of move, I’m going to have to ask you to believe me when I say that it has nothing to do with my professional life or my abilities to manage a facility like this. And I am not a fangirl. I’m not into actors or bikers. If there’s a movie, and it films here, that would be exciting for the business, but not something I’d be looking forward to on a personal level. My reasons for wanting to leave Tulsa are personal. I’d like you to respect that.”

  In Lilli’s estimation, that was a perfect answer—to the point, establishing a clear, respectful boundary. She hoped Shannon was serious when she said she could handle the guys, because the job was hers if she wanted it. She’d check her references before offering her the job, but Lilli’s search was over. She smiled. “Fair enough. I’ve got everything I need. If you don’t have any more questions, would you like a tour?”

  ~oOo~

  Shannon wasn’t wearing the right shoes to hike over the property, so Lilli gave her a tour of the main house, showing the rooms, each uniquely decorated, with its own powder room; four full bathrooms shared among the eight guest rooms; the kitchen, with its professional setup; the dining room, with service for up to fifty; the lobby/parlor; and the office, with the manager’s apartment behind it. Then they went out onto the porch, and Lilli described the workings of the farmland, where the barn would soon be and the animals it would house, and the woods with its trails and spring-fed creek. They walked around the porch to the back yard, of which Lilli was perhaps most proud: the garden. She’d done—or was doing; it was spring, so things still needed some filling out—an English garden behind the house, with riots of blooming plants. There were six main sections, each with a theme and a feature of its own—a gazing ball, a fountain, a kissing bench, things like that. In the very center stood a gorgeous gazebo, which Isaac had designed and crafted. Or it would be standing in the center, once Isaac and Show got it up.

  They were working on it now, both of them shirtless and sweating in the May afternoon sun. Show was still wearing his black beanie, of course. In almost a year, Lilli had never seen the top of his head. Isaac swore he wasn’t bald up there, but Lilli didn’t believe him.

  They looked damn good, though, the giants of the Horde, broad of back and rippled of muscle. Show had more ink than Isaac—fully covering his arms and shoulders, and a rampant black horse with a fiery mane and tail dominating his back. But as far as Lilli was concerned, Isaac was the real specimen, perfect in every conceivable way. She paused in the middle of describing the garden, caught up for a second in ogling her man. When Isaac turned and saw her, he grinned widely and waved her over.

  She looked at Shannon, who seemed to be doing her own staring. Yeah. Not into bikers, she’d said—except when they looked like this. Lilli felt a little territorial. “That’s my husband, Isaac. Come on, I’ll introduce you.” She went down the steps, expecting Shannon to follow. There were stepping stones lining the paths, so even in heels, she could probably navigate fine.

  Isaac folded Lilli up in his sweaty arms as soon as he could reach her. “Hey, Sport. How’re my girls?” He rubbed her belly.

  “We’re good. I wanted to introduce you to Shannon Bannerman. She’s interviewing for the manager gig.” Isaac raised his eyebrows, and she knew why. She hadn’t introduced him to any other applicant, and he was around most of the time. She wasn’t sure why she’d brought Shannon down here, except that she’d seen her staring and wanted to mark her claim on Isaac. Which was absurdly immature. But here they were.

  She turned to Shannon then and realized that it wasn’t Isaac she’d been eyeing. It was Show—massive, ink-covered, long-haired, long-bearded, beanie-wearing Showdown. Oh, poor Shannon. Show was doing a lot better since he’d gotten through the hell that had been the Christmas season, his first without his family. But his heart was locked up tight. His body, too. Since she’d embraced the role of the President’s old lady, she’d gotten to know the club girls some and was privy to their gossip. She knew that Show, even after his divorce, was not availing himself of their offerings at all. He was all business, all club, still living in the clubhouse, letting his own property go to rot. He wanted no kind of contact with women. Except Lilli, but that was a different thing altogether.

  Shannon took the hand that Isaac offered and smiled. Isaac cocked his head toward Show and said, “That’s Showdown. Show, Shannon.”

  Show nodded without looking and began hammering a nail into a board. Shannon looked confused at first, but recovered quickly and said to Isaac, “This is gorgeous. Craftsman style—nice choice.”

  Isaac grinned—he was a sucker for someone who knew anything about the stuff he did. “Yeah. Don’t like the foofaraw of most gazebos. The curlicues and like.”

  “I get you. Good lines to this. Suits the view, too, with the rows of crops and the fence line.”

  Isaac looked over at Lilli and winked. She nodded. Yeah, the job was filled.

  ~oOo~

  A barn raising. That had been Isaac’s big idea. Now, feeling like she was standing in the middle of a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Lilli was surrounded by almost literally the entire town. The men were putting up the barn, and the women were standing at long tables, feeding the troops. Baked beans, fried chicken, sausages, corn bread, potato salad, bean salad, pies. Kids ran all over—playing volleyball and tag and whatever. Geez. It was like they went out of their way to be quaint.

  Today was the raising. The rest of the long weekend was interior finish and painting. And this picnic, every day until the barn was done. When Isaac told her his plan, she’d scoffed. She loved the design, but the idea of a barn-raising seemed silly and unnecessary. They could afford to have the thing built. The money faucet was running too fast, yes, but they didn’t need to go begging.

  He’d pointed out that the town would love it—that it would serve as a celebration, the last piece of the reborn Signal Bend, and everybody would be involved. And he’d been right. Lilli had never seen a happier group of people working their asses off.

  Shannon, the newly hired manager of the Keller Acres Bed and Breakfast, was here, too. Lilli had wasted no time checking her references—and Isaac had Bart do some investigating, too—and Shannon had wasted no time accepting the job. Within a week of being hired, she was living on the premises. And today, two days after moving in, she was working the town, meeting everyone. The women were a bit guarded with her, but friendly enough. As Lilli herself knew well, it took a lot longer for the women to accept a new resident. Shannon would have to prove that she wasn’t on the prowl for their married men (not that there was a big pile of hotties in the batch) before she’d get some room from the women.

  The women were going to be jealous, and some were going to be catty about it. Shannon was the kind of woman that made an old-fashioned country wife feel insecure. Shit, she’d made Lilli feel insecure for a minute. But she was neither flaunting herself nor kowtowing to the smaller minds. She was dressed appropriately for the “women’s work,” in jeans, low boots, and a loose, black peasant top, her fiery red hair pushed off her face with a pretty scarf. People were just going to have to get u
sed to the fact that she was pretty and had a body built for sin.

  Almost every man on the premises had looked his fill, but Shannon didn’t seem to pay any of them particular mind. Her attention had its focus already. And that man had looked in her direction but not seen her at all. She’d noticed his lack of notice, that was obvious. Lilli wondered whether she should say something to dissuade her, but there was nothing she could say without telling a story which wasn’t hers to tell. Signal Bend’s newest resident would have to figure things out for herself.

  As the sun was dropping behind the tree line, the barn was up. The men packed up their tools, and the older boys cleaned up after them. The women got going with round three of the food: dinner. Lilli, exhausted and her back aching, absented herself and went to sit on the porch swing at the main house. It was a lovely view—the long shadows of the spring sunset, the bright new barn, the whole town milling about, laughing, talking, eating, drinking. The smell of spring foliage and freshly sawn wood. And her man, his braid loose and disheveled, his bare chest wet and streaked with sawdust, walking toward her, pulling a black shirt on over his shoulders.

  As he climbed the porch steps, he asked, “You okay, Sport?”

  “I’m good. Happy. Back hurts a little.”

  He sat next to her on the swing and put his hand on her belly. “She givin’ you trouble?”

  “Uh-uh. She’s been pretty quiet today.”

  He raised his eyebrows—the baby was usually very active. Lilli wasn’t worried—she felt right. But he didn’t know that. “Should we be worried about that?”

  As if to answer the question for herself, the baby rolled hard, and a little elbow or heel made a sharp mound as it pushed from one side of Lilli’s belly to the other. Isaac laughed and gave her a pat. “Okay, I guess that’s a no.”

  Lilli was tired. She was happy, but she was about to drop, and her back was singing. The picnic was turning into a party, and the thought of several more hours here tonight and then back at it all again tomorrow made her want to weep. “Would it be bad if we went home right now? I mean, since they’re building our barn, it would be bad to leave first, right?”