Cavanaugh

by Jody Kaye

  “You hate Ross.”

  “I’m willing to give the man a chance because I love you.”

  “And I’m giving one to him because I love him. Ross’s going to have a good life without me in it.”

  Like every morning recently, Grandy shot the stink-eye across the room to where Ross slept with his body adhered to her plastic-covered couch. She’d given up on platitudes that Rose and he would find their way back to one another, though, he heard his grandmother during her nightly prayers ask the Lord to give her grandson guidance and thank Him for the sensibility the He’d imparted on the boy to ensure Ross wasn’t sleeping in that nice new truck.

  Ross was still telling himself that choice had nothing to do with Rose’s commentary. It was still winter and it had been a damn cold one.

  Unfortunately for Ross, Grandy’s silent admonition was the least of his problems. He had a new client to meet today. The address the caller left on the office answering machine was too close to Kingsbrier for Ross’s liking. He’d pulled a map from the glove compartment and planned his route to avoid the ranch, unnerved that the plot was on the adjacent land. Seeing Rose those two times since December was a gut punch and Ross intended to avoid a third at all costs. Hopefully, this place had dense foliage obscuring the stable and apartments.

  His Cavanaugh truck pulled up to a beautiful old home that had seen better days. No other cars were parked in the drive so the unnamed person he’d been told to meet had yet to show up. Ross got out of the truck, wondering what the place had looked like in its hay day.

  It was a Victorian. Light blue with dark blue shutters. It had a traditional round turret out front with a roof that peaked over the top of the second story and a wraparound porch. Decorative spindles held up the railings. A few were misaligned or broken off altogether. The white painted gingerbread work was chipping in places. The gardens were overwrought with weeds, but that wasn’t Ross’s concern. He wasn’t sure how long the place had stood empty. It needed a structural engineer to ensure it was sound and a new roof that would eat into the owner’s budget.

  Making a mental list of questions, Ross put his hands in his jeans pockets damning himself as Grandy’s ring scratched his knuckles. He hadn’t worn these pants lately and he wasn’t brave enough to break his grandmother’s heart by telling her that Rose was gone for good. Grandy had been saddened when Rose didn’t attend the Christmas service. Ross was going to have to admit to the old woman someday that he’d lied saying his wife was sick.

  A man in a stiff navy suit caught his eye. At first, he thought the man appeared out of thin air, but in actuality, he’d turned the left corner coming from behind the house as if he too had taken more time to inspect its weathered beauty.

  “I should’ve known,” Ross muttered to himself.

  “Cavanaugh,” Eric said, tucking his right hand into his own pocket. “I appreciate your coming out.” Eric looked up at the turret. “Needs quite a bit of work doesn’t it?”

  Ross grunted in agreement.

  “My late wife’s name was Joy,” he said for the first time in eight years. “It was the embodiment of her. It’s what I remember most. We named our daughter Rose, forgetting that the beautiful bud has thorns. She was supposed to be the delicate symbol personified—quite the way her mother was. I’m convinced now that those thorns protected her when I failed to do so. But I digress.

  “While building Kingsbrier, Joy and I drove this road often to check on our home’s progress. She anticipated seeing this house on the way. I’d believed that it was her excitement to get to our property, until one day she remarked how much she loved the Victorian. I scoffed. After all, I was providing her with this enormous mansion. She’d chosen every detail within.

  “Joy began telling me stories—making them up to entertain me—about the little old couple who lived here. Sometimes they lived a sad existence and others it was bright and cheery. Often times it depended on my wife’s mood… Someday you’ll understand that for yourself… She talked a great deal about a small, happy home, especially when it seemed that money wasn’t able to buy the things she wanted. I didn’t understand. I didn’t want to understand either. I called her silly when she mourned the couple who lived here. I didn’t know until later she’d befriended them and her loss was real.

  “Then, not long afterward, Joy died.” Eric looked momentarily pensive. “I’m not a man who wears my emotions on my shirtsleeve, Cavanaugh. However, my daughter seems to trust in you so I’m bold to admit that I’ll never get over feeling that I’m in part responsible for my wife’s death. We’d wanted a large family and Joy never gave up her faith in trying to have more children, despite what the doctors explained to us. She did it for me because she knew how much I wanted a son… There are some things that money can’t buy. Love is one of them. A full life is another.”

  Eric stopped talking and focused on a shattered stained-glass window pane. He wore an expression similar to the pain on Rose’s face the day he’d hauled Grandy’s bed away. Rose let Ross think the worst of her. She’d refused to allow Lily Anne to explain what he’d overheard. There was no baby. There never had been one and more, than likely, there wasn’t any intent on Rose’s part to trap Ross with a pregnancy. Ross suddenly understood the distress Eric felt those years ago while watching his wife trying to catch something so fleeting and it left a hollow in the pit of his stomach.

  “But, again, I seem to be off on a tangent.” Eric stoically covered his emotions. “An investment company I’d bought with George Andrew acquired the land. I was too ashamed of myself to put it in my own name. I should have listened to Joy. She’d been trying to tell me that what we had was enough for her. That I was enough for her.”

  “And now you want this homestead fixed?” Ross asked.

  “No, I don’t. I never did. Stroll with me.” Eric called over his shoulder as he took to the road. He glanced back to ensure the other man followed “This house stands to remind me that I failed my wife when I didn’t take Joy seriously. I offered it to Rose. She refuses to move back to the mansion, but she doesn’t want this home either. She intends to stay where she is in the apartment, taking care of Lavender. I’d thought it a brilliant idea and would push, but we both understand Rose doesn’t do anything she doesn’t want to do… And perhaps this house now reminds me that I should be more considerate of her. She’s her mother’s daughter.”

  “She’s your daughter too,” Ross responded with cynicism.

  The two men stopped and faced one another.

  “I’d forgotten that. Do you know who reminded me?”

  Ross shrugged as if to say “Who?”.

  “She did.”

  “So if you don’t want me to remodel the Victorian why am I here?”

  “To mend a fence.” Eric pushed back a tree branch. Between the boughs Ross saw Rose dig a shovel into the ground. She placed a boot on the blade and rounded her back over the handle as it cut a hole for the post laying nearby.

  Ross turned to Eric, astonished.

  “She insists on finishing it all by herself and won’t let me contribute to the lumber. I thought that perhaps you’d offer her your expertise.”

  Ross watched Rose wipe her brow. She took off a pair of gloves to inspect what he knew were large blisters on her palms. On her own, she’d almost finished the corral they’d started together while he lived next-door to her. Ross remembered what it was like to work alongside Rose, showing her how to use his tools. The first time she whacked a nail with a hammer she folded it nearly over on itself. The next attempt was much better. He loved watching her learn how to do things. He’d loved every minute with her, even the infuriating ones.

  “Cavanaugh, these are for you.”

  Ross’s brow furrowed as Eric handed him what Ross had believed were the renovation designs for the Victorian.

  “The apple must not fall far from the tree. Although, I admit the behavior is learned from my child, not the other way around… I used Rose’s secretary, Thandie, t
o intercept the divorce decree before Rose could sign it.”

  “I signed it. My lawyer sent me a copy.”

  “But she didn’t. Not yet. So technically,” Eric cocked is chin toward the stable where Rose had gone back to work digging her holes “she’s still Rose Cavanaugh… and you’re the one who currently holds the power to either change or maintain that.”

  “Why would you do this? I’m not taking a cent—”

  “She’s refused the money as well, Ross. So I’m trying to give my daughter the one thing that her life’s been lacking for far too long. Joy.”

  Eric left Ross by the side of the road and continued walking the long stretch to the mansion.

  Ross opened the court documents, tracing a finger on the line where Rose’s signature belonged. This man, whom Rose considered an awful parent, had done this for her. But why?

  Rose hefted a small bag of cement, pouring it into a bucket and adding water. She stirred it with a stick that she then tossed to the side and filled the hole with the mixture before using all her might to force the post in.

  Ross chuckled a little. It wasn’t the process he’d use, but Rose’s method seemed to work for her. It struck him that she wasn’t asking for help from anyone.

  She’d never wanted rescuing. Rose wanted to do it herself. She wanted to contribute. From the kitchen fiasco to them building the table and when she held the flashlight and then bandaged his finger, all of the things that seemed so trivial weren’t to her. She’d scorned the princess ideology because no one other than Rose believed that she deserved the opportunity to try.

  It finally registered in Ross’s brain that for Rose to be at the Kingsbrier office in Houston the day he’d stormed, Eric had to have rolled out the welcome mat for his daughter. Ross knew she’d never been invited there before. Rose was working for her father. Eric finally saw Rose as the woman Ross hadn’t been able to believe he’d turned a blind eye on.

  She held the post to make sure it was straight and then clapped her dirty hands together and brushed the remaining grime on her behind. Then she danced up to an already set beam that Lavender was hitched to and nuzzled her girl, chattering on. Ross felt Rose’s delight across the silent field between them.

  Ross pushed through the thicket. His own judgment had been clouded too. He was so afraid that the whirlwind girl would blindside him that he’d ignored the changes in her and how she’d bloomed since the summer despite the coldness that seeped in this fall trying to destroy the bits and pieces of joy that she’d held onto.

  He’d been unfair when he accused her of trying to use a child to strangle hold him, because somewhere along the way Ross had gotten the notion that he and his Rose might have a family of their own.

  Lavender nickered, announcing Ross’s arrival.

  “What is it, sweet girl? …Ross. Why are you here?” Rose was dumbfounded. She wiped the cement powder off of her dusty flannel shirt and pushed back a lock that escaped her ratty bun.

  His lips twitched. She was so dirty. She was so damn beautiful.

  “We’re in a bit of a quandary. A two-fold problem it seems.”

  “How’s that?” she asked, nervously scratching at her neck and still trying to make herself presentable.

  Ross held up the divorce decree. “First, Eric doesn’t have your forging abilities or he’d have signed these for you.” He handed over the papers.

  “Thandie said these hadn’t come yet.” Rose blinked.

  “Thievery runs in your family.”

  Rose shook her head in disbelief. “My father?” She saw that Ross had already signed. “I, um. I’m sorry. If you have a pen I’ll take care of this.”

  “That’s where the second issue comes in. It seems that Eric’s chosen someone for you to be married to. It’s me.”

  “You?”

  “I’m as surprised as you are.” Ross rubbed the back of his neck. “Rose, you’re not going to marry who your father tells you to. But I won’t get another chance to tell you I’m in love with you. I married you because I loved you and I don’t mean in the platonic way that I kept insisting was the reason I’d gone through with it in the first place.”

  “You love me?” Her eyes brimmed with tears.

  “I do, sugar. Everything about you. I miss your muffins and your hair-brained schemes.”

  Rose scowled. Ross pulled her close.

  “And the way we felt wrapped up in each other that one night,” he whispered, dipping his nose to her neck.

  Her cheeks reddened, confirming she thought about it too.

  He let out that adorable little chuckle-huff and grinned.

  “I miss that.” She hadn’t pulled away.

  “We can stop dodging cupid’s arrow. It’s your choice.” His knuckles grazed her cheek and her eyes widened. He saw himself reflected in them. And something else was there that made Rose look even more like the picture on Eric’s desk. He couldn’t help kissing her and Rose invited him in.

  “I love you,” she said against his lips. “I wish I knew when it happened, but I don’t remember what it feels like anymore not to want you with me, even though I’m willing to let you go to make sure you’re happy… I was sort of hoping the morning of Lil’s wedding that this nice guy on your crew would jump at the chance to love a gal like me back.” She winked.

  He squinted. “Which one?”

  “You.” She batted his chest. He caught, and held, her hand in his. “You’re the man I want to love forever, Ross.”

  “Are you trying to fluff my feathers?” Ross rested his forehead against hers.

  “Is it working? Because it’s true.”

  Ross wrestled with his pocket. “I have something of yours.”

  Her ring glinted in the sunlight.

  “You can only have it on one condition. You need a band to match.”

  “If we’re doing this Ross, then so do you. Everyone will know you’re mine.”

  “You drive a hard bargain, but I got my say, didn’t I?”

  Ross put Grandy’s ring back on Rose’s finger where it belonged. Rose burrowed into the plane of his chest and placed her hand on his heart to admire it. He kissed her head.

  “I’m going to tell you I love you again.” He huffed and laughed, tightening his arms around her.

  “I’m going to say it back. A lot.”

  “So if we’re staying married, where do we go from here?” he asked. “Do you want help finishing the fence?”

  “Right now, I want you to be my husband,” she said, leading Ross through the stable and back toward the apartments.

  Thirty-plus years later…

  “That was a long day,” Ross remarked, loosening his tie and pulling it out from under his collar. The silk made a whipping sound against the cotton. “Three down. Two to go.”

  “Long, but worthwhile. Daveigh was a beautiful bride. And that grandson of yours stole everyone’s heart with his speech.” Rose sighed contentedly and began taking the pins out of her long hair and shaking it out the tresses.

  “Why do they always belong to me when they’ve done something bad?”

  “Mateo wasn’t naughty at all! There wasn’t a dry eye when he finished speaking during the ceremony.”

  As Ross began to unbutton his shirt Rose walked in front of him and turned, pulling her loose hair to the side. There was no reason to give instructions. They’d been married for over three decades. Ross pulled at the tiny zipper on the back of her dress. The bodice went slack against her breasts and she felt Ross’s finger flick the black enclosure of her bra. He pulled her to his chest snaking his hands under the fabric and touching the soft skin above her belly button. His thumb grazed the underside of her breast and she smiled.

  “Ross Cavanaugh, what will your children say?”

  He huffed and laughed the same way he’d done since before the day they met.

  “Sugar, if you haven’t noticed your children are all adults. Half of them are grown and gone. The others are three sheets to the wind from al
l the partying they’ve done and sound asleep so far down that long hall that they’ll never. Even. Hear us.” He kissed his favorite places on her graceful neck and clavicle.

  “Famous last words.” She turned, letting the gown slip to the floor along with her brassiere and laced her arms around Ross’s neck.

  He grunted as her form meshed with his own and she placed a delicate kiss on his lower lip before tucking herself into him and sighing contentedly.

  “Happy Anniversary. My treat was wonderful,” she thanked him.

  Ross’s chest shook as she mentioned sneaking off behind the stable to eat golden sponge cakes to avoid sharing them with their grandkids.

  “I didn’t want you to think I’d forget. Not on a day like today since we’ll be sharing our next anniversaries with our daughter. I have something else for you.”

  “Oh, whatever could that be?” she remarked, sardonically.

  Ross pulled a yellowed and dog-eared envelope out of his back pocket.

  “I won’t take it back. That check won’t ever be cashed.” She pushed on his chest. He caught her wrist, dragging Rose back. At times like this, she still had the hint of the devil in her eyes.

  “And I’ll never spend a dime of Kingsbrier money on my business. So you tuck it away and we’ll have this same squabble next year.”

  And the year after that. It was another one of their traditions.

  “I know you won’t. That’s why I love you so much.”

  “And here I thought it was my sixty-year-old body.”

  “The way that sixty-year-old body still looks is icing on the cake.” Rose winked. “Only you could still look a decade younger than you are. I, however—”

  “Still steal my breath the way you did when we met. And on our own wedding day.”

  “I was a lot more dressed up today than that day.”

  “But you’re just as beautiful. Maybe more.” He changed his mind. “Definitely more. You get prettier every day.”