Alaskan Sweethearts (8 page)

The boy nodded a little too quickly.

Scarlett had turned to look at her son, too.

“Mice don’t hurt you,” she assured him. “I’m just being silly.”

“I know,” the boy said in a small voice.

Hunter took several steps back and reached out to the boy. “You may as well ride on my shoulders. You’ll want to see how tall the swing is anyway.”

Joey raised his arms, a look of relief on his face.

It took another half hour, but Hunter hauled the metal poles out of the barn. He’d positioned Joey near the pine tree, telling him he was to help mark the place where he wanted the swing set to be. Once Hunter mentioned that the setup had been on the south side of the house by that pine tree when he and his brothers were boys, then that was where Joey wanted it.

“You had brothers?” the boy asked.

“Two of them,” Hunter said as he squatted to be on eye level with the boy. “We had to take turns on the swing, but you’ll get to have it all to yourself.”

“I’d rather have brothers,” Joey said emphatically. “I’d share.”

Hunter straightened and ruffled his hair. “You’re a good boy.”

“That he is,” Scarlett said from behind him.

Hunter turned. “You snuck up on us quietly.”

“Not too difficult in all this mud,” she answered. “Your grandfather was saying we should get home pretty soon so he can start the beef Wellington.”

“We have beef Wellington?” Hunter asked incredulously. In their house, it was considered cooking for company when someone opened a can of chili and served it over toast that wasn’t burned.

Scarlett shrugged. “That’s what he said.”

Hunter looked down at Joey. “We’ll come over tomorrow after church and work on the swing some more. It won’t take long now that I have the pieces. I expect you’re hungry, anyway?”

The boy wasted no time in giving an exaggerated nod.

“We don’t usually have company for dinner,” Hunter confided to Scarlett as they all started walking back to the house. “I wouldn’t want you to set your expectations too high.”

“No one could expect more than beef Wellington.”

“Well,” Hunter murmured. “That’s just it—”

“You don’t believe in the beef Wellington, is that it?” she asked, her voice teasing.

He shrugged. “Not counting on it and don’t want you to, either.”

Scarlett shook her head as she stopped and looked at him. “Did you ever notice that you worry a lot about disappointing people?”

“Just being realistic,” he said and left it at that. Only his brothers knew what a roller coaster it had been to live with his grandfather. People were always having their hopes and expectations dashed around him. As a boy, he used to avoid answering the door, never knowing who was knocking to complain. Even back then, all Hunter could do was try to keep the damage as light as possible.

“Can I ride with Gramps?” Joey asked when they neared the house. “In his pickup?”

Scarlett looked at Hunter, but he couldn’t speak. “Gramps” had been what his brothers had called the old man when they had been Joey’s age. It wasn’t just the cat who had adopted the boy.

“Mom?” Joey finally pressed for an answer.

“I guess,” Scarlett said, sounding none too sure about giving permission.

Joey didn’t seem to care if his mother endorsed the plan or not; he skipped over to the old man’s pickup and sat on the running board.

“I’ll wait,” the boy called out as the cat came to join him.

That was when Hunter realized Joey was too short to open the door.

“I’ll get my grandfather for you,” Hunter said as he walked over to the door to the house and opened it.

Scarlett stayed back with her son.

Hunter stepped quickly through the house, locating his grandfather in the side bedroom.

“Where did you get beef Wellington?” Hunter asked from the doorway.

His grandfather looked over and set down the rag he was using to wash the windows. “Never you mind where. We’re going to have candles on the table, too. And some of that classical music on the stereo.”

“This is not a date,” Hunter protested. “It’s dinner with our new neighbors. Well...and not even that for sure. They might become our new neighbors. When we see the attorney, I’m going to ask him about a rental agreement. We could charge a few dollars a year for the house.”

“You worry too much,” his grandfather said serenely. “Just leave everything to me.”

Hunter had a feeling those words would show up someday on his tombstone. “I can’t leave everything to you.”

But his grandfather wasn’t listening. He’d left the room.

Scarlett was waiting for Hunter when he got back to his pickup. His grandfather, Joey and the cat were already heading out.

“I think he’s setting us up,” Scarlett said when they were both settled inside the pickup. She didn’t sound as though she approved. “That grandfather of yours.”

Hunter sucked in his breath. His grandfather couldn’t be a more obvious matchmaker. He had hoped Scarlett wouldn’t realize it, though. “I’m sorry... I—”

“He thinks you’re going to persuade me not to sign that contract,” Scarlett said as if she could hardly contain the words. She was indignant. “Maybe that’s the con he’s running. He keeps putting us alone together so you have time to convince me not to sign. Then I leave thinking it’s my idea not to sign anything. Meanwhile his conscience is clear because he tried. And he doesn’t need to part with anything.”

Hunter was so relieved he chuckled. “Trust me. His conscience will never be clear.”

With that, Hunter turned the key in his pickup and they started the drive back to the main house.

“That rainbow is still there,” Scarlett said after staring out the windshield for a few minutes. “I didn’t think they lasted that long. Or maybe it’s a new one.”

“Likely it is,” Hunter said as he slowed a little. His grandfather wouldn’t mind if they took their time getting back. “They’re always a sign of new beginnings.”

“And gold,” Scarlett said as she grinned at him. “Maybe it means the Murphy family has found our pot of gold at last—in the place your grandfather is giving us.”

Hunter felt his face soften. He liked seeing her happy even if he didn’t believe it could last. He hoped the attorney would be able to help them tomorrow. It was time to put a stop to all of this. The man would know what to do. Hunter had worked with him long enough in doing damage control for his grandfather that he knew the man could spot loopholes faster than anyone else.

He’d have to make enough time tomorrow after church to also get the swing up for Joey. The boy deserved to use it at least once before they left. It would give him something to remember from his trip here.

Hunter looked over at his passenger. Scarlett still had that pleased expression on her face. He’d miss seeing the sight of her smiling, too.

“There really are not mice, are there?” Scarlett asked as she looked over at him.

“I’ll get you a cat,” Hunter promised. “We have some calico kittens in the barn that are almost ready to leave their mother.”

He was going to make this work. He’d get a whole crew of cats if he needed. He hadn’t realized how much he hoped that his grandfather really was turning over a new leaf.

“Joey has his heart set on a dog,” she said thoughtfully.

“I’ll get one of those, too,” Hunter offered wildly.

“Everybody knows cats and dogs don’t get along.”

“These will,” Hunter decreed rashly. The calicos were exceptional felines. “You’ve seen it for yourself today.”

Scarlett seemed to believe him because she settled back in her seat as though all of the problems in her world were solved.

Hunter knew better, but he didn’t want to disappoint her. Tomorrow would be soon enough for that. In the meantime, it was nice to pretend that Scarlett and Joey had nothing to worry about except getting some cats and dogs to live together in harmony.

Hunter stopped for a moment as he pulled into the driveway of the house he shared with his grandfather. The sky was blue and the storm seemed to be over even though the ground was still damp. He and his brothers had planted a dozen oak trees when this house had been being built. Six of them, leaves just starting to turn gold, had survived on the west side of the place.

This piece of earth had been home for so long that Hunter hadn’t noticed how neglected it all looked until he wondered how Scarlett saw it. The struggle for beauty went unseen. The water he and his brothers had hauled over the years for those trees was not visible. Now the field grasses came up to the house, most of them starting to dry up. By late September the land would be nothing but shades of brown.

“I’m afraid we’ve let the weeds take over,” Hunter said as he started his pickup again and slowly drove to his usual space on the east side of the house between the toolshed and the propane tank. “My grandfather built the house when my brothers and I started high school. Said we needed more room.”

They both reached for their respective door handles. When Hunter stepped down from the pickup, he looked around.

The paint on the two-story house, white with dark green trim on the windows, was a bit faded. He planned to freshen it this fall after all the harvesting was done. Four big bedrooms took over the upstairs and the downstairs had a living room big enough for the grand piano the older man had purchased.

“I remember when this place was new,” Hunter said ruefully to Scarlett as they started to walk to the door. “My grandfather had it built by a construction company out of Bozeman. It was quite a distance for them to come, but they put everything on trucks and hauled it here. In his day, he would have built it himself. But he was in his seventies then and us boys weren’t old enough.”

He looked over and saw the old man and Joey trying to unload a cooler from the back of the pickup his grandfather had driven.

“I best go help,” Hunter said to Scarlett as he hurried over and picked up one end of the burden. He was just in time since Joey couldn’t manage to carry half of the load and his grandfather was wavering, too.

Hunter hadn’t realized that Scarlett had followed him over until she stepped around him and held out her hand toward his grandfather.

“I can take it from here,” she said.

The old man nodded gratefully and stepped aside. “I didn’t realize it would be so heavy. Linda at the café had a couple of the guys from the Elkton Ranch take it to the pickup while we were making those birds for Joey.”

Once they had everything in the kitchen, though, his grandfather took over.

“You’re to just go sit in the living room and relax,” he directed Scarlett when she offered to help him with the cooking.

Hunter went outside to dig up some of the red potatoes from their garden. They didn’t grow much else, but they always managed the root vegetables—a few kinds of potatoes, carrots, onions and beets.

By the time Hunter came back inside, his grandfather had the table set in the kitchen. He’d found an old blue candle, half-burned, that he’d stuck in a glass bottle. None of their silverware matched anymore, but the old man had found the best of what they had. Joey was sitting at the table folding white paper towels into some kind of exotic bird for decoration.

Hunter went to the sink and scrubbed the potatoes. The beef Wellington was cooking in the oven and Hunter oiled the potatoes and set them in to roast with some young onions. The pastry wrapped around the meat was just starting to brown.

After that, Hunter went into the living room to check on Scarlett. She was sitting on the sofa, her head back on a pillow. She was sleeping. He hadn’t realized until then just how exhausted she must be. He tiptoed over to carefully put another pillow under her head so her neck wouldn’t start to ache. Then he stood and admired her for a moment. She had a sweet expression on her face.

Suddenly her eyes opened and she started to stand.

“I’m sorry, I—” she mumbled, still half-asleep. “Is dinner ready?”

“Not yet,” he whispered. “Why don’t you lie down and take a nap? You’ve got yourself propped up as it is.”

“Not polite.” She yawned.

“It’s okay,” he said with a smile. “We’re easy on manners around here.”

She started to move her pillows, but couldn’t reach them so Hunter stepped over and rearranged them for her so she could lie flat. He reached over to the arm of a nearby chair and brought back an afghan. As Scarlett settled into her new position, he draped the covering over her.

“Wake me when it’s dinnertime,” she requested.

“Will do,” Hunter murmured as he reached down and touched her on the forehead. He meant it as a reminder of the kiss parents bestowed on sleeping children and she smiled as she curled into the softness of the afghan.

“Don’t think I’m going to give up just because you’re being nice,” she said, her eyes closed already.

“You think I’m nice?” he asked.

Her eyes flew open at that, looking a little alarmed.

“Not that nice,” she protested.

“Oh,” Hunter said and then he winked at her. “Get some sleep.”

He walked over to the door as if he was going to leave the room, but he stood for a few minutes looking back at her. His grandfather’s schemes had caused him to lose a few friends over the years. He knew the look when someone first started not to trust him. Their eyes no longer smiled. Hearing Scarlett say she thought he was nice was bittersweet. It was a different look. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to forgive his grandfather if Scarlett found out from the attorney that the old man really was running a con on her. She would think Hunter had been in on it, too, even though he’d said he wasn’t. That’s always the way it went with these things. He didn’t want the expression in her eyes to change when she looked at him.

When Scarlett shifted in her sleep, Hunter went back to the kitchen. He could hear his grandfather and Joey talking even before he got there. He had to admit his grandfather had never involved a child in his schemes. Maybe his grandfather was right, Hunter told himself. Maybe he did worry too much. It could be that his grandfather was telling the truth. In any event, Hunter was going to believe in happy endings, at least for tonight.

* * *