“Looks as if she’s found herself a napping place in that booth over there,” Joe pointed out with a lopsided, engaging grin.
Sure enough, Angel was curled up in the space Todd had just vacated, sound asleep, her doll snuggled next to her. Heather seized on the excuse.
“Then I’d better carry her up right now.”
Joe stood at once. “She’s too heavy for you. I could take her for you.”
The man was solid muscle beneath his clean white T-shirt and snug-fitting jeans. He seemed like a genuinely nice man. She wondered why she wasn’t even the slightest bit attracted to him. Maybe, regretfully, it was simply because he was nothing at all like the man who’d once been the love of her life.
Todd had changed some since he’d come to Wyoming. Knowing him, she realized he’d begun adapting to a new role, just as he did when cast in a play, just as he had when he’d first gone to work for Megan. They were subtle changes he probably wasn’t even aware of making. His hair was a little longer, for one thing. And he had a light tan from being outdoors more. But there was no mistaking the eastern polish and sophistication that had drawn her to him years ago.
“Thanks for offering,” she said. “But I can manage.”
Joe nodded and, to her relief, backed off. “Another time, then.” He dropped a generous tip on the table, then strolled over to the counter and paid Henrietta, pausing long enough to flirt outrageously with her until she laughingly told him to get out so she could lock up.
When he’d gone, Henrietta regarded Heather intently. “You know, if you were looking for a fine husband and a daddy for Angel, you could do a whole lot worse than Joe Stevens. You’re the first woman I’ve seen him take an interest in since his wife died.”
“He lost his wife?” Heather asked, shocked. She ignored the suggestion that he could be a stand-in for Angel’s real daddy. “He can’t be more than twenty-eight, twenty-nine. How old was she?”
“He’s thirty-one, actually, but Marilee was only twenty-five when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. It took her in less than a year. That was about two years ago. Joe’s stayed to himself since then. For a time he was like a lost soul. We were all worried sick about him. He was doing some hard drinking, but from what I’ve seen he’s pulled himself together and sobered up now.”
“What does he do? For a living, I mean,” Heather asked.
“He’s a rancher. Has a spread west of town. He’s been buying up land, expanding the ranch he inherited from his family. He’s breeding some of the finest horses in the state. He caters to the rodeo circuit. He spent some time busting broncs himself. Has a couple of championship buckles, but he gave it up to marry Marilee.
“I have a lot of respect for that boy. He married her after she was diagnosed with cancer. Stuck right by her side. Wouldn’t let anybody else come in to help him nurse her. Wore himself out during that time. I think he blamed himself for not marrying her sooner, for taking the time to go off on the rodeo circuit the way he’d dreamed of doing since he was a boy. He made up for it, though. The way he loved her was something to see.”
“How awful that they had such a short time together,” Heather said.
“Not so short,” Henrietta replied. “The marriage was short, that’s true, but Joe had loved Marilee for as far back as I can remember. The expression ‘childhood sweethearts’ could have been coined for the two of them. They used to come in here when they were barely into their teens. They’d sit in that same booth where he was tonight, drinking sodas and laughing, planning their future. He was going to be a big rodeo star, then settle down with Marilee and raise horses and babies. I wondered if I’d ever see him in here again after she died, but he’s been coming back real regular the past few weeks. Until you came along, though, I hadn’t seen him laugh much.”
“He’s such a hunk, I’m amazed some woman around here hasn’t snapped him up.”
Henrietta chuckled. “Oh, believe you me, they’ve tried. One night he sat here and told me some of the tricks they’ve pulled. Said his freezer was still filled with all the casseroles and cakes they brought him. That’s normal enough, I suppose, when a man’s a widower, but they were offering a whole lot more, and some of them none too subtle about it. In my day, any woman who dared to go after a man so blatantly wouldn’t have been called a lady, that’s for sure.”
Heather began to get Henrietta’s own none-too-subtle message. “You told me all this so I won’t do anything to hurt him, didn’t you?” she guessed.
“Exactly. Like I said, Joe hasn’t shown any interest in another woman until you turned up. I wouldn’t want to see his heart broken.”
“I’ll make sure he knows that I’m leaving,” Heather promised.
“Either that,” Henrietta advised, then added pointedly, “or tell him your heart’s already taken.”
“But—”
“You can’t fool me, girl. Whatever history there is between you and Todd, it’s far from over.”
Heather prayed Henrietta was wrong, but deep inside she couldn’t help wondering if the older woman hadn’t gotten it exactly right.
6
T
odd hadn’t scheduled so many back-to-back meetings for himself and Megan since they’d moved the company’s headquarters from Manhattan to Whispering Wind. He was determined to fill every waking minute with work. Since paperwork left his mind free to wander, he’d concluded that meetings that forced him to focus on the subject at hand were safer. So far everyone was tolerating the shift in routine without comment, but both Megan and Peggy had started giving him speculative looks every time they walked through his office door. Right this second, Peggy was doing it again.
“What?” he snapped finally.
“Something’s up with you,” she said. “Want to talk about it? I know when things were real bad for me and Johnny, talking helped.”
That almost drew a full-fledged smile. The woman was a chatterbox. “I’m not surprised,” he said wryly.
“Okay, I know I babble sometimes, but I’m talking about real serious talk, you know? The heart-to-heart kind. Megan let me go on and on till I worked things out in my head. I’d be happy to listen to you.”
“The only thing I want to talk about is Megan’s idea for this cooking show,” he said adamantly. “Are you sure you’re up for it?”
She regarded him with obvious disappointment, but finally shrugged. “Okay, let’s talk about the show. I think the better question is whether you think I can do it. You’re the expert.”
“Peggy, there is not a doubt in my mind that you could handle this and be wildly successful. The real question is do you want to?”
“You’re worried that Johnny’s going to have a cow, aren’t you? Well, the truth is, he might, but you know what? That’s okay, because it’s something I want to do. For a long time, he expected me to get used to his running around with other women. That may be over, but it’s my turn now. He’ll have to get used to this.”
Todd barely resisted the urge to chuckle at her defiant tone. “It’s hardly the same thing.”
“No, but since I never wanted to run around with other men, it will have to do.”
He regarded her worriedly. “Peggy, if this is some sort of payback, if you’re not going into it with wholehearted enthusiasm, it’s a bad idea.”
“To tell you the truth, it scares me to death. The whole idea of carrying a nationally syndicated show all on my own, who would have thought it? I am so grateful to you and Megan for giving me this kind of an opportunity. I won’t let you down. I promise.”
“You can give it a hundred percent?”
“Whatever it takes,” she said firmly. “I’m not afraid of long hours or hard work.” She grinned. “Besides, it won’t hurt Johnny to spend a little more time looking after the kids. It’ll keep him out of trouble.”
“An interesting marital philosophy,” Todd observed.
“I’m learning as I go,” she admitted. “A year ago I wouldn’t have given you two cents for our chances to turn our marriage around, but we have. Almost, anyway. I think the biggest lesson we both learned is that you can’t take a relationship for granted. You have to work at it, especially when it hits the rough patches.”
“Something tells me you and Johnny will make it,” Todd said, all too aware that Heather had bolted at the first sign of difficulty. Now he was about to do the same thing.
“If we do, maybe we ought to launch a marriage-counseling program. Goodness knows I could have used some down-to-earth practical advice the first time I found out he was cheating on me.”
Todd chuckled.
“You think I’m joking, don’t you? I’m serious,” Peggy declared.
“If you keep this up, you’ll be the one with the media empire,” Todd told her.
“Not me. I’m just an average Wyoming housewife.”
“Peggy, there is nothing average about you,” Todd said, wishing he had the nerve to let her take a shot at counseling him. But he wasn’t prepared to let the world—or even this one kind, decent person—know about the situation in which he’d suddenly found himself. Years ago he’d been taught that a man faced his troubles all on his own. So what if he’d only been seventeen at the time? It was a lesson he’d never forgotten.
Despite the chill in the air, the sun was shining brightly and the breeze had a belated hint of spring in it on Friday afternoon. Angel was down for her nap, so Heather pulled a chair onto the sunny landing outside the upstairs apartment and settled down with a bottle of nail polish and an old issue of
People.
She’d just finished putting the first coat of bright pink polish on her nails when she realized she wasn’t alone. She turned her head to find Sissy Perkins standing halfway up the steps and watching her solemnly.
It seemed to Heather that Sissy was way too serious for a ten-year-old. Although she was a beautiful girl, with her red hair, flawless skin and delicate features, she rarely smiled and she never laughed. In fact, she was just about the quietest, politest and most sedate child Heather had ever seen. When Heather asked Henrietta about it, the older woman said only that Sissy had been through a lot in the past year.
Henrietta had adopted Sissy and her younger brother, Will, but that was about as much as Heather had learned. She figured Henrietta would reveal the rest when she was good and ready. She already knew that was Henrietta’s way, operating on a need-to-know basis, whether it had to do with customer idiosyncrasies or the location of extra creamers. She was talkative enough when she chose to be, but those times could be few and far between.
“Hi, Sissy. Is school out?”
The girl nodded and crept up another step. “Am I bothering you? Henrietta said not to bother you.”
Heather smiled. “Nope. I’m just doing my nails.” She glanced at Sissy’s nails, which had been chewed off practically to the quick. “Want me to do yours?”
Sissy hid her hands behind her back in obvious embarrassment. “No, thanks. I bite mine.”
“Maybe if they were a pretty color, you wouldn’t want to bite them,” Heather countered.
Sissy considered that, then sighed. “It probably wouldn’t matter. It’s a nervous habit, that’s what the shrink says, anyway. He says I’ll stop when I’m ready.”
Heather was startled by the casual reference to a shrink, but she didn’t pursue it. If this child needed a psychiatrist at her age, it was none of Heather’s business. That didn’t mean she couldn’t try to be Sissy’s friend.
“So, what are your plans for the weekend?”
Sissy shrugged. “Nothing special.”
“You’re not going to see any of your friends?”
“No. I guess I’ll help Henrietta around the house. And I’ll baby-sit Will.” Her expression brightened a little. “I could baby-sit Angel, too, if you want. I’m real responsible.”
“I’m sure you are, but you should be doing something fun. What’s your favorite thing to do?”
“Reading, I guess. You can go anywhere in the whole world you want to go in a book.”
Heather heard a wistful note in the girl’s voice, as if she longed to be someplace else. It was a longing no ten-year-old should be feeling. She should be living in the here and now, surrounded by friends and family and laughter.
“What about outdoors?” Heather asked. “Do you like any sports?”
Sissy shrugged again. “I guess so, but I’m not very good. Nobody ever chooses me for their team.”
“Then how about something you can do on your own? Cycling, maybe.” She was struck by a sudden inspiration, something she could share with this obviously lonely child. “How about in-line skating?”
Sissy looked intrigued, but she shook her head. “I don’t know how. Besides, I don’t have any skates.”
“I could show you,” Heather offered. “And I’ll bet my skates would fit you. We might have to stuff some paper in the toes, but they’d work. If you like it, we can talk to Henrietta about getting you your own skates.”
“Really?” the girl said, a spark of excitement in her eyes.
Heather seized the moment to try to do something to wipe that sad expression from Sissy’s face. “I don’t see why not. Let’s give it a try right now.”
She went inside and grabbed some tissues, which she wadded up, and the in-line skates she’d brought from New York because they were her favorite form of exercise. She’d already discovered that the sidewalk along Main Street was nice and level and mostly deserted, perfect for blading. She’d been out at dawn several times this week already, drawing stares at first, but friendly waves of greeting ever since.
Outside on the landing, she handed the skates to Sissy. “Let’s go downstairs and you can try them on.”
“What if Angel wakes up?”
“The door’s open. I’ll hear her. Angel makes a lot of racket when she’s ready to get up. She’s always afraid she might be missing something.”
Sissy nodded. “Will was like that, too, when he was little,” she said, then fell silent. Her lips quivered and she added in a low voice, “Till Daddy would get mad.”
As she spoke, a tear tracked down her cheek, followed by another and then another. Obviously Sissy had touched on something almost too painful for her to bear. Heather stared at her helplessly, then reached out to gather her close. At her touch Sissy froze for an instant, then released a shuddering sigh. She relaxed in Heather’s arms and gave way to noisy, gut-wrenching sobs. The sound brought Henrietta running.
“Oh, baby,” she murmured, taking over from Heather. “What is it?”
“She said something about her dad, and then she just started crying.” Heather had rarely seen such a heartbreaking display of anguish.
“I’ll explain later,” Henrietta mouthed, then led Sissy away.
Heather stared after them, shaken by the child’s misery. Her own childhood, in upstate New York, had been happy, if a little dull. She had considered her parents too strict from time to time and maybe they hadn’t been as supportive as she’d wanted them to be of her acting career or her decision to raise Angel on her own, but all in all, she’d had no experience with the kind of torment that Sissy was evidently going through. Even the wild mood swings of adolescence hadn’t brought anything like Sissy’s tears.
She recalled the bleakness in Sissy’s eyes when she’d mentioned her father. And those tears, they hadn’t been about sorrow, but something deeper. Suddenly it struck her. There had been anger, maybe even hatred, in that outburst. Could a ten-year-old child experience that kind of rage?
Later, after the diner had closed for the night, Henrietta poured two cups of coffee and beckoned Heather to a booth.
“After what happened earlier, you must have a lot of questions,” she began.
“It’s none of my business, but obviously I did or said something that set her off. Maybe I should know at least enough so that I won’t inadvertently do it again.”
Henrietta nodded. “Here it is in a nutshell. It’s not pretty. Sissy lost both her parents a few months back. The long and short of it is that her daddy had been abusing her mama for years. One night he started after Sissy. Her mama stepped in and shot him. Lyle survived, but at my urging Barbara Sue left him and she and the kids moved in with me. Lyle just couldn’t handle that. She was working for me here. As soon as he could get around, he came over here with a gun. Jake tried to stop him, but Lyle shot Jake in the leg, then killed Barbara Sue. The sheriff shot Lyle. That’s how I wound up with the two kids. I figured I owed it to Barbara Sue, because I was the one who all but forced her to finally take a stand.”
Heather was horrified. No wonder Sissy’s impulsive mention of her father’s anger had brought terrible memories flooding back. How many violent episodes had she witnessed? One would have been too many for a young, impressionable girl. And even at six, Will must be devastated.
As for Henrietta, she was clearly living with a burden of pain that shouldn’t be hers. Heather reached across the table and clasped her hand, giving it a squeeze.
“Don’t you dare blame yourself. It certainly wasn’t your fault,” Heather said. “The blame lies totally with that awful man. How could you possibly have known it would turn out the way it did? You told her what anyone would have, to get out and protect herself and her kids.”
“Yes, but…” Henrietta sighed. “I supposed you’re right.” Then her voice took on a trace of anger. “But there was no way to protect her, not really. It seems as if there’s not a damned thing the system can do until it’s too late!”
The door opened and the judge walked in just in time to overhear Henrietta’s last remark.
“You’re blaming the system for one fool’s misdeeds,” he said. “No one could have stopped Lyle Perkins. He was a mean kid and a rotten adult.”
“And everyone, including the sheriff, turned a blind eye to it,” Henrietta countered, scowling at him. “Oh, I don’t know why I waste my breath trying to talk to you about this,” she said, and headed for the kitchen.
The judge sighed and slid into the spot she’d vacated. “I doubt she’ll ever stop blaming herself,” he said sadly. “Or me.”
“What did you have to do with it?” Heather asked.
“Since Lyle was never brought into court, nothing. That doesn’t stop Henrietta from thinking I should have come swooping in and locked him up, anyway. Barbara Sue never filed charges, so how could I? My hands were tied. And the one time Barbara Sue did try to defend herself by shooting him, she wound up in my courtroom. I was tough on her, said she couldn’t go around shooting people just because she thought they deserved it.”
A rueful smile settled on his face. “You should have heard Henrietta. She stood up in the middle of that courtroom and blasted me from here to kingdom come. I could have held her in contempt and tossed her in jail right then and there. Probably should have, just to keep some decorum in the courtroom, but what she said had some merit. I took it into account when I let Barbara Sue off with probation. We got a restraining order against Lyle, too, so he couldn’t go near Barbara Sue when he got out of the hospital.”
“But that didn’t stop him, did it?”
He shook his head. “There’s no way to stop a man who’s determined to get even, not unless he messes it up the first time and gives us reason enough to throw him in jail. Unfortunately, Lyle didn’t mess it up. There’s not a minute that’s gone by since that I don’t ask myself what I could have done differently, but I have yet to come up with an answer.”