Zoey wore pink short shorts, a pink and white halter top, and white woven sandals that looked familiar. Her straight, chestnut-colored hair was cut in a striking asymmetrical style that looked cute on her, but would have made Natalie’s thick, wavy hair look like a drunkard had attacked her with pruning shears.
“You’re awake,” Natalie said to Zoey.
“Don’t make it sound like it’s such a miracle. I’ve got a ten o’clock class.”
“I’m surprised you remembered.”
“Have you ever had your blood type checked?” Zoey asked.
Natalie blinked. Her sister had such a mercurial mind it was sometimes hard to follow her train of thought. “What?”
“We’re checking our blood type in class today.”
“No, I don’t think I’ve ever had my blood type checked.”
“They probably checked it when you had surgery.”
Natalie shrugged. “Maybe. No one told me.”
“I’m betting your blood type is sour apple.” Zoey loved odd comparisons.
“Oh, I get it. Not a serious question, but rather a sarcastic dig at me.”
“It wouldn’t kill you to lighten up once in a while.” Zoey straightened, polished off her last bite of cereal, and left her empty bowl on the table.
Natalie crossed her arms, stared at the bowl, and then shifted her gaze back to Zoey.
“Okay, all right, I’ll take it to the kitchen.” Zoey carried off the bowl.
Lars set down his paper, cocked his gray head, his reading glasses dangling low on his nose. “Are you all right, Natty?”
Lars was Natalie’s oldest long-term boarder. He was from Norway and had once commanded a tramp steamer. He was in his late sixties, retired from the Department of Motor Vehicles, stood six-foot-five, loved quoting Eric Hoffer, and smelled persistently of pine. Every year his daughter sent him lutefisk for Christmas, and afterward, no one would go near him for a week. How he’d ended up in this arid part of Texas, so far from the sea, was one of the great mysteries of Cupid, although rumor had it that a broken heart had brought him here.
Natalie forced a smile. “Yes, sure, why wouldn’t I be?”
“You look . . .” He paused, and his blue eyes grew pensive. “Like something happened.”
“Nothing happened.” That is unless you counted falling in love at first sight.
C’mon. Get over that.
She had not fallen in love at first sight. It had been startling sexual chemistry, plain and simple. Really? All these years she’d longed to fall in love and now that it appeared to be happening, she was backpedaling faster than a politician caught sexting.
“Moonstruck,” Lars said. His perceptiveness unnerved her. Could he really see it on her? Was it that noticeable?
“The sun’s out. No moon to be struck by.” Natalie jammed her hands in her pockets, fingered Shot Through the Heart’s letter. If she was anything, she was lust struck. But she wasn’t even that. Not really. She would never see half-naked biker dude again. He was passing through and she was forever rooted in Cupid.
“Did you meet someone?” Zoey asked, coming back into the room with a sly smile on her face.
“No.” It was true. She
hadn’t
actually met the guy, but dammit, her cheeks heated.
“We lie the loudest when we lie to ourselves.” Lars dished up a Hofferism.
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Have you got a secret boyfriend?” Zoey cocked her head, looked intrigued.
“Are those my Brian Atwoods?” Natalie asked, trying to derail her.
Zoey put one foot behind her as if she could hide her feet. “You can’t wear them.”
“That’s not the point.”
“It’s just plain weird that you buy designer shoes when you can’t wear them.”
Natalie hardened her jaw. She knew it was foolish to buy shoes she would never wear. She couldn’t explain why she did it. Owning them made her feel . . . well . . .
normal
. Other women got to own beautiful shoes. Why not her?
“What’s the use of letting them go to waste?” Zoey argued.
“You should have asked my permission.”
“Ha! Like you would have said yes.”
Natalie sank her hands on her hips. “So you just take them?”
“A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding. When it is not, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people’s business,” Lars said.
Natalie raised an eyebrow. “More Hoffer?”
“I met him once, you know,” Lars mused, pocketing his reading glasses and getting to his feet. “In a Greenwich Village coffee shop. Fittingly enough, it was called Destiny. Destiny’s Coffee Shop. It had flamingo pink and black checkered tile floors. I was young and Hoffer was old but we clicked instantly. Magnificent man.”
“How’s the boat coming?” she asked to sidetrack him from more talk of Hoffer. Lars was having a handcrafted sailboat built in Mexico, in hopes of living out his dream of sailing around the world before he died.
He shook his head, looked so baleful that she wished she hadn’t brought it up. “On hold for now until I can come up with another installment payment.”
“How are you going to get the money?”
“I have a couple of schemes up my sleeve.”
At that moment, Pearl popped out of the kitchen, the smell of yeast bread, bacon, and French roast popping with her. She wore a V-neck tank top that was two sizes too small for her 44 DDD chest, green Bermuda shorts, and a camo-colored bandana wrapped around her short, spiky, gray hair. Her feet were shod in brown Doc Martens with black ankle socks, and deep, purple-blue veins bulged at her shins from a lifetime of standing at stoves.
Natalie had no idea how old she was. Pearl could have been anywhere from a hard forty to a light sixty. Someone told her once that they’d heard Pearl had spent time in Gatesville prison, but Natalie didn’t put stock in gossip, and besides, other than her crotchety attitude, Pearl was a model employee.
“You order that flour yet?” Pearl grunted. “I can’t make a decent multigrain pâte à choux without it.” The way she said the French word sounded like a sneeze.
“Not yet.”
“If I don’t have that flour in time for the Fourth of July weekend, I’m quittin’,” she grumbled, and waved a red rubber KitchenAid spatula for effect. Pearl was the most cantankerous woman she’d ever met, but she was also the best cook in Cupid. “And I mean it this time.”
“I’m on it.”
“That’s what you said yesterday.” Pearl glowered.
“You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you,” quoted Lars.
“You want me to take them off?” Zoey interrupted, reaching down to unbuckle a sandal. “ ’Cause I’ll take ’em off if that’s what you want.”
In the back of her mind, Natalie heard a deep-voiced male narrator say,
Natalie McCleary, this is your life.
It was small-minded of her to get pissy over the shoes. Someone might as well get some use out of them. “No, go, wear them in good health.”
“Thanks.” Zoey picked up her anatomy textbook from the table and headed out the door. “You’re not such a bad big sister.”
Pearl took her red spatula and went back to the kitchen, while Lars said something about taking his constitutional along the river and slipped out the back door.
From the other side of the wall came the sound of guests entering the formal dining room. Natalie went to greet her visitors—which included two older women traveling together, a young newlywed couple, and a middle-aged gentleman who said he was writing a book about the Marfa Lights.
The nearby town of Marfa was famous for inexplicable “ghost” lights that appeared in the night sky and defied scientific explanation. It was something of a curiosity. Several movies had been filmed in Marfa, including
Giant
with Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor. Natalie’s great-aunt Delia had gotten the movie stars’ autographs and they were framed and displayed on the wall in her foyer.
Natalie shook hands, made pleasantries, and suggested outings to the guests. Welcoming people to Cupid was her favorite part of the job.
“So,” said the female half of the young married couple. She was a trim blonde with a pert upturned nose dotted with freckles, and earnest brown eyes. “Tell us the story of how the town of Cupid got its name. I heard it involves a romantic legend.”
The young woman threw a besotted look at her husband as they filled their plates from the chafing dishes on the buffet. He responded by filching a piece of bacon off her plate. She swatted at him playfully and they laughed in unison. Seeing them together tugged at Natalie’s heartstrings. Would she ever have that easy camaraderie with a mate? Maybe. Could be. If this morning was the real deal. How would she know? And what was she supposed to do if it was the real deal? Biker dude was most likely halfway to El Paso by now.
“Yes, please do tell us. We love a ripping good yarn, don’t we, Mazey?” one of the older ladies chimed in as she maneuvered to the table, a cane in one hand and her plate in the other.
It was a story Natalie told every day, sometimes numerous times, but no one ever had to twist her arm to get her to relate it again. She was proud of her hometown and her heritage. Besides, the legend was her edge over the four-star hotel and spa condos.
“Well,” she said, sitting down with the guests, lowering her voice and glancing at each of them in turn, drawing them into her crafted narrative. “It all started with a hanging.”
Until he appeared I never knew what I was waiting for.
—MILLIE GREENWOOD
“R
ight after the Civil War, when Cupid was still just a settlement, there were three times as many women living here as men. And the few men that were around were either too young or too old for military service,” Natalie told her guests.
The sunlight fell across the table. Mazey squinted. Her companion shaded her eyes with her hand. Natalie got up to close the blinds. Cars motored by on Stone Street, and there came the sound of a motorcycle engine.
Natalie’s pulse quickened. It was a Harley! How fast could her heart gallop before she had a heart attack? Riveted. Right there to the spot. The Harley came into view. Natalie held her breath.
It was a gray-haired guy with a ZZ Top beard and a red “For Sale” sign posted on the back of his Harley. The local taxidermist, Beau Jenkins.
It was not he. Not her guy.
With trembling fingers, she snapped the blinds closed. Breathe. Crazy. This was craziness. Then again, wasn’t that what love at first sight was all about, an illogical craziness that somehow turned completely rational in the face of overwhelming emotion?
“Common problem post–Civil War,” said the guy who was writing the book. “All the good ones got picked off.”
“There were also a lot of outlaws and deserters roaming the area, and the local caverns often served as a hideout.” Natalie limped over to close the cover on the chafing dish of bacon that had been left open.
“Bad boys,” whispered the blond newlywed, and gave a little shiver.
Her husband hooked her around the shoulder with the crook of his elbow and pulled her closer to him.
“Because of all the outlaws, there were also a lot of hangings.” Natalie rearranged the paper napkins on the buffet table into a pretty pattern. There. Nice and orderly again.
Mazey put a hand to her mouth. “My goodness, how barbaric!”
“Function of the times,” said the writer. “Back then, they were free with the noose.”
Natalie slipped back into her chair. “Anyway, because of the man shortage and the preponderance of outlaws, someone got the bright idea that a man could be saved from being hanged if a woman from the settlement would agree to marry him.”
“Rehabilitation through forced marriage.” The writer laughed.
“It’s just like in that Jack Nicholson movie
Goin’ South
,” said Mazey’s companion.
“Exactly.” Natalie smiled. “We have the movie available on demand. It’s the ultimate marriage-of-convenience story. Jack Nicholson doesn’t get hanged and Mary Steenburgen gets someone to do her manual labor. And then nature takes its course. Similar story here in real life between Mingus Dill and Louisa Hendricks.”
“And it was love at first sight?” The blonde cut her eyes over at her husband. He chucked her under the chin affectionately.
“Hardly,” Natalie said. “Mingus was a good-looking man and quite charming. He had a way with women, but his talent got him into trouble. When a husband in Fort Worth caught Mingus in bed with his wife, he came at him with a meat cleaver. Mingus barely made it out the window with his hide attached. The husband was in a blind rage and came after him. In order to make a quick getaway, Mingus snagged the man’s horse, took off into the night, and fled to the Chihuahuan Desert.”
The writer took a small spiral notebook from his front shirt pocket and started taking notes.
“It turned out the woman’s husband was a marshal and feeling vindictive. Mingus was tagged as a horse thief on his wanted poster.” Natalie shifted in her seat, and the antique chair creaked.
“Horse thievery was a hanging offense,” the writer supplied.
“Sometime later, Mingus showed up here and caused a stir among the ladies, but eventually someone recognized him. One of the women warned him to get out of town, and once again, he barely made good his escape. A posse was hot on his trail,” she went on.
“How thrilling.” Mazey bit into a cinnamon roll.
The writer took a big gulp of coffee and went back to his scribbling.
“Not for Mingus. He was a lover, not a fighter.” Natalie got up again, retrieved the coffee carafe, and topped off the writer’s cup.
“Thanks,” he said.
Natalie held up the carafe. “Anyone else want more coffee?”
The bride shook her head.
The groom said, “Orange juice?”
Natalie retrieved the hand-squeezed orange juice from the iced bucket on the sideboard.
“Mingus reminds me of Jake Spoon from
Lonesome Dove
,” Mazey’s traveling companion said. “Remember him?”
“Oh yes.” Mazey fanned herself with her free hand. “Jake Spoon was a hottie. I would marry him in a nanosecond to save him from the gallows.”
Natalie didn’t point out that she was mixing the leading men in her fantasies. She gathered the guests’ empty plates and piled them into a stack at the end of the table. “Mingus took refuge in the caverns. He went deep in the cave, took a narrow passage that had never been explored before, hoping it would lead him to safety.”
“But it didn’t,” the bride guessed.
“No. Instead, he came upon a massive stalagmite, tall as a man, and in the perfect shape of Cupid holding a bow and arrow.” A strand of hair fell across Natalie’s eyes as she sorted the forks, spoons, and knives into separate piles.
“That must have been surprising to come across that in the dark,” the young groom said.
Natalie brushed aside the errant lock of hair. “Mingus took it as a sign. He’d heard about the law that could get him out of being hanged if a woman would take pity on him and make him her husband, so he got down on his knees and prayed to Cupid to touch the heart of some young local beauty, and that’s where the posse caught up to him.”
“How colorful.” Mazey licked honey from her fingers.
“The posse brought Mingus back to face justice, and as he stood at the gallows, looking beseechingly out at the beautiful young women, one angel stepped forward to save him.” Natalie paused for dramatic effect.
The guests collectively leaned forward, fully engaged in the story.
“Except she wasn’t quite what Mingus was hoping for,” Natalie said.
“How’s that?” the writer asked.
“A kind way to say it is that Louisa Hendricks was rather plain.” Natalie reached across the table to pluck a browning petal from the rose flower arrangement in the center of the table. The leaf crinkled between her fingers.
“Translation,” chortled the groom, revealing a row of teeth that were too small for his mouth. “She was fugly.”
“Benjy,” tittered his beautiful bride, and swatted his shoulder. “Behave.”
“Louisa was a spinster and several years older than Mingus,” Natalie said. “Her biological clock was ticking and she knew someone like Mingus was her last chance at getting the baby she so badly wanted. Plus, it didn’t hurt that he was a good-looking son of a gun. He would give her beautiful babies. Unfortunately, they were never blessed with children.”
“Poor guy,” the groom commiserated. “Trapped in a loveless marriage with a barren fugly woman.”
“Hey,” said his bride, “Louisa saved his sorry ass from being hanged, give her some credit, and he could have been the one shooting blanks.”
“Mingus
was
disappointed,” Natalie continued, “but in spite of all his flaws, he was a man of his word. Cupid had saved him, and he would honor his vow. Over the years, Mingus came to fall deeply in love with Louisa and they ended up having a long and happy marriage in spite of not having kids. Soon after Louisa rescued him, the settlement became a township, and it was named Cupid in honor of the stalagmite that saved Mingus from being hanged.”
Poor plain Louisa. How had she felt about being married to a sexy outlaw that so many other women wanted? Had she been proud of snagging him or anxious that someone would steal him from her? Perhaps she’d been self-conscious because she wasn’t pretty?
Absentmindedly, Natalie rubbed a hand down her right thigh. She understood what it was like not to fit in the mold of traditional beauty. How much it could hurt.
“But what about the letters to Cupid?” the bride asked. “Where do they come in?”
“That goes back to my own great-grandmother, Millie Greenwood.” Natalie’s chest puffed with pride.
“Wow, so we’re staying in the house of a living legend.”
“I’m not the legend,” Natalie said. “Here’s what happened. In 1924, my great-grandmother was a maid for the Fants, the richest family in Jeff Davis County, and she fell madly in love with their oldest son, John.”
“There’s nothing more alluring than forbidden love.” Mazey sighed longingly.
“John fell in love with Millie too, but he was betrothed to Elizabeth Nielson, the daughter of the second richest man in town. How could a poor maid dare hope for a happily-ever-after with John?” Natalie used a paper napkin to brush crumbs from the table and into her open palm.
“John’s family probably thought Millie was a gold digger,” said the groom.
The writer cleared his throat. “In those days the working class did not marry above their station. It was unheard of.”
“Exactly.” Natalie dusted the crumbs from her palm into the top plate on the stack of dirty dishes. “So a romance between them was hopeless and they both knew it.”
“How sad.” Mazey pressed a knuckle to her eye.
“On the evening before John’s wedding, Millie started thinking about Mingus Dill and how his plea to Cupid led him to the love of his life. In desperation, she wrote a letter to Cupid, begging him to find a way for her and John to be together. In the middle of the night, she slipped off to the caverns and put the letter at the foot of the Cupid stalagmite.”
“I would have been so scared!” the blonde exclaimed. “Going into a dark cave at night all by myself.”
“Love can make you do dangerous things.” Her groom lightly tickled her in the ribs. “But you’ll never have to go anywhere alone again.”
She giggled and ran a palm along his jaw.
Weren’t they just the cutest? Would she ever have that? Giggly love that made others around you roll their eyes. That biker sure had lighted a spark inside her. What if . . .
Quit it!
“What happened next?” asked Mazey.
This was Natalie’s favorite part of the story. She went for the brochures advertising the caverns that she kept in the drawer of the sideboard, undid the rubber band holding them together, and passed out the glossy pamphlets printed up by the Cupid Chamber of Commerce.
“John left Elizabeth at the altar, telling her he was in love with another. He went to find Millie, professed his love, and asked her to marry him.”
“Seriously?”
“Awesome.”
“How romantic.”
“I have to see this stalagmite.”
The writer looked up from his notes. “Did John know about the letter Millie wrote to Cupid?”
“No, he didn’t.”
“How did he react when he found out?”
“It caused a bit of a kerfuffle,” Natalie admitted. “Someone found the letter in the cave and it got back to Elizabeth. She claimed Millie had bewitched John by summoning up the aid of a pagan god. Everyone took sides and it almost split the town in two. If you want to see it, Millie’s letter is on display in the courthouse lobby.”
“That must have been rocky for the couple,” the writer said.
“If Cupid had bewitched John, he was good and solidly mesmerized. His love for Millie never wavered, even in the face of public outcry.” Idly, Natalie reached down to loosen the strap that attached the AFO to her leg. The Velcro made a soft ripping sound as she tugged on it and pressed it back down.
“When you’ve found the real deal, you’ll move heaven and earth for her.” The groom stared into his bride’s eyes.
“Ah, honey, that’s so sweet.” She nuzzled her husband.
They canoodled for a long moment until one of the older ladies cleared her throat loudly.
Natalie waited until the amorous couple broke apart before continuing. “The Cupid letter writing really took off when King Edward VIII abdicated the throne.”
The writer frowned. “Are you implying that Cupid played a hand in King Edward’s abdication?”
“Not implying. It’s fact.”
“How on earth is that possible?” Mazey planted a palm against her chest.
“Not long before his abdication, King Edward and Wallis Simpson called their romance quits because of his family responsibilities.” Natalie glanced at her watch. She needed to wrap up the story.
The writer interjected. “Wallis was twice divorced and their marriage would have caused a constitutional crisis in England.”
“That’s correct. Brokenhearted, Wallis came to Cupid to visit her dearest friend, Penelope Fant, who was John Fant’s older sister,” Natalie said. “Wallis and Penelope Fant had both attended a prestigious girls’ school in Baltimore together.”
“Hard to believe that a social climber like Wallis Simpson would lower herself to visit a place as colloquial as Cupid,” Mazey said.
“Which is precisely why she did. She wanted to get away from any and everything that reminded her of Edward. Then when Wallis heard about Millie and John’s romance, she decided to write a letter to Cupid to intervene in her love affair with the King of England. Two weeks later, the king showed up in Cupid, got down on one knee, and asked for Wallis’s hand in marriage. Shortly afterward, he abdicated to marry the woman he loved.”
“That’s so romantic, I’m getting goose bumps,” the blonde said.
Her husband rubbed his hands along her arms. “I’d give up the throne for you.”
Okay, these two were pushing the mushy meter to the limit. If Natalie hadn’t experienced the weirdest feelings for a total stranger that very morning, she might have considered a dose of insulin to combat all the sweetness. But even so, her stomach went all melty. She wanted to be like them!
“I can’t believe this amazing tale never made it into the history books,” Mazey mused. “It’s priceless.”
“The royal family squelched the story hard, and remember, this was before relentless paparazzi and wiretapping gossip rags. The media had more respect back then for people’s private lives. But throughout Texas, the Wallis Simpson story cemented the Cupid legend, and it became the cornerstone of our tourist economy.” Natalie folded her hands in her lap.