Melissa squinted, still several beats behind. "Mabel?"
"Mabel Elliott," Mr. Winthrop said helpfully. "We"re all retired, living in the same community, and relatively comfortable financially, and we take a lot of these little jaunts. Mabel knows how to use the internet, so she"s in charge of arranging accommodations."
"I see," Melissa said, still mystified, and beginning to wish she hadn"t agreed to that gla.s.s of lemonade. She could be home in a couple of minutes, taking a cool shower, donning shorts and a tank top and sandals, puttering around in her struggling vegetable garden and generally minding her own business.
Mr. Winthrop took her elbow, in a courtly way. "And with all the foliage surrounding the backyard," he added, dropping his voice, "there"s really no harm done anyway, now is there?"
He still sounded nervous, though. And Melissa could relate, because she was feeling downright jittery by now. What could possibly be going on?
They rounded the back corner of the house, and Melissa froze, her mouth open.
Five people, three women and two men, all having a grand old time, were playing croquet in the green, well-shaded gra.s.s.
And every last one of them was stark naked.
THE PICTURE OF J JILLIE AND Z ZACK, taken on their honeymoon, showed them parachuting in tandem, somewhere in Mexico, their faces alight with celebration as they mugged for the skydiving photographer jumping with them.
There were lots of photos of the St. Johns, but this one was Matt"s favorite.
"Tell me again about when this picture was taken," Matt said, snuggling down into his sleeping bag, while Steven perched on the edge of the lower bunk and Zeke made himself comfortable on an improvised dog bed nearby.
Holding the framed photograph in his hands, Steven smiled, taking in those familiar faces. Even now, it seemed impossible that two people with so much life in them could be gone.
"Well," Steven began, as he had a hundred times before, since he"d become Matt"s legal guardian and then his adoptive father, "we all went to school together, your mom, your dad and me, and right from the first, they were a real pair-"
"Tell me about the wedding," Matt prompted, with a yawn. It was all part of the pattern-he would fight sleep for a while, then lose the battle. "You were the best man, right?"
"I was the best man," Steven confirmed huskily.
"And you and my daddy had to wear penguin suits. penguin suits."
Steven chuckled, wondering if the kid was picturing him and Zack dressed up like short, squat birds from the Frozen North.
But, no-he knew what a tuxedo looked like. Matt had seen the wedding pictures a million times-usually, he asked why he wasn"t in them.
The answer-you weren"t born yet-never seemed to sink in.
"Yeah," Steven said belatedly. "We had to wear penguin suits."
"Mommy had on a pretty white dress, though," Matt chimed in.
"Yep."
"And out of all three of you, she was the best-looking."
"A rose between two thorns," Steven said, playing the game.
"A petunia in an onion patch," Matt responded, on cue.
They laughed, the man and the boy. There was a ragged quality to the sound.
"Tell me more about my mommy and daddy," Matt said.
Steven talked, his heart in his throat much of the time, until the boy finally nodded off. When he was sure Matt was asleep, he left the room, stepping carefully around the dog.
Out in the living room/kitchen area, Steven opened his laptop, booted it up and logged on. He hadn"t checked his email in a few days.
Once he"d weeded out the junk, and the stuff he didn"t feel like dealing with at the moment, he opened a recent message from his stepmother, Kim. It was dated that afternoon.
"Are you there yet?" she"d written. "Let us know when you get settled in Stone Creek, and your dad and I will come for a visit."
Smiling, Steven tapped out a brief reply. Kim had always treated him with warmth and good humor during those growing-up summers, never trying to take his mother"s place. "We"re here," he wrote, "and living the high life in a country-music star"s tour bus. There are bunk beds in Matt"s room, so you and Dad could sleep there."
The thought of that made his grin widen.
He added a description of Zeke, the sheepdog, recounting the pet-adoption saga, a.s.sured Kim that he and Matt were both fine, and signed off with love.
A second message came from Conner. "I"ll be in Stone Creek for the rodeo next month," it read. "Save me a bed."
And that was the whole thing.
Steven chuckled. His cousin was definitely a man of few words.
He hit Reply and told Conner he was always welcome and there would be a bed waiting when the time came. Compared to his cousin"s email, Steven"s was downright verbose.
A low whimper distracted him from the computer; he looked up and saw Zeke standing with his nose to the door crack, wanting to go outside.
Steven left the laptop on the table and accompanied Zeke out into the yard.
It wasn"t quite dark, but a few stars had begun to pop out here and there, and the ghost of a three-quarter moon peeked over the horizon, like a performer waiting in the wings.
Zeke sniffed around for a while, did his business and went back to the door, ready to go in.
Steven opened the door and the dog mounted the steps, then went directly back to Matt"s room.
Wide-awake, already bored with the internet and in no mood to watch TV, Steven sat on the fold-down metal steps in front of the threshold and looked out over what he could see of his ranch.
Some ranch, he thought. he thought. Most of the fences are down, the barn probably collapsed ten years ago and the house is a disaster. Most of the fences are down, the barn probably collapsed ten years ago and the house is a disaster.
He sighed and combed the fingers of his right hand through his hair, something he always did when he was questioning his own decisions.
His dad and Conner had both tried to persuade him to stay in Colorado and raise Matt on the family"s spread. Set up a law practice in Lonesome Bend.
He wasn"t sure they understood, his father and his cousin, why he"d needed to strike out on his own, create something new for himself and Matt and any generations that might follow.
He wasn"t sure he he understood, either. understood, either.
The Creed ranch was rightfully Conner"s, Steven figured, Conner"s and Brody"s. Their dad, dead since the brothers were hardly more than babies, had been Davis"s older brother and, therefore, the heir to the kingdom.
Not that anybody knew exactly where Conner"s identical twin brother was keeping himself these days. He"d had some kind of knock-down-drag-out with Conner, Brody had, and except for a Christmas card every few years, with a terse message scrawled somewhere inside, the family hadn"t heard from him in a decade.
Conner, like the good elder brother in the parable of the Prodigal Son, had worked shoulder to shoulder with Davis to make the ranch prosper, and it had. Even with the ups and downs of the economy and the ever-changing beef prices, it was a profitable operation.
When he was younger, shuttling back and forth between his mother"s place back East, where he lived fall, winter and spring, and the ranch, which he"d thought of as home, Steven had been more than a little jealous of his cousins. Two years younger than he was, the twins got to live on the land year-round, and Davis was a subst.i.tute father to them, the kind he couldn"t be to Steven, for the better part of every year, because of the distance between Lonesome Bend and Boston.
So, Steven had essentially lived a double life. Summers, he"d been a ranch kid, a cowboy. He"d herded cattle on horseback, mended fences, skinny-dipped in the lake, brawled with his cousins like a wolf cub in a litter, competed in rodeos.
All too soon, though, fall would roll around, and he"d find himself on an airplane, wearing preppy clothes instead of jeans and a T-shirt and old boots, with his hair cut short and brushed shiny.
In Boston, Steven played tennis and held a spot on the rowing team. He dated girls with trust funds. Even as a relatively little kid, he had his own suite of rooms in his grandfather"s sprawling mansion, and it was generally agreed-make that, a.s.sumed a.s.sumed-that he would one day join the prestigious law firm, founded well before the Civil War broke out, where his mother, two uncles and, of course, Granddad, carried on the family business.
School was difficult for Steven, at least in the beginning, a fact that troubled his mother to no end, but he"d worked hard, gotten the grades, made it through college and law school, and joined the company as a junior clerk, just like any other newbie.
Within a year, both Steven"s mother and his grandfather were gone, his mother having died of pneumonia, which had started out as an ordinary case of the flu, Granddad of a heart attack.
Steven had soon realized he couldn"t work for his uncles.
They resented the fact that he"d inherited his mother"s share of the family fortune, as well as a chunk that had been set aside for him at birth and gathering interest ever since. His uncles had never understood what had possessed their sister to hook up with a cowboy in some s.h.i.thole town out West during a summer road trip with her college roommates, get herself pregnant and compound the everlasting disgrace by keeping the baby.
But there were other reasons for the break, too; Michael and Edward Fletcher had never shared their father"s commitment to excellence, not to mention integrity, and his death hadn"t changed that. Nor could they match their sister"s keen intelligence.
A few months after the second funeral, his grandfather"s, Steven had called his best friend from school, Zack St. John, and Zack had recommended him for a position at the Denver firm where he worked.
The rest, as they say, was history.
In Boston, in the operation his mother had referred to as the "store," Steven had practiced corporate law. As soon as he"d made the move to Denver, however, he"d switched to criminal defense.
And he"d loved it.
He and Zack had worked together a lot, and they made a crack team. Steven was proud of their record, not just the wins, but the losses, too.
In every case, they"d done their absolute best.
Just then, Steven"s cell phone rang in his pocket, and the sound jolted him. For the briefest fraction of a moment, he"d forgotten that Zack was dead and gone, expected to hear his voice.
"h.e.l.lo?" he said, still sitting in the doorway of the tour bus, realizing that the night was turning chilly.
"Why didn"t you call?" Kim asked, with a smile in her voice.
Steven went inside, shut the door, kept his reply low because he didn"t want Matt waking up. The boy needed his rest, especially since he"d be starting day camp on Monday morning.
"Because I sent an email instead," he answered. His dad and stepmother had never had any children of their own, which was a pity, because they both had a real way with kids. They were good people, decent and responsible, and he loved them.
"So tell me all about Stone Creek," Kim said.
MELISSA PLUCKED her formerly frozen diet dinner out of the microwave and plunked it on the kitchen counter to cool, getting a mild steam-burn in the process. With her other hand, she held the cordless phone to her ear. her formerly frozen diet dinner out of the microwave and plunked it on the kitchen counter to cool, getting a mild steam-burn in the process. With her other hand, she held the cordless phone to her ear.
"I tell you that there are eighty-plus-year-old nudists nudists cavorting on cavorting on your property, your property, Ashley O"Ballivan, and all you can do is laugh?" Ashley O"Ballivan, and all you can do is laugh?"
"The name is McKenzie," Ashley replied cheerfully. "What did you expect expect me to do, Melissa? Call out the National Guard to restore order?" me to do, Melissa? Call out the National Guard to restore order?"
"I didn"t think you"d laugh, laugh, that"s all," Melissa said, miffed and not entirely sure why. that"s all," Melissa said, miffed and not entirely sure why.
"Why wouldn"t I laugh?" Ashley asked reasonably. "It"s funny. funny."
"Not to mention illegal." A belated giggle escaped Melissa. "I guess you"re right," she admitted, eyeing her food warily. The microwaved dish looked more like a plastic replica of lasagna than the real thing, the kind that might be sold in a joke shop-a.s.suming there was even a market for stuff like that. "But trust me, it was also a shock. You haven"t lived, my dear, until you"ve seen a pack of bare-a.s.s naked senior citizens engaged in a lively game of croquet."
"And you without a fire hose," Ashley quipped.
"Ha-ha," Melissa said, carefully peeling the cellophane cover from her lasagna. Ashley was the one with the cooking talent; Julia Child was her patron saint. Melissa had never really caught the culinary bug; in fact, she"d all but had herself vaccinated against it. "When are you coming home? I miss the pity suppers."
Ashley laughed again, but the underlying tone was gentle, and betrayed a slight degree of worry. ""Pity" suppers, is it?" she countered. "You know know when we"re coming home. I"ve told you nineteen times, it"ll be early next week." She paused, drew in a breath. "Melissa, what"s going on? Besides the nudist uprising, I mean?" when we"re coming home. I"ve told you nineteen times, it"ll be early next week." She paused, drew in a breath. "Melissa, what"s going on? Besides the nudist uprising, I mean?"
"Interesting choice of words," Melissa commented dryly, giving up on the lasagna and shoving it toward the back of the counter. "And it"s already Friday, so "early next week" might be-"
"Okay, Tuesday," Ashley said with a chuckle, then waited stubbornly for an answer to Melissa, what"s going on? Melissa, what"s going on?
"Byron Cahill got out of jail this morning," Melissa told her.
"Yes," Ashley prompted, sounding only mildly concerned.
"He didn"t show up on schedule," Melissa said. "Velda was upset."
"What else is happening?" Ashley pressed. "Velda"s been been upset for years, and you knew Byron"s release date all along." upset for years, and you knew Byron"s release date all along."
I met a man, Melissa imagined herself saying. Melissa imagined herself saying. His name is Steven Creed. He"s all wrong for me, and I think he"s beyond hot. His name is Steven Creed. He"s all wrong for me, and I think he"s beyond hot.
While she might well have confided in Ashley in person, she wasn"t ready to talk about Steven over the telephone. And, anyway, what was there to say? It wasn"t as if anything had happened.
Still, Ashley was an O"Ballivan and, among other things, that meant she wouldn"t give up until she got a story she could buy.
So Melissa threw something out there. "I was roped into heading up the Parade Committee," she said.
"Oh, my," Ashley replied, sounding taken aback. "How did that that happen?" happen?"
"I"m not sure, beyond the fact that Ona Frame can"t serve on the committee this year because her gallbladder exploded."
"It-exploded?"
"Not literally, Ash. And thank heaven for that, because you can just imagine the fallout-"