Chapter Eighteen

Rich drove along U.S. 15 south toward Hickory Valley with Torrie sitting quietly beside him, hardly making a sound. He wondered whether she was thinking about the information involving Dr. Winters and his half-sister’s adoption, or whether she was mulling over the night they spent together. She had been insistent they take both vases of white roses. Perched in a box on the back seat, the roses permeated the inside of the car with a sweet intoxicating smell. Torrie had also insisted they skip breakfast and stop only for a quick, fast-food hamburger since the trip would take over three hours.

“Why the silence?” he asked. “Come on, Torrie, tell me what’s bothering you.”

“The girls.” She frowned. “Surely they will be asking why we didn’t drive home last night.”

“That’s it?”

“Well, it might be awkward to lie and tell them we were too tired to drive back.”

Rich threw her a quick glance. Was she was feeling guilty? Having second thoughts about their relationship? Or was she truly concerned about the girls and how to explain a night away from them?

“We’ll tell them the truth, Torrie. We wanted to have some time alone. We went to see the falls. We had a nice dinner. I was exhausted, especially after the sleepover.” He stopped, then added, “Anyway, Estella is used to me being away.”

“But Iris is not. At least, not in another state where I can’t reach her.”

He sighed. A twinge of annoyance crept into his buoyant demeanor. “Okay, what do you want to tell them?”

“I don’t know. I know I don’t want to fight. I don’t want us to make commitments we can’t keep. We’ve spent one night together. Maybe we were just caught up in the moment. Maybe this was a rash decision.”

“Rash decision? Where do you come up with all these disastrous thoughts? Last time it was fate working to save us from a crazy impulsive act. I don’t know about you, but last night was no rash decision. I was caught up in the moment, and I want to be caught up in a lot more of them, sweetheart.” He picked up his phone from the console pocket beside him and handed it to her. “Here, look up the name of the bicycle shop I saw in Mansfield on the way up. Get me an address.”

“Whatever for?” She punched at the keyboard. “And you better not call me sweetheart in front of the girls.”

“Insurance, babe. The kind you like.”

“Can you be more specific?” She looked at him with a puzzled expression. “Maybe babe isn’t such a good idea either.”

He drew in a long breath. The woman had the ability to be exasperating without much effort. “Insurance so our time away will never cross their devious little minds. The girls need something else to do at the house besides pestering the poor cat and asking Lulu enough questions to fill a half-hour game show. So I thought we’d pick up bicycles for them in Mansfield.”

He recalled his conversation with Gertie’s ghost on the porch. He wasn’t about to tell Torrie that his grandmother had made the suggestion. He had noticed the bicycle shop on the way up.

“I loved to ride my bike at Gertie’s,” he admitted aloud. “I’d start at the back of the house where the lawn sloped downward. If you could get a fast start, you could come down into the circular drive and around the house to end up almost where you started. And barely pedaling! I wore a path around the place.”

Torrie slapped a hand on her knee. “I can’t let you buy Iris a bike, and I can’t afford to get her one yet.”

“Will you stop?” he begged. “Please stop with your tedious desire to be so independent. Why can’t the girls have fun together? If it will help to end your unrelenting guilt trip, I’ll tell them the bikes must stay at the house.” His black mood shifting like the wind, he offered her a conspiratorial wink. “And that only means Iris will be bugging you like a gnat on a hot summer day to spend more time with Estella, and you’ll be forced to spend more time with me.”

Torrie stared at him. “Does anyone ever win against you?”

Yes, he wanted to say. You did. You stole my heart, messed with my head, and made me the most confused, love-struck creature in the state. You belong to me, Torrie Larson. Now all I need to do is convince you.

“Not usually,” he admitted instead and reached over and ran his hand tenderly over the top of hers. “Torrie, I don’t want to bicker.”

“Well, we’ll have to get two bikes exactly the same and exactly the same color,” she said, conceding. “You better hope it’s possible. Otherwise, you’re going to see two little girls quibbling, instead of sailing around the house in mind-numbing circles.”

“Are you serious? You think they care what color they are?”

Torrie laughed. “Ah, Rich, you have a lot to learn about kids in groups of more than one, especially girls. Mom used to say raising kids is like working with one hand tied behind your back. Even my brothers would argue over new baseballs, bats, kick balls, soccer balls—even the color of their T-shirts. When she could, especially with sports equipment, Mom used to buy everything exactly the same, right down to the same manufacturer, then write their names on everything with a permanent marker so there’d be no mistaking who owned what. When someone’s baseball turned up missing, you’d find her checking everyone’s baseballs to make sure there was no pilfering taking place among her sons.”

Hours later, when they pulled into the driveway and unloaded their luggage, it was only Lulu who joyously greeted them at the door. “Welcome home, Richard Lee,” she quipped as he piled the luggage inside the entranceway. “Good trip?”

When he nodded, she waved at the family room in the back of the house. “Iris is resting on the couch with a book, and Estella is upstairs with Denise who’s doing an elaborate series of braids in her hair. The girls were up most of the night according to Denise, and it was really another wide-awake, rambunctious pajama party. Danielle came over to help and join in the merriment, but Denise should get a gold star. She deserves a few bonus Redman points. She worked like a mother hen to keep them in tow. And trust me, they were a sugar-induced handful when I left.”

“Noted,” Rich said. “Anything else?”

“Well, I think Sheba’s approaching her due date.”

He frowned.

Lulu grinned. “Estella asked again how we were going to locate the father when the blessed event occurs. She seems to think he’d want to know.”

“And what did you say?”

Lulu headed for the kitchen. “I told her to ask you.”

Rich groaned. “What am I missing here? You’re from a farm. Who better to explain the birds and the bees?”

“Me?” Lulu snorted. “Explaining the propagation of felines was never mentioned as part of my job description, so I’d better not lose one stinking point.” She marched down the hallway and disappeared into the kitchen.

“I never got a copy of that job description!” Rich yelled after her.

“Lunch will be on the table soon. Gather the troops,” she shouted in reply.

“Well played, Rich.” Torri’s laughter billowed out as she headed for the family room. “Can’t wait to see how you handle cat reproduction.”

Frowning and disgruntled, Rich climbed the staircase, halting at the top to listen to Denise and Estella chatting like magpies inside the front bedroom. From his vantage point, he could see Estella sitting on a chair, her small hands clasped demurely in her lap as she looked out her dormered window. Behind her, Denise stood, pins in her mouth, her hands deftly parting Estella’s hair, braiding, and coiling the braids into a fancy creation exactly like she was wearing. Not wanting to disturb their antics, he decided to silently stand and eavesdrop instead.

“Denise, do you ever feel different?” he heard Estella ask. She held her little head ramrod straight as Denise wound another braid into a fancy knot by her ear.

“Like how?” Denise asked, mumbling around the pins in her mouth.

“Well, since Mommy went to heaven, sometimes I feel all alone—like I don’t always belong because I don’t have a mother like all the other girls. And I don’t have any sisters or brothers. Sometimes I feel like I don’t fit in.”

Denise nodded. “Hmmm. Yes, sometimes, I do. Even with my sister, I sometimes have a feeling like I don’t belong. I think everyone does. Danielle and I’ve discussed it and she agrees everyone gets those thoughts. I guess it’s quite natural—to sometimes feel all alone, I mean.” She chuckled. “But then, I know my mother and dad love me, and you know your dad loves you, too. That’s what important, Estella. Someday, you’ll get a new mommy and she will love you very, very much.”

“But how can you be sure?” Estella asked. “What if she hates me?”

“No, Estella. No, no. Your dad would never marry anyone who didn’t love you as much as he does. He’s a wonderful father. You must trust him.”

“All right,” Estella said in a resigned tone. “I guess you’re right.” She brightened. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if my dad married Torrie? Then Iris could be my sister and I wouldn’t be an only child anymore!” She squirmed excitedly in the seat. “Then they could have a baby and I could have two sisters. I’d make a good big sister. I try to take care of Iris sometimes.”

“Hmmm,” Denise said, removing more pins still in her mouth. “Maybe you ought to take this subject up with your dad. Hold still, I’m almost finished.”

With a heavy heart, Rich looked at the two and sighed, turning to sneak back down the steps. He had no idea Estella worried about not belonging. About being alone. About not having siblings. He knew those feelings himself when he was growing up.

He swiveled slightly to take one last look at Denise Jordan who was winding the last braid onto Estella’s hair-do. She was getting a huge bonus for babysitting today. She was a peach, like Lulu indicated.

****

While they ate a quick lunch together of toasted cheese sandwiches and tomato soup with walnut brownies straight out of the oven, the girls chattered gaily, taking turns telling Rich and Torrie about their sleepover, the Parcheesi board game they had discovered in the trunk of toys, and how Denise had taught them the rules so they could play. Estella then promptly instructed everyone about the royal game of India and how it was once played on large outdoor boards using colorfully clothed servants of the royalty household as game pieces. She had looked it up on the Internet, and she wondered whether it was possible to make a board game with chalk on the circular drive out front and enlist everyone in the neighborhood to be human players.

But it was Iris, as Torrie earlier suggested, who whined, “Why did you have to spend the night in New York, Mommy? What were you doing there? I missed you.” She punched out her lower lip, ready to mope.

Rich and Torrie’s gaze met for a suspended moment, and Torrie felt a sinking feeling right down to her toes. She could never lie, but at the moment, even a plausible excuse eluded her.

Rich pushed himself from the table. “Well, we were getting important business taken care of, but we did manage to find time to buy you both a surprise.” He offered them an endearing smile.

And in a flash, the tide of events changed as both little girls threw off their glum expressions and jumped up, following Rich and Torrie out to the SUV in the circular drive. They squealed as he withdrew two new shiny pink bikes with white fenders and sparkling handlebar streamers.

“For the two most beautiful princesses in Hickory Valley.” Rich pushed the bikes to an open section of the driveway away from the car and shrubs.

Estella clapped her hands and looked in awe at the bikes. “Yippee! It’s just what I wanted. I’ve missed my bike so much since we’ve been here.”

“For me?” Iris asked, taken off-guard by the generosity of the gift. “Is it really, Mommy?” She ran and wound her arms around her mother’s legs and hugged her.

Torrie nodded. “But there are restrictions,” she said firmly, pushing the girl’s pale bangs from her forehead. “You must keep the bike here at Estella’s house and they must be ridden in the back of the house, here on the front circular drive, on the front sidewalk, or on the driveway leading to the garage. Under no circumstances are you girls to leave the property with them. You cannot ride them downtown. Do you understand?”

“But how will we tell them apart?” Estella asked.

Rich withdrew two decals of sparkling silver and pink, one with the initial “I” and the other with the initial “E” on it and waved them in the air. “These go on the back fender.”

“Can we try them out? Now?” Iris asked, jumping up and down.

“Yes, but let’s be careful,” Rich cautioned.

After he and Torrie separated each girl at an even greater distance, they held the bikes upright while the girls got their bearings. It was Iris who sailed away first, grinning, pedaling the bike with relative ease down the drive, adeptly turning and racing back, her hair flying out behind her. “This is so much better than the bikes at Aunt Elsa’s,” she yelled, referring to the bikes of her male cousins. She glided to a smooth stop and hopped down, giggling, before setting off again.

“They’re having a blast,” Torrie said and looked over at Rich standing with hands in his back pockets. “You’re a very generous man, Rich.” And a very handsome, but devious one. “They’ve completely forgotten we were away for a night.”

“Uh-huh.” He came to stand beside her and looped an arm over her shoulder, rubbing the side of her cheek with his thumb. The single act of disguised affection turned her heart over. She gazed up at him and wanted so much to stand on tiptoe and kiss him. She wanted so much to stand there all day in the sunlight beside him. To be happy like this forever. But she refrained from making any romantic gesture, content to just watch the girls and listen to their innocent riotous giggles fill the summer air around them before she headed off to the potting shed in the backyard to see what could be saved of her precious rose cuttings.

****

Later in afternoon, after lengthy telephone conversations about business, Rich wandered onto the porch and took in a breath of clear, clean summer air. Somewhere far off and to the north of where he stood, someone had mown a field of hay. After all these years, he was surprised he still could recognize the smell of freshly cut alfalfa and clover, a smell so sweet and so unique to rural living. Beside him, a chickadee chattered and two swallowtail butterflies flitted on a bush. He gazed toward the potting shed where Torrie had been laboring for the last few hours.

He ducked back inside, poured two glasses of Lulu’s homemade lemonade, and carried them across the yard. He found Torrie sitting on a stool before a bank of south windows. Head bent, deep in concentration, she was carefully examining and sorting the pieces of broken rose clippings Joe or Finn had salvaged and tucked into squat buckets of water to keep them fresh for grafting or rooting.

He set a glass beside her. “Is there anything I can do to help?” A multitude of flats holding four-inch pots filled with dirt lined the farthest end of the long counter.

Torrie looked up surprised. “You want to help?”

Rich watched her gaze travel from his scuffed cowboy boots to his faded Levis and on up to his plaid shirt before they rested on his face. He had purposely dug through his closet and donned the oldest clothes he could find in hopes of convincing her.

“This is a dirty job, Rich.”

He shrugged. “So is a lawyer’s job at times. Only a different kind of dirty.” He swept his hands over the counter and the buckets of rose clippings. “This whole mess is probably my fault, Torrie. Someone wants me to sell the house and hightail it out of Hickory Valley.” He went over to a far bucket and fingered a shiny leaf on a rose stem. “And anyway, babe, I just finished up a heap of legal business by computer and phone, so I’m your landscape slave until dinner time. Tell me what to do and how it’s done.”

Torrie shook her head, trying to look annoyed by his interruption, but finally slapped a pair of soft leather gloves against his chest. “First, we don’t want any thorns to harm those soft velvet hands, counselor. Some people knock the thorns off when they’re handling cuttings, but I prefer not to wound the plant any more than necessary.”

He nodded, slipped on the gloves, and grinned. “Yes, these velvet hands can work magic, don’t you agree?”

“Rich.” The tone was reprimanding.

“Okay, okay.” He chortled. “No wait. Just one more, please, Torrie. This one is good, I promise.” He held up his gloved hands and wiggled his fingers at her. “So now for the first time in my life, I can safely say I’ll be literally handling things here with kid gloves.”

This time, she gave him a doleful shake of her head. “I give up. You do know where Estella gets her clever but never-ending ability to annoy people, don’t you? Are you here to hinder or help?”

“Sorry.” He tried to look repentant, but couldn’t quite wipe the grin off his face.

She motioned him closer. “Since I don’t want you to play with knives and this one is very sharp”—she waved it in the air while he feigned being frightened and took a step backward—“I’m going to give you a six-inch stalk which is cut on a diagonal at the bottom and which has two sets of leaves attached. I will wound the rose stem at the bottom along the stalk as well.”

“Wound? Sounds like you have to be a little spiteful to do this. You sure you’re up to it?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Luckily for you, I’ve become adept at ignoring your snarky comments.”

“As are the girls, Lulu Smith, and even the darn cat.”

She shook her head again and persevered. “Now, try to focus. You’ll take each cutting, dip the bottom and the wound in this rooting hormone, and plant one in each corner of a pot farther up the counter, being careful to push them only half way into the soil.” She grabbed him by his shirt on his upper arm and pulled him along as she planted the first cutting. “See? It’s simple.”

He squinted at the pots of soil. “What’s the shiny stuff?”

“Perlite. The soil in the pot is half soil and half perlite. The high water content of volcanic glass lends itself perfectly for rooting plants.”

They worked for the next hour with Torrie explaining to him the difference between bud and cutting propagation methods and other landscape techniques and problems. He could tell by her animated gestures and the excitement in her voice how much she loved her work, enjoyed the outdoors, and liked watching things grow—but at the end of the day, she really loved the roses and flowers above all.

“You never grow tired of this?” he asked when they were finishing up.

“There are some things you never grow tired of,” she admitted.

“Or people.”

He fixed his gaze on her. She didn’t try to look away, but her cheeks burned from pink to red. He realized he could watch her for the rest of his life. He loved the way she moved so efficiently and athletically, almost gliding around the potting shed. Her fingers were delicate but agile when she worked on the rose stems. Despite the lack of jewelry, except the ring she designed and some small hoop earrings, she possessed a raw beauty mixed with natural earthy qualities.

When at last they were done, and two pairs of leather gloves lay side by side on the wooden counter, he pulled her to him and kissed her gently, lovingly on the lips. She didn’t resist, but snuggled in against his chest. Around them, the scent of roses and earth filled the shed.

“Torrie,” he said in a tortured voice, laying his cheek along the side of her hair, “would you ever consider marriage someday? I need you so much in my life.”

She pulled away slightly and searched his face. “How on earth would it ever work?”

He sighed, but still held her by both arms. “I’ve been on the phone for the last few days with the other attorneys in my office. What if I told you I’d consider staying in Hickory Valley, but just travel to Texas when needed? I’d put someone in charge of the Dallas office.”

“But what about Estella?”

“Estella? Estella is in love with this town, this place, the outdoors. She adores Iris and that flea-bitten, pain-in-the-backside cat. And she is thriving here more than when she was in Texas. Lulu is like a grandmother to her. Who knows, maybe my half-sister is living somewhere nearby. I still have to find her.”

“Oh, Rich, I don’t know what to say. Can you give me some time to think about all this? Some time to think things through? There’s so much that needs to be sorted out and discussed, so many questions to be answered. I have to consider Iris and what’s best for her. This is more complicated than you can imagine.”

He kissed her mouth, tenderly at first, then more insistently with growing ardor. He pulled away. “Then I take it your answer is not a no?” He kissed her again. “How about we just get engaged and see where it takes us?’

“Rich, you’re pushing,” she whispered against his lips.

“If I keep pushing, will you cave?” he asked softly. He ran his index fingers over her lower lip. “Let me put a ring on your hand. Say yes. You’re driving me wild.”

Standing on tiptoe, she brushed her lips over his again. “I’ll give it serious thought. How about you give me two weeks?”

“You aren’t making it easy for me, you stubborn sexy minx.”

From somewhere behind them, Estella asked, “What’s a sexy mink? And are you two kissing each other?”

Rich jerked upright, groaned, and felt Torrie stiffly pull away. Semi-shocked, they found both girls standing in the doorway of the shed.

“Oh, brother,” Torrie muttered under her breath. “See what I mean about complicated?”