“What are you doing here?”
She regretted the words as soon as they came out of her mouth. It was a rude way to greet the man, even though he had no business messing in her kitchen anymore.
He didn’t appear to take offense. He went right on putting cream and sugar in her old “Favorite Teacher” mug. But he’d always taken his coffee straight.
“You haven’t had your coffee yet this morning, have you? You still buy the best. I still make the best.” He handed her coffee with that same old sloe-eyed, sleepy morning smile. “My daughter lives here.”
“Is that how you got in?”
He sipped his own coffee. “She says she’s getting married. She’s not old enough, is she?”
“How old should she be?”
“Older than my little girl.” He boosted himself up the few inches that it took him to seat himself on the counter. His long legs dangled nearly to the floor. “I always liked Jamie. I thought he was really going to make something of himself. Pick up a couple of instruments, put a band together. He couldn’t sing, but he had a good ear.”
She let the “make something of himself” jibe sail past her ear.
“How did you get here? I didn’t see a strange vehicle in the driveway.”
“And you don’t see a strange man in your kitchen. You know us both. I’m still driving the same pickup, the one I left here with.”
“How old is that thing now?”
“I’ve lost track. But she had zero miles on her when I got her.” He gave his signature wink. “Just like you.”
“What a flattering comparison.”
“More than you know. That pickup is the only thing I have left that I don’t share, but Jordan needed it to haul some stuff.” His eyes went soft, as though resting them on her felt good to him. “How’ve you been?”
“Fine.”
“Your mom?”
“Not so fine.” She tried to remember what had been going on in her life when she’d last heard from him. “You know she has cancer.”
“No, I didn’t know. I’m sorry.” He wagged his head sadly. “Jordan said she’d moved back, but she didn’t say why. How’s she doing with it?”
“Jordan, or my mother? Coping, both of them.” She took her mothering stance, arms folded. “You haven’t given me one straight answer so far. Why are you here, Creed?”
“Jordan called to tell me she was getting married. Actually, she left a message on my new answering machine.” He grinned proudly. “I can call from anywhere and check in. So I got this message from her saying she had some news. I was coming into town anyway, so I…”
Her undeniable curiosity must have shown, because he was quick to explain. “I’ve got a gig. Haven’t had one here in a long time.” His smile seemed almost apologetic. “Yeah, I’m still at it. And, yeah, I still work construction to pay the bills.”
“So why are you here,” she repeated with exaggerated patience, “in this house?”
“Like I said, Jordan called. Talked to her last night. She called again this morning, wanting to use the pickup. She said you were gone with the van.”
“That’s right,” Camille recalled. “She told me she needed it today.”
“Said you’d been gone all night.” He shrugged diffidently. “’Course, we weren’t worried.”
“I left—”
“I haven’t seen the boy yet. What’s he like now? Still smart? Still…” A trace of the worry he’d disclaimed appeared in his eyes. “I know he’s not a boy, and I know I missed my chance to send the bad ones packing and give the good ones fair warning. I left it all to you. He’ll treat her right, won’t he?”
“I hope so,” she said with a sigh. “What am I saying? If he doesn’t, she’s outta there.” Another double take. “What am I saying? They’ll treat each other right.”
“Like partners?”
“They’ll make it, Creed.”
“They haven’t yet?” He gave a nervous laugh. “Just kidding. I don’t want to know. I’d have to break his neck, and I don’t think that would look too good. A neck brace with a tux.” Hunkering down, he propped his elbows on his knees and cradled his coffee between his hands. “She’s got her heart set on a fancy wedding, huh?”
“Fancier than ours was, I guess.”
“A ten-dollar chapel in Vegas with an Elvis impersonator would be fancier than ours was.” His eyes smiled for hers, hauling her into their private memory. “But the wedding night was a different story, wasn’t it?”
“It wasn’t fancy.”
“Neither is heaven.”
“Oh?” She raised her brow. “When were you last there?”
As always, Camille lost the ensuing stare-down. The instant she glanced away, she realized her foolishness. After all these years, she couldn’t stop herself from asking the stupidest of double-edged questions.
“So you’re here to congratulate your daughter on her engagement,” she said. “Plus you’ve got your own engagement.”
“Not the same kind.” He nodded toward the kitchen table. “I saw the note you left. What’s with Bridget? They’re splittin’ the sheets?”
“I guess so.” She lifted an eyebrow for a pointed reminder. “I hate that expression.”
He chuckled. “Hey, I left all the linen intact.”
“You were quite civilized.” She offered a piece of a smile. “You really were.”
“I surprised you sometimes, didn’t I?” He matched her, smile for smile. “You surprised me from the start, coming to that honky-tonk with your tony friends, then asking me if I took requests. I had a smooth comeback for you, but I couldn’t roll it past the knot in my tongue. Then you had to ask for Hank Williams.”
“That was about the extent of my knowledge of country music at the time.”
“Cut me to the quick. I hated to disappoint you right off the bat, but I didn’t do Hank Williams then. You can’t sing Hank Senior until you’ve done some serious suffering.” His gaze held hers. “I do ol’ Hank’s music now. I could break your heart with it.”
“I don’t doubt it.”
“And I still take requests.”
She gave a cool smile. “I don’t make them anymore.”
With a deferential nod he gave her side the point, then hopped off the counter and pulled the carafe from the coffeemaker. He offered her the first refill.
“I never let myself think about her getting married,” he mused as he poured his own second cup. “Going to school, going to work, all that seems okay, but it’s hard to think about her getting married, becoming some guy’s wife.” He slid the empty carafe back into its slot, switched the machine off, finally turned to Camille. “I thought you’d get married again.”
“Maybe I will.”
“You got somebody in mind?”
“Yes.” She lifted one shoulder, disappointed that he didn’t even blink. “But I haven’t found him yet. I’m not sure he exists.” She reached past him for creamer. “How about you?”
“Oh, I exist. I don’t know if I did when we were married, but I do now.”
“I mean…” He knew damn well what she meant, but she explained herself anyway. Old habit. “I notice you haven’t remarried.”
“You didn’t expect me to, did you? Once was enough for this cowboy.”
“Don’t give me that ‘cowboy’ stuff. Is that the way you exist now, the way you live?”
“That’s right. I get to play the lonesome cowboy. Gets ’em every time.”
“The women?”
“Right where they live.” He teased her with a quick one-finger belly poke. “I couldn’t make it without them.”
“Well, it was them or me, darlin’.” Because she got the “darlin’” right—his drawl with a touch of sarcasm—she was able to look him in the eye and smile. “And you chose them.”
“We’d stopped makin’ it long before that final choice was made.”
“Not completely.”
“Sex was all we had left, and you didn’t…” He glanced away, undone by his own cleverness. “I couldn’t hold on to you with just that.”
“Maybe it was all we ever had.”
“Maybe.” He took a step back. “And maybe we ought to find something else to talk about. This is hard enough without us draggin’ out the dirty laundry. We had some good times, didn’t we?”
“We had Jordan.”
“Have,” he averred. “You still have her, Camille. You always will. As for me…” He glanced out the window over the sink. “She wants her daddy to give her away again. But, damn, once was enough for that, too.”
“Nobody expected you to become a complete stranger, Creed.”
“Honey, can we call a truce?” He turned to her, voice soft, eyes soft, clearly gone soft all over at the thought of the impending giveaway. He touched her chin with one guitar-string-callused fingertip, traced the line of her jaw so softly that she couldn’t make herself turn her head away.
There was a reflexive answer, a polite answer, and a good answer. She held her breath, trying to sort them out while she gave him nothing but a heated stare.
“Hmm? For Jordan’s sake.” He tucked her hair behind her ear, massaged her earlobe with his thumb, her heart with a wistful smile. “I like your hair. I liked it long, but I like it this way, too. The color’s a little different.”
“Gray looks a lot better on you than it does on me.”
She wasn’t trying to flatter him, but she had to say something to stay on top of her game. Or her end of their game. She remembered the first time she’d seen him, the first look he’d given her, the first words he’d said. She remembered the scuffed black boots, the snug-fitting jeans, the way his shoulders made that pale blue satin western shirt seem as masculine as any football jersey. She’d made her peace with the fact that every detail of that first meeting was etched in her brain for the duration of Camille Delonga.
Letting him get this close now probably wasn’t doing said duration any favors, but she told herself that passive resistance was good exercise, since the knees were often the first to go.
“I’ve been thinkin’ about the good times.” He drew his hand back. “Ever since Jordie called me with the news, I’ve been thinking about when you and I got married. It wasn’t exactly a wedding, was it?”
“Why not?”
“You didn’t have all the bells and whistles you deserved. You should have had all your friends and family there, nice meal, fancy cake, big dance.”
“We had a dinner. Your family put on a big feed for us at the community center a few weeks later, and your friends and relatives showered us with gifts.”
“We got at least a dozen blankets,” he remembered, leaning back to rest against the edge of the counter as though touching her had been hard work.
“We were given thirteen blankets and four star quilts to be exact.”
“One of your many gifts.” He smiled when she drew a quizzical frown. “Exactitude. Is that a word?”
“I think so, although I’m not sure it’s a gift.”
“It was to me. I’ve been off ever since we split. I pay overdraft fees like you can’t believe.”
She laughed.
He shrugged, giving her the same boyish smile he’d always used to elicit her forgiveness. “Okay, I guess you can. Anyway, there was a feed, and there were gifts.”
There was nothing to forgive him for now, she reminded herself. He had his checkbook, and she had hers.
It was definitely something she could smile about. “And we danced on our wedding night.”
“We did, didn’t we?”
“And you sang to me. Not many brides have a groom who can sing to them.” She settled against the counter alongside him but gave herself a few inches of space. “We had a wedding, Creed. We had a marriage, and we had a child. Have a daughter. ‘Have’ while she’s…”
She lifted her hand. “No, you’re absolutely right. She’ll always be our daughter. And I don’t regret the wedding we had. I never have.” She turned. “What about you?”
“I didn’t at the time, but later it bothered me, knowing how much you missed out on.”
“You should have told me. That was one bother we could have written off.” She lowered her chin to her chest, looked down at the floor, and noticed his old black boots, the toes scuffed nearly colorless. Not far away the shiny toes of the black boots she rarely wore were sticking out from under her bathrobe.
How long had it been since she’d shared morning coffee with a man, hung out in her kitchen with him in her bathrobe?
What man? There had been only one. Creed Burke. And no one else. She’d told herself that she had a daughter to raise and didn’t need anyone else, but the truth was that she’d tried the dating ritual and hated it.
But she missed the morning coffee.
Get real, she told herself. How often had they shared morning coffee when they were married? Was she forgetting the mornings he’d been hung-over? The mornings his side of the bed had been empty? Bells and whistles didn’t begin to describe what she’d missed out on.
And don’t you forget it, she told herself.
But aloud she said, “We should have talked more.”
“I wasn’t much good at it.” He tipped his head back, viewed the ceiling. “Especially at first. Whenever I tried, I’d get mad when you didn’t seem to get my point. At first I’d wonder whether I had one and whether it mattered. Later on I figured I could have a damn good one and you wouldn’t notice.”
She looked at him curiously. He’d always preferred walking out on a disagreement to talking it over. Had he actually thought about it that much?
She shook her head. “That wasn’t why you weren’t much good at it. You weren’t always truthful.”
“I didn’t always tell you everything.”
“And I did. I told you everything.”
“So you always said. What makes you think you know better than I do?”
She opened her mouth to protest.
“No,” he said firmly, cutting her off with a gesture. “Hear me out for once. I got tired, too, Camille. A guy gets tired of being told everything. Just now I took a shot at telling you why I wasn’t good at talking about every damn thing that happened, and every person, and every word, and every friggin’…”
He let out a deep sigh, as though he’d been saving it up for a long time, and he turned, collecting himself for better control.
“I’m telling you that I can’t express myself as well as you do, at least not by talking. I’m telling you that I’m not much good at it. This is me, telling you something about me, and you just”—he snapped his fingers—“just like that, dismissed. It’s not some little bother, baby, it’s a big concern. But you have no trouble writing it off.”
He was right. She’d had her protest ready to fire, but he’d blown it off her wall. Her mind scrambled to put the pieces in order, but at the moment “I didn’t” and “you never” didn’t add up to a hill of beans.
“I just meant that I didn’t grow up dreaming of a fancy wedding,” she said quietly, feeling very small.
“And I didn’t grow up talking,” he said patiently. “Not like you did. So I’m not much good at it.”
“You’re doing fine now.”
“I’m not doing fine. I’m ready to walk out that door.”
Ah, the Creed she had known and…knew still. Prompting her to smile knowingly. “What’s stopping you?”
“I’d have to keep on walking, since our daughter has my pickup.”
He had to laugh, and she had to join him.
“Have you had breakfast?” she asked finally.
“I’ve had coffee.” He shrugged, shook his head, gave her that willing look, achingly reminiscent of the young heartbreaker she’d married. “Whatever she wants,” he said, “I’ll do what it takes to pay for it.”
“Wedding receptions?”
He groaned. “How many would I have to do, exactly?”
She had no idea. “Your share of fifty should cover half the cost.”
“No problem,” he said affably. “As long as I don’t have to be sober.”
Laughing, she reached for her frying pan. “I don’t think they notice at weddings.”
But she realized they were to become “we” for a while. The wedding people. Doomed for a time to wander from pillars of flowers to invitations to post. We for a while, a wee while, and then back to normal. Camille could handle it, would handle it, as Creed had suggested, for her daughter’s sake.
When Jordan walked through the door, it seemed for just a moment that “we” added up to three again. Mom and Dad were lingering at the kitchen table, a few scraps and crumbs left on their plates, some cold coffee in their cups. Little Jordan was rushing in from school to grab a bite to eat.
Camille hung her head, smiling, undoubtedly giving the impression that she was embarrassed about having breakfast with her ex-husband, or the fact that it was nearly noon and she still wasn’t dressed, or the simple fact that she was smiling. But no one picked up on it, maybe because they both knew full well that she was uncomfortable with feeling too comfortable.
So they greeted each other as though it were something they did every day. Like a normal family.
It was unusual for Jordan to come home for lunch, but she had something that didn’t belong to her. “Thanks for the use of your truck. With Mom’s van gone this morning, I don’t know how I would have gotten that plywood to school.”
“I’m sorry. I forgot that you…” Camille gestured vaguely in Creed’s direction. “You didn’t tell me that you already called…”
Addressing him with a quick glance, she shifted her apology. “Not that I didn’t intend…”
He turned to Jordan, laughing. “When did she forget how to finish a sentence?”
“I don’t know.” Jordan’s smile was tentative. “She had no problem with it yesterday.”
“I’ve hardly been able to catch my breath since yesterday. All of a sudden everything’s moving too fast for me to keep up, never mind finish a sentence.”
“Dad suggested that we look at the Countryside Inn for the reception.” Jordan handed Creed his keys. “His band is playing there this weekend.”
“Isn’t that sort of a pizza and beer motel? I don’t think that would quite do for the Mayfields.”
Rosemary’s sudden appearance in the kitchen doorway brought Creed to his feet.
“I thought you said this was going to be a Delonga wedding,” she said, reaching into Creed’s easy hug. “How’s my favorite son-in-law?”
“Ex-son-in-law, Mama.”
“I don’t divorce my children.” She patted his cheek. “You’ll be my favorite as long as there are no new prospects on the horizon. So far the horizon remains vacant.”
“And there’s peace in the valley,” Camille muttered, cradling her cold cup.
As she recalled, Creed had been at least a dozen kinds of undesirable as a son-in-law, but Rosemary’s objections to their marriage had evaporated the day Jordan was born. A dozen years and a pail of tears later, she hadn’t objected to the divorce outright, but she’d sure enjoyed playing devil’s advocate.
“How’s this a Delonga wedding when the bride’s name is still Burke?” Creed turned to his daughter. “It is, isn’t it?”
“Of course it is,” Jordan said promptly, having little time for detours in the conversation. “The Countryside Inn would be convenient to the church.”
“What church?” Camille demanded in a tone that questioned the legitimacy of any church that would locate near a place that would hire Creed’s band.
“We thought we’d use the church James grew up in since we’ve…” Jordan shrugged innocently. “Well, we’ve sort of bounced around church-wise.”
“I haven’t been able to get you to go for…”
Calm down. Camille took a breath as she placed both palms carefully on either side of her empty plate. She glanced at Creed, who didn’t seem to know whether to sit down with Camille or hang with his apparent allies.
“Okay, I’ve slacked off in a few areas,” she felt compelled to confess. “But I keep meaning to get back into the habit.”
“You don’t have to explain anything to me,” he said with a chuckle.
Jordan snatched the remaining corner of cold toast off the edge of Creed’s plate. “I’m putting the Countryside Inn on the list of places to consider,” she said, sucking the orange marmalade off her thumb.
“There’s already a list?” Camille muttered. She was surrounded by people who weren’t listening.
But neither was she. She was remembering that the marmalade in the cupboard had always been purchased as Creed’s favorite before it had become Jordan’s.
“How many people can they seat?” Jordan asked her father.
“We play in the bar, but I know they have a nice-size banquet room.” He slid back into his chair, the better to challenge Camille eye to eye. “Just because I play there doesn’t make it a dive.”
“I didn’t say ‘dive.’ I just don’t think we want pizza and beer for our daughter’s—”
“We’ll go this weekend,” Jordan decided. “James would love to hear Dad’s new band.”
Camille suddenly remembered how she’d spent the last twelve hours. “Have you talked to James today?”
“He told me about last night. He feels pretty bad about the whole mess.” Jordan brightened as she turned to Creed. “It would do James good to go out for pizza and beer and some live music this weekend.”
“We don’t solve any problems, but we can sure drown ’em out for a while.”
“Do I get to go?” Rosemary asked with a laugh.
“Sure, if you feel like it, Grandma. And we can check the place out at the same time. I’ll bet their rates would be reasonable. If it’s big enough, we might want to schedule a consultation with—”
“How big are we talking?” Camille asked.
“We only have about a hundred on our guest list so far.”
“There’s already a list?”
“When she comes up with a complete sentence, she likes to reuse it,” Jordan told Creed.
“You haven’t even set a date,” Camille reminded her.
“We’re getting to that,” Jordan told her mother, who was beginning to feel extraneous in the conversation. “We didn’t know what to do about your side, Dad. They probably wouldn’t be able to come all this way, would they? Wouldn’t really want to, probably.”
“Why not? Once they get a pass to leave the reservation, they ought to be able to get across the state line without too much hassle.”
“A pass?”
“Just kidding,” he said, his voice soft and tight.
Camille heard his tone over the words, actually heard him this time. With Creed there was fun kidding and there was defensive kidding. This was Creed telling his daughter that she was about to step on some thin skin.
“How long has it been since you’ve been out there?” he asked her.
“Since the last time I went with you, which was, what? When Grandma Frances died?”
He shook his head. “That can’t be right. It can’t be that long ago. That’s been almost three years.” He rose from his chair and stepped back from the table. “You do what you want about my side. You want ’em to come, they’ll come. Some of ’em anyway.”
“Which ones?” Jordan asked hesitantly.
“Which ones are welcome?”
“All of them, of course, but you have so many relatives, Dad. And we’d have to know for sure whether they were coming.”
“You do what you want,” he said. “I’m just glad I got invited.”
“And I’m glad I get to make another wedding dress,” Rosemary said, clearly as oblivious as Jordan was to the growing tension. “It’ll be the best thing I’ve ever done, Jordie. I want you to look at some of the pictures I’ve collected and tell me what you like.”
Jordan slipped her mother a frantic look.
Camille offered her daughter a tight smile. We’ll talk later.
Pushing back from the table gave Camille a chance to adjust her smile for her mother. I’m glad you’re feeling better.
Coming to her feet, she felt new warmth for her former husband, and she let it touch her eyes when they met his across the table. It’s good to see you again.