Chapter 25
CADE
A dark pit sank into my stomach as Sarah and Thomas departed. Long after their car sped down the driveway, and Wyatt and Cody dispersed to different chores elsewhere, I stared at the spot.
Something wasn’t right.
Noelle shared my unease. She padded down the hallway, peered inside Lily’s bedroom, and returned. “Lily is sleeping soundly.” She rubbed her palms over her arms, though the house wasn’t cold. I had added more logs to the fire while they were here, and it was plenty warm.
“Um . . .”
She chewed on her bottom lip. I pushed away from the wall and brought her into my arms, reassuring myself by reassuring her.
I didn’t like that expression on her face.
It pissed me off, because I didn’t like the uncertainty.
We had imagined other endings to this situation, and they might have been worse on the surface, but that sudden departure wasn’t on the list.
I couldn’t shake, we have the information we need, out of my head.
Noelle pressed into me, her face tucked into my neck. I swept a hand across her hair, moving it aside, and kept her anchored close.
“I don’t know what to make of that,” I reasoned aloud, “but it could have gone worse. At least they’re out of our hair. They got to see and hold Lily and ask questions and know where she lives. It shows goodwill, and that we’re not hiding her from anyone.”
“What did Thomas ask you?”
“Just about the house and renovations. Surface-level stuff, nothing very deep. I didn’t mention the animals in the walls or the weird doors that comprise the walls. They didn’t even go into the bathroom.”
A knot of tension existed in between her shoulders, so I rubbed my thumb in a circle around it, finding comfort in the touch. Touch. My goodness. How long had it been since I could soak up the warm touch of a woman?
So, I soaked her up.
“Well,” Noelle concluded, a little lost, “I think we can assume it is done for now, and we’ll . . . see if we hear from them.”
I pressed a kiss to her forehead and murmured, “I agree,” and she wrapped her arms around my waist. I held her there until long minutes had passed with nothing but the occasional sound from outside, the creak of the house. Eventually, she pulled away with a little sigh.
“I’ll get dinner started. It’ll take a few hours in the crock pot.”
“I’ll check on the knuckleheads. They’ll need new assignments soon, after they finish their online schooling.”
A chill settled on my shoulders a few hours later. Phone pressed to my ear, I paced across the barn floor and chewed on my lip. I called Pastor Mike.
Oddly enough, reception was highest in the middle of the barn instead of the house, which made my life easier when old man Morgan had commands to bark out from his recliner when I first arrived. Hardly six months passed before he turned the whole operation over to me.
A familiar voice answered.
“Hello?”
“Pastor Mike?”
“Cade, how are you?”
“Good.” I nodded, like that helped at all. Clearing my throat, I asked, “I just wanted to follow up and see how . . .”
. . . how things are going? stumbled on my tongue.
I sounded like an idiot who didn’t know what he wanted.
But how is my mom doing? also felt weird.
Too late, I realized that I had called Pastor Mike without knowing what I wanted from him, beyond a vague update about my mother.
It showed an eagerness I’d never been able to curb.
Noelle and Lily and the house kept me occupied and busy, but a corner of my mind and heart would always belong to my mom. I couldn’t shut her or concern for her off completely, though I tried. It percolated, always a backdrop.
Pastor Mike saved me from embarrassing myself with a bright, “Oh, sure! I’m glad you called. I was thinking about you yesterday. We just saw your mother a few days ago, and I was able to give her some of the things we bought with the money you sent. I apologize, I forgot to send pictures.”
A ding, ding, ding followed, and I glanced at my screen to see photos land.
Indeed, a bundle of clothes, some basic medicines, and toiletries.
But in the background of each picture was Mom.
She was smaller and thinner than I remembered.
Clearly, she avoided the camera—she always did—and Pastor Mike seemed to respect her desire to be mostly out of the image.
My stomach ached, seeing her so shriveled. It had been years since I saw her in anything of a really healthy state, but it still felt like a kick in the gut. My voice had a husky note that I hated when I replied.
“I see, thank you.”
“She hasn’t been back since then,” Pastor Mike said, a little slower, “but we think she will return. Sometimes, we have people come in and out for weeks before they disappear and pop up again later. I just . . . you know . . . it depends on a lot of factors.”
“Yes.” I cleared my throat again. “Thank you, truly. I appreciate all the work you’ve done to support her. Please, if—”
“I’ll let you know right away.”
“Thanks.”
I hung up, then felt guilty. I should have said goodbye, or something, but the weight in my chest was too much. Knowing I could find Mom, if I would just show up and do it, but I hadn’t yet, cut me deep. That pressure of responsibility cracked down until I thought actual fissures might form.
Mom needed me. Mom always needed me. Through the mental breaks, the lonely nights. I had been there for her until she wouldn’t let me. Then, I’d been there for Cora until she didn’t need me.
Now?
I could be here for Noelle. I wanted to be here for Noelle, for Lily. Perfect, tiny Lily. She needed a champion, a protector to keep the wolves at bay. Because wolves encroached and she had no idea.
I hit a fist into my chest. I had to get this off of here. The worry over Mom, the paranoia. Why could other people detach themselves from responsibilities, and I couldn’t? Why couldn’t I accept that she didn’t want to be part of my life, even though I wanted to be part of hers?
Every attempt landed in a landslide failure.
I cared.
I cared too much.
And it was going to kill me if I let it.
It took a full day for the weirdness of Sarah and Thomas’ departure to fizzle out. A full day for Noelle to stop walking around with a perplexed expression, and for her to start humming again while she cooked.
After that, we resumed our usual stride around the animals, the ranch, Lily, and the bathroom.
I hid my preoccupation in framing the bathroom and teaching Cody and Wyatt how to frame, use the nail guns, understand the difference between a weight-bearing and non-weight bearing wall, and measure out each stud at precisely sixteen inches from center to center.
The bathroom provided an outlet, and I sank into it.
The responsibilities didn’t seem so big, the debts so atrocious, when I could move a project forward.
Around four thirty—when the smell of simmering beef stew had just about driven me mad, and Wyatt and Cody’s stomachs brought them inside thanks to a batch of fresh cornbread smothered with melting honey butter—a knock came on the door.
“Got it!” I called, covered in sawdust. Noelle stayed in the kitchen. She wore Lily in a baby carrier on her chest that I had worn once, and it worked great. Wyatt teased me over it constantly, but I didn’t care.
Tonight, Lily’s little face and pert nose stuck out of the top as she snoozed, tucked into a tight knot. Noelle sashayed around the kitchen, barefoot, and I wanted to devour her every time I walked past. Sometimes, I did. Leaving her bemused and kissed in the middle of the room.
Nothing woke up my protective instincts like that woman holding that baby in my house.
The door swung open, and Cora beamed at me.
“Cade!”
She vaulted into my arms, and I caught her. Hawk smiled from behind her, nodded, and closed the door as I spun Cora into the room, excited to see her. She didn’t come to the ranch all that often, but I had a feeling that rumors around town made it her way.
I blamed Dagny.
Or dancing.
The entire town had seen us kissing.
Noelle crept to the kitchen doorway, one hand on Lily’s back, as I set Cora down. But Cora had already seen Noelle and immediately bounced over to her.
“I’m Cora!”
She wrapped her arms around Noelle and Lily, but kept her embrace gentle and light. Noelle managed a startled, but sincere, smile.
“H-hi Cora.”
“Cade’s sister.” Cora jerked a thumb to me. “He’s a jerk and hasn’t introduced me to you and Lily yet, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. Hi!”
Her perky personality lit up the room, as it always did. Hawk and I shook hands, exchanging our usual wry smiles at Cora’s bubbly antics.
“Chill, Cora,” I said with a soft elbow in her ribs. I nodded toward Noelle’s bundle. “There’s a baby in the house now.”
Cora’s nose lifted. “And something that smells like heaven! What smells so wonderful?”
“I’m just finishing up dinner,” Noelle said, edging back into the kitchen. She faced Cora as she said, “You’re welcome to stay and eat. There’s plenty to go around.”
“Oh! Let me help you.”
Cora dissolved into babbles and questions while draping her coat around the back of a chair and hauling her sleeves up her arms. Hawk leaned against the wall, gesturing to her with a nod.
“She’s been dying to get over here since we heard the rumors.”
I sighed.
Small town life.
Hawk grinned a devil-may-care smile that pegged me the way an older brother might. “You kissed a girl while dancing at the Dance-Hall-Slash-Bar. What did you think would happen?”
I grunted. Kissing Noelle so thoroughly in front of the whole town hadn’t been my best way to honor and celebrate her, but neither could I bring myself to regret it.
Hawk clapped me on the shoulder.
“And now we get to hear about it over dinner. Good to see a little life stirring on the ranch again, Cade.”