“You’re a good girl, Bodine. Don’t let anybody tell you different. Come on, Cora. I’m in the mood for a glass of wine with lunch.”
She’d have to work late, Bodine thought as she saddled Leo. But she’d planned to anyway. Two events that night, she mused, and she wanted to lend a hand at least in getting them going.
Besides, she had that fancy dinner to look forward to tomorrow night. She figured Callen would get his words together by then. And if he didn’t, she’d take that bull by the horns and say her own.
“Carol works here,” Alice said so quietly Bodine barely heard. “She’s taking those people out riding. She has bluebirds on her boots.”
“She’s taking them on a trail ride. I thought we’d ride more in the open, so you can get a good idea how things are laid out.”
“We’ll ride in the open. Easy works here. He’s too thin. He must need a wife to cook for him.”
“He could learn to cook for himself.”
“He calls Cal boss, but you’re the big boss.”
“And she doesn’t let us forget it.” Callen moved in to check the cinches. “You picked a good one here with Jake. Want a leg up?”
“I don’t need one anymore.”
Alice swung into the saddle as if she’d done so every day of her life. And made him proud.
“You have a good ride, Miss Alice.”
“I can, because you and Sundown taught me again. You’ve got a ma, but you’re mine, too. You can be mine, too.”
Touched Callen patted her knee. “We can be each other’s.”
“I’m Alice. You call me Alice. No more Miss Alice if we can be each other’s.”
“Alice it is.”
With Bodine, she walked the horse through the gate Callen opened.
“We can ride toward the river,” Bodine told her. “We’ll see some cabins, and pretty country, and one of the camps.”
“Camps.”
“It’s called ‘glamping.’ Glamour camping, because it’s really fancy and plush, and we do it up right on the resort. Not like pitching a tent and pulling out a bedroll.”
“Do we have to meet more people?”
“No.” Recognizing her nerves, Bodine tried an easy smile. “I mean, we could go by somebody who’d say hi, but you don’t have to talk to anybody if you don’t want to.”
“I get nervous when I do if I don’t know them. I’m better. I think I’m better.”
“Alice, you’re so much better.”
“I met Carol and Easy.”
“And that’s enough for one day.”
Smiling, Bodine looked over, and saw tears standing in Alice’s eyes. “What is it? What’s wrong? Do you want to go back?”
“No. No. No. I was happy to see you. Happy to see Cal. I get happy to see Chase, and Rory. You’re not mine. You’re not mine. He took my babies away, all my babies. And they’re not my babies now. They’re my babies and not my babies. If Bobby found them, if I found them, they’re not my babies. All grown up, and with another ma. A good ma would never, never tell them about their daddy. I can’t have them back. I’d have to tell them. And they don’t know me. I’m not the mother.”
She let out a shuddering sigh. “I can say it, I can tell you when we’re riding. It hurts in my heart, but it hurts more when I think of telling them. Cal says I’m brave. It’s braver not to look, not to find, not to tell. But it hurts.”
“I can’t even imagine how much.”
“Bobby put the man who shot Cal and Sundown in jail. He’ll put Sir in jail when he finds him. But I have to tell him not to find my babies. I have to tell him that, and protect them.”
“If I ever have a daughter, I’m going to name her Alice.”
Alice gasped, and though tears shimmered in her eyes, they widened with stunned joy. “Alice? For me?”
“For my brave aunt, who’ll get to spoil her.”
“And rock her to sleep?” This time her sigh spoke of pleasure. “I can sing to her. Reenie and I can sing to her. She’ll have a good ma, a good daddy.” Settling, she looked around. “It is pretty country. It feels like home again. Every day it feels more like home again.”
*
Whatever crunch it put her in, Bodine deemed it worth the hour or so she spent riding with Alice.
At sunset, she stepped out to check on the photography club holding their annual awards banquet, and was pleased to see the sky didn’t disappoint.
All thirty-eight members worked to capture the brilliance of light and color, the billows and streams. A number of guests there for the first outdoor concert of the season did the same.
Satisfied, she went to check on their headliner, the musicians, ran into Chelsea and Jessica.
“Have the waitstaff light all the candles in about fifteen minutes,” Jessica said. “I want the porches, the patios, the gardens to sparkle as soon as it’s dark. And we need at least two waitstaff circling out here.”
“On my list,” Chelsea assured her.
“I was about to hunt you down, and here you are. Chelsea, did you pick up those samples for the summer setups? The napkins and rings and candles?”
“Yesterday. I left them on your…” She slapped a hand to her face. “Crap! I left them on my kitchen counter. I walked right out without them, and you wanted them today. I’ll run home and get them right now.”
“You’ve got a full list right now. It can wait.”
“I’m sorry, Bo. I know you wanted to look them over, show them to your mother and your grannies, and I just— It won’t take me ten minutes to get them and come back.”
“You’re going to be running around here nonstop in about five minutes,” Jessica reminded her. “I can slip out in about an hour.”
They weren’t top priority, Bodine thought, but they were on the day’s agenda. “Why don’t we do this? I can just swing by and get them on my way home. I’m hoping to leave all this to both of you in about an hour. It’s easy for me to go by the Village on the way home. If you don’t mind giving me a key.”
“I’ll get it for you. I’m really sorry.”
“It could wait, but I’m going to be showing it to a bunch of women. I want to give them time to argue about it.”
“Two minutes. Just put it under the mat when you leave. I’ll give the waitstaff a heads-up on the way.”
“She’ll kick herself for a week.”
“She shouldn’t,” Bodine said. “She did me a favor picking them up when I was crunched for time. In any case, I’ll be here for another hour, longer if you need. Just let me know if you need a hand with either group.”
With Chelsea’s key in her pocket, she circled around, slipping into the dining hall to check on setup, then over to the Mill to do the same.
She came back out to Callen standing with the horses under the rise of a full red moon.
The music started up with the lusty “Nothing On but the Radio.”
She considered it perfect.
“I thought you’d have headed home by now.”