Chapter Six
Caroline woke with a gasp and a start next morning, in an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar room, in an unfamiliar country thousands of miles from what she had called home.
Was it the vast silence all around, as compared to street traffic and city noises, that had jerked her to consciousness? Was it the welter of emotions pertaining to yesterday’s very full, very exhausting tide of events? Was it, with so many worrisome details nibbling at the edge of sanity, something left unsaid or undone?
“Sophie!”
Today was Friday. It was reasonable to assume that this was another school day. Who saw to her breakfast—that acid-tongued gargoyle in the kitchen? Who helped her dress, who got her to school? In fact, which school did she attend, and how did she get there?
All these unanswered questions.
As she flung herself out of bed, quickly washed, and then threw on a robe to race downstairs, she wondered if Sophie’s father had decided to grace the mansion with his presence.
“Sophie?” She skidded to a halt in the kitchen.
“Carrie!” said Sophie, with a big beaming grin. She was seated at the table, working on a bowl of grits and biting into a slice of raisin toast. “I was afraid you left.”
“Oh, no, not at all. As you can see, I’m still here.”
That merited a dyspeptic look from Mrs. Wyeth, who was cutting up vegetables to dump into a huge soup pot already simmering on the modern range. Soup, at least, to all appearances. Perhaps the ingredients were poisonous mushrooms, gathered from the forest, and she was preparing a witch’s cauldron of something or other.
Caroline perched on one of the stools at the counter to smile at her new charge. “I was afraid I’d miss seeing you off to school this morning.”
“Oh. Uh-huh. Well, Mrs. Sampson will pick me up pretty soon—when, Mrs. Wyeth?”
“Half an hour,” the mountain mumbled.
“And then she’ll bring me home afterward.” Sophie finished her last spoonful of gelatinous glue and shoved the bowl aside with obvious relief. “It’s my last day, Carrie. Uh—will you still be here when I get back?”
Something struck Caroline in the region of her heart, hit hard with an almost audible twang, and zipped away again. “Yes, Sophie,” she said quietly. “I’ll be here. Are you ready to get dressed?”
“Uh-huh.” Sliding down from her chair, the child slipped a trusting hand into that of Caroline’s. “Wanna help me choose what to wear today?”
By eight o’clock, with Caroline freshly showered and dressed, she could straighten Sophie’s little pink top, brush a kiss across the top of her head, and wave a cheerful goodbye as the child clambered into the back seat of Lila Sampson’s sleek black SUV.
“Buckle up!” she called in warning. And got a thumbs’-up in return, as the vehicle pulled away from the circular drive.
“Well, now, that’s nice to see.”
Another voice from nowhere that startled the liver out of her.
“Oh. Mr. Sinclair. Good morning.”
He was standing behind her, on the top of three steps, his tall cowpuncher frame leaned like a vining wisteria against one of the round pillars. In his hand he carried a coffee cup, whose enticing aroma, for one who had put nothing but the dregs of toothpaste in her stomach, wrinkled her nostrils and clenched her gut with almost animal desire. Glimpsing the expression on her face, he grinned that slow, pleasant grin that could only be responded to in kind.
“Takin’ hold already,” Tom said, with what seemed to be approval.
“Well—trying to.”
Faded blue far-sighted eyes sent her a long, steady look. “Ahuh.” A moment or two passed, during which a soft breeze stirred leaves of the giant oaks overhead, and the lowing of a few cattle could be heard in the distance. “You got a few minutes free, Caroline?”
“It’s Carrie, evidently. And—yes…” She gave a short, helpless laugh and a small shrug. “I seem to have all sorts of free time.”
“Well, that’s fine. C’mon, let’s fetch you some coffee and head out t’ the back patio for a bit. I’d like t’ get t’ know you.”
She accepted the welcome gesture of his extended hand to take a step up, but with a shake of the head. “I’m persona non grata in the kitchen, I’m afraid.”
Tom’s chuckle warmed the air between them and deepened the sun lines of his face. “Met up with Emma, didja? Yeah, she can be a pistol, all right. But don’t you let her wear you down, Carrie. That’s gonna be your kitchen right soon.”
With a tightening of the lips, Caroline stopped short. “How much do you know?” she asked quietly.
“Well, now, a fair amount, I reckon. Ben does talk t’ me on occasion. C’mon, sugar, there ain’t nothin’ like that first cuppa coffee in the mornin’. And I’m guessin’ you haven’t had one yet. By the way, may I tell you how pretty you’re lookin’?”
Another spurt of laughter. “With that kind of talk, you can tell me anything. Lead on.”
At this hour of the day, in the shade of a multitude of mature trees, surrounded for privacy even on these unbounded acres by flowering hedges and rosebushes, this flagstone terrace attached to the rear of the house was one of the most sumptuous—and sensuous—spots Caroline had ever seen. Once they had braved the cook’s sulfurous glares for fresh coffee and a plate of Bismarcks, Tom escorted his guest to one of the spacious white wicker chairs cushioned in blue.
“This is lovely. Utterly lovely.” Sighing, Caroline sipped from her cup, then leaned back, crossed her ankles, and relaxed. Almost the first moment her nerves hadn’t felt on edge since she’d entered the front door—had it been only yesterday?
“Yeah, one of my favorite places.” Sun and shade dappled the scene as he squinted into the distance, at the long low buildings, the corral fences, the satisfying sense of prosperity and well-being.
“The roses could use a little work, though.”
Needing not quite so much direct hot sunlight and lots more misting and raining, the shrubs would have grown stronger and more prolific in the coolness of a Vermont summer. Caroline’s palms itched for the cool feel of good clean soil and a watering can. She could do so much here, just as she had done with that sweet, secluded garden tucked away at the back of her condo in Juniper. There, the roses had responded to her loving care by gushing forth in a multitude of blooms and scents. Lord, how she missed that place!
For a few minutes they simply sat, enjoying the view, and the fresh air, and the feeling of contentment and ease before the day’s chores must be started.
“I suppose you’ve been up and going for hours already,” Caroline ventured.
He sent her an amused glance. “Putineer. Can’t get anything done, lollygaggin’ around in bed half the day. But that Ben, he’s got me beat. Left at five for some kinda meetin’ halfway across the state.”
“He’s gone again? Oh, that wretch!” Exasperation twisted her words. Now that she had been in residence for almost twenty-four hours, she was being plagued by a whole ream of questions. Many of which concerned the daughter he had professed to love so much but whom he apparently found it so easy to ignore.
Over the rim of his cup, Tom gave her that slow, speculative survey once more. “You knew that, goin’ in, didn’t you? That, even without the call of business takin’ him hither and yon, he’s a sugarfoot.”
“Sugarfoot?”
“Tumbleweed. Wanderer. That gonna be a problem?”
Considering, she reached for a Bismarck, wondering at the same time whether happy Emma had spiked this particular one with ipecac, in her honor. “I didn’t think so—before,” she slowly admitted. “I’m having second thoughts now, and it’s all because of Sophie.”
“So you’re not sure if an arranged marriage is the way to go.”
“Not—entirely…”
“Maybe you shoulda pondered more on that b’fore you come down here,” he suggested gently.
She turned toward him, this man who was so easy to talk with, so comfortable to be around, so much a piece of the whole ranch yet part and parcel of his own skin.
“Are you married, Tom?”
“My, my, not exactly what I was expectin’. You’re fulla surprises, aren’t you, Carrie?”
“Never any interest?”
“No, ma’am. Too busy when I was younger, and then—well, things kinda got away from me. What are you gonna do about our boy, Ben?”
“Marry him, of course. It’s what I agreed to. And someone has to look after that child.”
With each slow nod of his head, the overlong black hair, attractively streaked with gray, tumbled down. He was a fine-looking man now; he must have been a finer-looking man, in his youth. “That’s good. That’s what I was hopin’ you’d say. She’s been a little lost soul for too long, dependent on the kindness of strangers. I’d like to see someone act like a genuine mama.”
“There’s so much I don’t know,” she said with obvious frustration. The cup was empty, and she was longing for a second. But this discussion must come first. “So much Ben hasn’t told me about. I don’t know how he can expect—”
“He just does, sugar. He can’t help it; it’s the way he’s made. He does all the decidin’, and figures everybody else will just go along, without any questions, b’cause he knows best.” Tom laid a light hand on her forearm. “I’ll help you any way I can. You just come t’ me when you have a question. Or when you get so mad at him you’d like t’ whack the boy with whatever stick of firewood is layin’ around. We’ll work it out. I promise you, we’ll work it out.”
There was still the matter of her own background.
“You saw the dossier I provided?” she asked doubtfully.
Tom planted one lanky leg across the other thigh, prepared to take as long as necessary with this confidential talk. “Well, now, you might say I’m sorta the consigliere of this here outfit. So Ben, he bounces a lotta ideas off me, discusses what’s botherin’ him, and so on. He wanted my opinion when he first started this mail order bride business.”
Farther out, in the mown grass, an ornate fountain sprayed its lovely glittering drops into the air and back down into a shallow pool. Refreshing. Carolyn could hear the musical tinkle from where they sat. How nice it would be to recline on that circular base and trail her fingers in the water.
The bluejays must have considered that angle, as well; several were strutting across the lawn, stabbing sharp beaks into the sod for whatever little critters might be hibernating there, and several others had decided to take advantage of this giant birdbath so thoughtfully provided by humans.
“And what was your opinion?”
“Didn’t see where he was goin’ with it, at first, and that’s a fact. He’s had his pick of lovelies around ever since—for years, and never showed an interest in marryin’ any of ’em. But he explained that he needed a mama for that little girl, and you, Miss Finch, seemed t’ fit the bill.”
“I was desperate,” Caroline finally admitted, very softly. “I had nowhere else to turn.”
Tom was eyeing her with sympathy. “Yes, ma’am. There are some tough times in life.”
From enjoying a comfortable, if not extravagant, lifestyle—with a lovely little home all her own, a good job teaching at the nearby private school, and the respect of her peers—Caroline Finch had been catapulted into a world of physical pain, emotional suffering, and creeping, alarming poverty. All due to the long-distance trucker aiming to beat a red light. The fact that the Prius which she was driving, and in which her father was riding as passenger, happened to be in the intersection at the time, made for a spectacular collision.
She was months recovering from her injuries. At least she’d gotten the chance to recover. Her father hadn’t. He had died of his massive wounds in the ambulance, en route to the hospital.
Christmas came and went, as did most of her colleagues and few friends, along with her post at Blakely Bridges College Prep. With employment eliminated, so, of course, was her insurance to pay for mounting medical bills. Nothing was left of her Prius to recover financially, nor had her blue-collar father left an estate. First to be sold was her laughably small stock portfolio; then it was necessary to cash in her pension. Last to go was the condo she had loved.
She might, of course, have sought reparations in some way. Plenty of attorneys existed for the sole purpose of helping workers regain their rights. In this case, her job. But she hadn’t pursued it. After so many months of turmoil, she was too tired to continue fighting, and the prospect of more conflict left her feeling even more exhausted.
Someone had jokingly suggested that she check out the want ads, since everything seemed to be falling apart in a big way. She’d done better. She’d found a special section with a list of men (via post office boxes, naturally) seeking mail order brides.
The rest, as they say, was history.
Her agreement to marry Benjamin Taggart, and raise his motherless daughter, had provided her with purse strings open for all contingencies.
It was that, or bankruptcy. Or worse.
“You musta been feelin’ like someone up above was out to getcha,” said Tom, after another sip of his cooling coffee.
“It was—very hard…” Even now, Caroline was hard-pressed to choke back tears. “I couldn’t even attend Dad’s funeral, because I was still only half-conscious in a hospital bed. By then, I felt that—there was—no way…out…”
Again, that gentle hand laid upon her forearm. “Sounds t’ me like you left a lotta bad stuff back there in Vermont. And that you’re ready now for a new beginnin’. A better life.”
Lashes wet, Caroline sent him a grateful glance. “I do believe you’re right, Tom.”
His smile held all the sweetness of a guardian angel “From what Ben tells me, you two have got a weddin’ scheduled in the next few days. Miss Finch, ma’am, I hope you will do me the supreme honor of lettin’ me walk you down the aisle.”
The tears no longer threatened; they were falling. Somehow, Caroline managed to smile, like sunshine after rain. “Mr. Sinclair, the honor would be all mine.”