“Oh, no, you don’t!” Lexie began gathering up the shoes and tossing them back into the cardboard box. “No more distractions, Val Champion. We need to finish this job so we can get you settled in your old room. Besides, you don’t want Tess to come back inside and catch us playing around. She’s been in a bad mood all afternoon.”
As if the words were prophetic, the slamming of the front door reverberated through the house. Tess had been in a funk since Alma Jensen had told her about selling the prized yearling bull to Brock Tolman. Tess’s decision to borrow the Jensen bull had gone just as Lexie had predicted, but she knew better than to mention that. Maybe next year, before breeding time, Tess would listen to her ideas.
Val stood and tucked a stray lock of hair behind one ear. “All right, I get the message. It’s back to work. But I’m hanging on to this.” She slipped the candy box out of sight, into an empty bureau drawer. “I want to see what’s inside.”
They finished moving the boxes in time to cook a pot of spaghetti for supper. Ruben and the two boys were invited, as well as Aaron, who had the tools and supplies needed to help Lexie set up the room for Shane. Tomorrow they’d be installing several grab bars and a frame on both sides of the toilet, as well as laying a ramp up to the front porch. Shane would be bringing other devices with him. But even with help, Lexie knew that his adjustment would take patience and courage—on her part as well as his.
The mood around the supper table was subdued. The only conversation centered around the plans for the weekend. Ruben and Pedro would be taking four bulls to a rodeo in Bisbee. Tess had offered to drive Whirlwind to a competition in Gallup, freeing Lexie to pick up Shane and get him settled.
At times like this, everyone missed Callie. Her love of good food and good company had made meals happy occasions. Now supper was just food, the spaghetti sauce too bland, the pasta overcooked, and the garlic bread store-bought. The worst of it was, it didn’t matter anymore. Eat and get on with whatever came next. That was the order of things these days. Without Callie, even sitting on the porch and watching the moon come up had lost its magic.
Lexie cleared the table, loaded the dishwasher, and went to her room. By the time she’d showered and laid out her clothes for tomorrow, she was ready for sleep. She lay in the darkness, listening to the sounds of Val rummaging in her room across the hall, moving furniture and putting things away. It was nice having Val home, she thought. Tess had always been the boss, unwilling to let go of her duties and have fun. Val was more like a real sister, more like a girlfriend. With that thought, Lexie drifted into sleep.
* * *
She was deep into dreams when she felt hands on her shoulders, shaking her awake. “Lexie!” It was Val. “Wake up! You’ve got to see this!”
“Huh . . . ?” Startled, Lexie opened her eyes and sat up. “What time is it?” she asked, still groggy.
“It doesn’t matter.” Val, dressed in the baggy tee and leggings she used for pajamas, thrust the open candy box before her. “Look at what I found in this box!”
“This had better be good, Val.” Lexie swung her feet to the floor and turned on the bedside lamp.
“Trust me, it is.” Val sat down beside her and laid the box on Lexie’s lap. “Take a look.”
The box held old photographs, some in black and white, some in faded Kodachrome that had turned to a sepia color. There were about a dozen of them. They appeared to be arranged in chronological order—but maybe Val had done that. Lexie’s pulse raced as she held the stack in her hand and viewed the images one by one.
The first picture showed two children dressed for the first day of school. They were standing on the front porch of the house, the pretty little girl looking nervous, the boy, older and much taller, with a mop of dark blond hair, appearing to comfort her. The girl reminded Lexie of Val in her old school photos. But this wasn’t Val. And girls didn’t wear those little ruffled dresses to school anymore.
“That’s our mother, isn’t it?” Lexie asked. “But who’s the boy? As far as I know, she didn’t have a brother.”
Val gave her a mysterious smile. “Keep looking,” she said.
The second photo
showed the same girl and boy, a little older, her in a swing, him pushing. In the next picture they were riding horses with the ranch house in the background. By now the boy was beginning to look vaguely familiar, but Lexie still couldn’t place him—he certainly wasn’t her dark-haired father.
There were more photos, then the classic prom picture—strapless formal, ill-fitting tux, in front of a big crepe paper heart. Lexie stared at it, the boy’s maturing features finally recognizable.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered. “That’s Aaron, isn’t it!”
“I was wondering when you’d catch on,” Val said. “Go on, keep looking.”
The last two photos told the story—the young man in the uniform of the U.S. Army. The beautiful girl poised to kiss him good-bye, a modest diamond engagement ring on her finger. The last photo was a formal portrait of a soldier—the sort of picture a girl would keep next to her bed while she waited for him to come home.
There were letters tied in a bundle—too personal and too painful to read—and, in the bottom of the box, wrapped in a lace-edged handkerchief, a small gold ring with a tiny, twinkling star of a diamond.
“I can’t believe it!” Lexie replaced the contents in the box and fell back onto the bed, gazing up at the ceiling fan. “What do you suppose happened?”
“I can guess,” Val said. “Dad happened. Bert Champion was tall, dark, handsome, and charming enough to turn any girl’s head. But what I can’t believe is that, in spite of everything, Aaron came home and stayed.”
“His parents owned the land. Maybe they needed him. Or maybe he had nowhere else to go,” Lexie said.
“Hey! What’s going on here?” Tess stood in the doorway, her hands on her hips. “How can I sleep with all the chatter you two are making?”
Val rose and held out the box. “Sit down, Tess,” she said. “We’ve got something to show you.”
Tess shuffled through the pictures without comment, but the expressions that moved like shadows across her face betrayed her emotions. After she’d finished looking, she put the pictures in the box, closed the lid, and handed it back to Val. “I always wondered why Aaron never married,” she said. “Our mother must’ve broken his heart.”