“Oh. Well.”
Merry sat up and looked at Grace. “What?”
“Nothing!” Grace yelped. “I hope she finds someone, too.”
Merry collapsed back to the bed and checked her email. And there it was. An emergency meeting of the board on Monday afternoon. The brochure was being printed on gorgeous glossy paper on Monday morning. Merry could force the board to take a look, she could present all her ideas for the fluff piece with the local paper, and then she’d free up some funds for renovations.
Everything was coming together. She was going to be a legend. Or at least not a wandering slacker who’d never held down a real job. And, damn it, that was good enough for her.
* * *
THIS WAS STUPID. It was pointless. And Shane had no idea what he was doing here.
His horse shifted impatiently, as unsure of her purpose as Shane was of his. Usually when Shane loaded her onto the horse trailer, there was hard work ahead. Hours of riding. Work to be done. But now they just stood here, looking over Providence as if it were dangerous.
It wasn’t, but someho
w Shane felt afraid.
He shouldn’t have come here. There was no reason.
But he finally shifted forward, and his horse walked slowly through the town.
Nothing looked different. The town was the same, but he wasn’t as quick to dismiss the buildings as he usually was.
This was their home, Merry had said. They didn’t want to leave.
The idea of it meant nothing to him. It changed nothing. But somehow her words had opened up memories of the time he’d spent here with his father. The mornings when they’d pull up so early Shane could see his breath in the air even in September. The way his dad would let him explore and poke around no matter now long Shane wanted to take. He might’ve been through the church twice already, but there was that one snake that kept escaping, sliding between the broken floorboards to hide.
His dad hadn’t been much of a talker. He hadn’t told stories about Providence. But he would point out an old horseshoe or a broken wagon wheel, and in Shane’s eyes they’d been archaeological wonders. Relics of a past filled with Native American wars and brave cowboys and shoot-outs with horse thieves.
Now Shane knew that life in Providence had been nothing like that. Any nearby Native Americans had been traders and hunters passing through, and the cowboys had been quiet, hard men who didn’t ride out in posses and probably spent more time farming than ranching. But as a kid… My God, these people had been heroes. And best of all, they’d been related to him.
Blood relations had seemed a good thing back then. At some point, it had damned them in his mind. He’d damned them along with his father.
Shane didn’t need to stop and poke around this time. The place held no romance for him, but he rode on toward the old trail.
He passed into the trees, a stiffness in his spine, jaw aching. How many hours had he spent on horseback here, following close behind his dad? Silent rides through bright green aspens just starting to edge toward yellow.
Oh, there was a road. They could have driven up to the ancient log cabin high in the trees, but that hadn’t been the point. The point had been the task of packing it up. Of learning how to travel light and load the horse just as Shane’s dad had done when he was little. Not with his father. Grandpa Bishop wasn’t a man who tolerated kids or had the patience to teach them. No, Shane’s dad had ridden with his grandfather, an old-time cowboy whom Shane had never met.
He eased his mare up the trail, so ancient and hard-packed that it was still clear of grass and brush even all these years later. They’d always come here alone, he and his dad. Alex hadn’t liked horseback riding or camping. He’d much rather have ridden a bike with his friends or raced ATVs. He’d never been here, never seen the cabin.
If Shane wanted to see Merry’s eyes light up, he could tell her about the cabin. He didn’t know who’d lived here, but judging by the state of the place twenty-five years before, it was damn old. She’d be over the moon about it. Exploring it. Researching. Solving the past like a mystery, as if finding the original owner’s name would make something right with the world.
But the world wasn’t right. He didn’t understand how she couldn’t see that. Her own father had left her without a backward glance. Was that why she wanted to see the past as romantic? Did that excuse her own father, because he must have had his reasons? He must have had troubles?
But that didn’t explain her love for this place. She’d been tricked into watching over Providence by people with an ulterior motive. How could she still see such good things? It was as if she willfully ignored all the shadows in life and claimed they were only there to set off the brightness of things.
He’d protect her from such foolishness if he could, but there was no way to do that. Because the world wasn’t right. His own role in Merry’s life was proof of that. He wished it wasn’t.
The trail drew close enough to the edge of the narrow canyon that he could see part of the stream bed where he and Merry had walked the day before, and he missed her in that moment. He’d have to bring her up here. She’d be so happy.
But then the trail was swallowed by the trees, and Shane was with his dad again. The ride to the cabin had only been about ninety minutes, but it had felt like a day long journey to a place no one had seen in a hundred years. This had been the point where Shane would settle from babbling excitement into quiet. Here in these shadows.
The sounds were the same. And he could feel his father. He could feel that memory, and then all the grief and hope of the next few years. Fuck, that man had broken them all. Him and his brother. And his mom most of all. Like Merry, she had a way of seeing only brightness, too, the difference being that she would look into utter blackness and deny the dark. She’d claim she’d seen a glimmer of something. If only Shane looked harder, he’d see it, too.
He had. For years.