Lauraine Snelling (11 page)

“You pull the back ones tomorrow, and we’ll talk about it then.”

“Not me, not de back feet.”

Maggie grunted as she stood upright. Not her either, but what was the choice?

ELEVEN

L
ike he’d always known, moving was the pits. August heat didn’t help.

Gil watched the movers drive off. Even though they weren’t going far, it had taken them twice as long as they said it would, and they were already over the cost estimate.

“You ready, Dad?” Eddie had Bonnie on a leash which seriously curtailed her sniffing of the grass along the driveway. She planted all four feet and leaned in the direction she desired to go. When he tugged on her leash, she turned her head to look at him as if he just didn’t get it. There was something important to smell where she wanted to go. “Bonnie, come.” With a put upon look that bassets had perfected through the ages, she turned and followed him to the van.

“You suppose that’s what they mean by bassetude?” Gil asked.

“Better than flat basset. If she’d gone flat basset, we might not have gotten her in the car for a while.” Eddie handed the leash to Maria and rolled his chair onto the lift. As well trained as she was, even Bonnie hit a stubborn streak once in a while, and picking up a sixty-five pound lump of flat basset was not easy. Gil could attest to that.

Once everyone was loaded, Gil took a moment to stare back at the house. The cleaners would be in tomorrow, and as soon as the decorator brought rental furniture in for show, it was ready to be put on the market. His Realtor assured him he would get top dollar and an easy sale.

He tossed and caught his keys and climbed into the van, feeling absurdly adventurous, or, if he were realistic, crazy. They were heading to Bakersfield for a few hours to let the movers do their job, and then he’d hired someone to come in and make up the beds, unpacking enough so they could pick up their life again without the battle of the boxes.

Besides, they had to get back to normal quickly—he had a business conference in Chicago in two days, and he was the keynote speaker.

Late that afternoon when they arrived at their new home, the moving truck was gone and the beds were set up and made. The furniture was in the correct rooms, towels in the bathrooms, and the bare bones of the kitchen put together. While there were stacks of boxes in the garage, the house was livable.

Maria opened cupboards in the kitchen and shook her head. “Muy bueno. This is amazing. I will start dinner.”

“No, check the fridge.” Sure enough, the meals he’d ordered were in place. Hiring a moving specialist had indeed paid off. One of the perks of working too many hours.

“Is the swimming pool ready?” Eddie asked after zipping around the entire house, looking at everything.

“Sorry, it’s not, but supposedly by next week.” The barn wasn’t finished either, but the fence around the yard was in place so Bonnie would be able to roam in a safe area. As he strolled through the house, Gil admired the views which would be far lovelier as the plants and trees grew and filled in the space. It would be a comfortable house. “Let’s eat out on the deck,” he suggested when he returned to the kitchen.

“Sí. Ten minutes. Tell Eddie to wash up.”

“Where is he?”

She nodded to the door. “Out with Bonnie. They looking around.”

Gil went through the French doors to the redwood deck with steps down to the tiled pool area. One side of the deck now had a long sloping ramp, as did the front entrance. Bonnie and Eddie were playing on the lawn which had been sodded right after Gil signed the initial papers. Her bark rolled across the pasture. They had far more room to play here, and once the barn was finished and the path paved to it, it would open even more room. Space, he’d never owned so much space in his life. He’d never even dreamed of owning so much land. He heard a wild call from the sky and shaded his eyes to look for the hawk. He found it circling on the thermals to the west. Little more than a month ago he’d first started considering a horse for his son and already almost all was in place. Would you call it divine providence or the answers to a small boy’s prayers—or both?

“Dinner’s ready. Come get washed up.”

Eddie waved and threw the ball one more time, then turned and propelled his chair up the slight grade to the ramp.

“We’re eating outside?”

“Seemed like a good idea.” He walked beside Eddie to the grouping of all-season wicker furniture. The umbrella shaded the place settings for three. Two tall blue pots held waving grasses and trailing flowers. While they’d looked nice at the other house, they were spectacular here. Maybe he’d have a barbecue built in here. There was plenty of room.

A breeze cooled the air as the sun dropped behind the mountains. Bonnie snored under the table, waiting for her usual offerings from Eddie’s plate. Rotisserie chicken, pasta salad, corn/black bean salad, and fresh rolls. Maria had made tall glasses of lemonade with wild berry syrup added and a sprig of mint on the glass rims.

Listening with one ear to Eddie talking to Maria, Gil’s mind flitted back to the many moves his family had made as a child. His dad had a bad case of wanderlust until finally his mother got tired of all the moves and said that was it. If her husband wanted to see what was over the next hill, he’d find her right there in a little house with a fenced-in yard in a small town on the edge of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. And he better send money on a regular basis because his two children had to eat.

None of those moves went like this one today. And while his father had died during one of his frequent wanderings, his mother was now set up in a comfortable house in a retirement community where she played all the bingo and bridge her heart desired, along with making sure the other residents kept busy with volunteer work. He and Eddie went to see her once a month. He knew she’d like this new place, and as soon as he built an apartment for Maria so they had a guest room, he’d bring her to visit.

Eddie’s question brought him back to the present.

“Sorry I was woolgathering, what did you say?”

“I asked when we might start looking for a horse.”

“Not until the barn is finished. I thought we’d ask Carly to help us find a dependable one.”

“She’ll say build a round pen.”

“A round pen?”

“An enclosed area where we can work the horse at first.”

“I thought perhaps at first we’d stable him at Rescue Ranch so you could have plenty of time to get used to each other. I have to find someone around here to take care of him too.”

“I was thinking that if I work with crutches and braces again, I could stand enough to groom most of him and feed and—”

“You want to do that?”

“I think so. It’s just so much easier to get around in the wheelchair.”

“As far as that goes, I can feed and such when I’m home, but I don’t think Maria wants to take on a horse too.”

Gil looked toward his housekeeper to see her shaking her head. “I know nothing about horses.”

“I don’t know much, but I’m sure we’re going to learn.”

“No problem, I’ll teach you both.”

“I’m sure you will.” Gil took out his PDA and clicked to the calendar. “I’m flying the red-eye to Chicago tomorrow night so we need to make sure all is well here before I leave. Eddie, you have a dental appointment tomorrow at two forty-five. I can drop you off, run some errands, and pick you up. All right with that?” Gil had learned fairly recently that if he prepared Eddie for things in advance, his son handled them much better. Maria was the one to point that out, she’d learned it years ago. Sometimes he wondered how he would ever make up for all the years he was gone more than he was home.

“Just cleaning right?”

“Yes. Unless you want Maria there to wait with you?”

Eddie gave him an oh-dad look.

Gil raised his hands, palm out. “Just checking.” When Maria got up to begin clearing the table, he helped her, carrying the tray into the house. “Thanks.”

“I did nothing but set the table.”

“Right. I hope you like your new kitchen.”

She glanced around it, a half smile on her face. “It eez beautiful, how could I not like it?”

“If you want some things changed, just let me know.”

“Sí. You could bring in some of those boxes marked kitchen.”

“Done.” He carried in three boxes and set them on the center island. “More?”

“Enough for now. Gracias.”

“I’m going to be setting up my computer and such in the den if you need more.”

“You go.” She shooed him out of the kitchen with flapping hands.

Gil was under the desk connecting cables when he heard Bonnie’s toenails and saw Eddie’s wheels.

“Dad?”

“Here.” He waved a hand above the desk. “Give me a minute.”

“I have my computer ready for you to do the same.”

“Okay.” He checked to make sure the cables were all connected to the right ports and surge protectors and worked his way out from under the desk. “Now to see if it all works.” He pushed the start button and rechecked the cables to the printer and copy machines while he waited for the machine to boot up. When the proper images showed on the screen, he clicked to desktop and breathed a sigh of relief. No matter how many times he’d done this, he still feared a meltdown. “I think this room will work real well.”

The U-shaped setup with the computer facing the wall and his desk clear to work on, all in rich ebony wood, took up a good part of the room, but no matter. Bookshelves would be built on both sides of the full wall section, and there was plenty of room left for the love seat and wing-backed chair around an ottoman that doubled as a table. The leather wingback with a good lamp beside it was his favorite reading chair. Although the room for Eddie to maneuver his wheelchair was tight, it was still manageable.

“Okay, let’s do yours.” As he walked down the hall, he thought of the pictures and artwork he’d hung on the walls in years past. Pictures of Eddie when he was little, his mom and dad, aunt and uncle and cousins. The wedding photos of him and Sandra were stored in a box to be taken out some day or perhaps not. Although he knew if Eddie started pushing to know more about her, he’d bring out the pictures. Maybe he should have had them out all the time, just said they were divorced, irreconcilable differences. But then he’d have to tell him why his mother never came around—and he couldn’t. He almost stopped. Come to think of it, his attorney hadn’t gotten back to him this week like he said he would with a report on his finding of Sandra. Gil promised himself to call the man back tonight. This had gone too long.

“Looks pretty plain in here.” He glanced around the walls that in the other house had been nearly hidden by Eddie’s posters of sports heroes, shelves with books and games, a computer desk, and a bar along with hand weights for strengthening his arms. Eddie’s tendencies toward neatness made use of baskets on shelves along with the old adage “a place for everything and everything in its place
.”

While Gil was neat by choice and effort, Eddie had inherited his near obsessiveness from his mother. Fortunately he hadn’t inherited the judgment that went along with Sandra’s views on perfection.

Gil checked to make sure all the cables were in place, then crawled under the desk to plug them in. “You did a good job.”

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist, you know.”

“True, but I know a lot of people who would panic at trying to set their whole system back up.” Gil turned the desk and pushed it back against the wall. When he stepped away, he saw Eddie rubbing his head.

Immediately his heart rate picked up. “Something wrong?”

“Not much. I just have a headache, that’s all.”

“How long has it been going on?”

Eddie shrugged. “Awhile but I thought it would go away.”

Gil crossed the room and laid the back of his hand on Eddie’s forehead. “No temp.”

“I’m not sick, I just have a headache.” A touch of crankiness underlined his voice. Eddie hated getting attention for being sick.

Gil stared at the scar on his son’s neck from where they had put in the shunt when he was an infant and had kept enlarging it as he grew. The shunt plugging up could indeed cause a headache. He scanned his memory. How long since it had been checked?

Eddie shrugged. “Don’t make a big deal out of it. Lots of people get headaches.”

Lots of people don’t have spina bifida and a shunt to drain the excess cerebral fluid off either.

TWELVE

A
t least he didn’t attack
.

Breaking Free stood at the far end of the round pen, ears flat back, staring at the man who had entered the pen. Trenton James stood perfectly still, just inside the gate, watching the horse. When the horse finally flicked his ears and shook his head, the man took two easy steps forward, stood and waited.

Maggie watched both horse and man, wondering at the patience of each to outdo the other. Before prison, she’d acted first and thought later, or, as her ex-husband Dennis described her, she was impulsive. Waiting for food, waiting to be counted, waiting . . . for freedom. She’d learned a lot about patience.

When the horse’s ears shifted, the man took two more steps, but when the horse threw up his head, the man stepped back two steps. Breaking Free watched a moment, lowered his head, and played with his lower lip.

Mr. James nodded, backed up, and left the pen, the horse watching him all the while.

“Why did you quit?” Maggie asked.

“Because he now knows that men won’t always chase him and hurt him. Leave him out there awhile before you bring him in. He can use some sunshine.”

“Look at him.”

Breaking Free had walked a few steps away from the fence and front knees buckling, rolled, on to one shoulder and over on his side. The horse grunted, rolled, and kicked before surging to his feet and giving a mighty shake.

“He’s learning to be a horse, not a machine.”

“I see that. I feel like a mother whose kid got up again and took three steps this time instead of one.” A stinging pain pricked her stomach. Charlie had been eleven months when he took his first long “walk”—to Dennis. She’d snapped the photo, and it had resided under her mattress ever since she was incarcerated. Years ago, she’d forbidden herself to look at it anymore; it caused too much of the past to rise up, but at least she always knew it was there. Sometimes she just put her hand under the mattress to feel the crinkle of it.