Sweet Montana Christmas (13 page)

One more set to go.

Once she'd finished, she showered and left, skipping her normal protein drink at the juice bar. As she opened the glass doors of the exit, the reflection showed Zach staring at her, ignoring the woman at his side.

Eat shit and die.

She twitched her hips with a little extra effort, to let him know what he was missing.

An hour later Sue Anne was up to her elbows in flour, sugar, and chocolate.

“What are you doing?” Julie asked as she came into the kitchen after she'd locked up for the night.

“It was slow. I figured you didn't need me. I decided to experiment. What if we offered brownies along with the fudge, truffles, and hot cocoa? Think they would sell?”

“I don't know.” Julie shrugged. “It's your store. Brownies are still chocolate.”

“That's the point. If this sells, we can move on to rich cakes or something.”

“Aren't you getting ahead of yourself? We haven't even officially opened the store.”

Sue Anne brushed a hand across her forehead, wiping off the dampness that had accumulated in her mad dash around the kitchen. “I guess I needed to work off some energy,” she said.

“Didn't you just come back from the gym?”

“Yeah.”

“Then what's up?”

 “Zach was at the gym.”

“And?”

“That's it. He was there. So was Brittany.”

“Brittany ... let me think ... ah, the real estate lady who's all put together.”

“Yep.” Sue Anne beat the batter harder than necessary.

“Let me guess...” Julie poured herself a cup of coffee from the pot that had been sitting around all day.

Sue Anne winced. “That stuff must be vile by now.”

“Well, since it's after closing, I was going to suggest a glass of wine at the Red Bird, but you've decided to create a flour cyclone instead.”

A glass of wine sounded much more fun than making brownies. She stopped beating, pulled out a spoon, wrapped the top of the bowl, and thrust it into the fridge. She could clean up later.

“Let's go.” She grinned at Julie. “My treat.”

“Like that?”

She looked down. Flour covered most of her clothes. “Give me two minutes.”

Five minutes later, they were walking over to Higgins Street, the March air chilly but without the freezing cold of the earlier months.

“So what's with you and Zach?” Julie asked as they stepped onto the bridge crossing the Clark Fork. The lights of the Wilma Theater glittered through the darkness marking the other side of the river, and the frigid droplets from their breath proceeded them as they walked.

“I don't know,” Sue Anne answered honestly. “We went on that one date, then he didn't call for two weeks. He asked me out when we at the airport, but then ... I don't know ... he seemed to lose interest.” She shrugged. “Probably for the best, because he's not planning on staying.”

“But you like him, don't you?” Julie pulled open the door to the Florence Building.

She liked him all right. It just didn't seem to be reciprocal in the way she really wanted, and she wasn't up for the pain of unrequited like.

The busyness of getting a table in the red-tinged art deco wine bar and choosing and ordering their selections allowed Sue Anne to dodge the question for a while. As soon as they were finished, she went on the offensive.

“Are you seeing Reed?”

Julie looked away and shrugged.

The clink of glasses and low murmurs of small talk filled the silent gap between them.

This was not how she wanted it to go at all.

“Look, Julie, we've been friends for a long time. We used to tell each other everything. Do we have to let a man get between us?”

“He calls me, you know.” Julie's attention was back. “Asks me about you—what you're doing, who you're seeing.” Her eyes watered. “I wish someone would care that much about me. I wish
he'd
care that much about me.”

“Why does he matter so much?”

“I don't know. He's sexy, you know.”

“Kind of.” Sue Anne compared Reed's wiry frame against Zach's strong build. In her opinion, the security officer won, hands down.

“Well, I think he is.” Defensiveness crept into Julie's voice. “But he can't see me at all.”

“Don't you think it's a little creepy that he won't let go of me? That he calls you to ask questions about me?”

“I think it's sweet.”

“Chardonnay?” the waitress asked.

Julie raised her hand.

The waitress set the glass in front of her and placed the ruby red pinot noir in front of Sue Anne.

“Thanks,” they both said.

They sipped their drinks as Sue Anne searched for a way to reopen the conversation and get to the heart of Julie's infatuation with Reed.

“I don't understand why you're not grateful that a man, any man, wants to be with you. I'd be,” Julie blurted.

“Hey, Julie, what's really up? I thought you were fine being single and dating.”

“My last sister just announced her engagement. Now all the attention is focused on me. Where I come from, if you're not married by twenty-five, you're an old maid and not much use as a woman, either.”

Julie had been raised in a small Montana town that was predominantly Mormon. Like many communities in the eastern half of the state, the morals and values were traditional, including the roles between men and women.

“Do you believe that?” she asked gently.

“I don't know.” A tear spilled from Julie's eye, and she swiftly wiped it away.

Sue Anne tried to find the appropriate response. Childhood beliefs were tough to break. Fortunately, her father had been around long enough to balance her mother's overly feminine leanings, encouraging Sue Anne to reach for her dreams, no matter how imperfect they may be.

God, she missed him. His death no longer had the power to bring her to her knees. Instead, it was a small dull ache that was simply part of her being.

“Your parents sent you to college,” Sue Anne said. “They must have meant for you to be something other than a housewife.”

“Reluctantly.” Julie played with her glass. “I came here mostly on scholarships and grant money. They thought I should settle down, marry the boy I went to the prom with, and support him as he built up his wheat farm.”

Sue Anne couldn't see Julie following that path. The problem was, she realized, Julie wasn't striking out on her own, either. Julie was tagging along on her dream.

No wonder she felt lost.

“Could we talk about something else?” Julie asked. “I feel like I'm about to burst into tears, and this is
not
the place I want to do it.”

“Sure.” But they'd continue this conversation at some point, Sue Anne would make sure of that. She owed that to her friend.

• • •

The scent of peppermint enveloped Sue Anne as she stood in her miniscule shower the next morning, sudsing up her hair. It had been a good evening. Now that she had a better understanding of what was driving her friend, she could relax a bit. This was about Julie's needs, not hers. They'd spent the rest of the evening talking about the Grizzly teams and the weather and gossiping about their friends.

“It's good to have friends,” she informed Sugar, who was impatiently waiting for her to finish whatever it was she was doing. “I mean, doggy friends are great, but you can't have the same quality time as you can with a girlfriend.”

Sugar wagged her tail, as if to say, “I can try.”

Sue Anne laughed, her spirits brighter than they'd been for a while. With any luck, she and Julie would continue to grow closer again.

Before making her breakfast, a bowl of instant oatmeal, she let Sugar out the back door. At some level, she knew she should probably make her breakfast from scratch, but after all the cooking she did, simple was the way to go.

The phone rang when she was almost ready to go to the shop. Glancing at the number, she groaned and glanced at her watch. Ten minutes before she needed to leave for work.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hello, darling. It's been such a long time since I've heard from you, I got worried.”

“I've been busy. The opening and all. Sorry. I've been meaning to call. How are you?” She poured herself a second cup of coffee and settled onto the couch. Sugar immediately jumped up beside her.

“Oh, I don't know. Nothing seems interesting down here anymore. I was thinking of coming to see you.”

“In Missoula?” This had been such a promising day a few moments ago

“Well, why not?”

“I wouldn't have much time to show you around. The store and all that.” Her head started to throb.

“I'm sure I could entertain myself while you play shopkeeper, honey. After all, they do have ranchers with money in Missoula, don't they?”

“They're more around Kalispell and Billings,” she said. There had to be a way to dissuade her mother. “We've got starving professors here.”

“Oh, don't be silly.” Her mother paused. “Although, if that's true, I really do think you should come home where you could have a chance of finding happiness.”

I had my chance, and it slipped away before I could even grab tight.

“I'll be fine, Mother.”

“I'll plan for April.”

“Mom.” She couldn't open her shop with her mom underfoot.

“It will have stopped snowing up there, won't it?”

“Yes, Mom, but I'm in the midst of planning my official launch.” Besides, she'd promised her grandmother she'd come to Seattle for a few days to help after the older woman's knee operation. That was all the time she could afford away from the store.

“Launch? I thought you were already open?”

“I am,” Sue Anne said, holding her temper like it was a half-broken mustang. “I'll tell you what. Why don't you come in May? That will be after all danger of snow has passed.” A small lie. It did snow in April, but it was rare. Maybe by May, her mother would lose interest and the whole thing could be avoided.

It wasn't that she didn't love her mother; she did. But Mom could be high maintenance.

“You could come here. It doesn't snow in Texas in April, you know.”

“Same problem, Mom. I'm preparing for a launch. I don't have time to take a trip to Sugar Land.”

She could feel her mother's hurt over the almost 2,000-mile distance. Damn it. Why did they always need to wrangle?

 “I never had the drive you do to make a go of a business,” her mother said. “Once I married your father, I seemed to have more than enough to do. Now, without either one of you, I've got too much time on my hands.”

There was an element of loneliness in her mother's voice she'd never heard before. Sue Anne had heard that men who retired often got depressed. It must be the same for stay-at-home moms when their children left.

And to no longer have a husband? Doubly hard.

She glanced at her watch.

“I've got to go, Mom,” she said. “It's time for me to go to work. I'll call you soon.” She genuinely meant it this time.

“Think about coming home, sweetie. I miss you.”

 “I will, Mom. Bye now.”

She hung up the phone with an unfamiliar sense of sorrow.

“Um ... officer, my car won't start.”

The familiar voice made Zach spin around.

Sue Anne. Her face was flushed, and her hair was windblown from the thirty-mile-an-hour wind they were having. March showed no possibility of going out like a lamb.

“What do you mean it won't start?” His voice was gruffer than he'd intended.

“Put the key in the ignition, turn, nothing.” She glared at him. “It. Won't. Start.”

“I'll get someone to help you.” He looked around. Pat was over by the baggage carousel. Tony, the third member of the patrol, was upstairs, refilling his coffee cup at the Liquid Planet.

Just as well. He didn't want either of them taking care of Sue Anne.

Before he had a chance to examine that feeling too closely, he got on the walkie-talkie.

“Got to help a woman start her car,” he said. “Can you handle the floor?”

Pat glanced in his direction. “Isn't that the chocolate lady?”

“Yes.”

Pat waved.

Sue Anne's face brightened, and she waved back.

“He's a nice man,” she said. “Do you know his girlfriend is selling her business to come down and be with him? He must be worth it.”

The implied “and you aren't” underlined her words.

Zach suppressed a growl and started walking toward the side of the airport building where the patrol cars were parked. He stopped when he realized Sue Anne wasn't beside him. He turned around to find her a few feet from where he'd left her, a frown on her face.

“What bit you in the ass?” she asked as she walked toward him.

“Shh.” He looked around. “Someone might hear you.”

“Ass,” she said again at the same volume. “You are an ass. I should have known when I found out you liked lima beans.”

What? Oh yeah. He had a vague recollection about a lima bean conversation when they first met. He was right to stay away from her. She had the strangest ideas.

“If you don't mind, I'll find someone else to help me,” she continued. “Pat treats me much more nicely than you do, and he already has a girlfriend.”

Some nagging whisper, in a voice that sounded very much like his mother's, scratched at his consciousness. He
was
being an ass.

And he didn't want to look at why, but he suspected he knew.

No matter how hard he'd tried, he couldn't get Sue Anne's face out of his memory, and that pissed him off.

She was standing right in front of him, daring him to do something. The fierce look in her eyes and determined set of her jaw let him know how angry she was.