she was your daughter.”
The picture of Julia, dressed in a pair of black slacks and a red jacket with black trim, materialized in his mind. The first time he’d seen her across the kindergarten room she had been talking with the teacher, her hands gesturing as she spoke. He could almost tell what she was saying by their movements. Very expressive.
He’d made his rounds looking at the pictures the students had drawn of their families and home, then at some of his daughter’s work on her desk. Although the whole time his gaze kept straying to the petite woman with Sarah Alpert, he stayed across the room. He knew trouble when he saw it.
“Ellie’s birthday is in a few weeks. I haven’t been here that long. Where’s a good place to have a birthday party?”
“All I’ve heard from Paige is about how great The Amazing Pizza is. According to my daughter, it has everything a person having a birthday could want. Rides, games, food, all indoors under one roof. She’s already working on me for hers in January.”
“Thanks. I’ll look into it.” She slid him a look. “Unless you think Paige would be upset if Ellie had hers there before she did?”
Evan chuckled. “Hardly. If I told her I was taking her there every weekend, I would have a happy camper.” He saw his daughter and Ellie heading for them. “But don’t say anything to her about it. I want to surprise her. She thinks we’re gonna have it at the ranch.”
“She doesn’t want it at the ranch?”
“No way.”
“Ellie would love to have her party somewhere like that. All she talks about is learning to ride a horse.”
“Sometimes we don’t appreciate what we have,” he said in a low voice.
“Daddy, can Ellie come spend the night tonight? I want to show her my other pets you wouldn’t let me bring.”
“I have some work I need to do when I get home. I don’t…” He swallowed his next words when a disappointed expression descended over his daughter’s face. He was being manipulated, but Paige had been through a rough nine months. Her mother had died suddenly of a drug overdose, and now her aunt, Evan’s little sister Whitney, was missing in action. “Sure. That is, if Mrs. Saunders says yes.”
“Mommy, can I?”
Julia’s gaze flitted from one girl to the other, then settled on him. “Are you sure? We can make it another time if you have work to do.”
“No, that’s okay. The girls can help me.”
“Then it’s fine by me.”
Paige threw her arms around him. “Thanks. We’d better get moving then.” She whirled around and raced toward Sugar tied to a post with Ellie quickly catching up with her.
“That quick exit is my daughter’s way of saying let’s get out of here before he changes his mind,” he said with a chuckle. “I’ll bring the girls to church tomorrow for Sunday-school class.”
“That’s great. I’ll pick her up here then.”
The girls approached with the pony. Ellie grabbed her fishbowl off the post and hugged it against her chest.
“Do you mind following me to my apartment so I can pack an overnight bag for Ellie? I don’t think that outfit will look too good for church tomorrow.” Julia gestured toward her daughter, whose jeans and long sleeve striped shirt were dirty. “It shouldn’t be too far out of your way.”
“Mommy, why don’t you bring it out later before you go over to Anna’s tonight? We have a lot to do before it gets dark.”
“I could,” Julia replied with hesitation in her voice. “I haven’t been on a ranch yet. We didn’t have too many in Chicago.”
“Daddy has a big one. It’s the best in Texas.” Paige tugged on the reins and led Sugar toward the horse trailer.
As the girls walked away, their heads bent together, Evan sighed. “I think we’re being manipulated.”
“You think?”
Evan strode toward his truck with Julia beside him. “The ranch isn’t too far outside of town. It’s on Johnson Road about three miles out. I have a sign over the entrance that says the Double P Ranch.”
“Double P?”
“After Paige. It’s all for her. Her heritage.”
Julia retrieved the fishbowl from Ellie before she climbed up into the cab of the pickup. “I’ll be there by six.”
Evan opened the back of the horse trailer and took the reins from his daughter. “We’ll still be at the barn. Stop by there, Mrs. Saunders.”
After Paige scurried to the passenger door of the truck, Julia said, “It isn’t Mrs. Saunders but Miss Saunders. I’ve never been married,” then strolled toward her dark green Ford Mustang.
Julia drove east on Johnson Road, tapping her fingers against the steering wheel in time with an eighties tune blaring from the radio. She was running a little late and hated to be since she was usually on time unless Ellie was involved.
She’d had her hand on the doorknob heading out of her apartment when the phone rang. She’d thought about ignoring it, but as a social worker, she knew emergencies occurred even on a Saturday night.
“Mommy, I need ya to bring my movie, The Parent Trap. ”
Ellie gave her directions where to find her treasure box with the DVD in it. Julia smiled at the thought of the items in her daughter’s decorated shoe box. There was a plastic horse that her daughter had informed her was exactly the kind she wanted for her birthday, a picture of the two of them together in front of the apartment building in Chicago and a stack of letters from Grandma….
Thinking of her mother brought back memories that ladened her heart with sadness. Ellie hadn’t seen her grandmother much, even though they had lived in the same town for most of her young life.
Tears misted Julia’s eyes. I’m sorry, Dad, Mom. I’m so sorry.
She swiped at her cheeks and focused ahead on the asphalt pavement.
Suddenly, a loud pop exploded in the air, and her Mustang jerked to the left toward the ditch alongside the highway. She swallowed the panic down and tried to gain control of her car. She turned the steering wheel to the right but it was too late.
Chapter Two
I’ ve never been married. In his barn Evan stabbed the pitchfork into the hay to fill his wheelbarrow. She’d said that then left him to wonder what she’d meant, especially by the almost defensive tone in her voice. A warning? It shouldn’t mean a thing to him, but it did. He would chalk it up to his curiosity, except that it was more than that.
Julia Saunders intrigued him.
Against his better judgment.
If she’d said it to warn him away, then she didn’t need to worry because the last thing he wanted to do was get involved with a woman. Not after Diane.
If she’d said it to shock him, she clearly didn’t know him well. He didn’t shock easily, not after his experiences in the war. He’d seen the scope of human tragedy.
And human joy.
Life and death, at its elemental core.
“Daddy, we cleaned out the stall. Can we ride the horse now?” Paige skidded to a stop in front of him with Ellie right behind her.
“Let me finish putting fresh hay in the last one, then I’ll saddle Bessie for y’all to ride.”
“We’re really gonna get to ride a horse?” Ellie asked his daughter as they strolled to the mare’s stall.
Evan