The Brands Who Came For Christmas Read online

Chapter 4

  Maya walked into the familiar comfort of the farmhouse with a crooked smile on her face. She sailed past her mother and her sisters, ignored all their questions and demands, and floated up the stairs to her bedroom. She was asleep almost before her hair dampened the pillows.

  Twelve hours later, she gradually came to. It was a dull, foggy sort of awakening, and it came with a pounding head and a queasiness in her stomach that grew worse by several degrees when she tried to move. “Damn,” she moaned. “Why am I so…?” And then memory came. And she sat up fast, despite the rush of dizziness. “Oh my God, what have I done?”

  “That’s the best question I’ve heard in a while.” Maya turned toward the sound of her mother’s voice. Vidalia had been sitting in a chair by the window, but she rose now. Her waist-long ebony curls were pulled around to one side in a ponytail that trailed down over her shoulder. She wore jeans that showed off a figure no mother of five grown daughters ought to still have, and a denim blouse with flowers embroidered at the shoulders.

  “Oh, Mom.” Maya put her hand to her head and fell back on the pillows limply.

  “You wanna tell me about it?”

  Tears burned at the backs of her eyes, so she kept them squeezed tight. “I don’t know what got into me.”

  She heard soft steps as her mother crossed the room, felt the shift of the mattress as Vidalia sat down on its edge. A comforting whiff of her mother’s violets-and-vanilla body wash reached her senses. As fresh as all outdoors. “Come on, sit up. Sip this.” Her voice was soothing, and her cool hand stroked the hair away from Maya’s face. “I had a feelin’ you’d be sick this morning. As little as you touch the stuff, even a few beers can make you sick.”

  Maya forced her eyes open and saw that her mother’s other hand held a glass of what looked like tomato juice and smelled like the spice aisle at Gayle’s Grocery. She grimaced, but she sipped. And when the tiniest relief seemed to coat her stomach, she sipped some more.

  “Now I want you to stop beatin’ yourself up over whatever happened last night,” Vidalia said.

  “You wouldn’t say that if you knew what happened last night.”

  Her mother smiled. “Well, now, let me take a stab at it, hmm? You got the birthday blues. Lord knows, child, I’ve had ‘em, too. They hit you any time you turn an age that ends in nine. Except for nineteen, of course, which doesn’t count.”

  Maya frowned and lifted her head.

  “Drink,” her mother said. So she drank. And Vidalia went on. “People tend to think these crisis points hit us at the round numbers. Thirty, forty, fifty. But they don’t. It’s the dang nines. By the time you turn thirty, you’ll have had a year to get used to the idea of turning thirty. But twenty-nine—well now, that’s a shocker. All of a sudden you’re looking at thirty seriously for the first time.”

  Draining the glass, Maya set it aside.

  “Better?” Vidalia asked.

  “Stomach is. Head still aches though.”

  “Give it time to work. Old family remedies never fail. Now, where was I?”

  “Trying to make me feel like I haven’t done something horrible.”

  “Oh, right.” Again, Vidalia smiled. “So you had a couple of drinks last night And a handsome cowboy came along, and you had a good time with him. It’s not the end of the world, you know.”

  Swallowing hard, lowering her gaze, Maya said, “I took him up to the falls, Mom. I…we….” She bit her lip. “God, what was I thinking?”

  Stroking her hair, which was her specialty, Vidalia said, “You had sex with him?”

  Maya nodded, feeling as guilty as a schoolgirl caught cheating on a final exam.

  “Hon, you’re twenty-nine years old. And sex is a celebration of life. It’s acknowledging that you’re not just a good, decent upstanding, respectable person, but a woman. A real live red-blooded, glorious woman. And that’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with that. I mean, all right, technically, it’s a broken commandment, and the Reverend Jackson would probably disagree with me. But God forgives, daughter. And He expects us to slip up now and then.”

  Maya looked up, sniffling. “You really think so?”

  “Of course I do. Making mistakes and learning from them is part the whole point of the human experience. So long as you used protection, there’s not a thing in the world all that terrible about a grown woman….” She let her voice trail off, probably because Maya’s eyes had flown suddenly wider and her hand had clapped to her mouth. “Maya? Honey? You…you did use protection. Didn’t you?”

  Her mother pulled Maya’s hand from her mouth. “Didn’t you ?’’ she repeated.

  “I…I don’t…know. I mean, it was dark, and I was….”

  “You were what?”

  Maya swallowed hard. “I was…drunk.”

  Vidalia blinked. “How drunk?” When Maya didn’t answer, she slammed her hands to her thighs. “Maya, I’d have never let you leave with him if I thought you’d had more than a beer or two!”

  “I just…wasn’t thinking last night. God, Mom, I don’t know if he used protection or not!”

  Closing her eyes slowly, her mother sighed. “I think that’s something you might want to find out, child.”

  Nodding hard, Maya got out of bed and looked down to see that she was still wearing the same clothes she’d had on last night. Her white blouse had mud stains here and there, and her jeans were wrinkled. But there was a new addition to her ensemble. Caleb’s denim shirt. “I’ll shower, and then I’ll go talk to him. He’s staying over at the boarding house.” Then she paused, and a smile tugged at her lips. “He said he wanted to see me again.”

  Her mother bit her lip, saying nothing.

  “I really like this man, Mom. I mean…he’s not what I thought I wanted…not well-off or respectable or any of that…but there’s something about him.”

  Sighing softly, Vidalia managed a smile that looked shaky. “Well now, that’s nice, hon. That’s real nice. You go shower now. Go on.”

  Nodding, Maya hurried into the bathroom.

  She used the hair dryer, so her brown hair was bouncier and seemed thicker than usual. She wore a pastel blue dress with an A-line skirt and a tab collar. And she even added a hint of makeup, something she so seldom did that she had to borrow it from Selene’s room. She looked in the mirror and nodded in approval. She looked perfect. Respectable. Good. Even pretty. If she had time, she thought, she would bake some cookies or something, to show off how good she was at that. Cooking was something she loved and was very good at. But that would have to wait. Surely Caleb would be staying on for a little while. Even though she’d been drinking last night, she’d still felt something—something extraordinary—between them. He had to have felt it, too.

  He had to.

  She took the beat-up family station wagon and drove into town, taking her time, humming along with the country song on the radio. Then she pulled into the tiny lot at the boarding house. And the first whisper of doubt crept along her spine when she didn’t see his rusty pickup parked there.

  Still, she got out and went through the front door to the big screened in front porch, and across that to the inner door, where she rang the bell.

  Ida-May Peabody answered in a moment, greeting her with raised eyebrows. “Why, Maya Brand. Aren’t you looking nice today! Whatever brings you here first thing in the morning?”

  “A guest of yours…left something at the saloon last night,” Maya said, holding up the shirt “I’ve come by to return it.”

  Mrs. Peabody blinked. “But hon, I’ve only got two folks staying here. Maddy Sumner’s cousin, Lois, who’s here for the wedding, and Ol’ Hank.”

  She shook her head. “This man would have just checked in late last night,” she said. “Caleb Cain?”

  The woman shook her head.

  Fighting a rising sense of unease, Maya rushed on. “He’s about so tall, dark hair, blue eyes, early thirties or so….” But Mrs. Peabody just kept on shaking her head from side to side
, very slowly. “Are you sure?” she asked, almost brokenly.

  “Sorry, Maya. No one like that has been near the place.”

  Closing her eyes slowly, drawing a deep breath, Maya said, “Thanks, anyway, Mrs. Peabody. I must have misunderstood him. Sorry to have bothered you.”

  “No trouble, dear.” Mrs. Peabody closed the door and left Maya standing there, holding the stranger’s shirt and feeling a little bit used. A little bit betrayed. And a whole lot disappointed.

  “I have no one to blame but myself,” she muttered, drumming up the will to turn and walk back to her car. She got in, tossed the shirt into the passenger side and told herself she shouldn’t be crushed over this. She should chalk it up to experience, hope to God there would be no life-threatening or life-altering repercussions, and move on.

  She should.

  So why did she have the feeling that wasn’t going to be as easy as it ought to be?

  Three weeks later, her mother dragged her to an appointment with Dr. Sheila Stone, an ob-gyn in the nearby town of Tucker Lake. And while she knew these things were necessary, Maya hated every second of it all the same. Still, the doctor—a stern, handsome redhead with close-cropped hair and wire-rim glasses—took blood and urine samples, and subjected Maya to a thorough exam and a handful of advice.

  “I assume you realize the chance you took by having casual sex with a man you didn’t know,” Dr. Stone said. “I’m not here to lecture you on morality or even stupidity, Maya. But for the love of God, use a condom next time.”

  “I told you, I was drinking. This is totally out of character for me, and it won’t happen again.”

  Her face softening, Dr. Stone nodded. “We all do dumb things sometimes, I suppose. Are you worried?”

  “Shouldn’t I be? Wouldn’t you be, Dr. Stone?”

  “Yes, I guess I would. And my patients call me Dr. Sheila.”

  “I don’t plan to be one of your patients,” Maya said. “This is a one-time visit.”

  Removing her gloves, Dr. Sheila went to the sink to wash her hands. “Actually, Maya, the truth is you’re going to have to come back a few more times.”

  Maya blinked. “I am?”

  “I’m afraid so.” She tugged paper towels, wiped her hands dry. “Certain venereal diseases or pregnancy should show up right away, of course. But for HIV… well, you’re going to have be tested again in six weeks, and after that in six months, and after that—”

  Maya held up a hand. “This is insane.”

  “That’s what I try to tell people. It is insane—especially when a ninety-nine-cent item in a foil wrapper would prevent all the worry. Well, most of it, anyway.”

  Sighing, Maya said, “What if I can find the man?”

  The doctor shrugged. “Well, if he’s willing to be tested, and if his test came back clean, and if he was the only person you’d had sexual contact with—then we could rest assured you hadn’t contracted the virus.”

  Maya drew a deep breath, held it a long moment, and sighed. “Then I suppose I should swallow my pride and contact him.”

  “I suppose you should.” Turning, she walked to the counter and glanced down at the urine sample to which she’d added chemicals. She was very still for a moment.

  “Dr. Sheila?” Maya asked, sliding off the table to pull on her jeans and button them. “What is it? Is something wrong?”

  Turning, the woman looked at her. “We’re going to need to confirm this with the blood work, Maya…but, um…according to this…you’re pregnant.”

  Maya stopped moving. She was standing there with a paper gown on top and a pair of jeans on the bottom, in her sock feet, and this woman was saying something in a foreign language. It made no sense. It did not translate. It was not comprehensible.

  Dr. Sheila came forward and gripped Maya’s arms. Gently she led her to a chair and eased her into it. “Are you okay?”

  Blinking against the shock, Maya tried to talk, but all that came out was a whisper, and it wasn’t what she’d planned to say at all.

  “I want my mother,” she rasped.

  “I’ll get her.”

  Caleb spent several tense days at his father’s bedside, racked with guilt over having been out of town when his dad needed him most. But he was back home now. And if this episode had taught him anything, it was that you couldn’t run away from your duty. Your heritage. Your responsibilities. He was expected to play a certain role in life, and he damn well would.

  Running away in search of something simpler, something better, had only brought on disaster. And the pipe dreams he’d been indulging in that night? About settling down, about setting up a law office in a little one-horse town. About living there in a farmhouse with vines up one side, and a big dog, and maybe a duck pond in back. About marrying a daisy-fresh wife who had freckles on the bridge of her nose and looked great in blue jeans. They were just that—pipe dreams.

  It was just as well this had happened when it had, if it had to happen at all. Before he did something foolish. Before he forgot who he was.

  Still, every now and then he would find himself staring out at a rainy night sky and remembering…thinking again about that incredible woman he’d met and the night they’d spent together. Maya Brand. Even her name was one of a kind.

  Had she been disappointed to find him gone the next morning? Or just angry? He wondered if he’d hurt her, and hoped he hadn’t. A little voice told him he knew damn well he’d hurt her. It had been her first time. Women took things like that to heart. Still, she would be fine, a woman like that. Smart, capable. Surrounded by family. She would be just fine. And sooner or later she would find a man far better for her than he was. Far better.

  It was good he’d had to come home, before things got too complicated between them. As it turned out, it had been just a brief interlude. One night of….

  What?

  That was what bugged him. Try as he might, he couldn’t quite think of that time with Maya as a one-night stand or a meaningless sexual encounter between two consenting adults. He couldn’t.

  Maybe someday he would go back there and….

  But no. No. It wasn’t meant to be. He had to be here, taking care of his father’s interests. Setting his own future into motion. She had to be there, in that little town, with her sisters and her mom. He would probably forget her soon. She would forget him, too.

  It was for the best.

  Damn, why did that sound like such a lie?

  Maya spent the next five weeks just trying to absorb the unavoidable facts. First, that she was pregnant, unmarried and destined to become the most scandalous member of her notorious family. All she’d worked for—the image she’d tried so hard to cultivate as the respectable one, the responsible one, the sane one—all of that was gone—or would be the second word got around town about her condition.

  The second fact staring her in the face became cruelly obvious when Mel insisted on trying to locate Caleb Cain of Tulsa to tell him that he was going to be a father. There was no such person. He’d lied to her.

  So there it was. And she wallowed in it for those first five weeks, and even for a while after that. She stopped going out, stopped helping at the saloon. She stopped dressing, for the most part. Spent her days in sweats or her nightgown. In the mornings she was too ill to feel like dressing, and in the afternoon, she figured, why bother? She did all her usual domestic tasks, which gave her some comfort. Baking cookies and bread. Eating cookies and bread. Sewing and quilting and knitting. But, for the most part, she moped.

  Until one bright, sunny morning on the first day of June, when Vidalia marched through Maya’s bedroom door, flicked on the bright overhead light and said, “Time’s up, daughter. Now get out of that rocking chair, get a smile on that face and put some clothes on.”

  Looking up, her knitting in her hand, Maya blinked in the light. She liked it dim. Dark. It was easier to dwell on her ruined life that way. “Leave me alone, Mom.”

  “I will not leave you alone.” Vidalia wen
t to the closet, flipped hangers until she found a sunny yellow dress, then tossed it onto the bed. “I’ve left you alone for long enough already. Thought I’d give you time to absorb this. And I have. But like I said, time’s up.”

  She walked to the rocking chair, took the knitting from Maya’s hands and placed it in the basket on the floor. “No more feeling sorry for yourself, girl.”

  “What would you suggest I do instead?”

  “Get up on your feet and act like the daughter I raised instead of some watercolor wimp. You’re a Brand, Maya. And you’ve been given a gift more precious than any other you’ll ever know. A child. You should be down on your knees giving thanks, not pouting as if you’ve been cursed. You want my granddaughter to think she’s unwanted? Hmm?”

  “How do you know it’s a girl?” Maya asked.

  Her mother drew her brows together tight and tipped her head to one side, giving Maya the look that said she’d asked a foolish question. Then she gripped Maya’s arms and drew her to her feet. “Come on. Into the shower. If I can handle five of you all by myself, you can certainly deal with one when you’ve got all of us to help you.”

  “I know that.”

  “Then act like it. You don’t need any man to get through life, daughter. If anyone knows that, it’s me, and if anyone ought to know it, it’s any daughter of mine. You’re all you need. You.” She poked Maya’s chest. “And her,” she said, laying a gentle hand on Maya’s belly. “That’s all. Your sisters and I are an added bonus. Now march in there and shower, then dress and get your tail down to the saloon. Wound-lickin’ time is over.”

  Her mother was right, Maya realized. She had been wallowing in a nice thick mire of self-pity. She’d been lied to, used and left behind. She was pregnant and alone and scared to death, and everything she’d ever wanted out of life suddenly seemed impossible.

  But it wasn’t. Not really. She could bounce back from this. Somehow. After all, her mom had, and in a time when things had been much harder on single mothers than they were today.

  She pressed her palms to her belly. There was the baby to think about now. What kind of a mother would she be? Depressed, moody, sullen all the time? Or alive and loving and happy?

  Sighing, she looked down. “Your grandma’s right, little one. Mamma’s all through sulking now. Promise.”

  Vidalia nodded in approval. “Good girl.” She left Maya to get her act together.

  So Maya showered, and she dressed. She was glad her mother had chosen the sunny yellow dress, rather than something snug fitting, because she felt as if her belly was already beginning to swell just a bit. Her mother insisted that was all in her imagination, but she felt it all the same.

  There was a tap at the door, and Maya turned, yellow dress in place, hair still bundled in a towel. Selene stepped in, grabbed her hand and pulled her into the hall. “You’ve gotta see this!” she said.

  “Slow down. Selene! What’s going on?”

  But Selene ran, tugging Maya behind her, down the hall, into her own room. Then she stopped and pointed at the little table in the corner. It was covered in odd items, that table. Shells, rocks, candles. And, right now, those tarot cards Selene was always playing with. Two of them lay face up on the table.

  Maya eyed the cards, because Selene seemed so excited about something, but they made little sense to her. One looked like a clown juggling, and the other was a nude woman with some sort of baton in each hand.

  “So?” Maya asked, looking at Selene.

  “Maya! You’re having twins!”

  Maya tried not to laugh, she really did. But it escaped her anyway, in a big gust, when she couldn’t hold it in any longer. She held her belly, and snorted and roared so hard her sides hurt. So hard her eyes watered. If felt good to laugh. Thank God she had an insane kid sister to keep her amused.

  “This isn’t funny!” Selene said. “I’m telling you, it’s twins, Maya. Look at the cards!”

  Maya glanced at them again, still trembling with laughter, but neither card had any babies on it, much less two of them. She got her laughter under control, gave her sister a gentle hug and said, “I love you, you flaky little weirdo. Twins.” And, laughing some more, she went back to her own room; then, grabbing her shoes, she headed downstairs.

  It was good to have a family, even an oddball crew like this—or especially an oddball crew like this. She’d needed a good laugh to snap her out of her well of misery. It was time to take charge of her life again.

  She needed things. Baby furniture and clothes, a bigger vehicle, just for starters. She needed to get a nursery ready in this old house. There was so much to be done. So many plans to make.

  For the first time she began to allow herself to get a little bit excited about the notion of being a mother. And the image her mother had painted for her, of another little girl in the family, warmed her inside. She missed having little girls running around this old house. She’d been a second mom to her sisters, being the oldest of them.

  And now maybe she would have a little girl of her own.

  One thing was for sure, this baby would be the most spoiled child in seven counties if Maya’s sisters and mother had anything to say about things. The most protected, too. And the most loved.

  She smiled, shaking her head yet again at Selene and her silly notions. But between the two of them, Vidalia and Selene had managed to snap her out of her state of melancholia. There was so much to be done! She’d wasted far too much time already.