Dakota Born (10 page)

“You
don't
want me to give her the loan?” There was no satisfying the old woman.

Her eyes closed. “The woman offered you the most precious item she possesses. You couldn't ask for better collateral. And she already has the building.”

“She wants to run a pizza restaurant. Just how many pizzas do you seriously think she's going to sell in a town the size of Buffalo Valley—especially in winter?”

“She won't have rent, won't have high overhead, won't have anything but her supplies and the loan on her pizza oven.”

“Yes.” He'd already heard all that and still felt the widow was a poor risk.

His grandmother shook her head again. “What I want to teach you is that looking at the bottom line can only tell you so much. A real banker makes decision with his head
and
his heart. You have an overabundance of one and are completely lacking in the other.”

Heath looked away.

“Give the widow her loan, Max.”

He straightened. “I'm Heath, Grandma. Max is dead.”

“Don't I know it,” she grumbled. “Now go,” she said, gesturing with her hand. “Go before I say something I'll regret.”

 

Gage had been cutting wheat all morning under a darkening sky. Most of the six hundred acres planted were already harvested. With the threat of rain in the air and the wind picking up speed, he decided to get the combine out of the fields before it got stuck in the mud.

He'd worked sixteen hours the day before and he'd been up before the sun that morning, hoping to beat the storm.

Not until he pulled into the yard did he notice Lindsay's car. He was instantly angry, but he understood his reaction. He didn't want to see her, had taken pains to avoid contact with her. He wasn't a man who ran away from many things, and he barely knew this woman, but she dominated his thoughts to an unprecedented—and disturbing—degree. He'd wondered what it would feel like to kiss her, to hold her, to have her as part of his life. At night when he stumbled into bed, exhausted, he couldn't close his eyes without her image filling his mind. It made him damn mad because he knew he was setting himself up for trouble. Most everyone agreed she wouldn't stay. Marta Hansen thought it prudent that they continue to search for a permanent replacement. Gage agreed. Lindsay had signed a one-year contract and in his opinion, it'd be a miracle if she lasted that long.

As bad luck would have it, Lindsay and his mother stepped out of the house at the precise moment he'd decided to head for the barn.

“Gage.” His mother raised her hand and called to him.

Briefly he considered pretending he hadn't heard her, but knew it would do no good, especially when one of the dogs came running after him, barking like crazy. He removed his hat and drew his forearm across his brow, then bent down to scratch Tramp's ears, cursing under his breath. With the border collie leaping beside him, he walked slowly toward the women.

“You remember Lindsay, don't you?” his mother asked as he approached.

“Yeah.” He nodded once, aware that he could have been more polite.

“Hello, Gage.”

“Lindsay's visiting every family that has a high-school student,” his mother explained.

“I'm new to teaching,” she said, apparently for his benefit, “and I'm going to need help from the community. Leta and Hassie have been wonderful already.” She smiled fondly at his mother.

“What kind of help are you looking for?” Gage asked, his voice gruff and unfriendly.

She ignored his lack of welcome. “I was hoping you could tell me something about yourself, something you could share with my students.”

“That's why she's here, Gage,” his mother said, frowning at him. “Lindsay wants to get to know everyone, and I was telling her about your bees.”

“I've been meaning to thank you for the jar of honey,” Lindsay added. “It's delicious.”

“It didn't come from me. My mother's the one who sent it.”

“Gage!” Leta chastised. The phone rang inside the house and she glanced over her shoulder. “I'd better answer that,” she said reluctantly. She took a couple of steps toward the door, then hesitated, looking from Lindsay to Gage. She seemed almost afraid to leave the two of them alone.

“You go on. I'll walk Miss Snyder to her car,” Gage told her.

His mother hurried to the house, leaving the two of them standing in the yard with the wind whirling dust devils about them.

“Would you be willing to talk to the class about your beehives?” Lindsay asked. She gazed up at him, eyebrows drawn together.

He was framing his refusal, but she didn't give him the opportunity. “Joshua McKenna said he'd come and talk about the history of North Dakota,” she went on in a rush. “He's apparently quite knowledgeable in that area, plus he's read quite a bit about the Lewis and Clark expedition. I'm hoping to convince Jeb McKenna to talk about buffalo—I mean bison.”

“Jeb said he would?” That surprised Gage. His neighbor to the south had lost a leg a few years back and become something of a recluse. He'd quit farming and taken up raising bison, surprising everyone with his success. But since the accident, he rarely ventured into town. Gage knew Joshua worried about his son, and Sarah had bent over backward to help her brother, but to no avail.

“Joshua's talking to him for me.”

That explained it. And it also gave him a diplomatic way of avoiding this. He already knew that her students couldn't care less about his bees. Kevin had been around them all his life and showed zero interest.

“If Jeb agrees, then so will I.”

Lindsay frowned, clearly puzzled. “Have I done something to offend you?”

So she liked the direct approach. Fine, so did he. “As a matter of fact you have. You came back.”

She scowled fiercely at him. “Do you mean to tell me you'd rather the high school just closed?”

“No. It's nothing personal, Miss Snyder, but I don't want you here.” His words were carried off by the wind, but anger flared in her eyes, and Gage knew she'd heard him.

“Why should you care one way or the other? You don't know me.”

“I don't
want
to know you.”

She blinked as if he'd so utterly baffled her, she no longer knew what to say. The storm broke just then, and she turned around and ran straight for her car. Thunder crashed overhead, and the rain fell in fat, thick drops that beaded on the dry, dusty soil.

Her car door slammed. She was dry and safe, but Gage stood in the downpour and watched as she drove out of his yard. By the time he dashed into the house, he was drenched to the skin.

He hadn't even removed his hat before his mother laid into him. “I want to know what you said to Lindsay.”

Unaccustomed to that tone of voice from his soft-spoken mother, Gage just stared at her.

The rain pounded against the roof, and Leta raised her voice. “Answer me, young man.”

“I'm thirty-five, Mother, and could hardly be considered a young man.”

“Then quit acting like a nineteen-year-old.”

Gage hadn't fought with his mother in years, and would prefer to keep the peace now. As far as he was concerned, what he had or hadn't said to Lindsay Snyder was none of her business. “I didn't say anything.”

“Yes, you did. I saw the way Lindsay raced to her car. You insulted her, didn't you?”

“If she took exception to—”

“I won't have it! You were rude to her, and I won't have it. Do you hear me?”

Gage had hardly ever seen his mother this angry. Her face was red, her eyes blazing and she held herself ramrod straight.

“Mom—”

“You'll apologize.”

“The hell I will.” Gage wasn't going to let his mother dictate his actions.

Before their disagreement could turn into a full-fledged argument, he left the house. He'd rather stand in the pouring rain than fight with his mother over a woman like Lindsay Snyder.

By dinnertime her mood hadn't improved. She didn't speak to him while she placed their meal on the table, then pointedly stalked out of the room when Gage and Kevin sat down to eat.

“What'd you do to make Mom so mad?” Kevin asked as he pulled out a kitchen chair.

“Nothing,” he barked at his younger brother.

Kevin raised both hands as if to protect himself. “Sorry I asked.”

Gage reached for a biscuit, then froze as his mother marched back into the kitchen with a bouquet of purple prairie wildflowers she'd cut that morning. “Take these with you.”

Gage's eyes narrowed. “I'm not going anywhere.”

She left the room again and, relieved, Gage returned to his meal. He hadn't taken more than two bites when his mother was back, carrying her purse and the flowers.

“Kevin,” she said, “would you kindly drive me into town so I can apologize for my son's rudeness?”

“Ah…” Kevin looked helplessly from his mother to Gage. “I was hoping to drive over to—” He stopped in midsentence when Leta glared at him. “All right,” he agreed, grabbing a last bite of biscuit and standing up.

Gage could only imagine what his mother would say to Lindsay. Furious, he bolted to his feet and threw his napkin onto his plate. “Dammit all to hell.” Leta was going to make his life miserable until he gave in and did what she asked.

He stomped out of the house, pausing only long enough to grab the truck keys from the peg by the door. At least the rain had stopped.

His mother hurried after him, slogging through the mud. “Take the flowers with you.”

He didn't look back as he marched across the yard. “The hell with the flowers.”

His anger sustained him all the way into town. Even when he'd parked outside the teacher's house, he had to draw several deep breaths in an effort to cool his temper.

What annoyed him the most was knowing that his mother was right. He owed Lindsay an apology, and given the opportunity he would've offered her one. He resented being pressured into it.

Climbing out of the truck, he walked up her porch steps and leaned on the doorbell. The dogs barked wildly—sounded like useless little critters. He moved his hat and stabbed his fingers through the tangled mass of hair, determined to make the best of this. He'd say his piece, then leave.

The door opened and Lindsay stood on the other side wearing shorts and work boots, with her ash-blond hair tied up in a kerchief, and a hammer and chisel in her hand. She seemed as shocked to see him as he was to find her looking like…like a construction worker.

“Gage?”

He stiffened. “I'm here to apologize.”

Her face relaxed, and she opened the screen door for him. “Come in.”

He stepped inside and the dogs greeted him as though he were a long-lost relative. He decided they might be useless—sure weren't much protection—but they
were
kind of cute. Petting them gave him the opportunity to look the house over. He was impressed; what had, a few weeks earlier, been a decrepit old house was now a home. Her curtains and furniture, a dark-green rug, some lamps, photographs and prints on the clean white walls—it all made an incredible difference.

Frowning, he noticed the fireplace. Apparently she'd been hammering away at it. “Something wrong with your fireplace?”

“No.”

“Then why—”

“No reason.”

“If you're dismantling the fireplace, there's got to be a reason.”

She set the hammer and chisel aside. “Are you here to apologize or to question my remodeling efforts?”

Remodeling?
Gage sincerely doubted that, but she had made one good point. He wasn't there to chitchat. “As I explained, I came to…apologize.” The words didn't come easy, nor did he mention that it had been at his mother's insistence. “I was rude to you earlier this afternoon.”

“Yes, you were.”

She certainly wasn't cutting him any slack.

“Why?” she asked. “What have I ever done to you?”

He didn't know how to answer. He couldn't find a way to tell her that every time he saw her or thought about her, he got angry. So, instead, he told her what he suspected. “You aren't going to last. All you're doing is raising everyone's hopes. Once reality hits, you'll move on. You'll abandon the community.”

“I signed a contract for one year and I intend to honor that.”

“Like hell you will.” He was angry again, so angry he couldn't keep from raising his voice. “You won't make it past the first snowfall.”

“Like hell I won't.” She was yelling now, too. “I'm a woman of my word.”

“Why'd you come in the first place? What's Buffalo Valley got that you can't find in Savannah?”