Heartache Falls (14 page)

“No. That was our second disabled dog, Draper.”

“You had two disabled pets?” LaNelle asked.

“We did. I admit it got to be a pain. That’s why when we finally lost Draper, Mac swore he was done with pets.”

But that vow hadn’t lasted, had it? He had a new dog. A springer spaniel mix. Vows didn’t seem to mean as much to Mac Timberlake as she had believed.

More than ready to change the subject, Ali addressed Nic. “Have you found a photo of Jackie Kennedy’s wedding gown, yet?”

“Oh, yeah. I found it and Princess Grace’s and Liz Taylor’s.
People
magazine did a best-and-worst wedding fashion issue, and it’s archived. So here you go.” She turned the laptop screen around so that the other women could see. “I still say I win.”

“What’s the contest?” Celeste asked.

Sage gestured toward the box at the end of the table. “Ali brought her wedding gown to donate for the cause, and it started an argument about which celebrity had the most beautiful wedding gown.”

Ali expected Celeste to join the other women in viewing the photographs and debating the question. Instead she walked to the end of the table and lifted the wedding gown from its box. “Oh, Alison, this is lovely.”

It was yards and yards and yards of satin and Chantilly lace and tiny white pearls. The style appeared dated today, but twenty years ago she’d been on the cutting edge of fashion. “I knew it was mine the moment I saw it.”

“Tell me about that day.”

“Oh, Celeste, I don’t want to—”

“Indulge me, dear.”

What was this, trip-down-memory-lane day?

Celeste fluffed out the dress, spreading out the train. “Where did you buy this?”

“Marshall Field’s on the Miracle Mile in Chicago. One of my sorority sisters went with me and we made a day of it, shopping for my gown and the bridesmaids’ dresses. She was my maid of honor at our wedding. She told the salesclerk to bring something sophisticated but romantic. I knew the moment I saw it that it was my dress. I put it on and I felt as glam as Jackie, Liz, and Princess Grace put together.”

“You were happy.”

“I was so very happy.”
That day, and for a long time afterward
.

Celeste touched her arm. “Are you certain you want to donate your gown to our quilt project?”

“I’d love to see us make something beautiful out of it. It’s hopeful, in a way. That something old and tired can be transformed into something new and wonderful. Does that make sense?”

“It makes perfect sense.” Celeste squeezed her hand. “The wedding gown quilts the Patchwork Angels have made reflect the positive energies of Eternity Springs, this special place where we are blessed to live. When I place a wedding gown quilt on a bed in Angel’s Rest, it’s as if the fabrics we used, the stitches we made together, offer love and hope and dreams, friendship and laughter and compassion to those who come to this valley in pain.”

“That may be a little too much symbolism for me, Celeste. My marriage is in serious trouble. I don’t know how much hope the fabric from my wedding gown has to offer. In the other quilts we did, the fabric
represented marriages that lasted forty and fifty years.”

“You don’t think a marriage that has lasted more than twenty years has value? You don’t think that a marriage that lasts forty or fifty years has rough spots?”

“I …” Ali snapped her mouth shut. All marriages had rough spots. She knew that.

“You need to remember …” Celeste’s voice trailed off as she looked inside Ali’s gown and pursed her lips. “What do we have here?”

She reached inside the bodice and pulled out a little stick-on green shamrock. Seeing it, Ali caught her breath in surprise.

The scenery in Rocky Mountain State Park took one’s breath away. On this last full day of Mac’s first visit to Denver, she’d taken him up to Estes Park for a drive through Rocky Mountain National Park. At his suggestion, she’d packed a picnic basket and they’d found a spectacular, clover-covered meadow on which to spread their blanket and enjoy their lunch
.

“It simply doesn’t get any better than this,” he said, stretching out and resting his weight on his elbows, his long, denim-clad legs crossed at the ankles. “Beautiful scenery, beautiful weather.” He glanced over and gave her a steamy look. “Beautiful woman.”

Ali grinned. “Don’t even think about it,” she warned. They’d been sleeping together for more than a year now, and she recognized that look. “This meadow only seems isolated. We could be overrun by a station wagon full of tourists looking to get an upclose and personal look at nature.”

“Hey.” He rolled over onto his side and allowed his gaze to slowly trail over her. “What’s more natural than a big horny goat in a mountain meadow?”

“That’s bighorn sheep, city boy.”

“No.” He reached out and traced the vee at her neck with an index finger. “I’m definitely a goat.”

Ali shivered at his touch and considered cutting the tour short and finding a room to rent near Estes Park. “I wish I were going back with you tomorrow. I should have gone to summer school.”

“No, it’s good for you to have this time with your dad. I like him. It’s clear that he loves you a lot.” He hesitated a moment, then asked, “What has he said about me?”

The nervousness in his expression touched her. “I think he likes you. I know he enjoyed debating the death penalty with you at dinner last night.”

“When he wasn’t eyeing his steak knife as if he wanted to plunge it into my heart.”

Ali laughed. “You have to understand that he’s very protective of me, and he’s always been a little chilly to the guys I’ve dated.”

“Chilly? I’d say
icy
better described it.” Mac took hold of her hand and brought it to his mouth to press a kiss against her palm. “That’s okay. I can’t blame him. It’s only natural for him to resent me because I am the luckiest man on earth.”

“Lucky?”

“Yep. Don’t look now, Ali, but we didn’t spread our blanket in just any old field of clover. These are four-leaf clovers.”

“Oh, really?” she replied, playing along
.

“That’s right. Perfect setting for a guy to get lucky, don’t you think?”

“Stop right there, Timberlake. I already told you that you’re not getting lucky here.”

“See, this is why I’m gonna be the lawyer. Whereas you are considering only one definition of the phrase, I have something else in mind. For now, anyway.”

Mac kissed her palm again, and then the sensitive skin on the inside of her wrist, as he stared deeply into her eyes. “I love you, Alison Michelle Cavanaugh. I love your strength and your compassion and your wisdom. I love your heart. I love your beauty, inside and out.” His lips twitched as he added, “God knows I love your body.”

“Oh, Mac.” Ali melted at both his words and the emotions shining in his eyes. “I love you, too.”

His expression grew both serious and intense as he rolled up onto his knees. Keeping hold of her hand with his left hand, he reached into his pants pocket with his right
.

Ali’s breath caught and her heart began to pound as he knelt on one knee before her. “Ali, be my wife, my lover, my lucky charm.” He pulled a lovely diamond solitaire from his pocket and said, “Ali, will you marry me?”

When she said yes, Mac Timberlake got lucky in a field of clover high in the Colorado Rockies—in every sense of the word
.

In Nic Callahan’s house in Eternity Springs more than two decades later, Ali Timberlake fingered the little shamrock and sighed. “Mac used to give me shamrocks. It was kind of our special symbol. He
talked my maid of honor into putting that there so it would be next to my heart when we said our wedding vows.” She paused a moment, then added, “I haven’t thought of shamrocks in a very long time.”

“Perhaps you should think about that while you’re working on our next quilt.” Celeste patted her arm, then handed her a pair of scissors and addressed the group. “I’d like to suggest for our next wedding gown quilt that we use the pattern called Hopes and Wishes.”

“That’s a lovely choice,” LaNelle said.

Hopes and Wishes and shamrocks. Ali slipped the point of the scissors into the seam at the waist. Definitely something to think about.

The Patchwork Angels meeting continued, drawing Ali into the pleasure of friendship, and it wasn’t until the meeting broke up and Lori Reese approached her with a question that returned her thoughts to topics less pleasant. “Ali? Could I talk to you for a few minutes? About Chase?”

“Sure, honey,” she said, though she swallowed a sigh. She was having enough love-life trouble of her own. She really didn’t want to get tangled up in the romantic foibles of her children. Yet she knew that was exactly what she had to deal with now. “I drove over tonight since I had so much to carry. Want to go for a ride with me?”

“In the Beamer? Of course! Can we put the top down?”

“It’s definitely a ragtop evening.” Ali waited while Lori spoke with her mother, explaining the plan. Lori had dated Ali’s son Chase during the two summers he’d spent in Eternity Springs working on the Double
R Ranch. Last fall when Chase returned to Colorado University and Lori went away to college in Texas, the two agreed to date other people. From what she’d observed and Sarah had shared, both kids were okay with the arrangement. This summer Chase had an internship out of state, so he wouldn’t be spending his break in Eternity Springs. She hoped Lori wasn’t brokenhearted. She adored Lori, but she already had enough heartache on her plate.

On the way out to the car, she tossed Lori the keys. “Will you drive?”

“Woo-hoo!” the teenager said. “Okay if I take the scenic route?”

“Sounds great.”

Ali decided to let the girl take the conversational lead, so she settled back into the leather seat, rested her head against the headrest, closed her eyes, and enjoyed the evening air as Lori made the drive around Hummingbird Lake. She relaxed and was feeling quite content because Lori kept the conversation to innocuous subjects such as Ali’s car, Sarah’s latest hairstyle, and the contest taking place at the Mocha Moose to pick the birth date of Sage Rafferty’s first child—never mind the fact that Sage wasn’t pregnant.

It wasn’t until Lori pulled the car to a stop in front of her own house that she broached Chase’s name. “So, Ali, about Chase.”

Ali stifled a groan. Just barely.

“He asked me to remind you that you thought the intervention you guys had with Sage a while back was a good idea.” Lori grinned, stepped out of the car, and finger-waved. “Bye.”

“Wait!” Ali called after her. “What are you talking about?”

“See you tomorrow, Ali. Thanks for letting me drive your smokin’ car.” The young woman all but ran into her house to escape any further inquisition.

Yet as Ali drove back toward the carriage house, she knew what she would find. Her maternal instinct on high alert, she parked her car in the Angel’s Rest garage and walked toward the carriage house.

“Surprise!”

The sound of Chase’s voice was no big shock. Hearing both Stephen’s and Caitlin’s voices stopped her in her tracks. An intervention?
This is bound to be fun
, she thought wryly.

Nevertheless, she opened her arms and said with complete sincerity, “My babies! I am so happy to see you.”

EIGHT

Mac drew down the zipper of his judicial robe as he walked into his office at the end of a long work day. He was tired both in body and in spirit. As the trial had dragged on, he’d realized he didn’t like celebrity lawyers any more than he liked celebrity ballplayers. He didn’t like celebrity trials, and he absolutely didn’t like the paparazzi and tabloid reporters who apparently didn’t believe in the word
no
.

Nor did he like going home to an empty house.

He hung his robe on the wall tree, then loosened his tie and walked past the large cherry worktable piled with his books. He sank into his leather office chair just as a knock sounded on his door. “Come in.”

The door opened and Mac’s clerk, Mike Reed, entered with Gus. Mac eyed the dog and felt a little of his tension ease. “Hey, boy. Did the vet get you fixed up?”

Mike released the leash, and the dog slowly ambled over to Mac—a stark contrast to his ordinary dash and bound—then plopped down at his feet. “Gus has a respiratory infection. I have medicine. He’s good for tonight, so start it in the morning.” Setting two blue plastic prescription bottles down on Mac’s desk, he
added, “Doc says he should be just as good as new next week, but if he’s not, bring him back.”

Mac scratched his pet behind his ears. “Thanks for taking him for me, Mike. Not exactly in the job description, I know.”

“Hey, my dogs are my children. I’m glad to help. Poor boy was downright pitiful.” Jerking his thumb over his shoulder, he said, “I saw Louise headed out the front door. She said we’re done for the day?”

“Yes.” Mac picked up one of the prescription bottles to read the label. “I think we all need a night off to recharge. Go do something fun and relaxing, then show up here ready to work at eight.”