February, 1993
Robert pulled the car into the garage and pressed the button to bring the door down. The wind was blowing snow into the garage and the temperature was still dropping. He was glad he had sent his staff home early or they would never have gotten out of the building. He hurried into the house and hung his coat on the rack by the back door.
Usually Susan greeted him at the door, but he knew how tough things had been for her the past few weeks. Perhaps she was napping. She had barely slept at all lately.
He moved through the kitchen and into the living room. She stood at the front of the house, staring out at the snow. There was a letter lying open on the table next to a stack of condolence cards. He glanced at it and recognized the handwriting. He moved up behind her and put his arms around her waist. She leaned her head back against his shoulder.
“It’s really coming down out there,” she said softly, remotely.
“I heard the weather report on the radio and sent everyone home early.” He lay his cheek against her silky hair. “I know we’ve got tickets for the symphony tonight…”
“Let’s build a fire in the fireplace and sit in front of the fire instead.”
“Sounds good to me.” He had some things he wanted to talk over with her anyway. Tonight would be a good time.
The snow was coming down even faster now. Two children, bundled into anonymity, dashed down the street. There was already plenty of snow for one to scrape up a snowball and throw it at the other as they leaned against the wind. Robert smiled, thinking about the twins and the winters when they were small.
“Remember the winter Helena made those snow sculptures?”
Susan smiled. “She had a lot of talent with sculpture. It was good of her art teacher to encourage her.”
Robert chuckled. “I also remember Melissa sneaking out one night to put a great big dick on that George Washington she sculpted.”
“You weren’t laughing at the time,” Susan recalled. “And when you asked Melissa how she knew what it was supposed to look like and she told you she got it from your anatomy texts, I thought you were going to burst a blood vessel.”
“Things were kind of crazy. Helena was crying that Melissa ruined her sculpture. Neighbors were noticing and the phone was ringing off the hook.”
Susan laughed. “And there you were hacking off that thing in subzero weather.”
Robert winced at the memory. “Not one of my better moments.”
“I suppose not.” Susan turned quiet again.
“So where is Melissa now?” Robert asked, glancing at the letter on the table.
“Sri Lanka. She says she’s with a group of businessmen on a trade mission.”
Robert snorted. He had no idea what Melissa might be doing on a trade mission. Trading hanky panky no doubt. “I wish she’d settle down someplace.”
“She’s been in Florida for some time now. Ever since Helena made it her main residence.”
“Not that either one of them seem to be there much. Helena’s always off to Houston or London, or flying out to meet that husband of hers somewhere. And you can never tell where Melissa will end up.”
“They do both have active lives. But they seem to be happy.”
Robert shrugged. He pulled Susan down onto the sofa and into his lap. “And you, Mrs. Thompson, are you happy?” He traced a line down her cheek with his finger.
She turned her head and placed a soft kiss on the end of his finger. “I’ve still got you. I’m happy.”
The words were right, but the tone wasn’t. He pulled her into a tight hug. “I know you miss your parents. Despite the fact we never got along, I’ve always appreciated the fact that they loved you dearly.”
“If I hadn’t been playing ‘horse girl’ they might still be alive,” she admitted quietly, speaking into the hollow of his neck.
“They loved to watch you show. And you love to ride. Nothing could have kept them away from you when you were close enough for them to drive to a show.”
“It just seems so irresponsible of me, always flying off to this horse show or that, just to win another ribbon. It all seems so pointless.”
Robert pushed Susan up so he could look into her eyes. “Honey, you weren’t to blame for your parents’ death. That idiotic drunk driver was. And good thing the accident killed him too.”
“Robert, don’t say things like that!”
“I mean it. I’m glad he’s dead. I didn’t get along with your parents, and lord knows they hated me, but they didn’t deserve to be killed like that, nor did their murderer deserve to live.”
“They didn’t hate you.”
“Susie, you read that will. They couldn’t have slapped me in the face any harder than that. They didn’t trust me, they didn’t like me, and they didn’t want you to have anything to do with me, despite the fact that we’ve been married thirty years now.”
There really was no way to reply to that. The will had been very specific. The house, land, business holdings and money all belonged to Susan. However, Robert was specifically forbidden to inherit any of it. He couldn’t even inhabit the house if he outlived Susan. Upon Susan’s death, everything reverted to a family trust for the twins and their potential offspring.
“I need to go check on supper. I want to make sure it’s done in case the storm gets worse and we lose power.”
It didn’t happen often, but the weather reports said this storm was going to be a bad one. Susan checked on the pot of stew on the stove while Robert made sure there was plenty of firewood and other necessities. Dark came early and Robert had a roaring fire going by dinnertime. Susan set a table for two in the family room near the fireplace and Robert poured them each a glass of wine. They settled down to dinner with bowls of stew and fresh biscuits.
“I talked to Kent Sussman today,” Robert said. Given Susan’s current mood, Robert wasn’t sure this was the right time, but he had been waiting all day to discuss this idea with her.
“Really? Is everything okay with our investments?” Susan asked.
“Just fine, honey. The way the economy is right now, it’s almost impossible to lose money. I just wanted to ask him about a couple of possibilities.”
“Such as?”
“Well, as of last spring, I fully qualify for all pension benefits from the company. No matter how much longer I work, I won’t get any additional money.”
Susan frowned. “That doesn’t seem quite right.”
Robert shrugged. “That’s the way it works. At least for the pension. They’ve always compensated me in other ways, like partial rights for those drug patents. That’s provided a great deal of extra income, but does nothing as far as changing my salary or pension benefits.”
“And those awards you’ve won.”
“The company always felt those provided additional prestige to them, while costing them little. Most likely its kept my salary lower than I would have demanded if I had been willing to move from one company to another. But they’ve always treated me fairly and provided well for me.”
“What are you getting at, Robert?”
“I’ve been thinking, Susie. I know how much you love the place in Texas. And you’ve been saying for years that it’s not the competing you love as much as raising the horses. We certainly can’t do that here. But we could move to the ranch so you could take a more active role with the horses.”
She looked at him for a moment. He couldn’t read her reaction, which was unusual. Most of the time he could read her like a book, but occasionally, she would withdraw so completely that it was like looking at a stranger.
She dropped her eyes back to her plate and took a spoonful of stew. Finally she said, “I was thinking of giving up riding.”
Robert stopped eating. He watched is wife for a moment, not speaking, just watching. Susan didn’t seem inclined to elaborate on the statement. He knew she was hurting badly. She had lost weight over the past six weeks since her parents died. She barely slept, and when she did, she frequently sobbed in her sleep. All he could do was hold her. He had tried to get her to talk about it before, but awake, she kept a tight rein on her emotions and would not speak of the accident.
She had flown to Texas on a Wednesday. The horse show was in Abilene. She had loaded the horses into the trailer and asked her parents if they wanted to ride in the Suburban with her. They declined, deciding to drive their own car the following day since her father had some patients to see that afternoon and a business meeting the following morning. She had invited Maggie who was her parent’s housekeeper as well as her lifelong friend to drive with her. They arrived late at night, settled the horses in before retiring to the small cabin at the front of the horse trailer.
The following day had been a day of hard work for her. She and Maggie rose early the next morning, groomed the horses and readied themselves for a long day in the ring. Susan had entered a number of halter classes for the yearling and mare. The riding classes began later in the day. Susan expected to see her parents in the stands by the time she first rode into the ring. They weren’t there. She had a full day, but called the ranch from a pay phone as soon as her final event was over. There was no answer.
She called Robert at home, but he had just arrived home from work and knew nothing. She decided that her parents must have had car trouble along the way, and returned to her evening events. Robert received a call shortly after she called him. Mid-morning that day, just south of Silver Valley on US 83, an old pickup truck had come barreling out of a side road. It never slowed. It never seemed to even see the white Cadillac Dr. Miller was driving. It slammed into the car at the passenger side door hard enough to push the Cadillac twenty yards into the cotton field that lined the road. It rolled twice. By the time another car passed by and witnessed the scene, both her parents and the drunk driver were dead.
Robert had no way to call Susan, but he certainly didn’t want her to hear it from a stranger. He called the airport first, but couldn’t get a flight into Abilene until the next afternoon. He could find a flight to Dallas that night, but no connecting flight to Abilene. He called Melissa, thinking that she might be able to help, and got her answering machine. He called Helena, and got an answering service. He had expected that. He explained who he was and that it was a family emergency and they assured him they would contact her immediately. Twenty interminable minutes later the phone rang. He had hoped it was Helena, but it was Susan.
Robert had to tell her. Over the phone. He ached to be there for her, but he couldn’t hide it from her. Susan went quiet. She was breathing, he could still hear that, but she wouldn’t answer him. Maggie took the phone from her and he had to explain it again. He assured Maggie that he would be flying into Abilene just as soon as he could manage it. She gave him the number of the pay phone and the number for the office of the pavilion where the horse show was being held. He asked to speak to Susan again, but and Maggie tried to put her on the phone but Susan refused. Maggie said she wasn’t crying, but she wasn’t speaking either.
Almost as soon as he hung up, he received a call from Helena. He had been blunt and impatient, not even thinking until days later that it was Helena’s grandparents he was talking about. He needed Melissa’s help to get to Abilene and he needed to get there right now. Helena put him on hold and in two minutes both his daughters were on the line.
Melissa had been distraught, but Robert didn’t want to hear it. He wanted to get to Susan. It was all that mattered to him at the moment. Helena suggested a charter flight, and Missy agreed. She told them to hold while she got on another line. She was back quickly with a name and a phone number. They would be waiting for him at a small executive airport less than twenty miles from him. He would be in Abilene by midnight. He hung up and headed for the airport, barely hearing his daughters’ assurances that they would meet him and Susan at Miller’s Bluff. Funeral arrangements were far from his main concern. Susan was his only concern.
By the time he arrived at the livestock arena, it was nearly one a.m. Susan was sitting in a folding chair outside the trailer. She stood and moved into his arms and it seemed that he could feel her grief like an extra skin wrapped around her. Maggie was there too. She had arranged for a room for them at a nearby hotel. Robert took Susan there in the Suburban.
It was as if she wasn’t even there during the next few days. She went through the motions of living. The funeral had been pre-arranged. The will was read when they returned home. Both Helena and Melissa were bequeathed a sum of money. Both were also recipients of a special trust, a continuation of the one that provided for their education. Susan received all property through a family trust where she was the beneficiary. Robert’s name was never mentioned, but it was specified that Susan’s spouse at the time of her death would not be allowed to remain on the property, all would revert to the family trust, to be held for the future offspring of Missy and Helena.
He didn’t really care about that. His career had been more than successful. He made plenty of money to provide for himself and Susan in comfort for the rest of their lives. He was more than happy that the place she grew up in, a place also special to his girls, would always remain in the family. It also occurred to him that should he die before Susan, and should she decide to marry again, the bastard would never be able to take anything away from his girls. There was something satisfying in that. No one could harm Susan or the girls. Protecting them was the only thing he and old Doc Miller had ever agreed on.
“You would be bored.”
They had been eating in silence, as they had for most of the meals over the last several months. Unless Robert was trying to cajole her into a conversation, Susan had been nearly unresponsive. He was startled out of his reverie by the sound of her voice, almost confused by what she had said.
“What?”
“You avoid going to the ranch for more than a day or two at a time. You’re always ready to come back here and get back to work.”
Robert sighed. It probably did look that way to her. It wasn’t the ranch he was trying to avoid, but her parents. He found being near them oppressive and inhibiting. Despite the fact that they had first made love there, before their marriage, in the barn, he was always terrified that Doc Miller would hear them and accuse them of something inappropriate. He took her hand. “Two things.”
She tilted her head, waiting for him to go on.
“First, anywhere you are, I’ll be happy. Also, I’ve already been talking to a few people who would like me to do some consulting work. Remember Tony Azarian? He struck out on his own a couple of years ago.”
“I remember him. You said at the time that start-ups like that were a risky business.”
“They are—if you’re investing in them. If you’re being hired to consult, they pay you. Tony has been asking me to look over some things, but I felt there would be a conflict of interest. But that wouldn’t be the case if I retired.”
“How much to they want to pay you to consult?” she asked, curious.
The number he quoted her made her raise her eyebrows. He nodded and smiled. “And that’s only one consulting job. There are plenty of others out there. I would set my own hours, and could work from anywhere. Occasionally I would have to meet with them in person, but I don’t think you would mind visits here every three months or so.”
She smiled and shook her head.
“Besides,” Robert glanced at the window with a smile. “I could play golf just about any day you wanted to get me out of your hair. Here, you would be stuck with me.”
She smiled. It was the first smile he had seen reach all the way to her eyes since her parents’ death. “I like being stuck with you.”
He slipped out of his chair, moved around the small table and knelt by her side. “I’ll be happily stuck to you whenever you like.”
She stroked his cheek and leaned her forehead down to touch his. “That sounds very suggestive.”
He brushed her lips softly with his own. “I meant it to.”
She ran her fingers through his hair and caressed his ear. “Being snowed in does have its advantages.”
“Perhaps we should enjoy them right now.” He pressed his lips to hers, kissing her softly at first, then with an encouraging response from her, more passionately.
The fire burned low and their supper grew cold. Susan stirred lazily among the cushions and quilts before the hearth. Robert’s head was pillowed on her breast. She moved her fingers through his thick hair. In the dim firelight his hair almost had the sandy blond glow from their youth rather than the mixed white and gray it had become over the years.
“What if we go down there for a few months and you don’t like it?” She asked softly.
Robert was almost asleep, his arms and legs wrapped round his wife, his body sated and relaxed. “We don’t have to sell this house right away. We could rent it out for a year. Come back if we don’t want to stay there. Or go somewhere else.” He moved his hand slowly up her bare hip to her breast. “So, you want to try it?”
“You’ll be home more? So we can do this more often?”
“You can declare a ‘snow day’ whenever you like, Miss Susie,” he drawled.
“I predict a lot of snow in Texas this year.”
Robert smiled. He was glad to have her back.
.
