The Challenge(54)

“Are you free tomorrow night?” he asked her.

“I would check my dance card if I had one. I think I can squeeze it in.” He smiled at her, enjoying the banter between them.

“I don’t know what you’re doing here, Beth, but I’m glad you are. Does seven-thirty sound civilized?” She nodded with a smile. “Inviting a woman to dinner at five sounds so gauche.” They both laughed. She had a feeling that he’d had a sophisticated life once upon a time, but not lately. As she had, he had taken to the mountains and made a life here. She had the impression that he’d be good to talk to. If nothing else, he was smart and fun.

They had dinner at the diner the next day, and were the last people to leave. They went to the Cowboy Bar afterwards for a glass of wine. Harvey was extremely well read, interested in many subjects, and read The New York Times every day, and The Wall Street Journal when he had time. He liked the outdoors and he cared about people. He thought Beth was the most unusual, interesting woman he’d ever met, and she thought the same about him.

“What are you doing here?” she asked as they finished their wine. She was curious about him.

“I think a lot of the people here, the newcomers anyway, are runaways, from a past life. I took this job because I love the outdoors. I was married when I was in the SEALs. I was young. I was gone all the time. My wife knew what to expect when we got married. But living it is something else. I was gone a lot. Too much. She died of a brain tumor. I got home three days before she died. We had three wonderful last days together, but I realized that I didn’t want that life anymore. I almost missed her death. But more important, I missed her life.

“I never married again, and crazy as it sounds, Fishtail suits me. It’s peaceful. I feel at home on the mountain. If I never share my life again, I’ll be happy here alone. And if I do, I won’t miss anything next time. I’ll be home every night sitting by the fire, like Santa Claus with Mrs. Claus, waiting for Christmas.” It was a sweet image. “I needed to stop running. And for some reason, I stopped running when I got here. It works for me, although that must sound very dull to you,” he said simply.

“Actually, it doesn’t,” she said. “I think it suits me too. I didn’t expect that. But I understand now why my ex-husband wanted to move here. He wasn’t the right man for me to do that with. But I’m happy here on my own. I’ve been a warrior to get what I wanted until now. I’ve fought everybody and everything, including myself, to get where I wanted to be. But I don’t want to fight anymore. I want to sit still for a while, and do something different.” She had only realized recently that she was tired of fighting. She had understood it while Juliet was lost on the mountain. “If I need a minute of excitement, I’ll go to New York. I’m not turning in my passport, just my sword.”

“You make a lovely gladiator,” he said, smiling at her, as they left the Cowboy Bar. “It’s funny that we should meet here. There are so many other places where we could have met along the way. Destiny is strange.”

“It is, and interesting too. I don’t believe in chance meetings. I think we meet people for a reason, at the right time,” she said, looking up at him, her eyes full of questions.

“I believe that too,” he said, as they walked back to his car with the Park Service emblem on it, and his name: Chief Mack. He drove her home and they sat for a minute in the official car. She couldn’t forget that he had brought her daughter home from the mountain. “I had a really nice time, Beth. I’m glad you came back, and that you’ll be spending some time here. I’d like to do this again. Do you like to dance, by the way?” She smiled.

“Yes, I do. But I haven’t had a chance to in years. I went to dancing school, and I used to dance with my father, and, it sounds ridiculous now, I was a debutante once upon a time.”

He smiled broadly. “I was an escort at a debutante cotillion a million years ago. There’s a place where you can dance in Billings. Kind of an old-fashioned bar with a dance floor. Would you go with me sometime?”

“I’d love it,” she said, beaming. “You see, no chance meetings. Thank you for tonight.” It was so perfect that long after she’d been a debutante in a forgotten world and he’d been an escort at a cotillion, they should meet in Fishtail, Montana, a town of four hundred and seventy-eight people. The symmetry of it was perfect.

She waved as she slipped into her house and he drove away.





Chapter 16


Tom and Marlene’s mad passion continued all through October into November. They met every day and spent most of the day in bed, ravishing each other’s bodies and touching each other’s souls. He had never been as in love before, and she had loved Bob very differently. What Tom and Marlene shared was raw passion. They lay in bed talking about it one day.

“Do you really want to wait a year after Bob’s death to tell the kids?” he asked her. It seemed like an eternity to him. He wanted a life with her.

“It’s only nine months now,” she corrected him. “And yes, I do want to wait. They wouldn’t understand. And I don’t want to spoil it with them.”

“I hate lying to them,” Tom said, and kissed her neck. “These things happen to people. They fall in love, even after they loved someone else. The boys’ father is not here anymore. You are and you have a right to be loved and have someone love and take care of you. I want to take care of you and them too. Wouldn’t Bob have wanted that for you, and for them?”