Getting Married Again

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“That’s not—”

“I’ve had enough advice for one night, Mom. See you in the morning.” Jackson ignored his mother’s pleas to return and raced out to the parking lot.

“WE THOUGHT YOU WEREN’T COMING,” Marguerite announced upon opening the door to Birdie’s house, wearing a plunging, lacy dress Mary considered more appropriate for Madonna than for a plump, widowed retiree.

“It’s not even eight-thirty.” Mary tried to keep her tone even as she stepped inside, although she longed to snap at someone. It wasn’t Marguerite’s fault that Mary was late to the group’s weekly bridge game.

Mary wasn’t upset at Jackson for delaying her, although he hadn’t wanted to listen to the rest of what she had to say about his relationship with Lexie. Mary’s mood had more to do with her anxiety about her own love life. She had recently made a decision to return to dating.

For nearly twenty years, Mary had avoided thinking about men as anything other than friends. She’d warmed her toes at night with her grandmother’s hot-water bottle while she kept her mind busy worrying about her kids and the business she’d started with Jeremy’s life insurance money. She had the Painted Pony to run, gray hair she’d earned every right not to color and an occasional whisker she plucked off her chin. She thought men, romance and sex were a thing of the past.

That all changed a few months ago when Sirus Socrath, Jackson’s former Hot Shot superintendent, stopped to help Mary change a flat tire alongside the road. She’d been driving into Boise to pick up supplies, when a tire blew. While she was struggling to loosen the last lug nut, Sirus had pulled up.

“Having trouble?”

“I think this one lug is rusted on.” Mary gaped at Sirus’s long, lanky frame. From that angle, he looked like the cock-of-the-walk, as her mother used to say. Mary blinked, unused to thinking of Sirus as anything other than a hardworking man of the community and her friend. In that moment, she saw him for the first time as M-A-N as if she were W-O-M-A-N. Mary shook her head and dismissed the odd feeling. She was a grandmother, for heaven’s sake.

Sirus knelt next to her on the road’s dirt shoulder and loosened the lug nut with ease. His hands were as long as the rest of him, his arms strong from years of fighting fires.

“Not rusted. It just needed a man’s touch, you know?” Sirus’s faded blue eyes gazed directly into Mary’s and his lips turned up ever so slightly at the corners.

Was Sirus Socrath flirting with her? Mary reminded herself that she was fifty-five, and Sirus was sixty if he was a day, and twice divorced to boot. But that didn’t stop her heart from pounding as it hadn’t for years.

A few days after the flat tire incident, Sirus showed up at Birdie’s on bridge night even though he’d never been there before. He claimed to have come to replace Smiley, who could barely see the cards anymore, although Mary imagined Sirus joined them to spend more time with her. Still, nothing changed between them. Sirus didn’t seek Mary out or call her, try to hold her hand or kiss her. Sirus never gave Mary any reason to think he wanted her to be anything more than a friend. Yet, Mary was sure he did want more.

Either that or she was going insane.

Perhaps she’d swallowed too much river water, or maybe she was finally completing menopause. It didn’t matter what the cause was. Once Sirus lit the dormant spark within her, Mary couldn’t seem to put it out.

The seed had been planted—she’d been alone too long.

Mary stepped inside Birdie’s house, feet thumping on the hardwood floor as loudly as her heart pounded now in her ears. She could feel Sirus’s eyes upon her. He had kind eyes. Patient eyes. Eyes that let her know he’d wait for Mary to decide when she was ready for him.

Ready for him? She’d been alone for nearly two decades. She could take care of the house, her car and her business. But she’d forgotten how to take care of a man.

Mary had promised herself she’d work up the courage to ask Sirus back to her house for coffee tonight, the same as she’d been promising herself every Sunday night for the past month. They’d sit on the couch and talk. She’d ask him how he’d come by that scar on his forehead. Later, when she’d drunk some coffee that she planned to lace with a little confidence-building whiskey, maybe she’d work up the courage to kiss Sirus.

Mary couldn’t look at Sirus now, for fear she was suffering from an overactive imagination and Sirus would be looking at her as just a friend. If he’d awakened these longings accidentally, Mary wasn’t sure what she’d do.

There were snacks on the green felt-covered card table and mints in a crystal bowl that Birdie insisted was from France, though Mary had seen bowls just like it at the dollar store in Boise. The television blared. Someone, probably Sirus, had scooted Birdie’s brocade wing chair up close to the set and Smiley perched on it, leaning so close to the screen that Mary thought the old barber might fall into it.

Sirus and Smiley had been sharing Sirus’s small cabin since Smiley drove off the road two years ago and nearly killed himself. They weren’t related, although Smiley was old enough to be Sirus’s father. But neither of them had any family close by. It was just the way of the community to take care of its own.

Sirus gazed up at Mary from his seat at the card table and sent her a smile that warmed her to her toes.

Would you like to come over to my house later for coffee?

The question remained unvoiced.

She was such a coward. She couldn’t even risk a little rejection from an old friend.

Mary slid into a metal folding chair across from Sirus. She’d found true love once, over thirty years ago with Jeremy Garrett, a Hot Shot, and had been blessed with that love for more than a decade. Then, eighteen years ago, Jeremy died while fighting a wildland fire. It had very nearly broken her heart when Jackson followed in his father’s footsteps. Every time Jackson went out on a fire, Mary smiled bravely and prayed for his safe return.

“How are you this evening, Mary?” Sirus asked, bringing her thoughts back to the present.

The blender whirred in the kitchen. Marguerite and Birdie were making the strawberry daiquiris they loved so much. A quick glance at Smiley showed him engrossed in a television reality show. This was about as private as the evening was going to get.

“Jackson came home today.” Mary tried to send Sirus a smile, but smiling at Sirus had become a self-conscious act for Mary, as if she were a teenager with an unrequited crush.

“Yeah, he stopped at the office. I didn’t get much of a chance to talk to him.” No longer able to keep up with the younger firefighters, yet still a prime physical specimen, Sirus now worked at the National Interagency Fire Center as an incident commander. He coordinated fire attack crews in the field. That meant working nontraditional hours and days. It wasn’t unusual for NIFC to be staffed round the clock during fire season.

Sirus kept his warm brown gaze on Mary, while his large hands shuffled the deck of cards. His face was as long and narrow as the rest of him, but not sharp. Nothing about Sirus was sharp, not even the faint scar along his temple. Carrying himself tall and proud, he was a handsome man in his own way. Mary liked looking at him. He was a sturdy man, too, in both stature and personality. You could rely on a man like Sirus.

“Jackson’s staying at my house.” She’d known Sirus for years without so much as a stray spark of interest flaring between them. Why now? She was happy with her life the way it was. Wasn’t she?

“How’s he doing?”

“He’s…” Mary frowned, struggling for the right word. Her son was still heartbroken over Lexie, but there was something else about his demeanor that didn’t seem right, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. “I don’t know. He’s quiet. You know Jackson, he’s always got something to say.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m probably just imagining things.”

Sirus considered her words for a moment. “Does he seem—”

“Look at this, Sirus,” Smiley interrupted loudly, pointing at the television screen. “This fool’s going to eat raw snake eggs.”

Sirus shrugged apologetically and obliged Smiley by acknowledging the grossness of the stunt.

In the meantime, Mary’s mind wandered. What if Mary kissed Sirus and liked it? Or worse, what if she were brave enough to take off her clothes and climb into bed with him someday? What if the sex was great? Her smile would give it away. Everyone in Silver Bend would know she was Sirus’s love toy.

And if their lovemaking fell short of greatness…

Disaster.

Sirus was her bridge partner. If she began a relationship with him and it failed, she’d have to look across the table and see his disappointment on a weekly basis. Men were always dissatisfied when it came to sex. They didn’t get it enough. They didn’t get it with someone young enough. They didn’t get it wild enough. And Mary didn’t even want to think about the extra pounds and wrinkles she’d accumulated since the last time she’d been with a man. Sirus was bound to be disappointed with her. She’d never be able to play bridge again.

The television segment finished and Sirus’s eyes drifted down to Mary’s hands and then back up to her face. “You must be happy that Jackson’s home.”

The temperature in the room rocketed up five degrees. “Words cannot describe how I’m feeling right now.” Guilt. Disappointment. Lust.

Lust? Mary had to be imagining Sirus’s interest, even if she wasn’t imagining her own.

In the kitchen, the blender ground to a halt.

“Why don’t you shuffle?” Sirus set the cards in the middle of the table. “Your hands move with such grace, it’s a pleasure to watch.”

Mary could picture her hands moving, all right. Her cheeks flushed with heat. She let her eyes follow the pearly snaps on Sirus’s worn western shirt down to the edge of the table, wondering about Sirus’s body. Long legs, long arms, long fingers…

She was depraved!

Mary’s eyes snapped up to Sirus’s. He chuckled, and it sent another tingle of awareness through her. Mary coughed, trying to break this spell he had over her.

“Here come the refreshments,” Marguerite said as she brought in a tray full of the icy pink drinks.

“What’s so funny?” Birdie asked, carrying a plate of cocktail wieners and cheese cubes, each speared with a toothpick.

“Jackson came home,” Sirus said.

“Grew a decent beard in Russia,” Smiley nearly shouted, not turning from the television.

“Smiley, turn that down. You’re not deaf,” Birdie instructed, holding her small frame as tight and precise as a bird.

Smiley did as he was told. Most everyone in Silver Bend did what Birdie wanted. She’d been married to the town mayor for years and then taken the position herself after his death.

“Never mind that. Did he see Lexie?” Marguerite sat down next to Mary and leaned her buxom qualities over the table.

“What did he say about the baby?” Birdie probed.

Mary blinked, then shook her head and made a weak attempt at a smile. “I don’t know.” Although Lexie didn’t talk about it much, she had confirmed when asked that the baby was Jackson’s. That knowledge had only made folks in Silver Bend more interested in Jackson’s reaction.

Marguerite settled back in her chair. “He’ll do the right thing.”

“Should come in for a shave,” Smiley added.

“She’ll take him back, of course.” Marguerite took the cards from the middle of the table and began to shuffle. The many rings she wore sparkled in the lamplight.

Mary looked away, not wanting to know if Sirus was fascinated with Marguerite’s hands, too. She’d never noticed his interest in her before. What if she’d never noticed his interest in Marguerite, either?

“It’s none of our business, anyway,” Sirus said.

“Hogswaddle. We care about them. Besides, they were meant for each other. I’ll tell Jackson tomorrow that he should send flowers.” Birdie’s words rang with authority.

“Flowers. That’s so sweet,” Marguerite crooned. “Maybe I’ll stop by later in the week to see how they’re doing.”

“Let’s just mind our own affairs and play cards.” Sirus didn’t sound happy.

It was all Mary could do not to look at Sirus. He was right, of course. But that wasn’t the way it was in the tight-knit, small community of Silver Bend. If Mary wanted to explore these unsettling feelings Sirus had aroused in her, she’d receive just as much advice and meddling as Lexie and Jackson were about to get.

She was too old for this.

CHAPTER FOUR

“YOU COULD HAVE CALLED to warn me he was coming home,” Lexie gently chided Mary the next afternoon as she sat in a booth and rolled silverware in paper napkins. The baby she carried was oddly still.

Lexie and Heidi came by the Painted Pony on Monday mornings to help Mary put the place back in order after a hectic few days of weekend traffic. Mary’s business was steady, but she, like everyone else in Silver Bend, ran lean in terms of crew. Although Lexie used to be a cook and waitress for Mary, the discovery of her pregnancy and the complications that made it high risk had forced Lexie to stop working altogether, swallow her pride and apply for assistance.

“Heidi, don’t do that.” Mary turned to Heidi, who had stacked glasses in a pyramid at the other end of Lexie’s table without Lexie even noticing.

“I know what I’m doing.” Heidi grinned. “Just a few more and I’ll break my record.”

“If any glasses break, I’d like them to be broken by paying customers,” Mary chastised, but some of the sting had vanished from her tone.

Heidi’s smile was nearly as powerful as her father’s.

“Heidi, just because you started wearing a bra doesn’t mean you can bend the rules.” Lexie tried to tease Heidi into doing what her grandmother had asked.

“Mo-om.” Heidi rolled her eyes. “Have I ever broken a glass?”

“Yes!” Mary and Lexie chimed in.

“That was a long time ago.” Heidi delicately placed another glass on her pyramid.

“Two months,” Lexie pointed out.

“Last June,” Mary clarified. “Go put those in the dishwasher with the other dishes you’re supposed to be washing.”

“And if you break any, you’ll be grounded until you’re old enough to wear a girdle,” Lexie added.