Sins of Summer Read online

  Dear Reader,

  In so many of my previous books, the hero and heroine triumph over the hardships of a westward-expanding America. I’ve enjoyed writing my Western romances, hope you’ve enjoyed reading them, and still intend to write more of them.

  Yet lately I’ve been longing to tell a story from a more recent time in our history, the period between World Wars I and II, years when young lovers faced a different kind of hardship: the Great Depression. Drama and romance flowered then as well. Gangsters, every bit as nefarious as western outlaws, made violent headlines while young people danced to new jazz rhythms that shocked their elders. As always, strong family ties were the keys to survival.

  With Hope is the first of at least three novels I’m writing set in the 1930s. It tells the story of a woman trying to keep her farm and misfit siblings together after her parents’ deaths, and of the strong, kind-hearted man who helps her but can’t offer her the one thing he wants to give her the most.

  I hope you’ll enjoy it when it comes your way in the fall of 1998.

  With thanks to all my loyal readers,

  Dorothy Garlock

  Books by Dorothy Garlock

  Annie Lash

  Dream River

  Forever Victoria

  A Gentle Giving

  Glorious Dawn

  Homeplace

  Lonesome River

  Love and Cherish

  Larkspur

  Midnight Blue

  Nightrose

  Restless Wind

  Ribbon in the Sky

  River of Tomorrow

  The Searching Hearts

  Sins of Summer

  Sweetwater

  Tenderness

  The Listening Sky

  This Loving Land

  Wayward Wind

  Wild Sweet Wilderness

  Wind of Promise

  Yesteryear

  Published by

  WARNER BOOKS

  Copyright

  WARNER BOOKS EDITION

  Copyright © 1994 by Dorothy Garlock

  All rights reserved.

  Warner Books, Inc.

  Hachette Book Group

  237 Park Avenue

  New York, NY 10017

  Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com

  First eBook Edition: September 2009

  ISBN: 978-0-7595-2277-0

  Contents

  BOOKS BY DOROTHY GARLOCK

  COPYRIGHT

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  For the Tulsa gang—

  Joy and Mike Bruza,

  Caroline and Emily

  Janythe and Tim Graham

  Lauren and Scott

  Jennifer Carwile

  Meredith and Matt

  And in memory of Jack and Tony Bruza

  CHAPTER

  * 1 *

  “We’re almost there.”

  The man lowered his head and spoke to the girl, although he knew that she could not hear him. Five miles back he had taken her from her horse, placed her in front of him in the saddle, and opened his sheepskin coat and wrapped it and a blanket around her. They had been traveling since daybreak, stopping only a time or two to rest the horses and to eat the meat and biscuits he had stored in his saddlebags.

  It was quiet and bitterly cold.

  The snow seemed to go on forever. The wind worked softly, smoothing out the snow around the gray spiky trunks and naked branches that edged the road. Flakes touched the man’s whiskered face and stayed there. The creases in his coat and the blanket wrapped around the girl became a web of white lines.

  Around a little bend the road flattened out and buildings came in sight. The weary man sighed with relief.

  A track of rutted snow and mud led to a weathered-plank, two-storied house, a barn, outbuildings, and a few shacks. Black smoke oozed out of chimneys. This was the Callahan Lumber Company headquarters, not unlike a dozen other operations in the Bitterroot Range of Idaho.

  The man glanced with curiosity at the house as he passed it on the way to the barn. It was big and square with tall, narrow windows. The front door looked as if it were seldom, if ever, used. A large covered porch ran along the back of the house. Light came from the back windows.

  The horse, sensing the end of the journey, walked faster, whinnied softly, and stopped at the barn door. The man shook the girl. She looked up with questioning eyes. Without speaking, he lifted her to the ground, dismounted, swung back the heavy door and motioned her to go ahead. He followed, leading the horses. It was dark in the barn. Before he closed the door, shutting out what little light the late afternoon provided, he lit a lantern.

  The girl hugged the blanket around her and waited while the man quickly unsaddled the horses, wiped them down, put them in a stall and forked them some hay. Leaving the bundles he had taken from behind the saddles in the stalls with the horses, he went to the girl, adjusted the shawl that covered her head, and, with an arm around her shoulders, guided her out of the barn and across the snow-covered ground to the house.

  Standing at the window, Dory was trying to decide if she had enough time to make a quick trip to the outhouse before Jeanmarie awakened, when the riders rode into the yard and stopped in front of the barn. The saddle of one horse was empty, while the other carried double. Was someone really hurt, or was it a couple of no-goods hoping to get into the house by pretending to need help? If that was the case, she would send them packing with a load of buckshot in their rears. That stupid trick had been tried before.

  Dory was always apprehensive when men came to the homestead. Only the most reckless dared to come when her brothers were not at home. As she watched, a man stepped out of the saddle and reached to lift someone down. The person was small and wore a… skirt that came to her shoe tops. Forevermore! A woman! She went into the barn. He followed with the horses.

  Dory’s heart thudded with excitement. It had been months since she had talked to another woman. The last time she had been to town was before Thanksgiving, and here it was April. She waited eagerly for the barn door to open. Would they go to the bunkhouse seeking shelter for the night, or would they come to the house?

  When they crossed the yard toward the house, she backed away from the window. She heard them on the steps to the porch, stomping the snow from their boots, and she opened the door when the knock sounded. A man with a dark stubble of beard on his face stood with his arm across the shoulders of a young girl. Her face was red with cold.

  “Come in. It must be near zero.”

  Dory swung the door wide, stepped back for them to enter then quickly closed it against the biting cold. Warm air struck the man’s face—air filled with the scent of freshly baked bread. Two lamps lighted the cozy, well-equipped kitchen. A black iron range dominated one end of the room, a cobblestone fireplace large enough for a six-foot log the other.

  “I’m Benton Waller.”

  “Are you lost?” Dory lifted straight dark brows.

  “Not if this is the
headquarters of Callahan Lumber Company.” He pulled an envelope from his pocket and handed it to her. She glanced at the writing and handed it back.

  “This is the Callahan homestead. The mill is farther north—five or six miles.” Her eyes went to the girl and back to him. His eyes were the color of polished pewter and she couldn’t help being intrigued by their unusual color and the keen intelligence they projected. “You must be the donkey engine man from Spokane,” she said with sudden realization.

  “I’ve been hired to set up the steam donkey. I wrote that I’d be here between the tenth and the fifteenth.”

  “I hadn’t heard you were bringing your family,” she said, glancing at the girl, who hovered close to the man’s side, her head barely reaching his shoulder. She was young, slight; her face stiff with cold. “Come over to the fire. There’s nothing worse than a late spring blizzard.”

  The girl ignored the invitation until the man, with his hand against her back, urged her toward the roaring fire.

  “We’ll warm up a bit and go on up to the mill.”

  “You were promised family quarters?”

  “He said there would be a cabin—”

  “—The cabin Louis had in mind isn’t fit for a girl. He’s at the mill and won’t be back until tomorrow,” Dory said, not bothering to hide her frank appraisal of the girl and the tall, lean man who stood with his back to the fire. He had removed his hat the instant he had stepped inside the door, revealing thick black hair. His face was too blunt-edged to be called handsome. Despite his casual manner, she felt the tension in him and knew instinctively that he was a hardened, cautious man who had had his share of bad times.

  “Mrs. Callahan, my daughter is cold and tired. I’d be obliged if you’d tell me where we can settle in.”

  “Miss Callahan. Louis, Milo, and James are my brothers— the sons of the Callahan who founded the company.”

  Ben caught the slight sarcastic note in her voice, and he studied her face. It was oval with a small straight nose, wide generous mouth, large green eyes surrounded by dark lashes. Tall and capable looking, she was not exactly pretty, but the short, untameable, sable brown curls that covered her head like a woolly cap gave her a gamine appeal.

  “It was Louis Callahan who asked me to come here.”

  “Damn Louis! He should know a girl can’t stay in one of those shacks. Lordy mercy! I could throw a cat through the wall of any of them. He didn’t say a word about your bringing your family. Then again… why should he? I’m just a woman with barely enough brains to stay out of the fire.” She stopped abruptly as if regretting her unguarded comments.

  The fact that she swore didn’t shock Ben as much as the bitterness in her voice when she spoke of her brother.

  “He didn’t know I was bringing my daughter. I just said I wanted private quarters.”

  The girl tilted her head so that she could see her father’s face. The shawl had slipped back showing light, straw-colored hair. An anxious frown drew her brows together over cornflower-blue eyes. She put a hand on his arm and shook it. He looked down at her and spoke slowly.

  “It’s all right.”

  “Of course, it is,” Dory Callahan said quickly. “She can stay in here with me. There’s a bunkhouse out next to the barn. Wiley’s out there. He’ll show you where you can bunk for the night. Tomorrow you can talk to Louis.”

  “Thank you.” Ben turned to the girl and pulled the blanket from around her. The coat she wore was much too big for her small frame. While he unbuttoned it, her eyes never left his face. “Stay with the lady.” Again he spoke slowly. “Stay here.” He pointed to a kitchen chair.

  The girl put her forefinger against his chest, then pointed to another chair. “You?”

  He shook his head.

  She pushed his hands away and rebuttoned her coat. She shook her head vigorously and pulled the shawl back over her head.

  Ben looked up and caught Dory staring at the girl. “She can’t hear.” He spoke impatiently, yet softly as if the girl could hear him. “She’s afraid I’ll leave her.”

  The poor little thing.

  “Then stay with her for a while. Hang your coats there by the door.” She smiled at the girl. “It’s been a while since I’ve had a female visitor. What’s her name?”

  “Odette. She doesn’t talk much,” Ben said, shrugging off his sheepskin coat.

  “She speaks?”

  “When she has to. She was very sick about eight years ago, and when she came out of it, she couldn’t hear. I’m trying to teach her to read my lips.”

  “Can she understand me?”

  “Some. She understands most of what I say, but she’s used to me. She can read and write. She’s no dummy.” He said it defensively as if he’d had to establish that fact before.

  Dory wanted to know more about this strange pair, but his tone told her it was time to change the subject.

  “Would you like coffee and a slice of fresh bread?”

  “My mouth has been watering since I stepped inside the door.”

  When he smiled, lines in his whiskered cheeks formed brackets on each side of his mouth. His teeth were straight and white and free of tobacco stains, but Dory sensed that he was a hard man and not the type to be traveling around with a daughter the size of this girl.

  Where was his wife?

  “How far did you come today?”

  “From Cataldo Mission.”

  A small girl appeared in the doorway, knuckling sleep from her eyes.

  “Ma… ma, who’s that?”

  “Sweetheart! You’ve had such a long nap.” Dory bent to lift the child up into her arms.

  “Who’s that?” the child asked again.

  “Someone to see Uncle Louis.”

  “I gotta pee-pee—”

  “Shhh… honey. Excuse me,” Dory said and left the room with the child peering at them over her mother’s shoulder. Her hair was short, curly and bright red. Yet the resemblance was so strong Ben had no doubt that they were mother and child.

  He looked down to see Odette staring after the woman and little girl, then quickly trying to smooth her hair back with her palms. She pulled the collar of her dress out over the heavy sweater she had worn beneath her coat.

  “Are you hungry?” he asked silently, his lips forming the words slowly. She smiled and nodded. He smiled back. “Say it.”

  “Hungry.” Her lips formed the word silently.

  “Say it,” he insisted and pointed to his ear.

  She grinned impishly, then said, “Hungry. You?”

  “You bet.” He pinched her chin with his thumb and forefinger. “You little imp. You like me to nag you to talk,” he said affectionately.

  Dory, with the child in her arms, stood in the doorway watching the exchange between Ben Waller and his daughter. It surprised her that such a rough-looking man would be so patient and gentle with the girl. The Callahan men didn’t have a patient bone in their bodies, much less a gentle one—except for James. He was young yet. Give him time and he might turn out to be as hard as Louis and Milo.

  “This is my daughter, Jeanmarie,” Dory said with pride as she lowered the little girl to the floor. The toddler headed straight for Odette and took her hand.

  “What your name?”

  Odette quickly looked at Ben. He silently repeated the question while the child looked from one to the other.

  “Odette.” The name came hesitantly.

  “I’m three.” Jeanmarie held up three fingers. “Soon I’ll be four.” She unfolded another finger. “I had a kitty cat, but… it run off. You got a kitty cat?”

  Odette looked puzzled.

  “Come here, chatterbox.” Dory scooped up the child and sat her on a high stool at the table. “She’ll talk your arm off,” Dory said to cover the silence. “She gets pretty wound up when company comes. We seldom have visitors and never see another woman unless we go to town. I can’t promise that she’ll get used to your daughter and stop pestering her.”

  �
�I don’t know if Odette has ever been around a child.”

  Dory hesitated for an instant on her way to the cupboard to get cups and plates. He didn’t know if his daughter had ever been around a child. That was strange. What kind of man wouldn’t know that about his own daughter? The girl might not even be his daughter. She certainly didn’t resemble him in any way, although it was easy to see that she adored him. Dory gave a mental shrug. Regardless of who and what they were, their coming was a break in her dreary existence.

  “Sit down. Mr. Waller, would Odette like milk in her coffee or coffee in her milk? Sometimes I color Jeanmarie’s milk with coffee. It makes her feel grown up.”

  Ben repeated the question and Odette answered aloud.

  “Coffee… please.”

  Dory Callahan flipped a loaf of bread from a pan onto a smooth board. The sleeves of a flannel shirt were rolled to her elbows. It sloped down over well-rounded breasts and was tucked neatly into the surprisingly small waistband of a heavy wool skirt that hit her legs a good six inches above her slender ankles. She wore black stockings and fur-lined moccasins. She was not a small woman, and yet she was feminine.

  Ben could not help wondering about her child and why she had made a point of making it perfectly clear that she was Miss Callahan. Unmarried. Yet the child was her flesh and blood. A man would have to be blind not to see it.

  “What your name?” Jeanmarie asked.

  “Ben Waller.”

  “My name is Jeanmarie. I’m almost four.” She held up four fingers. Ben didn’t know what to say to that so he didn’t say anything. “I got a doll,” she said looking expectantly into Odette’s face. “Uncle Louis broke her leg. Uncle James fix it. Want to see my picture book? It’s got a monkey.” Jeanmarie giggled behind her hand. Odette remained silent. After a long pause, Jeanmarie looked at her mother and her lips began to tremble. “She don’t like m-me—”

  Dory set the coffeepot back on the stove and took the chair next to her daughter. She put her palm on the child’s face to turn it toward her.

  “Listen to me, honey. Of course she likes you. Who wouldn’t like a sweet, pretty little girl like you? The reason she isn’t talking to you is that she can’t hear what you’re saying to her.”