Sutton's Way

“Do you?” he asked, turning his head. In the daylight glare of snow and sleet, she saw an odd twinkle in his black eyes. “Try digging a hole out there.”

She gave him a speaking glance and resigned herself to going with him.

He drove the sled right into the barn and left her to wander through the aisle, looking at the horses and the two new calves in the various stalls while he dealt with unhitching and stalling the horse.

“What’s wrong with these little things?” she asked, her hands in her pockets and her ears freezing as she nodded toward the two calves.

“Their mamas starved out in the pasture,” he said quietly. “I couldn’t get to them in time.”

He sounded as if that mattered to him. She looked up at his dark face, seeing new character in it. “I didn’t think a cow or two would matter,” she said absently.

“I lost everything I had a few months back,” he said matter-of-factly. “I’m trying to pull out of bankruptcy, and right now it’s a toss-up as to whether I’ll even come close. Every cow counts.” He looked down at her. “But it isn’t just the money. It disturbs me to see anything die from lack of attention. Even a cow.”

“Or a mere woman?” she said with a faint smile. “Don’t worry, I know you don’t want me here. I’m…grateful to you for coming to my rescue. Most of the firewood was frozen and Mr. Durning apparently doesn’t smoke, because there weren’t a lot of matches around.”

He scowled faintly. “No, Durning doesn’t smoke. Didn’t you know?”

She shrugged. “I never had reason to ask,” she said, without telling him that it was her aunt, not herself, who would know about Mr. Durning’s habits. Let him enjoy his disgusting opinion of her.

“Elliot said you’d been sick.”

She lifted a face carefully kept blank. “Sort of,” she replied.

“Didn’t Durning care enough to come with you?”

“Mr. Sutton, my personal life is none of your business,” she said firmly. “You can think whatever you want to about me. I don’t care. But for what it’s worth, I hate men probably as much as you hate women, so you won’t have to hold me off with a stick.”

His face went hard at the remark, but he didn’t say anything. He searched her eyes for one long moment and then turned toward the house, gesturing her to follow.

Elliot was overjoyed with their new house guest. Quinn Sutton had a television and all sorts of tapes, and there was, surprisingly enough, a brand-new keyboard on a living-room table.

She touched it lovingly, and Elliot grinned at her. “Like it?” he asked proudly. “Dad gave it to me for Christmas. It’s not an expensive one, you know, but it’s nice to practice on. Listen.”

He turned it on and flipped switches, and gave a pretty decent rendition of a tune by Genesis.

Amanda, who was formally taught in piano, smiled at his efforts. “Very good,” she praised. “But try a B-flat instead of a B at the end of that last measure and see if it doesn’t give you a better sound.”

Elliot cocked his head. “I play by ear,” he faltered.

“Sorry.” She reached over and touched the key she wanted. “That one.” She fingered the whole chord. “You have a very good ear.”

“But I can’t read music,” he sighed. His blue eyes searched her face. “You can, can’t you?”

She nodded, smiling wistfully. “I used to long for piano lessons. I took them in spurts and then begged a…friend to let me use her piano to practice on. It took me a long time to learn just the basics, but I do all right.”

“All right” meant that she and the boys had won a Grammy award for their last album and it had been one of her own songs that had headlined it. But she couldn’t tell Elliot that. She was convinced that Quinn Sutton would have thrown her out the front door if he’d known what she did for a living. He didn’t seem like a rock fan, and once he got a look at her stage costume and her group, he’d probably accuse her of a lot worse than being his neighbor’s live-in lover. She shivered. Well, at least she didn’t like Quinn Sutton, and that was a good thing. She might get out of here without having him find out who she really was, but just in case, it wouldn’t do to let herself become interested in him.

“I don’t suppose you’d consider teaching me how to read music?” Elliot asked. “For something to do, you know, since we’re going to be snowed in for a while, the way it looks.”

“Sure, I’ll teach you,” she murmured, smiling at him. “If you dad doesn’t mind,” she added with a quick glance at the doorway.

Quinn Sutton was standing there, in jeans and red-checked flannel shirt with a cup of black coffee in one hand, watching them.

“None of that rock stuff,” he said shortly. “That’s a bad influence on kids.”

“Bad influence?” Amanda was almost shocked, despite the fact that she’d gauged his tastes very well.

“Those raucous lyrics and suggestive costumes, and satanism,” he muttered. “I confiscated his tapes and put them away. It’s indecent.”

“Some of it is, yes,” she agreed quietly. “But you can’t lump it all into one category, Mr. Sutton. And these days, a lot of the groups are even encouraging chastity and going to war on drug use…”

“You don’t really believe that bull, do you?” he asked coldly.

“It’s true, Dad,” Elliot piped up.

“You can shut up,” he told his son. He turned. “I’ve got a lot of paperwork to get through. Don’t turn that thing on high, will you? Harry will show you to your room when you’re ready to bed down, Miss Corrie,” he added, and looked as if he’d like to have shown her to a room underwater. “Or Elliot can.”

“Thanks again,” she said, but she didn’t look up. He made her feel totally inadequate and guilty. In a small way, it was like going back to that night…

“Don’t stay up past nine, Elliot,” Quinn told his son.

“Okay, Dad.”

Amanda looked after the tall man with her jaw hanging loose. “What did he say?” she asked.

“He said not to stay up past nine,” Elliot replied. “We all go to bed at nine,” he added with a grin at her expression. “There, there, you’ll get used to it. Ranch life, you know. Here, now, what was that about a B-flat? What’s a B-flat?”

She was obviously expected to go to bed with the chickens and probably get up with them, too. Absently she picked up the keyboard and began to explain the basics of music to Elliot.

“Did he really hide all your tapes?” she asked curiously.

“Yes, he did,” Elliot chuckled, glancing toward the stairs. “But I know where he hid them.” He studied her with pursed lips. “You know, you look awfully familiar somehow.”

Amanda managed to keep a calm expression on her face, despite her twinge of fear. Her picture, along with that of the men in the group, was on all their albums and tapes. God forbid that Elliot should be a fan and have one of them, but they were popular with young people his age. “They say we all have a counterpart, don’t they?” she asked and smiled. “Maybe you saw somebody who looked like me. Here, this is how you run a C scale….”

She successfully changed the subject and Elliot didn’t bring it up again. They went upstairs a half hour later, and she breathed a sigh of relief. Since the autocratic Mr. Sutton hadn’t given her time to pack, she wound up sleeping in her clothes under the spotless white sheets. She only hoped that she wasn’t going to have the nightmares here. She couldn’t bear the thought of having Quinn Sutton ask her about them. He’d probably say that she’d gotten just what she deserved.

But the nightmares didn’t come. She slept with delicious abandon and didn’t dream at all. She woke up the next morning oddly refreshed just as the sun was coming up, even before Elliot knocked on her door to tell her that Harry had breakfast ready downstairs.

She combed out her hair and rebraided it, wrapping it around the crown of her head and pinning it there as she’d had it last night. She tidied herself after she’d washed up, and went downstairs with a lively step.

Quinn Sutton and Elliot were already making great inroads into huge, fluffy pancakes smothered in syrup when she joined them.

Harry brought in a fresh pot of coffee and grinned at her. “How about some hotcakes and sausage?” he asked.

“Just a hotcake and a sausage, please,” she said and grinned back. “I’m not much of a breakfast person.”

“You’ll learn if you stay in these mountains long,” Quinn said, sparing her a speaking glance. “You need more meat on those bones. Fix her three, Harry.”