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“That was absolutely amazing Leila.” Dusty smiled and then closed his eyes. We had just wrapped up yet another round of steamy love-making, and I could hear a barn owl hooting from outside the window. A coyote howled off in the distance. I was just about to get up for some water when I thought I heard someone rapping at the door downstairs. I lied motionless for a second, wondering if Dusty heard the same sound. Then I heard it again. “Is someone at the door?” I propped myself up on one elbow and looked at Dusty.
“Sure sounds like it. I wonder if Mackie next door is having a problem with his pick-up again. Let me see what’s going on.” Dusty sat up, rubbed his eyes, and then slid on a pair of jeans. The knocking got louder. “I’m coming. I’m coming.” Dusty shook his head and then hustled out of the room and down the steps. I sat up in bed, curious as to whether it really was his neighbors. But as soon as the creaking of the front door subsided, I knew that it wasn’t his neighbor. I could hear a woman’s voice. Then, I simply heard silence.
Chapter 11
After a long pause, I got up softly from the bed. I could hear hushed voices downstairs, and I immediately knew that something was going on. Who was Dusty speaking to? Why was there a woman inside the house? I slid on a robe and then crept to the edge of the doorway. I wondered what would require his attention this late at night, and I wanted to find out who was down there. I moved slowly toward the foot of the steps, then craned my neck. I couldn’t see anything.
“It’s okay, Emily.” I heard Dusty speak and I froze in my tracks. Emily? My heart pounded. Was that his wife he was speaking to? His wife that was thought to have died in a plane crash? I was stunned. Then I told myself to relax. Surely, it must be another Emily because his wife, Emily was dead. I inched down the first few steps and stopped moving when they creaked. “I just can’t get over what you’re telling me.” I heard Dusty’s voice once again.
“I know it sounds crazy, but that’s what happened.” The woman spoke and I inched down another step, holding on to the railing as I moved. The next step creaked as well, so I stopped, balancing on one foot. “It was months before anyone in Sweden could send the report, and with everyone’s missing identification, it was just impossible.” The woman’s voice sounded kind yet determined.
“How am I supposed to react?” Dusty cried out loud. Then, just as I appeared on the middle of the stairs, he wrapped his arms around the woman’s waist and pulled her close to his chest. He rubbed his face in her hair and then kissed her passionately on the lips. I felt my stomach lurch. The woman ran her hands over his back and then ran her hands through his thick, wavy hair. “I missed you so bad.” Dusty spoke and then kissed her again. I watched on in silence, unable to move off the stairs. It must be her, I thought to myself. It was his wife, Emily, after all.
I was just about to turn around and retreat to the guest room when I heard a cry from Carter’s room. It was good timing, since the longer I watched Dusty and Emily from above the more pained my emotions became. I walked into Carter’s nursery and scooped him out of his crib. He was easily settled with a few rocks back and forth, but I carried him into the guest room and lied with him on my bed. I didn’t know what else to do. I felt sick to my stomach, trapped, and confused.
“Emily! No!” Dusty cried out just as I settled Carter into the bed with me. I heard footsteps bounding up the steps and then yelling from the hallway. “He’s asleep. You’ll have to wait.” Dusty yelled out and then I heard a hand on the doorknob. I sat up, clutching Carter in my arms. What on Earth was going on? The door swung open, and a tall, shapely woman with long, blond hair and big, blue eyes stared down at me.
“Give me my son.” Her face contorted and she looked at me with scorn. I clutched Carter and backed away.
“Who the hell are you?” I knew damn well who it was, but I also felt compelled to hold my ground. After all, I had been invited here. I had just spent the last hour making passionate love with the man who was standing in the hallway. I had cared for this baby over the last several months, and I wasn’t about to just hand him over, whether this woman claimed to be his mother or not. She glared at me and then attempted to dash across the room, but I darted out of her way, Carter held tightly to my chest.
“Emily! You have to at least give Leila the chance to give her goodbyes to Carter. She’s raised him as her own for the last six months.” Dusty had an air of despondency in his voice. He walked slowly toward the guest room, then attempted to step foot inside but Emily held her arm out.
“No. You back off, Dusty. This is my son. I refuse to just let a stranger step in the way.” Emily looked at Dusty, an exasperated expression on her face. Dusty looked at me and then dropped his gaze to the floor. I stared at Dusty.
“So what are you going to do now, Dusty? Did you tell Emily about that you and I had just finished making passionate love before she showed up at your doorstep?” I looked at her with a pounding sensation in my heart. “How could you let her do this to you? She led you to believe that she was dead for almost a year, and you just let her come back inside your house like this?” I could feel a side of me coming out that I didn’t know existed. It was defensive, angry, and confused.
“I was involved in a terrorist kidnapping!” Emily glared at me again, her voice low and threatening. “For six months I was holed up in another county, with another family, doing whatever was asked of me. I had no say in what information was relayed to my husband, so why don’t you just keep your nose out of my business?” Emily placed her hands on her hips and then looked back at Dusty. “Hand over my child. Now.” She inched closer toward me, and I slowly backed away. I wasn’t about to let her take Carter.
“Stop it!” Dusty reached for Emily’s arm. As soon as he had her held back, I dashed out of the room, clutching Carter as tightly against my chest as I could. I careened down the steps and then grabbed the first set of keys that I saw on the brass hook by the door. I fumbled with the door knob, then squeezed out just as I heard Dusty’s footsteps thundering down the steps.
“Leila! Wait!” He called my name but I slammed the door behind us, then galloped across the gravel driveway until I reached the silver Laredo parked on the side of the fence. I quickly strapped Carter inside, then jumped behind the wheel. I spun out of the driveway while a bewildered Dusty stood motionless, watching me disappear into the distance.
Chapter 12
I drove straight ahead, my hands gripped on the wheel, until I could safely conclude that we were out of sight. I veered to the left and headed south on the highway that led to Bozeman. My heart was still racing, but I felt a slight twinge of relief over the fact that it was dark, and that I had a full tank of gas to keep us moving until we needed to stop. Where were we heading? I wasn’t even sure, but Bozeman sounded like it made the most sense.
I passed a sign that indicated we were about one-hundred and thirty miles from Bozeman. I estimated that it would take us about two hours to get there, and it sounded like as feasible an option as any. I realized that I had no plan, that I was essentially running away from the situation inside Dusty’s house. I needed a place where I could just collect my thoughts, where I would get my mind straight and make a decision as to how I wanted to proceed.
Carter cried out from his car-seat and I winced. I hadn’t even grabbed his diaper bag. What would I do for his bottles? I knew that as soon as I could pull over, I’d be able to find a store where I could get some formula and diapers. We’d be fine if we could just get a little bit further away from the ranch. I pictured Emily’s face glaring at me in the guest room and I cringed. I still couldn’t believe that she was alive and inside Dusty’s home.
My eyes were on the road but my mind was all over the place. I drove on for another few minutes, checking in the rear-view mirror the whole time to see if Carter had fallen asleep. When I finally saw an exit, I jumped off and pulled into the first food store parking lot that I found. Carter looked sleepy, but I carefully pulled him out and carried him into the store. I wasn’t panicked, but I was definitely worried. I knew little about Montana, and I had no idea what to expect once we reached Bozeman.
Cater started getting fussy as soon as we got to the parking lot so I sat in the back seat with him while he drank down a bottle. Then we got back on the road, and drove through the darkness, my mind set on reaching our destination. I turned on the radio and flipped the stations until I found some classical music that seemed to clammy nerves. I sipped on my water and struggled to keep my eyes open, watching for signs that would take us into Bozeman. It was close to midnight when we finally arrived.
I drove us around for a few minutes, trying to acquaint myself with the layout of the town. Then I sized up a hotel in the center of the Bozeman tourist district, paid for a room, and carried Carter inside to the second floor. I got him settled inside the bed with a blanket, then changed his diaper and gave him a rub on the back until he fell sound asleep. I was sorry that he wouldn’t be able to sleep in his cozy crib tonight, but I also felt that he was safer with me here. I had reason to trust Emily, whether she claimed to be his mother or not.
It wasn’t easy falling asleep. It was the first night in several months that I’d slept alone, and I closed my eyes, fighting back the tears, when I imagined Dusty standing there in Emily’s arms. How could this be happening? We had gone through with the marriage, had signed off in the court house back in July, and now? Our new lives together were bluntly disrupted by the intrusion of his supposedly deceased wife. I shook my head in both jealousy and confusion.
After about a half hour of tossing and turning I decided that sleep was futile. After checking on carter, who was sound asleep, I sat on the edge of the bed and covered my face in my hands. Then, as if it had built up to the point of having nowhere else to go, the tears fell like a deluge and I threw myself on the bed in a sadly pathetic heap. I had been crying for about ten minutes when my phone lit up with a call. It was Dusty.
Should I answer it? My heart raced and my mind reeled. I wanted so badly to hear his voice, wanted to tell him that I loved him and that I would come back home with Carter, but then I thought about Emily. Why had she done this? It wasn’t fair for her to just tromp back into Dusty’s life, and it also wasn’t right for her to speak to me the way that she did. I had always thought from her pictures that she was a waif-like fairy of a woman, but meeting her in person made me realize that she had both a mean streak and a calculated personality.
“Hello?” I finally answered, exasperated.
“Leila. Please.” I could tell that dusty was doing his best to remain calm. In his defense, it really wasn’t his fault that Emily had shown up to begin with. I was sure that he had found it as unexpected as I did. But what did he think of me now? How could he grapple with the fact that he had just spent the last year trying to get over her, only to have her show up out of the blue on a warm summer night? I was dumbfounded and confused. “Don’t hang up.” Dusty pleaded, so I took a deep breath and then waited for him to speak.
“Look. You have to understand that seeing Emily at my door was the last thing on Earth that I ever expected to have happen. I mean…” Dusty paused. I could tell that he was just as bewildered as I was. It was one thing to have an ex-wife pop up unexpectedly. But it was completely another to have a supposedly deceased wife show up on the doorstep. “First of all, I am still trying to process the fact that Emily is even alive. It just has my head spinning. Okay?” Dusty tried to explain. “And I’m also trying to figure out how she was unable to contact me all this time. But that’s beside the point. I married you, since then. We’ve been living together. I let you into my life.” He spoke and I listened.
