Wildwood Creek (27 page)

He tipped his hat in response. “I do declare, ma’am, it would be my pleasure to escort you wherever you are headed.”

“I was just about to stroll up to the Delevan house for tea.” I realized I’d missed hearing his laugh this morning even more than I’d missed having hot coffee. The sound was deep, warm, and sweet. I really liked the way he laughed.

He offered his arm, I hooked mine into it, and we strolled up the street chatting about the school day. In the back of my mind, guilt niggled as we said hello to Andy outside the blacksmith shop, then started up the path to the Delevan house. The reality of what I was doing closed in on me. I was aiding and abetting Kim in sneaking off the set, a security breach of monumental proportions. Meanwhile, Blake was working night and day, trying to control security issues. If Kim was found out, it would look bad for Blake and the security team. How would he feel when he discovered that I was in on it? That I’d walked up the hill with him, chatting about school, when I knew what Kim was doing?

I wasn’t a liar. How would I ever prove that to him, if the whole thing came to light?

At the big house, Netta and Genie were sitting on the porch in their rocking chairs, along with Lynne Everly and two other cast members living the lives of the kitchen women. Apparently I was the first guest to arrive, since there seem to be no one else around.

“Well, look who it is,” Netta clucked, smiling at Blake. “You makin’ sure the young ladies of Wildwood are safe on the streets today?”

“Yes, ma’am, I am.” He tipped his hat. “It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.”

“Doesn’t look like yer sufferin’ so much,” Genie drawled,
and the two women giggled at the joke. “Y’all come on up and have a bite. It looks like we fixed tea and cakes for nothin’. That little production assistant just came in and told us the power’s gone down all over the place, and they don’t know what’s wrong or when it’ll get fixed. Now don’t that just put the socks on the rooster?”

“Yes, ma’am, it does.” Blake’s brows knotted, and he looked toward crew camp, suddenly all business.

Lynne Everly, the aging history professor who was now Old Asmae, lifted a platter off the table. “Try these tea cakes. It took us all morning to get these things right, and now they won’t even be on camera. Hoo-ee, reminds me of baking for funerals in my mama’s kitchen, that’s for sure. Every recipe we made started with a pound a’ butter.”

Blake helped me up the stairs, then quickly made excuses to leave, grabbed a tea cake at the ladies’ insistence, and headed off toward the crew camp.

I lowered myself carefully into a porch chair, muscling the hoops into place before accepting a teacup and cake. The sweet treat tasted like heaven, even though by modern standards it was somewhere between a cracker and a cookie. Not all that sugary.

“Pretty good, huh?” Lynne prodded. “That recipe is authentic 1860. Got it from an old journal.”

“It’s delicious.” Oddly, after weeks of classes about the uncomfortable social structure of Civil War–era race relations, I felt like we’d be reprimanded any minute for enjoying cakes together and laughing on the porch. At times like this, I wondered how the African-American participants felt about life in the village. I’d asked Andy when I’d taken the school kids up to the blacksmith’s shop for a science lesson. He’d simply shrugged and said, “How do you feel about being an Irish schoolteacher? It’s history. It is what it is.”

Nearby, Lynne’s granddaughter, Alexis, was enjoying a break from the life of Essie Jane. She and Bella, one of my older students, had settled in on a rope hammock, giggling and using it as a swing.

Wren appeared from the general direction of crew camp and invited herself in for goodies. Since the chairs were full, she settled on the porch steps, her daisy-print cotton skirt spilling around her.

“They look like they’re enjoying the break. I think I need one of those hammocks,” I commented. The afternoon was warm and breezy. A perfect time to kick back and watch the clouds drift overhead—as if there were ever time for that on a normal day in Wildwood. There was always something to do in the work of daily life.

“You should ask your neighbor for one,” Genie offered. “He made us that neat little thang—just brought it by the other day and hung it up there in by the tree line. I do declare, that boy is handy as a pocket on a shirt. Some gal is gonna be lucky to snag that young fella.” She gave me a pointed look, and I felt sweat dripping under my Sunday-best dress. Was it hot up here, or was it just me?

Netta continued the Blake Fulton brag fest. “Blake said he learned about making something out of nothin’ while he was in Iraq. Why, he’s a bona fide war hero—did you know that? He probably wouldn’t tell unless someone asked, of course. He’s so modest.”

Wren batted her lashes at me. “You should ask him to make us a hammock, sissy. He’ll do it if
you
ask. He’ll do
anything
you ask.”

I slanted a narrow look her way. “Don’t you need to go sit in front of the air conditioner in your trailer or something?”

“I like it better here.” A freckly smirk came my way. “Anyhow, the power’s out, remember? It’s hot up there in the trail
ers. It’s a good day for swimming, and I want to wear my swimsuit this time. We can walk all the way down to the lake. I heard up in crew camp it’ll be, like,
tomorrow
before they can get all the equipment back online, so we’re just free as birds.
And
yesterday Blake told me that the drought’s got the lake so far down that a
graveyard
came up out of the water. I wanna go see it.”

Wren’s story teased my curiosity. It also struck me in a way I hadn’t expected, touching a tender place. Blake had spent time talking with Wren, telling her stories. He really was a nice guy.

With that came the usual measure of doubt. The voice of doom, warning that
nice
wasn’t a guarantee of anything. Kim was right about me. Love and loss were so tangled inside me, it was impossible to sort one from the other. Both terrified me.

“Y’all go on and enjoy yerselves. No sense sittin’ around here with us old gals.” Netta fanned herself with a bit of embroidery in progress.

“Awesome!” Wren jumped up before I could answer. “I’ll go get my swimsuit on.”

“Make sure you tell your mom where you’re going.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” She jogged down the stairs and was gone.

I sat and talked to the ladies until Wren came back, this time wearing shorts and a T-shirt with a swimsuit underneath. She was trailed by none other than Blake Fulton, practically dragging him by the arm. “Look who
I
found,” she teased.

“Afternoon again, ladies.” Blake seemed a little confused.

Netta smiled. “Why, Blake Fulton.” She stood up and straightened her dress. “You’re just the man needed to protect a pair of innocent damsels from any-thang that might be lurkin’ between here and the lakeshore.”

A wave of consternation snaked across his forehead, lowering one brow and raising the other. “You look a little dressed up for swimming, Miss Netta.”

“Not them, goofball. Me n’ Allie,” Wren protested, and Blake caught my eye with a wink. He knew. He was just messing with everyone. The usual little tingle went through my stomach. He’d already decided to slip away to the lake with us, and he wasn’t doing it because Wren had dragged him along. He was looking forward to it.

How I could tell all that from a single look was beyond me, but sometimes it just happened between the two of us. It was odd, feeling that kind of connection with someone so quickly. If I didn’t watch myself, I could tumble head over heels and be off my feet, just like Kim was. . . .

He grinned at me from beneath his hat, and the issues went out the window. All of a sudden, I wished Wren weren’t coming along, which wasn’t very kind of me, since it was her idea.

“You children go on and cool off. In fact, if y’all hang on just a minute, we’ll pack you up some of these cakes to take along. Somebody might as well have ’em. Lord knows we don’t need it.”

“I’ll go do it.” Lynne rose from her chair. “It’s my kitchen.”

Genie hooked her arm through Lynne’s as they started toward the door. “We’ll do it together. I been waiting on people my whole life. This silly bit of having folks wait on me is making me crazy as a bullbat.”

Lynne’s laugh echoed high into the rafters. “Not me, sister. After raising five kids and seventeen grandkids, I’m ready for
somebody
to wait on me. You’re looking at Princess Gran-gran. My grandkids don’t call me that for nothing.”

They disappeared through the door laughing, and Netta decided it was time for Blake and me to be on our way. “Y’all two go on down and rustle up whatever else y’all need to take
to the water. Wren can stay here for the food and bring it to the schoolhouse in a minute.”

I stood up, more than ready to depart the porch and the over-the-top matchmaking. My nerves did a little pirouette as Blake offered his elbow, and we descended the steps together, veering toward the spring path instead of toward town. “Shorter this way. But if you’re worried that you might get your pretty tea dress dirty . . .”

I glanced up at him and had that melting feeling. “I’m not worried.”

On the hammock, the pair of tweens sat up. “Hey, Blake!” Alexis called out, sending a wistful look his way.

“Hey, Alexis. How’s the swing working out?” I’d noticed that Blake already knew practically everyone in the village, especially the women . . . of all sizes. The girls on the hammock were eyeballing him as if he were a rock star.

“Pretty good.” Alexis dangled her long, thin legs over the side, idly kicking her feet, part woman, part little girl. “Hey, I saw that guy in the woods again last night. The ghost guy? He was there, I swear. I’m not making it up. I think you better come again tonight and stake out the porch. That’s the third night in a row I’ve seen him, you know.”

Wrinkles of concern formed at the corners of Blake’s eyes. “Alexis, I looked all over the woods and didn’t see any sign someone had been out there. You sure you two haven’t just been telling each other too many stories up in the attic?”

“There’s been somebody there. I’m not making it up.” Alexis tipped her head up to one side, offering a short burst of teenage attitude.

“Did your grandma see him?”

“By the time she got all the way out of bed, he was gone. But he
was
there, I know he was. It’s creepy. He walks around on the hill and then sometimes, he just stands there and looks.”

Blake pulled his bottom lip between his teeth, scanning the trees. “Did
anybody
else in the house see him?”

“No. Nobody else would get up and look.”

Blake nodded, unsurprised. Even I, who hadn’t spent much time around the big house, knew that Carlton Danes, who played the town founder, wasn’t nearly the pioneer he thought he’d be. He may have looked like Harland Delevan with his dark hair and handlebar mustache, but he was about as western as my mother. He couldn’t handle the heat and spent his time between go-lives lolling around in his room.

“I’ll come back and check it out tonight,” Blake promised. “See if I can get a look at your ghost.” He winked at her, and she pulled a little embroidered pillow off the hammock and threw it at him.

“I didn’t say he was a ghost. I just said he
might
be a ghost. Or maybe he’s one of those paparazzi sneaking around. You can chase him off like you did the other ones.”

“I’ll do my best.” He snatched up the pillow and threw it back to her. “You guys should go down to the water. Hot day out here.”

“That an invitation? Granny says we can’t go unless we have someone to watch after us. She’s all worried some creep might get us at the lakeshore or something.”

Blake glanced my way, letting me decide. “Sure. Wren’s in the house waiting for some picnic food. You can walk down to the schoolhouse with her.”

“
Wren’s
coming?” It was clearly a complaint.

Blake frowned. “Hey, if you’re too good to go with us . . .”

“Yeah, whatever.” The girls scooted off the hammock and ran for the house in a long-legged teenage footrace. Alexis was an athlete. She could fly. I wondered if her counterpart, Essie Jane, ever had the chance to run freely through the grass on this hillside, or if her life was one of constant hard labor and abuse.

“What’s behind that look?” Blake asked as we started down the path to the spring. “Something crossed your mind all of a sudden.”

I felt strangely exposed. So much of my life had always been about keeping the wild meanderings of my mind to myself. I’d learned early on that sharing those things around Mom and Lloyd’s house didn’t bring good results. Strangely enough, the advice that came to me now was Wren’s:
You worry too much about what other people think.
If an eleven-year-old could spot it . . .

“Do you ever wonder what they were really like? Whether we’re getting any of it right? About the people who lived here first, I mean. Are we doing them any justice, or just making a farce out of their lives for entertainment’s sake? It bothers me a little, I guess. People
died
here. Disappeared off the face of the earth, as far as we can tell. A whole town full of people. I don’t know . . . I guess I just feel like . . .” I trailed off, searching.

“Like we owe them something?” Blake put words to my thoughts.

“Exactly. I feel like we owe it to them to get it right, to honor their lives, not just use them to put on a show or compete for a million dollars in gold. There’s too much of that these days. It’s like TV has become all about turning people into comic characters so we can ridicule them. I don’t want to be part of that.
Something
happened to the residents here. They deserve for the truth to finally come out. I’m just not sure that’s really what Rav Singh’s goal is. He seems more about the sensationalism. This whole thing with planting ore and duplicating a gold rush . . .” I stopped walking and looked up into the trees, suddenly feeling as if the citizens of Wildwood were watching.

Blake studied me for a moment, seeming to muse on the
question. “You know, I like that about you. You don’t just go with the program. You think for yourself.”