Always Dakota - Debbie Macomber [4]
“Lie down,” Maddy said.
“I have a house full of company,” Margaret objected weakly. It went against the grain to let someone dictate what she should or shouldn’t do. With anyone else, she’d have made a fuss, insisted it was her place to be with her father’s friends.
“You’re dead on your feet,” Maddy told her.
Margaret nestled her head in her pillow, surprised by how good it felt against her face. How cool and comforting. “I…I thought I was prepared,” she said, her eyes closed. “I thought I could handle this.”
“No one’s ever ready to lose a father,” Maddy said as she covered Margaret with the afghan from the foot of the bed. The weight of it settled warmly over her shoulders.
“Sleep now. By the time you wake, everyone will be gone.”
“Nothing’s ever going to be the same again,” Margaret whispered.
“You’re right, it won’t.”
Maddy’s voice sounded soothing, even if her words didn’t. But then, Margaret could count on her friend to tell the truth. Already she could feel sleep approach, could feel the tension leave her body. “Matt didn’t attend the funeral, did he?”
“No,” Maddy said.
“I thought he would.” She was keenly disappointed that he hadn’t bothered to show up.
“I know.”
Maddy was disappointed in him, too. Margaret could tell from the inflection in her voice. Few people understood why she loved Matt. If pressured to explain, Margaret wasn’t sure she could justify her feelings. Matt Eilers was as handsome as sin, shallow and conceited. But she loved him and had from the moment she’d met him.
With Maddy’s tutoring, Margaret had done everything possible to get Matt to recognize that she was a woman with a woman’s heart. A few months back, she’d had her hair done and put on panty hose for the first time in her life. The panty hose had nearly wrestled her to the ground and the new hairdo had made her look like one of the Marx Brothers—in her opinion, anyway. The whole beautifying operation had been a unique form of torture, but she’d willingly do it all again for Matt.
“I’m sure he’ll stop by later and pay his respects,” Margaret whispered, confident that he would.
“He should have been here today.” Maddy wasn’t nearly as forgiving. “Don’t worry about Matt.”
“I’m not.”
“Call me in the morning,” Maddy said.
“I will,” she promised, exhausted and grateful for Maddy’s friendship. Her last thought before she drifted off to sleep was of the father she loved and how bleak her life would feel without him.
Jeb McKenna knew his wife well, and her silence worried him as he drove the short distance between the Clemens house and his ranch. Unlike the Clemenses and most other ranchers in the area, Jeb raised bison; Maddy owned the grocery store in town. Right now, though, she was staying home with their infant daughter.
“You’re worried about Margaret, aren’t you?” he asked as he turned down the mile-long dirt driveway leading to their home. Maddy had barely said a word after seeing Margaret to her room.
“She was ready to collapse,” Maddy told him. “God only knows the last time she slept. Sadie said she’d been up for two nights straight.”
“Poor thing.” One didn’t generally think of Margaret in those terms. She came across as tough, strong, capable. They’d been neighbors for about five years—ever since Jeb had bought the property—and he’d seen Margaret on a number of different occasions. It was some time before he’d realized Margaret was a she instead of a he. It’d startled him, but he wasn’t the only person she’d inadvertently fooled. Maddy confessed that when they’d first met, she’d taken Margaret for a ranch hand.
“Bernard’s death has shaken her.”
Jeb understood. Joshua McKenna was in his late sixties now, and Jeb knew that sooner or later he, too, would lose his father. The inevitability of it made him feel a wave of sadness…and regret. He parked the car and turned off the engine.
“I’ll talk to Margaret in the morning,” Maddy said absently.
The October wind