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  I’d been so exhausted this past winter, huge with my third pregnancy, that attempting to corral our sweet, busy little boys, Axton Clark, almost four, and Marshall Augustus, Junior, age two, proved almost impossible. Fortunately I didn’t have far to walk for help; our back deck was only a stone’s throw from Clark’s. While Marshall was at work on weekdays – he’d been hired four years ago by Montana Fish and Wildlife – Clark helped me mind Ax and little Marsh. The boys had been so excited for the arrival of their new brother, picking different names for him each day, and hadn’t we all been surprised and delighted when a baby girl arrived, instead. We named her Celia Faye.

  “I gotta come…”

  “Not yet!” I slowed our vigorous motion, clinging to his shoulders; the right bore a puckered round scar from the bullet’s passage through his body and I put my lips on it, inhaling a deep breath. The lake lapped our waists.

  “Angel…”

  “Now,” I gasped at last, shuddering against him, renewed beyond belief.

  Marshall kept me wrapped in his arms and ducked us both beneath the surface. We erupted from the lake laughing, soaked and sated, to hear cheering and clapping from the bank; I squeaked and sank to my nose in the water while Marshall remained standing with arms lifted and widespread. He called, “Thank you, I deserve applause for that!”

  Case snorted, laughing, already shedding his shirt. “What we saw was about five seconds of performance there, Rawley, nothing to brag about.”

  “We just got here, we didn’t see anything,” Tish assured me, shaking out her curls, keeping her swimsuit primly in place until she’d entered the water. She threw it back to shore and then kicked off the lake bottom, swimming underwater until clearing the weeds, surfacing with a happy sigh and smoothing hair from her face.

  “Are the kids still sleeping?” I asked, gliding to my sister’s side. We’d left the little ones in Aunt Jilly and Uncle Justin’s cabin under the watchful eyes of Rae and Millie Jo, who’d both turned fourteen this past winter.

  “They were when we snuck out. The big kids are still playing Monopoly.”

  By ‘big kids’ she meant Matthew, Nathaniel, Millie Jo, Rae, Brantley, Henry, and Riley. And Wy, who was visiting with Clark; the two of them had ridden from Montana with us, alternating between our truck and Case’s. These days the ‘little kids’ were Zoe, Lorie, and James; my little Axton, Marsh, and baby Celia; and Case and Tish’s Annie and Shea. Annie was almost four, same as Ax, while Shea, whose full name was Charles Shea, had just turned one.

  “Make waaaay!” shouted another voice and five seconds later the dock shuddered as Mathias raced over it and leaped from the end, producing more noise than all of our kids combined. He surfaced with a roar, whooping and splashing, clearly hoping to incite a water fight; Case and Marsh were happy to oblige.

  “This was supposed to be a private date,” I complained, flicking water at them.

  Camille perched on the end of the dock and let her toes dangle in the lake, observing us with a smile. Her long hair hung in a loose braid and she wore cut-off jeans over her suit. It was only a matter of time before she joined us; the mosquitoes were atrocious.

  “Are Mom and Aunt Jilly coming in?” Tish asked her.

  “How come everyone’s at Shore Leave? I thought they were at Mom’s,” I groaned, watching as the cafe windows suddenly glowed with golden light; in the next second I heard Mom and Aunt Jilly laughing as they climbed the porch steps.

  “They decided to make margaritas and needed supplies,” Camille explained.

  I glanced toward my husband, who had Mathias in a headlock, both of them in water up to their armpits; Case leaped and took everyone underwater, displacing about half the lake in the process – and I witnessed my romantic date night disappear over the horizon. I couldn’t help but giggle at their roughhousing; the guys tended to revert to teenaged behavior when in each other’s company.

  “Ruthie, what do you say? You in the mood for a margarita?” Tish swam to my side.

  “That sounds great, actually.”

  Five minutes later, back in our suits and wrapped in beach towels, we followed Camille up the damp shore. I heard the blender before we entered the cafe and hooked my arm through Tish’s, taking a moment to count my blessings; I never let a day pass without doing so. Happiness, contentment; the joy of a simple life. I would never again take these things for granted. It had been many years since I’d experienced a cold pulse at the base of my spine, a sickening twinge at the back of my neck – the sense that if I’d turned around a second faster, I would have spied Fallon behind me. Waiting. Biding his time. The first year home I’d suffered panic attacks and intense nightmares; Marshall’s love and patience were endless and I’d eventually overcome such anxieties.

  Even so, there were still occasional moments when shards of fear pierced my heart and I would have to stop what I was doing and run to find Marshall; times when I would spy him coming my way across our barnyard, silhouetted by the saffron glow of sunset, his wide shoulders and lanky stride, his cowboy hat and easy grace, and gladness would rise so swift and potent in my heart it was half pain. In addition to Arrow and Banjo we kept two mares, Twyla and Tilly, gentle horses upon which Marsh was teaching our boys to ride; Celia, too, once she was old enough. I supposed that one day I would return to work at the law office with Tish, but not anytime soon. I loved being home with my kids and horses; Marsh and I joked about having a dozen of each someday.

  The mood inside Shore Leave was one of pure, unbridled summertime joy. All the adults – the alleged adults, as Grandma said – were gathered along the bar counter, while Aunt Jilly poured tequila and Mom spun the blender. Clark sat between Dodge and Rich; along with Blythe and Uncle Justin, they were drinking tap beer rather than margaritas. Two relationships of particular magnitude had formed while Marshall and I were away; Grandma explained to me, much later, that they had reconsidered a few things in the face of my disappearance. And so it was that Grandma and Aunt Ellen, the independent daughters of Louisa Davis, raised to rule the roost without men, had finally admitted their feelings for Rich and Dodge. Of course we’d suspected long before that Ellen and Dodge cared for each other, but to witness them openly happy and in love was a blessing to all of us.

  Mom, Blythe, Uncle Justin, and Aunt Jilly had undertaken the bulk of running Shore Leave these days. Along with Case and Tish, Jalesville was the place Marshall and I called home these days, but Landon would never be fully displaced in my heart. Every summer Tish and I packed up our busy families, and more often than not Clark and one or two of the Rawley boys, to spend July in Landon. We continued the tradition of celebrating the annual Fourth of July Eve party, watching the parade and fireworks the next day; lounging on the lakeshore during the hot daylight hours and gathering by the fire and listening to Marshall and Case make music as evening faded to night.

  My family, I thought, aching with happiness. My family of women no longer afraid of a curse on them. No longer afraid of the past.

  There were unknowns. Though I thought often of them, I had not yet found the courage to look up any available information on Patricia, Cole, or Axton, the Rawleys or the Davises. A part of me justified this by the fact that their descendents – us – were alive and thriving, which assured me that they, too, had continued on long past 1882. Neither had Camille attempted to find Malcolm. One night, two summers ago, she confided in Tish and me, weeping and overcome as she told us about what really took place between her and Malcolm that night in Muscatine; her words were the only secret I had ever, or would ever, keep from Marshall.

  Some late nights Marshall and I lay awake in our cabin, speculating about those we’d left behind. Though we both missed all of them intensely, we had decided long ago that we would leave the past alone. Thankfully, neither of us had ever since felt the pull of time on our bodies or spirits.

  “We did what we could,” Marsh whispered once. “We nearly gave them our lives, angel.”

  But sometimes I t
hought I heard Patricia’s voice, calling to me.

  Sometimes I sensed Axton hovering near – his spirit, maybe, or maybe nothing more than my memories of him.

  I comforted myself with the knowledge that Axton’s soul inhabited Case – he and Patricia finally allowed a life together, after everything they had been through.

  I shut out the ‘what-ifs’ that tried to surface.

  “Girls! Just in time. Come have a drink!” Aunt Jilly heralded as Tish, Camille, and I entered from the dining room, raising her margarita glass in a salute.

  “Are those the boys I hear roughhousing?” Grandma asked, pretending irritation. “We’ll have Charlie Evans out here with all that noise!”

  Rich passed Grandma a fresh margarita, kissing her cheek in the process.

  “Is our cabin still in one piece?” Uncle Justin asked Tish, with a grin. “I think you and Case were the last to leave.”

  “Rae and Millie Jo are good baby-sitters,” Tish said reassuringly, holding out her mug for Mom to fill with delicious, frothy, citrus slush. “Ooh, yum.”

  “Wy’s still there,” I reminded Uncle Justin, hugging Aunt Ellen from behind before accepting a brimming mug. “And he’s a very responsible kid.” Though, at nineteen, Wy wasn’t exactly a kid anymore. It was tough to think of him as a young adult; in most ways, he was still smiley, adorable, adoring Wy. It wasn’t lost on me, or Camille, that Millie Jo’s gigantic crush on him increased in strength every summer.

  Once we each held a fresh drink, Blythe stood and lifted his beer. “I’d like to propose a toast,” he said, winking at Mom. He wore a pale blue Shore Leave t-shirt and yellow swim trunks, his long hair in a low ponytail; other than his full beard and mustache, Blythe looked almost no different than the first summer he came into our lives, over fifteen years ago now. Mom, who honestly hadn’t changed all that much either, blew him a kiss, which he pretended to catch; then he pressed her kiss to his heart.

  “Awwww,” Aunt Jilly cooed; her blue eyes gleamed with both love and tequila. She hooked one arm around Uncle Justin’s neck and planted a smooching kiss on his scarred face, and he laughed, tugging her onto his lap.

  Having gained our full attention and adopting a teasing, formal air, Blythe said, “I want to express my deep gratitude at being Joelle’s husband and therefore a part of this family. Baby,” and he grinned anew at Mom, “I love you. I’ve never loved anyone more. Thank you for our family and for our lives here together.”

  Tears and laughter and hearty agreement from everyone. I set down my glass to latch my arms around Camille and Tish, on either side of me, and squeezed them close. My sisters, who I could not get by without. Our men, our children, our extended families. All gathered here in and around Shore Leave and Flickertail Lake, where everything began. We knew how fortunate we were; we understood the blessings of our simple life.

  A family of women, no longer afraid to love.

  “Thank you,” I whispered to the universe, smiling and crying both at once. “Thank you so much.”