The Widow's Protector

Yes, she was sorry he was dead, but she didn’t really miss him at all.

It was an ugly thought, but it was a truth that had burrowed deep into her heart and mind over the past few months. These days she couldn’t even remember if there had ever been any good times with Jeff. Maybe at the beginning. There must have been some back then.

But she couldn’t remember them. They were layered over with five years of ugliness, and as far as she was concerned they could stay buried.

She had a different future now, a future that included a new daughter. She needed to keep her attention on that, not the past.

She was wiping the last plate with a towel when she thought of Ryder again. Imagine coming home to find your wife had killed herself. How could you live with that? His words about depression and doctors and medicines indicated that she’d had good care, but evidently it hadn’t been enough.

Drying her hands, she thought about that and intuited that at some very deep level, no matter what you had done to try to care for someone, if they committed suicide then you were bound to feel you had failed in some essential way.

No wonder he wanted to pound nails and work on her roof. With demons like that, what other outlet could there be?

She heard him come down the stairs, then he appeared in the kitchen door. She noticed again how attractive he was but pushed the thought away. Now was not the time, and she wasn’t sure she’d ever want to become involved with a man again anyway.

“One small, slow leak,” he said. “I’ll need the biggest pot or bucket you have to make sure it doesn’t do any ceiling damage overnight. Other than that, we should be good for now. I’ll check again at bedtime to be certain.”

She gave him the five-gallon bucket she used for mopping and watched him disappear once again.

The night yawned before her, and she wondered how they would spend the time. No TV, no power. They could talk, become a little better acquainted, but that prospect frightened her a bit.

Did she really want to know him better? What if she started to really like him?

Not that it would matter, she told herself. He’d be leaving as soon as he had fixed the roof. He had said so.

He wouldn’t want to spend any more time in this godforsaken place than he had to. She wasn’t sure she would if she had a choice.

But she didn’t have one. Not yet. There was nothing to do but endure.

At least she knew she could do that much.

Ryder went to get the portable radio from the storm shelter so they could try to find some news about the extent of damage around them and when they could expect the weather to clear. He had to detach the antenna that had allowed them to use it in the shelter, but he didn’t think he was going to have much trouble aboveground. If he did, he could always find a wire somewhere.

He checked the phone when he returned and found it still out. His cell phone continued to give him no connection. Oh, well, Ben hadn’t expected him for a week or two anyway. Tomorrow would be soon enough to give him a call. Ben was already irritated that Ryder was taking the slow route out there. Another few days couldn’t matter.

In the meantime, he realized he was grateful to be here. He couldn’t imagine that woman being alone and pregnant with no power, no phone, no idea whether roads were passable and nobody to help.

It definitely wasn’t right.

She had moved the oil lamps to the living room right off the small entry hall, and he joined her there with the radio. “Do you mind?”

“No. That’s a great idea. I was just sitting here wondering what was going on in the rest of the county.”

“Maybe we’ll find out if I can get a signal. Right now my cell phone thinks the world has vanished.”

Her lovely smile reappeared. “It’s never easy to get a cell signal out here. Closer to town they have more towers, but out here where ranches are so spread out, we don’t have many. I hear a lot of the ranchers and farmers who can afford them have satellite phones.”

But that would be beyond her means, he thought. That didn’t sit well with him, either. He supposed in the old days pioneer women had dealt with worse, but this wasn’t the old days, this woman didn’t much resemble a pioneer with loads of knowledge about how to do things, and a pregnant woman without a reliable telephone struck him as dangerous. But of course he couldn’t say so. He’d already inserted himself too much into her life. Maybe more than she wanted.

The radio crackled and the announcer’s voice emerged and then disappeared again into the static. Road crews were out trying to clear roads. At one point Marti looked at him.

“I won’t be able to get you to town until they clear Eighty-six.”

“I’m staying at least a few days anyway.”

Bursts of information got through. Line crews from surrounding areas were arriving to help restore power. Conard City had completely lost power. Damage reports remained sketchy as the sheriff’s department tried to visit outlying properties. Emergency aid had begun to arrive.

They received an incomplete picture of the situation, some speculation about how many tornadoes and how strong, but the information sufficed to tell Ryder that it was bad. Very bad.

With each bit of news, Marti sagged more. Drawn and pale, she appeared exhausted.

“You need to get to bed,” he said finally. “It’s been a stressful day. Let me just check the attic one more time, then you get some sleep. We can assess things better in the morning.”

She nodded wordlessly.

He climbed one more time into the attic, checking around, but found no more new leaks. The bucket had hardly filled, so he felt no need to empty it.

Back downstairs, he sent Marti up and watched her climb those stairs as if her feet weighed a ton.

Sympathy squeezed his heart. Unwanted, unwelcome, it happened anyway.

Unbidden, a thought floated across his mind: maybe he could help this woman out in a way he’d never been able to help Brandy. It probably wouldn’t ease his sense of guilt much, but it might put a bandage on his soul.

And he so desperately needed a bandage.

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