Her dad would tinker with the RV, keep the lawn trimmed with his ancient push mower and swap yarns with his cronies over at Sully’s on hot afternoons, while her mom would garden and haunt the café during working hours, making sure things were shipshape.
It wasn’t that Alice Bailey interfered, exactly. She’d run the place, along with her husband, for close to forty years, that was all, and she had a vested interest, emotional if not financial.
Brynne enjoyed having her mom around—mostly. Alice always introduced new recipes to the menu, and her many, many friends came from all over Wild Horse County to lunch and sip sweet tea and hear all about the Baileys’ adventures on the road.
In the quiet times, though, when it was just Alice and Brynne, and sometimes Brynne’s dad, Mike, Alice asked questions.
Had Brynne been seeing anyone special?
She was over that man from Boston, right?
Was she sure she wanted to stay in Painted Pony Creek? Maybe she ought to sell the business—Alice swore she and Mike wouldn’t mind—and spend a year in Paris or possibly Florence, just painting.
Or what about New York? She’d probably love New York, all that color and motion and sensual stimulation...
Brynne sighed, finished her bath and let the tub drain as she wrapped herself in a fluffy towel and stepped out onto the mat.
She loved Paris—who didn’t?—and Florence and New York, and she knew it would be good for her to work less and paint more—sometimes she actually ached to pick up a brush—but she wasn’t an heiress or a trust fund baby. She had responsibilities, right here in Painted Pony Creek—she had friends, her art, a business, a cat. She couldn’t just go haring off to another city or another country at a whim.
As she brushed and flossed and rinsed, she thought about Painted Pony Creek.
It certainly wasn’t cosmopolitan, by any stretch of the imagination, but it was, as she’d told Eli earlier, home.
The scenery was breathtakingly beautiful, too—snowcapped mountains, stands of timber reaching as far as the eye could see, shimmering lakes brimming with fish, four distinct seasons, and canyons and valleys. When it came to landscapes fit to paint, Montana had everything and more.
The drawbacks? Painted Pony Creek was a small town—ironically, one of its charms—and that meant there wasn’t a lot to do.
Oh, there were events—the big rodeo, the Fourth of July blowout and barbecue at the town park, classic car shows and the like—but, at least at the Creek, no museums or galleries, no film or art festivals.
Unless....
Unless someone, like Brynne, decided to start something—not a museum or a gallery, and not a film festival, since folks in rural Montana probably wouldn’t go for subtitles and intellectual angst, but a celebration of various arts and crafts, well, that just might fly.
There were lots of artists in the state—producing everything from chainsaw sculpture to exquisite landscapes in oils. There were wood-carvers and potters, quilters, doll makers—the list was practically endless.
Something quickened within Brynne as she thought of the possibilities.
The city park was huge, with plenty of room for booths, a stage featuring local bands, like The GateCrashers—the group Carly sang with—and concessions galore.
With adequate promotion, such a gathering would draw visitors from all over the region. Bailey’s, Sully’s Bar and Grill, and the various fast-food places around the Creek would be jumping, and the bed-and-breakfasts, the new hotel and even Russ Schafer’s motel off the old highway would be booked to capacity.
Oh, yes. An art festival could give the whole community a boost, financially and otherwise.
Unless, of course, it fizzled.
Putting something like that together would be a job of gargantuan proportions; Brynne would need permits, some kind of liability insurance, and a virtual army of volunteers. They would have to attract and vet artists, musicians, food-service people.
And the publicity? Well, she didn’t even want to think about that, not at eleven thirty at night, with a twelve-hour workday behind her.
The whole idea was probably a crazy tangent, and nothing more.
After a good night’s sleep, Brynne decided as she turned off the tree lights with a tap of her bare foot, she’d be in her right mind again.
Probably.
CHAPTER THREE
THE SNOW KEPT right on coming down.
After leaving Bailey’s, Eli stopped by the office, checked in with Melba Summers, the deputy he’d hired in November, after Oliver Boone moved on to another job in another state.
All was quiet on the western front, for the moment anyway, so he clocked out for the day.
That conversation with Brynne, back at Bailey’s, had left him with a lot to think about, and he wanted to do that thinking in a quiet place—his place.
A mile or so out of town, he met a snowplow heading back toward town.
The driver, Laura Wiley, waved as they passed each other, and Eli waved back.
That was one of the best things about living in a place like the Creek—knowing everybody. It gave a person a sense of security, and there were a hell of a lot fewer surprises.
Not that the town was composed of saints and angels; far from it.
The area was populated by human beings, some good, some bad, with the vast majority falling somewhere in between those two extremes.
There were plenty of creeps and lowlifes, that was for sure, but Eli knew who they were, and he kept an eye on them.
Strangers, of course, were another matter, and the Creek got its share of those, too, mostly just passing through. During the big rodeo, in mid-June, for instance, spectators came from all over Montana and well beyond its borders, too.
Most were decent folks, looking to have a good time and go peaceably back home again, but there were thieves, con artists and other no-goods, as well.
At rodeo time, Eli hired temporary deputies and put in eighteen-hour days himself. The town’s Fourth of July celebration could get pretty rowdy, too, but so far, with his regular crew and a few extras, he’d managed to keep the lid on.
His mind tripped back to the kids at Bailey’s—Eric, his nephew, and Carly, in particular. He hoped they’d put off the planned sledding and snowboarding until morning, but they were kids, after all. Invincible.
He’d text Eric later, remind him that he was still on probation; the boy seemed to have undergone a major change of heart, but it would be all too easy for him to fall into his old ways, start hanging out with thugs like Freddie Lansing and his buddies again.
Nothing good would come of that.
If Eric were caught drinking or taking drugs—or running with Freddie and the gang—he’d be headed back to court, and this time, he wouldn’t get off with community service and a stern warning.