Out of Exile. Carla Cassidy

two women returned to the sink, where they washed and dried the dishes and chattered about inconsequential things.

      When they had finished putting the dishes away, Lilly asked if Clara would like to take a walk with her.

      Clara declined, stating that perhaps she would take a little nap so she’d be rested for the family meeting that night. “It will be so nice to see everyone this evening. Did you know Mark has a nine-year-old stepson, and Luke is the stepfather to a precious little girl and boy. So many new family members, such joy. You are coming to the meeting?”

      “Oh, I don’t know,” Lilly said hesitantly. “I might pop my head in to say hello to everyone, but I don’t think it’s a good idea….”

      “Nonsense,” Clara said. She reached up and placed her hands on Lilly’s cheeks. It was a gesture as familiar to Lilly as her own heartbeat. “Legally your last name might be Winstead, but in your heart, and in my heart, you’re a Delaney through and through. And you should be at that family meeting.”

      Lilly smiled and pulled Clara’s hands from her cheeks. She planted a kiss in each hand, then closed Clara’s fingers as if to capture the kisses. “We’ll see and now I think I’ll take a little walk. Sure you won’t join me?”

      “Not me, but enjoy the sunshine.”

      Sunshine. There was plenty of that in Inferno, Arizona, Lilly thought as she stepped out the front door a few minutes later.

      Although it was October, the sunshine was bright and warm and the temperature was in the eighties. Lilly had no specific destination or direction in mind, but she set off walking in the direction of the old barn Matthew had mentioned they were renovating.

      Lilly and Matthew had spent lots of time in that barn years ago. Back then the barn had been in use, the loft filled with bales of hay, the lower level storage for machinery and grain.

      The two teenagers would crawl up in the loft, make themselves comfortable among the hay, and talk. Well, actually, Lilly would do most of the talking.

      Thinking back, it was funny to realize that she’d never shared with him the circumstances of his aunt “adopting” her, and he’d never spoken about his family. It was as if they’d both silently agreed that discussing parents or personal history was off-limits.

      Instead they spoke of school and favorite subjects, they discussed and compared ranch life and city life. They shared dreams and talked about what they saw for themselves in the future. But always Lilly sensed turbulent emotions just beneath his surface, simmering passions that he kept tightly reined.

      Brush tickled her ankles as she walked, and the heat on her shoulders was pleasant. Although much of the Delaney ranch was desert-like, there was a beauty in the landscape that surrounded her.

      To the distant right of where she walked, she could see the green grass and tall trees she knew were nourished by a nearby creek. She and Matthew had waded in the creek numerous times. She could still remember how he’d looked with his jeans rolled up to expose his athletic calves and his shirtless chest so broad and tanned.

      She shook her head to dispel the images from the past. Oh, that boy had stirred frightening, wonderful yearnings inside her teenage heart. And it unsettled her more than a little that the adult Matthew seemed to be stirring the same kinds of feelings in an adult Lilliana Winstead.

      The old barn rose up in the distance. Weathered gray and minus the doors, the place certainly wasn’t the one from her memory. Just as Matthew wasn’t the young boy of my memories, she reminded herself.

      As she walked closer, she saw Mark, Matthew’s brother, and Jacob Tilley carrying out a load of old lumber and dumping it into the bed of a pickup.

      “Lilly.” Mark swept his hat off his head and approached her with a friendly smile. “Matthew told me this morning that you and Aunt Clara had come to visit.”

      “Yes, I’m visiting, but Aunt Clara is planning on staying,” she replied. “And I understand congratulations are in order for you. Not only a new wife and stepson, but also a baby on the way. Congratulations, Mark.”

      His likable features radiated with the brightness of his smile. “Yeah, pretty amazing. I didn’t think any of us would ever marry or have families, and suddenly we’re all the marrying sort.”

      “Except Matthew,” she said.

      His smile turned rueful. “Yeah, except Matthew. Matthew doesn’t date…he dictates.” Shadows fell into Mark’s eyes, as if thoughts of his older brother saddened him. “I think maybe Matthew feels safest alone.”

      Lilly desperately wanted to ask more questions, to explore what Mark meant by his words, but at that moment Jacob joined them. He asked Mark about what to do with additional items in the barn.

      “I hate to cut our reunion short, but we’ve got a load of lumber arriving first thing in the morning and need to get the rest of this work done,” Mark said.

      “Please, don’t let me interrupt you,” Lilly exclaimed. “I was just doing a little walking to stretch my legs.”

      “You’ll be at the family meeting tonight?”

      Lilly shrugged. “Probably.”

      “Nice seeing you again,” Jacob said as he and Mark headed back to the barn. Lilly watched until the two men had disappeared into the barn, then turned and headed toward the house.

      Matthew feels safest alone.

      An interesting statement, and she wondered exactly what Mark had meant by his words about his brother.

      Before going back to the house, Lilly stopped in at cottage three to see how the painting was coming along. She found Ned and Eddie at work in the living room. They both offered her friendly smiles.

      “We’ll have this place knocked out and looking just fine for your aunt by this evening,” Ned said, a friendly smile curving his thin lips upward.

      “We already gave the bedroom a nice new coat,” Eddie added.

      “I appreciate it,” she replied. “It all looks very nice. Do you two stay here on the ranch?” she asked.

      “Not me,” Ned said. “I rent a small house in town. I like to separate my work life from my private life.”

      “And I rent an old shed that’s been renovated into a little cabin at the Watson ranch down the road a piece,” Eddie explained.

      Realizing she was keeping them away from their work, she murmured a goodbye then went back to the main house. Once there, she went into the kitchen, poured herself a glass of iced tea, then returned to the porch, where the chairs were in the shade.

      Matthew feels safest alone.

      Again Mark’s words played around and around in Lilly’s head. Oddly enough, she understood. Oh, she didn’t understand what emotional barriers might be in play inside Matthew. But she certainly understood the choice to live a life alone to keep oneself emotionally intact. Wasn’t that exactly what she had done?

      Sure, she’d had relationships with men in the past, but when they got too close, when she feared becoming vulnerable, she walked away. She would never put herself in a position again where somebody important in her life would walk away from her.

      Safer to be alone. Yes, she knew all about that. What she didn’t know was what had caused Matthew to make the same decision about himself.

      From the master bedroom downstairs in the back of the house, Matthew heard his brothers and sister and in-laws arriving for the family meeting.

      The sounds of their laughter, the easiness that had grown between them over the past couple of months emphasized an isolation Matthew hadn’t realized he felt until this moment.

      He stared at his reflection in the dresser mirror, a deep frown creasing his forehead as the laughter and merriment seeped in through his closed bedroom