The Wrangler’s Christmas Gift (The Malones of Grand, Montana #4)

Epilogue

T hat spring, the opening of the Mel Brezo/Heather Malone retrospective was like nothing anyone had ever seen and Heather alternated between pride and terror. Enormous screens played repeating reels of Colt’s footage around the vast room, while framed still shots accented the displays of paintings. Her life, her secrets, all exposed.

Art aficionados wandered quietly, their low murmurs of question or appreciation barely rising above the evocative background music. Malcolm’s placement was spot-on, the lighting perfect. Serving staff circulated discreetly with trays of champagne and tiny bites of things with goat cheese and chives and fancy bread. Heather could eat none of it and even the champagne did nothing to still her nerves.

One corner of the room featured the landscape she’d been working on before Christmas. The three snow-covered peaks represented Diana’s three children, embraced by the loving arms of clouds. To the subtle anatomical imagery, she’d added—if you knew where among the trees to look—the image of a woman with a child at her breast. Only Heather knew that tears diluted the paint depicting the best memories she had of her time with Diana. It was titled, simply: Motherhood .

On the opposite corner of the room was a photo triptych featuring Brade, Leila and Lucas. Kitty-corner to them were side-by-side portraits of Em and Colt. She’d wondered at first whether giving them equal weight would hurt Em. Then she decided that Em would recognize that this was for Colt and that nothing could ever diminish what she and Em shared. As for what Em and Colt shared, well. That was for them to recognize. Their posters were flanked by smaller images of some of the other foster kids who’d agreed to be featured, including a small picture of Tammy and her new family.

She’d even found a picture of her own parents, sepia-toned with age, her father’s face soft and smiling as he stood with his arm around his pretty young wife. They’d had love, too, once. The truth was, everyone was simply doing the best they could with what they had, with all their perfectly imperfect, human love. She hoped her father had become that soft, smiling man again in the last years of his life. She hoped he’d found peace.

Finally, nearest the exit, where the most recent and impactful of the paintings hung in pride of place, was the photo she prized most of all. Colt had outdone himself, capturing a close-up of her and JP on the night of the wedding, standing together but not quite touching, as they looked out toward the nativity scene. Both their faces wore the unmistakable shine of joy.

They would be together again, soon. She wasn’t letting him have all the grandparent time, after all.

For the first time in her career, Heather Malone wandered through the crowd at her own exhibit, smiling to herself, her stomach settling slightly. Despite the sensationalism of her story, she wasn’t immediately identified, and she did nothing to change that. Occasionally someone did a double take, but mostly they gave her the respect of her privacy.

“Well, Hetty,” same a voice at her elbow. “How does it feel to be out in the world, finally?

She turned to see Malcolm Black, the man who’d brought Mel Brezo to such wild success, who’d been championing her all these years, who’d encouraged her to own her full identity.

“Malcolm.” They exchanged a long, hard hug. “You’ve done an amazing job, here. It’s better than I could have imagined.”

He stepped back, his eyes shining. “I’m good at what I do,” he said. “But I’ve never had such great material to work with. Including the photos and video clips was brilliant.”

“I have Colt to thank for that.”

“That boy has come a long way,” Malcolm said. “I understand he and Em are partnering on a new project?”

She nodded and gave him a quick overview of their documentary film. “My story will be included, but it’s just one of many. Mal, I’m so proud of them.”

“Good for you, Hetty,” he said. “I know it can’t be easy to share your story so widely.”

She glanced around the room. “I’ve been sharing my story, through my paintings, for years, only nobody knew it but me. And maybe you.”

He shook his head. “You were a vault. I recognized the power of your work early on, but the source, that was your own secret. You were so adamant about hiding, I knew the stakes were high. I had no idea how high, though. Hetty, you’re a marvel, you know that?”

Her cheeks warmed at the praise. Standing up with the work of her heart and allowing herself to be seen in this show was every bit as hard as she’d expected, but the response from her fans had been overwhelmingly positive.

More importantly, a weight she didn’t even know she’d been carrying was gone from her heart. It was as if for three decades, she’d been whispering from a lonely mountaintop into a cold, empty valley, never knowing if anyone heard her, only to find herself standing on a stage, with a megaphone, in front of a cheering audience.

“Will Em keep her name?” Malcolm asked.

Early in the new year, Heather had initiated formal proceedings to adopt Em as her legal daughter. Adult adoptions moved forward much quicker, with far less paperwork, than infant adoptions, and they were signing the final papers shortly.

She nodded. “She’s staying Emmet Garcia, to honor Jolene. We’re announcing it in Grand, next week. Will you come out with me, to celebrate? Everyone wants to meet you.”

And the reason they were going to Grand for the celebration was because their announcement had a twist that authorities hadn’t dealt with before, one only three people knew about. Well, four. Em had insisted on telling Colt, too.

Heather hugged the secret to her heart, marveling again at all the ways family might be imagined, created, defined, rebuilt, by blood, love and law. Em, who’d never known her father, had requested Joseph Patrick Keane adopt her as well, and he’d agreed.

Blood had brought Heather Malone and Father Joseph Patrick back into their triplets’ lives. Love linked them both to Diana. Now, through law, they would share another child.

Once, their time together was measured in minutes, or hours or days, joined by the fragile glue of stories, contained in letters. Once, they’d been torn apart and for seasons and years, they were gone. Now, they were found and bound, tied by truth, sustained by story, for all the years or seasons or days or minutes they had left.

The lost Malones were all, finally, home where they belonged.

The End