Sugar Creek Read Online Free PDF Page B

it would make me feel better.”
    “Comfort’s enough,” Edna said. “In fact, I can’t think of much better to leave a grandchild with. And when I’m dead and gone, you’ll still have that.”
    Rachel made a face. “Shut up—it’s not like you’re going anywhere anytime soon.” Then she turned back to the piano, focusing on a photo of Edna taken in the fifties, out by the creek. She wore a short-sleeved sweater with a white lace collar and a dark skirt. “You were really pretty,” Rachel said.
    “Took after my mother,” Edna replied immodestly, motioning to an even older picture, on the wall—from the thirties—of Rachel’s great-grandmother, who was, indeed, just as lovely, even in what Rachel saw as a long, shapeless dress and flat hair pulled tight behind her head. “And good thing, too, because looks and charm was about all a girl in Destiny could hope for back then. I’m glad times have changed.”
    Which reminded Rachel of something that hadn’t changed, or apparently not much—the Farris/Romo feud. “By the way, I didn’t get a chance to tell you last night, but I got pulled over by Mike Romo on my way into town.”
    Rachel waited for Edna to fly into a fit over “those damn Romos” as she’d done on a regular basis in Rachel’s youth—so she couldn’t have been more stunned when Edna smiled and said, “Ah. Mike’s a decent fella. Caught ya speedin’, huh? He’s a stickler—you’ll really have to slow it down while you’re here.”
    Rachel just stared at her grandmother, her mouth hanging open. “What the hell is this ? Since when do you have anything nice to say about a Romo?”
    She shrugged again, tilting her gray head. “Like I said, times have changed. Oh, I still don’t have much nice to say about most of ’em, but Mike’s a good egg. Not much of a talker, at least not to most folks, but he does a lotta good around here.”
    “Huh,” Rachel said blankly, still trying to get over it. “He told me you and he got along, but I didn’t believe him. And…well, he still has plenty bad to say about the Farrises, just so you know.”
    “Never claimed he was a saint.”
    “He said we’d never had any respect for the law—and that we were smart-asses.” She neglected to mention that she’d actually started the name-calling.
    Yet Edna just cracked a smile, clearly amused. “Sounds like he’s got us pegged.”
    And Rachel rolled her eyes in disbelief. “Where’s your family loyalty gone? This isn’t the Edna I know.”
    “Maybe the better question is—where’s my family gone? Once you’re by yourself…well, maybe it stops feelin’ like there’s much to be loyal to. Or maybe I just got old and tired of bein’ rambunctious. Easier to just get along with folks. That’s somethin’ I wish I’d figured out sooner in life.”
    Rachel just stared, planting her hands on her hips. “Who are you? And what have you done with my grandmother?”
    “I don’t see what the big to-do is. We are all smart-asses—except maybe for your cousin Elaine, but that’s just ’cause she’s not very bright. Takes some brains to be a good smart-ass. And your uncle Dave did have some shady real estate dealin’s years ago when he was runnin’ short on cash, and your great aunt Liddie was practically famous around here for writin’ bad checks back in theseventies—recession and all, you know. And your cousin Robby—”
    “Stop.” Rachel held up a hand. “I already know all this and don’t like being reminded.”
    Yet Edna just shook her head. “We are what we are, darlin’. Don’t mean all of us are that way, but nobody’s perfect, either.”
    And what was it the Farrises were? Bad with money. Most of them anyway. For Rachel, that was the resounding theme that ran through every branch of her family tree. Some relatives, like Dave and Liddie and Robby, let it show, way too much—while others, like her parents, appeared comfortable on the surface, yet mostly squandered