by Sarah Hegger
Phi had a point. “About that,” Blythe said. “I know you must have paid for the car he drives to Uber and taxi, and I also know he’s trying to pay you back.”
“Oh?” Phi looked imperious, every inch the diva.
It intimidated the hell out of Blythe, but she kept going. “Nobody in our family can or will help him, and he deserves a hand up.” She pulled the check out and slid it across the table. “This is the first payment. I can pay you in four installments.” She glanced behind her, suddenly nervous. “But I don’t want Will to know.”
“This—” Phi held the check up with her forefinger and thumb. “This is a gross impertinence.” She sneered. “I acquit you on the grounds of loving your brother and being a wonderful girl.” Phi ripped the check in half. “But whatever my financial dealings may or may not be with Wilhelm, they do not concern you.”
Stunned, Blythe sat there and didn’t know what to do. She felt ashamed and angry at the same time.
“My darling girl.” Phi took both her hands. “I can see I have angered you, and I really do not care. Wilhelm is trying to make his own way in the world. You, more than most, know what that feels like and also what charity feels like.”
“But he’s my brother.”
Phi shook her head. “But that does not give you the right to cut his balls off and carry them in your pocket.”
Blythe was not sure she agreed, but it didn’t look like Phi cared one way or the other. “I want to help him. He deserves it.”
“You have helped him.” Phi squeezed her hands. “You have shown him love where there was none for him. You have believed in him when none other would. And you have shown him how to pursue a dream and bring it to fruition. No amount of money in the world can compete with that.”
Chapter Seventeen
Another day PE, post-Eric, and still counting. Apparently a time would come when Blythe wouldn’t count days by Eric’s absence in them. Being new to this heartache thing, she’d have to rely on conventional wisdom for that, and also keep herself busy.
No worries there with the Barrows brothers crowding for space in her mind. Brett loomed on her horizon, a really large and really dark cloud with a chance of a heavy storm. Her older brother scared the shit out of her, and she was way past pretending he didn’t. Last time she’d given that a try, she’d ended up with a broken arm. The time before that, she had made close personal contact with the wall. Enough said!
Blake occupied another portion of her mind and had her leaving work and heading for St. Peter’s. Growing up Barrows gave you a front row seat into addiction. Regardless of what Blake said, he was going to need help to make his sobriety stick. Even then it was no guarantee.
She found Reverend Michael exactly where she expected him to be, shuttling in between the church and the rec center.
“Blythe.” He gave her his broad, beautiful smile. “This is an unexpected surprise.”
She got the feeling that most people got this greeting. “Do you have five minutes?”
“For you? Always.” Behind the smile though, he looked tired. Not so much physically, but weary and drained. So many people wanted a piece of Reverend Michael, and no matter how broad those shoulders, that had to get exhausting.
“It’s about Blake,” she said as he led her into his small, cluttered office in the rec center. “I imagine you heard what happened on Thursday?”
Michael nodded slowly and settled himself behind his battered desk. Paper, books and posters covered every inch of faux wood. “I’m not going to lecture you about addiction,” Michael said. “You’ve seen enough of it to know how this goes.”
“You’re worried about me taking in Blake,” she said.
Michael nodded. “And the fact that you say that makes me feel a bit better.”
“I do know addicts.” Michael was one of those priests who invited the truth. Mainly because he never judged. “I’m trying to keep realistic about him. I also have to think of Kim.”
With a rueful smile, Michael planted his massive boots on the edge of his desk. “You got it. Now how can I help you do that?”
It struck her how many people came to him for help, and she felt momentarily guilty for being another one. “I wanted to talk to you about his recovery. See what programs you offered here.”
“You should talk to Daniel.” Michael lurched forward and dropped his legs. “Daniel works in the teen program but he’s also no stranger to addiction or prison.”
Blythe took Daniel’s details from Michael.
As she stood to leave, Laura poked her head around the door. “Just saying that I’m off now.”
“Laura.” Michael beamed and indicated Blythe. “Do you know Blythe Barrows?”
“Blythe.” Laura looked taken aback. “I apologize, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
With her perfectly groomed, shiny hair, immaculate makeup and tasteful clothing, Laura had created such a convincing mask, unless you knew what lay behind that faultless exterior.
“Hi, Laura.” Blythe hadn’t really studied her when last they’d met. Laura had aged well. She looked better now than she had at nineteen.
“Good, you know each other.” Michael stood and rubbed his hands together. He grinned at both of them, apparently clueless.
However, Blythe knew him better than that. A man this clever and intuitive had to be reading the atmosphere like a meteorologist.
“We know each other.” Blythe let Laura know she still had her number.
Laura flushed. “We used to know each other. People change.”
Wow, was this a dominant theme in her life right now.
“I was about to put Blythe in contact with Daniel,” Michael said. “Perhaps you can help her out.”
Minuscule as it was, Blythe still caught Laura’s hesitation before she said, “Sure. He’s actually wrapping up with his group in the other room.”
Michael stormed for the door. “Great. I’ll leave the two of you to it then.”
Laura watched him go through narrowed eyes. She gave a short laugh. “Well, this is awkward. Again. Let me take you to meet Daniel.”
Blythe followed her down the corridor and through the main room where she taught her class. Beyond that were several smaller meeting rooms, and Laura went to one of these and peeked through the window in the door.
Actually, Laura had changed a bit. She now wore a pair of well-loved jeans, but the cashmere sweater was still pure poison princess.
Laura dropped back onto her heels. “Looks like he might be a little bit. I could always give him a message for you.” She looked pathetically hopeful.
“No, I’ll wait.” Poison princess could be contagious.
Laura’s next question left Blythe gaping. “How’s Eric?”
“Fine.” The automatic answer left her mouth before she could stop it. Laura must be one of the few people in Ghost Falls who suspected what had been going on between Blythe and Eric. “We’re not…” Blythe didn’t want to define it any more than that. “Not anymore.”
“Oh.” Laura looked at her toes and nodded. “I’m sorry to hear that. You were good for him.”
“What?” Their conversation had drifted into the weirdest place, and Blythe couldn’t pretend. “I was never really anything to him. I was just around after you…when you…” The funny thing about keeping a secret for so many years was that keeping it became a habit, and even now, she didn’t want to say it out loud.
“When I screwed him over,” Laura said. “You were there for him when I trapped him into an engagement with a fake pregnancy.”
“Holy crap!” Never in her wildest imaginings could she have pictured their conversation. Or Laura’s blistering honestly. “You really want to talk about this.”
“No.” Laura shrugged. “But I’ve had a shitty couple of years. It makes you get honest with yourself.”
“And everybody else apparently.” Blythe shook her head, still trying to come to terms with it.
“You know, I don’t to this day know why I did it.” Rising on her toes again, Laura peered through the door. “I was nineteen and Eric was mine, but I knew enough to know he wasn’t going to stay mine.”
Blythe had always wanted to hear her answers, but Eric didn’t talk about that time a lot. Even though it had been the start of their friendship—or whatever the hell they’d had—he avoided the subject.
“You wouldn’t be the first person to try that tactic,” she said.”
Laura grimaced. “And I chose my target well.” She shook her head. “I played on his weak spot and I won.”
“It could be worse.” Blythe had come across a nineteen-year-old Eric, out of his mind drunk behind Cranks bar. Pat had spent a lot of his time and most of whatever money he could get his hands on there. The bar was a rough one and she’d only gone there to get Pat and bring him home.
She had spotted Eric sitting on a stack of empty beer crates outside the bar and stopped to talk to him. Drunk and frightened, Eric had unloaded the entire story on her. “At least you didn’t keep it up until he married you.”
“What a winner I am.” Laura snorted. “I can’t even take credit for that. Phi saw right through me and gave me a come-to-Jesus that left me reeling for days.”
Now Phi knowing about her and Eric made more sense.
“I sulked around her for years.” Laura chuckled. “There is nothing so humiliating as being called out on something and knowing you have no leg to stand on.”
“I’ve been there a time or two,” she said. “I heard you got divorced.”
“You heard right.” Laura saddened. “I hurt a good man. Another good man that is, because under that too cool for school charmer, Eric is a good man.”
Blythe’s heart gave that familiar pang. Things would be easier if she could consign Eric to asshole and walk way, but he wasn’t. “But still allergic to being pinned down.”
Laura gave her a long look, and then nodded. “I probably had a little something to do with that.”
“Don’t give yourself too much credit.” Blythe smiled to soften her words. “Cressy did her thing long, long before you.”
“Right.” Laura rolled her eyes. Movement from the other side of the door caught her attention and she peered through again. “Here they come.”
She and Blythe stepped back as the door flew open and ten or eleven teen boys tumbled out. They ranged in age from about fourteen to twenty, but they all carried their attitude like a backpack with them.
An attractive tall man in his thirties followed them out. Not strictly speaking good looking, he had brown hair flopping over a pair of hazel eyes. He caught sight of Blythe and smiled. “Hi.”
Oh, yes, indeed, he had a little something-something going on. She held out her hand. “I’m Blythe, and Michael said I should speak with you.”
“Remind me to thank Michael.” His eyes twinkled. How anyone could deliver such a cheesy line and not sound lame she didn’t know, but Daniel did it.
Laura shifted, and his attention swung that way.
“Hi.” Laura’s openness disappeared, and she looked tense.
Daniel’s smile tightened. “Hi, Laura.”
“I brought her along to meet you.” Laura motioned Blythe. “Now I need to get going. Nice to see you again, Blythe.”
“And you too.” Surprisingly it had been.
She and Daniel watched Laura scuttle away. One of them may have checked out Laura’s ass in those jeans, and it certainly wasn’t her.
“So.” Daniel flushed when he caught on that she’d busted him. “What can I do for you?”
Blythe told him about Blake.
“Here’s my card.” Daniel dug a card out of his back pocket. “Pass it on to Blake and tell him to give me a call.” His expression gentled. “You know he has to make the call, right? About all of this.”
“I know.” She had learned the lesson the hard way. “But it doesn’t mean I can’t give him a hand.”
“No, it doesn’t.” Daniel smiled, and that fizz pop came back again. She wondered if Laura had noticed it. Of course Laura had noticed it. You either ran from a man because you disliked him or because you really didn’t.
“Are you ready to leave?” Daniel looked around them as he locked the meeting room door. “Because I’ll walk you out if you are.”
“I’m done.” Blythe fell into step beside him. So much more done than she’d imagined when she came here today. The conversation with Laura still played in her mind. For years she’d hated Laura for what she’d done to Eric.
For years Blythe had held her fake pregnancy and miscarriage against Laura, and one conversation didn’t take that all away. But Laura hadn’t made any excuses for her behavior and hadn’t tried to justify herself. That kind of honesty counted for something.
They reached the exterior door, and Daniel held it open for her.
Blythe waited while he locked it. Church recreation center or not, they were in a bad part of town.
Daniel waited by her car as she unlocked it. “Are you the same Blythe who does the exercise class?”
“I am.” She tossed her purse into the passenger seat.
“Brett’s sister?”
Blythe nodded. “You know Brett?”
“Yeah.” Daniel rubbed his nape. “I was into some pretty bad stuff before I got sent to prison.”
“Ah. That makes sense.”
“Anyway.” Daniel leaned on the open car door. “I’d like to chat to you about doing something aimed more specifically at my teen girls.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah.” He shrugged. “I wanted to explore the possibility of exercise helping with their self-esteem issues. So many of them have them.”
Blythe welcomed the chance. “It’s called being a girl. Too many of us grow up with body issues and keep them even as adults.”
“But not you?” Daniel’s look of admiration was enough to soothe a girl’s ego.
She laughed. “Nice line, but even me.”
“I’ve got zero game.” Daniel pulled a face. “But would you consider having coffee with me anyway?”
If she hadn’t caught that look at Laura, Blythe would be all over his offer. Daniel was just the sort of guy to help someone over Eric Evans. At least he would be a step in the right direction.
“I’d love to have coffee,” she said. “And put something together for your teen girls. But I don’t think I’m the one you should be asking out for coffee.”
He winced. “Caught that did you?”
Blythe had to laugh. “It was hard to miss.”
Chapter Eighteen
Eric ignored his ringing phone and kept his gaze on the view outside his office window. Downtown Ghost Falls would never inspire creative greatness, but it made for better viewing than the growing pile of crap on his desk.
On top was his draft for the merger, mostly blank because he couldn’t get his head in the game.
He checked his phone.
Miranda.
Their evening had ended pleasantly enough. He’d walked her back to her hotel and side stepped her offer to come in. He had given her a chaste kiss on the cheek and walked away.
She had told him she was going out of town for a few days and would be back. He guessed she was back and keen for a repeat of their last date.
There really was no reason for him not to, other than the growing realization that he didn’t want to.
Outside her hotel room door, Miranda had looked up at him with her luminous espresso eyes and full, plum mouth, and it had done nothing for him other than send him running.
Cooper had also sent him a few messages, along with a sheath of incident reports.
Brett kept vigilant
on the night shift. Thus far, he’d reported four incidents. None of them had amounted to anything, because Brett had chased the trouble away, but this kind of shit couldn’t go on.
Also according to Cooper, Bo and Becker had pitched up, worked several full shifts and not bitched once. That must be some kind of record. His thumb was halfway to dialing Blythe and sharing with her before he stopped himself.
She was right and he owed her this much. If he didn’t want the same things she wanted, then he had no business pursuing her. He had been keeping away from her, and any day now it would get easier. These reaches for his phone, or desire to share something with her would pass.
Four cars made their way down Main Street, constituting the extent of Ghost Fall’s lunchtime rush. He’d given up a good life in Denver to be here closer to his family.
Right now, had he been in Denver, he would be making his way to Big Bites for a roast beef on whole wheat. Maybe, given his crappy day, he’d add a Fat Tire to his sandwich.
But no, here he was in swinging Ghost Falls, where apparently, the powers that be also felt the need to investigate his sites for health and safety procedures.
Their focus? Surprise, surprise, Highgate site. All of this crap hitting one site couldn’t be coincidence.
Now he came to the truly troubling part. He really didn’t give a shit. Not much of a shit at any rate. He’d rather stare out the window as Bets Schumaker bottlenecked what little traffic there was with her barge of a car.
“Hey,” Nate’s voice had him swinging his chair around.
Eric went back to his view. “Hey yourself.”
“What are we looking at?” Nate joined him in staring out the window.
“Not much.”
Bets was in the longwinded process executing a sixteen-point turn.
Nate sighed. “Damn, I wish I could get her to drive something else.”
“Arrest her.”
“For what?”