The clock in the parlor chimed midnight. Angie reached for a lemon raisin cookie. Lenore had known she’d need comfort food while they hashed out these gut-wrenching issues.
“Happy birthday, sweetheart,” the woman continued in a resonant voice. “Forty years ago today, I welcomed you into this world, where you were causing a different big conflict. Yet I knew you were special, and that I’d been chosen as your guardian angel. That’s how it works, you know.”
Angie looked up from her cookie. “So, what’re you saying?”
The white-haired woman took her hand. “As we move from moment to moment, choice to choice, some doors open, while others close. We all live in the houses we’ve built for ourselves, and the pieces fall into place for better or worse. We’re creating our lives—our worlds—as we go,” she explained. “Needless to say, our choices affect other lives. They generate new choices for everyone we show our love to or withhold it from.”
This was nothing new, and Lenore was taking her sweet time about coming to a point. Angie stifled a yawn. “Sorry. Long day.”
“And the beginning of another one,” Lenore replied. “I just wanted to point out the interesting fact that you were born here, a native of this town, while Rita is just passing through. A tourist, of sorts.”
A tourist. It wasn’t the first time that concept had come up today, and it intrigued Angie that her mentor had applied that term to Rita McQueen. “How do you figure? She’s been here long enough to establish relationships and a business, and—”
“The tide washes things in, and it carries things out. Eventually even the rocks jutting up from the sea wear away. Though some rocks are denser, more firmly anchored than others.” Lenore smiled. “Go to bed now, dear. As you relax and drift off, remember to send your love to everyone you know, because everyone needs it. Some of us more than others right now. It’ll all work out the way it’s supposed to. I promise.”
Twenty-Eight
“HAPPY birthday, Angie! And thanks for being our excuse to party, chica. I couldn’t keep your cake a secret much longer.” Elena looked up from the layered masterpiece she was decorating, a cake that closely resembled the bungalow on Windswept. “And with the band coming over, it’ll be a great way to turn forty. Better than black balloons that say you’re over the hill.”
And better than those thirtysomething birthdays where Gregg got violent, she recalled ruefully. Yet, with Lenore’s red and purple streamers and Japanese lanterns hung all around the parlor, who could remain mired in the past?
“Thanks,” she murmured. Guys in fedoras and white shirts were arriving to set up chairs, and they too expressed fond birthday wishes.
Kyle gave her a long hug and bussed her cheek. “Ya can’t be forty, little girl. I’m only a few years older than that kid who ran scared after ya were born, right?” he teased. He gave her a small package, his face creased with anticipation. “I’m not the best gift wrapper in the world, but I thought ya might like this.”
Angie’s heart thudded as she popped the tape with her fingernail. Then tears sprang to her eyes. It was a framed enlargement of him and Patty holding her just after she was born.
“Oh, wow! Oh—this is going on the shelf beside the fireplace!”
“Got those motion detectors in place this morning, too. Sounds like I’m a day behind on that, and I’m real sorry, hon.” His gaze locked with hers. “Rita better watch her step. Word about that rumble at Hot Karma got around pretty fast. Billy was so peeved, he told her to stay home tonight. Didn’t need any of her shenanigans breakin’ up your party, see.”
Angie nodded as a black Navigator pulled into the parking lot. “Well, for Tyler’s sake, I hope she doesn’t show up.”
“She does, she’s gonna deal with me.”
His protective tone made her heart swell, and so did the sight of Ross and his son approaching in their felt fedoras with wild paisley neckties. Tyler set down three bulky instrument cases and then flashed his purple braces at her. “Ready to romp? You’re gonna hear some ragtime tonight, lady!”
Tyler’s quick hug and feisty attitude made her heart sing. How many guys his age would get so revved about music that predated everyone here? Or about playing it with guys old enough to be his grandpas?
When T.C. headed back to the car, Ross sidled up to sling his arm around her. “Better today?” he murmured.
She tweaked his hat brim. Who could feel depressed or scared with a sexy man like Ross Costello looking ready to kiss her clothes off? She had sent him some love last night, as Lenore suggested, and it had restored some perspective: this man had rescued her from herself the first time they met, and he’d been her staunchest supporter…her forever lover and friend ever since. His baby blues were shining for her and nobody else. “I seem to be surrounded by optimists who refuse to let me sulk—”
His lips wiped away the fact that the boys in the band, along with Lenore and Elena, were watching them. The kiss held her hostage in the best of ways, made her Ross’s willing partner again.
“More where that came from,” he whispered huskily, “and a little something later, for your present.”
“But you’ve done too much already, what with this party—”
“Yeah, I’ve let you in for a whole lot of headaches,” he interrupted, gazing at her intently. “Thanks for giving me another chance.”
“Hey, Costello, ya gonna play or get a room?” Kyle called from across the parlor. “We’ve got a party to start.”
And what a party! When it sank in that the Wing Tips had come to play for her because Tyler insisted, Angie was reminded how special these new friends considered her, how they truly cared about her, no matter how little time they’d actually known each other. Lenore and Elena flanked her on the long sofa, clapping with the syncopated rhythm of a ragtime dance that made Angie’s toes tap. Kyle hammed it up on his trombone, and then Ross and T.C. seemed bent on outdoing each other during an intricate duet—or was it a duel?—between trumpet and soprano sax. Tyler was truly amazing.
Ross sang “The Sheik of Araby” with playfully suggestive gestures Angie didn’t recall from when Daddy had sung it years ago. Immediately following, Tyler made all their jaws drop with a virtuoso medley of Sousa marches on Lenore’s old upright. As the audience applauded wildly, he grinned.
“That was an arrangement I wrote for one of my classes,” he remarked with a modest shrug. “And Dad, if you’ll join me on ‘High Society’…well, I wrote this arrangement so you could play along, because it was the song that convinced me I wanted to be the best. Like you.”
Angie nipped her lip. Her pulse pounded with pride, and Ross, flushed with pleasure, said, “Worth every penny I paid to send this boy to school, wouldn’t you say, guys?”
Lenore squeezed Angie’s hand. Did it get any better than this? The Wing Tips sat forward in their chairs, anticipating a rare musical treat. Ross was just putting his trumpet to his lips when he was interrupted by the ring of a cell phone. It was Kyle’s. Angie’s father grabbed it and muffled his voice, and the conversation didn’t take long.
“Sorry to interrupt, guys, but the sheriff says our new alarm went off. Seems we’ve caught Angie’s cat burglar.”
The parlor got very quiet.
“Let’s roll,” Ross murmured. “We’ll continue the party after we deal with this.”
Angie steeled her nerves. “I’m going, too.” Her feet took her toward Ross’s Navigator even as her heart wondered if she really wanted to endure another scene with Rita. Was this going to be the end of it all, or would Rita find another way out of paying for her misdeeds?
Tyler helped her into the car, and he didn’t appear too thrilled. Kyle joined the young man in the backseat, looking none too overjoyed that his security system had done its job.
They arrived at 24 Windswept Lane to find Darrel Hix coming down the steps. Rita was already in custody. She seemed subdued until she saw them getting out of Ross’s car.
“So what’re you staring at?
” she demanded curtly. “If you think some rinky-dink security cam will make me apologize after Angie stole my—” She choked when Tyler stepped out of the car, gawking at the handcuffs fastening her to the sheriff. “Haven’t you caused me enough trauma for one visit?” she pleaded. “Isn’t it enough that my own son has forsaken me—?”
“Wasn’t Angie’s idea for you to break into her house,” T.C. replied in a tight voice. “You broke the law, plain and simple. And what you did to Dad and Angie, running that ad in the paper, well—that was way over the top.” He sighed, the starch going out of his bravado. “You need help, Mom…need to be seeing Dr. James again. Need to be taking your meds, or getting better ones. And we’ve known it for a long time now.”
Rita looked ready to lecture him but then fell back against the police cruiser, her shoulders shaking. “It was one last attempt to…to recover what was mine,” she wheezed. “Nobody seems to care what happens to me, though. I’ll just have to sell the shop and—”
“I’ll get you a good price for it,” Ross assured her. “You could do well in plenty of places. You’ve established yourself online, you could—”
“—move on with my life, without the love of my life,” the redhead continued between woeful sniffles. “What’s left for me here, if my own son turns away to side with his father’s bimbo?”
“And that’s as far as you’re gonna go with that!” Kyle stepped toward her, pointing a finger that trembled. “Nobody wanted to see ya hurt, Rita—you’re a helluva singer and the boys’d do just about anything for ya. But you’ve crossed the line this time. Sooner or later we all gotta own up to stuff we’ve done, and it’s your turn. You brought this on yourself.”
After Sheriff Hix took Angie’s statement and snapped photos of the ruined Murphy mattress, he shook his head over the ad in the newspaper. He looked at them all as though he detested this part of being a small-town lawman. “You plan to press charges? Take her to court?” he asked in his bristly voice.
Angie’s heart hammered. She held Ross’s gaze, sensed Tyler’s humiliation. This felt a lot like her confrontation with Gregg at the apartment: she’d seen justice done…but it hadn’t really repaired the emotional damage, had it? She’d received her check for the money he’d stolen from her account, but her ex would fester with his resentment and anger forever—unless he changed his attitude. Turned his bitterness and hatred into—
Love.
You must give love not to receive love back or to attract it, but because it’s who you are. It’s why you’re here. It’s why we’re all here.
Lenore’s words from last night sent goose bumps up her spine, and Angie sensed it was one of those “aha!” moments—an epiphany of Spirit the universe, and God, and everyone who loved her had been trying to bestow upon her. But she had to accept their gift and send it out again, didn’t she? Wasn’t that how the Law of Attraction worked?
Even though everyone was watching her, waiting for her reply, Angie closed her eyes. Rita, I send you love and light…I send you healing…I send you the happiness and purpose that will help you find your way again, she prayed.
She opened her eyes. Cleared her throat and focused on the redhead who sagged against the police car. Did her damndest to smile. “No, Sheriff. The last thing Rita needs is to be locked away, or dragged into court,” she said. “And the last thing I want is to keep feeling like her victim. It’s time to stop being afraid of each other—because this fear is the opposite of love.
“And maybe this sounds hokey, Rita,” she went on in a stronger voice, “but I just now prayed that you would find the love and happiness and healing that’ll help you get a life again. And I meant that in the best way.”
Everybody stood quietly, just looking at her, and then at the slender woman wearing the handcuffs. Rita blinked. Tears dribbled down each cheek, and her lips moved but no sound came out.
“Good point, Angie. Real good point.” Ross smiled sadly and reached for his cell phone. “I’ll call Elliott James, her shrink, and her doctor, Craig Cramer, and let them take over. I feel like we’ve said and done all we can, Darrel.” He punched in a number and waited, then paced in front of the house as he spoke. When he turned to them again, he looked relieved. Almost peaceful. “Dr. James is on his way. He’ll take it from here.”
THEY returned to the inn and gave Lenore, Elena, and the guys in the band a brief summary of what had gone down. Angie felt subdued despite the streamers and party decorations, recalling the way Rita had wilted…how she’d bowed her head and gotten into Elliott’s car after the sheriff removed the handcuffs.,
But then Lenore put her arms around Angie’s shoulders and Ross’s. “That’s the spirit,” she said with a glowing smile. “That’s really the Spirit at work, and I’m guessing your compassion for Rita will go a long way toward healing this whole situation. You okay with this, Tyler?”
“Yep. It’s been a long time coming, and now Mom can get herself together again.” Ross’s son flashed his braces, grinning as he put on his fedora. “But now we need to shake it, and then dive into some punch and cake, because tonight’s all about Angie!” He opened his instrument cases, setting out a banjo, a trumpet, a clarinet, and then hefting an accordion’s straps over his shoulders. “You guys are all in on this, okay? We’ll keep it in B-flat, and we’re jammin’ to ‘Happy Birthday’ in a four-four boogie-ragtime mode. Got it?”
Billy Linhardt tucked his fiddle under his chin, grinning, while the other guys positioned their instruments, too. Angie took her seat between Lenore and Elena again, and as T.C. snapped his fingers to set the beat, her happiness crept back. After all, when had anyone ever performed a song just for her? And wasn’t it cool that Tyler chose to salute her, to give a musical thumbs-up to his dad’s new relationship?
Despite all she’d heard, she wasn’t prepared for the musical brilliance Tyler and the Wing Tips now displayed. How did guys who played with this kid so seldom keep the music together so effortlessly and have so much fun doing it? It was a joy to follow their expressions as they perched on the edges of their folding chairs, playing their hearts out, to watch Ross burst with pride as his son played a showy accordion polka, then strummed a Dixieland banjo, crooned with his clarinet, dueled with his dad on a trumpet, and then coaxed Mac McCaslin off the bench for a honky-tonk piano finale. His cohorts never missed a beat, and “Happy Birthday” had never been played this way.
As Lenore and Elena swayed with her, Angie realized the men were amazing themselves, too. Tyler’s talent raised theirs up, and they all soared with a joy that came out in intricate riffs and runs and trills like she’d never heard.
“Hot damn and hallelujah!” Angie hopped up to cheer as the last note resounded around the room. Elena jumped up and down like a little girl, while Lenore laughed and cried as she called out her bravos. The guys clapped each other’s backs and praised Tyler lavishly.
Ross grabbed his son in an unabashed bear hug, and this time T.C. didn’t pull away. He winked at Angie over his dad’s head, flushed with exuberance.
“Everybody sing now!” Lenore called out as she lit the candles on the bungalow cake. “Happy birrrrthday to youuuuu…”
Angie stood, flummoxed and happy, as this roomful of new friends harmonized the age-old birthday song. Ross jovially directed with one hand, while his other arm found her shoulders, and during the last, loud note he kissed her one more time. His eyes sparkled, inches in front of hers.
“I love you so much, angel baby,” he murmured. “Happiness always. Forty’s nothing! The best is yet to be.”
It sounded like such a sweet promise, only to be surpassed by her father approaching with some official-looking papers. “I’m pleased to let ya all know that Angie gets her little house today! Signed, sealed, and delivered. Happy birthday, honey!”
A loud cheer went up as Angie gaped at Kyle and then at the man who still held her. “Ross, I—I know we’ve talked about that house being mine, but—”
“No buts, babe. I in
tended for you to have it all along.”
“—now that I have a job, I can make payments, or—” She turned to look him full in the face. “You told me how much those houses sold for and…and you bought four of them! I can’t just accept—”
“Sure you can.” Ross’s grin held a sweet secret, one he’d been saving up for just this moment, it seemed. He winked at Kyle. “Thanks to your old man’s attention to detail, the grant for those houses’ historical preservation came through. And when the attorney at the bank heard what we were doing, he bought two of the other ones—one for himself and one as investment property! So your place is paid for, babe.
“And it’s like we hoped,” he added as he took everyone in with a happy sweep of his hand. “He—and the loan officer—saw it as a first step in the rehabbing of Harmony Falls. So we’re betting other investors step forward now. It’s all good—and best of all, it keeps Kyle here gainfully employed and out of trouble for a long, long time!” he teased.
Her father laughed and hugged her hard. “Hey, it might be preservation and investment and all that other stuff, but for you, little girl, it was the gift I wanted to give ya. Just like ya gave your time to me.”
What could she say to that? Angie blinked away tears, laughing and accepting hugs from Lenore and Tyler and the others.
“Happy birthday, chica! It’s all good, sí?” Elena thrust a plate of cake at her, grinning.
Yes, Angie did see, as she closed her eyes over the first forkful of moist, butterscotch cake: a room full of well-wishers, Lenore, her father, and the man she was crazy in love with. They all celebrated with her, where a couple months ago she’d had only a lonely apartment and a stalker ex-husband. It was all good. Promises of sweet tomorrows rang in her mind, along with memories of all the fabulous music she’d heard at this party.
She smiled and thanked everyone as the party wound down. The guys fussed over Elena’s cake and guzzled punch before packing away their instruments and music stands. Angie hugged her father and Tyler as they left, saying something about a game of pool and a beer uptown.
Law of Attraction Page 26