After careening into him, she’d staggered to find her balance, and her heel had snapped on the edge of a grate.
Randy had steadied her and then knelt to retrieve her heel. He’d held it up as if it were a ring and he were proposing.
“Oh, Nana,” Lola had breathed, because Nana had always promised Lola a prince and Randy was golden and glowing. “Why now?”
“Bad day?” He’d stood and given her a smile New Yorkers didn’t often bestow—a kind smile, an interested smile.
Lola had been horrified to realize she was near tears. Over a shoe. Over Nana.
“Hey, don’t cry.” Randy had hustled her out of the foot traffic and into the doorway of a tourist gift shop, next to a display of green foam Statue of Liberty tiaras. “I’ll pay for your shoe. It was my fault.”
In her broken shoes, Lola had been off-kilter. “Thanks, but that’s not necessary.” She’d stared at him a little too long, fighting the feeling that her grandmother somehow had a hand in this meeting.
“It’s not necessary.” Randy had grinned and gone from handsome to hunky. “But what is necessary is a drink and a sympathetic ear for your problems.”
He’d been such a good listener. After that, they’d spent every waking, nonworking moment together for a week.
He’d rolled over in bed one morning and whispered in Lola’s ear, “Wouldn’t it be great to wake up like this every day?”
She’d squealed her acceptance: “Yes!”
Two weeks later, they were married, and she’d moved to Sunshine.
Lola dropped her forehead to the table. “He didn’t even propose.” Not with the right question.
“Hey, now.” Drew patted the table near her head, most likely so he could snatch another fry. “Randy could have backed out at any time.”
“Being left at the altar would’ve been preferable to this.” She’d still have a job on Broadway. She’d still have her self-respect.
Drew didn’t immediately reply.
Lola lifted her head to look at her dinner partner.
He was chewing. Chewing!
“My life is flaming out, and you’ve got nothing to say? Nothing?”
“I’m hungry.” Drew didn’t flinch from her incredulity. “The food is hot. And you don’t want my advice anyway.”
Her life was in ruins, and the man who’d bought her for a date—marked down—thought it was more important to eat his burger than to offer her sympathy or advice? Lola wanted to kick him in the shins. And she might have if she hadn’t been wearing open-toed sandals. As it was, her foot kicked out, completely of its own accord, and brushed Drew’s firm thigh.
He stopped chewing. “Are you…Was that…”
“That was an accident.” Lola placed both feet solidly on the floor, wishing she could disappear.
There was heat in his gaze. And amusement. “Nervous twitch?”
“Something like that.”
“Do you want to know what I think?”
“Not really.” Not anymore. She eyed the door.
He waved aside her remark and delivered his opinion in the same tone of voice a doctor used to deliver bad news. “I think Randy loved you.”
“Really?” A tiny spark of hope ignited in her chest.
“Yes.” He wiped his hands on a napkin and looked her in the eye with that detached cop expression of his when she much preferred howdy-do heat. “I just don’t think it was the passionate I’m-gonna-die-without-you kind of love.”
The horrible truth of that statement belly flopped in her stomach.
“My grandmother was wrong,” Lola said after a moment. Her hopes, her dreams, the scrapbook. She never should’ve believed Nana. “There are no happily-ever-afters.”
Drew stopped tucking a tomato back into his burger. “Don’t say that.”
“Why not?” There was so much fragile hope in those two quiet words that Lola almost wanted to snatch them back.
Someone bid an exorbitant amount for Avery. Then the bidding stopped, and the auction was called to a close.
“Just…don’t say there’s no happy endings.” Drew had that look men got on their faces when they found themselves unexpectedly talking about feelings with a woman. The same back-against-the-wall look Randy had had on his face the day he’d agreed to marry her. “I’m probably wrong. My sisters claim I know nothing about life. Or love.”
There was something about buttoned-up Sheriff Drew Taylor fumbling around in a conversation about love that almost had Lola smiling.
“But maybe…” Drew was fixing his drippy burger and not paying attention to Lola. “Maybe you were the other woman. Maybe you’re the one who stole him away.”
The anger that had led her to burn Randy’s underwear reared its fire-spitting head. “If that were true, wouldn’t there be an ex-girlfriend around?” A woman the townspeople liked more than Lola? She lifted her chin and stared down her nose at Drew.
He shrugged. Shrugged!
“Sheriff.” It was Mims who spoke, but the Widows Club board trailed behind her. “It looks like Lola’s ready to go home.”
Lola smiled fondly at the widowed sisterhood.
“Come along, hon.” Bitsy, whose black dress was vintage eighties A-line with a set of those shoulder pads she was so fond of, gently drew Lola from the booth.
Lola didn’t need to be asked twice to leave. She scooted to the edge of the seat. She’d ridden with Avery, who was seated on the other side of the room with a man Lola didn’t recognize. Her date was just starting. “Don’t you need to stick around for the auction’s after-party?” she asked the board.
“Nope.” Clarice leaned on the table and raised her voice to be heard over the crowd. “We’ve collected our money, and now we’re taking care of our own.”
Edith Archer appeared behind Mims. She looked as unkempt as a doll stuck in the crack of a couch for too long—mussed short gray hair, wrinkled yellow polo and blue jeans, and that sad air of abandonment that Lola had felt all year. “I want to join the Widows Club.”
“Not now,” Mims said tightly without turning. “It hasn’t been six months.”
“That’s a rule,” Clarice shouted as Bitsy pulled Lola free of the booth.
“I don’t care.” Edith looked as empty as Lola felt. She elbowed her way into the center of the clustered women. “My husband’s dead. My dog is dead. And I feel dead. I need something to do.”
“I can take Lola home,” Drew said wearily. He pushed his plate away, burger unfinished. “Edith needs you ladies.”
Before Lola could refuse, Clarice blocked the sheriff with her walking stick. “Now, Sheriff. We don’t want Lola to be taken advantage of. You shouldn’t kiss on the first date, much less get past the front door.”
“All I said was I can drive Lola home.” Drew held up his hands in surrender. “No passes were planned. Remember, I didn’t even want to buy her.”
Lola lifted her chin above her wounded pride. “The Widows Club is driving me home.”
“We’ll discuss this later, Edith.” Mims signaled the rest of them toward the exit. “We’re leaving.”
“Not without me.” Edith was adamant, dogging Mims.
On the way out, Lola stopped by Avery’s table to make sure she didn’t need saving and to tell her she was going home. Avery didn’t look pleased with her date, an attractive man with thick curly hair, but she assured Lola everything was fine.
A few minutes later, Lola was jammed in the back of Clarice’s minivan and stuck between Mims and Edith. Clarice drove as if they’d robbed a bank and were in the getaway vehicle, making Lola wish she’d accepted a ride from Drew.
“This is Widows Club business.” Mims wielded that I’m-in-control voice like a stock trader on Wall Street. “I’m not sure why you came, Edith.”
“I’m a widow.” Edith sounded more confident than before, possibly because she hadn’t been left behind. “Just because we’ve had our differences in the past, Mims, doesn’t mean you can bar me from the club.”
“Differences?” sputtered Mims.
“I won Charlie fair and square fifty years ago.” Edith patted Lola’s knee and said, sweet as you please, “Lola, did you fill out your Widows Club paperwork? If not, can we do it together?”
Mims growled like a wounded predator.
“I’ve done no paperwork, but I don’t think I should be a member.” Which seemed disloyal when the board had been so timely getting Lola out of the bar. “Randy was sleeping around. And before I commit to the Widows Club, I’m going to find out if he loved me.”
“Good for you.” Edith patted Lola’s knee again.
“We encourage forgiveness and moving on,” Mims said.
“Forgiveness?” Edith bumped into Lola’s shoulder on a sharp turn. “If Charlie had cheated on me, I’d want the slut to hang from her toenails in the town square.”
“Really?” Mims jerked sideways in her seat, snarling at Edith. “Is that the advice you’d give a young widow?”
“Yes. I’d want to know all the details.” Edith’s outraged voice filled the minivan. “I’d go see Madame LeClaire to talk to Charlie from the afterlife and get the truth.”
“Dead husbands tell no tales,” Mims intoned.
Lola was open to asking the afterlife for answers, seeing as how she was getting so little from the living. “And while I had Randy on a spiritual line, I’d ask him where things went wrong.”
“Do not take the blame for Randy’s actions,” Mims said in her commanding voice.
“Now, Mims,” Bitsy said from the front passenger seat. “Don’t dismiss the healing power of talking to the dead. I find great comfort sitting graveside.” She’d been widowed three times and was always as friendly and composed as a saint. “I talk to Jim about financial matters. I talk to Terry about house upkeep. And I talk to Wendell about being lonely.” This last revelation was drenched with unmistakable longing.
“What are we talking about?” Clarice asked in her loudest voice.
Bitsy leaned across the front seat divide and shouted, “Visiting our husbands at the cemetery.”
“Oh. Sometimes when I visit Fritz’s headstone and tell him my problems, I can almost hear him answer back.” Clarice sent the tires squealing as she turned the corner onto Skyview Drive.
There was a moment of silence, almost like a silent amen, either because all the older widows agreed with Clarice or because Clarice had pulled safely into Lola’s ash-strewn driveway.
Mims broke the silence, continuing her offensive but without her previous intensity. “What’s past is past. Edith and Lola need to think about their futures.”
“I can’t lay the past to rest that easily,” Edith said in a loud voice, as if she who spoke the loudest was right. “Some people need more closure than others.” She got out of the minivan.
“Amen.” Lola tumbled out after her older compatriot, dodging the boxes and trash bags filled with Randy’s things. The thrift store was picking them up on Monday.
“Some people,” Edith continued, “need the truth to move on.”
This sounded like an argument that wasn’t going to be solved tonight. “I can take it from here, gang.” Lola brushed past Edith toward the front door, fumbling for the house key pinned to her bra strap. She opened her door, stepped inside, and then shut it behind her. The dead bolt struck home, and Lola plastered her back to the wood, listening to the widows bicker as Edith worked her way back to the minivan.
Randy and Candy, the two blow-up dolls, flanked the fireplace. Because they looked so similar, with shapeless, androgynous bodies, she and Avery had dressed them and propped them up before they’d left for Shaw’s. In his boxers and wifebeater, Blow-Up Randy looked ready for bed. Candy cleaned up much better. She wore a scarlet cocktail dress Lola no longer fit into, and despite not having any cleavage, she looked like she would’ve gone for more than fifty dollars at auction.
“That dress looks better on you than me.” Lola moved to the bar and poured herself a shot of whiskey. When her stomach protested, she set it down untouched next to Randy’s gun safe and turned to face her husband. Or at least his plastic stand-in. “Okay, Randy. Time to come clean. Did you love me?”
Stand-In Randy said nothing, which was probably for the best since he was full of hot air.
Real Randy had been full of it too. Full of compliments like “Your hair is so fine and soft” or “I love it when you wear blue. It’s my favorite color.”
Lola rubbed her temples, moving closer to the fireplace. Her head was starting to pound with hangover intensity.
She longed to hear Randy’s voice telling her he loved her and asking for forgiveness.
But she also longed to hear him tell her whether their marriage had been a mistake.
And then she longed to kick him to the curb.
Stand-In Randy said nothing, of course.
She rubbed her temples again.
“I can almost hear him answer back,” Clarice had said.
“Fine.” She’d go out to the cemetery tomorrow and have a heart-to-heart with Randy.
Blow-Up Randy lost his footing and slid to the carpet, wheezing slightly, as if he’d sprung a small leak.
Lola kicked him toward the door and went to lean on the bar. She had too many unanswered questions and was too wound up to sleep.
Randy’s head was turned her way, and he reached for her with one pale, stubby arm as if inviting her to go somewhere. Randy had always been so nice—opening doors, helping her cook, getting her oil changed without asking. He’d never grabbed her arm and yanked her along like Drew had done tonight. He’d never put his hunger before her emotional needs. Or so she’d thought.
“I hate you,” she said to her plastic husband. And then louder, “I hate you!”
Unfazed, Randy kept his hand out, as if he wanted her forgiveness.
“We’re a long way from the f-word, Buster.” But Lola took pity on him. She walked over and propped him up by the door. “I wish you could talk.”
Blow-Up Randy wheezed, a shifting of dead air that sounded like a sigh.
Lola stared at his simple, smiling face. “Fine. I’ll take you to the cemetery tomorrow.” It seemed appropriate to bring him. If Edith was to be believed, it might serve to channel Randy’s spirit.
Of course, if she went tomorrow, people would see her with a blow-up doll. They’d be reminded of the bonfire today, small though it’d been, and her meltdown at the auction tonight. People would think she’d lost her marbles when it was exactly the opposite. Lola was afraid she’d found them too late to do her any good.
She didn’t want people to talk, but she wanted to bring the life-size symbol of her cheating husband to the cemetery. She’d just have to go when it wasn’t crowded.
Except the only time the cemetery was guaranteed to be empty was at night.
“Well, that settles it.” Lola grabbed her key ring and Stand-In Randy.
She’d just have to go now.
Chapter Six
Sheriff, we’ve got a report of a ghost in the cemetery.”
Drew had just sat down on his couch at home and had just started to regret not being able to buy a date with Wendy when the call came in from dispatch.
Flo’s deep smoker’s voice crackled over the radio, which was still strapped to Drew’s shoulder. “Do you want me to send Gary or Emily over to check it out?”
“No.” Drew spoke into the radio. “The cemetery is closer to my house.” Besides, the farmhouse was too quiet without Becky. Even in sleep, her presence made the place feel lived in. Was this how it would be if Jane won her custody battle? He got to his feet. “I’ll go.”
“That’s what I thought.” Flo should’ve applied for the sheriff’s job. She practically ran the department anyway, even though she used a wheelchair and worked from home.
Drew drove his cruiser down a deserted stretch of foggy two-lane highway to the Sunshine Valley Cemetery. The wrought iron gates had been painted a pearly white and were uncharacterist
ically open.
Drew drove slowly between them. Chances were some local kids were out drinking and egging each other on. He swiveled the cruiser’s spotlight around the fog-blanketed cemetery, nearly missing the ghost.
It was Lola.
She wore the same white minidress she’d had on earlier. Her skin glowed like ivory in the spotlight. She had on a pair of black rain boots and was pointing a gun at a body lying on the ground.
Drew’s pulse kicked past prank procedure to armed-and-dangerous action.
He threw the cruiser in park and shouted out the open window. “Lola!” He jumped out of the car and drew his firearm. “Drop the gun.”
Lola didn’t spare him a glance. “Hey, Sheriff.” So casual. As if he were dropping off his rent check.
“Put the gun down, Lola.” She hadn’t just gone over the edge; she’d plunged into dangerous territory. Drew kept her in his gun sights as he moved carefully up the hill. “Put the gun down now.”
He was too late. There was something wrong with the person on the ground. Their skin was the yellowish-pink color of the long dead, and they weren’t moving.
Maddeningly, the fog obscured the details.
Drew ran up the hill, weapon still drawn, his gaze darting between Lola and her victim. About ten feet away, he realized Lola was aiming at a person with no toes and no pulse. She was aiming at a blow-up doll.
He swore. With relief-fueled gusto.
In a string. With colorful verb use.
And pointed his muzzle to the ground.
“Randy never was one to give a straight answer unless he was cornered.” Lola sounded sane and sober, but the gun pointed at the plastic body contradicted that impression.
She’d taken Watch-Out-World to a whole new level.
“Put down the gun.” Drew knew better than to trust anyone with a drawn weapon.
“I decline.” She spared Drew a glance. “I need a moment alone with my husband. The widows said if I was quiet, I could hear Randy speak.”
Can't Hurry Love Page 5