Return to Paradise

by Laina Villeneuve

  “There are things I miss about the shop,” he countered. His phone chirped, and he checked it. “Trevor is with me,” he said with great satisfaction.

  “That only evens it up since we know Gran votes for a garden.”

  The phone chirped again. “Ha! Chrystal is with me.”

  “Let me see that.” I grabbed the phone and saw that Chrystal had, indeed, said she’d prefer a massage. “Chrystal is our sister. No surprise in her wanting a massage. She’s never been a big fan of the outdoors.”

  Gran cut in. “That’s the truth. Whenever I had all you little ones out here, I couldn’t keep Lacey or the boys inside, but Chrystal was always curled up with a book. Shall we put the electronics away?” Gran asked, inclining her head ever so slightly toward Madison.

  “Sorry to be rude,” I apologized, poking Cal in the chest with his phone since he’d been the one who started texting. As soon as he tucked it in his back pocket, it chirped again. Cal froze.

  “It’s okay,” Madison said. “Is that another sibling?”

  “The last. Bennett is our oldest brother.”

  “What’s his vote?” Madison asked.

  “I’ll put it on silent after this, promise.” Cal glanced at the screen and frowned.

  “I suppose that means Benny is with us.” Gran’s eyes twinkled. Even though the texting bothered her, I knew she was pleased to have another grandchild on her side. “Not that it’s our place to dictate what Madison does with her land. But if you do decide on a garden, I’d love to help. I may look old and move slowly, but I get a lot of work done.”

  “Thank you,” Madison said. “And thank you for feeding me tonight. It’s been a long time since I had a meal as nice as this.”

  “Aren’t you kind. Your folks raised you right,” Gran said pointedly.

  Madison blushed and tried to hide it by looking down at her plate. Totally missing her reaction, Cal pushed.

  “Where’s your family?” he asked.

  “Paradise,” Madison said. “They run cattle.”

  She delivered the words to her food, and I thought about how she said her father hadn’t raised her and had mentioned a woman named Ruth. My clumsy and clueless brother had no idea how sensitive the topic was for her, so I blocked any other questions with my own about dessert. Madison’s eyes thanked me. I would’ve liked to have squeezed her hand but didn’t want to risk making her uncomfortable. I bused her plate, ordering Cal to grab Gran’s, so he wouldn’t get any ideas about prodding further into Madison’s business. “No more grilling,” I said as we slipped dishes into the sink.

  “C’mon. She’s cute. Don’t you want to know more about her?”

  “Yes, I want to know more about her. On my own. That’s for me to find out, not you.”

  “But she’s single and into girls? Because if she’s into guys…”

  “Shut it, Cal.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Lacey

  I sat in my car outside Dani and Hope’s trying to wipe off what was surely a giveaway grin. Since I was late, they were bound to be full of questions, and I wanted a minute to run through the call with Madison. We’d chatted on the phone a few times after the dinner with my gran. I’d kept things light for a week, calling to ask about her place or the garden or making sure she knew where Houdini was. That way, when I finally did call to ask her out, it was indeed a surprise for her. Before I had to come clean with the group, I wanted a moment to linger on the smile I heard in her voice when I finally asked her to have dinner with me. I knew Della was going to be upset.

  Gabe pulled up at his parents’ place across the yard, so I pushed open my own door and waved to him. We climbed different sets of stairs, his to the two-story main house where he lived with his parents, and mine to the two-bedroom place they had originally built for him. He’d never taken up residence, which prompted Hope to suggest they rent it to Dani three years ago when she moved to Quincy to start teaching at the local college. After they married, Hope moved in.

  I found a sign taped to the door: Joy’s asleep. Come on in. Inside, Hope and Dani were cuddled together on the couch, and Della sat in the rocking chair. Dani had pulled one of the kitchen chairs into the living room for me. After delivering hugs and kisses on the cheek to all three, I settled into my spot. “What’ve I missed?”

  “That’s what we want to know.” Hope smiled. She had her blond hair in a loose ponytail and was wearing sweats and one of Dani’s flannel shirts. We’d been the same year in school, but I only ever knew her as the Mormon girl, superconservative and quiet. When I moved back to Quincy after college and ran into her at her diner, Cup of Joy, I’d barely recognized the woman she’d blossomed into. Had that confident elegance not been a product of the woman she was dating, I could have asked her out.

  My stomach flip-flopped at the reminder that I had asked Madison out on a proper date, bringing the smile I’d been trying to hide front and center.

  “The woman from the shop, I knew it,” Dani said.

  “You two hooked up?” Della set down her drink with a force that betrayed her emotion. “When I got her number, you said you weren’t interested.”

  “I wasn’t. And you said that you don’t always tell me everything, so I’m doing the same.”

  “But then I did tell you I was asking her out.”

  I looked at Dani and Hope apologetically. “But it was only to the game.”

  “She said she was crazy busy. I was giving her some space.”

  “Last time you said you thought she had some weird thing for Shawneen?” Hope interrupted.

  I appreciated her effort to shut down the conversation and tried to figure out what I could say to get everyone to drop it. Since Shawneen didn’t know who Madison was, I didn’t feel like I could explain exactly why it didn’t worry me anymore. It was Madison’s business after all. I tried for simple, hoping nobody would ask any follow-up questions. “She doesn’t.”

  “And you know this…” Dani’s wheels were turning. “That day I picked up the book, she was sitting in Shawneen’s car…”

  “Speaking of books, thanks for waiting for me to talk about how great Dani’s pick was. I wasn’t sure about the supernatural element, but it definitely made the book more layered,” I said, hoping they’d accept my redirect.

  I was still lost in my thoughts about The Date, trying to figure out the perfect thing to serve, what to wear, how much to clean up my place. Had Della and I not had a past, I would have asked her advice. The group would happily change the topic of the evening from the book to my dating life. A month ago, I’d been okay with how we’d drifted into something more like a therapy session exploring why things had gone so badly at the Chinese restaurant. But now it seemed like there might be something between Madison and me, and book club was definitely not the place to discuss it.

  “Not enough sex,” Della quipped. She hadn’t really accepted that I wanted to change the topic. I knew she was thinking I’d blown her chance to get laid. “So have you slept with Spacey yet?”

  I groaned inwardly wondering how much fun they’d had rhyming Lacey with Spacey in my absence and regretted that I’d spun Madison’s questioning my ideas about destiny as her lacking sophistication. Nonetheless, I ignored her attempt to bait me. “That’s what I liked about the book. There’s so much more story.”

  “Completely unbelievable. I’m surprised you didn’t throw it across the room when she started in with the ghosts.”

  Della had no tolerance for inconsistency in anything. If I didn’t believe in ghosts in real life, I shouldn’t like them in fiction either. “All I’m saying is I enjoyed a novel plot. If we never read another story about a woman returning home to rekindle things with her high school love, it will be too soon.”

  Hope agreed, noting that it seemed like every author explored that story at least once. As the group remembered similar stories, I slipped into my own thoughts, remembering how I’d believed Madison had returned because of a romantic connection to Sh
awneen. I didn’t know about her first love yet, or any of her romantic history, if in fact she had one. There was so much about her that I didn’t know and was looking forward to finding out.

  “Someone’s spaced out in her own romance.” Della didn’t let me stay caught in my own musings for long. “Why didn’t you ask her to come with you tonight?”

  The tone of her voice made me wonder if I’d ever be able to attend with Madison. “Sure. First date in front of the firing squad. There’s nothing wrong with that idea.”

  “Sounds like someone’s got a guilty conscience.” Della puffed out her chest and sat taller, ready to fight.

  She had me there. “Look, I…”

  “She’d be very welcome,” Hope broke in softly.

  Hope’s tone invited me to take a breath before I said more. She’s one of those people who has amazing wait time that saves them from saying something they later regret. While I appreciated her attempt, I still felt protective of Madison. “I doubt she’d be interested. She’s reading a pretty serious political tome right now. Somehow, I’m guessing romance isn’t her genre.”

  Dani smiled. “It wasn’t Hope’s either. Remember when you discovered my bookshelf? What was the first one I gave you?”

  “Roller Coaster. You thought I’d like all the details about food.”

  With that, they were off on another tangent recalling their favorites. Dani winked at me, and it hit me that in this circle, all of us had multiple siblings. Madison had talked about her parents but had never mentioned brothers or sisters. I was willing to bet that at her dinner table people took turns speaking and didn’t banter the way we all were used to.

  Although my siblings and I picked at each other, we were as close as puppies in a litter, and we behaved like that too, readily pouncing on each other in a mostly playful way, all of us feeding off the others’ energy. Madison had only met one brother. How would she have fared with all four of my siblings, the various spouses and eight nieces and nephews?

  I admired the way Hope and Dani had so quickly defused the tension. Neither Della nor I had that in us. We both knew how to make ourselves heard, but neither knew how to listen. I had no patience for her insecurity, and she didn’t like the way I called her out on it. She’d argued that we could work it out, but I didn’t think a relationship should take that much work.

  I couldn’t help comparing how Madison challenged me for saying I’d apologized when I hadn’t. Della would have accused me and made me defensive whereas Madison’s words made me stop and think, an action with which I seriously lacked experience.

  Chapter Twenty

  Lacey

  I could’ve closed the shop early. Could have closed the bay doors and turned around the Open sign an hour ago when I started getting particularly antsy. None of my regulars had a vehicle to pick up, and I didn’t expect anyone. My business-woman practicality kept me puttering in the shop until five sharp. It had argued that I didn’t even need the half hour I’d given myself to shower and change before Madison came over at five thirty. I didn’t need extra time to obsess about how to fix my hair or whether the faded jeans and soft plum shirt I’d picked out were the right choice.

  Five minutes before I closed, an old Honda Civic wagon I didn’t recognize slowed and, though I willed it to keep going, swung into my drive. Please be asking for directions. Barely into my second year of opening Rainbow Auto, I really shouldn’t be willing any business away, but glancing at the clock, I felt my control over the evening slip.

  “Can I help you?” I asked when the driver, a young woman with shoulder-length brown hair and heavy bangs, stepped out.

  “I don’t know. You’re probably going to laugh at me for stopping, but all of a sudden there’s this weird smell coming from my dash.”

  I propped my broom and walked to the driver’s side. I ducked my head in but could only smell the evergreen air freshener she had hanging from the dash. “Was there smoke?”

  “No, only the smell.”

  “Look, I’m about to close. If you could get a ride and let me keep it overnight, I can take a look at it first thing in the morning.”

  She looked crestfallen. “My aunt and uncle live in Chester. They’re expecting me tonight, and I can’t ask them to drive forty-five minutes to get me.”

  And she was worried the car would break down on the last leg of her journey. Great. I couldn’t send her on her way with fingers crossed and not spend the rest of the night worrying about what might happen. I took my be right back sign and hung it on the front door on the off-chance Madison arrived before I was back with a diagnosis. On my way back over to the Civic, I closed the bay doors. “Let’s see if we can’t get the car to make the weird smell for me.”

  “Thank you so much,” she gushed. “Do you want to drive?”

  “No. You drive. You know the Safeway over the hill?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We’ll turn around there.”

  As we drove toward Quincy, I examined the dash and took deep breaths, wondering what could produce the smell she described as something between burning plastic and melting feathers. She made the left into the market parking lot and shot me an apologetic look. “It really was making a weird smell.”

  “I believe you, but there’s not much I can do if it’s stopped. There’s nothing wrong with the motor. You’ve got power. Nothing different in the brakes?”

  “They feel like they always do,” she answered.

  The trip there and back only took seven minutes, and I was thinking if I skipped washing my hair, I’d still be fine as long as Madison wasn’t the kind to arrive early. That was factoring in having the young Civic owner popping the hood to let me check the hoses and connections. I had not anticipated Shawneen. When I saw her standing on my front porch, I almost told the driver to keep going, but how would I even begin to explain? Helpless, I sat trapped as the driver pulled up at my shop again.

  “Pop the hood, and I’ll do a quick check underneath. Seems like you should be fine to get to Chester though.”

  “I’m so sorry. You were about to close up, weren’t you?”

  “Don’t worry about it,” I said. With Shawneen there, I wasn’t likely to get a shower at all and wondered if I reeked of the shop from my pores or whether changing my clothes would suffice.

  “Lacey honey,” Shawneen said, scuttling over to the car when she saw me get out.

  “Did Dennis find a new door for the Nova?”

  “He said I don’t need a new door. He borrowed a welder and said he’s sure he can use the wench on his Jeep to pull it closed.”

  “The wench?” I repeated, trying not to laugh as I pictured Shawneen holding the door handle and him pulling on her ankles.

  She nodded making it even harder to resist laughing. “Once it’s shut, he said we can weld it in place. It’ll cost less than a new door.”

  Had she still been Shawneen-the-parasitic-drain, I might have handed over the keys to the Nova, but now she was Madison’s mother. I hadn’t figured out how that factored in, and I still wanted to check the Civic’s hoses and connections, and… I glanced at my watch. There was no way I’d be able to clear out these customers before Madison arrived. Surprisingly, the Nova shifted up to the top priority. I simply couldn’t let Shawneen’s imbecile boyfriend get his hands on it and weld the door shut when all it needed was a new one from a junkyard.

  “Hold on a minute, can you?” It wasn’t like Dennis was waiting, and I didn’t see her driving it without the door. I wanted to at least get the Civic taken care of and figure out a way to move Shawneen along. Trying my best not to let her rush me, I poked and prodded in the Civic’s engine so with a clear conscience I could send its driver off to Chester. Of course, while my head was under the hood, Madison arrived.

  My frustration spiked when I heard her truck. I hated that our first date was beginning with my shop full of people. This was the first time she hadn’t arrived in her work clothes, and I had to be professional and keep my focus.
Of course since Shawneen was there, it got worse.

  “Shop’s closed, honey,” Shawneen said as Madison approached the Civic.

  Madison stopped short, and I flushed at Shawneen’s presumption to handle my shop. “Hey Ma…” I stopped myself before I said her full name. If I addressed her as Madison, Shawneen would have to realize who she was. Wouldn’t she? How could she miss that they shared the same high cheeks and wide mouth? “I’m almost finished here.”

  “That’s fine.” Madison glanced in Shawneen’s direction but otherwise didn’t engage her.

  I apologized to the young woman for not being able to help more and after she left, stood between Madison and Shawneen. If Madison had been to my house before, I would have asked her if she’d like to wait inside, but given that this was her first time, that felt even more awkward than standing between her and the woman who’d given birth to her and hadn’t seen her for twenty years and didn’t even recognize her… In any other situation, I’d introduce the two, but, unable to do that, I trusted that Madison would understand as I continued my conversation with Shawneen.

  “Listen, if you let Dennis weld the door shut, you’ll ruin that car. It’s a safety issue. Her engine and frame have years left. Plus, think about what it means for you. You don’t want to be crawling over the console for years. All you need is a new door off a junker. You could even find a video on how to change out doors on the Internet and do it yourselves.”

  “But wouldn’t we need a new door?”

  “True,” I admitted. “I didn’t have any luck finding anything in town, but there are bigger salvage yards in Chico or Reno.”

  “My father uses the place in Chico,” Madison said as if she was testing Shawneen. I wanted to throttle her for the way she blinked at Madison in surprise like she’d simply forgotten about her.

  Madison held Shawneen’s gaze. What I’d first taken for her being slow made so much more sense to me now that I had insight into her past. It seemed like she was challenging Shawneen to see her. Quietly, she added, “He used to live here in Quincy and would drive down the canyon for parts.”