The Last Chance Cafe

by Linda Lael Miller

  She jumped in, spouted her address, and felt a dizzying sense of relief as she looked back through the rear window. Joel was on the sidewalk, hands stuffed into the pockets of his stylish overcoat, watching the car pull away.

  Within twenty minutes, she was home. She tipped the driver generously and dashed up the walk to her own door, fumbling a little with the key. Inside, she flipped on the hall lights, paused beside the telephone table in the hallway—the light on the answering machine was blinking—debated her options for a moment, wanting to open the packet, wanting not to open it, then pressed the play button. Mrs. Draper might have called with some concern about Kiley and Kiera.

  The voice she heard was totally unfamiliar, the tone quietly callous, and somehow insinuating. “I saw you at the bar, Hallie,” the man said. “What was in the package?”

  Hallie laid a hand to her heart, her breathing rapid and shallow, her eyes wide with alarm. The message ended with the click of a receiver being replaced, and she knew, even before she checked the caller ID screen, that the effort was wasted. Unknown name, unknown number, it read.

  She turned around, locked and bolted the door behind her, then walked through the dining room to the spacious kitchen. Through the window over the sink, she could see the courtyard, still riotous with summer roses, and the lights of Nora Draper’s townhouse. She fumbled for the phone hanging near the stove, speed-dialed the number.

  Her neighbor answered immediately, and the cheerful sound of her voice nearly made Hallie’s knees buckle with relief. She freed her shoulder-length hair from its clip at the back of her head and ran the fingers of her right hand through it. She would shed pearls, suit and pantyhose as soon as it was feasible.

  “It’s me, Hallie,” she said. “I’m back. Are Kiera and Kiley okay?”

  “Why, bless your heart,” Nora replied, “they’re just fine. We’re having a slumber party.”

  Hallie swallowed in an effort to rein in her emotions a little. “You’re sure you don’t mind keeping the girls overnight?”

  “Mind? I’m enjoying every moment.” There was a gentle pause. “Are you all right, dear? Do you need anything? I just hate to think of you over there all alone, trying to cope with a loss like this. You could sleep here, you know. I’d fold out the hide-a-bed.”

  Hallie smiled, blinking back tears. “I really just need to rest,” she said quietly. She would examine the contents of the little manila envelope now, have that private glass of wine she’d been promising herself, that long, hot bath, and then slip between the sheets, close her eyes and, please God, step outside her life, however temporarily, into sweet oblivion. Time enough to think about the phone message when the daylight returned. “I’ll come and get the girls in the morning.”

  “You’re exhausted,” Nora said kindly. “Get a good night’s sleep.”

  “I will,” Hallie promised, missing her long-dead mother sorely, missing Lou. She had her daughters and a few friends—acquaintances, really, since her long work days hadn’t left much time for socializing—and she was used to being independent, but she’d never felt more profoundly alone, or more vulnerable.

  She hung up, checked the front and back locks again, then sat down at the dining room table, opened her purse, and took out the small envelope. Her fingers trembled slightly as she lifted the flap and turned the package upside down.

  There was a little brass key inside, with a paper tag attached, on which Lou had written, Virgin Mary. Hallie smiled and shook her head, immediately breaking the code.

  She held the key against her heart for a long moment, then carried it into her bedroom and set it carefully on her nightstand. She proceeded to the adjoining bathroom, where she lit candles and started water running in the tub, then backtracked to the kitchen for a glass of Chardonnay. After a long, restorative soak, she put on a cotton nightshirt and crawled into bed, where, to her great surprise, she slept soundly until the twins awakened her the next morning, leaping on the mattress and bouncing with their usual exuberance.

  Hallie groaned, then laughed, then got out of bed. At the start of that day, so innocent and so ordinary, she could not have imagined how it would end.

  “We’re going to Grampa’s place,” she said, when she was dressed, and the three of them had had cereal and fruit at the breakfast bar.

  Two sets of blue-gray eyes regarded her solemnly.

  “Grampa’s dead,” Kiley said, as though that dispensed with any need to set foot in the man’s house.

  “Don’t say that,” Kiera protested.

  “It’s true.”

  “Enough,” Hallie said, and poured herself a second cup of coffee. She was stalling. Lou’s place, without Lou. It would be like a body without a heart. The girls missed him terribly; he’d been a surrogate father to them, since Joel wasn’t interested. “If you’d rather stay with Mrs. Draper, I’m sure it can be arranged.”

  “I want to go with you,” Kiera said.

  “Me, too,” Kiley decided.

  Hallie went into her room, collected the key, slipped it into the hip pocket of her jeans. Then, taking her coffee along, she collected her car keys, locked up the condo, and loaded the kids into the backseat of her navy blue BMW. When the seatbelts were fastened and the engine was humming, they started across town.

  Lou’s split-level rancher was in a modest section of Phoenix, on a tree-lined street. While many houses in the Valley of the Sun boasted stucco walls and tile roofs, with courtyards and rock gardens instead of lawns, Lou’s was a simple brick affair with green shutters. There were flower beds and green grass in the front yard, though it was starting to look a little overgrown.

  Hallie hesitated for a few moments, just sitting there in the driveway with the BMW still running, then switched off the ignition, pocketed the keys, and got out. Virgin Mary, she thought, remembering the scrawled letters on the key tag, and headed for the storage shed in the backyard. The door was padlocked, but Hallie knew the combination, and she opened it easily. Kiera and Kiley, having no interest in the shed where their grandfather had kept his lawnmower, an assortment of tools, and boxes of Christmas paraphernalia, among other things, raced toward the tire swing Lou had put up years before, for Hallie, and left their mother to her mysterious pursuits.

  It took half an hour of dusty exploration, but Hallie finally located the nearly life-size plastic Nativity set that had graced the front yard every holiday season, from the Friday after Thanksgiving until the second of January. Each piece was swaddled in newspaper, and she unwrapped Joseph, a shepherd, and one of the Wise Men before coming at last to Mary.

  Upending the statue on the cement floor, she found a metal cashbox wedged into the base. Stomach fluttering, she pulled it out, rewrapped Mary, and put her back with the other decorations. Then, after running her hands down the thighs of her jeans, she brought out the tagged key and turned the lock.

  At first, the contents seemed innocuous—documents, printouts downloaded from the Internet, newspaper clippings, a few murky Polaroid shots, their subjects not immediately discernible. Hallie closed the box, held it protectively in both hands as she stepped outside into the fresh air and sunlight.

  Kiera and Kiley were playing on the tire swing, getting along for once, laughing. Hallie looked around, the hairs rising on the back of her neck, then made her way to the relative privacy of the covered patio, where Lou had probably grilled a million hot dogs and hamburgers over the years. She sat down at the picnic table, feeling weak in the knees, the box before her, and raised the lid again.

  The computer printouts were maps to places in the desert, campgrounds mostly, and parks. Some were marked, in Lou’s handwriting, with small, indented X’s. The snapshots showed men in various bars, and other dark places, exchanging things, or just talking in earnest. Hallie recognized several of the men, and her flesh prickled.

  She unfolded a document, smoothed it on the surface of the picnic table, and scanned the first page. It was a transcript, probably of a telephone conversation, and
the subject was some kind of shipment, being brought in from Mexico. Hallie felt another sick quiver in the pit of her stomach. This was stuff she didn’t want to know, and the names, many of them all-too-familiar, were ones she didn’t want to recognize.

  She looked over her shoulder, and was startled to see Joel standing by the swing, hands in the pockets of his chinos, chatting with the girls. Their faces were upturned, adoring. Hallie felt a sudden urge to race across the lawn, gather her children close, hustle them away. Instead, she froze, there where Lou had served so many summer meals, watching as her ex-husband looked up, met her gaze, and ambled toward her. His hands were still in his pockets.

  He was just a few feet away when she found her voice. “What are you doing here?” she asked. Stupid question. His face was in some of the pictures, his name in the transcript. Jesus God, Lou, she thought, if you knew this stuff, why didn’t you warn me?

  She knew the answer, of course. Lou had been pursuing a major investigation, and he hadn’t expected to die before it was completed. He wouldn’t have compromised the case by discussing it with a civilian, even if that civilian was his stepdaughter, with children sired by one of the suspects.

  “Just thought I’d see how you’re doing this morning,” Joel said. He was trying not to look at the open cashbox and the papers, but he didn’t succeed. “What have we here?”

  Hallie was surprised at how easily the lie sprang to her lips. She even managed a cordial smile. “Stocks, bonds, some appraisal photographs,” she said. “It seems Lou left me something besides this house and his pension fund.”

  “Let’s have a look,” Joel suggested, as if he had every right.

  Hallie shuffled everything back into the box, smoothly, and drew it toward her. “It’s all pretty straightforward,” she said. “I can handle it.”

  He frowned, and she got to her feet, cradling the box. Smiling.

  “Why don’t you and Barbara stop by the restaurant Saturday night?” she said, talking too fast, too eagerly. “I’ve got a new dish you might like to try. On the house, of course.”

  Joel arched an eyebrow, still watching the box. “Okay,” he said, uncertainly. Then he rustled up a smile of his own. “I could take the kids for the day. Give you a little break.”

  A chill danced up Hallie’s spine. “We have plans,” she replied lightly. “Stop by the restaurant Saturday night, Joel.”

  He got to his feet.

  “Girls!” Hallie called. “Come on. Time to go.”

  “Let me have the box, Hallie,” Joel insisted, in a monotone.

  “Another time,” Hallie chimed. She’d never make it to the BMW, still parked in the driveway in front of the house, but Lou’s old pickup was behind the shed, facing the alley fence, and the keys were probably in the ignition. Nobody in their right mind, Lou had always maintained, would steal that worthless truck, but he could always hope.

  She started toward the girls, and the pickup truck, her strides long, her heart pounding in her throat. She shuffled her surprised daughters into the front seat of the old rig, tossed the box in after them, and scrambled behind the wheel. Joel was several yards behind her, but he was taller, and intent on the chase. Hallie had passed easily under the clotheslines, but Joel had gotten himself entangled, affording her precious moments to start the sputtering motor and push down the locks on the doors.

  “Mommy,” Kiera piped up. “What are you—?”

  Hallie stepped on the clutch, shifted into first gear, and drove right into the board fence, knocking it down, jostling into the alley.

  “Daddy is chasing us!” Kiley announced, looking back through the oval window. “Mommy, stop!”

  Hallie shifted again, and barreled toward the end of the alley, picking up speed with every jostle and bump. A glance at the rearview mirror showed Joel standing in the alley, glaring after her and swearing. It wouldn’t be long until he regained his senses and came after them, but Hallie had grown up in that neighborhood, and she knew every side street, every shortcut, and every dead end. By the time he got back to his car, she and the girls and the evidence Lou had gathered would be long gone.

  Kiley tried again. “Mommy?”

  Hallie took the corner on two wheels, tires screeching. “Fasten your seat belts, girls,” she said. “We’re going on a little trip.”

  The first thing she did, once they had left Phoenix far behind, was hide the cashbox.

  2

  T he tiny brass bell above the door tinkled in the same annoyingly cheerful way it always did, that night when the whole slow and sleepy course of his life did a sudden 180. Chance Qualtrough probably wouldn’t even have bothered to give his stool at the counter a quarter turn and take a look, if it hadn’t been for the odd sliver of heat that caught somewhere in the innermost regions of his heart and took a tight stitch there. He glanced over his shoulder, and there she was, coated in snow, skinny and scared, with a little kid clasping either hand. He squinted, taking in the rugrats—girls, judging by their small pink jackets, fuzzy mittens and the pom-poms on their knitted hats, and no older than six or seven. Despite an instinctive reluctance, Chance raised his gaze to the woman’s face.

  Her eyes were brown, and there were strands of blond hair—that dishwater shade that’s invariably natural—peeking out from under her snow-crusted baseball cap. She was a stranger to Primrose Creek, Chance was sure of that, and yet, as he looked at her, he had a peculiar feeling that they’d been acquainted once, long ago, and parted unwillingly.

  He was still chewing on that fanciful insight when Madge Beardsley, who owned the Last Chance Café in partnership with her brother, an ex-rodeo clown and one-time convict named Bear, rushed over to greet the new crew of refugees. Bear came out of the kitchen, wiping his hands on his apron, to get a better look. “Why, just look at you,” Madge fussed, fluttery as an old hen. “Half frozen to death!” She was caught in a time warp, Madge was, circa 1955. She wore her drugstore-red hair high and hard, and her lipstick was vampire-crimson. Her pink dress was right out of an early episode of I Love Lucy, as were the oversize pearl baubles clipped to her earlobes and the saddle shoes on her feet.

  The blonde shivered visibly and finally released her hold on the little girls’ hands. She nodded to Bear. “My . . . my truck broke down, out on the highway—”

  “Good heavens,” Madge exclaimed, herding her charges toward the one empty booth remaining. There were a lot of folks stranded at the Last Chance that night, most of them locals, though a few were just passing through, and the place was pretty lively. “You don’t mean to tell me you were all alone out there, in this weather—”

  She smiled warily and nodded, and Chance was chagrined to realize that he was still watching her. She must have sensed that, for she glanced briefly in his direction, and the smile faded. Fumbling a little, she concentrated on unbundling the kids, then herself. Madge draped their coats and hats over the old-fashioned soda cooler, since the pegs on the wall were already bulging, and poured three big mugs of hot cocoa, with extra whipped cream on top, without even being asked.

  “What’s your name, honey?” Madge demanded of the stranger, setting out the mugs. Both kids stared at the mounds of sweet froth on top, their eyes wide and luminous, like their mother’s, but light instead of dark, and one of them hooked a finger in the stuff and slipped it into her mouth.

  “Hallie,” the woman answered, a little hesitantly. “Hallie . . . O’Rourke. These are my daughters, Kiley and Kiera.”

  Madge beamed at the kids. “Twins,” she remarked, delighted. “How old are you?”

  “Seven,” said the one who’d swiped a taste of whipped cream. “I’m Kiley, and that’s Kiera. I was born first, so that means I’m bigger, even if it doesn’t show.” She paused, as though mulling over some private secret, debating whether or not to share it, then added, “We’re gifted, you know.”

  Kiera tossed her sister a long-suffering look, but offered no comment.

  Still embroiled in a drama that was, any w
ay you looked at it, none of his damn business, Chance wondered where Mister O’Rourke was, and what the hell had possessed the man to let his family go traipsing all over the countryside in weather like this. He turned back to his coffee and pie, trying in vain to set Hallie O’Rourke aside in his thoughts, like a newspaper article he’d already read. In spite of that effort, he remained aware of her in every cell of his body, and all the spaces in between, and that scared the hell out of him. He took a few moments to recover, and when he had, a vague sense of suspicion still nudged at him. Maybe it was something he’d glimpsed in her eyes, maybe it was his own need to be cautious, but the possibility that she was on the run from somebody or something definitely crossed his mind.

  He tried not to eavesdrop on the new arrivals—God knew, there was plenty of noise in the café to distract him, what with the jukebox cranked up and the Ladies Aid Society over there in the far corner, playing cutthroat canasta—but he might as well have been sitting right at Hallie’s table. It was as if the conversation were being beamed to a transmitter behind his right ear.

  One of the kids spoke up. “Hallie? Can I have a cheeseburger?”

  Chance shook his head and took another sip of his coffee. What was this world coming to? he wondered. Families out joy-riding in the middle of a blinding snowstorm. Little kids calling their mothers by her first name, as if she were a playmate and not a parent. Madge gave Hallie a vinyl-covered menu, then trotted off to refill cups along the length of the counter and cut slices of banana cream pie for a flock of truckers over by the pinball machines.

  “That’s ‘Mom’ to you,” Hallie said, unruffled, “and you can split a burger with Kiera. You wouldn’t be able to eat a whole one anyway.”

  “I want my own cheeseburger. All to myself.”

  Hallie tried another tack. “We have to be careful with our money, sweetheart. You know that.”

  “I think we should go home. We’d have lots of money if we just went home.”