Sweet Home Carolina

by Rice, Patricia

  She had an ugly thought. “Have you heard anything from the mill? Has the river started rising?”

  Jo’s usual effervescence went silent as she grasped the horrible implication. “Let me call someone to look. The SUV won’t be safe out there. Or Flint could come up and get the pickup and drive over.”

  “Left the pickup in High Point. All I have is Luigi and the Bentley. I’ll call Hoss. He has that old Land Rover. We might have to call off the shift today.”

  She hung up on Jo and flipped through her card file for Hoss’s number. Punching it into the phone, she clicked on the television for a weather report.

  She’d been living on such a high cloud this past week that she hadn’t heard the news or weather or anything outside her own little bubble. This was what happened when grasshoppers convinced ants to play.

  “I’ve just done been down there,” Hoss reported when she asked. “It’s rising fast. The bridge ain’t safe once the water goes over it. You’d better start calling and canceling. Guess that hurricane that hit the Gulf is finding its way up here.”

  Amy stared out the window in growing horror. “You remember what happened the last time a hurricane came inland from the Gulf?”

  “Yeah, baby,” Hoss said with regret. “That man of yours got a yacht to save us?”

  Amy said a word that hadn’t passed her lips in a decade, then started giving orders.

  * * *

  Zack found one of Amy’s sweaters on the floor of the hotel closet. He picked it up, and the gentle aroma of jasmine wafted around him. His insides knotted at the memories produced by the scent.

  He’d made colossal mistakes in his life. Letting Gabrielle drive to the Alps with Danielle had been one of them.

  He didn’t want to lose the woman and children he loved…again.

  He couldn’t help thinking that his leaving Northfork now would be a mistake that would hurt a lot of people. But he didn’t trust his own judgment. He wanted Amy, and he liked getting what he wanted. He was capable of justifying and rationalizing until he was convinced that going after her was the right thing to do.

  Maybe she was right and they didn’t belong together. His parents certainly had proved that love didn’t make a marriage work. He thought his parents loved each other. They simply couldn’t live together. Or even choose a country to live in. He and Amy had entire continents separating them. So maybe they needed time apart to think about it.

  The only thing he knew absolutely was that he loved his work and he didn’t want to return to the lonely way he’d lived these last ten years.

  Crushing the silk knit in his fist, Zack punched Pascal’s speed-dial number on his cell and waited for his financial consultant to answer. He watched the rain patter outside the hotel window and wondered if Amy had made it home safely last night.

  Stupid thought. If she hadn’t, Luigi would have called.

  Amy hadn’t called him this morning.

  Absence might make the heart grown fonder, but Zack’s simply hurt from her rejection. Contemplating strings of lonely mornings like this, he growled into the receiver when Pascal finally answered.

  “Have Brigitte schedule my flight. I am almost done here. We have enough orders to operate for the next six months, at least. Set a date with the Versailles committee for next week. I am meeting with the Smithsonian next month, so I cannot linger over there. We will need to find a manager for the Versailles project.”

  He had spent ten years building his fame and reputation. It was time he rested on his laurels, picking and choosing his projects. He liked it in the States. He disliked Versailles. Easy choice. Those in the future might not be so easily decided.

  He clicked on the local news to check the weather while he discussed arrangements for the project with Pascal. He muted the talking heads until the weather map appeared, then flicked the sound on in time to hear —

  The hurricane hitting the North Carolina mountains has caused a landslide on the Blue Ridge Parkway, causing that road to be closed, according to the state police.

  A choppy video of rushing brown waters and toppling trees followed. An SUV floated past the remains of a home crumbling into the river. A list of school and work cancellations scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

  Zack didn’t wait to see if the mill was listed. Cursing, he hung up on Pascal and hit the speed dial for Luigi’s cell. And got no answer.

  Now wasn’t the time to panic. He’d do that later, after he found Amy and the children and saw them to safety.

  If Amy didn’t see the sense in leaving the mountains now, and coming to live with him, then his father would be right. American women were too stubborn and independent to live with.

  Zack knew he was kidding no one, not even himself, but he needed a balm to soothe his rattled nerves, and Amy wasn’t here.

  The drive to the mountains would take hours. He prayed there were still roads left for him to drive on by the time he got there.

  * * *

  “The cell tower must be down.” Luigi stoically clicked his useless clamshell closed and with Hoss’s help, heaved a computer server onto a dolly.

  “Leave, now,” Amy ordered. “You and Hoss take the Rover and go. I’d appreciate it if you’d check on the kids at Jo’s, but get the heck out of here while you can.”

  Hoss snorted. “Flint and Jo can take care of the kids. I’m not crossing that bridge now.”

  “And we’re not leaving you anywhere near those computers,” Luigi added ominously, pushing the dolly toward the elevator to the second floor.

  A gust of wind and rain swept water under the doors. It wasn’t enough to cause alarm yet, but Amy didn’t want to risk all of Zack’s new equipment and their small inventory of cloth. She’d had Luigi drive her to the office so she could call every employee on their payroll and tell them to stay home, but some of their workers had insisted on coming in to help anyway.

  The mill was their livelihood, and people up here knew how to fight for what was theirs. As long as the mill building itself held, they’d be fine. The heavy machinery couldn’t be hauled to higher ground, but they were moving everything else that could be.

  Hoss checked out the second-story windows and yelled down from the balcony, “Bridge is under water. Hope y’all brought lots of good food.”

  Amy closed her eyes and prayed. She prayed for the safety of her children first. Flint’s log cabin was sturdy enough, but if the mountain decided to slide, a cabin wouldn’t stop it. At least they were away from the river. So was her mother. She was the fool down in the valley.

  She wished she could sing like Jo. A good round of “Amazing Grace” would do wonders at a time like this.

  The electricity flickered and went out.

  “I didn’t do it!” she shouted into the sudden darkness.

  Nervous laughter rippled across the huge echoing room. She’d counted a dozen employees hauling inventory up the stairs, most of them older workers without small children at home. The rain would stop soon, she tried to tell herself. All would be well.

  Thunder rolled overhead, and the rain poured harder.

  “Michael row the boat ashore, hallelujah!” a voice sang out in the darkness.

  Laughter followed, but more voices lifted in the old gospel song.

  “Sister help to trim the sail,” Amy sang with the next verse. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She loved these people. She couldn’t leave, no matter how much she loved Zack.

  Thinking of him had the tears rolling faster. She loved his charm, his humor, and his intelligence. But most of all, she loved the man buried deep inside who so desperately craved the love of others. And before she could even consider all the permutations of that, she had to let him go.

  “The river is deep and the river is wide,” she sang with great feeling. The chorus had never held so much meaning as it did now, with the river slowly covering the floor of the old building.

  Carrying a heavy bolt of tapestry toward the stairs, Amy splashed through an ankle-dee
p low spot. The mill had survived floods before, she told herself.

  But cleaning the machinery would take months. They’d have to shut down production.

  “Chills the body, but not the soul,” rang to the rafters.

  Amy wanted nothing more than to fling her chilly body into Zack’s warm arms right now, apologize fervently, and promise she’d never leave again. She would never again force him into anything his sensible head said not to do, if only he would speak to her after this was over.

  But she knew she lied.

  She’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. She couldn’t let her home die. So she’d simply have to find some way to save the mill by herself.

  She guessed that was why bodies had souls. And hearts. Love and courage would keep them going when all else failed.

  “There’s benches over in the Music Barn,” someone called from the floor. “Maybe we could prop some of these bigger pieces up on benches and hope the river don’t rise much more.”

  Amy glanced out the window. Muddy water swirled across the parking lot and between the buildings. It wasn’t deep yet, but it would rise swiftly as the river rushed down the mountain.

  “Works for me,” Hoss shouted, clattering down the stairs in his big boots.

  Amy knew she didn’t have the authority to stop him. She wished Zack was here to tell him they were fools, that machinery wasn’t worth their lives.

  She glanced up the hill where her cottage was hidden by trees. Without the mill, she’d lose her home.

  “If anyone goes out there, I’m following,” she shouted into the darkness below. “So you better think twice before you open that door, Hoss Whitcomb! That isn’t white water out there, and you can’t raft on it.”

  She could feel the fresh damp breeze and see the rectangle of light as he defiantly opened the door.

  “It’s just a little bitty creek, Ames,” Hoss shouted back. “You just come right on out and wade in it if you like.”

  She smacked her hand into the wall as a line of people followed him out into the dangerously swirling waters.

  “You can’t stop people fighting for their lives,” Luigi said from beside her. “Zack would have been down there, leading them on.”

  Which is why she didn’t belong in his world. She belonged in her cozy kitchen, with her children at her feet, baking muffins with pig snoses.

  But thanks to Zack, she’d learned she could do what she had to do. And do it damned well.

  Thirty-one

  Zack steered the newly rented Hummer up the drive to Flint’s cabin, the first stop on the way up the mountain. He wanted to carry Amy and her family out to safety, and renting another Hummer had seemed the best means.

  The state police had tried to prevent him from driving in, but he’d circumnavigated their roadblocks. He’d driven over roads that were no better than creek beds. He’d ground fallen saplings and debris beneath the vehicle’s huge tires. He should have turned back a dozen times, but he couldn’t when his life, his future, was up the side of this treacherous mountain.

  His knee ached from twisting it the wrong way. He’d worked it too hard and neglected it too long these last weeks.

  Even admitting he was wrong wasn’t sufficient to distract him from the mud pouring past the Hummer’s wheels as they splattered up the gravel drive. He prayed Amy was here with her sister and the children. He knew he could get everyone out safely if they were quick.

  He winced as he remembered Amy’s mother had a home farther up the mountain, on the other side of town. They’d never leave without her.

  One thing at a time. Find Amy and the children. If they weren’t here, maybe they’d be at the apartment above the café. It was a little too close to the river for comfort, but it was on the main highway, unlike this mud trap of Flint’s.

  There were no vehicles in front of the cabin, and it didn’t take a second glance to understand why.

  The original owner of the land had stripped off the trees, and now the yard was a running waterfall of silt and rock. The house could wash off its foundation at any moment.

  Don’t panic he told himself, attempting his cell again. Still no reception. The café next. Surely they were all at the café. Or maybe they’d taken the children over the mountain to safety. Maybe he was on a wild goose chase, imagining himself the white knight riding to their rescue when he was only making a dramatic European ass of himself. Everyone was probably drinking hot coffee and soup somewhere warm and dry right now, and they’d laugh themselves sick if they knew the silly Brit was having a nervous breakdown worrying about them out in this tempest.

  At least the wind had died to a low roar, he tried to console himself as he steered the bulky vehicle down the river of mud to the road again. Flying debris had dented the Hummer’s door earlier. It was mid-October, so most of the branches still had their foliage. Now he needed to fear only rain-laden trees toppling as their roots were sucked from the mire. A slimy trail of fallen leaves added to the slipperiness of the water and sludge on the highway.

  He used the Hummer’s grill to gently push a young tree trunk from the road. He should have brought a chain saw in case he came across a larger obstacle. He’d packed fresh water and blankets and the kinds of things he’d been taught to have for emergencies, but fallen trees weren’t a common obstacle in Europe.

  He couldn’t live in a country that would subject his family to hurricanes and tornadoes and earthquakes. England was far more civilized. He’d simply have to persuade Amy of that.

  He knew he might as well talk to wallpaper.

  Zack’s knuckles were white by the time he arrived in Northfork. The day was rapidly sliding into night, but there wasn’t more than a flicker of light in any window. The electricity had gone out again. Falling trees and limbs took the wires out, he’d learned.

  He didn’t bother parking in the lot on the far end of town but halted the Hummer on the sidewalk directly in front of the café and left the emergency lights flashing. The limited local traffic on the blockaded highway could pull around him.

  Sliding across the front seats, he opened the passenger door and then hopped down, wincing as his bad knee almost gave way. The café door popped open before he reached it, and cheers rang from inside.

  Word of the show’s success had apparently traveled up here. He admired the strength of a people who could take this hurricane with such equanimity that they saw it as a passing disaster and cheered the promise he’d created of tomorrow. He ought to feel pride, but success wasn’t as important as Amy. Or her children.

  Anxiously, he scanned the room. He recognized the new waitress who’d taken Amy’s place behind the counter and a number of people from the mill and church. He hadn’t realized he knew so many people here. But among all the apprehensive faces, he didn’t see the ones he wanted, and his heart sank.

  Jo hurried from the back, shoving long tendrils of blond hair from her face and looking worried. The effervescent Jo looking worried sent Zack over the edge.

  “Where are they?” he shouted in what sounded like panic even to him.

  “Flint took the kids up to Mama, where it should be safer, but then the phones went out, and we haven’t heard anything since.”

  “Is Amy with them?” he demanded, already turning and heading back to the door.

  Someone shoved a cup of coffee in his hand. Jo ran to follow him, grabbing a dripping slicker someone handed her. “She and your driver went to the mill early this morning. The bridge is out over the river, so they can’t get back.”

  The memory of another night on a snow-slick Italian highway with flashing police and ambulance lights almost paralyzed him. Sick to his stomach, Zack left the coffee on a table and refused to open the front door for Jo. “You stay here, on the main road, where you’ll receive communication faster than anywhere else.”

  “My husband and boys are out there somewhere,” she stated flatly, hands on hips. “It isn’t any safer here than out there.”

  “It is the way I�
��ll be driving if I have to cross the river,” he retorted. “I’ll not have your life on my hands. You’ll stay here and call if the tower starts working again. I’ll check on the children first. Give me directions to your mother’s.”

  He knew country music star Joella was considered town royalty, but he’d reached the end of his patient nonchalance. Beneath his glare, even she backed down. She gave him a quick description of her mother’s drive and bit her fingernail as he stalked out.

  Amy was down at the mill, saving his wretched ass. He’d have to kill her for that, once he got his hands on her. Terror that he might never touch her again hollowed out his insides. He shot the Hummer into gear and proceeded up the mountain, deliberately not picturing rising rivers and flooding mills and buildings crashing into swirling water.

  Children came first. Amy would want that. He didn’t dare go after her without word of her children. He understood her well.

  Trying to see through a windshield blanketed by torrents of rain, driving around boulders that had fallen from the bare cliff face, Zack prayed as he’d never prayed before. Facing the possibility that Amy and her children might be lost from this world, he lost his pride, his confidence, all those things that had kept him whole all these years. He was stripped down to raw nerves and a frantic desire to never again let them out of his sight — ever.

  He’d sworn never to place his heart in the hands of another again, but he finally understood that before Amy and her children came along, he had been nothing. He’d built a shell of a man, and now all his carefully constructed camouflage was disintegrating, revealing the true man beneath — a man who needed a family.

  He wanted to move forward. He wanted to be the man Amy thought he was. The husband and father who laughed with children and built communities, not the dilettante who played and pretended it was work.

  He couldn’t do it without her. That knowledge grew as he searched the side of the road for the decorative mailbox Jo had described as belonging to their mother.

  Finding the landmark he sought, Zack turned the Hummer up another mountain of mud. If there was gravel on the drive, he couldn’t tell for the rivers running down it. Was he fooling himself, or had the rain let up slightly?