The Perfect Hope

by Nora Roberts

  “You didn’t punch him in the face; you kicked him in the balls.”

  “Yes.” She let out a breath. “And thank you for the assist.”

  “No problem.”

  “No, really. Thank you. My pride took a hell of a hit over Jonathan. It meant a lot to be able to have some payback. I owe you.”

  “Yeah, so you said.”

  They stared at each other for one throbbing moment with something dangerous and interesting sizzling around the edges.

  “Okay. Name your price.”

  He could think of any number of dangerous and interesting things. She’d expect something like that, something that involved dimly lit rooms. He figured her for a woman who usually got just what she expected.

  “I like pie.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Pie. I like it. It’s a good time of year for cherry pie. Anyway, I gotta go.” He got to his feet; so did his dog. “You know, sometimes what goes around comes around; sometimes it doesn’t, and a good kick in the balls has to be enough.”

  Maybe it was, she thought as he left, but why didn’t it feel like enough?

  Now that her mad was over, and she was left alone, everything connected to her life that involved Jonathan seemed hollow. All the years she’d dedicated to his family’s businesses, to him, to being the perfect employee, companion, hostess felt flat and false. Felt horrible.

  Not only had she given the Wickhams and Jonathan her best, but in the end, her best fell short. Worse, so much worse, they’d used her. There was no question his parents had known. They’d entertained her in their home, as their son’s … companion. They’d met her family.

  They’d betrayed her. They’d made her a fool.

  No. She pushed herself to her feet, put the glasses back on the tray. She’d done that to herself. She was responsible for her own actions, her own decisions, just as she was for her own happiness.

  She carried the tray inside to the kitchen, calmly poured the remaining tea down the sink. Yes, her mad had fizzled, she thought as she loaded the glasses in the dishwasher. Now she felt sad, sad and shamed.

  Tears burned her eyes, so she let them come. Why not? She was alone, wasn’t she? Dutifully she went into the basement, carried up bottles of water, cans of soft drinks.

  She restocked the refrigerator, then just rested her forehead on the door.

  And smelled the fresh, warm scent of honeysuckle, felt a hand stroke her hair.

  She squeezed her eyes shut. Not alone after all.

  “I’ll be all right. I’ll be fine. I just have to get through this little pity party.”

  Don’t cry over him.

  Hope wasn’t sure if she heard the words, or if they played in her mind.

  “I’m not. Not over him, not for him. For me. For the three years I gave myself to him thinking it mattered. It’s hard to know it never did. Hard to realize, to really understand he thought of me as an accessory he could buy, use, set aside, and, worse, pick up again whenever he wanted.”

  She took a breath. “That’s done. I’m done.”

  She turned, slowly, saw only the empty kitchen. “I guess you’re not ready to let me see you. Maybe I’m not ready either. But it helps, having another woman around.”

  Better, she went into her office for the cosmetic bag she kept there. Once she’d freshened her makeup, she made a shopping list.

  She had a pie to bake.

  As she wrote, she heard The Lobby door open. Even as she rose, assuming her guests had returned, she heard Avery call out.

  “Right here.”

  She stepped out.

  “What’s going on?” Avery demanded. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “Ryder said Jonathan was here, and you were upset.”

  “He said that?”

  “Well, he said your ex-asshole came by and stirred you up. I figured it out. What the hell was that dickhead doing here?”

  “He—” She broke off when she heard the front door open, and the voices pour in. “I can’t explain now.” She pulled Avery out The Lobby door. “My guests are here. I’ll tell you later.”

  “I’m off at five. I’ll get Clare and—”

  “I can’t, not with guests here. And these ladies like to party.” But this took face-to-face, she thought. Texting or emailing wouldn’t cut it. “Tomorrow, after they check out.”

  “Give me a clue,” Avery insisted.

  “He thought I should move back to Georgetown, take my job back, and be his mistress.”

  “Big buckets of shit!”

  “At least. I can’t talk now.” She glanced over her shoulder.

  “Do you have check-ins tomorrow?”

  “No, actually, I don’t have guests tomorrow night.”

  “Now you do. Clare and I are coming, and we’re staying. I’ll bring food for a roast-Jonathan’s-shriveled-little-balls party.”

  “Yes.” The worst edge of her mood flew away as she threw her arms around Avery. “That’s exactly what I need. Just exactly. I need to go in.”

  “You call if you need me before tomorrow.”

  “I will, but I’m better—much.”

  A woman could always count on her girl pals, Hope thought as she turned to the door. They never let you down.

  But she hadn’t realized Ryder had the insight to understand she’d needed them.

  Maybe she should have.

  THAT NIGHT, WHEN the inn was quiet again—though she wondered if the echoes of six happily tipsy women playing Rock Band would swirl through the rooms for days—Hope settled down with her laptop.

  Carolee had the breakfast shift, she thought, so she could sleep late if she needed to. She wanted to give the search for Lizzy’s Billy an hour before bed.

  She remembered the sensation of a hand stroking her hair when she’d been low. Women friends didn’t let you down, she mused, and she supposed she and Lizzy were friends—of a sort.

  She brought up the website of the Liberty House School. Her ancestor Catherine Darby—whom she’d discovered was Eliza Ford’s sister—their Lizzy’s sister—had founded it. Hope had attended it herself, as had her siblings, her mother, her grandmother.

  Maybe that connection would bear fruit.

  She found the email address for the head librarian and composed a letter. Maybe there was some sort of documentation, old letters, something. She’d already mined her family, but according to everyone she’d spoken to, all the papers relating to Catherine Ford Darby had been turned over to the school long ago.

  “Just a name,” she murmured. “We just need a name.”

  The sisters might have written each other when Eliza left New York for Maryland, for Billy. If not, surely Catherine had written a friend or a family member about her sister.

  Next she wrote a distant cousin, one she’d never met. Family sources claimed the cousin was writing a biography on Catherine Ford Darby. If true, the cousin might be a source of information. You could hardly write about Catherine without writing about her sister, the sister who’d died young, and so far from home.

  With the emails sent, she brought up the site listing all the Civil War soldiers buried in the National Cemetery in Sharpsburg.

  They suspected Billy had been a soldier, either from the area or who had fought at Antietam. Perhaps both. But the data they’d uncovered on Lizzy had her arriving at the inn right before the battle, and dying while it raged.

  Everything indicated she’d given up her wealthy, well-positioned family in New York and traveled to Boonsboro—young and alone. For Billy.

  Every instinct told Hope that Lizzy had come for him, for love. An elopement? An assignation? Had they found each other, however briefly, before she’d contracted the fever that took her life?

  She hoped so, but everything pointed to Eliza Ford dying alone, without friends or family beside her.

  So many boys died, too, Hope thought. She picked up the sad task of reading names. So many, and William was a common name.
/>   Still, she stuck with it, making notes until her head began to throb and her eyes blur.

  “That’s all I can do tonight.”

  She shut down the laptop, walked through the apartment, checking lights and the door.

  When she crawled into bed, she reviewed her to-do list for the next day. But fell asleep with the memory of that kiss in the parking lot. Ryder’s hand fisted in her hair.

  The smell of honeysuckle drifted over her. But this time she didn’t feel the hand stroke her hair.

  WHEN THE CREW knocked off the next afternoon, Ryder took advantage of the quiet to run through his checklist, make adjustments to the work assignments for the next day.

  Dumbass snored under the plywood spanning the sawhorses, letting out occasional yips as he dreamed of chasing whatever dogs chased in dreams.

  Long day, he thought. Long week. He wanted a cold beer and a hot shower, in that order.

  He’d get the first at Vesta, with his brothers for company since their women were having a hen party at the inn. They’d go over progress, and he’d be pleased to report to Owen he could schedule the final on the bakery building. It looked like their new tenant could start loading in her equipment and furnishings over the weekend.

  Another few weeks—maybe middle of August—and Avery could start planning her grand opening.

  Then he could focus in on this place, he mused, looking around at the raw walls. If things went right—and he really wanted them to go right—they’d tear off that mother of a tar roof next week and start framing the pitch.

  He knew his mother was already looking at tile and paint fans, and put that right out of his mind. He had to deal with the right now, and the right now included bringing in steel beams, cutting through cinder block, and installing a shitload of new windows.

  No, he corrected, that was tomorrow and into next week. The right now was that cold beer.

  He toed the dog awake with his boot. “You can sleep in the truck, you lazy bastard.”

  The dog stirred himself to yawn, sit up. And plop his head in Ryder’s lap.

  “No beer for you.” Ryder scratched at the dog’s ears, gave the homely face a rub. “You can’t handle it. Remember last time? All you did was lap up half a spilled beer before I caught you, and what happened? You walked into walls and puked. You’re a lousy drunk, Dumbass.”

  “My grandmother had a cat who drank brandy.”

  This time she gave him a jolt. He shifted, watching Hope as she came in the St. Paul Street door. For a moment the light framed around her, caught at the ends of her hair.

  She took a man’s breath away, he thought. It just wasn’t right.

  “Is that so?”

  “It is. Her name was Penelope, and she had a taste for Azteca de Oro. She had a thimbleful every night, and died at the age of twenty-two. The cat who wouldn’t die.”

  “D.A. likes toilet water.”

  “Yes, I’m aware.” She walked over, set the pie dish on the plywood. “Payment in full.”

  She’d done the fancy latticework for the top crust, he noted. He stuck a finger in a space between, ignoring her appalled, “Don’t! Oh, really.” Scooping some out, he sampled.

  It hit that perfect note between tart and sweet. He should’ve figured it. “It’s good.”

  “It would be even better on a plate, with a fork.”

  “Maybe. I’ll try that out later.”

  “Don’t,” she repeated, and this time slapped his hand. Reaching in her pocket, she took out a Milk Bone for the dog. “He may drink out of the toilet, but by and large he has better manners than you do.” She gave D.A.’s head a pat. “Is it all right if I take some pictures in here tomorrow?”

  “Why?”

  “I thought I’d update the inn’s Facebook page, include some of what’s happening. This, Avery’s, the bakery. We’re going to offer guests free day passes, so some who’re thinking about booking might be interested in the progress. Especially if I can add a projected opening date.”

  He circled a finger in the air. “Look around. Does it look like I can give you an opening date?”

  “Projected.”

  “No. Take pictures if you want. You can put up the bakery’s opening soon.”

  “How soon?”

  “Ask the baker. We should get the final and U&O tomorrow, then it’s up to her.”

  “That’s great. I’ll touch base with her.” She hesitated. “It was nice of you to tell Avery I was upset yesterday.”

  “You’d moved out of pissed off to broody. I figure that’s girl territory.”

  Yes, she thought, more insightful than she’d given him credit for. And kinder.

  “Close enough. I should get back. We don’t have any guests tonight, so she and Clare are coming over.”

  “I got the bulletin.” He got up, hefted the pie. “I’m going for a beer.”

  “I got that bulletin.” She stepped out, and since it seemed polite, waited for him to lock up. “What color are you going to paint this place?”

  “Something else.”

  “Already an improvement. Your mother’s talking about a slatey blue, chrome accents, white trim, gray stonework along the base.”

  “That’s her deal.”

  “She’s good at it. Have you seen Avery’s logo for the new place?”

  “The pug pulling the tap. Funny.”

  “And charming. She and Owen are getting one this weekend—a pug, and apparently a Lab since they couldn’t come to a full agreement.”

  He’d heard that, too. Owen had lists. “They’re going to chew shoes, boots, furniture, and pee on the floor, and make Owen crazy. I’m all for it.”

  He put the dog in the cab, windows half down and—knowing D.A.—set the pie in the bed of the truck.

  “Well,” she began, “have a—”

  She didn’t manage more as he yanked her against him, lifted her up to her toes, and swooped in for a kiss that shot the rest of the words out of the top of her head. She managed to grab his waist for balance though she couldn’t have fallen if the earth had quaked, not with his hands fisted—one in her hair, one on the back of her shirt.

  Heat rocketed down her arms, up her legs, into her center, sharp as lightning bolts. Then her hands slid up his back, gripped his shirt in turn as she rode that lightning.

  She didn’t pull back, didn’t gasp in shock or protest. He’d have released her if she had. But he was tired of looking the other way, or trying to. Ignoring her—or trying to. She’d stirred it up. He could give himself that excuse. In The Penthouse, then again here in the damn parking lot.

  He’d had samples. Now he wanted a good, healthy bite.

  She smelled of summer. Warm breezes, sun-drenched flowers with exotic names. She tasted like the pie, the perfect meeting of tart and sweet. And she met the demands of the kiss without hesitation. Need for need.

  When he let her go she rocked a little. Those sultry eyes of hers were heavy and aware. She rubbed her lips together lightly, as if to hold the flavor—and stirred him again.

  “What was that for?” she asked him.

  “I just wanted it to be my idea this time.” He cocked his head. “You want a pie now?”

  He surprised a laugh out of her. “That’s all right. I made two. One question. Do you consider yourself my boss?”

  “Hell no.” He looked not only stunned but irritated. “My mother’s your boss. I don’t have time to boss you. I’ve got enough to do.”

  “All right.”

  “Listen, if you think that was anything like that asshole you were tangled with—”

  “Not in the least.” She saw irritation edge up toward fury, laid a calming hand on his arm. “Not in the least. It’s just a detail I wanted to confirm, for both of us. Then we’re clear on that detail in case either of us get any more ideas. Enjoy your pie,” she told him, and walked back to the inn.

  “She’s going to take some more figuring out,” he muttered, then turned to the dog. “Take a nap. I’ll be ba
ck.”

  He left his truck where it was and walked over to meet his brothers.

  HOPE SET UP wine and cheese, herbed crackers, and some summer berries—along with a pitcher of fresh lemonade for the expectant mother. She was fussing with little details when she heard Clare come in. “In here!” she called out.

  She poured lemonade in a tall glass over ice, offered it when Clare came in. “Welcome to Inn BoonsBoro and our first official Girls’ Night.”

  “It got me through the day. Are you all right?”

  “Oh, I am, but have much to tell. Where’s Avery?”

  “She’s finishing up something at Vesta. Hope, you should’ve called the minute Jonathan stepped his stupid Gucci loafers in this place.”

  “Actually, they were Ferragamos. And it caught me off guard, I admit, but I was handling it.”

  “Avery told me he actually suggested you move back to Georgetown and start up with him again.” Clare, her hair spread around her shoulders like sunlight, dropped down on the couch, snarled. “I never liked him, then I hated him. But now? I want to hurt him. I want to beat him unconscious with a shovel, then tattoo I’m a cheating dickhead on his ass.”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you, too.”

  “Have a snack.”

  “All I do is snack.” Clare heaved a sigh. “I eat all day long. I can’t seem to stop.”

  “You’re eating for three.”

  “At this rate I’m going to weigh three hundred pounds. I don’t care. Sit down, and you eat something, too, so I don’t feel like a big pregnant pig.”

  “I can’t sit yet.” Not when she was still carrying the sexual buzz from that kiss. But she spread some cheese on a cracker, poured herself a glass of wine.

  And hearing Avery, poured a second.

  “God! It’s always something.” Avery grabbed the wine, slugged some down. “Okay, let’s get this ball-roasting started. Oooh, raspberries.” She popped two, plopped beside Clare on the butter yellow leather sofa, pulled the clip from her hair, shook it out. “Tell us all.”