Nope, she thought, stop thinking about that.
“A baby…Mom hasn't had a baby is a long time. I don't think she remembers how hard it is. Do you think we should move back to the house? Help out?”
Harper cursed and then said, “Heck no. Are you kidding? If we move back, we'll never get away again. We’ll be trapped.”
“But you love it there. The house is great. Also, I win. We’re talking babies instead of bodies so I win.”
“I’m not moving back,” Harper said. “I don’t care if we’re druids and druids tend to live together. I love walking down the street in the morning with Quinton and getting a bagel. I love Gram not knowing my every move. I love the way the wind smells when it's not rolling past Gram’s love nest.”
“I’m going to vomit,” Scarlett said. She caught a glimpse of a man down the street who could be her dad. Goodness, she hoped it wasn’t. She did not want to talk to him yet.
“I think," Harper said casually. “That making you want to vomit means that I win.”
“Wait,” Scarlett said, turning and running back to Old Mrs. Lovejoy.
“What?” The woman snapped. “I still don’t have my bread. I have toast in the mornings and now I won’t have it and my day will be off. I don’t like change. I assume you’ll be making cinnamon raisin bread? It was my week for cinnamon raisin toast. I think a lot of things about you, Scarlett Oaken, but you do make good bread.”
Scarlett blinked, wondering just what Mrs. Lovejoy thought about her and then said, “I’ll make you that bread if you tell me about my dad’s old friends?"
“The ones getting murdered? Your dad probably is the killer.” Mrs. Lovejoy cleared her throat and spat. Harper had caught up and she bit back a laugh at Mrs. Lovejoy. “Surely your Gram or Henna or that old gossiping cow, Mabel could tell you about them. But…of course they wouldn’t.”
"But why…”
“They never liked him, your dad. I didn’t either. Never liked him. He always seemed shady.”
She coughed and Scarlett opened her mouth to ask again, but Mrs. Lovejoy held up her hand.
“You followed him around like a puppy. Makes sense that those women would try to soften things for you.”
“They love me,” Scarlett told her.
“They coddle you,” Mrs. Lovejoy said. “Let me tell you something about that snake in the grass. He tried to make a play for my daughter once. She was smarter than your mom. He got a slap in the face, in the end. Yet when she got home, she realized he’d stolen her purse blind. I told my Jenny it was a lesson well-learned. You don't go on dates with someone who lives with another woman and has a kid in town.”
“Duh,” Harper said.
Scarlett—now that she was grown—could only think about how hard that was for her mom.
“That’s dirty,” Harper said. “If any man would roofie someone…”
“Seems like something I’d have expected of you. Stealing your date blind,” Mrs. Lovejoy told Harper. “People think Quinton just doesn’t have any friends. But I know the truth. That boy is head over heels and you’ll crush him. Like you always do. Like Scarlett’s dad did to Maye. I always thought you should have been his kid rather than Scarlett.”
“Hey now,” Scarlett said. “That’s enough.”
“You came to me for the truth, didn’t you? You can’t trust your mom or even your gram, Sasha, to tell you how it really was with your dad. The only thing that confused anyone was why it took your mom so long to kick him out. Good riddance to trash when she finally did.”
Harper’s voice was even and she seemed entirely unaffected by Mrs. Lovejoy’s jab when she said, “She was in love, you fool.”
Scarlett knew that too-even tone and knew that Harper’s feelings had been hurt. Probably because Mrs. Lovejoy had taken a shot at both Maye and Quinton.
“I trusted you to see the worst side of things,” Scarlett told Mrs. Lovejoy. “Thank you for not disappointing me.”
Scarlett grabbed Harper’s arm and dragged her away from Mrs. Lovejoy.
“You are the best thing that ever happened to Quinton,” Scarlett told Harper.
“No…no…I’m not.”
“Harper, there he is…”
She turned quickly and Scarlett laughed. Quinton really was a standing there, waiting for Harper, but the light that came across Harper’s face made Scarlett jealous. Not that she didn’t want her sister to be happy because she did. Scarlett just…needed something for herself. She’d never been that in love before. Not even with her ex-husband. Harper was so in love she couldn’t hide it.
“Hello,” Scarlett said, waving and then told Harper, “I’ll get the food.”
Scarlett walked the rest of the way to the chinese food restaurant, catching a glimpse of that man that could be her dad again. She paused, she didn’t want to talk to him, but he had just turned into an alleyway, and there wasn’t really a good reason to use that. It didn’t cut through to anywhere that was worth going unless you worked over there.
Scarlett crossed the street and skulked closed to the alley. She must seem ridiculous if anyone was watching her, but she didn’t care. She wanted to see what he was up to without talking to him.
She laid her back against the wall of the building and peeked into the shadows.
He was standing in the center of the alley with his hands held out to his sides. Her dad’s version of Lex’s ambiguous shrug. Was whoever he was talking to as irritated by that move as Scarlett was by Lex’s non-answer shrugs?
The woman was about Maye’s age. Her eyes were red with crying and her hair was dark and a little tangled. She hadn’t aged as gracefully as Scarlett’s mother, but the woman was lovely.
Scarlett whispered to the east wind and it carried the conversation to her.
“Peter? Leroy? Really, Davis? How could you? How could you do that?”
“I didn’t,” Scarlett’s Dad said in placating tone. “I wouldn’t do that. I told you…I was never good enough.”
“You’re right about that,” the woman said. “I should have known. I knew how you were. I knew how you treated your girl and your kid. I’d have thought…I was stupid.”
“Helen, honey,” Scarlett’s Dad said, “So much time has passed. Can’t we move on?”
“Are you kidding me?” Helen’s shriek hurt Scarlett’s ears, and it took a moment for Scarlett to realize that there was magic in the shriek.
Scarlett shook off the pain in her ears and tried to focus, blinking away the pain.
Just how many women had he used? Was this one of them? It sure seemed like it. Had he convinced this one that he’d loved her too? Given the way she was looking at him, Scarlett would guess the answer was no.
“Helen,” someone shouted from the other end of the alleyway. “Let’s go.”
Scarlett skittered back before her father or Helen saw that she’d been eavesdropping. It seemed that she wasn’t the only one who thought her dad might have killed Leroy and Peter. Had he? She didn’t want to believe it of him, but what did she really know of him? He was the placeholder for a father figure, but she didn’t really have a dad, did she? Dads—real ones—they didn’t abandon you like he’d abandoned her.
Scarlett ran around the building, holding her hand to her still ringing ear. If she hurried…yes…they were putting groceries in the car. Who did she think she was? Some sort of spy? Helen and the guy she was with were just loading up their car.
She shook her head at herself. Shady stuff there—unloading groceries. The man with Helen was holding a gallon of milk, for goodness sake. Italian bread was sticking out of the bag. She could see a gallon of pain, some rope hanging out of the hardware store bag with the shape of tape and some paint. Scarlett had bought all of that in the last few months herself. She sniffed and looked at her finger. There was blood on it. She touched her ear again and realized that Helen’s anger was enough to make Scarlett’s ear bleed from the backlash of her spell.
Geez, Scarlett thought thinking a
bout how much anger Helen must still carry from whatever happened between her and Scarlett’s Dad before.
She laughed, glancing at the groceries again, and mocking herself for expecting there to be a body. Maybe she just wanted it. If Helen were the bad guy, her Dad wasn’t. But that was naive. Regardless of Helen, Scarlett’s Dad was a sorry excuse for a human.
She wiped the blood away on her ear and ran to get dinner.
* * * * *
Gram, Henna, their boyfriends, Aunt Briët, the cousins, Harper, Quinton, Maeve—who Amelie had re-named Rebel—Scarlett’s daughters, Lex, Gus, and Gus’s girlfriend somehow ended up in Scarlett’s apartment. It was crowded, and the awkwardness between Gus and Scarlett was fierce.
Scarlett looked at Harper when Gus and his girlfriend arrived, but she shook her head once. Her eyes narrowed as the couple went into the living room, and she turned on Gram.
“What?” Gram asked her smile wicked, her mean eyes dancing.
“I’ll get you,” Scarlett hissed. “I know it was you, and I’ll get you.”
“You both need to live your lives,” Gram said back not bothering to lower her voice. “You both need a good kick in the patoot and quit treading water. I mean…” She muttered a curse and said, “Sometimes you just need to dive in.”
As soon as everyone was settled, Scarlett grabbed a container of Kung Pao Tofu, chopsticks, and edged towards the back kitchen wall. She’d hoped that Lex would make his way over, because she needed to pick his brain—and maybe throw her dad to her wolf—Lex.
It was, however, Gus’s girlfriend who slipped away from the others to stand with Scarlett.
“Thank you for inviting me,” Celia said. She was adorable, a little pocketful of pixie cuteness, and hadn’t even seen that Scarlett had been pole-axed at Celia and Gus’s arrival. “Your Gram is so sweet.”
Scarlett smiled and took a too-large bite of her tofu. If her mouth was full, she wouldn't have to reply. Scarlett made an ambiguous noise since she didn’t want to lie to Celia.
“I know how close you and Gus are, and it means a lot to me that you’ve reached out.”
Scarlett paused at that. Had Gus talked to Celia about Scarlett? Why? Why would he do that with someone he was dating?
“Gus was so proud of you when you helped figure out who killed that mean man and then save your ex-husband.”
Scarlett smiled around her food and took way longer than necessary to chew it up. Gus hadn’t talked to her since he’d left, and those things had happened while he was gone. Gus only knew about it from one of her epically pathetic voicemails. At least she knew now he’d listened to them though she wasn’t sure what to do with the information that he’d shared them with the woman he was dating.
Scarlett poured herself some more wine and handed Celia a glass, hoping the drink would shut her up.
“Have you and the sheriff been together for long?”
Scarlett glanced up and said, “We’re not together.”
“Oh,” Celia glanced behind her and then, lowering her voice, said, “I saw him pull you over. I just assumed…given…well…you know…”
Scarlett did remember. She remembered Lex pulling her from the Suburban. The way he’d been so close to her body—if she thought hard about it, she’d be able to recall the exact feel of his warmth against hers. Instead, she said, “I suppose you could say we’re sort of circling the idea. But we’re not together.”
Celia grinned, and Scarlett didn’t quite miss how the smile didn’t reach Celia’s eyes that time. “He looks like he’s got it bad for you.”
Those sideways, interrogatory comments were a Mystic Cove gossip special move. Scarlett had been raised to resist them. And, the key to gossips was to never feed them.
“Where are you from?” Scarlett asked as she took another bite of her chinese food.
“Mommy,” Luna said, tugging on her shirt.
Scarlett glanced down, she hadn’t even seen Luna appear at her side.
“Can we have pie or cake? Or both?”
Scarlett considered and then pulled from the freezer the recipes she’d been playing with. One was a rainbow layer cake. The other was a peach pie. She said, “They’ll defrost for a while. Would you bring Nana some more tea?”
Luna hopped up and down with the excitement of helping. Scarlett watched long enough to pour the ginger tea from the glass mug to a lidded travel cup. Scarlett tossed the peach pie into the newly clean oven, hoping that Celia would have returned to being tucked into Gus’s side, but she hadn’t moved.
“Is your mom not feeling well?”
“Ginger tea,” Scarlett said, sidestepping the question, “is amazing with lemon and honey. Have you tried it? I love ginger. Ginger-molasses cookies, gingerbread, ginger tofu and snap peas. Mmmm. Would you like some?”
Celia shook her head, “I can’t stand the smell of it. I lived with my sister when she was pregnant and she swilled it all day long.”
Scarlett laughed and then said, “Just talking about ginger has convinced me to make some fall gingerbread for the morning, so be prepared if y’all come in.”
The playing nice was killing her. She glanced around for help and saw Harper smirking in the corner and Lex glancing Scarlett’s way. His gaze was as inscrutable as always. She wanted to smack him for watching and also wanted to see him curled up with Amelie, but his daughter was sitting between Maeve and Phoebe chattering as though she’d found what she’d always been looking for.
The movie was playing but the only one watching it was Ella who'd pleaded for Trolls. Everyone else was chattering in little groups here and there. It was nice. It was…family.
Scarlett’s gaze met Harper’s, and she jerked her head, just the tiniest bit to try to get her to come over. In reply, Harper reached out and tangled her fingers with Quinton’s. He glanced down at her and smiled, never even realizing Harper was messing with Scarlett. Her eyes narrowed for a second and then she forced a smile for Celia.
“Are you sure it’s ok that I’m here?”
“To be honest, Celia, I’m having a terrible day and all of this is to distract me from it.” Only partially a lie. “Gus is important to me, so you’re important to me. To all of us. Gus is family. Nothing will change that.”
Celia smiled though Scarlett wasn’t quite sure that Celia believed that statement. Scarlett just couldn’t care. She cut Celia a piece of cake and said, “Would you mind handing this around?”
The moment that Celia started delivering cake plates, Scarlett waved Lex over.
“So…” Scarlett cleared her throat, “What did you want and do you have any idea what’s getting these guys killed?”
“Not yet,” Lex said. He took the cake that Scarlett handed him, and said, “Does this mean you’re going to forgive me?”
“The problem,” Scarlett told him softly so that the others couldn’t hear, “Is that I like you. And I already adore Amelie. I want you to be part of our life, but now I feel like I can’t trust you.”
“You can trust me,” he said, catching the irony of his statement and his mouth twisting sourly.
Scarlett didn’t let it go though. “Says the man who lied to me for months.”
He snapped his jaw shut and then said, “I can’t change that.”
His wide shoulders shrugged that ambiguous shrug and she smacked him on the arm.
“I…I really wish you didn’t have to,” Scarlett admitted.
That was the problem. She really did wish she didn’t have to regret what had happened and yet she couldn’t forget what he’d done. Maybe it was too soon. She kept wanting to end their friendship, to storm away furious, but something was stopping her. Naiveté? Loneliness? Something equally pathetic?
He cleared his throat and shifting his wrestler’s build catching her attention. She took a long deep breath, whooshing it out slowly, and considered how nice it would be to just flail her fists at him until he got why she was so mad. But the way he met her eyes—inscrutable as they always were—
made her think that maybe, just maybe, he did get it. Maybe he even really and truly regretted his actions.
If she did…if he did…could she find a way to trust him again? Because when Gus had left, Scarlett had lost her best friend. But she’d been ok, because—Lex had been right there—helping her, answering her calls, showing up when she was upset. He had, she slowly realized, answered her every time she’d called. He’d made her a priority. Just like she’d been thinking before. She’d been able to count on him as a true friend that was becoming maybe something more.
The realization was making her skin bump with gooseflesh. If he hadn’t had the secret daughter…but he did.
“You want to go for a walk?” She couldn’t believe those words came out of her mouth.
He nodded, and she didn’t take back the invitation. She led the way out of the apartment.
They didn’t say much until they’d reached the garden behind Scarlett and Harper’s building. It was an old brick building, with four shops and above those shops—four apartments. Only Scarlett and Harper had an apartment. The other two were empty, and they'd each taken the one at the end of the building above their shop. A long hall connected their apartments and the back of the shops with steps that went to the second level at either end.
Scarlett made her way to the stone garden bench and admitted, “I think—even more so—that my dad has something to do with the murder.”
She then told him about her dad tracking her mom down in Boston and his attempt to just slide into their lives here. She didn’t tell Lex about the baby—it wasn’t her story to tell, and she was still too torn up over how she felt about him to decide if he deserved their secrets. She realized that a week ago—she’d have told Lex in a second. Gus too. Now neither of them were someone she felt comfortable sharing the story.
Hobgoblins and Homework Page 8