by Jan Coffey
“Hi! Sorry I’m late.”
“Hey, no problem. In fact, your timing is perfect.” He stepped back, motioning for her to come in. “My parents just sat down to eat.” He lowered his voice. “They were wondering if we wanted to hang around and have dinner with them before the movie, but I didn’t commit us to anything. So, whatever you say.”
“Whatever!” Heather replied, breathing in his spicy cologne as she stepped through the door. He looked gorgeous, showered and shaved and wearing a tan polo shirt and a pair of kakis. “I think I’m underdressed.”
As he closed the door, she looked down at the old jeans and T-shirt she was wearing. A couple inches of midriff showed.
“You look great!”
She was surprised when he placed a kiss on her neck.
“It’s nice to see you again, Heather.”
At the sound of the woman’s voice, Heather leaped out of her skin. In the dim light of the long hallway, she’d not seen Chris’s mother standing at the other end.
“Uhh…hi! Nice to see you, too, Mrs. Webster.”
“I thought you were eating, Mom.” Chris wrapped a hand around Heather’s bare waist and started urging her along the hall.
“It’s been a long time.”
The son’s comment went unanswered. The woman’s attention was focused totally on Heather…and on Chris’s hand on her skin.
“Yes, it has. About two years.”
“You’ve changed quite a bit.”
Heather didn’t miss the critical inflection in the woman’s tone. She also didn’t miss the disapproving scrutiny of her looks.
“That’s what everybody has been telling me.”
“And I am sure you understand why.”
“Well, you know what they say. Kids grow and change and grow some more.”
“Yes. Like weeds, some of them.”
Though she would normally have lashed out at anyone with such a condescending attitude, Heather bit her tongue. Mrs. Webster’s insulting manner was making her feel extremely uncomfortable right now. Even vulnerable. All she wanted to do was get out.
“Come on, Mom. I’ve heard Dad say that roses are weeds, too. And they’re the best smelling flowers in the garden.”
Chris’s mother was a thin little thing, maybe five feet at the most, but right now the woman looked more like seven feet tall. She was like a mother bear ready to tear an intruder apart. Heather tried to brush off Chris’s hand, but he hung on, slipping a couple of fingers into the waistband of her pants and pulling her closer.
“You definitely smell good,” he whispered against her ear, his fingers inching along the waistline. Heather caught his wrist.
Patricia Webster didn’t miss a thing.
“So what’ll it be?” Chris asked. “Her cooking or should we fly the coop?”
“Whatever,” Heather whispered, finding herself tongue-tied.
“How come you’re all standing in the dark?” The overhead light in the hallway came on at that moment as Chris’s father appeared in the doorway to the kitchen.
“Hello, Heather. Great to see you back here. How is your mother?”
“Just great.” She managed to unhook Chris’s fingers and went on to answer Reverend Webster’s rapid-fire questions about California and the family. The whole time, she could feel Patricia Webster’s eyes burning a hole through her skin.
“So, are you kids staying for dinner?” the minister finally asked.
Chris looked at Heather for an answer.
She was having a hard time not making a dash for the door. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll take a rain check. Perhaps some other time.”
“No problem!” Allan Webster replied cheerfully.
“I’ll be waiting up, Chris,” his mother said. “Don’t forget you have to be at work early tomorrow morning.” With a last frowning glance at Heather, the woman turned around and disappeared into the kitchen.
“Say hello to your dad for me, will you?” Reverend Webster said, following his wife.
Heather let out a breath that she didn’t know she was holding.
“Sure thing,” she replied.
As Chris led her out the front door, it was all she could do to keep from running for the car.
“Never mind my mother. I don’t know what’s wrong with her these days,” he commented, holding the door of his station wagon open for her.
Heather climbed in and glanced back uneasily toward the house. “I know what’s wrong with her. She doesn’t like me.”
~~~~
The only noise in the house was the echo of Max’s paws on the plastic drop cloths as he made his rounds, sniffing every corner. The sun had disappeared in the west, and the darkness was gradually crowding the fringe of yellows and reds and deepening purples toward the horizon. The overhead fluorescent light of the kitchen shining through open, curtainless windows threw quadrangular shapes of white on the backyard lawn and the driveway.
Léa flexed her arms and tried to shake out the burn she was feeling in her muscles. Setting the paint tray on the stepladder, she climbed up, ready to roll a coat of paint on the kitchen ceiling.
Max wandered in and looked at her for a second before stretching out in the kitchen doorway.
“Good boy,” she said. “I wouldn’t get too close, if I were y—“
Without any warning, Max leaped up, growling and barking furiously as he charged past her to the door leading to the mudroom. Her heart in her throat, Léa nearly fell off the stepladder. She climbed down, staring at the dog scratching and barking at the door.
“What is it, Max? You scared the shit out of me.”
The mudroom that separated the kitchen from a second outside door was small and the overhead light was on. A row of coat hooks lined one wall. Both doors had glass panels in the upper half, but neither had a lock that worked, so far as Léa knew.
She peered through the mudroom door. The little room was empty, and she tried to see through the glass of the outside door. She couldn’t see anything of the concrete porch and steps down to the backyard.
“What is it, good boy?” She crouched beside the agitated dog, holding his collar, petting him, trying to get his attention away from whatever it was beyond the doors. But he continued to bark and listen and growl. “What is it, a skunk out there?”
Léa froze at the sound of the outside door knob turning. Despite her hold on him, Max leaped up at the glass again, standing now on his hind legs and barking ferociously.
She slowly pushed herself to her feet.
Dusty was inside the mudroom, facing her.
Chapter 23
Every light in Léa’s house appeared to be on. Every window open. Mick drove past the house and pulled into his driveway, parking next to his truck. Popping the trunk for the groceries, he grabbed the single long stem rose off the passenger seat.
The smell of summer permeated the night air. A good night for cooking on the grille and eating dinner by candlelight on the back porch, he thought.
Mick was coming around the truck when he heard the sharp scream coming from the Hardys’ house. Léa. The bag of groceries hit the driveway. He covered the ground around the back of his house at a dead run.
Max was barking furiously. Out of the corner of his eye, Mick spotted a two-legged shadow disappear through the thick brush behind the carriage house. He instinctively veered toward the carriage house and then hesitated, undecided for a split-second whether to run down the intruder or go to Léa. Turning to the house, Mick went up the back steps three at the time. Cold panic washed through him when he saw the outside door to the mudroom was wide open. Max’s paws were pressed against the glass on the kitchen door and his fangs were bared.
“Léa!” He banged on the door when he didn’t see her. The dog recognized him, and the tone of his bark changed. Mick tried to push open the door but a weight at the bottom was holding it shut. He peered downward through the glass. Léa was on the floor, her back braced against the door.
“L�
�a! It’s me, Mick.” He turned the knob and tried to push it as he knocked. Max’s barks were now playful. The dog’s tail was wagging when he jumped on the door in greeting. “Let me in, Léa.”
She shifted her weight to the wall, and Mick went in. The sight of her curled up and shaking ripped at his heart.
“Are you okay? Please tell me you are okay.” He knelt beside her, touching her face, checking for bruises, cuts. “What happened?”
“Dusty.” She raised her head off her knees. She was pale, trembling badly. “He was here…in the mudroom. He had a knife. He…he gestured that he was going to cut my throat.” Her hands were shaking as imitated the motion. “He’s going to kill me.”
Max had moved off to the cement landing on the back steps, barking into the night. Mick drew Léa into his arms, and she came willingly, clutching on to him as if he were her lifeline. “Did he come in? Did he touch you?”
“No.” She shook her head. “When I screamed, he…he walked away. He didn’t run. He grinned at me…like he was telling me that he was going to get me, anyway. And then he just walked away.”
“Do you have your phone?”
Léa motioned toward the counter.
“Neither one of us is too confident about the Stonybrook Police right now, but I still think this is a good time to call them.”
She pushed away from him. “This was not my imagination. He was really here.”
“I believe you. And when I am done with them, they’ll believe you, too.” Mick dialed the police and reported what had happened. He also left a message to have Rich Weir call or stop by the house.
When he ended the call, Léa was standing at the kitchen sink, attacking the paintbrushes and rollers. He was relieved to see her shaking off the fear, fighting back.
“Why?” she asked angrily.
“Everybody in town says Dusty’s deck got shuffled when he was in the service. But he’s been around a long time. And, as far as I know, this is the first time he’s been a threat to anyone.” Mick folded the stepladder and put it against a wall. As much as he wanted to hold Léa and take her out of here, he understood her need for answers.
“What have I ever done to him? Why is he doing this to me?”
“I’ve heard talk that Marilyn was always good to him. Maybe out of some twisted sense of loyalty, he hates you because of Ted.”
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “But he hates Stephanie, too. I saw him today. Downtown by the entrance to the park. He thoroughly enjoyed it when she fell apart on the street.”
“Well, they have a past. It goes back a long way.”
Léa shut off the water and turned to him. She had gained some of the color back in her face. The fear was gone, too.
“What kind of past?”
“I am not the best source of gossip.” Mick tore off some paper towels from a roll on the counter and started drying Léa’s hands. The need to touch her, to make sure she was really okay, was overwhelming. “But from what I remember hearing years ago, before he went in the service, Dusty was the town bad boy, running wild. And Stephanie—despite her family and money—was his shadow. They were an item. But then he went in the army, and Stephanie immediately ran off with Charlie Foley.”
“Whose family owned the mill and half of Stonybrook with it.”
He nodded. “And Marilyn was born the same year.”
“Did Stephanie’s husband put him up in that trailer on the mill property?”
“I think he did. He’s been there for as long as I can remember. It could be that Stephanie asked him to because Dusty was in bad shape when he came back. He’s always worked there. He was one of the gatekeepers when the mill was operating. Later, he just lived there as a watchman. It was perfect for him.”
“Could Dusty be Marilyn’s father?”
“I really don’t think anybody can answer that but Stephanie.” Mick answered honestly. “But I can tell you this, as much as they tried to hush it up, there have always been rumors to that effect floating around Stonybrook.”
Mick wrapped his arms around her. She settled against his chest.
“The Hardys are not the only ones with problems in this town,” he said. “The sad thing is, when Ted married Marilyn, I don’t think he had a clue how messed up that family was.”
“You’re right. He didn’t.”
Max ran back into the house. The flashing lights of a police car pulling up to the curb drew their attention.
“What happens if they don’t believe me again?”
“I’ll unleash the dogs,” Mick assured her. “My lawyers, the politicians I know, and the reporter that did that article on you. Rich won’t brush this off.”
Léa didn’t object. She didn’t insist that she didn’t need his help or that she was going to take care of this all by herself. She entwined her fingers with his and walked to the front door.
~~~~
“I don’t think this is such a good idea.” Heather glanced uncomfortably at the dark countryside whizzing by her window. “I told my father we were going to a movie, and I promised I’d come home right after that.”
“I’ll get you home at exactly when the movie gets out.” Chris put a reassuring hand on her knee. “Come on, Heather, for old times’ sake. It’ll be fun. Remember how we used to go to the lake all the time when you lived here before?”
“That last summer we were thirteen and fourteen, and we used to drive our bikes out here in the daylight. There’s a big difference betw—”
“We used to go swimming,” he said, cutting her short and putting his hand back on the wheel. “That was fun. Remember the time we drove our bikes off the pier in front of my folks’ cottage? It was like flying into the lake.”
Heather couldn’t stop herself from smiling back at him. “I didn’t drive my bike off. You pushed me off. And it was freezing.” She punched him on the arm. “That was like the week after Easter. There were still ice chunks in that water.”
“But I jumped in after you, didn’t I?”
Heather felt the jagged edges of anxiety sawing away at her brain as Chris turned down the winding gravel driveway. She remembered the route.
“Listen, Chris, I told you I don’t want to go to the lake.”
“Come on. Don’t be such a spoil sport. We’ll only stay a couple of minutes.”
He steered the station wagon into the short driveway beside his parents’ cabin. The beams from the headlights skimmed out over the lake’s surface as he stopped.
Dark thickets of oak and pine cut them off, providing a privacy Heather did not feel comfortable with. She looked at him and tried to not show her nervousness. “Looks the same as it used to. Not much building going on around here, I guess.”
“Actually, there is some.” He turned off the headlights, and they were immersed in darkness. “There are about six more cabins being built down at the far end of the lake.” He leaned over to point them out to her. “And just over there, around the curve of the lake shore, your father’s company is renovating the Lion Inn and all its cottages.”
Heather already knew about that, but she wanted to keep him talking so that things wouldn’t get too serious. “Your parents have had this cabin for a while, haven’t they?”
“Yeah.” He undid her seatbelt. “How about a twenty-five cent tour of the inside?”
So much for keeping him talking. She took a peek past him at the dark windows of the cabin. The closest lights that she could see were across the lake.
“No way, Chris. It’s too creepy out here alone.” She felt much better once she’d said it. “I’ll come back in the daylight if you want to invite me back again. But I’d just as soon stay in the car right now.”
Heather stared straight ahead, but felt the weight of his gaze studying her. She knew what he was thinking. This was the same thing she’d run into with the boys in L.A. They all looked at her ‘mod-goth’ look, listened to her sassy tongue, and automatically assumed she’d be an easy hookup. What none of them guessed w
as that she was still intact.
“I understand.”
His quiet acceptance was a surprise. He was looking at the lake, seemingly content. Heather felt the knot of worry in her stomach loosen a bit.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“You’re welcome.”
She smiled and looked at his handsome profile again. “But if you think you’re going to lay a guilt trip on me by being so nice, it won’t work. I’m not going in.”
“I don’t want to go in anymore, either.”
“Then what are you doing, sulking?”
“I’m not sulking.” He smiled. In that moment, she thought he was more than hot. Chris Webster was solar. “I’m remembering.”
“Remembering what?”
“Our first kiss. Right there, by those rocks. On that small ledge by the water.”
“That wasn’t our first kiss,” Heather protested. “That was the first time you tried French kissing me.”
“I don’t remember you complaining too much.”
She hadn’t complained at all. She’d been thirteen, but even back then he was hot, and he knew exactly what to do with his mouth. It had been two years now, and Heather thought none of the boys on the West Coast even came close to him in the kissing department. She took a quick look at his mouth and wondered if he was going to kiss her tonight before they went home.
Somewhere along the shore near the Lion Inn, Heather saw a vehicle pull in, facing the lake. A minute later the headlights went out.
“So, is this place still a big hangout for high school kids to come out at night and fog up their car windows?”
“It sure is.” He smiled. “Do you want to do some window fogging with me?”
“No!”
“How about some innocent kissing?”
She shifted in the seat, until her back was against the door. “There is nothing innocent about your kissing.”
“I think you’re making more of me than I am.” He slid a few inches toward her. Heather felt her entire body heat up at the way his gaze focused on her lips. “How about if you try me out a little…just for old times’ sake.”