First Choice, Second Chance

by Lynn Rae

  An equally inhospitable work environment was standing in a busy street in small town Indiana. She didn’t even want to pull out her phone and check messages for fear an enormous grain truck would roar by and vibrate it right out of her hands.

  Somehow in her time spent musing, she’d lost track of both Roger and Dave. She walked along the side of the monument which listed prominent Dorchesterians who’d overseen the erection of the memorial, rounded the corner to the side sporting a bas relief of some pivotal battle involving dead horses and men with bayonets, and then turned along the final panel with no sight of either man. Where had the two gone? How was she supposed to explain losing half of her committee, or be able to even get back to Palmer since her ride had vanished? Her belly tightened with dread, and she glanced around the buildings lining the street, hoping to spot the two chubby men wearing matching Palmer High School windbreakers. There were no familiar figures in sight.

  Emily heard someone call out her name, and she spun around. With relief, she saw Paul Ellison waving at her as he nimbly crossed the street and joined her next to the sculpture. He didn’t even notice the statue; instead, he focused on her with an intent gaze.

  “Hi, Emily. Sorry I’m late. What’s wrong?”

  “I lost them.”

  His forehead crinkled as he absorbed the news. “Who? Dave and Roger? I saw them heading into that restaurant over there about a minute ago.” He pointed to a brick building directly across the street, and as Emily peered into the windows, she thought she spotted the two men at the counter.

  Relief and annoyance energized her in equal parts. “They didn’t tell me they were going anywhere. I circled this whole thing looking for them.”

  “They’re hard to keep track of. Especially when there’s pie and coffee in the vicinity.” Paul shrugged his shoulders and took a step closer to her, probably to put some distance between himself and the traffic speeding along beside them. The stone base of the general’s monument showed numerous impact marks and blackened bumper smudges, and Emily wasn’t sure how many drivers even noticed the century-old obstacle downtown. Just thinking of someone chatting on their cell phone and misjudging distances as they drove by made her nervous.

  “I should have called you and let you know this excursion was a bust. There wasn’t much information on the statue and nothing on what they did for its restoration,” Emily said before jumping in fright when a truck passed and blatted its air brakes. Paul reached out to steady her, and she gave him a smile of gratitude.

  “You don’t have my number.”

  She shook her head at her blunder. Of course she didn’t. That’s something she should have taken care of with all the committee members at their inaugural meeting.

  “Would you like it?” He watched her, and she realized his hand was hovering but not quite touching her elbow. A dimple creased his cheek and some tight feeling in her loosed slightly. There was no logical reason for it, but she was very glad to see him.

  With a quick nod, she agreed, and they both pulled out their phones and exchanged information. First phone numbers and then e-mails. When she asked for his Facebook information, Paul shook his head.

  “I don’t go on it very much. Too much of a time waster.”

  “I agree. I spend enough time updating the Main Street page for the merchants, I hardly want to go home and post about my own boring life.” Oops. She wished she hadn’t sounded so self-pitying at the end. It was something her brother chastised her about whenever he heard her self-deprecation.

  “I’ll find you and friend you. We can give each other boring updates,” Paul offered, and the warmth in his voice caught her attention. Another vehicle rushed by with a throbbing muffler, and this time he did touch her elbow. “Maybe we should get away from here so we can hear each other think.”

  “And collect Dave and Roger.” Emily knew she sounded irritated, but she was too anxious to smooth her voice.

  Paul kept his hand on her elbow until they were safely across the street and standing in front of the restaurant where the wayward men waited. The ambient noise from the traffic lessened, and Emily relaxed her shoulders and sighed out a pent-up breath. Paul turned to face the monument and frowned.

  “It’s more dynamic than ours, isn’t it?”

  “That’s kind of inevitable because of the rearing horse.”

  “Too bad Great-Great-Uncle Peter was a ground pounder.”

  Emily chuckled at Paul’s matter-of-fact categorization of his ancestor. This was a man who wasn’t interested in inflating the importance of those who’d gone before him. He smiled at her display of humor and gestured toward the door as he opened it for her. A bell tinkled as they entered, and both Palmer men, ensconced at the counter with filled coffee cups and plates of half-eaten slices of cherry pie in front of them, turned and nodded.

  “Why’d you two run off and leave Emily stranded like that?” Paul stepped ahead of her as he confronted his friends.

  “We said we were taking a break,” Dave said before he shoveled another piece of pie in his mouth.

  “Well, to be fair, you said it as we were crossing the street,” Roger added, trying on his now familiar hang dog expression.

  So they’d skipped out on her when she was on the other side of the monument. Emily tried to smooth her mood into a professional, no-hurt-feelings state despite being discarded in the middle of town. She failed.

  “You just sat here eating pie while she stood out there alone.” Paul narrowed his eyes at his friends. “That traffic’s wild out there.”

  “Christ, Paul, calm down. We’re at the counter so she could see us when she crossed to get to the car,” Roger said.

  “Want me to order you a slice? It’s really good,” Dave said as he stabbed his fork into a shard of crust.

  “No, we don’t want any pie.” Paul turned toward her as she confirmed his declaration with a nod. “Did you see everything you wanted to here?”

  She had some pictures, the articles, and ringing ears, compliments of Dorchester’s traffic. She couldn’t imagine finding anything else.

  “All right, you guys, we’re heading back to Palmer.”

  Both Dave and Roger waved goodbye as Paul held the door for her as they left the restaurant. The sun had finally sunk below the rooflines, and she could take in the late nineteenth-century buildings without squinting. It was a pleasant downtown once she was safely away from the treacherous intersection in the center.

  Paul’s sigh diverted her from looking at the Italianate eyebrows on the lovely glazed yellow brick building across the street, aglow with the last golden light of the setting sun. He was frowning and shaking his head as he glanced back at the restaurant.

  “I’m sorry about them. I guess I was wrong when I told you they knew how to behave.”

  Emily thought about giving him empty reassurances but decided not to. It had hurt her when she’d discovered they’d abandoned her like that. It wasn’t as if they’d stranded her in the middle of the desert, but she’d hoped they’d regarded her as part of their team. Maybe she was too sensitive, but between the stress of the noise, rushing traffic, and the jolt she’d felt when she’d found herself alone, she had no energy to pretend.

  “I was worried about how I was going to get home.”

  Paul peered at her with concern. “I bet you were. Come on, let’s get you there.”

  He held out his hand in a gesture that swung between showing her the way and guiding her, but Emily hesitated. Somehow, she thought she needed to keep everyone on the committee together, for appearances sake. Paul must have interpreted her hesitation differently, because he dropped his hand to his side.

  “Unless it would make you uncomfortable to be—”

  “No. Let’s go.”

  Dusk mellowed the landscape as Paul approached Palmer. Full dark came quicker as winter approached, and he flipped on the headlights in preparation. He had about another ten minutes of driving to do before he’d need to wake up the woman beside him an
d find out where she lived.

  Emily had been completely confused by his truck when he’d started it up, and her fascinated questions about how he’d converted the old International Harvest Scout to electric propulsion had carried them through the first ten minutes of the drive. He’d always been better with mechanics and engineering than small talk, so it was a relief to hold a conversation and not struggle for the next thing to say. Once the drive was underway, she’d started to yawn and apologize, and he’d left her alone to fall asleep despite his urge to keep talking with her. Now, she had her body curled in an impossible-looking position on the bench seat, and he wished he’d installed a center seat belt so she could sit next to him and rest her head on his shoulder.

  There wasn’t much traffic on the dim highway, and between the silence of his passenger and the quiet of the truck’s new engine, Paul found himself thinking too much. It had always been a fault of his. Rampant imagination and introspection satisfied his nature, but often irritated his family. His wife had always claimed he was only half-there when he’d spent time with her and that he checked out entirely if she was angry. Courtney didn’t seem to mind it very much, but he’d never been high on her list of interests, at least not until her mother died.

  But he wasn’t thinking about missing his wife, or worrying about what sort of immature mischief his daughter was embroiled in. No, he was thinking about Emily Fontaine. He hadn’t been this intrigued by a woman in years—decades—if he cared to admit it to himself.

  As if she sensed his thoughts, Emily shifted her legs, and her head rolled up. She blinked her eyes and peered at the nearly dark, flat fields speeding by them, and then glanced over at him with a slight smile.

  “How long was I out?”

  “About a half an hour.”

  “Sorry about that. I didn’t sleep well last night, and that whole thing at the Polhamus Monument stressed me out.”

  Paul looked away from those sad green eyes and full mouth and concentrated on the lines painted on asphalt. “Feel better?”

  He caught her nod out of the corner of his eye, and she stretched her arms. “Absolutely. Riding in this truck was better than a sleeping pill.”

  “Since you have my number now, anytime you can’t sleep, give me a call, and I’ll drive you around.” Paul had no idea where that had come from and was afraid to look at Emily for fear her expression would show how dismayed she was by his offer. What was he thinking?

  Instead of horrified silence, he heard a low chuckle and risked a glance to find she was smiling at him. “I might take you up on that. Insomnia is my middle name.”

  Okay, that had gone well. Paul wasn’t sure how long he could keep the conversation going without saying something awkward. Ask about her, that is a great conversational gambit.

  “So, my guess is you aren’t from Palmer.”

  “Nope, grew up in Toledo. After college I went from job to job until I realized I liked tourism and downtown revitalization. So, I started over and here I am.”

  Paul took in her reference to a recent college experience with resignation. She was young. Far too young for him to be noticing her like he was. Older than Courtney but not by much. He needed to keep her talking while he regrouped. “Is Palmer where you want to be?”

  Oh, that sounded like he was fishing for information, which he certainly shouldn’t do.

  “Sure, as long as the grant money holds out.” Emily pulled on her seat-belt shoulder strap and twisted so she could face him. “I really want to work in a convention and visitor’s bureau for a tourism-focused town like Marfield, on the Ohio River. It’s historic, and they have a great downtown full of older buildings with a wide variety of businesses. Lots of good restaurants and the river cruise ships stop by there in the summer.”

  She sounded enthusiastic and young. Paul told his subconscious to concentrate on “young” and “relocating soon” whenever he thought about Emily. Those were two formidable deterrents to developing a friendship with her. A friendship or anything else.

  “I’ve been there; it’s very scenic. All those hills and forests.” And very different from the flat farm fields that surrounded his home town.

  “Mmm.”

  Paul looked away from the highway and saw she was sitting up with her hands folded in her lap. He sensed she was thinking about something serious and didn’t know if he should inquire or leave her to her thoughts.

  “My brother thinks I’m wasting my time with this stuff. He wants me to come back home and work with him.”

  “What does he do?”

  “Insurance. He took over my parents’ company when they retired. He thinks I’m foolish taking jobs that don’t lead anywhere and dreaming about traveling the world,” she said, in such a wistful tone he stared at her.

  Her mouth had turned down, and there was a melancholy mist in her eyes as she shrugged her shoulders. He struggled for something encouraging to say but failed. Stop thinking about her now. It didn’t matter how her hair glowed in the light of the dashboard display. It didn’t matter how every part of her curved into another part of her in a fascinating topography. And it certainly didn’t matter that he liked talking with her so much—

  “Watch out!”

  At Emily’s shouted warning, Paul returned his attention to the road and saw a herd of deer bounding across less than twenty yards away. They were illuminated in his headlights, their eyes glowing greenish gold in the gloom as he slammed on his brakes and reached out for Emily with his right hand. The truck bucked and skidded as the deer ahead of them leaped away, scattering to both sides of the road. Like blowing leaves, the animals’ bodies moved randomly, and Paul braced himself for impact, hoping if they did hit one it wouldn’t come flying through the windshield. A few agonizing seconds later, the truck was still, slewed across the yellow lines, and there were no creatures visible anywhere in the dark.

  Sucking in a breath of relief, he turned to look at Emily. She was pulled tight by the seat belt over her shoulder and clutching the arm he’d instinctively pressed against her chest. He felt her fingertips dig in, and her body vibrated with shaky breathing.

  “You okay?”

  She swallowed hard with a nod, and then gave him a weak smile. Her eyes looked huge in the low light of the truck’s interior. “That was scary.”

  Paul flipped on his hazard blinkers and warily scanned the dark fields around them for more deer. The adrenaline surging through his veins upped his alertness. There was no traffic ahead or behind. Belatedly, he realized he was still touching Emily and moved his arm away from her breasts. She flung her hands up over her eyes and bowed her head.

  “Hey, it’s okay. We’re fine, the truck’s fine, and we didn’t even bump one of the dumb things.”

  She sniffed and spoke in a muffled voice against her hands. “I know, it’s just hard going from relaxed to terrified in about two seconds.”

  “I know. We can sit still for a minute, no one’s coming.”

  “Good, I think I need to catch my breath or get my heart out of my throat or something.” There was a hint of humor in her tone, and Paul felt relieved. He had experience dealing with crying jags compliments of living with Karen and Courtney, both volatile women, but it seemed Emily was going to pull through with minimal outburst.

  The dark around them was suddenly illuminated by flashing red and blue, and Paul jumped in surprise while Emily squeaked in alarm. She grabbed for his free hand and twisted around to look through the back window. “It’s the police.”

  “Can they pull us over when we’re already stopped?” Paul wondered as he rolled down his window with the manual handle.

  He saw a dark figure wearing a broad-brimmed hat exit the car and walk their way, the headlights of the cruiser glaring in his eyes.

  “What seems to be the trouble?” A man’s voice rang out. Emily clutched his hand, and he squeezed back before reluctantly taking it away from her grip. He held up both since he didn’t want to give the trooper any misgivings.

/>   Emily wanted to drag Paul’s hand back to her side. She’d grown unaccountably attached to it in the last few terrifying minutes. The rolling lights of the police car brightened the interior with a tempo that matched the rapid beating of her heart. What were the chances there was a sheriff or highway patrol officer just happening along, moments after the explosion of deer they’d just managed to avoid?

  She looked at Paul’s long fingers splayed out in plain sight of the officer and wondered if she needed to show her own. They were still shaking with the shock of the near collision and the police might interpret that as a guilty conscience. She sucked in deep breaths though her nose and released them slowly through her mouth in an effort to calm herself.

  A man in a large felt hat looked in the driver’s side window with a serious expression on his clean-shaven face. He peered at Paul and then looked her over. Emily didn’t smile, she was still seeing flying deer in her mind’s eye.

  “A herd of deer?”

  “That’s right. We’re lucky we didn’t hit one,” Paul said in that earnest tone she liked. A little of her stress fell away whenever she heard it.

  “Yeah, they’re starting in early this year. Had a messy hit two nights ago near Chester.” The officer nodded his head once, his eyes still on her. Emily didn’t recognize him, but with the uniform, lowlying hat, and inky darkness broken by colored lights, she might not have recognized her own brother. “Sure your truck is okay? Maybe you should take a look around to be sure.”

  Paul nodded his head in approval at this logical suggestion. After explaining he was getting a flashlight from the glove box, he hopped out of the truck and walked around it in the company of the officer. They nodded at intervals, and Emily just sat there and waited for the interruption to be over. She wanted to go home and sleep, or hoped to sleep considering all the excitement she’d experienced that evening. She wanted Paul to take her home and tell her good-night so she could relax.