by Cait London
Uma held her breath. She could feel Lauren, sense her needing something…
Mitchell nodded slowly as the memories stirred between them. “I liked Lauren. I’m sorry.”
“I am, too. It was absolutely senseless—without reason. I guess these things happen in the city, but Madrid has always been so safe. You look so tired, Mitchell. I hope you find the peace you need here.” She glanced at the clutter, a broom and vacuum resting in one corner. In the hallway beside her rested a pile of cardboard boxes that had held dishes, silverware, a toaster; plastic that had covered a mattress and box springs set all stuffed into a refrigerator box large enough for a child’s clubhouse.
“How do you know that I need peace, Uma?” he asked quietly.
“Because everyone does,” she said and wondered if she would ever find peace and safety again.
He frowned and hesitated, then he took a folded note from his pocket and gave it to her. “It was a long day. I’ll put this casserole—smells good—in the kitchen. Here—”
Mitchell stood by her as she opened it; he hesitated and moved into the kitchen. On the note, Billy’s small, immature handwriting scrawled over a stain.
I’m getting out of this town and never coming back. I know you can understand that. They ran you out one time and that’s what they’re doing to me. Didn’t have time to clean up. Sorry. Uma wants Lauren’s things, all that junk in the back bedroom.
She crushed the note in her hand. Lauren.
The blood was still on her hands, the terrifying memory of that night. Uma moved through the house that Billy had stripped, trying not to remember how happy Lauren had been when they’d first bought it, how hard she’d worked, stripping cabinets, painting…
The master bedroom was large and freshly cleaned. A king-size bed, the only piece of furniture in the room, stood unmade. The scent of lemon cleaner came from the bathroom as she passed.
The second bedroom had a broken window, plastic stapled over the glass. It was dirty and empty, but the third bedroom, the tiniest room where Lauren had ached to place her baby’s crib…
Billy said we should wait for children until we can better afford them…
When Uma saw the clutter carelessly stacked at one end of the room, she couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. This was all that was left of Lauren—a haphazard dumping of the lovely person she had been. Unable to move, Uma felt her throat tighten and her eyes burn with tears; she leaned against the wall, her arms around herself. She squeezed her lids closed to seal away that terrible night, and yet it came back—shattering her once more. She couldn’t open her eyes when she sensed Mitchell had come to stand beside her.
“I know how much she meant to you,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry about your baby and about Lauren.”
“They never found out who shot Lauren.” She swallowed roughly, tears too close to breaking free. Automatically, she reached for Lauren’s rumpled, discarded clothing and began folding, placing the neat stack on an old chair. A moment ago they were all girls, planning marriages and babies, and now—“Would you mind if I didn’t collect all this now? I will, but not just yet. I can’t bear—”
“It’s fine where it is. I’ll clean the room and straighten things a bit. Here’s a key—you can come when you want.” He took a key from his pocket.
She clasped the key in her fist and knew that he understood she would need time and strength to deal with all that remained of Lauren. “Thank you.”
“Uma?”
She tried to shake herself free of the tears. “Yes?”
“I’m sorry about that—what happened that day in the hospital room. I’m sorry I grabbed you. I’ve always regretted that.”
She shook her head, looking up at him. “I know. I know how difficult it was for you back then. You were just a boy, and in so much pain. You’d just lost your father and your home.”
Mitchell moved away from her, his jaw hard and uncompromising. “I shouldn’t have—”
“It’s in the past, Mitchell. Please don’t think about it…but if I had Billy Howard in my sights now, I’d never forget how he just tossed Lauren’s life into one unloved pile. I’m so angry now. I’d better go. But first, let me help you make your bed. Two people can do the work quicker and you look so tired. Your wife will be, too. When is she coming?”
“I’m not married. I was. It didn’t work out.” Mitchell’s light brown eyes were shadowed and steady upon her. “Billy told me about you and Everett.”
“Yes. We’re still friends. We had a child together. That doesn’t go away.” Uma smiled briefly; Everett had had other ideas, and she’d tried at first. It wasn’t a matter of forgiveness for his affair after their baby had died and she sank into depression; it was that they just didn’t fit anymore. And she felt as if something inside her had died with her baby. She didn’t feel like a woman any longer; she felt empty, filling the days with her father and friends, her work.
She smiled at Mitchell. “Let’s go make your bed. Billy sold the washer and dryer and you don’t look as if you’d mind sleeping on a board tonight, let alone brand new bedding that hasn’t been washed.”
“I wouldn’t,” he said grimly, and Uma remembered how harshly he had grown up. Fred Warren hadn’t liked spending money on household goods. He’d used every penny on the land, on the horses he had raised and broken and sold, trying to stretch the feed and grain bill with that of pasture seed, and veterinarian bills—and in the end, Fred spent what extra money he had on alcohol.
In the large master bedroom, Mitchell worked on the opposite side of the bed, placing the mattress pad on it and then the sheets. He was efficient and awkward, glancing at her as she neatly fitted the corners, and she knew that homemaking wasn’t a usual task for him. She ran a hand across the smooth brown blanket and fluffed the pillows. “When are the rest of your things coming?”
“This is it. I thought I’d add whatever I needed as I went along.”
She lifted her brows. “You have a whole house to fill. Try the secondhand store. You’ll need some furniture, like a living room chair and maybe a television set. There isn’t that much to do in Madrid. Do you have a job?”
“I thought I’d see what turned up.”
“I’ll help you, if you want. I could ask around.”
“I thought I’d take my time and get the feel of things.”
She could never jump into a life away from what she knew. She wondered how many times Mitchell had had to adjust to a new town, a new life. “I—please don’t answer this, if you’re uncomfortable with it, but did you ever find out who nailed the barn and the house door shut the night your father died?”
Though Mitchell’s expression didn’t change, she could feel him sinking inside himself, a darkness enveloping him. “Someone who thought I was involved with his wife—I wasn’t. The man is dead now. He had a heart attack soon after that night…end of story. You were the only one who believed that my family hadn’t set the fire to get insurance money.”
“Lauren believed in you, and Shelly, and I think one of the deputies did, too. He was your father’s friend. You remember Lonny? He’s the police chief now.”
Mitchell nodded and studied her in that quiet, gauging way. “Would you like to see the rest of the house—the kitchen?”
Uma hadn’t been in the house since her last coffee with Lauren. She placed her hand over her heart. “Yes, I would. I’ve already seen the other rooms. Billy wasn’t much on home maintenance or cleanliness. Poor Lauren spoiled him. She managed the real estate office and did most of the work there, too.”
The kitchen was ruined, cabinet doors hanging off their hinges as though torn by an enraged hand, burned spots on the Formica counter top, ugly marks on the carpet. The stainless steel stove that Lauren had loved and cleaned meticulously was filthy. The sight made Uma feel nauseated. “I’d better go.”
“Uma?” Mitchell’s voice was deep and gentle.
She fought the tears burning her lids and then angrily brushed them
away. “I miss Lauren. She was a part of my life, a good part, and now she’s gone—murdered right there in front of me on an ordinary summer night. I saw his face. Even without license plates, I could identify that car. And they haven’t found him. How can that be? How can a murderer drive by and shoot her? What had she done?”
Uma picked up the embroidered tea towel she had brought to cover the casserole and dabbed her eyes. “I’m sorry. I’ve got to go. Thank you for calling me about Lauren’s things. I’ll take care of them, but just not now.”
When Mitchell said nothing, but only stared at the scarred linoleum floor, Uma knew that the past still held him. She reached to touch his arm and the muscle there hardened immediately. “Please don’t worry about that time so long ago. You were just a boy in pain. I understood.”
He smiled tightly, briefly. “It shouldn’t have happened. Not to you.”
She couldn’t resist smoothing that rough, hard cheek gently, and sensed the power that he held in check, the darkness lurking around him. “Be good to yourself, Mitchell.”
The answer came with a scowl and his hand gripping her wrist, pushing her hand away. “You think I deserve that, do you?”
“Yes, I do.” But Uma’s thoughts were with Lauren, and she had to get out of the house. She tried not to run as she hurried into the hot, honeysuckle-scented night. When she turned to glance back, Mitchell stood enveloped by the porch’s shadows and the cat sat beside him, gently flicking his tail.
TWO
After Uma had gone, a moth circled the ceiling light, and Mitchell watched it as he thought of the woman she had become.
Still compassionate and considerate. Still the same thick waving hair, a rich mink brown that gleamed with reddish highlights as if it had trapped the warmth of the sun. He’d gripped it in his fist all those years ago and the silky feel had remained, haunting him. Or was it the sweetness, the honesty he’d held for just that moment, and in his pain, wanted to destroy?
He’d known Uma forever, the forbidden girl from the right side of uptown. Perfect. Complete. She’d always been strong in herself, sensitive to others, and poised. The first anger he’d seen in her was just now, when she thought of Lauren’s death. Then her dislike of Billy was right there on the edge, smoldering in those smoky gray eyes.
A woman’s passion was there, controlled and simmering.
How long ago was it that he’d felt as deeply?
He didn’t want Uma touching him. He didn’t want that longing inside him to lean into her gentle touch. He didn’t want her pity.
He should have comforted her, said the right words about Lauren, but he couldn’t. He didn’t know how. His emotions were locked inside him.
She didn’t blame him for his attack all those years ago. How could she not?
The telephone rang, and after he answered, a man’s muffled voice asked, “Mitchell Warren?”
“Yes. Who is this?”
“We don’t want you here.” Another silence, and the caller hung up. Mitchell replaced the receiver slowly; he’d expected as much, his arrival certain to stir Madrid’s gossip. The voice was metallic and smooth and sexless, as if it had been electronically manufactured.
He walked out into the garden, now overgrown and littered with broken limbs. A woman had once loved it, and now the white picket fence needed painting and repair. Roses bloomed amid the weeds—Mitchell stopped, surprised to see Uma in the garden.
Framed by the moonlight dappling through the oak tree, Uma stood, head bowed. Her hands were stretched out over the roses, not touching them. Her face was pale, eyes huge in the shadows as she turned to him. “I loved her so. These roses are from my grandmother’s garden. They’re Hansa…with that clove scent, they’re typical of the Rugosas, and in the fall the hips are large and orange-red. In my garden, her grandmother’s Russelliana is climbing on a trellis. We shared the roses, sometimes going to old homesteads and collecting starts—all of us, Lauren, myself, Pearl, and Shelly. Pearl wasn’t that enthusiastic, but she came along to be with us. And Shelly really doesn’t have time to tend a garden now, or the energy. Poor Lauren’s are so overgrown.”
Her voice was only a soft whisper in the night, her hand drifting across a tumble of tiny white roses in a half barrel. “Lauren would make sachets from the petals and from the lavender buds, and she’d make soap, too. She’d let Dozer come cut rose hips for his winter teas. I couldn’t bear to come here…we’ve always been together. And now we’re not.”
She pushed the old swing tied to a sturdy oak branch. “She kept this here for the neighborhood children and loved to watch them play.”
Mitchell understood the necessity of closure. She needed to reckon with Lauren’s murder as badly as he needed to resolve his past, separating Fred’s bitterness from him.
Her cheeks were silvery with tears, which she impatiently scrubbed away. She looked at her hands, studying them. “I’d better go. Goodnight.”
“Uma?”
“Yes?”
“I’ll prune the bushes.” It was the least he could do, though the offer surprised him.
“Do you know how?”
Her tone was listless as she continued to study her hands, turning the palms upward. What was it that she saw in those slender, graceful fingers, those soft palms?
He’d trained himself to gauge people in business, to stay away from emotional entanglements. Yet he’d offered. Mitchell frowned slightly, uncomfortable with whatever she stirred within him. “I’ll learn.”
“Be careful of the thorns. The plants should be fed—manure tea, if you want, or something commercial, and a spray for insects who love to feast on them. Until tonight, I couldn’t bear to come here to tend them. In another month or so, they’ll be beautiful.”
She scrubbed whatever she saw on her hands away, and slid into the darkness. She crossed the shadows on the sidewalk, just as she had crossed his thoughts through the years.
A cloud passed across the moon and Mitchell thought briefly about her marriage, the man’s name she’d kept. Everett Thornton would have suited her, a man with the right kind of background. What went wrong?
In the still night and among the budding fragrant roses, Mitchell’s parents’ raging battles echoed; they stalked him while a slight breeze riffled the tops of the trees, whispering in the leaves. His mother had pleaded, his father cursed bitterly. And then Grace Warren had gone to her young sons, begging them to come with her. Their father’s taunts had snagged their fierce pride and they’d chosen to stay.
Mitchell didn’t want to think about the woman who was his mother. He didn’t want to open the letters she’d sent through the years.
Blaming it on his dark mood, the homecoming that wasn’t sweet, Mitchell tore away a rotting white trellis and tossed it into a fragrant, rambling bed of blooms.
Small town welcoming, he thought, as inside the house, he filled a paper plate with the casserole and dished out another smaller helping for the cat, who had followed him inside. Crumpled beside the dish was the tea towel that Uma had used to wipe her tears.
Mitchell ran his finger over the delicate embroidery, tracing the white thread of the flowers.
In her way, Uma Lawrence Thornton was dangerous to him. He didn’t like the restless softness disturbing him now. Nothing was adding up, or could be logically dissected. Mitchell liked assessments and bottom lines from which to build, but Uma tangled his senses.
On impulse, he picked up the telephone and called Roman. A woman protested sleepily and Roman’s voice was rough and deep in the Las Vegas night.
“It’s Mitchell. Bad timing?”
“What’s wrong?” Roman’s tone changed to alert.
“I’m in Madrid. I bought back the old places—the ranch and the garage—and a house in town.”
“My God. What did you do that for?”
“I had to. Don’t know why. Here’s my phone number and mailing address.” Mitchell smiled. He could almost see Roman sitting up in bed, reaching for a pad and pen. I
n the background a woman groaned sleepily.
Glass shattered and Roman cursed, then muttered, “You’re making a mistake, Mitchell.”
“Could be.” Facing the past was better than the terminal freeze inside him.
“You just walked out of a top job, back to that hick town?”
“Uh-huh. Seemed the right thing to do now, for me.”
After he hung up, Mitchell smoothed the tea towel on the counter. Was it the right thing to do? Could he find what he needed?
“Mitchell Warren is back?” Shelly turned suddenly to Uma.
“I thought you should know,” Uma replied.
Time seemed to stop as Shelly slowly placed a laundry basket on the kitchen counter of her small, well-kept home.
By nine o’clock that night, Shelly had already cleaned two houses and was picking up after her rebellious teenage daughter, Dani. Dressed in her standard T-shirt and jeans, Shelly was tall and leggy, and moved with the lean grace of a woman who was physically active. Sun had streaked her chestnut hair, tethered in a ponytail. The clean-cut planes of Shelly’s face would age gracefully, her skin gleaming without cosmetics.
“Why? Why is Mitchell back? Why would he want to come back?”
Uma searched her thoughts and emotions about Mitchell. She could almost feel the hardness of his jaw now beneath her fingers, the way he tore her hand from him—and she’d ached over the bitter life he’d known, for the life he must have had. “He’s very quiet and watchful. I think he’s lost something, and he needs to find it. There’s a deadly quietness in him that—”
“I wondered why you came tonight. You came to warn me. I haven’t told Dani about her father.”
Uma nodded; Shelly hadn’t told anyone about her daughter’s father, including her own family, who had cast her out. An unmarried teenage mother, she’d kept her baby, supporting them by doing housework. Despite pressure to place her baby out for adoption, Shelly had never wavered beneath the gossip.