Dangerous Season

by Lyn Cote

  Audra pondered this, but wouldn’t let her mother shift the focus. “I was heartbroken, too. So was Megan.”

  “I know and that probably made you easy prey to a sleaze like Gordon Hamilton.” She made a sound of disgust. “How can I make you understand? You came home for our first Christmas—without your father—and you told me you were pregnant. I couldn’t face it. How could I handle being a widow, a single mother, a grandmother and you having a baby without a husband? I was barely able to get up some mornings and face another day without Jim. I couldn’t handle one more thing.”

  Audra began to grasp her mother’s motivation for asking her to give up Evie for adoption, but it still rankled to be classed as “one more thing.” Couldn’t her mother see how much that hurt? “So that means,” Audra accused, “I shouldn’t have expected your help?”

  “Honey—” Lois leaned forward, reached for Audra’s hand “—please don’t take it like that. I’m not saying I was right. I’m only telling you why I did what I did. I should have found the strength to stand by you. I didn’t and I know I failed you.”

  Audra took her mother’s hand, feeling tears wet her eyes. Finally she’d received an apology. But was it enough to fill the hole in her heart? “I needed you so much.”

  “I’m sorry, Audra. I can’t go back and unsay the words I said. But when you went ahead and had Evie, I was happy. I really was. I admired you for taking responsibility.”

  “You didn’t show it.”

  “By then I didn’t know how to show you my true feelings. After the hurtful words we spoke to each other that Christmas—” Lois dipped her chin “—a gulf had opened between us. And afterward, when we were together, I always seemed to say the wrong things. I was always so uptight.”

  Honesty forced Audra to say, “I was, too. I know that I haven’t tried to bridge the gap between us. It hurt too badly.”

  Lois squeezed Audra’s hand. “I decided that this summer I had to make an attempt.”

  Audra finally got to ask the question that had teased her since the morning her mom had invited Evie over for her first afternoon solo visit. “Why this summer?”

  Lois released her hand and took a sip of coffee as if flustered. “It’s silly really. Just one of those moments that pop up and hit us in the face unexpectedly. I was at lunch with my friends for my fiftieth birthday. We chatted and then everyone was bringing out photographs of their grandchildren.”

  Lois smiled wryly. “And it suddenly slapped me in the face that I was fifty years old. I had one grandchild and I didn’t have one photo of Evie in my wallet. Then it also hit me that Evie was seven years old and I only had seven years left to get to know her before she started high school and didn’t care anymore about getting to know me. And on top of that, Megan had just finished her junior year in high school. She’ll be leaving me next fall and…”

  Audra half smiled in return. She felt the connection of a mother to a mother. “I get it, Mom. I get it. I already get chills thinking of Evie leaving home.”

  Lois gave a half chuckle and beamed at her. A sudden, but very natural peace stretched between them.

  Audra sighed. A gull swooped overhead, screeching. Out on the blue, blue lake, a parasailer was gliding over the gentle waves with a rainbow-striped sail. High above the water, an eagle circling dived toward the water. The peace of the setting washed through Audra along with understanding at last. Lois wasn’t perfect, but neither was Audra. She felt suddenly free, lighter.

  Coming home that long-ago Christmas, she’d assumed, as children all did, that her mother was indestructible. And now she knew the truth—mothers were just women blessed with children. “Let’s not be at odds anymore, okay?” Audra reached over and laid her hand on her mother’s.

  “Okay.” Lois rested her hand momentarily on both theirs. “Evie’s a lovely little girl.” She sat back and lifted her coffee mug again. “You’ve done a great job with her.”

  Audra tested the water of their new harmony and mentioned a name she never spoke to her mother. “Shirley helped me.”

  Lois lifted the mug as if in salute. “And I’m going to thank her for that the very next time I see her.”

  The sliding-glass door behind them opened. “Hey, Audra,” Megan said, “what are you doing here? I was just about to drive into town.”

  Grinning, Audra glanced over her shoulder at her sister. “Audra’s Place is closed today. Come over here and we’ll tell you all about it.”

  Megan paused and propped a hand on her hip. “And will that explain why Uncle Hal is snoring away in our guest bedroom?”

  Audra chuckled softly. Megan was one in a million.

  “Megan, pour yourself some coffee,” Lois instructed, “and some for your sister and bring out the croissants on the counter. The three of us are going to have a long chat about many things.”

  Megan gave Audra a quizzical look and then stepped back inside.

  “It’s going to be a good day,” Lois said, staring out over the vast sparkling blue lake.

  “Yes.” A very good day.

  “I hope—” Lois slanted a look at Audra “—you’re serious about that handsome sheriff.”

  “I am.” Happiness bubbled up, frothy and sweet, inside Audra.

  “Good. Evie adores him and Jim would have loved him as a son-in-law.”

  Megan stepped outside with a tray in her hands. “Cool. Does that mean I’m going to be a bridesmaid soon?”

  Audra chuckled and then she laughed. Life was good.

  “Hey, Sheriff, would you be here to romance my boss?” Chad teased Keir outside Audra’s Dutch door that evening after closing.

  Keir paused in the deep purple twilight. “Don’t be so smart,” he said, grinning. Though he was fatigued from loss of sleep, nothing could have kept him away from Audra tonight. Audra had told him she loved him. The memory still made him glow so warm and bright that he thought it might be visible to the naked eye.

  Besides another mystery had been solved and Audra needed to be told.

  Chad’s expression changed. “How’s it going with Brent?”

  “He’s in a lot of trouble. But his father has hired him a good lawyer and Brent’s still a minor.”

  “I didn’t know…I didn’t know till this summer that Brent had such a jerk for a father. Brent strutted into our school last fall like we should all fall down and kiss his big toe, you know what I mean?”

  “I have a good idea.”

  “I feel bad like…” Chad’s voice faded away. “Like I—”

  “Brent’s setting the fires isn’t your fault. But it pays to remember that no one has a perfect life. And the people that bug everyone most are usually the most miserable themselves.”

  “Really?” Chad eyed him.

  “Really.”

  “Okay. Gotta go. Shirley wants me home on time. All this stuff with Brent kind of spooked her or something. She’s been kinda sad all day.”

  “Shirley has a tender heart,” Keir agreed.

  Chad nodded, mounted his bike and peddled down the alley.

  Keir approached the open Dutch door. Memories of going through the legal procedures of an arrest here for Brent played through his mind. But after Ramsdel had left with Lois, Audra’s beautiful words of love to him had overwhelmed and broken through all the sadness of this day.

  Audra stood in the doorway, waiting for him. “I knew you’d come.” She opened the bottom half of the door and she drew him inside. Then she shut both halves of the door behind him.

  Though all he wanted was to take her into his arms, he had something else to tell her first. The solution to the final mystery of this bedeviled summer. “Brent was the one calling and hanging up on Gordon Hamilton.”

  She stared up at him. “Brent?”

  “Yes, in May he told your uncle about seeing Gordon with his new bride at your café. Hal unfortunately told him of the connection between Evie and Gordon. When your uncle added that Gordon was not contributing to Evie’s support, Brent was
even angrier. The calls were Brent’s way of paying Gordon back for you and Evie.”

  She sighed and shook her head. “Well, perhaps Brent did some good. A lawyer called me this afternoon and said that Gordon would begin paying me child support plus back child support next month.”

  “You’re kidding?” Mixed emotions over this development unsettled him.

  “No, I was shocked. I gleaned from the lawyer’s careful phrases that Gordon’s family was afraid a scandal might come in the future if people found out that he hadn’t supported his birth daughter.”

  Keir felt his brows draw together. “So Gordon didn’t grow a conscience. He just decided to protect himself. Wonder if his bride knows anything about this?”

  “I couldn’t say. But I know I won’t be calling her anytime soon. Poor woman. She got stuck with Gordon.”

  Keir chuckled and then gave in, and folded her into his arms. “It’s all over.”

  “It’s over, but we are just beginning, aren’t we?” She lifted her face to his and smiled.

  He kissed her, a sense of awe flowing through him. This wonderful woman loves me. His heart did silent somersaults inside him. “I love you, Audra.”

  She pressed against him, breathing in his distinctive scent. “I love you.”

  The scent of garlic and oregano hung over them. He grinned, thinking that the scent would always remind him of this moment here with Audra. He framed her face within his hands. “This isn’t the most romantic of settings for a proposal.”

  Her heart skipped one beat and then began bouncing as if she were jumping rope. She grinned. “Oh, I don’t know,” she teased. “Remember the love scene in Evie’s latest favorite DVD, Lady and the Tramp?”

  He laughed out loud and hummed a bar of “Bella Notta.” “You’re wonderful,” he said and he kissed her.

  She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Take me to the beach, Keir. I want to walk along the shore with you.”

  Within minutes, they’d returned to their favorite spot on the coast of Lake Superior. Audra walked beside the man she loved, hand in hand. Like a rippled ribbon of light, the beam from the half-moon glistened on the lake’s surface, flowing right to them as if they and the moon were connected. “Sometimes it’s almost too beautiful here, isn’t it?”

  He clasped her in his arms. “I don’t deserve someone as wonderful as you.”

  “I don’t deserve someone as wonderful as you,” she echoed. “Isn’t it nice that God always has something better for us than we can even dream of?”

  He stroked her hair and she leaned into him.

  “I just hope,” Keir said, his voice suddenly low and rasping, “He can help me get a handle on my temper.”

  She stopped Keir’s self-reproach with a kiss. “He will. And I didn’t tell you but I had a long talk with my mother and we’re going to start being good to one another from now on. It felt good to ‘speak the truth in love.’”

  He inhaled her light floral fragrance and the scent of the pines on the breeze. “Yes. Please marry me.”

  “Of course. Now kiss me. Please,” she whispered.

  “My pleasure.” He held her in his arms, feeling her warmth and knowing nothing except death would ever part them.

  EPILOGUE

  The day after Labor Day, sitting behind his desk in his office, Keir opened his mail. Outside his window, the highest maple leaves had turned bright red and the lower branches had leaves edged with the beginnings of gold. The apple festival was coming and life was good.

  He and Audra were planning a winter wedding. Brent had been placed in his father’s custody while the legal fallout from his fire-setting played out. And Audra had received her first check from Gordon. They’d agreed to put the money into an account for Evie’s future education.

  When he and Audra had told her little girl about their upcoming wedding, Evie had squealed she couldn’t wait to call him “Daddy.” Pleasure flushed afresh, warm and sweet, through Keir.

  He opened another letter. Gloom crashed into his world. Oh, no. He read the letter twice, its news bringing back the recollection of an awful tragedy that had hit Winfield seven years before. If I’m upset and I was just the arresting officer, how will this hit Trish? And her whole family?

  At that moment, as if on cue, Trish Franklin tapped on his door and stuck her head in. “Have a moment?”

  He took a deep breath and nodded. “Come in. I have a letter you need to read.”

  She looked puzzled but walked in.

  “Sit down.” He motioned toward the chair.

  She sat.

  He handed her the letter.

  She took it. “What is it? You’re scaring me.”

  “Just read it and then we’ll have to discuss how we’re going to handle this.”

  Trish spread open the sheet of heavy paper. The official letterhead made her breath catch in her throat. She read the first sentence. Oh, no. It can’t be.

  Dear Reader,

  I hope you’ve enjoyed the first book in my HARBOR INTRIGUE series. Audra and Keir both had made mistakes in the past. We have all done things we wish we hadn’t. That’s being human. But how wonderful is God’s forgiveness and grace. Every Easter season, I go back over what Jesus was willing to do for us—be rejected, humiliated, tortured and killed. And all for me. And for you. As Charles Wesley wrote in his immortal hymn titled, “And Can It Be That I Should Gain?” in 1738, Amazing love! How can it be, That Thou, my God, shouldst die for me?

  I loved writing a happy ending to Keir and Audra’s long loneliness. And I was delighted to give Evie such a great daddy! I hope you will enjoy the next two books in the series, DANGEROUS GAME and DANGEROUS SECRETS.

  Please let me know if these stories touch your heart. You can write me at P.O. Box 864, Woodruff, WI 54568 or e-mail me at l.cote@juno.com or visit my Web site www.LynCote.net.

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  Audra and her mother have been at odds for several years at the beginning of this story. Have you had a similar situation in your life? How did you close the gap?

  Keir had been a rebellious youth. What was the cause of his rebellion? Have you seen this type of rebellion in anyone close to you?

  What softened Keir’s hard heart? Have you ever felt your heart soften? How does sin harden a heart?

  Audra was faced at a young age with an unplanned pregnancy. She chose to keep her daughter. How did this have an impact on her life? In your opinion, was it the wisest choice she could have made?

  Hal Ramsdel is the bull in the china shop of relationships. What do you think caused his damaging behavior? Is there hope for Hal?

  Shirley and Tom are special people. What makes them special?

  Sarah Ramsdel plays a prominent role even though she’s been dead for nearly a decade. Is there anyone in your family or circle who had this from-the-grave influence? Was it for good or ill?

  Both Chad and Brent had troubled fathers. Do the sins of the fathers really affect their sons and daughters? If so, why is this? Is there such a thing as bad blood?

  At the end of the book, Audra faces her mother and they finally talk over their differences. In real life, sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn’t. Have you ever confronted someone about how they have hurt you? What were the consequences?

  What new insights on life and love did you gain from reading this book? Would you recommend it to a friend? Why or why not?

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-4558-1

  DANGEROUS SEASON

  Copyright © 2007 by Lyn Cote

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Steeple Hill Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and inciden
ts are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This edition published by arrangement with Steeple Hill Books.

  ® and TM are trademarks of Steeple Hill Books, used under license. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

  www.SteepleHill.com