by Jeff Shelby
But even though I told myself all this, the feeling wouldn’t go away. And that worried me. Because I shouldn’t care about what Gunnar did, or who he did things with.
My phone buzzed in my coat pocket, startling me. I pulled it out, grateful for the diversion, but I sighed when I saw the name on the screen.
Declan.
A fresh wave of guilt washed over me. Here I was, lamenting over the fact that my old boyfriend was getting back together with his ex-wife, and my new love interest was calling me.
Not a good position to be in.
I answered the phone with as cheery of a hello as I could muster.
“Hey, beautiful,” Declan said, and butterflies fluttered in my stomach. “I was just calling to see how everything is going with the kids. Figured it would be easier to talk on the phone than in person.”
It was a simple question. How was everything going? I could just say fine, and Declan would accept that. But he was the person I told nearly everything to, and I felt this strong urge to tell him what had gone on over the last couple of days with Gunnar and the drugs and Luke and now Lucy. Doing that, though, would require me to face the other things that had also happened: Gunnar telling me we had no relationship, and he and Lucy possibly being back together…and how those things made me feel.
I swallowed and went with the safe answer, the answer I’d known I was going to give all along.
“I’m fine. How are you?”
“Busy,” he said, and chuckled. “Which is to be expected. But I miss you. Feels like I haven’t seen you in forever.”
It wasn’t far from the truth. The last time we’d spent any length of time together had been the night I’d spent at his house.
“I know,” I said softly.
“What? I can’t hear you. Are you home?”
“I’m outside,” I said, speaking louder.
“It's freezing today,” he said. “And you’re just now better after that cold you had. Be careful.”
“I am,” I said. I waited a minute and then asked, “Did you just call to say hello?”
“Yes. Well, no.” It was his turn to pause. “I want to see you. I actually need to see you, but I know how hard it is with your family in town.”
Butterflies tickled my insides again. He needed to see me?
“I don’t know if I can make that happen,” I said truthfully. “This week is kind of crazy.”
“I know. For me, too. That’s why I wanted to drop off your presents. Just in case we didn’t get a chance to see each other before Christmas.”
I froze.
The presents.
In my haste to get things ready for Luke and Laura’s earlier arrival, I’d forgotten all about getting Declan a Christmas present. It had been on my radar, but after being sick for a week and then spending time cleaning up the house, it had just slipped my mind.
I was a failure. A horrible human.
But I wasn’t going to let Declan know that. “I know. I need to drop your presents off. I, uh, forgot to give them to you when you stopped by the other day.”
He made a sound. “You don’t have to get me anything.”
“I know. But I want to.” I covered my mouth. I’d used present tense, as if I hadn’t already gotten him something. Because I hadn’t.
“Well, if you want to swing by tonight, I’ll be home late. And you can always come to the church.”
“Okay,” I said. “Maybe I’ll do that.”
“I hope you do,” he said. “I really want to see you. And talk to you.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
We hung up and my head was filled with new thoughts. Sure, I was still thinking about the guitar pick in the barn, and the fact that Luke had seen someone who looked like Lucy when he was inside, and how Gunnar and Lucy were apparently upstairs in Gunnar’s house, engaging in consummating what ever their relationship was at their very moment, but I was also thinking about Declan.
And that I desperately needed to find a Christmas gift for him.
TWENTY THREE
There was nothing to get Declan.
Actually, there was nowhere in Latney to actually shop for a gift for Declan.
That was why I was wandering aimlessly around Sophia’s boutique, looking at Christmas decorations and shabby chic knickknacks.
I’d left the house shortly after coming back from Gunnar’s. Laura was in a foul mood because Connor had decided to wait until the next day to drive down.
“I thought you didn’t want him driving in the snow,” I’d reminded her.
She’d hugged a pillow to her chest, her legs tucked under her on the sofa. “I didn’t.”
“So isn’t that a good thing?”
She pouted. “But I still want him here.”
“What’s he supposed to do?” Luke asked. He was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, holding a sandwich he’d made himself for lunch. The kid was constantly eating. “Fly?”
She scowled at him and I told her I was heading into town to do some shopping and did she want to come with? I knew it would cramp my shopping, but I also didn’t want to leave her sulking at home.
But she’d refused, opting to catch up on some reading instead, so I’d found myself driving alone into Latney, wondering where on earth I might find something suitable to give to my pastor-lover.
I came up with exactly zero good ideas. I briefly toyed with a gift certificate or even a basket of food from Toby’s. They had an abundant selection of gourmet cheeses and meats, and I knew I could put together a nice, elegant collection of snacks. Paired with a bottle of wine, it would be the perfect gift for someone. Just not Declan. He had church members constantly bringing him meals and desserts, so it wasn’t like he was lacking in the sustenance department. Besides, giving a basket of food was about as impersonal and unexciting as it could get.
I could stop at the hardware store and look for gift ideas there, but I had no idea if Declan needed anything. I actually didn’t even know if Declan was handy with tools, or if he liked to build things.
I sighed and stared at a shelf filled with delicate china teacups. I wasn’t going to find a single thing in Sophia’s that would make a good gift for Declan, and I knew it.
But that wasn’t the only thing that had me sighing in frustration. Because I also hadn’t found a single new piece of information about the mysterious woman Luke had claimed to see in Gunnar’s barn. Because my thoughts had drifted back to that, too, and what the latest developments were in Gunnar’s case.
I closed my eyes, mentally berating myself. Claimed to see. Was I really doubting my own son’s account of what had happened?
I picked up a lace table runner. Not because it was something I was considering gifting to Declan, but because with all of my thoughts running wild, I needed to feel anchored to something. Holding that starched piece of fabric and running my fingers over the raised design was grounding. I might not have answers to several things I was thinking about, but I knew the lace felt the way I knew it should.
I took a deep breath and set the fabric back on the shelf. It slipped and fell to the ground and I lurched forward to try to grab it. But it drifted during its short flight, and I leaned a little too far to the left, and much too close to the display of handmade soaps stacked on an antique vanity. The lace fluttered to the floor and the bars of soap clattered after, every last one of them.
I got to my knees, gathering them up, shaking my head when I noticed the dents and chunks taken out of some of the handcrafted soaps. I was a klutz. And an idiot. I wondered if Sophia would make me buy the damaged ones.
I stood up, as many bars of soap in my hands as I could carry, and was immediately knocked to the floor again.
I stared up at the person who had run into me, and my mouth dropped open.
Lucy Forsythe stared back at me.
“What are you doing here?” I blurted.
Her frown was clearly visible behind her glasses. “I’m shopping,” she said, as if this
should be obvious. She stared pointedly at the soaps scattered on the ground. “What are you doing?”
I blushed. “It was an accident,” I told her. “I bumped into the display.”
“An accident,” she said coolly. “So you’re telling me you don’t go about your life purposefully destroying things?”
Her tone was almost lighthearted, but not quite. I was almost positive there was an underlying meaning to her words, and I instantly flashed back to the scene in the living room from the day before, when Jill had accused me of sleeping with her dad.
Just as quickly, I remembered the conversation Jill and I had just had at her front door, when she’d told me her mom and dad were upstairs together. In a bedroom.
Which was the whole reason I’d asked why she was at Sophia’s in the first place.
The heat in my cheeks intensified. I tried to busy myself with restacking the soaps. “Not if I can help it,” I said, answering her question in what I hoped was an equally light tone.
Lucy responded with a tight-lipped smile.
The silence was overwhelming so I tried to fill it with small talk. This was not the time to ask questions about the barn or Lucy’s potential involvement in what had happened to Gunnar. Not at Sophia’s, and not while I was clumsily trying to pick up a display I’d knocked over.
“Gunnar told me you’re between houses,” I said.
She nodded.
“That’s nice that he has the space available to offer you guys a place to stay.”
“Yes,” Lucy responded. “He didn’t have to do that.”
I leaned down to grab more of the soaps. “He’s a good man,” I said.
“He is,” Lucy said, nodding. “Always has been.” She studied me from behind her glasses. Even with her face made up, she looked a little tired. “You know, we didn’t divorce for the normal reasons.”
I busied myself stacking the soaps, trying to create something that remotely resembled the display I’d knocked over.
“We loved each other,” Lucy said, her voice firm. “Love built over twenty years time doesn’t just disappear.”
I could have argued that statement. I’d spent that same amount of time with Charlie, and the love we’d once shared had definitely dissolved. Sure, I cared about him as a person, and I didn’t wish any ill will toward him during our separation and subsequent divorce, but we’d become different people over the two decades we’d spent together. Different people with different needs and different priorities, and the things we’d originally loved about the other had either waned or no longer served the same importance they once had. Maybe our love hadn’t disappeared, per se, but it certainly hadn’t evolved in the way it needed to in order to maintain our marriage.
“Gunnar didn’t want me or Jill to spend Christmas in a hotel,” she continued. “He values family, even when the dynamics change.”
I just nodded. Why was she telling me all of this?
“And I have to say, it’s nice being back in the house.” Lucy smiled. “It’s nice being a family again, even if it is temporary.”
I didn’t know if she’d intended for the words to hurt me, to affect me in some way, but they did. And once again, I felt stupid for feeling that way. I had made the decision to end things with Gunnar. I had been the one who had walked away. What he did from here on out shouldn’t matter.
So why did it?
I forced the brightest smile I could muster. “I’m glad you have a place to stay for the holidays.”
“Not just a place to stay,” she said, shaking her head. “A home.”
“Of course.” I finished with the display just as Sophia appeared. Her face was a mask of concern and I knew she was headed in our direction to see what had happened.
I welcomed the diversion, because I was pretty sure I’d gotten the answers I’d been looking for about Lucy, however inadvertently.
She was happy to be back in Latney with Gunnar. And I couldn’t imagine her doing anything—including storing drugs or framing Gunnar—to jeopardize that.
TWENTY FOUR
Snow was falling the next morning, and Laura was once again a nervous wreck.
“It’s winter, honey,” I said to her. “It’s going to snow.”
“I know, but it’s coming down even harder than yesterday.”
We’d finished breakfast an hour ago and I was parked on the couch with a crossword puzzle book. The UPS driver had finally delivered the last of my packages, a planner Laura had on her wish list, and I was doing my best to relax and not think about Gunnar or Declan or anything but the immediate here and now.
Because everything else felt a little overwhelming.
I still didn’t have a clue what I was going to get Declan for Christmas, and I still didn’t know if or how I was going to be able to help Gunnar. But the snow was falling and a song from The Nutcracker was playing on the radio and I was determined to focus on a few good things before being sucked back into the fray. I knew it would come soon enough.
I glanced out the living room window. Laura was right; the snow was coming down at a faster rate than the day before. However, the temperature outside looked as though it was significantly warmer because the flakes weren’t really sticking. To the grass, yes, but the driveway was still clear. Wet, but clear.
“I’m sure he’ll be fine,” I told her with a smile.
“Promise?”
I tried not to roll my eyes and just focused on the book in my lap instead of offering a response. “Why don’t you think about something else?” I suggested.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know.” I looked around the room, at the crèches on the mantle and the stockings that hung below them. At the Christmas tree with its pretty lights twinkling, and the greenery draped over the bannister leading upstairs. “What do you think of the Christmas decorations? Seeing all of the old stuff in the new house?”
Laura wrinkled her nose. “It’s fine,” she said, her words at complete odds with her expression.
“I love this fireplace,” I told her, forging ahead with my attempt at conversation. “The way the stockings look.”
She glanced at the mantle. “Yeah,” she said, almost grudgingly. “It does look nice.”
I studied my crossword for a minute, then erased a wrong answer. I wasn’t sure why I was attempting to do one, as they always ended in frustration for me. But it was one of those things that I felt like I was supposed to enjoy so, from time to time, I’d pick up a book at the supermarket and give it a go again.
I was pretty sure this one was going to end up as a fire starter. Soon.
“I do love that we still do stockings,” Laura said, her eyes still on the fireplace.
“Yeah?”
She nodded, her high ponytail bobbing up and down. “All of the little goodies you managed to find. I used to think Santa was the smartest person in the world. How did he know what kind of candy every kid liked? How did he know which Beanie Babies I did or didn’t have?”
I chuckled. “Santa was a smart cookie.”
“And the money. Finding the money in my stocking was the best. Knowing that I had some cash to spend on whatever I wanted.” She sighed, but it was a happy one, like she was awash with good memories.
My pencil stilled. I had lots of little goodies and trinkets for the kids’ stockings, just like I did every year. Their favorite candies and snacks, guitar picks and strings for Luke, lip balm and hand sanitizers for Laura.
But somehow I’d forgotten the money.
And I knew how much cash was in my purse.
None.
I picked up my phone and glanced at the time. It was just shy of eleven o’clock. The bank would be open for several more hours, but tomorrow was Christmas Eve and I was certain they would be closed. If I wanted to continue the tradition of money in their stockings, I was going to have to run to town.
I tried to close my crossword book slowly, casually. “I think I’m going to run into town,” I said to Laura.
>
“What? In this weather?”
“It’s snowing, Laura. That’s it. No hurricane, no blizzard. Snow. That is melting as it falls.”
Her eyes narrowed. “But you were just in town yesterday.”
“I know,” I said. “But I forgot to get something.”
The suspicious look intensified. “What?”
“Something I need.” I knew I was being evasive.
“You’re working the case, aren’t you?”
For once, she was wrong. My need to go into town had nothing to do with what had happened to Gunnar. But I still didn’t want to tell her the real reason: that I had flaked and forgotten to get the one thing she loved finding most in her Christmas stocking.
“No,” I said firmly. “I am not working the case. I need to stop at the bank, and then Toby’s for some groceries.”
She considered my words. “How long will you be gone?” she finally asked.
“An hour. Two, tops.”
“What does it matter? Last time I checked, you’re not the parent,” Luke said from the hallway. He crossed the living room and flopped down on the couch next to me. It was clear his words were meant for his sister.
Laura glared at him. “Shut up.”
It never failed to surprise me how quickly they devolved into their childhood selves around each other.
Luke held up a leather case. “Wanna play?” he asked his sister. “For old time’s sake.” It was the backgammon set I’d had since I was little, the one they’d commandeered as kids after I’d taught them how to play.
“You’ll lose,” she told him, her nose in the air.
He grinned. “Wanna bet?”
“You never win,” she said. She glanced out the window, no doubt looking for Connor’s car. I wondered what time he had left Arlington.
“Five dollars says I do,” Luke said.
Laura turned to him. “Ten,” she said.
His grin widened into a full-fledged smile. “Deal.”