He hoped Mayor Howell and the other council members had a better argument for the development than he’d presented to Summer. Instead of being reassured by what he said, Cameron got the distinct opinion that her open mind on the issue was taking a turn in another direction.
Neither he nor the police chief were elected officials, but both were expected to be at the City Council meetings every month, available to answer questions from citizens, city staff and the elected representatives on the council.
All he wanted tonight was a couple of extra-strength Tylenol tablets and his bed.
Cameron patted his pocket, looking for the headache medication. He remembered he’d tossed the bottle in his gear bag. A glance at his watch told him he had time to dash out to the car, get it and be back before the invocation and Pledge of Allegiance that opened every City Council meeting.
He retrieved the pills and downed three with a sip of water from the fountain outside the council clerk’s office. He was about to head back into the council’s chambers when he overheard part of a conversation.
“I just don’t understand what she sees in him,” a woman was saying. “He’s not a doctor.”
“Everyone on the planet isn’t a doctor, Mom,” the answering voice said.
He’d heard that voice before. It belonged to Dr. Spring Darling. Were the women talking about him?
“But you know how...” the rest of the words were somehow muffled. “...she hasn’t even had him over for Sunday dinner. That says a lot if you ask me. Why is she sneaking around and hiding him?”
So they were talking about him! The man Summer was seeing who wasn’t a doctor.
Cameron felt a knot in his gut.
Was Summer hiding him from her family?
It figured. She was just like Melanie.
What would ever make him think Summer would be any different than his ex-wife? The two had way more in common with each other than either had in common with him. Common being the salient adjective there, he thought with bile rising.
Summer didn’t think he was good enough to meet her mother. The woman who’d broken Mickey’s heart and married a doctor—just like her daughter had—and just like his ex had left him for.
It wasn’t as if he’d taken her home to meet his own mother. But she was in Tennessee, a long way from Cedar Springs. Summer’s mother lived across town, all of ten minutes away.
Cameron stared at his hands. He might be the fire chief, but his hands were those of a working man. No, he didn’t have a medical degree from an Ivy League school, but he’d put himself through college by working nights and earning his bachelor’s degree. He didn’t belong to the local country club where Mrs. Darling, no doubt, sat on the board. But he’d knocked down a kitchen fire there his first week on the job.
Summer and her mother apparently considered him the hired help, someone to be hidden away from view.
The headache he’d just taken three Tylenol to combat suddenly throbbed even stronger in his head.
Cameron glanced around the corner. The women were disappearing beyond the doors leading into the City Council chambers. Definitely Spring Darling. And the older woman with her, the one who clearly didn’t care much for a working-class firefighter, even a fire chief, dating her precious daughter, could only be the indomitable Lovie Darling.
What had Summer called her mother? A force to be reckoned with.
With less than a charitable spirit, Cameron entered the room, took his seat between the police chief and the city manager and stewed.
The tension in the room was already palpable. Residents wanted information about the proposed new development and had come en masse to confront their elected officials.
Since Dr. Spring Darling and her mother were sitting with a few people Cameron recognized from the historical society, he surmised that they were among the opponents to the project.
How could they or anyone else be against a project that hadn’t even been presented to the City Council? The architect’s presentation to the council hadn’t even been formally scheduled.
Cameron focused his attention on the meeting when Mayor Howell started speaking.
“I can appreciate your concern,” she said into the microphone at her spot in the middle of the raised platform that held the seven Cedar Springs City Council members’ seats. “But at the moment, it is misplaced concern, Georgina.”
Cameron knew that Georgina Lundsford was the past president of the Cedar Springs Historical Review Advisory Committee. The historical committee members were well versed on the law and on the historical significance of just about every property within the city limits. Most of the members were also members of, or connected to, the Cedar Springs Historical Society. The difference between the two groups continued to confound and elude him.
But Bernadette Howell didn’t get to be mayor of Cedar Springs by being a shrinking violet. As far as Cameron was concerned, the two women were evenly matched, each believing the other wrong and clearly suspecting a hidden agenda.
As he watched the byplay between the mayor and Mrs. Lundsford—what his mother would call a nice-nasty exchange, unpleasantness disguised in polite words and tones—he became aware of someone watching him. His gaze shifted from the woman at the speaker’s podium and across the audience. He saw her then.
Dr. Spring Darling didn’t avert her eyes when his gaze connected with hers. She maintained eye contact with him and then mouthed the words, “I’m sorry.”
Had she seen him in the hallway?
There was no other reason for Dr. Darling to apologize to him.
Sorry for what?
He raised an eyebrow in silent question.
When her gaze shifted ever so slightly to the left where her mother sat erect in her seat listening to the mayor and Mrs. Lundsford, he knew he’d guessed correctly. She had seen him and knew that he’d overheard her mother’s harsh words.
As the City Council meeting wore on, he wondered when and how Spring Darling would approach him.
It didn’t take long.
The Cedar Springs City Council always took a brief recess after the assorted proclamations and the public comment period and before the start of the evening’s formal meeting.
While some people stood and chitchatted among themselves, others got coffee or a soft drink. Cameron usually used the twenty minutes to catch up on email or pulled out his tablet to read the most recent cover story in his fire chiefs’ journal. Occasionally a resident would have a question for him.
When he heard the quiet, “Excuse me, Chief Jackson,” he figured it was a city resident with a smoke alarm or other fire safety question.
It was a resident of Cedar Springs, but he knew this one was not interested in talking about fire safety, or the fire department’s budget. She was dressed in cream-colored linen slacks with a blouse and blazer. A large chunky necklace of sand-hued stones and turquoise hung at her neck.
It screamed “I’m wealthy and influential.”
Cameron rose. “Dr. Darling. Hello.”
She held out a hand, “Call me Spring, please.”
He nodded. And then waited.
“Do you have a moment?” she asked after a brief hesitation. “For a personal conversation?”
He nodded. “We can talk over there,” he said, indicating a door leading to an anteroom off the council chambers.
When the door closed behind them, she got right to it.
“This is rather embarrassing,” she said. “I know you overheard part of the conversation between me and my mother before the meeting started.”
He nodded.
“And taken out of context, it probably sounded very...” she struggled for a word.
“Condescending? Snobbish?”
She winced. “Yes,” Spring said. “Both of those things. I’m
sorry. It’s just that Lovie can be...rather forceful in pursuit of her goals. And she has tunnel vision when it comes to one of those goals.”
Cameron remained silent.
“She’s of an age where she has a big empty house and no grandkids to fill it with. She wants to spoil grandbabies. And with four daughters, all of whom she considers ‘of prime marrying age’ and not a single one of us even remotely looking like we’ll be marrying any time soon, she’s grown impatient.
“She... We,” she amended as she tucked her small clutch bag under her arm. “We know you and Summer have been seeing each other, and she wants to know what your intentions are. It’s not an excuse,” Spring added. “But it is an explanation.”
“Hmm,” Cameron said.
“Even if Mother doesn’t realize it, the rest of us know the reason Summer hasn’t invited you to The Compound.”
“Because I don’t have M.D. after my name?”
Spring blinked as if startled. Then she shook her head. “No. That’s not it at all,” she said. “ Like any mother, my mother wants what’s best for her children, and that’s even though all four of us are now grown women all leading active and independent lives. My sister Autumn would say Mother needed a hobby, but she has several and they keep her just as busy as meddling in our business does.”
Cameron’s lip twitched at that, mostly because he could relate. On more than one occasion his sister Mandy had called complaining about what she considered maternal meddling.
“No,” Spring said, shaking her head. “It has nothing to do with you not being a doctor. Not being a doctor probably works in your favor with my sister, although, from what I gather, fire chief sounds like it’s probably even more demanding than the hours that doctors put in.”
“Speaking from experience, Doctor Darling?”
“Touché,” she murmured. “Summer hasn’t invited you to dinner at The Compound because any dinner or lunch or brunch at the house isn’t going to be about the meal. It will be an inquisition, Lovie-style.”
“Lovie-style?”
She nodded, and made a slight grimace. “Usually when girls bring boys home, it’s the father the boyfriends worry about. Not at our house. When we were growing up and dating, everyone was cool with Daddy. He made them laugh. He gave our boyfriends tips on fishing or cars, recommended them for internships and summer jobs, and if he really liked them, he’d grant an extra half an hour on curfew. It was Mother who made our dates sweat. Big time,” Spring said.
“My guess,” she continued, “is that Summer is sparing you what would be a most unpleasant, bordering on painful, experience of one of Lovie’s meals.”
Despite the reason for their conversation, Cameron found that he liked Spring Darling. She didn’t flinch from controversy and stood up for what she believed in. He knew she’d inherited that trait from her mother, the indomitable Lovie Darling.
“Thank you, Doctor....” He paused, then amended to say, “Thank you, Spring. Your candor means a lot.”
“I just didn’t want you to leave tonight with that... With her comments as the first impression you have of her.”
When they returned to the City Council chambers, the clerk was bringing the meeting back to order. As they finished with city business, Cameron studied the two blonde women sitting side-by-side. In one he saw Summer ten years from now, and in the other, he saw that she would age into an elegant and striking woman.
He liked what he saw. A lot.
But looks didn’t make a relationship.
Despite Spring’s admirable defense of her mother, Cameron was all too familiar with how a relationship could and would turn. At first Melanie loved that he was a firefighter, a real-life superhero, she used to say. But the subtle digs had started almost immediately after the honeymoon.
And the honeymoon—partially funded by her parents—was when and where things started going downhill in that relationship. Melanie’s parents were already aghast that their precious princess was marrying someone who wasn’t listed in the social register or on the Forbes list. Princess Melanie—what he’d teasingly called her before realizing that she acted as if she were royalty, had never flown commercial in any class except first. The idea of flying coach from Tennessee all the way to Hawaii was abhorrent to his former in-laws. Wanting to keep his new bride happy, he’d accepted the “wedding gift” of first-class round-trip airfare booked just two days before their departure.
Cameron should have realized then that things were going to get bad. The experience with his ex-wife didn’t kill him, though. And he knew to beware lest he find himself ensnared in the same type of situation.
* * *
When Cameron saw Summer again, he didn’t mention the conversation he had with Spring, but they did talk about the big topic of the City Council meeting. Two articles in the Cedar Springs Gazette covered the meeting, one on the proposed development for the city that had the members of the Historical Review Advisory Committee up in arms, and the second article on the other business conducted during the meeting.
Both Lovie Darling and Georgina Lundsford were quoted in opposition of the project. The newspaper’s reporter had faithfully recorded the testy exchange between the mayor and Mrs. Lundsford.
“How did your mother’s name go from Louvenia to Lovie?” Cameron asked.
Summer’s brow furrowed. “You know, I don’t know. She even signs her name as Lovie Darling.”
They were on their way to a car wash at Commerce Plaza. The Youth Missions Team from The Fellowship was sponsoring the event as a fundraiser for its upcoming mission trip. Cameron had signed up to help wash cars and Summer had remembered his invitation to join him. Since all hands were welcome and needed, Cameron didn’t beg off. She had the newspaper open on her lap as Cameron drove.
“Hardly anyone calls her Louvenia. She must have told the reporter her first name, or he—” she glanced down at the article to see who wrote it “—she did some homework. All my life, all I’ve heard anyone call her is Lovie.”
Summer read the article about the development. “Spring is beside herself,” she said after she finished. “She’s working behind the scenes doing research on land use. When she gets riled up, there’s no stopping her. She got that from Mom.”
Cameron nodded. “She didn’t speak during the public comment period of the council meeting.”
Summer shook her head. “She wouldn’t. Not yet, at least. She’s in the historical society and wants to see the plans first. The tentative date of that public meeting with the presentation to the City Council is marked in big red letters on her wall calendar.”
“At least there’s someone willing to wait to see what’s being proposed. The council members are just as curious and interested in seeing the proposal. What I don’t understand,” he said, “are all the objections before anyone has seen anything. I’ve had no less than five calls already from people concerned about the impact on fire and EMT response if there’s a new and large residential component to the plans. All development isn’t necessarily detrimental just because it’s development.”
“That’s where the advisory committee and the historical society part ways—or so Spring says. I have yet to get a grasp on what’s the difference between those groups.”
“Tell me about it,” he muttered.
“But, Cameron, we don’t need to see plans to know it’s going to impact us. That’s why Mother and Spring were there, to keep tabs on the entire thing. The land the city is considering is adjacent to our property and that’s been Darling land for a long, long time. That’s why Spring’s title and boundary research is imperative. She suspects a land grab could be in the works.”
“Why didn’t you attend the City Council meeting?”
She scrunched up her nose. “A council meeting with all that gavel banging and motion making is not for me. That’s Spring’s
thing. She’s Miss Community Engagement. If she needs me there, I’ll be there for moral support. But for the moment, I’m just getting myself acclimated with the community.”
“But you’re from here,” he observed.
Folding the paper, she tucked it between the seats and crossed her legs. “It’s different,” she explained. “Even though I grew up here, those years were through the eyes of a child and a teenager. I went away to college for four years, only coming home for breaks. Plus, I spent two of those summer breaks abroad. Then I got married. So even though Cedar Springs is home, I’m getting to know it for the first time—through adult eyes.”
“I get that,” Cameron said. “And what do you think so far about your hometown?”
“I like what it’s become,” she said with a smile. “Usually when you return to a place after an absence, everything seems smaller than it was in your memory. It’s the opposite. There’s so much more here now. And in just a few short years. It really is a little city, not so much a small town anymore.”
“Progress.”
“That’s what I hear they call it,” she said. “You know, my dad still made house calls. That was into the 1990s. Who still did that?”
Cameron grinned. “Nobody. I thought house calls went out in the fifties and sixties.”
“Not in the Cedar Springs I grew up in. Spring says she used to go with him. I don’t remember that, but it makes sense given that she was almost ten when I was born.”
They passed through downtown Cedar Springs, taking a shortcut to Commerce Plaza via a street parallel to Main.
“I really like the Main Street renaissance,” Summer said.
He nodded. “It looks good.”
They spent the next two hours with the teenagers from the Fellowship’s Youth Missions Team washing cars and interacting with the public. The first ninety minutes flew by in a blur of suds, water and wiping tires, doors and windows of cars, minivans and even a boat that a couple hauled in on a trailer. While the men and the teenage boys washed the vehicles, the females and younger kids brought in business with hand-made signs held high and calls out to drivers entering and exiting the plaza’s main entrances.
The Fireman Finds a Wife Page 12