Hope Falls_Passing Through

by Frances Elliot

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One – Friday Evening

  Chapter Two – Saturday

  Chapter Three – Saturday Night

  Chapter Four – Sunday

  Chapter Five – Monday

  Chapter Six – Monday Evening

  Chapter Seven – Monday Night

  Chapter Eight – Monday Night, Part 2

  Chapter Nine – Tuesday Morning

  Chapter Ten – Tuesday Afternoon

  Chapter Eleven – Tuesday Evening

  Chapter Twelve – Tuesday Evening, Part 2

  Chapter Thirteen – Tuesday Night

  Chapter Fourteen – Wednesday

  Text copyright ©2016 by the Author.

  This work was made possible by a special license through the Kindle Worlds publishing program and has not necessarily been reviewed by Melanie Shawn. All characters, scenes, events, plots and related elements appearing in the original Hope Falls remain the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of Melanie Shawn, or their affiliates or licensors.

  For more information on Kindle Worlds: http://www.amazon.com/kindleworlds

  Passing Through

  by

  Frances Elliot

  Acknowledgments

  I want to thank Melanie and Shawna, for creating a world where fantasies come true.

  Thanks also to the other Worlds authors, for inspiring me to give this a try.

  And my gratitude to Shari Hearn, author extraordinaire, for her help with matters both large and small.

  Prologue

  “The usual?”

  Ryan looked up at the waitress, winced as pain shot through his hung-over head and mumbled “Just coffee today, please.”

  Apparently he had attained “regular” status at this little café and he didn’t know if he was pleased or annoyed. As he’d crossed the small hotel lobby this morning, the desk clerk had called out “So you’ll be with us this evening?” and Ryan was pretty sure there’d been something mocking in her tone. But since he’d been checking in and out of the place all weekend, he supposed he deserved that.

  After three days in town, he had to admit that he was no longer just passing through. He was now -- well, lingering, he supposed. Maybe out-and-out loitering was more like it. Certainly people would be justified in being a little curious about his definition of “passing through.” At this rate, it would take him a month to make the state line.

  But there was something about Hope Falls and it wasn’t just that girl. Of course, she was the main reason he’d been hanging around since Friday night -- the need to meet and talk to her had become absurdly important. He had to shake off this ridiculous feeling that she was The One before he moved on forever.

  This morning, though, it seemed that even if he never saw her again, there might be some other reason he’d wound up in this one-stoplight town. He didn’t believe in Fate, but over the past few days, he’d sure as hell felt something poking at him, urging him onto unfamiliar paths – he just couldn’t figure out why.

  All he’d known was that it was time to get out of San Francisco, where everything had begun to taste sour. He’d been sick of his work, irritated with his friends, uncertain about his girlfriend and bored with the city. It had taken six months to figure out that what really bored and annoyed him was himself, and that he no longer liked the person he’d become.

  So in the space of a week, he’d notified his clients he was taking a break, sold the gleaming high-rise condo he’d never enjoyed, traded in the slick sports car for a quiet, reliable blahmobile and with no clear plan at all, hit the road.

  There were old friends in Chicago, some family in New York, and he’d decided a leisurely back-roads journey would give him time to decompress, play some music, see the country and think about what, exactly, had gone wrong with his life.

  But after fighting the horrible Friday traffic out of the Bay Area, a torrential spring rain forced him off the interstate and into a maze of twisting mountain roads that for all he knew were leading him up to the Yukon. Grimly accepting defeat, he’d stopped at the first cluster of lights he found.

  Disgusted with his lack of progress but determined to get a better start tomorrow, he’d checked into the only hotel and set off in search of something to eat. Surely there was a hamburger available somewhere here in Hicksville.

  ***

  All she knew was that if she didn’t get out of Hope Falls soon, she would lose her few remaining marbles. Everything Alice loved about her hometown had begun to grate on her and she was moving through her days on autopilot. Pleasant and smiling on the outside, seething with frustration on the inside, she began each day with a sigh.

  And she’d been so happy to be back after she’d finished law school, so full of plans and expectations. Living and working with her brother had seemed like a great idea while she still had the college loans hanging over her head, but as the years rolled by, the glut of degree-clutching job applicants continued and her hopes for escape diminished. Her life had become dull and predictable without her noticing until it seemed too late to do something about it.

  And there was her non-existent social life, of course. She was very, very tired of listening to her friends tell her she needed “to get out a little more, meet some new guys” -- she was pretty sure she’d dated and discarded every unattached male within a fifty-mile radius.

  Every week or so, a nice man from Stevens Creek took her out to dinner and then to bed, but it wasn’t exactly skyrockets for either of them. She wanted something electrifying, needed to feel that rush of physical excitement, craved the exhilaration of passionate sex. She wanted, needed, to fall in love -- even just a little bit in love, even if didn’t last.

  Had that guy finally left town, she wondered? The very small portion of her brain that remained rational told her it would be a good thing if he’d moved on, that she’d become way too invested in a relationship that didn’t exist.

  But no matter how she struggled to retain her sanity, no matter how often she reminded herself she’d hadn’t even met him, Alice simply could not shake the feeling that something important was about to happen. Throw that ridiculous conviction on top of the instantaneous sexual charge she’d felt when she first saw him and the result was emotional chaos.

  Chapter One – Friday Evening

  Alice had been listening patiently for two hours as Mrs. Palmer revised her will for the third time this year. Despite roaring good health (Alice had recently seen her hefting a twenty-pound sack of topsoil over at the hardware), the 70-year-old had become obsessed with the disposition of her estate.

  When her only relative, an avaricious nephew with a gambling problem, had been incarcerated (“overdue” was the general reaction around town), she’d reluctantly faced facts and begun investigating various animal charities. Alice had heard the pros and cons of every shelter, sanctuary, and rescue program in the country. And beyond. Burros in Mexico? Elephants in Kenya?

  “You know, Mrs. Palmer, it’s getting a little late and I think you should give this more thought, anyway. My brother will be in tomorrow and he might be more helpful than I’ve been.”

  “I doubt it,” said David, coming through the door and shaking his umbrella.

  “What are you doing here?” said Alice. “I thought you were driving over to the supermarket in Collinsville.”

  “Not in this weather. State road’s all backed up.”

  Great. Another dinner at Sue Ann’s or JT’s. Same old menus, same old faces. She’d actually been looking forward to cooking, which showed how desperate she was. David must have seen something in her face, because he said hastily “Tell you what, sis. I’ll finish up with Mrs. Palmer while you go get a beer
and if the storm lets up we’ll shop after we have dinner. The market’s open ‘til midnight – it’ll be fun. I’ll let you choose the ice cream flavors this time.”

  He’d always been pretty good at cheering her up and even late-night grocery shopping sounded like an adventure compared to another evening at home. She smiled at him, collected her things and made her hasty escape from Mrs. Palmer as gracefully as possible. Almost as soon as she’d stepped out into the rain, she realized she’d forgotten her keys and turned back.

  ***

  Head down, shoulders hunched against the rain, Ryan was still aware that someone had stepped out of the door just ahead of him and he’d adjusted his pace to avoid a collision. But she spun around almost immediately, just missing his eye with an umbrella spoke and then stumbling back in surprise. He reached, caught her upper arm to steady her, looked into her face, and to his surprise blurted “Hey. How are you?” Not oops, sorry, pardon me or watch where you’re going, babe.

  No, he’d said “How are you?” Equally odd, her response had been “Fine, how about you?” They’d stared at each other for what seemed a long time; then she went back through the door she’d exited and he continued down the sidewalk.

  Without thinking, he halted under a store awning about ten paces further along and stared at a window display of children’s shoes as if he were in desperate need of new Mary Janes. He couldn’t seem to organize his thoughts at all – even though clear, logical thinking was his specialty.

  Funny thing was, she wasn’t his type at all. He usually went for the tall dramatic type with long dark hair, bright red lipstick and dangerous eyes. That girl had wisps of blonde hair escaping from under her hat; she was average height, and she’d seemed – what?

  Friendly-looking, open, not mysterious at all. So definitely not his type. Cute, though, and too bad all that rain gear had hidden what he suspected was a pretty nice figure. And what a strange encounter – for a split second, it felt as though he’d known her all his life. He shrugged and went on, spotting ahead a neon sign spelling out the very welcome word “Tavern.”

  ***

  Alice dithered around the office a few minutes, drawing a curious look from her brother. She wanted to let the man she’d bumped into disappear down the street before she went out again. Weird, she thought.

  When he’d asked how she was, it seemed perfectly natural, as though they were old friends. But ugh, not her type at all. Unlike a lot of her friends, those bad boys just didn’t do it for her and she’d pegged this one in an instant. Leather jacket, rock-star skinny, longish dark hair and stubbly beard, he probably still played in a bad garage band with some buddies and wore a single earring. Very, very handsome, though, and very nice bright blue eyes.

  Those eyes. Even though the meeting had been brief, she’d felt as if his eyes had looked into hers so deeply that he instantly knew everything there was to know about her. Her dreams, her fears, her past, her future were all opened and accessible to him.

  Then she felt a quick twitch and a small tremor ran through her as she remembered that last quick downward dart of his eyes to her body -- as if that, too, would be instantly accessible.

  Finally she said goodnight again and once back outside, looked up and down the street before heading over to JT’s. The moment she saw that the stranger was not in sight, she was flooded with disappointment and she abandoned her lame attempts to convince herself she wasn’t interested.

  She suddenly felt as though she’d missed her last, best chance at something she couldn’t quite define. She trudged on to the bar, wondering why a quick encounter seemed to have such an impact.

  ***

  Inside the warm, moderately noisy bar, Ryan realized this was the kind of joint he’d been missing in San Francisco – pool tables, juke box, year-round twinkle lights, and judging by the mismatched memorabilia, an ownership with highly eclectic tastes in professional sports.

  The walls were covered with framed jerseys representing a wacky assortment of teams -- Dolphins, Jets, Bulls, Lakers, Tigers, Cubs (three of those) and off in a corner, half hidden by a unlit beer sign, a tattered Cleveland Browns sweatshirt. It was the kind of place with a lot of general conversation around the bar and almost continuous laughter from one source or another. And no one was staring at a cell phone.

  The nice-looking older woman to his left asked if he were new in town before he’d even ordered a drink. When he’d answered “just passing through,” instead of asking the usual “where are you headed” kind of question, she’d patted his arm and said in a meaningful tone “Well, we’ll see, won’t we? Maybe not.”

  He began a polite reply but she interrupted, saying, “It’ll be fun. Try to enjoy yourself.” Then she told him to order her another drink if the bartender came by and headed over to the jukebox. What was this, a “Twilight Zone” episode?

  The bartender wandered over and took his order. “Dolores giving you the third degree?” he asked.

  “Not really. She seemed a little … odd, though.”

  “Aw, she thinks she’s psychic. Don’t let her read your palm, though – it takes forever and she tells everybody the same thing.”

  “And that is?

  “Great life in a small town with a happy spouse and many happy children. I think she’s seen “It’s A Wonderful Life” a few too many times. I’ll go put your order in.”

  Ryan laughed and sipped his beer as he looked around the large room. It seemed an unusually cheerful crowd, and he wondered where the bummed out, cranky drinkers congregated to complain about their bosses or the government.

  The street door opened and the girl who’d tried to attack him with her umbrella walked in and moved to hang up her things on a nearby coat rack. For some reason, he quickly looked away, avoiding eye contact as she scanned the room. She moved to an empty table for two and took the chair facing away from him. Almost immediately, a waitress appeared with two menus and a glass of draft beer.

  Hmm. So she was clearly a regular here, and waiting for someone, probably a date -- but maybe just a girlfriend. Or her parole officer, for all he knew. But Ryan found himself unabashedly studying the little he could see of her.

  The fair hair tumbled past her shoulders in soft waves, and she wore a plain black sweater and gray slacks. He wondered what she did for a living in that kind of outfit – teacher, probably, something like that.

  More to the point, what did she wear under that kind of outfit, he wondered. Some women who wore very conservative clothes had really fancy stuff underneath, those black, lacy … okay, getting ahead of himself there.

  Let’s see. From this distance at least, he could see no ring on her finger as she lifted her glass to drink. And she seemed to be a draft beer kind of girl. His ex-girlfriend Veronica knew a lot about wines and Ryan had often thought how nice it would be to date someone who didn’t take fifteen minutes to order a drink.

  The guy she was waiting for arrived about the same time as Ryan’s hamburger and he looked him over carefully. Nice-enough looking, he supposed, but a little short. He sat down without embracing or kissing her, so probably the thrill was gone, just another long-term relationship chugging along despite the fact that neither of them cared much anymore.

  Also, Ryan decided there was something a little shifty about those eyes – the date looked like a shady used car salesman or Ponzi scheme runner. Probably did some time over in the state pen, too.

  “That’s her brother,” Dolores said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “The young man who just sat down with Alice. That’s her brother, David.”

  Embarrassed, but certain Dolores wouldn’t buy “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ryan simply said “Oh,” and turned his attention to his plate.

  “She’s really a lovely girl. We all wonder why she hasn’t married, but I suppose the right guy just hasn’t come along. Yet.” Dolores seemed determined to continue this awkward conversation and Ryan couldn’t think of a way to change the subject.<
br />
  “I didn’t mean to stare,” he said. “I guess she reminds me of someone else. One of my sisters, I suppose. Or something like that,” he added, feeling strangely unsettled. Now he’d made things worse, he thought, because something skeptical in Dolores’ eyes made it clear she somehow knew he didn’t have a sister.

  “Really? And how many sisters do you have?”

  He was beginning to feel defensive. “Eight,” he said, narrowing his eyes and daring her to call his bluff.

  The corners of her mouth twitched as though she wanted to laugh, but all she said was “How nice. Well, enjoy your supper,” before sliding off her stool and heading for the door.

  Good grief, Ryan thought. Maybe if the rain was letting up, he should just collect his stuff and get the hell out of town before things got even weirder. The girl was nice-looking and yeah, there was something about her that turned him on, but there was no reason to feel so instantly infatuated.

  He declined another beer and finished his dinner, keeping his eyes on his plate or the bottles behind the bar, never once glancing at her. Okay, maybe he took a few peeks, but at least he’d quit staring, he thought. He’d paid his tab and left, wondering if the girl had noticed him when she came in.

  ***

  Alice watched him leaving and sighed to herself, revising that “too skinny” opinion. His jeans hung from his hips in a way that made her want to lick her lips. And she got a good look at his arms and shoulders as he paused at the door to put on his jacket. No, not too skinny at all.

  She’d noticed him the instant she walked in and thought she’d seen his eyes flick away from hers. Unaccountably flustered, she sat in the first chair she saw that faced away from him and regretted it immediately.