chapter Eleven
Gracie supposed there was a certain ironic symmetry to the fact that she ran out of gas thirty yards away from Eb's Stop & Pump. Of course, it wasn't Eb's any longer. Eb had died a few years ago while on a whale-watching trip out of P-town. She liked thinking of her old friend out there on the ocean with a pair of binoculars and a lot of curiosity. It made her feel good to know he was adventuring when his time came but his loss was deeply felt.
The big red sign now read Gas-2-Go and the smaller signs beneath it promised that milk, cigarettes, magazines, and coffee were all waiting inside to soothe the frazzled traveler. There was a car wash adjacent to the parking lot, a Jiffy Lube, and unless her eyes deceived her, the ramshackle motel behind Eb's gas station was now a sparkling Motel 6.
And that wasn't all. She had already noticed the brand spanking-new condo that curved around the harbor, all pre-weathered siding and gingerbread trim with Hollywood-perfect rowboats bobbing in the calm waters that lapped against the owners-only pier. Unless she missed her guess, she'd bet there were more condos where that one came from.
Idle Point was bursting at the seams with prosperity and she felt almost like a stranger as she sat there in her truck with the New York plates and her New York attitude and tried to take it all in. She wondered if this was how Noah had felt when he came home from St. Luke's each summer to a town that had changed just enough to keep him slightly off-balance, not quite sure if he was a townie or a tourist or just passing through on his way to someplace else.
She reached over and scratched the top of Pye's head through the bars of the cat carrier. Pyewacket opened one lime green eye, yawned, then dived back inside a dream.
Lucky you, she thought as she climbed out of the car and stretched. At least Pye's dreams couldn't break his heart. The worst that could happen was tuna for supper instead of mackerel.
Her limbs were stiff and sore from spending eight hours behind the wheel without a break. Once she had crossed the Tappan Zee and headed north toward New England, she had simply kept on going. A smarter woman would have stopped for lunch in Massachusetts, walked around a little, read a magazine or two, then knocked off the rest of the drive up the coast to Idle Point.
Or then again maybe a smarter woman wouldn't be there at all.
Everywhere she looked she saw ghosts. Old Eb, his eyes brimming with tears, as he wished her well. Gramma Del and her friends hosting the church bazaar in Fireman's Park across the street. Noah racing down Main Street in his flashy red sports car.
Noah.
Damn it. She had promised herself she wouldn't fall prey to memories but now that she was standing there with the ocean breeze whipping all around her, so sharp and salty she could almost taste it, it was impossible to keep the past at bay. At least she wouldn't run into Noah while she was here. The last she'd heard, he was still in Europe somewhere living the life he'd always dreamed about. The kind of life that, if she was being honest, had never appealed to Gracie. She would have followed him because she loved him but she would have always longed for home. Idle Point was where she had wanted to be, where she had thought she would settle down and establish herself with Doctor Jim as the second-best vet in town.
You know you could turn around and drive back to New York right now. The voice followed her as she strode toward the man lounging in front of Gas-2-Go. Who'd know? You're a stranger around here. Fill the gas tank then run for your life.
The man lounging near the air pumps looked over in her direction. He had dark hair, a slightly receding hairline, and a look of shock on his face. He looked vaguely familiar to Gracie. She stopped and looked at him closely as the years slid away. "Don?" she asked. "Don Hasty, is that you?"
"Gracie?" He stood up. "I'll be a son of a bitch! Gracie Taylor, you've finally come home!"
#
"You worry too much," Laquita said to Ben as he paced the small living room of the house by the docks. "Everything will go smoothly." She patted his arm with a gentle hand. "I promise you."
Ben felt that touch deep in his soul but he still wasn't convinced. "It's a long time since Gracie's been home. A lot's changed."
Laquita smiled. "I'm the biggest change, Ben, and you've already told her we're getting married. The rest is window dressing."
He stopped pacing and sat down on the arm of the sofa Laquita had reupholstered last year. The fabric was pure creamy white with streaks of sunny yellow and pale green running through it. He couldn't quite remember what color the old fabric had been—spilled tea, maybe, or a nice shade of used coffee grounds. If you had told him ten years ago that he would be living with something so beautiful he would've pegged you for the one with the drinking problem. He'd never cared much about the way he lived. Drunks never did. All a drunk cared about was the next bottle of Johnnie.
Drunks didn't care about their kids either. Drunks didn't show up for birthday parties or first communion or graduation. They didn't notice the awards or the scholarships or the hard work. They didn't notice when the sleeping infant in the baby blanket turned into an accomplished young woman with sad eyes. They sure as hell didn't notice when that young woman stopped coming home. Not while they were drinking. He would still be a drunk if it weren't for Laquita. He'd still be peeing his pants, sleeping in his own vomit, wondering why his daughter didn't love him the way a father ought to be loved.
"I saw what you did in Ma's cottage," he said. "It looks swell."
"Better than swell," Laquita said with a smile. "It's looking wicked good."
"I think Graciela will be comfortable in there." He had cleaned the place from ceiling to basement, and then Laquita had performed some magic with paint and paper and fabric until the little cottage looked like a home for the first time since Del died.
"I think she'll love it. We all need our own space, especially while we we're getting used to being a family." Laquita reached for the coat she kept on the peg near the door then slid her arms into the sleeves. "She knows the cottage belongs to her?"
Ben nodded. "She never much cared."
"Can't say that I blame her," Laquita said as she moved into his arms for a hug. "This wasn't a happy place when she lived here."
He winced again. He wanted to correct Laquita, try to put a different spin on her words but he knew she wouldn't allow it. Honesty was part of recovery. Brutal honesty about your own failings was crucial to rebuilding your life. Laquita never blinked when she faced her own demons and she refused to allow him to blink when he faced his. It was one of the countless things he loved about her.
"I'm sorry I have to leave," she said as he walked with her to the front door. "I never thought I'd be called in for night shift this week but with Tammy being sick and my vacation coming up and everything—"
"She'll understand. You're a nurse. You go when you're needed."
"Apologize to Gracie for me, will you, Ben? I left her a note but—"
He kissed her. "Don't worry. Just drive safely. Those wet leaves are—"
"Slippery as ice. I grew up here, remember? I know all about wet leaves." She said it kindly but she said it as a reminder that she was a grown woman, his equal in all the ways that mattered.
He stood in the doorway and watched while she warmed up her car then backed slowly out of the driveway. She beeped her horn twice, waved, then disappeared down the road. He stayed there until her tail lights faded into the dusk then went back inside to make himself a cup of coffee and wait for his daughter to come home.
#
Laquita's smile didn't falter until she made the turn onto Sheltered Rock Road. She held it, wide and true and unwavering, for exactly that long before it all fell apart. That was the point where even Ben, with his preternaturally sharp eyesight, could no longer see her and she could drop her guard.
Well, now she'd done it. She had lied to Ben, the one thing she had sworn she would never do. The truth was important to both of them, vitally important, but how on earth do you tell the man you're about to marry that you would rather walk barefoot on burning coals than see his daughter again?
Any woman worth her salt would do exactly what Laquita had done: run for her life. She had shamelessly offered her services at the hospital on her day off which just happened to be the day Gracie was due back in town. If that had failed, she might have thrown herself under a truck.
Gracie had been the one girl in school who intimidated Laquita. She was tall, smart, pretty, ambitious, disciplined, determined to achieve her goals despite the formidable odds against her. Next to her, Laquita had felt like a short, round slug. How she had envied Gracie's only child status, her room of her own, the fact that she could think her own thoughts without having to fight for space to breathe. The only time she had ever felt remotely Gracie's equal was the day they had bumped into each other one early morning in a motel parking lot outside of town. So you're human, she had thought, noting the blush of embarrassment on Gracie's throat and face and the way she clutched Noah's hand. But then there was Noah, arguably the best—if least reliable—catch in town. Rich, smart, wild, great-looking. They were an unlikely match and yet, to Laquita's way of thinking, inevitable. Temporary, but inevitable.
All of Laquita's romances before Ben had been temporary. Romance. Now there was a funny term for you. There had been very little that was romantic about her encounters in bars and motel rooms and the back seats of more cars than you'd find in the parking lot during a Patriots game. Sometimes she had been looking for sex, for the oblivion that came with the act, but most of the time she had been looking for the kind of comfort and security she could only find in the arms of an older man or a bottle of vodka. She'd seen a shrink a few years ago, not long after she and Ben started living together, in an attempt to understand why she had done the things she did and the shrink focused on the obvious answer: she was searching for a father figure.
"I have a father," she had told him. Darnell was a kind-hearted man who loved his kids, all eleven of them.
"But you have to share him," the shrink had pointed out. "You didn't share the other men."
But of course she had shared them with their wives and other lovers. Until Ben Taylor came into her life, nobody had ever loved her totally and completely to the exclusion of others and it was a feeling she cherished and returned in full measure. Her feelings for Ben were unlike anything she had ever known before. It was more than sex, more than security, more than the comfort of a pair of strong arms around you in the heart of the night. It was about wanting to share the good and bad of life, sit down with over dinner at night and breakfast in the morning. Ben knew her darkest secrets, same as she knew his. They had faced down the monsters in the closet and were still standing.
She wanted Gracie to know these things. Gracie and Ben had had a terribly troubled relationship and there was no doubt in anyone's mind that the blame lay solely at Ben's feet. He had failed miserably as a parent and Gracie deserved all the credit for turning out as well as she had. But Ben had changed, was changing, and more than anything Laquita wanted Gracie to appreciate that fact, to get to know her father before it was too late.
Because the clock was always ticking. The days passed and then the years and next thing you knew it was time to say goodbye. Every time she looked at Ben, she wondered how much time they would have left and knew it wouldn't be near enough. Her family teased her by calling her an old soul and it was true. She had always been older than her years, able to see the end of things where her friends could only see the beginning. It was part of the reason she had never really enjoyed the company of men her own age. They didn't understand how precious it all was or how quickly it passed.
Ben did. It was one of the many reasons why she loved him.
Another wave of apprehension swept over her. Ben was so happy that Graciela was coming home for the wedding. Happy and anxious and hopeful—so hopeful that it almost broke Laquita's heart. He wanted to make things right between him and Gracie. She had told him that they had come a long way over the last few years and that he should be proud of the progress he and his daughter had made toward becoming a family. She had also told him that he shouldn't expect miracles. Maybe Gracie had gone about as far as she was able to go with him and he should accept it and be grateful to have this much.
He had no idea that Laquita was praying for a miracle.
Everyone had said she and Ben would never last, that the age difference would put an end to them before they had a chance to get started but they were wrong. The only reason she ever wished Ben could be younger was so she could have him with her longer. Other than that, she wouldn't change a thing.
Except to give him back his daughter.
#
"Can I get you anything else, Mrs. C.?" Rachel Adams wiped away an imaginary streak from the crystal-clear library window of the house on the hill. "Another pot of tea or some of that pumpkin bread maybe."
Ruth Chase smiled and shook her head. "Nothing, thank you, Rachel. I'll be more than fine until dinner."
"Are Noah and Sophie eating dinner with you?"
Ruth's smile widened and Rachel smiled back at her. Grandmotherhood was proving to be as delightful as everyone had said it would be. "Sophie loves your Greek salad. If we have some feta, perhaps you could—"
"Done," said Rachel. "It's good to see the little one smile after all she's been through."
"That it is." She pointed toward a stack of books near the doorway. "I found some wonderful books on the Renaissance for Storm. She's welcome to keep them as long as she likes."
Rachel thanked her. "I'll send her in to get them as soon as she comes home from school."
"No hurry," said Ruth. "They're here waiting."
Storm was Rachel and Darnell's eleventh and last child. Storm was fourteen years old, beautiful, and more charming than the law allowed. Ruth thoroughly enjoyed having the child living under her roof. In truth she enjoyed all of the Adamses, including their extended family of brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, and the scattering of in-laws. Ruth had first opened her home to them three years ago, right after the flash flood that had washed away the home by the river and everything in them. Two of the Adams children had been badly hurt, as had Darnell himself when he tried to save them, but God was kind that day and let them live. The Urbanska family hadn't been that lucky. All six of them, lost to nature's fury.
The town had leaped into action. The fire department organized a food drive. The police department collected donations of money, clothes, household goods. Families took shelter where they could but the huge Adams clan faced being split until Ruth heard about their plight and offered her home. "I'm rattling around this place like a marble," she said when Darnell expressed reluctance to accept her generosity. "I'd love the company. Why should all those bedrooms go to waste?"
Darnell and Rachel finally agreed but with the proviso they be allowed to work around the house to earn their keep. The plan worked out so well that a temporary arrangement quickly turned into a permanent situation that was highly agreeable to all.
If someone had told her twenty years ago that the family of hippies who lived down by the river would move into her house and turn it into a home, she would have laughed out loud. If someone had told her that her son would return at last from Europe with a beautiful little daughter in tow, she would have been astonished. Life, she had learned, was nothing if not surprising.
Like the fact that Rachel's eldest, Laquita, was marrying Ben Taylor. Ruth was too old to be shocked by much of anything but that news did give her a moment's pause. The age difference alone was reason enough to think twice, but given both Ben's and Laquita's personal histories—well, there had certainly been more than a fair share of gossip about both of them. Still, there was no denying that something about them seemed right, as if each supplied what the other lacked, and together they were stronger than anything life could throw their way.
Rachel had mentioned that Ben invited Gracie home for the wedding. Once, a very long time ago, Ruth had seen Gracie and Noah together, embracing in the shadows of the lighthouse and she had felt a pain in her heart that still had the power to take her breath away. They 'd never stood a chance, of course—Simon would have seen to that—but the sight of them together had reminded her again of how powerful young love could be.
Ruth had been a widow now for a little over eight years and in that time she had discovered many things about herself. She had learned that the human heart was very adaptable. The pain of losing Simon so suddenly had never really left her but the unbearable grief had faded with time until it became as much a part of her being as her pulse or respiration. You could live with pain, Ruth discovered. To her surprise, it was possible to go on.
Living with regret was something else entirely. She had many regrets. Some of them were as wide and deep as eternity.
The first year without Simon had been difficult. In one tragic afternoon she lost her husband to death and her son to circumstance, leaving her to deal with the aftermath alone. Simon had always been the one to deal with the unpleasant aspects of life. He paid the bills. He took care of keeping the cars in good running order, made sure insurance policies were up to date, kept tabs on household repairs, and still managed to write for and publish the Gazette even though readership wasn't half of what it used to be.
"Sell, Ruth." That had been Ed Hinkemeyer's advice when they met to discuss her financial future a few weeks after Simon's funeral. He showed her the latest offer from the Boston newspaper syndicate that had been their most persistent suitor. "You want my advice? Take the money and run."
She had come very close to doing just that. The Gazette had fallen into disfavor. The reputation it had enjoyed during those heady days after Simon's Pulitzer was a thing of the past. Now it was just another daily tabloid dose of town news, police blotter updates, and supermarket circulars, like every other small town New England paper. Letting it go had seemed the better part of valor and Ruth had been prepared to do exactly that until the day she went into the office to speak to the employees. Bare unadorned numbers in a ledger were replaced with names and faces who came with families and stories, and she knew she had no choice but hold onto the Gazette a little bit longer.
For one thing it made her feel closer to Simon, as if she were somehow making up for a lifetime of mistakes. They had both been very good at making mistakes. She was grateful he went to his grave not knowing anything about hers.
Her broken hip this spring had slowed her down but so far it hadn't stopped her. She had let Noah think she was more frail than she was, which was probably being manipulative but she was certain the circumstances warranted such measures. She had caused so much damage already. She wouldn't cause any more. This was a time for healing. Her last chance to get things right, to know that just once she had thought of Noah's happiness before her own.
She had asked him if he would take over some of her responsibilities while he was home and he agreed. He needed a place to be right now, both for his own sake and for Sophie's, and that place might as well be Idle Point. It would do him good to drop in at the Gazette, to take Sophie to school in the morning and pick her up in the afternoon, to show her where he used to go sledding on the rare Christmas break when they stayed home. It would do them all good to be a family again.
#
"Take a seat, Gracie," Ben said after she took off her coat and let a suspicious Pyewacket out of his carrier. "I'll fix you a cup of coffee."
"You don't have to do that," she said. "I can—"
"Sit." He pointed toward the beautiful pale cream and yellow sofa near the front window. "You're the one who just spent eight hours on the road."
She was reasonably certain she had stumbled into some kind of alternate universe. Few other explanations seemed to fit. If the cottage didn't still boast the same slanted hallway floor and staggered ceilings, she would think her father had razed the old house and built a new one from the ground up. This house was quiet and serene. Soft white walls, white curtains, white sofa with the faintest touches of yellow and green. Tables of bleached oak. The hardwood floor had been sanded then stained the palest maple and polished to a comfortable glow. The house breathed happiness and exhaled contentment, much as her father himself. Her father's reading glasses rested on the coffee table, next to an empty cup. A copy of the latest Tom Clancy lay open on the end table nearest Ben's chair. She couldn't remember ever seeing her father read for pleasure. Gracie had always been the one with her nose in a book, letting the magical words inside transport her to Singapore and Tibet, the African coast and the North Pole. Her father had found his escape in a bottle of booze.
If she had ever wondered whether the change in Ben was real or an illusion he managed to maintain for a weekend visit every now and again, she had her answer. This oasis of calm and control told her everything she needed to know. She looked about for signs of Laquita and found a nursing textbook on the bookshelf near the television, a copy of the newest Danielle Steel, a small lipstick in a silver-toned case, and three back issues of U. S. News and World Report. She had no doubt Laquita was responsible for most of the changes in Ben's life and she wondered what changes Ben had brought about in Laquita's life as well.
He seemed so happy, so filled with plans for the future. If Laquita only loved him half as much, they would be guaranteed a wonderful life. But then when did life ever come with guarantees?
"Laquita had a pot of chowdah on the stove," Ben said as he came back into the room with a tray piled high with goodies. "I put some in a bowl for you, a few crackers. You look like you could use a good meal."
"I've always looked like I could use a good meal," she said, laughing.
"You take after your grandmother," he said and there was a fondness in his tone she couldn't remember ever hearing before. "She ate and ate and stayed skinny as a broomstick."
Do I really take after Gramma Del, Dad? Can you tell me if her blood and yours really flows through my veins? She pushed the thought from her mind. What did it matter? All that mattered was the fact that they were there together in that strange yet familiar living room, on this cold November evening, with a bowl of good chowder for each of them and the sounds of the ocean winds beating against the house.
Asking for more might be tempting the gods.
"I hate to eat alone," she said. "You look like you could use a good meal yourself."
He glanced at the clock on the mantel. "It's after six," he said. "Wouldn't hurt to have some supper with you."
She followed him into the kitchen where he fixed himself a bowl of chowder too. She found a can of cat food in her bag and emptied it onto a paper plate for a grateful Pyewacket. There was so much history between Gracie and her father, so much that was dark and hurtful, that this simple act of breaking bread together in the house where she had grown up was nothing less than a small miracle. They sat down opposite each other at the old wooden table where Gramma Del had made a thousand meals and she saw her life moving past her eyes. The last time she had seen this room, this table, was the day she lost Noah forever. She had left the letter for him right here, not six inches away from her right hand, tucked between the salt shaker and the sugar bowl. How many letters were here when you finally came home, Dad? Did Noah read his? Did you ever wonder why I never came home again?
How many nights had she spent wondering if she should have stayed and confronted Simon and Ben and forced all of the secrets out into the light but she had been a product of her upbringing, raised on a diet of keeping family secrets hidden away in the shadows.
She told herself not to ask for the moon, to be satisfied with this tiny piece of it, but she couldn't help wishing for answers to the questions she could never ask.
#
"...parents work for Mrs. Chase at the house. The youngest, Storm, is almost fourteen... doing Thanksgiving dinner there..."
Gracie tried hard to pay attention but the combination of warm soup, a cozy sofa, and exhaustion were taking their toll. She had already nodded off three times while her father was talking and she was determined not to nod off a fourth time.
"You should get a little shut-eye," he said, reaching down to scratch Pye behind his left ear. "You're out on your feet, Graciela."
She started to protest but he was having none of it. "Get some sleep. We'll have plenty of time to jaw tomorrow when Laquita's home."
Gracie barely stifled a yawn. "I wanted to stay up and see her tonight."
"She won't be in until after two," Ben said. "I don't think there's a way in hell you could stay awake that long."
She looked at the clock. It read ten-fifteen. "You're right," she said. "I'll never make it." She stood up and battled that yawn one more time. "I really enjoyed this, Dad."
He stood up and gave her an awkward pat on the right shoulder. "So did I."
"Am I sleeping in the sewing room?"
"No," he said. "Laquita fixed up Gramma's place for you. We figured you might like a little privacy."
"That's wonderful," she said, appreciating the gesture. "What a nice thing to do." Mending fences was hard work. They would all benefit from a little breathing room.
"It is yours, after all."
She stopped mid-stretch. "I keep forgetting that."
"Things have changed, Graciela."
"I know." She hesitated, then leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. "I'm glad."
Ben helped her unload the Jeep. She carried a squirming Pyewacket across the rain-soaked yard then deposited him in the front room.
"You sleep well," her father said, giving her an awkward pat on the shoulder.
"You too." She looked away for a moment. "Please apologize to Laquita."
"We'll see you at breakfast?"
She nodded. "Absolutely."
She went to lock the door after him then remembered where she was and she laughed softly. She was back home in Idle Point.
#
Mornings were the worst. Sophie didn't like mornings at all and no matter how many times Noah told her it was time to get up, she burrowed more deeply under the covers and clung to sleep as if her life depended upon it.
"Come on, Soph." He shook her tiny shoulder. "You're coming to work with me today and we can't be late." Okay, so that wasn't strictly true. His family owned the Gazette. He could be as late as he wanted.
She opened one sleepy eye. "No school today?"
"No school for three days," he said as she sat up and yawned, tiny fists pressed against her mouth. "You're on suspension?"
"What's that?"
"A punishment," Noah said, "for biting your classmates." He reminded her of the fact that Mrs. Cavanaugh was still quite displeased with her behavior but he couldn't tell how much of an impact that news had on his little daughter.
"Can I play with a computer?"
"Sure," he said, "but you can't go to the office and play with the computers if you don't get dressed."
I'll be damned. He watched as she ran barefoot to the bathroom and started brushing her teeth. A little good old-fashioned bribery and he was in business. Why hadn't anybody told him that logic and reason were for the birds? Bribery was the only real way to a child's heart. There was a lesson to be learned there and it wasn't one that Dr. Spock would have embraced.
The truth was, he barely knew Sophie. Each day he learned something new about her, something that reminded him either of himself or, now and again, of Catherine. Or what little he knew of Catherine. Their affair had lasted only six months. They had parted amicably when Catherine’s acting career took her from London to Sidney. Neither one of them had suggested Noah join her. He had that effect on women.
He took a little pair of jeans out of the closet, a white shirt with a lacy collar, a pink sweater, and laid them down on the bed. He tapped on the bathroom door. "Sophie, do you need help in there?"
"Go away!"
Five years old and guarding her privacy. He had kept the bathroom door open until he was twenty-two. "Okay, Soph," he said, stepping away from the door. "I'm here if you need me."
He waited. And waited. And waited a little bit more. Finally he knocked on the door again and was treated to an explosion of words uttered in such a thick English accent that he couldn't understand any of them. Temperament? A problem? Something only a woman would understand? He was stumped. He and Sophie not only had a bit of a language problem, they had a gender problem as well.
It was going to be a long day.
He was determined not to run to his mother with every problem he encountered with Sophie. He had been away from home for eight years. He had built an independent life. His mother had had more than her share of problems while he was gone and she hadn't run to him for help. The least he could do for her now was work out his own difficulties with his daughter.
Unless Storm was around.
Sophie liked Storm Adams. Storm was much the way he had remembered Laquita at that age: remarkably self-possessed, quiet, almost Zen-like in her acceptance of the vicissitudes of life. The antithesis of his livewire daughter. Seeing your home and belongings swept away in a flash flood had to have been a devastating experience but you would never know it by Storm. His mother seemed very fond of Storm. She encouraged the girl to use their personal library anytime she liked and he had noticed Storm reading quietly in a corner of the room the last few nights.
He stepped out into the hallway. No sign of anyone. He walked over to the landing and looked down at the foyer where Rachel Adams was polishing the mirror that hung over the small table where they stacked outgoing mail. She caught sight of him and looked up.
"Morning, Noah. Breakfast's ready when you are."
"Thanks, Rachel," he said. "Is Storm around anywhere?"
Rachel shook her head. The movement made her hip-length ponytail sway. "Band practice this morning." She grinned up at him. "Girl trouble?"
"You could hear her down there in the foyer?"
"Couldn't understand a word but the intent was pretty clear."
"I think she's having a problem with her hair."
"It starts early," Rachel said, barely containing a laugh. She reached into her pocket and withdrew a crinkled circle of soft hot pink fabric. "Your secret weapon."
He bounded down the stairs and took it from her. "Does this secret weapon have a name?"
"Ask Sophie," she said, turning back to the mirror. "She'll know."
Rachel was right. Sophie hollered. "Scruncheeee!" then made a lunge for it. Even though Noah was new at the parenthood game, he recognized a power position when he saw it. Maybe there was hope for him yet.
#
Gracie woke up a little after six the next day to the sound of the morning paper hitting the front door. Pyewacket slept curled up next to her; his purr almost drowned out the sound of the wind off the ocean. She felt groggy, not quite all there even though she'd managed almost eight hours of sleep. She had been dreaming about Gramma Del, one of those talky dreams where much was said and little remembered.
You wouldn't recognize this place, Gramma. Laquita made new curtains, recovered your sofa and your favorite chair. She painted the walls white. Can you imagine that? White walls and pale yellow scatter rugs. She even filled the fridge for me with milk and orange juice and eggs and arranged for the paper. And she writes notes. Remember how you were always trying to get me to write my thank-you notes? Bet you wouldn't have had any trouble with Laquita—
Good grief. She sat up straight, suddenly wide awake. Laquita was about to become Gramma Del's daughter-in-law, or she would be if Gramma were still alive. She would be Gracie's stepmother which meant Rachel and Darnell, the hippies by the river, would be her father's parents-in-law and they'd be related to all of the Adams kids and whoever they ended up marrying—it was all too confusing.
The note from Laquita was on the nightstand. Gracie rolled over on her side and reached for it. She had been so tired last night that the words ran together like melted candle wax. Okay, it was a simple welcome note. Warm but not too warm. Brief but not terse. Very much in keeping with the low-key manner Gracie remembered when she thought about Laquita. Of course there was also the matter of Laquita's sex life. She had slept with half the men in town by the time she turned twenty years old. Gracie felt like a bit of a bitch for thinking it, but she couldn't help wondering if her father's intended found monogamy a good fit.
"None of your business," she said out loud. "None of your damn business."
She swung her legs out of bed then did a few stretches. Faint streaks of light pushed their way through the oyster white fabric shades at the windows. She pushed the shade aside and peered across the yard at her father's cottage. The blinds were drawn. She could see there were no lights on inside. A red Toyota, probably Laquita's, was parked in the driveway next to Gracie's truck.
Domestic tranquility, she thought then turned away from the window. Who would have thought Ben would find it long before his daughter?
#
"We're up shit creek," Andy Futrello announced to Noah the moment he and Sophie walked into the newsroom, "and Levine's got the paddle."
Noah looked pointedly at his little girl then back at Andy. "Let's watch it, okay?"
"Sorry. I'm not used to seeing a kid around here."
"Yeah, well that makes two of us." He helped Sophie out of her jacket then settled her down at an empty desk with her crayons and coloring book. "So what's wrong?" he said to Andy.
"Ann Levine's in the hospital," Andy said. "Heart attack and it looks like she won't be getting her column in on time."
"How is she?" Noah had grown up with newspaper types. He knew all about their mastery of understatement.
"I don't know how she is. All I know is that we've got a hole in the editorial page and it needs to be filled in the next forty-five minutes or we're in trouble."
"We've been in trouble for quite a while," Noah observed. "Levine isn't going to tip the scales much either way."
"Check out the list of advertisers yet, Noah? Levine brought in half of 'em. She goes, they go."
"What is it exactly that Levine writes?"
"That family shit—" Andy glanced toward Sophie. "I mean stuff. Warm fuzzies, like if you crossed Donna Reed with that Martha Stewart dame and they gave birth to somebody who could write."
"And that pulled in the house and garden money."
"That pulled in house and garden and bookstores and it grew from there. Without the revenue Levine pulled in, we'd be dead and buried."
"They'd bolt after missing one column?"
"Who the hell knows but I sure don't want to risk it. I don't have good feelings about this, Noah. We don't have that kind of cushion to play with."
"If my mother ends up selling to Granite News Syndicate, that won't be a problem."
"A lot's been happening the last few months and your mother—and don't get me wrong, she's a great woman, really knows what's going on—but since your mother went in for the broken hip and all that, she's stepped away from the fray and let me tell you, it's a lot rougher now than it was." He told Noah that Granite News was getting cold feet and any slip in circulation would be enough to kill the deal.
There was a part of Noah that wouldn't be disappointed at all if that happened. Granite News was your typical conglomerate, one more concerned with syndicates and cutting costs than with providing good jobs for good people who loved the newspaper business. He had tried on more than one occasion to question his mother about her choice but each time Ruth had neatly changed the subject. He wondered how committed she really was to the venture.
"So we need some stories while Mary's on the disabled list. You're a writer, Andy. Give us some."
"I'm a sportswriter. I can't do that home and hearth crap."
"There's got to be somebody who can handle it."
"Most of us are straight news guys. We report what we see. Your old man knew how to write the essays that got noticed. Mary knows how to write the ones that bring in money."
"So you're saying we're up the creek."
"Yeah," said Andy. "That's what I'm saying." He paused, then continued, "You did some writing over there in Europe, didn't you?"
"Some," Noah conceded, "but it was mostly ad copy. I sold a few op-ed pieces to the American papers and—" He stopped cold. "I'm not on staff."
Andy started to laugh. "You own the staff."
"Yeah," said Noah, starting to laugh himself, "I do, don't I?"
"So why don't you give it a try. It's not like we have anything to lose."
Noah glanced over at Sophie who was twirling her scrunchie around a bright blue crayon and humming softly to herself. The moment of absolute powerlessness he'd felt this morning when she refused to come out of the bathroom came back to him in vivid detail. Andy was right. They had nothing to lose.
He sat down at the word processor and started to write.
#
All they did at the newspaper office was yell. Sophie had been playing Go Fish at one of the computers, trying to pretend it wasn't so noisy and scary in there. She hated yelling. Every time grownups yelled, bad things happened.
Sophie had lived with a lot of different people since she was a baby and she knew all about how these things worked. First the grownups yelled at each other, then they yelled at her, and then the next thing she knew her bags were packed and she was on her way to another new house where the people didn't really want her.
Even her new father was yelling. He and the fat man were yelling right into each other's faces and it scared Sophie. They spoke really fast in those strange American accents. She could only understand some of what they were saying but she was sure they were yelling about her.
"I don't know much about bringing up kids," her new father had told her the day they went to court in London to sign the papers, "so I hope you'll help me." He had given her a big hug but she had held herself all stiff in his arms. "We're in this together, Sophie, you and me. We're a family now."
He said that her new name was Sophie Chase and that she would be his daughter forever.
Sophie didn't believe him. If he loved her so much and was so happy that she was his daughter, then why was he so busy yelling at people and hammering the computer keys with his big fingers? If she ran away, it would probably take him a fortnight to realize she was missing.
#
Try as she might, Gracie couldn't find any traces of Gramma Del left in the old cottage. Except for the boxes tucked away in the attic, the place was stripped clean of old memories. It left her feeling disoriented, as if she had made a wrong turn somewhere and this wasn't Gramma Del's at all. She flipped through the Gazette but didn't find much of anything to hold her interest there. She didn't recognize most of the names and faces, something she thought would never happen in Idle Point. Finally she dressed then let herself out the front door to take a walk. She used to walk all the way into town in the days before she was old enough to drive. This seemed as good a time as any to see if she could still do it.
She wondered if Gerson's Bakery was still at the corner opposite the barber shop. She craved bagels and cream cheese and maybe some of those delicious sticky buns with the nuts studded all over the top. Maybe she would buy some freshly-ground coffee beans too—she was sure coffee mania had reached Idle Point by now—and bring them back to share with Ben and Laquita. The more she thought about the idea, the more she liked it. She wasn't a guest; she was family, and family contributed to the pantry.
Truth was, she was a little apprehensive about actually meeting Laquita again after all these years and seeing how her dad and old schoolmate fit together. Going for a long walk was one way to burn off nervous energy and center herself. Gracie always had a lot of physical energy to burn, and she had quickly discovered that the best thing about living in Manhattan was the walking. Nobody thought you were strange if you walked forty or fifty blocks at a time, Battery Park to the Upper West Side, East River to the Hudson. Still, Manhattan wasn't Idle Point. Manhattan didn't smell like ocean kissed by pine trees. When you could find the sky, it was never storybook blue.
Not that the sky was blue that morning. It was a deep, brooding pewter grey with rain that was more than a mist but less than a storm. She wore jeans, a heavy black sweater, and her favorite jacket. Tina had told her it made her look like a runaway Trappist monk but Gracie loved it. It was too big and too old to be fashionable, but Gracie had never been one to worry about that. She loved disappearing inside the jacket when she walked the city, letting the hood fall over her face, obscuring her identity. It made her feel mysterious.
Gerson's was gone and a sandwich shop had opened in its place. The bank boasted a facelift and a brand new name while the grocery store, candy shop, and dry cleaners all looked exactly the way they had when she left. Herb's Camera Shop was still next to Leonard Insurance which was next to Samantha's Bridal which was next to Video Haven which was next to Patsy's. And everybody knew Patsy's was next to the Gazette.
She was cold and hungry and wet and she needed caffeine. The lights from Patsy's down the block splashed out onto the rainswept street. She remembered Patsy's blueberry muffins with great fondness. A blueberry muffin with a huge mug of hot coffee with lots of sugar and maybe some scrambled eggs. What was she hesitating for? Simon Chase was dead. Noah was on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Sure she would probably run into plenty of people she knew but they could never break her heart. Besides, why had she come home to Idle Point if she wasn't going to reconnect with old friends and familiar faces.
The rain was slicing down faster. She ducked her head and let the hood fall over her face, limiting her vision to just a few inches of sidewalk in front of her. She could almost taste the coffee, hot and sweet, as—
The little girl came out of nowhere. One second Gracie was the only person on the street, the next second she was almost knocked over by a child with a curly blond ponytail who burst out of the Gazette office like she had the hounds of hell at her heels.
"Whoa, honey!" She backed up a step and put her hands on the child's slender shoulders. The child was shivering already and no wonder. No coat, no sweater, nobody paying attention. "Where are you running to?"
The child looked up at her with huge blue eyes framed by dark lashes thick and long enough to make a grown woman weep. She had only known one other lucky person with such beautiful eyes. The child's hair was golden blond. Her skin was fair and pink. She looked positively angelic as she hauled off and kicked Gracie hard in the shin then ran off down the street.
"Why you little—"
Gracie took off in hot pursuit. If that little brat thought she was going to get away with a stunt like that, she had another think coming. The kid was fast but short. Gracie was fast and tall. She captured her assailant before they reached Samantha's Bridal and swept her up into her arms.
"Where are your parents?" Gracie demanded as she marched the wet, wriggling child back up the block toward the Gazette. "How could they let you run around in this rain without a coat?"
The kid tried to kick her again but Gracie held her out and away from her body the way she once held an angry fox terrier.
"Oh no you don't. One free kick is all you get."
"Bloody hell!" the little girl yelled. "Why don't you sod off?"
Gracie was so shocked she almost dropped her. "Somebody should wash out that mouth of yours with a bar of soap."
It was the kid's turn to be shocked. Her eyes widened as she stared up at Gracie then she giggled. "Soap!"
"Yes, soap. Exactly what a little brat with a dirty mouth needs."
"You can't tell me what to do."
"I can tell you you're not going to kick me in the shin and get away with it." She tucked the child under her right arm. "Now who do you belong to?"
The girl thrust her little pointed chin out and pressed her lips tightly together.
"Silent treatment, is it?" Gracie muttered. "Don't worry. I'll find out." She pushed open the door to the newspaper office. The place buzzed like an angry hive.
"Does anybody here own this child?" she called out.
Nobody paid any attention. They went on running to and fro, typing away at their workstations, ignoring her.
The kid, however, landed another sharp right that made Gracie cry out.
"If somebody doesn't claim this child in the next thirty seconds, I'm taking her to the police station before she breaks my leg."
The kid tried to make a break for it but Gracie held on tight.
"Papa!" The kid had a pair of lungs on her a hog caller would envy. "Help!"
"Sophie?" A male voice rang out from one of the cubicles.
That voice... . Sweat broke out on Gracie's brow. It couldn't be. God wouldn't possibly play a trick like this on her. She heard footsteps. She knew that rhythm, hard right soft left hard right soft left. The rhythm of his walk, the sound of his voice, the smell of his skin—they were all part of her soul's language. She put the little girl down. Every instinct told her to run but she couldn't move. She had been running for eight years and she couldn't do it any longer.