Chapter 9
With many questions racing in her brain, Lucy walked up to the front step of Rosanna Bridger’s two-story townhome. Paint had begun to chip and weeds grew through cracks in the driveway before the single-car garage. There were toys junking up the yard. Lucy had never been to Rosanna’s home before, and seeing its condition worried her. So had hearing the woman’s voice when she’d called yesterday evening.
That Rosanna had called her at all surprised her. But she’d explained how fond Sophie was of her and that she had no one else to turn to. She’d confessed the state of her marriage. Her husband would be moving out today and she didn’t want Sophie around when that happened.
As she stepped up to the door, she heard arguing.
“Hurry up and get that kid out of here,” a man said in an angry, snide tone. “I don’t have all day and Harry is on his way with the moving truck.”
“Lucy will be here any minute,” Rosanna answered in a strained voice.
Lucy rang the doorbell. What kind of environment was Sophie living in?
Rosanna opened the door. “Lucy. Hi.” She opened the door wider. “I can’t thank you enough for doing this.”
Lucy looked past her to the man standing in a small living room filled with boxes. Paper plates with food still on them littered the coffee table. Last night’s dinner?
“I’ll get Sophie.” Rosanna vanished up the stairs.
The man watched Lucy, his gaze going all over her body before resting on her face. After dealing with Cam, she was hypersensitive to strange men who gave her a bad feeling.
“How do you know Rosanna?” the man asked.
“I’m sorry, you are...?”
“Layne Bridger. Soon to be single.”
Lucy didn’t even spare him an acknowledgment for that statement.
“How do you know her?” Layne asked. “She doesn’t have many friends here.”
Rosanna had explained she’d moved from Minnesota where she was from because her new husband had gotten a job here in North Carolina. They’d only been together for two years.
“I met her through the literacy program.”
“Ah.” He raised his head in a half nod. Lucy couldn’t tell if it was in mocking or if he was impressed. “You’re one of those do-gooders.”
“Isn’t that what you are?” she asked sarcastically, not appreciating his insult. He had been mocking her.
Just then, Sophie came bounding down the stairs.
“Lucy! Lucy!” She ran up to her and threw her small body against her.
Lucy laughed and crouched to her level to give her a hug. “Hey there, little pumpkin. Are you ready to go have a sleepover at my house?”
Sophie’s smile expanded to gigantic proportions. “Yeah!”
“Here’s her bag.” Rosanna handed a flowery duffel to Lucy, eyeing her uncertainly. Was she threatened by how much Sophie liked Lucy? Were things so bad with her home life that it had created a wedge between them?
“Come on, honey.” Lucy took the girl’s hand and said to Rosanna, “You have my number....”
“Yes. Thank you again.” Rosanna walked them to the door.
Lucy took Sophie outside and to her Subaru, putting the duffel in the backseat. Sophie knew the drill about sitting in the back. She planted herself behind the front passenger seat, happy as could be.
Lucy got in and began driving. “How are things at home, Sophie?” It was time to start picking for information.
Sophie’s happy glow dimmed some. “Okay.”
“Just okay?”
She glanced up at Lucy, then turned toward the window. Her feet didn’t quite reach the floor and she bobbed them up and down.
“Rosanna and Layne aren’t getting along, huh?” Lucy coaxed.
“No. They fight.”
“Layne is moving out this weekend, so things should get better.”
Sophie shrugged.
“Why don’t you like it at Rosanna’s house?”
Again, Sophie shrugged, feet still bobbing.
“It’s okay, you can tell me. I won’t say anything to Rosanna.”
Sophie’s feet stopped moving. “She yells at me.”
“Rosanna does?”
“She never wants me to be around,” she blurted in a louder voice, eyes looking at Lucy with a desperate plea. “She never plays with me or lets me play at friends’ houses and she never lets me watch TV!” The torment poured out from her tiny body. “It’s boring there! Rosanna doesn’t want me. Nobody does!”
That well and truly sliced a gash in Lucy’s heart. “Oh, sweetie. It might seem that way, but Rosanna does want you. She’s just going through a rough time right now. You wait and see, once Layne moves out, you two will have fun together again.”
“It’s not fun there.” Lucy barely heard her quiet voice.
She took her shopping and then out for dinner. It was getting late when they arrived at the estate.
When Lucy retrieved her bag and walked with Sophie toward the side entrance, Sophie gaped at the huge home.
“You live here?”
“Just for a while. I’m taking care of someone who was injured and just released from the hospital. That’s what I do. I’m a nurse.”
“I want to be a nurse when I grow up.” She skipped along toward the side entrance.
“Do you?” Or was she just saying that because she had a case of hero worship going on with Lucy?
“Yes. My mommy was a nurse. Rosanna told me you were a nurse.”
“Did she?”
“Yes. My mommy had brown hair, too.”
Oh, this poor child. Losing her mother at such a young age.
When they entered the house, Sophie continued to gape as Lucy declined the help of a servant and took her up to the room Kate had prepared for her.
Inside the white-and-pink room, it was fit for a princess.
“Wow!” Sophie yelled, bouncing into the bedroom that had been designed especially for kids, with its pink comforter and pictures and a rug. Lucy wondered if the items had been placed here just for Sophie. There were toys in an open trunk and a dollhouse left open.
Lucy put the duffel down on the bed while Sophie dropped before the Victorian-style, yellow-and-white Princess Anne dollhouse. The interior was fully furnished.
“I asked for some monster girl dolls for my birthday,” Sophie said.
Monster girl dolls was the latest trend in dolls. Times sure had changed since Lucy was a kid. “When’s your birthday?”
“March 15.”
This week? “I’m sure Rosanna will get you them.”
“No.” Her head whipped back and up to see Lucy. “She said I couldn’t have them.”
“Why not?”
“She said she can’t afford them.”
Because Layne had cleaned out her bank accounts. Lucy was uncertain how much she should intervene. Part of her contemplated taking her for herself and part of her warned to be careful. Winning Sophie over too much might harm her. Lucy would have to return her to Rosanna.
“Will you get me those monster girl dolls?” Sophie asked.
Lucy couldn’t respond right away.
“You said Imagene gave us those books. Can she give me those dolls?”
The drawbacks of making up stories...
“I don’t know, Sophie.”
“Will you ask her?”
She hesitated. “I’ll try, okay?”
“Okay.” She was back to being the happy girl again, pretending she had the dolls she wanted, her hands curled as though she held two and moved them through the elaborate miniature house.
“What happened to my mommy?” Sophie asked.
The question took Lucy aback and she had to spend a few seconds to think it through. “Well, she was in a bad car accident.”
Sophie turned with a blank look. Had no one explained this to her? Likely someone had tried but she didn’t understand.
“A man in a big truck ran into her car while she was driving. He didn’t mean to. That’s why it’s called an accident.”
Sophie stopped playing and stared down at her hands. “Where did my mommy go? Why doesn’t she come and get me?”
Why doesn’t she come and get me. Lucy swallowed a wave of sorrow for the girl, her eyes burning with near-tears. She knelt beside Sophie. “Well...she can’t, honey. She died in the accident.”
“Why do mommies have to die?”
Lucy touched her shoulder. “Everybody dies. Usually that isn’t until we’re all very old. It’s when accidents happen that they’re taken from us sooner than they should be.”
Sophie looked down at the lower level of the dollhouse, her young mind trying to process a grave topic.
“You know, every time you think of your mom, she’s here with you. You keep her right here.” Lucy pointed to her own heart. “As long as she’s there, she’ll always be with you. She won’t be able to talk to you, and you won’t be able to see her, but she’ll be here. She’s here right now.”
A glimmer of hope lit in Sophie’s eyes. “She is?” She searched the room.
“Yes, but remember, you can’t see or hear her. You can just feel her.” Lucy pointed to her heart again. “Right here.”
When Lucy withdrew her hand, Sophie pressed hers there.
Lucy had to leave before she started crying in front of Sophie. “Get your pajamas on. I’ll be back to tuck you in, okay?”
“Okay.” Sophie pretended to play with a doll a while longer. At first her motions were mechanical, but as the imaginary doll went up the stairs and into a beautifully furnished master bedroom, she seemed to fall into another world, the tragic loss of her mother receding to a dark corner of her small head.
* * *
Listening to Darcy talk on the phone with his new girlfriend, Thad suffered the glaring evidence that his best friend was falling in love. So fast? It was like a bad movie he couldn’t stop watching. The smile on Darcy’s face stayed after he disconnected the call and stared off into space. Thad imagined a cartoon character with big, round eyes and red hearts floating up over his head. Desks surrounded the one where he sat, phones rang, detectives talked, and Darcy was oblivious to it all. Worse, he seemed to have forgotten Thad stood next to him.
Sitting on the office chair beside his daydreaming friend, Thad cleared his throat.
Snapped back to the real world, Darcy straightened some papers and put them back into a folder on his cluttered desk, two computer screens and a keyboard sticking up from a bed of papers, folders and books.
“We were talking about Cam confronting Lucy outside her hair appointment,” Thad reminded him, not missing his self-conscious preoccupation with the papers. Moving them to other piles on his desk would hardly tidy things up.
“Right. Yeah. I’ll get the paperwork going to charge him for stalking. We may not have enough evidence.”
They had Lucy’s phone records, and Thad had witnessed the first confrontation in front of the hospital, but Lucy hadn’t gotten the old woman’s name who’d witnessed the confrontation in front of the hair salon. She had no pictures, nor had she reported the second incident to police.
Maybe the threat of charges would be enough to scare him away from Lucy. Thad had a feeling it wouldn’t.
Noticing Darcy drift off into another daydream, he gave up trying to get any work done. “Things are going pretty good between you and that girl.”
Darcy’s attention came back to him. “I talk to her every day. We’ve gone out a couple of times. Dude. I can’t get her out of my mind.”
Wow, every day. “Do you want to?”
“No. Yes. It’s so soon after my divorce.” His uncertainty was palpable, but Thad didn’t think his uncertainty extended to his feelings for the woman.
“She makes me feel so good,” Darcy continued, getting that dreamy look again. “Am I just desperate or is this for real?”
Thad had no idea, and he was the wrong person to ask. “Just go with it.” That’s what he always did. Stay in the now and enjoy it while it lasted.
“This is different,” Darcy said.
He could tell his friend was torn over this. “How? Do you think you’re falling in love with her?”
When Darcy could only answer with silent resignation, Thad controlled his alarm. “Already?”
“I know it’s crazy, but Avery is... I don’t know... She’s so...perfect for me. She’s having a rough time getting over what happened to her, and we’re taking it slow, but we talk about everything.”
“Are you hearing what you’re saying? Taking it slow? You just met her.”
“It doesn’t seem like it. It seems like I’ve known her my whole life.” His whole face corroborated his claim.
Thad had never experienced anything like that. Or had he? Being with Lucy felt like that, only it was different. With her, there was this burning cauldron of...not lust...attraction. Pure attraction. The kind that led to something deeper. Unlike Darcy’s relationship with Avery, his with Lucy was slow to develop. He couldn’t say she was perfect for him because she had opposing beliefs. But there was something about her that drew him to her. Her literacy charity. Her caring nature. The way she teased him without being insulting. If he were to make the stretch and say they had things in common, it was their service to the community. Didn’t that qualify as the same belief structure? Was it only his issue with marriage and babies that didn’t mesh?
When a resounding affirmative response resonated inside of him, he tensed. That removed, his relationship with Lucy had a striking resemblance to Darcy and Avery’s.
Darcy chuckled as he observed Thad. “Maybe we should plan a double wedding.”
Thad pushed the office chair back and stood. “I’m not getting married.”
“Fine. Don’t get married, but you’re falling in love, my friend. There’s no stopping it. The same is happening to me, so I know.”
That only instilled fear and panic in Thad. And then he wondered why. Why did falling in love with Lucy give him the instinct to run the other way?
Because she wanted a family. A traditional family. Thad wasn’t against sharing part of his life with someone. “Till death do us part” wasn’t realistic. And he was a realist when it came to marriage. Marriage didn’t last. Period.
“Easy, there, fella,” Darcy teased. “You should see your face.”
“I’m okay.”
“You’re more than okay. You’re falling in love.” He chuckled some more. “I can’t believe it’s happening to us at the same time.”
“It’s not happening to me.” As the words tumbled out, he wondered why he felt he had to say them. He wasn’t against falling in love. It was the same principle. Enjoy it while it lasted; that was his motto. But would Lucy force him into marriage if he did fall in love with her?
Darcy patted his shoulder. “You go ahead and keep telling yourself that.”
“Thanks for being a friend, Darcy. I have to go.” He walked away to more of Darcy’s chuckles.
This morning his mother had mentioned she needed the house in Carova Beach prepared for a visit and needed someone she could trust. She suggested he take Lucy there. All this talk about falling in love had him tempted to agree. Take Lucy somewhere isolated and let all his guard down with her. Spend an entire day naked in bed...
In the hall leading to the exit, his cell rang. Not recognizing the number, he answered. “Winston.”
“You don’t know when to back off,” a man’s voice said. He didn’t recognize it.
“Who is this?”
“Someone who’s going to teach you when it’s time to back off.”
Thad stopped walking as he realized Jaden had said those exact words to him. Back off.
“Jaden?” he asked, but the connection had already been broken.
As he put his phone away, he spotted Wade Thomas through the glass wall of his office. He was staring at Thad. He’d seen him talking to Darcy and he didn’t like it. More than a chief of police trying to keep his men in line, Wade looked at him as though he knew who had just called him.
Thad contemplated going into his office and asking him point-blank. But what good would that do? If the chief was innocent, Thad would only push an already thin boundary. If he wasn’t and he knew more about this investigation than he was letting on, he would simply deny it.
* * *
Thad entered the estate, plagued by the threat he’d received. What would the caller do to teach him when it was time to back off? Making his way deeper into the home, Thad climbed the stairs to go to the bedroom where he was sleeping to change into something more casual. Unlike Darcy, he preferred soft shirts and jeans over the dress pants and shirts with strangling ties. He removed his jacket on the way. At the top of the stairs, he almost bumped into Lucy.
She wiped her eyes, tears springing from them. When she saw him, her quiet sobbing broke into something more wrenching and she flung herself against him, arms going around him.
Thad dropped his jacket and wrapped her in his arms. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.” What had happened? Had Cam gotten to her again?
Her outburst calmed as fast as it had come on. She sniffled and leaned back. “I’m sorry.” She moved to step away but he kept her firmly where she was.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
Lucy wiped her eyes again.
Reaching into his front pocket, he retrieved a handkerchief and hung it up in front of her.
She took it from him. “Really? You carry a handkerchief?”
“Crime scene investigator. It gets used at least three times a week.” He grinned when she moved the cloth away from her face with a grimace. “I have a rotation and this one is clean.”
She blew her nose. “Who uses them? You?”
“No. People I talk to who know the victim.”
“Oh.” She kept the handkerchief and lowered her hands, curled and now resting on his chest. “Sophie is here.”
“Here?” The bedrooms were filling up fast. Pretty soon there wouldn’t be any left. Kate in the master, Sam in one, he and Lucy in two more, and now Sophie. There was only one more room left.
“Rosanna called.” Lucy explained how Sophie had come to stay here for the night. “She seemed so scared when I picked her up, and Layne...”
Rosanna’s husband. Soon to be ex-husband. “What about him?”
“I didn’t like him. Sophie doesn’t, either.”
“Why don’t you like him?”
“It’s just a feeling. And he seemed to hit on me.”
Thad ignored the instant jealousy that information inflicted on him. “Rosanna is the one who filed for the divorce. Maybe he’s not happy about having to move out.”
“Maybe.” She didn’t seem convinced.
“That’s why you’re crying?”
“No.” Her eyes bloomed fresh tears but they didn’t spill over. “Sophie asked about her mother. She doesn’t understand where she went.”
“And you had to try and explain.” That would be hard on anyone. Sophie was an innocent child.
Thad kissed Lucy’s forehead. “She’ll be all right.” Especially while she slept in a room that was right next to his and across from Lucy’s. A real family affair...
Just then his mother appeared at the end of the hall, using the wall for support. Seeing them, she stopped.
Thad set Lucy apart from him. “Mother. What are you doing up?”
“I heard crying.”
“Lucy was upset over Sophie’s situation. She’s okay now,” Thad said.
“Yes. I’m okay now.”
“I can see that.” Kate wore a triumphant smile.
Now she’d never leave him alone until he agreed to take Lucy with him to get the Carova beach house ready for her visit.
* * *
Late that night, Thad woke to the cries of a young child. Waking the rest of the way, he realized it was Sophie.
Leaping off the bed, he ran into the hall. No one else had gone to see to Sophie. Going by instinct, he went into the girl’s room. Sophie sat up in bed, her face a contortion of misery, mouth open with a long wail ringing through the room. She’d wake everyone in the house with that set of lungs.
He went to her and sat on the bed. “What’s the matter?”
She reached for him with her tiny hands. A child seeking comfort from him was a new experience. He gathered her in the blankets and lifted her onto his lap, where she snuggled close, her wails easing a bit but still crying.
“What happened, Sophie?” he asked, bringing his face down so he could see her teary one. The sight touched something deep inside of him. He wiped her face with his fingers.
“Layne came to get me.”
Thad glanced around the room. Had he broken into the house? Impossible. Security was tight. Then he thought of Jaden.
“He was hairy and had green eyes.” Sophie sniffled, no longer crying and now intent on impressing upon Thad what she’d seen. “They glowed.”
“You had a nightmare?”
“He came after me,” she said, traumatized by the realness of her dream.
“Layne can’t get you here. You won’t see him anymore. When you get home, he’ll be gone.”
“You promise?”
“I promise.”
She relaxed on his lap, leaning back to look up at him. “I don’t like Layne.”
“Yeah, neither does Lucy.”
“He fishes.”
That’s what the girl didn’t like about him?
“I don’t like the fishing house,” Sophie said.
The fishing house must be a rental or second home Layne frequented. “What don’t you like about it?”
“It smells like fish.”
Thad smiled. “Do you like Rosanna?” The investigator in him made him ask. That and an inexplicable protectiveness.
Sophie didn’t answer.
“Do you?” he pressed.
“I like Lucy.”
“Who doesn’t like Lucy?” Thad couldn’t stop his chuckle. “But what about Rosanna?”
“She’s okay.”
“Better than Layne.”
The little girl nodded emphatically, eyes big with certainty. “Lots better.”
“Well, that’s good. You won’t have to live with Layne anymore, just Rosanna.”
The animation faded from Sophie’s face and she looked down.
“What’s the matter?” Thad asked.
She raised her eyes, so solemn and full of gravity no child should have to bear. “I want my mommy.”
A spear drove through his heart at her declaration, followed by a fierce impulse to do something about her sorrow. He’d never felt anything like it before.
Thad rubbed her back gently. “I know you do. I wish I could bring her back to you.”
Sophie snuggled closer to him again. “I like you.”
She liked him. He watched her eyes close, a gesture of utter trust in the adult who held her. Thad didn’t want to let her go. He waited while she drifted off to sleep, staring at her sweet face, overwhelmed by her loss, wishing he could find a way to fill the void. No child should lose their parents, the only family they had. Sophie had been thrown into a cold world and desperately sought warmth.
Thad was concerned over her aversion to Layne and her increasing withdrawal from Rosanna. Rosanna’s situation may have been suitable when she’d first taken Sophie into her home, but that was no longer the case. This poor child was adrift and in need of a soft place to land. And damn if Thad didn’t entertain giving that to her.
Lifting her, he set her down on the mattress and adjusted the blankets so they weren’t twisted. She made a little groaning sound and then fell into deep sleep again. Thad stood and looked down at her, torn apart inside.
His rational side argued that he’d never been against kids. He was only against bringing them into a family that was doomed to break apart. But what was his answer to Sophie’s situation? Her mother had died. Her father hadn’t stuck around when she was born and would never claim responsibility for her. She had been brought into a dysfunctional family and now had no family at all.
Thad could turn away from marriage and babies and prevent an emotional breakup of his own, but what was he supposed to do when a child who wasn’t his was left motherless and the foster home where she lived was no longer a safe haven?
“Now you know why I cried,” he heard a woman’s voice say from behind him. Lucy.
She stood in the doorway. How much had she witnessed? Enough. His wall shot back up into place. “She had a nightmare.” With that he walked to the door. Lucy stepped out of the way, and he passed her.
In his room, he closed the door, but not before seeing Lucy once more. She knew what comforting Sophie had done to him. The lock to his heart had been opened, and his beliefs questioned.