A Small-Town Homecoming (19 page)

“You’re okay,” she said.

“Yeah.”

“Good,” she managed.

And then, her heart numb and her brain buzzing, she crumpled and crept into the safety of a familiar, black nothingness deep inside, and she turned and walked out the door.

Q
UINN SAGGED
against the unforgiving back of the wooden visitor’s chair in Reed Oberman’s corner of the police station late Thursday morning, feeling every bruise he’d acquired the night before. He’d taken Rosie home and tucked her into bed, showered and collapsed on his own mattress. And then he’d lain awake, staring at his ceiling, reliving the night’s events. Reliving the surging rage and the heart-stopping terror and the knee-buckling pain, until the evening shadows faded to filmy daylight.

Hunger and thirst had driven him from bed shortly after seven, and he’d limped through the front room, heading toward the kitchen, hoping a bowl of cereal and a glass of juice would cure the insomnia that exhaustion hadn’t been able to dent. It was then that he’d discovered what Tess had done, what he hadn’t noticed a few hours earlier when he’d carried a sleeping Rosie down the hall.

His front room had been painted a soft, silvery green. Plump new pillows on his old brown sofa picked up the beautiful color in lively tones, and a watercolor print of a lighthouse on a sandy shore hung on the wall above. She’d managed to make his run-down, secondhand space seem updated and inviting without changing much of anything at all.

Imagine what she might have done with me, he’d thought, if she’d cared enough to stick around and try.

He’d stared at the walls and the print, at the pretty bakery cake and festive party things arranged on his coffee table. And then he’d closed his eyes and seen again the revulsion in her face when she’d come close enough to smell Wade’s whiskey on his clothes, and he’d heard again her flat, emotionless voice when she’d turned her back on him.

Damn. Needing Tess more than he’d ever needed a drink was a hell of an improvement in his addictions. He’d stood there, in that room she’d brightened, fighting the pressure building in his chest and the thick, hot pain clogging his throat. And then he’d returned to his room to dress.

After leaving Neva to watch over his still-sleeping daughter, he’d come to the police station to make another statement and check on the status of the investigation. He had to do something, make some sort of progress. Like a shark, if he stopped moving, he’d drown.

Reed returned to his cubicle and dropped heavily into his desk chair. He rubbed a hand over his reddened eyes and sighed. “Wade isn’t changing his story. He’s still insisting he acted alone.”

“Did you offer him a deal?”

“Working on it.” Reed tipped back in his creaky chair and yawned. “Still trying to convince the DA there’s enough evidence to point to an accessory.”

“There isn’t any evidence.”

“There’s the problem.” Reed frowned. “It’s not that I don’t believe you, it’s just that—”

“It’s easier to hang this on Wade and forget about the conspiracy angle.”

Reed nodded. “We’ve got a witness, we’ve got a truck showing damage consistent with reported events, we’ve got forensic evidence in that same truck and on
Wade’s clothes. And we’ve got a confession. It’s an open-and-shut case.”

“Neat and tidy.” Quinn shifted in his chair, his own words a fresh reminder of the pain this had caused Tess, as he forced down another surge of anger. “Except for what was spray-painted on the side of my trailer.”

“Wade’s confessed to that, too.”

“Did you ask him what it meant?”

Reed glanced up. “No.”

“Ask him. If he knows what it means, ask him how he heard about it, where he got the idea in the first place. Press him for the details.” Quinn stood, wincing as he straightened. “You and I both know Wade’s too stupid to plan things through like this. He had a fairly strong motive for cutting that board on the scaffolding. He didn’t have any reason to cause that spill or start that fire. He came looking for a job—he wouldn’t have wanted to destroy the job site that might have given it to him.”

“There’s one motive you haven’t mentioned,” Reed said. “Revenge.”

Quinn stopped in the doorway and glanced over his shoulder. “It’s a sorry testament to my life to admit I can consider that as another possibility.”

T
ESS KICKED OFF
her shoes and stretched out on the plush sofa in her grandmother’s blue parlor the evening after the fire. They’d shared a quiet dinner in the kitchen, allowing Julia to cluck and fuss over them both and soothe them with asparagus bisque and steaming sourdough baguettes fresh from the oven. The thought of returning alone to her house, of waking in her empty bed and beginning again in the morning was overwhelming. “I’m too tired to move, Mémère. Maybe I’ll stay right in this spot for the rest of the week.”

“Nonsense. We’ve more to do—and more reasons to do it—than ever.” Geneva poured herself a cup of tea. “Although I must admit this project has turned out to be more of a challenge than I’d expected.”

Tess laughed sourly. “Your talent for understatement never ceases to amaze me.”

“And your capacity for passion has never failed to disappoint me.” Geneva continued. “So why do I get the feeling you’re not as angry over what has happened or as determined to see this through as I thought you’d be?”

“I don’t know. It’s the shock, I suppose.” Tess rolled her head more comfortably against a pillow and closed her eyes. “I’m just so tired.”

“I’ve heard depression can sap one’s energy.”

“I’m not depressed. I just—I haven’t had much sleep lately.”

The clock on the mantel chimed its deep, metallic bong, marking another hour of her life. Tess had always loved that sound, but tonight it seemed…

Depressing.

She shifted on her side and studied her grandmother. “Did you love Grandpa, Mémère? Always? Even toward the end, when he was so sick?”

“Not in the same way. He wasn’t the same man at that point.” Geneva sighed and smoothed a hand over the soft throw on her lap. “And anything I may tell you about my relationship with your grandfather has nothing at all to do with you and Quinn. You’re two different people.”

“He’s an alcoholic, Mémère.” Tess rolled to her back and stared at the beamed and plastered ceiling. “I swore I’d never get involved with a man who had that problem.”

“
Had
is a word in the past tense. And it’s another convenient excuse.”

“Why are all excuses convenient?” Tess’s eyelids
drifted shut. “Why can’t they be excellent, or justified, or brilliant?”

“I suppose I should sit quietly and be supportive,” Geneva said impatiently, “or serve as a sounding board while you work your way through your quandary. But I’ve never enjoyed that particular role in any relationship.”

“This isn’t just a relationship,” Tess said. “I’m your granddaughter.”

“And that’s why I’ve tolerated your foolishness for as long as I have this evening.”

Tess sat upright and faced her grandmother. “I’m trying not to be foolish. I’m trying to consider everything that could possibly go wrong.”

“And looking for reasons—or excuses—to back out of the first serious love affair you’ve had for years.”

“Maybe that’s what I want to do, deep down inside.” Tess stared at the clock, unable to face her grandmother’s stern gaze. “Back out of this.”

“Would that make you happy?”

“No. Not now. But maybe, in the future, I’ll be glad I took some time to think about this.”

“You’ve had several months to think about this,” Geneva said as she lifted the cup to her lips.

“I haven’t been thinking about marriage.”

“No. But you’ve been thinking about the man.” She paused for a sip. “What do you think of him, Tess?”

“What do
you
think of him, Mémère? And please, don’t tell me it’s none of my business. Or that this is none of yours. I want to know. Why did you hire him to do this job?”

“Because I believed he’d be strong enough to stand up to you.” She set the tea aside. “And because on the surface, he appeared to be exactly the wrong man for
you, so I didn’t worry you’d be suspicious about my real motives.”

“What do you mean, your real motives?”

“I may be an old lady, Tess dear, but I’m not blind. Quinn is a handsome, virile man. A caring father who values family, from what I’ve observed.”

“Mémère.” Tess fell back against the cushions, shocked to her core. “You hired a stud for your own granddaughter.”

“I’m glad you agree about the stud factor. I told you, I have a great deal of experience reading people. Close your mouth, Tess dear. It’s unattractive to let your jaw hang open like that.” Geneva flapped a hand in Tess’s direction. “As you told me yourself, I can be one hell of a scary lady.”

“Then I’m sure you’ll get the results you want,” Tess told her steely spined grandmother with a grin. “You always do, Mémère.”

Q
UINN SAT
on his sofa that night, cushioned by pretty pillows, his daughter tucked beside him.

“Dad. Talk to me.” Rosie pulled the remote from his hand and switched off the television. “You can say anything. You can’t say anything worse than stuff I’ve already said to myself, a dozen times.”

“That sounds familiar.”

She shrugged. “I probably heard it on TV. On one of those sappy family shows. The ones with the perfect parents and the perfect kids.”

“No one would watch a show like that.”

“Don’t change the subject.”

“That sounds familiar, too,” he said. She pinched him, hard.
“Ow,”
he said, rubbing his arm.

“You’re upset about Tess, right?”

“Yeah,” he admitted. “How’d you know?”

“Lately, everything is about Tess.”

“That’s not right,” he said, frowning. “Everything is supposed to be about you.”

Rosie shifted away with a disgusted snort. “No wonder you’re having problems.”

They sat in silence for a while, and then she began to twist the ring Tess had bought for her on one of their afternoon shopping trips. “Maybe this
is
about me,” she said. “About me and Tess. And you and Tess. About the three of us.”

“The three of us?”

Twist, twist, twist. “Do you love her?”

“Yeah,” he said with an unhappy sigh. “I do.”

“Does she love you?”

“I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know why she would, but—yeah.” He shrugged away the hurt. “I’m pretty sure she does.”

“Dad.”
Rosie shifted to face him. “This is awesome.”

“It is?”

“Of course it is. Now you can marry her, and we can go live in her house, and I can get a dog, and she can pick me up every day from school and—”

“I haven’t asked her to marry me yet.”

“Well, are you going to?”

“I don’t know.”

“Dad.”

“Rosie.”
He rubbed a hand over his eyes, fuzzy with exhaustion and humming with nerves. “This is important. I can’t just ask someone to marry me so we can live at her house and get a dog.”

“So ask her because you love her.”

It sounded like a good idea, but maybe sleep deprivation and stress were twisting his thought processes like warm taffy. Tess might turn him down, but what did
he have to lose by asking, except a chance to be with her forever?

Tess. Being with Tess forever was worth just about anything he’d have to do to get her to say yes.

“What about you?” he asked his daughter.

“Don’t worry. I love her, too, Dad.”

God, he was getting tired of this tendency toward hot, dry lumps in his throat. Unable to speak, he lifted his arm and dropped it around Rosie’s shoulders to pull her closer.

“Dad.” Her voice was muffled against his shirt.

“Yeah.”

“Let go. You’re acting like one of those sappy dads on TV.”

He gave her one last squeeze before releasing her. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I don’t think we’re ever going to be one of those sappy families.”

“Not while Tess is around.” Rosie gave him what looked suspiciously like a sappy grin. “She won’t let us.”

Q
UINN STOOD
outside Tess’s office the next day, a bouquet of long-stemmed blue flowers in one hand and a cup of syrupy coffee in the other. He wished he had a ring, but he wanted to get the proposal out of the way first. Besides, Tess would be so picky about what he put on her finger he was safer letting her choose it.

The lady had great taste. Whatever she selected would likely bite a pretty big chunk out of his savings, but he had no doubt it would be the prettiest ring in the shop. He’d enjoy seeing it sparkle on her long, slender hand when she pointed to something on her computer monitor or clacked the keys on her keyboard or gestured
as she told a tale. He’d like knowing it was on her hand when she walked down Main Street as if she owned the strip, with all the men watching and admiring and knowing she belonged to him.

And to Rosie.

Tess opened her door and stood with one hand on the knob and the other at her waist. “Are you going to stand out there all day?”

“No.”

“Are you going to come in?”

“Yeah.”

She turned and headed toward the back of the room. “You brought me coffee?” she asked over her shoulder.

“And flowers.” He extended his arm. “Here.”

“‘Here.’” She took them from him and set them on her desk. “How romantic.”

“You want romantic?”

“You tell me. Do I?”

He grew very still and stared at her, watching for some clue as to what he should say or do next.

She sucked in a deep breath and covered her eyes with her hands. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t snap at you. This time, anyway.” She dropped her hands with a sigh. “And the flowers are very nice. Thank you.”

“You’ll need to put them in water.” Quinn gestured awkwardly toward the bouquet and then let his arm drop. “Or something.”

“I know what to do with flowers.”

“I don’t want to talk about the damn flowers.”

“Fine.” She set her hip against her desk and crossed her arms. “What
do
you want to talk about?”

“Howard Cobb, for a start.”

She gripped the desk’s edges until her knuckles turned white. “Has he been arrested?”