Between Us Girls (11 page)

She watched him walk away, grateful as always that he did indeed stay on at the Casa for whatever reason. She would be lost without him.

He wasn't movie star handsome like her Syd had been, but frankly, if she were forty years younger, he'd be starring in her daydreams.

When her husband Syd died ten years ago, she had been completely lost. Slowly she found her way into a life without him. She sold their condo and moved into the Casa, which her smart cookie of a father had bought in the 1960s. He had held on to it because his daughter loved the place so much and begged for the opportunity to inherit it.

Life worked for her at the Casa. Still, there was a void. When Keagan had shown up a few years later, she knew what was missing. He brought with him a good dose of masculinity, an attribute a single businesswoman needed to lean on now and then.

And there were the subtle things. Like this morning, how he stopped and chatted for a spell exactly when she needed it. Puzzled by Samantha and concerned about Jasmyn, she had indeed been feeling a little bit lost.

Fifteen

Jasmyn awoke from a deep sleep, not quite sure where she was.

Sunlight filtered through partially open venetian blinds. She saw a giant bouquet of fernlike stems sprouting in a patch of blue sky. It was not an oak tree.

She thought about turning her back to the view, but her body refused to respond. The familiar inertia had been triggered, she remembered now, when she talked with Quinn about the date. The anniversary. Was it still the seventeenth? Maybe she had slept all the way through it.

Probably not. The heaviness would have lightened if it were the next day.

Its sensation always reminded her of walking at the creek's edge as a kid with Quinn. Their feet would sink deep into squishy mud, sometimes halfway up their shins. The mud became a monster with strong hands that yanked off shoes and socks. They squealed in delicious fear and played tug-of-war with it, freeing their legs at last.

Now her whole body was being sucked down and trapped in the monster's clutches. Squealing in delicious fear never entered the picture. Eventually, though, the heaviness would pass, strength would return to her muscles or to her willpower—she wasn't sure which—and she'd get up. Eventually. By the end of the day.

At least that's what had always happened so far.

The bouts were lessening. In the beginning they had come daily. Lately not so often. They hadn't knocked her out for a whole entire day
since…Well, not since her arrival in California. Had Quinn really needed to tell her the date?

Jasmyn lost herself in the memory she so badly wanted to forget.

The siren's
woo-ooo
. The translucent curtain of algae green. The funnel, like a finger of God, twirling. The roar of a freight train slamming against her ears. The waiting in the basement.

Then…the seeing. The seeing of a reality so dreadful they should have draped it with a cloth. They should have averted their eyes.

Her home, her cocoon, was a pile of unrecognizable trash. The spaces between the walls, where she cooked, cleaned, bathed, slept, breathed…gone. Gone. Absolutely gone.

And so the day of the sixth month anniversary passed in Cottage Eleven.

“Jasmyn, dear, are you all right?” Liv smiled in the doorway, a plate of brownies in her hand, the patio lights behind her already lit in the dusky courtyard.

Jasmyn had lost the whole entire day. “I'm fine.” It wasn't a lie. Compared to not being able to get out of bed, she was really pretty much okay.

“Well, I became concerned when I didn't see you all day. Not that I keep track of everyone's comings and goings.” Her shoulders rose and fell. “Okay, sometimes I do. Especially you single gals because, well, just because who else will make sure you're home safe and sound? Anyway.” She handed her the plate. “Chocolate. It's good for whatever ails you.”

Jasmyn caught a whiff of warm chocolate. “Thank you.” She placed a hand on the door, ready to shut it at the first opportunity.

“I bet you thought chicken soup was the cure-all.”

“I'm fine. Really.”

The creases in Liv's forehead said she clearly did not believe Jasmyn was fine.“I'm just a little tired.”

Liv nodded. “You've had quite a couple of weeks.”

A couple of weeks. Try six months. Whatever. “I need to go home.”

“Home! To Illinois? Oh goodness, not before Saturday, surely! I mean, Chadwick has planned a trip to Disneyland for you on Wednesday. He's
talked Riley into taking Tasha out of school. Inez wants to bring the twins, her great-grandsons.”

“I don't know—”

“You just go now and rest up. We'll talk tomorrow.” Liv turned and hurried away.

Jasmyn shut the door and leaned against it. She did not want to talk tomorrow! She did not want to go to Disneyland!

Oh, what was happening to her new safe place with its batch of warm fuzzies?

A great sob erupted. She slid to the floor and muffled it with her arms, not wanting to disturb the neighbors who had welcomed her.

Sixteen

The office door was open. Liv liked to smell the damp night air and hear the trickling fountain while she worked at her desk. Work tonight meant snooping into a probable tenant's background.

She removed her glasses, propped her elbows on either side of the computer keyboard, and pressed her forehead into her hands. “Lord, what is wrong with me?”

Liv did not doubt her presumption that Jasmyn Albright was a probable tenant. It was a knowledge given to her, visceral, deep, and inexplicable. Such things happened now and then, often enough for her to sense when they were true.

She imagined they came from God. Why? It didn't matter. Why weren't a timetable and a to-do list included for her? It didn't matter.

Except this time it mattered. A fear gnawed at her. What if the someday were eons from now? She wanted Jasmyn there right now on a permanent basis. She'd never felt such a crazy notion.

The sound of a discreet throat clearing told her Keagan stood in the doorway. She looked up and saw him.

“Knock, knock?”

“Come on in.”

“What's up?” He sat in the armchair across the desk.

“What makes you think something's up?”

“It's after eleven and the front gate was open.”

“Open!” Liv moaned. She never forgot to close and lock the gate before dark at the absolute latest. Never.

“Are you feeling okay?”

She replaced her glasses. “How do you mean?”

“Olivia.” He fixed his laser beam gaze on her. “You forget the gate about once a year. Either somebody died or the doctor gave you bad news.”

She waved a hand and almost said
nonsense
, but Keagan didn't speak nonsense. He most likely was not capable of doing so.

“Well?” He leaned forward. “Which is it?”

“Neither.” She shook her head. “All right. I'm tied up in knots about Jasmyn.”

“The visitor who's leaving Saturday. Why?”

“Well, because…” She glanced around the office. From a wall a photograph her late husband, Syd, smiled down. It was an eight-by-ten black and white glossy head shot. He'd had it taken as a joke because she always called him movie star handsome. He'd even scrawled
Best Wishes
and signed his name,
Sydney Engstrom
, like Robert Redford would do.

The man had kept her going. They married late in life; she was forty-six, he fifty. She hadn't taken his last name because by then she was well known in the business world as the owner of McAlister Realty, which had been around since her father founded it in the 1950s. Syd didn't mind. He wasn't the sort to be threatened. They had enjoyed only a dozen years together before he passed away too soon. Way too soon.

She suddenly felt very old and very alone.

“You don't get tied up in knots about strangers. Overly concerned and involved maybe, but not upset.”

“I know.” She swiveled the monitor so he could see it. “Look at these.” She clicked through several online photos.

“Let me guess. It's not a pile of toothpicks.”

“No, it's Jasmyn's farmhouse after the tornado.”

The scenes could have been taken in a war zone. Rubble was scattered across fields of tilled soil. The only partially recognizable things were a toppled, leafless oak and a chunk of green metal identified in the caption as a combine fender.

“Tornadoes were in other parts of the Midwest that day that caused a lot of destruction, but nothing in her area except her home. The local newspaper devoted pages to her story. The article says the funnel's path went straight through the Albright property. Jasmyn's house and two barns
and all their contents were totally demolished. Nothing was salvageable. Isn't that heartbreaking?”

“That's a tough one.”

“Check out the date. It happened six months ago
today.
What an awful anniversary and, as far as I can tell, she spent it all alone inside her cottage. Probably crying her eyes out. I knocked a few times throughout the day, but she didn't answer until tonight.”

“Hmm.”

“Poor thing comes out to California for a little R and R and what happens? The few things she has replaced are stolen. She was actually almost rude to me. Jasmyn Albright, rude! She said she needs to go home.” Liv pointed at the monitor. “Home. Do you believe it? She doesn't have a home! She doesn't even have any family!”

“You know better than anyone that sometimes friends are home and family.”

“Except for her best friend, she doesn't have enough friends back there to hang her heart on.”

“Is that what she said?”

“Well, not exactly.” Exactly, Jasmyn had said her hometown was a wonderful place. “But it's easy to deduce from her tone that she'd rather be here.”

Keagan leaned back in his chair. “It's not her cottage.”

“What?”

“You said she spent the day inside her cottage. It's not hers.”

“Yes, it most surely is her—” She cut off the babbling. Her voice had risen an octave and her words were running together.

“Liv, Jasmyn hasn't paid rent or moved in. The place is not technically hers. Correct?”

She shrugged.

“You probably had one of your hunches, but you're jumping the gun here. You've known her all of two weeks.”

She swallowed and lowered her tone. “I don't want her to leave.”

He didn't reply for a moment. “People have come and gone from the Casa for years. You always give them a healthy shove out of the nest when you know their wings are ready to fly. This morning you were ready to give Sam a nudge. When they leave, you get a little sad, but not afraid. A
season is over. Such is life. And besides, everyone always comes back to visit you.”

She nodded.

“What's different about Jasmyn Albright?”

Liv replayed the two weeks since Jasmyn's arrival. On that first morning, there had been a deep heart connection. Since then they had spoken freely on whatever subject came up as if they'd known each other for years.

Liv had taken her around Seaside Village and introduced her to people at the market, the coffee shop, and the library. She had even explained the work involved with running the complex and the girl was quick to catch on. They had simply enjoyed each other's companionship the way a mother and a daughter would.

Oh.

Where had that come from?

Keagan reached over and, with a few strokes on the keyboard, logged out and powered down the computer. “Have some tea. Go to bed. If you're still this needy in the morning, I'm moving you into that assisted living care facility over on El Camino.” He smiled his almost smile and walked out the door.

Well.
She released a pent-up breath. “Well.”