Dandelion Wishes (14 page)

She wasn’t in control outside her bedroom. But here, she was queen and master of all things. No one completed her sentences in her room. No one treated her like an invalid. Here she felt like she had before the accident—in charge of her own destiny.

She didn’t want to think about how small her world had become.

She’d take things one day at a time.

Tomorrow, she’d have to get more paint.

Fire-engine red would do nicely.

Paint smudged, exhausted and smiling, Tracy crawled into bed.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

W
ILL
WAS
WAITING
for her.

The realization made Emma pedal faster.

He was stretching, getting ready for their race up Parish Hill. But he spotted Emma the moment she crossed the bridge into view. He’d tossed out a challenge last night at the bowling alley and again when they’d rescued Granny Rose. She hadn’t planned on showing up, preferring to stay with her grandmother. But Agnes had appeared early to have coffee with Granny, who was lucid once more and planning her daily rehearsal of
The Music Man.

And somehow, this prickly friendship she and Will had developed was helping to soothe the hurt between her and Tracy. Emma wasn’t going to examine her feelings more closely because this was as far as their friendship went—bowling challenges and races up Parish Hill.

Ahead, the fog hovered low above him, like a canopy, and clung to the ground in wispy tendrils at his ankles. Beads of water dotted his blond hair like a crown. The morning was gray. And still he managed to look bright, shiny, glowing.

When she got closer, Will grinned and spun around, heading toward Parish Hill.

Emma pumped the pedals. Soon she was inching past him up the first switchback.

“Careful of those gears.” His voice was deep, but on the verge of breathlessness.

She didn’t waste words. She didn’t dwell on those places inside her that sparked when he spoke. She concentrated all her being into pedaling, all her focus into staying on the bike. There would be no changing gears today. She’d stay in the same one all the way.

Second hill. Third. Emma pulled away. Her lungs strained. Her legs threatened to drop off. This ranked among one of the stupidest things she’d ever done. She’d made a tactical error. He’d outmaneuvered her. Emma was out in front and he was a full switchback below her. If she collapsed or quit first, all Will had to do was take a few steps farther and he’d win.

She needed a distraction. The bright orange of a poppy petal. The rich brown of the earth. The glint of sunshine off a blue jay’s wing.

The growl of a motor filled her ears. Tires squealed.

Gripping her handlebars, Emma flashed back to the accident, but the sounds were different, higher pitched, farther away. This wasn’t a memory induced by her mentally composing a painting.

Emma yelled a warning.

More rubber protested on pavement.

A car was coming fast. Too fast.

And then a vintage blue Volkswagen Beetle exploded around the corner above her, swinging wide, right at Emma.

Ice filled her limbs, her lungs, her veins.

Time slowed.

The car drifted. Tires screeched on a trajectory of death.

Emma’s.

She jerked the handlebars and pumped the pedals. Her front tire bounced off the pavement at the same time the car’s rear fender clipped the bike’s sprockets, whipping her off the road.

Airborne, she felt the wind rush over her, muting the sound of the rampaging car.

Emma plummeted through the air toward the steep slope and tumbled to earth with a breath-stealing thud. She rolled and tumbled. The world spun in a kaleidoscope of color. She ate dirt. Banged against rocks and branches and all sorts of hard things that hurt and promised to hurt worse later. She’d never stop rolling. She’d never—

If she didn’t stop, she’d slide across the next switchback and into the path of the car.

Panic gave her jellied limbs strength. Emma flung her arms and legs into a big X and flopped onto her back, hoping she’d stretch wide enough to snag something.

Her foot hooked on a tree root with a jolt of pain and she spun to an ankle-twisting halt. Realized she was screaming. Stopped. Gasped for air. Registered the sound and smell of burning rubber. Remembered Will was somewhere on the road below.

She tried to warn him, but her breath came in shallow, rib-racking gasps too weak to form words, much less shout.

The Beetle took the corner, arcing toward Will, who wasn’t getting out of the way. He was shouting and waving his arms in the middle of the road, like some B-movie hero who didn’t have a stunt double.

“Will,” Emma managed to rasp, her mind already flattening him beneath the small car, her heart already mourning him despite him being such a pain.

At the last moment, Will jumped aside, leaped onto the driver’s running board and clung to the open window.

With one last earsplitting squeal of tires, the engine died and the car jolted to a stop.

“I’ll kill him.” Emma wasn’t sure if she meant the driver or Will. Probably whoever she reached first.

Groaning, she picked herself up and made her way to the road on shaky legs that threatened to buckle and an ankle that protested every step. Her body felt sluggish and numb, but her brain was reaching for strong words she planned to use very soon.

The entire car, including the windshield, was caked with dust. Emma couldn’t see who was driving. Cobwebs covered the headlights, hung like garlands from the hubcaps.

Emma leaned in the open passenger window opposite Will, ready to chew the driver out. And then she realized who it was. “Mildred?”

Mildred’s lower lip trembled. Her fingers kneaded the steering wheel. “I just wanted... I just wanted... I just wanted to prove I could still drive.” And then she started to cry.

Emma’s anger deflated on a gush of air. Mildred had taught Emma to drive when she was fifteen, risking whiplash and Granny Rose’s wrath. It was Mildred who’d loaned her a vintage Mercedes-Benz coupe one weekend when Emma was a dateless bridesmaid. It was Mildred who’d traded in her car keys—well, almost all her car keys—for a candy-apple-red walker.

Will’s gaze found Emma’s. “You okay?”

She nodded. Now that the anger was gone, feeling had started returning to her body. Her battered, scraped up, blood-oozing body. Emma leaned more heavily on the car door. Dirt from her arms sprinkled onto the seat. She could feel debris in her shoes, down her sports bra and up the back of her shorts.

Mildred wiped at a tear. “I’m worthless. I can’t see. I can’t walk. I can’t do anything anymore.”

“That’s not true.” Emma’s heart went out to her. “You’ve been taking care of yourself for years. That’s not easy for someone with a walker.”

Will gave Emma an approving look.

“Don’t try to make me feel better. I’ve made up my mind. I’m worthless.” Mildred’s hands dropped to her lap. “Drive me down to the morgue. I’ve outlived my reason for being.”

“No more talk like that. You’re on the town council, aren’t you? You picked the wrong road, is all. You should stick to straightaways.” Will shot Emma a significant look that seemed to say “go with me here.”

The problem was a tiny voice in Emma’s head wanted to go with Will anywhere, at odds with her artistic dreams, which demanded she go it alone.

“Curves are tough,” Emma agreed. Especially curves with fifty-foot drop-offs, bike riders, joggers and unsuspecting squirrels. Mildred was lucky she hadn’t killed herself on one of the other switchbacks above them.

“You won’t tell Agnes and Rose, will you?” she sniffed. “I’ll put the car back in the carport, I promise.”

“It’ll be our little secret if you let us drive you home,” Will assured her, using his forearm to wipe at the caked dirt on the windshield.

Emma very carefully promised nothing. She hoped Will had his fingers crossed behind his back.

“I knew I could trust you.” Mildred brightened. “I don’t want to interrupt your run. I should be fine driving home from here. I know the way like the back of my hand.”

Will reached in and took the keys from the ignition. “We insist. I’ll help you get in the passenger seat, since I don’t see your walker in the back.”

“I left it in the driveway.” Mildred had the grace to blush.

“Hop in the back, Emma.” Will was in command mode.

Emma was in no mood to be bossed around. “I can ride my bike home.” She turned to look uphill. She didn’t see her bike at first. And then she looked higher. The frame had been speared by an oak branch about ten feet below the road where she’d been hit. The slope she’d fallen down was a steep obstacle course of trees, thick fallen branches and rocks the size of Saint Bernards. She could have been killed.

Emma’s legs gave out and she crumpled to the pavement.

* * *

W
ILL
HAD
TO
practically lift Emma into the backseat of the old Beetle. She hadn’t passed out, but her face was a clammy green color that worried him. She didn’t say a word on the drive to Mildred’s house. Very un-Emma-like.

They settled Mildred into her favorite recliner. From there, she could see her big-screen television and—if she wasn’t legally blind—she could have seen her racing pictures on the wall. Given what he’d heard over the years about her career, Will was curious.

One black-and-white photo showed a vintage race car wrapped around a tree. “Did you crash this car in a race?”

“You could say that. I was forced off the track during my victory lap by some very resentful men.” There was regret in her normally sweet-tempered voice. “I got over it. Took a long time, but I got over it.”

Despite being banged up pretty bad, Emma made Mildred a cup of tea. She didn’t complain or lay blame. But Will wasn’t sure her steady state would last much longer.

“I’m borrowing your car to take Emma home,” he told Mildred.

“When you bring it back, make sure you hang the keys on the hook by the kitchen door so I can find them when I need them.” Mildred started to smile and then seemed to think better of it.

Will helped Emma up from the couch. She had to be hurting, otherwise she’d be telling him not to boss her around. “We’ll talk more about driving privileges when I get back.”

“Oh. Okay.” Mildred sighed.

It only took a few silent minutes to drive to Rose’s house. Will was really worried now.

“Thanks for the ride.” Emma opened the creaky car door slowly, swinging one foot out at a time.

She moved so carefully Will was able to shut off the car and come around to the passenger side before Emma stood up.

“I can take it from here.” She limped forward.

Will took her gently by the arm. “The only reason I didn’t drive straight to the hospital is because your pupils aren’t dilated and you aren’t screaming in pain. I don’t think you’ve had a concussion.”

She walked in measured steps toward the porch. “Thanks for the astute diagnosis.” She groaned as she lifted her foot onto the first step. “I can go it alone from here.”

“Doubtful.” Will swept Emma into his arms. She gave a little mewling cry of protest, like one of Felix’s kittens, but didn’t say another word as he carried her up to the front door. He fumbled with the screen to get in. No one locked their doors in Harmony Valley. “Rose? Are you home?”

“She’s working on
The Music Man
with those kids in Cloverdale this morning. Agnes drove her.”

Emma was cradled against his chest as if she belonged there, her arm looped around his neck. They crossed the threshold as if they were a newly married couple, except they weren’t married. They weren’t in once-in-a-lifetime finery. He reeked of sweat and she smelled like someone had tried to bury her alive.

It was a miracle she hadn’t broken her neck on that hill or hit her head. That was twice now that she’d walked away from disaster—once with Tracy and once with him. “You need to buy a lottery ticket.”

Emma squirmed. “You can put me down now.”

He didn’t want to. In his arms, she was safe. “You need a bath.” Will turned to the stairs. By the time he got to the second-floor landing he was almost as sweaty and winded as he’d been during their race. He deposited her carefully in the bathroom and started the bathwater.

“I think you’ve fulfilled your Boy Scout pledge for the day.” Emma waved him toward the bathroom door, but even that effort lacked her usual spunk.

Will stepped closer and picked a twig out of her dark hair. It would be so easy to slip his palm into the crook in her neck, draw her close and kiss her, if only to reassure himself that she was okay. He’d watched helplessly as Emma was flung from her bike. The slow-motion horror of it returned to him in a rush. His hands wanted to shake. His breath wanted to catch. His mind wanted to erase the memory.

She could have hit her head and ended up like Tracy. A few days ago he’d wished Tracy’s fate on Emma. How ironic that today he felt differently.

“I’m fine. I’ll live to bowl another day.” Emma’s voice was barely above a whisper, as if she, too, was sensing her mortality.

Will looked her up and down one more time to make sure she was indeed fine and still standing before him instead of lying in broken pieces on Parish Hill, with Mildred and her Beetle a mangled mess somewhere nearby. He wouldn’t have been able to call for help if anything serious had happened up there. He would’ve had to run to the top of the hill for cell service or down into town for a landline. But he couldn’t have left them if they needed CPR or a tourniquet or a hand to hold as they lay dying.

Will’s body did shake then. With rage. The entire town, including Emma, wore blinders. They needed what had become basic necessities, like cell-phone service and a volunteer fire department. “This can’t go on.”

“I agree,” she said on a bone-tired sigh. “I’m not going to race you to the top of Parish Hill anymore. In fact, as soon as I get Granny Rose to the doctor, I’m leaving.”

“I mean, the town has to stop fighting us on these changes.” His words snapped with anger, no hint of the fear and caring that had spawned them. “What’s it going to take? Someone dying? You dying?”

With a growl of possession, Will wrapped both hands around Emma’s neck, tugged her close and planted a kiss on her mouth that was far from gentle. Just as quickly, he released her and spun away.

“I... You... Don’t...” she sputtered.

He was already on the landing. “I’ll be back to check on you in an hour. Answer the door or I’ll assume you’ve passed out and need CPR.”

She let loose a primitive yell and then slammed the bathroom door.

Will laughed. It was a maniacal sort of laugh. The kind where you knew you were in deep trouble, but didn’t have a clue how to get out.