Deconstructing Lila (Entangled Select) (19 page)

She didn’t want to cry. Dammit. She didn’t want to show this woman any emotion other than anger, but Lila couldn’t stop the tears that slid down her cheeks. She couldn’t stop the well of emotion bubbling up from her chest and escaping past her lips.

Suddenly Sarah was there, her arms wrapped around Lila, her soft linen blouse pressed against her cheek. Nonsense words stumbled past her lips and into Lila’s hair. A lot of “I’m sorry” and “I hope you can forgive me someday” made their way into Lila’s foggy brain.

She cried for the mother she’d never known and the mountains of pain Sarah had obviously suffered; for herself who’d almost repeated her mother’s mistakes by leaving Hannington and Jake, but just scraped by realizing ten years sooner where her heart truly lived.

And crap, she cried because she realized she shared more qualities with Sarah than she’d ever imagined.

As Lila regained control and dried her tears, Sarah’s arms fell away and they were back to sitting across from each other at the table.

“So why now? Why did you decide this moment was right to come back?” She had no idea what she expected, but what Sarah said next shocked the shoes right off her feet.

“I read a small Associated Press piece a few weeks ago, you know, one of the around-the-U.S. color pieces that is short, but interesting. In it, the reporter talked about a small Texas town and one woman’s fight to restore a piece of Old West history. A former brothel on the Chisholm Trail.

“Beside the story was a small black-and-white photo of you standing outside Prudence’s old place. And I thought if you’re going to reopen Miss Pru’s, you’d probably want to do it right.”

Sarah lifted her worn leather satchel off the concrete next to her chair and removed an old leather-bound book. She passed it to Lila.

“Open it. I think these may help with the interior restoration.”

Lila accepted the book and lifted the cover. It creaked softly in protest. There on the first page rested a black-and-white photograph of a lovely young woman, standing confidently, her gloved hand resting atop the back of a chair. Her features were even and beautiful, her smile wide and genuine, almost infectious, Lila decided. Her hair disappeared in a loose coiffure under a smart hat with a jaunty feather.

She wore a high-collared white blouse with a great deal of lace at the throat, which cascaded down to a trim waist, outlined to perfection under a jeweled shell belt.

A snappy two-piece suit consisted of a short jacket with large lapels, to show off the lace of course, and a heavy A-line skirt brushed the floor, matching the hat. A beautiful embroidered ribbon pattern scrolled up the sides of the skirt from the hem.

The plate under the Victorian-styled image: Prudence MacIntosh.

Immediately she thought of the journal and Carrie’s story about the missing photo album from the city’s museum. She glanced up at Sarah. “Where did you find this?”

“I stole it from someone a very long time ago.”

“Howard and Janie Armstrong?”

Sarah struggled to find the words. “Ah, well, how did you know?”

Something clicked in her mind and at last it all made sense to Lila. “Howard knows you stole the original photo album and he wanted to punish you by refusing to give me Miss Pru’s journal.”

“It seems Prudence left more than a photo album behind. She also left a diary hidden away inside the building. Howard recovered it and would have destroyed it as revenge against you, I guess, but someone intervened and made sure I got it instead.

“What did you do to Howard to make him dislike our family so much?” she asked Sarah, eager to know at last what made the man so unpleasant.

Sarah took a deep breath and let it go. “I refused to date him.”

Lila waited for more revelations, but Sarah didn’t have any. “That’s it? You wouldn’t go out with the guy?”

“He thought because our family didn’t have the money or standing his did, that I would fall into his arms. I didn’t. By that time, I was already in love with your father.”

A spurned boyfriend. It all made sense now. She wondered briefly if Threasa knew this part of the story.

Lila flipped quickly through the book, excited by the number of photos inside. Dozens of interior shots of Miss Pru’s! Although her great-great-grandmother was not in all the images, it was a gift beyond measure. She could return Miss Pru’s to its original grandeur.

“I don’t know what to say,” she told Sarah.

“The response, Lila, is thank you.”

Lila whipped her head around to see Granny coming in the side gate from the driveway. How long had she been there, listening to her and Sarah?

Long enough, she decided, when she saw the guarded look in her granny’s eyes.

Nobody said anything for several seconds, and then Sarah stood to face her mother-in-law. They stared at each other, two feet between them, but Lila figured it could have been miles. Neither moved.

“I’m going to go inside. Let you two talk.” She got up and scooped Miss Pru’s album under her arm. As she closed the sliding glass door behind her, she saw Granny take a seat at the table with Sarah following suit.

Lesson Number Twenty-Two
—

Take your time. Cherish the day, your children, and the sex you have with your man. All of those can be taken away in a heartbeat, maybe never to return. Savor them. You will find greater satisfaction if you do.

Chapter Twenty-Four

H
ow many hours in a day?
For Jake, it seemed more than the average twenty-four. Monday, the day of his appointment with Dr. Rogers, had come and gone, but Tuesday hung on and on and on.

He feared Wednesday.

“Yo, Jake. We gonna work or what?”

Jake lowered the bit of molding he measured for the ceiling and gave Casler a glare. The man had been an ass all morning and his mood didn’t seem to be improving as the day wore on. Not that Jake could blame him. His mood sucked, too.

“I am working,
Takoda.
” He put a heavy emphasis on his nickname, letting Casler know in a friendly way to lay off.

Casler gave him the finger and returned to working on the electrical requirements for all the damn lights Lila wanted on the ground floor. The room would be brighter than an August day in Texas if she flipped the switch on all the lights down here.

“Oh, my.”

Jake closed his eyes, praying for ten good minutes in the day when he could get some work done. Lately, his ability to do his job had gone to hell.

He swiveled on the ladder to see Lila standing in the middle of the room, almost under Casler’s feet. Casler gave him a look that said, “get your woman out from under me,” but he saw the smile he flashed her when he thought Jake wasn’t looking.

He never had gotten to the bottom of their truce. In the end he figured as long as they weren’t fighting on the job site, he could live with Casler helping her out behind his back.

“I couldn’t stay away. I’m as excited about this project as I was on my very first restoration.” Her smile kicked the voltage in the room up another one hundred watts. Jake felt singed by its warmth.

“It’s on schedule. The staircase will be finished today and we can proceed upstairs once code okays it.”

She clapped her hands and her pure joy forced a smile he couldn’t hold back.

“Nobody’s ever clapped for work I’ve done. This is a first.”

Her eyes met Jake’s. “Well, I’m glad I was your first.”

His gaze went to her breasts and lower, remembering in vivid detail the day his truck had a flat.

The smile slipped off her face at the innuendo. Embarrassed, she glanced up at Casler, who busied himself with the wiring.

Jake saw his back shake with suppressed laughter.

“I, ah, meant the applause,” she said.

Jake crossed to her, stepping over rolled-up drop cloths and cans of stain to be used later on the hardwood restoration. “I know what you meant. Come up here and I’ll show you the moldings and wainscoting we’ve started.”

He guided Lila by her elbow to the front of the store, giving them some distance from everyone else. He tried to ignore the sweet smell of her hair and pointed out what had been accomplished and what remained to be done.

She stared at the walls, a grin the size of Palo Duro Canyon on her lips.

“Something bothering you?” he asked.

She looked into his eyes, confusion bringing her brows together. “Bothering me? What do you—”

His smile cut her sentence short.

“Stop messing with me. I’m in a good mood today and I don’t want anyone to ruin it.”

“I can see that. You win the lottery?”

“I wish,” she fired. “No. I’m just high on life. It’s full of surprises and wonder. You never know what’s around the corner.”

Yeah, full of surprises, at least that much rang true.

But he didn’t want to rain on her parade, so he kept a ridiculous smile on his stupid face.

He didn’t fool her. “You hear me, Jacob Winter? You never know what the next day will bring. That’s all part of living honestly. Accepting the uncertainty.”

Jake bent to examine the wainscoting, leaving Lila to talk to air. He didn’t want to burst her bubble, but his life was a living hell of uncertainty right about now.

She bent down beside him, laying a hand on his knee. Her touch burned through his jeans. “I know you went to see Dr. Rogers. How’d it go?”

He did not want to have this discussion now. “The wainscoting remnants we found behind the paneling gave us a great model to patch the parts too damaged, or just gone. It was expensive, though. At a height of seven feet around the entire ground floor, it cost you a pretty penny.”

“Jake, I know you don’t want to talk about it. Whatever is between us doesn’t matter. I’m your friend. Always have been and always will be.”

“Thanks,” he said curtly, standing and forcing Lila to drop her hand.

She followed suit and they stood quietly, examining the wall.

“It’s beautiful. I’ve got photos now to compare it to and I can choose the color for the inset panels to hopefully come close to the original.”

Jake nodded like he knew what photos she referred to.

“Sarah Gentry came home.”

Her words didn’t register right away. Sarah Gentry? Where had he heard?

“Your mother?” he said, incredulous.

She nodded her head.

“So, she wasn’t dead.”

“Jake!” Her voice cut the silence.

He shrugged. “Sorry. I assumed since she never came home, she probably died. Why would she stay away so long?”

“It’s a long story. But after I saw how much it meant to Granny to have her back, it made it all okay.”

“She just strolled up to the front door and said, ‘Hi, I’m home’?” He couldn’t believe it. And that Lila didn’t freak out about it. No panic. No sweating or hand-wringing.

She
had
changed.

She laughed now. “Actually, that’s very close to what really happened.”

Jake led the way out the door to the bench on the sidewalk. “Keep talking. I’m listening.” He went to the cab of his truck and removed a thermos of lemonade his mother had dropped by earlier.

“She’s been in California most of the time and from what I can gather—she hasn’t told me the whole story yet—she’s lived a really tough life.”

He blew dust out of two plastic cups and poured them each a tall amount of the still-cold drink.

“She eventually got her act together, went to school, and became a therapist. She has her own practice and everything.”

He took a swallow of his lemonade and watched her face. A calm acceptance radiated from her eyes and the set of her shoulders. This was the new Lila, the woman he didn’t know much about. “So is she here to stay?”

“I don’t know. But it doesn’t matter. I don’t think we could shake her now if we tried.”

Jake looked away, at the traffic passing through the town square. Nothing but the model of cars had changed in the scenery over the last thirty years. Lila had come home, but she wasn’t standing still. Her life moved forward. Jake’s didn’t.

“It’s only confirmed what I’ve come to realize this last year, Jake. It’s never too late.”

He’d see about that tomorrow.

“If you’re glad, then I’m glad for you and Barbara. You let me know though if things get a little out of hand over there. I can come and pick you two ladies up and take you to dinner. Or whatever.”

He stood and tossed his cup into one of the city-supplied garbage cans standing sentry outside Lila’s building. He needed to get back inside and back to work, away from his wife’s quiet determination.

One thing at a time. And right now, tomorrow’s doctor visit loomed like a summer storm on the horizon.

L
ila climbed in the passenger seat of Sarah’s green Honda Accord, noticing a faint trace of vanilla. The early-morning heat filtered through the tinted windshield in a dreamy haze and the smell of the cream leather seats and the homey scent made her heart lurch with unexpected happiness.

Back home in Hannington. With family.

“All set?” Sarah asked, closing the driver’s door and starting the ignition. She was just as put together today as she had been the day she stepped onto Granny’s front porch searching for the family she’d left behind.

Sarah’s hair swung softly against the shoulders of her short-sleeve denim shirt. Judging by the perfect and stylish fall of her mother’s mid-length hair, Lila knew she’d paid a pretty penny for the cut. But in L.A., didn’t everyone pay a premium?

“Yep.”

Sarah backed out of Granny’s driveway and headed for Main Street, her brown eyes on the road ahead. Lila could tell by the high set of her shoulders that she was tense. “It’s been some time since I visited Michael’s grave. Please correct me if I take a wrong turn.”

“Oh, right,” Lila said. Sometimes she wished she could forget the way to Greenwood Memorial. Too many people from her life, too many relatives she never got to know, were buried there. Her father. Her grandfather, dead of a heart attack before Lila was born, and a host of great-uncles, some killed in World War II, others after, laid to rest inside the hedged boundaries of the green fields.

When Sarah called her this morning, the last thing Lila expected was for her to ask for company when she visited her father’s grave. It made sense, though. Today was her dad’s birthday. If he had survived his tour in the Middle East, he’d be fifty-five.

The drive took ten minutes, mostly because of the traffic lights on Main. Sarah parked in the paved lot outside the white two-story colonial structure that served as both chapel and business office. Lila hung back a few paces watching Sarah as she stepped to the line dividing the sidewalk from the dark, tar-covered asphalt and stopped, her feet pointing in the direction that would take her to Michael’s marker.

She caught her breath, watching her mother’s silent struggle, and for a moment felt unsure what to do. Should she intervene, lead Sarah into the headstone-marked field, or wait?

Sarah made the decision for her and crossed over onto the sidewalk, walking rapidly through the quiet Spanish oak–lined cemetery.

“Your father and I had a special tradition for his birthday,” she began, her voice husky. “It was never about one day out of the year—we always made a week out of it. I would give him small presents leading up to his actual birthday and finally, on that day, we would celebrate. Breakfast in bed, a leisurely nap in the afternoon, and dinner out.”

“What types of gifts?” she asked Sarah.

“Oh, um, personal, ah, well, I did all of his favorite things. And showered him with attention.”

Did Sarah actually blush? What would make her blush?
Oh
. Lila let the matter drop. She didn’t need to really know anything else about her parents’ sex life.

Sarah smiled and slid a glance Lila’s way. “When he was deployed overseas, I would write letters every day, so he could open them each day preceding his birthday.”

Lila knew the story. Michael Gentry, a Marine, spent two birthdays overseas. The final one came in 1990, months before his death during Desert Storm. Lila had just turned five and hadn’t seen her father in two years.

She couldn’t remember what he looked like other than the photos Granny kept on the walls. She just had an impression of a big man with rough hands who held her close at night before tucking her into bed.

Sarah patted the side of the shoebox under her arm. “I have twenty-five years worth of birthday letters in this box. One hundred seventy-five letters to be exact.”

Lila’s heart clenched involuntarily and tears stung the backs of her eyes. Her mother had been writing to him all these years?

“There is so much I should have done, Lila. I’ve wasted so much time. Days and years I can never recover. Gone. Like Michael.”

Her mother reached across the inches and laid a hesitant arm across Lila’s shoulders. Her touch was light, but sure. Up ahead, she made out her father’s marker, a horizontal monument with an engraved image of a book detailing Michael’s dates of birth and death in bold black letters.

They left the sidewalk and picked their way between headstones with Lila leading the way. She didn’t know how to respond to Sarah with her stories and motherly pats on the back. She wanted to leave her grief and resentment behind and could feel the distance between the two of them lessening every day.

“Tell me about Jake.”

Sarah’s question couldn’t have surprised her more if she said she’d won the Mega Millions lottery.

“Barbara told me a little bit. The two of you married out of high school?”

She didn’t intend to, but she found herself telling Sarah everything. His illness, their separation, her subsequent therapy, and her decision to come home and patch things up with Jake.

“I know you’re scared.” Sarah’s eyes were intelligent and empathetic.
She understood.
“Worried that it might be too late. How do you convince someone to take another chance when so much time has passed?”

“Well, crap. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?” Lila shook her head, sighing. Yes, she and Sarah had a lot in common.

“So tell me, Dr. Gentry, what’s your game plan? I think I might need to compare notes with you.”