The Carson Springs Trilogy: Stranger in Paradise, Taste of Honey, and Wish Come True (36 page)

Tom cast her a modest look. “As far as I’m concerned, the slate’s been wiped clean. That was the best meal I’ve had in months.”

She smiled. “You won’t get very far as a lawyer talking that way.”

They were making their way along the fern-lined path that wound through deep shade to the parking area below, taking their time, in no particular hurry to get back to their respective lives. Along narrower paths that branched off from the main one, cedar-shingled guest cabins were tucked discreetly amid the trees, barely visible in places. In areas where sunlight had found its way through the dense canopy overhead, flowerbeds lush with bloom—bleeding heart, lady’s slipper, trillium, gentian—made her think of her own garden, and how much she looked forward to watching it grow.

“Speaking of which, I had a word with Mr. Roellinger the other day,” Tom said. “He loves the house and said to tell you that anytime you get homesick and want to stop in for a visit, you’re more than welcome.”

“Somehow I don’t see that happening.” She braced herself for a proprietary twinge, but none came. “I’m afraid the poor man doesn’t stand a chance against Lupe, though. She’ll be over there every chance she gets.”

“I thought she was retiring.”

“Tell
her
that.”

“What about you? Ever think about going back to work one day?”

She shrugged. “Maybe. When the baby’s a little older. In the meantime, I’m perfectly happy with the way things are.”

He shot her a sidelong glance. “It doesn’t get lonely?”

“Max is all the company I need right now.” These past weeks she’d grown truly fond of Tom’s dog. She’d be sorry to see him go.

As if he’d read her mind, Tom said, “Keep him as long as you like. I wouldn’t sleep nights, thinking of you all alone out there.”.

His eyes, behind their square black frames, were filled with concern, his broad shoulders angled downward as if in a conscious effort to keep from towering over her. Sam felt a twinge of regret. Why Ian? Why couldn’t she have fallen in love with Tom Kemp instead?

In the parking lot she kissed his cheek before climbing into her car. “Honestly, Tom. I really
couldn’t
have managed without you.”

“What are friends for?”

“I can see now why Martin depended on you so much.”

“We looked out for each other,” he said, loyal to his partner even in death.

She glanced in the rearview mirror as she was pulling out. Tom was standing where she’d left him, watching her go, his expression reminding her of how Max looked whenever she headed for the door. Like his dog, Tom wouldn’t be endlessly available. One day he’d have better things to do than wait for an invitation that might never come.

She was surprised to find a lump in her throat.

The following day, Gerry arrived on schedule to help paint the nursery. Saturdays were normally reserved for her children, so Sam was especially appreciative, until it became clear her friend was on a self-appointed mission that had less to do with lending a hand than doling out a piece of her mind.

They’d barely started on the trim, a pale gold that would go nicely with the yellowish cream for the walls, when Gerry said offhandedly, “I don’t know why you didn’t ask Ian’s opinion. He’s the artist, after all.”

“This isn’t exactly the Sistine Chapel,” Sam said.

Gerry glanced at the ceiling. “Now that you mention it, a cherub or two wouldn’t hurt.”

“Very funny.”

“I wasn’t trying to be.” Gerry settled back on her heels. In pleated khaki trousers, with a brightly patterned scarf knotted about her head, she was a glamorous Ethel Mertz, with a mouth to match. “Sam, you can’t go on acting like he doesn’t exist. Whatever cockamamy arrangement you two come up with, he’s still the father of this child.”

Sam dabbed furiously at the sill. “How do you know we haven’t discussed it?”

“I’m your oldest and, I hope, dearest friend.” Gerry was as relentless as the fly bumping against the windowpane. “Even if you didn’t look the way you do, I’d know.”

“Naturally, the way I look couldn’t have anything to do with being pregnant.”

“Pregnant, and blooming like a rose. That’s not what I meant.” Gerry set her brush aside, and rose to her feet with a crackling of joints. “You’re miserable, and you know it.”

“As a matter of fact, I’ve never been happier.” Sam glared at her until a dribble of paint working its way down between her knuckles prompted her to lower her brush.

“Like you were with Martin?”

Sam looked at Gerry standing in a pane of sunlight, a headline from one of the newspapers spread over the floor spooling out from under her heel:
FEDS JOIN SEARCH FOR KILLER
. Old friends, she thought, could be dangerous, too. They knew too much.

“That’s hitting below the belt,” she said.

“Not when it’s for your own good.” Gerry walked over and pried the brush from her hand, propping it on the can. “It’s one thing to
want
to be happy,” she said, “another to make believe you are when you’re not. Believe me, I’m a Purple Heart veteran of that war. If I had a dollar for every time I should have shot my mouth off at Mike, I wouldn’t have to work for a living.”

Sam recalled her friend’s divorce, how messy it had been. But Gerry wasn’t the type to wallow in self-pity. The only time Sam had seen her cry,
really
cry, was that terrible year after leaving the convent. A time Gerry hardly ever talked about, and Sam knew enough not to bring up.

“Okay, so I’m not
blissfully
happy,” she admitted. “But I’m not exactly miserable, either. I’m”—she searched for the word—“hanging in there.”

Max wandered into the room just then, his plumed orange tail that acted like a magnet for every burr and foxtail within a five-mile radius wagging expectantly. He stood there looking at her until Sam patted his head. It wasn’t until she noticed the feathery streak of paint on the wall behind him that she shooed him out into the hall.

When she turned back, her friend was standing by the window looking out. Sunlight streamed around her like in an illustrated Bible story: the Blessed Virgin Mary, infinitely knowing and wise.

“Why does it always seem nobler to soldier on? Mother Courage was probably a bitter old harpy with a bug up her ass.” Gerry turned to eye Sam with fond exasperation, a smudge of yellow paint on one cheek. “So what if Ian’s younger and knows nothing about babies? That didn’t stop Wes from marrying Alice—or either of us from having kids.”

“Can we please not discuss this?” Sam made it clear from her tone that it wasn’t a request. “I’ve had about all I can take.”

“Not from me, you haven’t.” Gerry stepped away from the window, not the Blessed Virgin but a gypsy with fierce eyes and corkscrews of black hair trailing from her scarf. “Remember the promise we made to each other when we were kids? We swore we’d never let each other get away with something we knew was wrong.”

“We’re not sixteen anymore,” Sam said. “And since you brought it up, I don’t recall your taking my advice when I begged you not to go into the convent.”

“I should have listened.”

“Nobody could tell you anything in those days.”

“I
was
pretty full of myself, wasn’t I?” Gerry shook her head at the memory. “Not exactly ideal qualifications for a nun. It’s a miracle I made it to my final vows. Just think what would have happened if I’d actually gone through with it instead of—” She broke off abruptly with a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“Listen to me, going on about myself when it’s
you
we’re discussing.”

“Were we? I thought the subject was closed.” Sam retrieved her brush.

Minutes later she looked up to find her friend staring out the window, wearing an odd, faraway look. When Gerry spoke, it was in a soft, almost dreamy voice. “Do you know what I regret the most? That I didn’t hold her. Just once…before they took her away.”

Sam felt a light chill tiptoe up her spine. They hadn’t spoken of it in years, but she didn’t have to ask what her friend was referring to. “I didn’t know it was still bothering you,” she said gently.

Gerry turned to her with a look that in the blink of an eye revealed everything. The heartbreak she’d kept hidden all these years, the tears shed into her pillow at night, the endless wondering about an infant daughter now grown.

“It never goes away,” she said.

“Have you thought about looking for her?”

“No.” Gerry spoke firmly.

“Are you afraid she’d want to know about her father?”

“Partly. If the diocese were ever to find out…” Gerry broke off with a sigh. “Mostly, though, it’s just…well, it wouldn’t be fair to either of us, stirring all that up again.”

“What if she comes looking for you someday?”

“I’ll cross that bridge if and when I get to it.” Gerry hugged herself, trembling a little.

“You still haven’t told the kids?” Andie would understand, she thought. Sam wasn’t so sure about eleven-year-old Justin.

“What for? They’d only ask questions I couldn’t answer.”

“For your own sake then.”

“Like penance, you mean?” Gerry shot her a smile that was painful to look at, like the jagged neck of a bottle that moments before had been whole. “Hail Mary, full of grace…twenty-eight years ago I gave up my child and now I want her back?”

Sam caught the glint of tears, and regretted having snapped at her earlier. “I just hope,” she said, walking over and laying a hand on her arm, “I was as good a friend to you then as you are to me now.”

Gerry laughed a little, thumbing away her tears. “Does that mean I’m forgiven for butting in?”

“Not quite.” Sam smiled. “But I’m working on it.”

Gerry bent to pick up her brush, regarding it thoughtfully. “While you’re working on it there’s something else I’d like to know—why yellow? In a few weeks, you’ll know whether it’s going to be a boy or a girl.” She was referring, of course, to the results of the amniocentesis.

“I asked Inez not to tell me the sex.”

Gerry looked at her in disbelief. “How will you be able to stand not knowing?”

“I didn’t know with the girls.”

“You didn’t have a choice back then.”

“Maybe those days were better in some ways.”

“We didn’t have Huggies then. Or proper car seats.”

Sam shook her head at the memory. “Can you believe it? Those awful things that hooked over the back of the seat. It’s a wonder more babies weren’t killed.” She looked out the window, where the sun shone over freshly turned earth in which the newly planted perennials thrived. A garden was something she understood, something she could cope with. She sighed. “It’s been so long, I feel like Rip Van Winkle.”

“Watch it,” Gerry growled.

Sam laughed. “
You’re
not having a baby.”

“Thank the Lord Jesus.” Gerry simultaneously rolled her eyes and made the sign of the cross. “Which doesn’t change the fact that I fully intend to support you any way I can.”

“I could use a Lamaze coach.” Sam hadn’t thought of it until now, but it occurred to her that Gerry would be the ideal candidate: one who wouldn’t cut her any slack.

“I’d be honored.” Her friend gave a little curtsy.

Sam waited for her to bring up Ian, but for once Gerry kept her thoughts to herself. That ought to have satisfied her, but somehow it didn’t. For without an argument there was no one to reason with, no way to rid herself of this yearning. Was she making a mistake? Was the happiness that had eluded her with Martin just within reach? The wrong size and shape and brand, but happiness all the same. Would she wake up one day, gray haired with a child in tow, to find she’d missed the boat? The thought was terrifying.

“D
O YOU THINK
they’ll ever catch him?”

“I read somewhere that ten percent of all homicides go unsolved.” Laura held herself braced as they approached a sharp bend in the road. “Ease up now. Remember what I told you.”

Finch tightened her grip on the wheel. “Slow going into a curve, speed up going out.”

“Not
speed.
Accelerate. There’s a difference.”

The girl frowned in concentration. This was only her third driving lesson, and though she was as apt a pupil as on horseback, it was still nerve-racking. They were sticking to back roads until Laura could figure out what to do about a learner’s permit.

“I heard Melodie Wycoff say they found some evidence.” Finch eased nicely into the bend, and the old Truesdale place, ragged and unkempt, swung into view. An equally dejected-looking mutt sat by the mailbox canting at a drunken angle.

Laura shuddered at the memory.
Melodie and her big mouth,
she thought. “I thought that kind of thing was supposed to be confidential.”

“The shoe prints around the body, for one thing—she says they’re too small to have been made by a man.” They passed a boarded-up fruit stand with a strawberry field beyond.

“I guess that rules out Hector.”

“But not me.” Finch shot her an uneasy glance.

Laura considered her answer carefully. It wouldn’t do to make light of Finch’s concerns. Being paranoid wasn’t going to help, either. “I think,” she said, “if the police were looking for you, they’d have caught up with you by now. Besides, you have an alibi. You were with Maude.”

“For all they know, I might’ve sneaked off while she was asleep.” Finch’s knuckles were white against the wheel.

“Aren’t we getting a little ahead of ourselves? If the killer
is
a woman, which I’m not convinced is the case, that would leave about nine thousand other suspects. As far as anyone knows it could be
me.
Or Anna Vincenzi. Or even Maude.”

They were nearing a fork, where the road branched off in the direction of Dos Palmas and on the left, toward Laura’s: two miles of rutted blacktop and sagging fences, with the occasional holographic flash of eyes at night to remind you of just how far out in the boonies you were.

“I just wish they’d catch him,” Finch said. “Or her.”

Laura thought of the mystery blonde she’d glimpsed outside the barn that day. She’d given a statement to the police, but as far as she knew nothing had come of it. Could the woman be connected with the murder?