“I’m so pleased you could accept our invitation,” Mary Berger, the center’s social director, said as she approached Olivia. “We’re looking forward to hearing what you have to say.”
Olivia smiled blandly. She was nervous already and hoped she could pull this off without stumbling over her notes and humiliating herself—and her mother—in the process.
“Did you want our guest of honor to sit with you?” Mary asked Charlotte. She leaned close to Olivia and said in a low voice, “Your mother tends to want speakers she knows to sit with her and her friends instead of at the head table.”
Olivia recalled that Jack Griffin had spoken to the seniors last year, and apparently her mother had captured him for herself. She’d paid the price, however, when Jack had convinced Charlotte to contribute to the weekly Seniors’ Page for The Cedar Cove Chronicle.
“Mom? Would you like me to sit with you and Laura and the others?” Olivia asked.
Charlotte stiffened and her chin came up as though the question offended her. “I think you should be at the head table.”
“I do, too,” Mary said primly. With that, she turned and walked smartly in the direction of the stage. Olivia was about to follow when Charlotte caught her by the arm.
“Get your dessert early,” she said in a loud whisper.
“Dessert?”
“If you don’t get it right away, everything’ll be gone by the time we line up for the buffet. So we help ourselves to dessert first. That’s just the way we do things here. I don’t approve, mind you, but no one cares what I think about it.”
“All right, Mom,” she whispered back.
Mary showed her to her seat at the head table, and Olivia reached for her dessert plate as instructed by her mother. The food tables offered a variety that was truly impressive. She chose a piece of lemon sponge cake and returned to her seat just as Mary was about to say a few words of welcome. The social director of the Senior Center made a small huffy sound as Charlotte walked past.
“Your mother might not approve of the practice, but it doesn’t stop her from indulging, does it?” Mary said, leaning down from the podium.
“She knows that if she doesn’t get her dessert beforehand, there won’t be anything left,” Olivia said calmly, setting her piece of lemon sponge cake next to her empty plate.
Olivia tried not to smile. In many ways, her mother was a rebel, but a much-loved one. There were days Charlotte drove her crazy, yet at the same time Olivia deeply admired her. Charlotte was fully involved in life; she engaged in plenty of creative activities and had a genuine commitment to the welfare of others. Twenty-five years from now, Olivia hoped to be just like her. The fact that the indefatigable Charlotte seemed to be losing energy distressed everyone in the family, and Olivia resolved to talk to her about seeing the doctor.
As the seniors closest to the wall left their tables to form a long line at the buffet table, Olivia saw Justine and Seth at the back of the room. Her daughter and son-in-law had come to hear her speech. Charlotte got to the newlyweds first, and quickly escorted them to her table. Olivia watched as her mother introduced the young couple to her friends, who were obviously enchanted, especially by Seth. Soon space was cleared next to Charlotte, and they both sat down. Laura urged Seth to his feet a moment later, escorting him to the buffet table to fill plates for himself and his wife.
Justine and Seth weren’t the only surprise visitors. Olivia saw Jack slip into the back of the room just as she stepped up to the podium to give her talk. Pausing when she noticed him, she was encouraged by his broad smile and his wink. Smiling too, she launched into her speech—which was about the creativity of older people and how much they contributed to society.
Afterward, Olivia couldn’t remember a word of it, but apparently she’d made sense because there was a nice, appreciative round of applause when she finished. Mary announced that Bob Beldon, the proprietor of the Thyme and Tide B and B, would be the February speaker, made a few other “housekeeping” announcements, and the meeting was over. To Olivia’s astonishment, a small crowd swarmed toward the head table to thank her for coming.
Charlotte hurried around the table and stood next to Olivia, clutching her arm, telling anyone and everyone that Olivia was her daughter—as if this was news! Mary had announced the fact earlier, but apparently that didn’t satisfy her mother.
Justine and Seth waited until her admirers had drifted off. “You sounded really good, Mom,” Justine said. “I understand why Grandma’s so proud of you.”
This was quite a compliment coming from her daughter. For a moment, Olivia was too overwhelmed to speak. Her relationship with Justine wasn’t always easy, although God knew she tried. The most difficult aspect of being a parent to an adult child was holding one’s tongue, she’d discovered. “It was wonderful of you and Seth to be here.”
Seth, her son-in-law, stood a head taller than everyone else in the room. “Great job, Olivia,” he said with a respectful nod.
“We came by to ask you to dinner tonight,” Justine told her, “And I’m cooking.”
This was the first invitation she’d received from her daughter, and Olivia didn’t know quite what to make of it. “Thank you. I’d enjoy that.” Then, because she thought—and hoped—there might be more to this invitation than met the eye, she asked, “Any special reason?”
Seth chuckled. “Don’t worry, we aren’t going to ask for a loan or anything.”
“Trust me, I’m not worried. Just…curious.” She was thrilled to see her daughter this happy. Justine looked more at peace with herself than she had in years, and it was clear to Olivia that this marriage had brought her daughter contentment. She didn’t know what had happened to Warren Saget, but he was apparently out of her life. That certainly didn’t hurt Olivia’s feelings any.
“Then you’ll come?”
“Of course.”
As Charlotte escorted her to the door, she said, “Laura and I are going to take a trip out to the Silverdale yarn store this afternoon.” Charlotte needed more yarn about as much as the desert needed more sand, but Olivia didn’t say so. If buying yarn of every weight and color made her mother happy, Olivia could only approve.
“I’ll walk you to your car,” Jack said, coming up behind her. “Hello, Charlotte.” He kissed Olivia’s mother on the cheek, then placed his arm around Olivia’s shoulders. “Excellent speech. I took lots of notes.”
“Jack!” she cried. “You’re not going to put anything about this in the paper, are you?”
“Sure I am.”
“No, you’re not,” Charlotte said sternly, shocking them both. “I am. Olivia is my daughter and I write the Seniors’ Page. She spoke at the Senior Center, so don’t traipse on my territory. I don’t care if you are the editor, this story is mine.”
“Okay, okay.” Jack raised both hands in mock surrender, but his eyes were twinkling.
Jack kept his arm around her shoulder as they walked outside. “That wasn’t so bad, now was it?”
“Yes, it was,” Olivia said, “but I survived.”
Jack checked his watch and grimaced. “I’m late to report on a City Council meeting. I’ll call you, okay?”
“Yes, please do.”
He kissed her and it was more than just a short kiss of farewell. He was saying he missed her, missed their Tuesday-night dinner dates. She told him she did, too. Amazing how much a single kiss could say.
They parted, and Jack reluctantly turned and hurried across the street to his battered car. Olivia hated to see him go. Sighing, she returned to the courthouse for her afternoon session.
By that evening, as she drove to Justine and Seth’s apartment, Olivia had begun to wonder again about the reason for this unexpected invitation. Would there be an announcement?
Her daughter answered the door, looking so radiantly happy that it was all Olivia could do not to stare. She’d only been to the apartment one previous time, when it’d been filled with gifts from the wedding reception and boxes were
scattered every which way. Her daughter had done a wonderful job of incorporating Seth’s things into her utterly feminine home, making it his home, too.
Seth brought out a bottle of sparkling wine while Justine hung up Olivia’s coat.
“Are we celebrating something?” Olivia asked, sitting on a delicate chair with petit point upholstery.
“We have news,” Justine said, smiling warmly at her husband.
Seth set the wine bottle on the counter and then sank down on the sofa next to Justine. “When I returned from fishing this last time, Justine and I decided we didn’t want to spend half the year apart.”
“It’s just too hard on both of us,” Justine added.
This was their news?
“You’re giving up fishing?” Olivia asked. It was in Seth’s blood. The Gunderson family had a long history as fishermen, dating back four or five generations.
“Seth and I are buying a restaurant,” Justine announced. “The Captain’s Galley has been for sale for a couple of months and we made an offer, which the owner has accepted.”
Okay, this wasn’t exactly what Olivia had hoped, but it wasn’t bad. “That’s great!”
“We haven’t decided on a new name yet,” Justine said. “But we’re very excited.” She glanced at her husband and he reached for her hand.
Olivia relaxed. “I’m thrilled for you. It’s going to be a lot of hard work, but you already know that.”
“Seth’s been saving for years for something like this.” Again her daughter looked proudly at her husband. “I’ll keep my job for now, but eventually I’ll be working at the restaurant, too.”
“Are you keeping the current staff or hiring new people?” Olivia asked, wondering about Cecilia Randall, who worked as a part-time hostess at The Captain’s Galley.
“We don’t know any of the staff yet,” Seth told her. “This is still very new. In fact, we just found out that our offer had been accepted an hour ago.”
“Actually, we invited you to dinner before we heard from the real estate broker.”
“Oh? You mean there’s more?”
“Mama,” Justine said, leaning forward and gripping both of Olivia’s hands.
Her daughter only called her that when she was feeling very emotional; Olivia hadn’t heard it in years. Justine’s beautiful blue eyes filled with tears as she smiled at Olivia. “Seth and I are pregnant.”
Olivia let out a cry of sheer happiness and leaped to her feet. Justine and Seth stood, too, and Olivia wrapped her arms around them as tears of joy streamed down her cheeks. This was the news she’d come to hear.
Cliff Harding sat with his long legs stretched out, staring at the television set. The sitcom bored him, but he didn’t blame the writing or the acting. He’d been restless all day.
Hell of a way to spend a Friday night. What he really wanted to do was see Grace. He’d purposely not talked to her since shortly before Christmas. He was tired of always being the one to contact her; this time, he decided, she’d have to call him. Ten days into the New Year felt more like ten lifetimes, and his resolve was weakening. He’d told her he was a patient man but that was stretching the truth. He could be patient. He didn’t like it, though, not one damn bit.
Maybe she was right and he should think about seeing other women. The problem was, no one interested him half as much as Grace. He liked everything about her. Her smile, her laugh, the gentle way she had with children and animals. She wasn’t conventionally beautiful, but she possessed beauty in abundance. He liked her salt-and-pepper hair and approved of the shorter cut, preferring it to the longer style she’d worn in the family photograph. Although she’d obviously aged since then, the years had only added depth and maturity.
Cliff believed in the importance of loyalty—a belief his divorce had confirmed—and he didn’t want to be with a woman who could easily turn her back on a thirty-five year marriage. But it was now nine months since Dan’s disappearance, and from all the evidence, the choice to leave had been his.
Everything he’d heard pointed to the fact that Grace’s ex was involved with another woman. The afternoon Grace spent on his ranch, she’d told him a little about those early weeks after Dan had vanished. When she described finding out about a ring he’d charged at a jewelry store, she’d grown tearful. Apparently Dan had bought a ring on their VISA bill. His last paycheck covered the amount of the purchase, and that had been mailed to Grace from his employer.
What hurt Grace was the fact that other than the plain gold band he’d given her on their wedding day, Dan had never purchased her a ring. It seemed he’d bought one for another woman, though, and that had cut Grace to the quick.
Walking into his office, Cliff reached for a novel, the latest thriller by an author he particularly enjoyed. But even before he went back into the living room and opened the book, he knew it was useless. His mind was on Grace, not the mindless entertainment of a television sit-com, or even the involved plot of a murder mystery.
Christmas week was the last time he’d seen her. Again, it had been at his own instigation. After the trip to the ranch, she’d written him a brief note. Three lines. A simple thank-you, and yet he’d read that card over and over, looking for some secret message, some encouragement.
He waited until just before Christmas, then dropped in at the Cedar Cove Library with a gift. It was nothing creative or terribly expensive. Just a token gift so she’d known he’d been thinking about her. From her brief note, he saw that she’d used a fountain pen. He preferred fountain pens himself. He’d picked up one of his favorite brands, had the store wrap it and then promptly delivered it to her at the library. She’d seemed surprised and grateful but also embarrassed because she didn’t have anything for him.
She couldn’t afford it, he realized. Her ex-husband’s disappearance had obviously created financial difficulties; she’d worked with a budget that included two incomes and now there was only one. Their conversation was brief, the day he saw her at the library, but he could easily read between the lines. This was a difficult Christmas for her, and not only because it was the first since her divorce became final.
Cliff harbored a secret hope that she’d invite him to Christmas dinner, but she was joining her youngest daughter for the holiday. He’d hoped she might call him on New Year’s Eve, perhaps suggest meeting for a drink. But that hadn’t happened, either.
Now Cliff was beginning to doubt himself—and Grace. She might never recover from Dan’s disappearance. Even if they got involved, he feared she’d always be looking over her shoulder for Dan. Perhaps the best thing to do was walk away and forget he’d ever met her.
It should be easy. They’d never kissed. Okay, once on the cheek. They’d held hands a couple of times, but that was about as sensual as it got. Cliff was more man than saint, and whenever they were together the temptation to hold and kiss her, really kiss her, grew more potent.
The phone rang, startling him out of his reverie. He’d never been one for extended telephone conversations. His gruff, unfriendly voice usually turned telemarketers away, which he considered a definite bonus.
“Harding,” he barked.
No one spoke, and Cliff had started to hang up when he heard Grace’s tentative greeting. He jerked the phone back to his ear.
“Grace?”
“Hello, Cliff. I hope you don’t mind me phoning you out of the blue like this.”
“Hello, Grace.” He kept his voice just a little impatient.
“I wanted to thank you for the fountain pen. I really like the way it writes.”
His problem, Cliff decided, was that he was too eager, which was why he’d come up with his wait-and-see strategy, why he hadn’t been in touch since Christmas. If he was a bit more standoffish, she might appreciate him more, seek out his company. Apparently, his plan had worked—although only seconds earlier he was ready to forget the entire relationship. Cool Hand Cliff, that was him.
“When you came by the library, you suggested the two of us might
go out for dinner one night.”
“Did I?” he asked casually, although he knew very well that he had.
“Yes.” She sounded pretty certain of herself. “I was thinking I’d take you up on that offer—if you’re still interested.”
He was interested, all right, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to pretend otherwise. “When?”
“I…I don’t know. What’s a good time for you?”
“Let me check my calendar.” He ruffled through the pages of his book, as though he had to consult a full social calendar. “How about tomorrow night? Seven?”
She sighed, clearly relieved. “That would be perfect.”
All day Saturday, Cliff was in a state of nervous anticipaton. Saturday night, Cliff had shaved, showered and dressed by six. He could leave now, but in evening traffic it only took about fifteen minutes to get from his ranch to her house. He’d rather arrive early, though, than hang around at home.
As it was, even after taking his time, he got there a whole half hour ahead of schedule, which he was afraid might give Grace the wrong message. Instead, he was pleasantly surprised to discover that she seemed equally nervous.
“I thought we’d drive into Tacoma,” he said. He wanted Grace to feel comfortable, and he wasn’t sure that would be possible if she was constantly worried about who might see the two of them together. “There’s a nice Italian place I’m fond of on the other side of the bride.” The Narrows separated the Kitsap Peninsula from Tacoma and the bridge linked the two communities.
“I love Italian food.”
Cliff had called ahead and reserved a corner table. The drive was relaxed, conversation alternating with companionable silence. Their meal took nearly two hours as they lingered first over dinner and wine and then coffee and dessert. Cliff wasn’t eager to leave, but the restaurant was filling up and it didn’t seem right to hold on to the table all night.
Returning to Cedar Cove, they approached the Narrows Bridge. As traffic slowed, Cliff glanced at Grace and saw she’d leaned her head against the back of the seat, her eyes closed.
Debbie Macomber's Cedar Cove Series Page 46
