by Cara Colter
“Now, now,” Marion said, coming up to her and putting an arm around her waist. “None of that. It’s time, and you’re going to be fine.”
“I’m glad someone thinks so.” Audrey leaned her head down on top of Marion’s.
The woman was maybe five feet tall but a dynamo nonetheless.
“How can I ever thank you,” Audrey began, choking up.
“No. I mean it. Don’t. This is a happy house. I told you that when you moved in, and it’s certainly not going to change now that you’re moving out. I have adored having you. I will be rooting for you all the way. You’re certainly welcome to call and come visit. In fact, I’ll be hurt if you don’t. But it’s time to push you out of the nest, my dear. On with your life. I’m very wise about these things, you know? And I’m always right. You’re ready.”
Audrey stood up, nodded and worked hard not to cry.
“I didn’t think anyone in the world would have given me another chance, except you—”
“No. I mean it. Don’t. If you want to pay me back, you find someone else to help get back on their feet. That’s the thanks I’m interested in.”
“All right. I will,” she promised, looking around longingly at the pretty iron bed with the pink flowery quilt, the lace curtains, tiny sitting area and a kitchenette the size of a broom closet. Her sanctuary in her time of need. “I’m going to miss this place, too. So much.”
Marion beamed at her. “You’re ready to go, my dear. And you never told me. What did you think of Simon?”
“Well, he’s not sixty and balding.”
Marion whole body shook because she laughed so hard. “How in the world did you get the impression Simon Collier was sixty and balding?”
“I don’t know. I mean, you talked about how successful he is and that the man is rich. I just assumed he wasn’t …”
Ridiculously attractive?
Audrey hoped she wasn’t blushing just thinking about it.
Honestly.
“How old is he?” she asked, because it was the first question that occurred to her, and she didn’t want to even talk about how good the man looked.
“I don’t know. I’ve known him forever. Since he was practically a boy.”
“And has he always been so … demanding?”
“Yes.” Marion nodded. “And always known what he wants and how to get it. In business, I mean.”
Audrey felt a little flutter of panic. “Marion, you’re not trying to fix me up with Simon Collier, are you?”
“No. Of course not—”
“Because a man is the last thing I want or need in my life.”
“I know,” Marion said with an odd look in her eyes that made Audrey nervous. “Now, is this all you brought?”
Audrey nodded, picking up the overnight bag and the handle of her rolling suitcase.
When they got outside, Marion shut the door and said, “Don’t look back. Only forward. It’s the only way to get to where you want to go.”
And Audrey was ready to cry again. “I saw Andie today.”
“Really?” She knew how much this meant to Audrey.
Audrey started down the little path that led around the side of the house and to her car out front, with Marion following. “A few blocks from Simon’s. She was furious when I told her I’d be living and working nearby.”
“Well, you knew she’d likely be upset about that. It’s not a surprise, and it’s not a setback. It just proves you were right in thinking if you could be close, you’d run into your daughter. Give it time. You’ll wear her down.”
“Oh, I hope so. I don’t know what else to do.”
Marion rolled her eyes, then grinned. “She’s a teenage girl. They change their minds every thirty seconds, and they find drama in the smallest of things.”
“It was no small thing that I did.”
“I know, but you’re still her mother. A girl her age needs her mother, and it’s never too soon to learn how important forgiveness is,” Marion insisted. “I’m right about this. And I’m right about you, too. Try to believe me, if you can’t believe in yourself just yet.”
“I will,” Audrey promised.
She got to the car, hefted the suitcase into the backseat, then the shoulder bag. Her cell phone rang.
“It’s Richard.” Audrey made a face when she saw the number.
“Don’t let him bully you. The man is certainly not blameless in all this.”
Audrey took a breath and answered, “Hello, Richard.”
“What kind of nonsense is this I hear about you moving to Highland Park, Audrey?” He was bellowing, so Marion heard every word, too.
“It’s true. I’ll be living there. I have a job.”
He laughed. “And I can just imagine what you could do to earn your keep in a place like Highland Park.”
Audrey saw red but held her tongue. The conversation wasn’t anything unexpected. Andie didn’t want her there. She wanted Richard to ask her not to come back.
She listened as long as she could stand to, then simply said, “Tell her I’m sorry, but I’m staying.”
Richard called her selfish, irresponsible and a bad mother. He was still yelling when she hung up on him.
Marion stood in front of her, looking sad and angry and yet calm as could be. Put Marion in the midst of the worst of emotional storms, and she’d look just like this, as if she was saying to you, Okay, let’s think about how you can handle this without doing anything stupid.
“You heard him. Andie begged him to tell me to go away.”
Marion nodded, wise and confident in a way Audrey thought she could never, ever be again, if she ever had been that sure of herself in her life.
“The surprise is that Richard actually took the time to listen to her and then did what she asked,” she told Marion.
“I was thinking the same thing myself,” Marion said, putting a hand over Audrey’s and holding on to her. “And I’ll tell you a little secret, just because it might make you feel a bit better. If you ever wanted him to, Simon could crush your ex-husband with his little pinkie. Businesswise, I mean. If the urge to have Richard destroyed just happened to overtake you and couldn’t be resisted.”
Audrey laughed, liking the idea of anyone being able to crush Richard.
“If our daughter wasn’t headed to college in a year and a half, I’d consider it,” Audrey said, trying to hang on to her resolve to do this. “What do I do now?”
“You trust yourself, Audrey. Trust that you know what you’re doing, what’s important to you. Your daughter. And that you’re working to make things right with her.”
Audrey leaned down and hugged Marion. “How did you get to be so smart?”
“I made a ton of spectacular mistakes of my own. The trick is learning from them, which you’ve done.” Marion let her go, giving her a big grin. “Now, go get your daughter back.”
Audrey found Simon Collier’s house quiet and dark as she pulled into the driveway and parked at the bottom of the steps that led to her quarters. She was unloading the first box when the front door opened. Ms. Bee looked out, and Tink barked like crazy.
“Early, I see,” Ms. Bee said, as if she were both surprised and, possibly, actually pleased by that particular trait—someone arriving early for work.
“You can let the dog out. I’ll take charge of him now,” Audrey told her.
In two seconds flat, Tink shot out the door and across the distance between them, complete joy on his face, as if he were thrilled that she’d returned.
Audrey put the box down and knelt to greet him. He put his front paws on her thighs and practically hurled himself at her chest. She laughed and put her arms around him as he snuggled against her for a moment, then reached up and breathed warm puppy breath on her. Next thing she knew, it felt as if he was trying to wash her entire face with his slightly raspy tongue.
“Okay, okay,” Audrey said. “Thank you, but—”
And then she started to cry.
Tink drew ba
ck, likely tasting her tears. Puzzled, he cocked his head to one side and then started making his crying sound, too.
“I’m fine,” Audrey tried to reassure him. “Or, I will be. I just don’t remember the last time anyone was this happy to see me. You’re very sweet. A little rambunctious, but sweet.”
She fluffed his pretty silvery-black fir and just sat there and soaked up all that happiness that seemed to radiate from him toward her.
Dogs loved lavishly, extravagantly, without holding anything back.
She’d forgotten that in the last few years since her family’s last dog died.
When no one else loved you, a dog still would, which Tink proved by licking her cheek some more.
“Okay.” She pushed him back gently. “This is going to be hard for you to understand, but a lot of people don’t appreciate doggy kisses, Tink. Why don’t you come upstairs with me and check out my new place, okay? We’ll find you someplace to sleep, and tomorrow we’ll go for a nice, long run.”
Twenty minutes later, all her things were in. It was quiet, peaceful even, and the little apartment was all hers. She’d never lived any place that was entirely hers, having gone from her mother’s house to a tiny apartment she’d shared with a girlfriend to Richard’s apartment, then Marion’s cottage.
She was scared but excited.
Curled up on one end of the overstuffed sofa, the dog practically in her lap, she soaked up the quiet, the comfort of the warmth and weight of the dog, and fell asleep without ever making it to her new bed.
Chapter Four
Audrey woke early to messy, doggy kisses, opened her eyes and found herself stretched out on the sofa, the dog next to her licking her face.
“Ugh,” she groaned, having slept on her side on a couch that wasn’t exactly uncomfortable but just not so great on her neck.
Tink gave his little cry, then grinned at her, practically bouncing with excitement as he looked at her as if to say, You’re still here!
Audrey sighed and looked outside to see that it was daylight, but just barely.
“I guess we might as well start our day,” she told Tink. “Give me just a minute and we’ll go running. I promise.”
He slipped off the couch and bounded for the door. She let him out so he could take care of his business, then quickly brushed her teeth, put on her sweats and running shoes and headed for the door.
Tink was waiting for her on the other side of it, grinning like crazy.
“Okay,” Audrey said. “Let’s find out what it takes to wear you out.”
He danced along beside her as she went down the stairs, nearly tripping her twice because he was staying so close, then was beside himself with excitement while she struggled to get his regular collar with the receiver for the electronic fence off and put on a leash and collar they’d use for their run.
He was really puzzled by Audrey’s stretching routine, watching every move with his head cocked to the right, then the left, as if he was trying to understand. She bent over and found him sniffing her hair and trying to lick her face, until she laughed out loud and gently pushed him away.
He came right back.
“Okay, we have a lot to work on,” she told him, mentally making a list. “First, we’re going to run.”
She took off at an easy jog, down the street that took her farther into Simon’s neighborhood, not nearly brave enough to step back into her own. It was cool but not cold with the sun shining down through the trees. They passed a few other joggers, a few other dogs.
Tink, looking as if he could run all day, was just thrilled to be out.
Audrey kept going, waiting for that feeling. People called it a runner’s high, but Audrey didn’t need a high. She wanted to get to the point where she wasn’t thinking about anything at all. To where the need to breathe—and the sound of her own heart thumping strongly, the breeze on her face and the rhythm of her feet hitting the sidewalk—was simply all there was.
It was like reaching a place in her head that no one else could get to, a place where she was perfectly safe from everything, even her own thoughts, her doubts, her fears.
Some people might call it an emptiness and not understand.
But it wasn’t. It was peace.
If she ran far enough and got tired enough, she could finally be at peace.
She found it that morning and didn’t want to let it go, so she ran some more, ran until she got a nasty cramp and had to stop. She collapsed on a bench in front of the ice cream store, Tink limping on the sidewalk at her feet, tongue lolling out, his breathing as fast as hers. Audrey grabbed her calf, groaning as she tried to stretch it without standing up, because her other leg felt like jelly. Tink roused himself enough to make it to the water dish and start lapping, making a huge mess in his enthusiasm for it.
People were starting to make it out onto the streets now. A couple of kids walking to school stopped to pet Tink. Audrey thought she saw a woman she knew from the PTA at Andie’s school but couldn’t tell for sure.
Her cramp finally easing, she stood up gingerly to test it out, see if they could continue on now, then winced as she took a few steps.
“We really outdid ourselves this morning,” she told Tink, who stretched out on the sidewalk looking as if he could happily go to sleep right where he was.
She’d worn a pedometer to keep track of their mileage but hadn’t stopped to look at it until she’d already gone too far.
“I think we’ll have to limp home,” she told the dog. “So, I hope you’re as tired as I am.”
He got wearily to his feet, as if to show that he was.
Trying not to make the muscles in her leg any madder than they already were, she moved slowly and hadn’t gone fifty feet when a car, an old Buick, pulled to the curb beside her and stopped.
A teenage boy, one of three in the car, got out.
Andie’s friend, Jake, Audrey realized.
“Mrs. Graham? Are you all right?”
“Just a cramp, Jake. We’ll be fine.”
He hesitated, then said, “You’re really living around here?”
“Yes, I am,” she said.
“You want to get in? We could make room and take you home.”
“Jake,” the driver called out. “We’ve got to get to school.”
“It’s just a few blocks. We have time,” he told his friend, then looked back at Audrey. “Really. We do.”
She suspected he wanted to talk to her more than anything else and agreed. Jake climbed into the backseat, and she got in front with the dog beside her, sitting on the floor by her feet. Jake introduced her as Andie’s mother, which had his friend, the driver, doing a double take but saying nothing. Audrey gave him directions and thanked them all for the ride.
Jake whistled as they pulled into the driveway of Simon Collier’s house. “Wow. You live here?”
“I’m working here,” Audrey told him as she got out of the car.
Jake got out, too, saying, “She’s really upset that you’re back.”
“I know. I’m sorry about that, but I have to try to make things right between us, Jake.”
He nodded. “I don’t know if she’ll forgive you or not, but … she’s really not very happy living with her father and his girlfriend.”
“I didn’t think she would be,” Audrey said. “But thank you for telling me and for being her friend. And I’m really sorry about all the trouble I caused for you last fall. I had no right to draw you into my mess.”
She’d gotten drunk at a party one night and made a huge scene. Andie, in trying to get her home, called Jake to come and get them both. Jake, who hadn’t even had a license back then, ended up wrecking his uncle’s car early that morning while trying to get an unconscious Audrey to the hospital. Audrey still considered it a miracle none of them had been seriously hurt in the accident.
“My uncle says I made my own choices, and they were all bad. Not in trying to help Andie, but in understanding what I could and couldn’t do. Understanding whe
n I needed help myself.”
“But I’m the one whose behavior put you in a position to have to make those choices that got you into trouble. And for that, I’m sorry.”
He nodded. “I know. We got your letter.”
“Well,” Audrey said. “Thanks for the ride. If you or Andie needs anything, I’m living right there, above the garage. You can come by anytime.”
Not that she thought he would. Still, she was here. She wasn’t leaving.
Jake got in the car and Audrey watched them drive off; then, with her leg muscles still cramped tight, she limped across the driveway toward her apartment.
Audrey was sitting under a tree in the front yard, studying the house, the placement of the big trees and shrubs, the existing planting beds, the fence to one side that belonged to the neighbors, thinking of what to do with what was already there and what to add to it, when her phone rang.
Tink roused himself from his spot sprawled out in the grass beside her, but only long enough to lift his head, see that it was nothing but her cell phone ringing, then gave a contented, tired groan and sank back down into the grass.
Audrey was still laughing at him for how tired and complacent he’d been today, since their run, when she picked up the phone and said, “Hello.”
“Don’t tell me you’re actually enjoying this job,” Simon Collier asked, with astonishment in his voice.
She felt a little tickle of something run through her.
Pleasure?
At the sound of his voice?
Surely not.
Please, not.
“Is it impossible for you to believe I could be enjoying myself?” she asked, hoping that little fizzle of something didn’t come through in her voice.
“I would think it’s at least highly improbable, given the tasks involved. Namely, dealing with a certain unruly creature,” he said.
