Now You See Me

by Kris Fletcher

  For as long as they lived in Comeback Cove, neither she nor the kids would be able to escape. And if she, a grown woman, felt choked by it, then what the hell was it doing to her kids?

  “Oh, my God.” She blushed when she realized she’d said it aloud. There were a couple of titters, but she barely heard them. She was too busy turning to address Jillian.

  “Your Wor— I mean, Mayor McFarlane, and members of the planning board, and all the rest of you. I want to thank you for giving this matter such thorough consideration. If I hadn’t had to fight to have this sale approved, I wouldn’t have had the chance to learn some truths about myself, and about—about some other people. People and history.”

  In the fourth row, Steve McCoy turned white. A couple of other heads ducked. Lyddie could feel the mood shifting from impatience to cold, gripping fear.

  What was it J.T. had said?

  People do stupid things when they’re afraid.

  Steve and the others—they’d been acting out of fear. For twenty-five years they’d been walking around with that secret hanging over them. It might not have impacted their every move, but it had eaten at them. It had to. Otherwise, none of them would have reacted the way they did when J.T. came back to town.

  “Not to worry.” Lyddie shook her head before anyone could panic. “I’m not out to rewrite things that have long been accepted as gospel. A very wise man once told me that the last thing most people want to hear is the truth, and I think—no, I know he was right. About that and a lot of other things.”

  Ruth closed her eyes and rocked in her seat. Iris beamed through her tears and gave Lyddie a thumbs-up. The rest of the audience erupted in a wave of squeaking chairs and rustling papers and fierce whispers that threatened to drown out anything else Lyddie might have wanted to say. That was fine. She could wait.

  But not for much longer.

  Jillian leaned forward. “Lyddie, we need to vote. Is there a point to this?”

  A point? Oh, yeah. Lyddie scanned the faces in front of her and admitted that she was no better than Steve and the others. She’d been acting out of fear, too. Fear of falling in love again, of having her heart broken again. That was the real reason she’d picked J.T. for her fling. It wasn’t just because of the way he filled out those bike shorts, it was because she thought he’d be gone before he could do any damage to her heart.

  Everyone said she was so strong, so brave. It was time she lived up to her reputation.

  “Lydia...”

  “I’m sorry.” Lyddie gathered her papers. “You’ve all been wonderful. I thank you for everything you’ve done and I’m sorry for wasting your time. I just realized that I really, really shouldn’t be here.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  LYDDIE HAD A GOOD head start, and the element of surprise in her favor. So she made it out of Town Hall and inside River Joe’s before Nadine and Iris caught up with her.

  “Are you all right, Lyddie?” Iris patted her arm. “Do you need anything?”

  Nadine, meanwhile, simply rolled her eyes and said, “So you finally got a clue.”

  Lyddie said nothing. She curled up in the love seat by the fireplace with her eyes closed, listening to the women whisper to each other. She really wished they would go away so she could get on with the more important activities ahead of her, but they would need explanations anyway. She might as well get it over with all at once.

  She opened her eyes. “Where’s Ruth? Is she okay?”

  “I’m here.”

  Ruth sounded weak and wobbly as she walked through the door, but at least she was here and on her feet, not sobbing in a corner all alone.

  “You’re going to move.” It wasn’t a question. Nadine grabbed Iris’s hand and dragged her toward the kitchen.

  Lyddie guided Ruth down beside her on the love seat, grasping Ruth’s cold hands tight between her own. “I know this is hard. I know I promised I would stay. But my first duty has to be to the kids, and this isn’t good for them anymore. It was the right thing when we first came, but not now. Now they need to grow up without the pressure of living up to the myth this town has created.”

  “But what on earth is wrong with having a good example?”

  “Ruth, think. Ben got caught defacing a school that bears his father’s name. Tish is stuck with an obsessive teacher. And Sara wants to go live someplace where nobody knows who her father was, where she can be who or what she wants to be.”

  “Sara just wants music lessons.”

  Interesting, that Ruth had no comeback for the other two. “It’s more than the music.”

  “It’s because of him, isn’t it?” The bitterness in Ruth’s voice made it clear that she wasn’t talking about Glenn.

  Lyddie placed her hand on Ruth’s knee. “You probably won’t believe this, not now, but it’s not because of J.T. We need to move no matter what happens with him.”

  The first sob broke through as Ruth crumpled. Lyddie pulled her close, her own tears slipping down her cheeks.

  “We’re not going far,” she whispered. “That, I can definitely say. Not back to Peterborough, but somewhere new. New and close. Maybe Brockville, or Ottawa. That way, if you choose to stay here, we’ll be close enough that visiting is easy.” She drew in her breath. “Or, if you choose to come with us, you could still keep up with everyone here.”

  Ruth raised her head. The cautious hope on her face was enough to break Lyddie’s heart.

  “You—you would want me to come with you?”

  “I want what is best for my kids. That includes their grandmother. And even though you and I have had some...some rough times the past couple of months, I do love you and want you to be happy, too. You belong in our lives. That’s not going to change.”

  “But what about...him?”

  “I don’t know what’s going to happen with J.T. I really don’t.” Her voice faltered. “I would like to think that we might have a chance, because, Ruth, I think I’m in love with him.”

  A small yip came from the kitchen. Ruth looked from the door to Lyddie, then hiccupped while Lyddie giggled.

  “Gotta love a small town,” she whispered to Ruth, who nodded. Lyddie turned toward the kitchen, ready to call to the others to join them, but Ruth raised a hand to stop her first.

  “I have to admit, I have a lot of hard feelings about that—about J.T.,” she said softly. “But if learning to let go of that is the price I have to pay to be with my grandchildren...if you’re still willing to give me a chance...I promise I will try.”

  “He’s a good man. He deserves that.”

  Ruth’s nod was small, but it was still so much more than Lyddie would have believed possible that she couldn’t help smiling. She and Ruth would get through this. They would find their way.

  Another sound from the kitchen made Ruth shake her head. “Iris Delaney, stop trying to pretend you’re not eavesdropping and come on out here. You too, Nadine.”

  “’Bout time,” Nadine said as she sauntered toward them. “I was getting a crick in my neck trying to listen to you two through that door.” Her unblinking stare made Lyddie twitch. “So? Am I out of a job?”

  “Not yet. But you know, I bet you would do really well in the potato-chip business.”

  Nadine nodded slowly before breaking into a grin. “You might be onto something, kiddo.”

  Iris nudged Lyddie aside to hand Ruth a tissue. “Since you know we were listening, there’s no point in beating around the bush. It just so happens that J.T. and I are also looking to settle in, oh, Brockville or Ottawa. Maybe you and I could get a place together. It would make the move that much easier for both of us, and Lyddie and J.T. will need some grandmas handy to take the children for the honeymoon.”

  Ruth’s hands clenched but she managed a smile in Iris’s direction. That was more than Lyddie could dredge up, what with the way her stomach jumped as she thought, once again, of J.T.’s actions at the meeting.

  She needed to see him. Now.

  “Ladies?”
>
  Three sets of beloved eyes turned in her direction.

  “Please don’t be offended, but I need you all to leave. It’s been a heck of a night. I need a few minutes alone. And Iris, could you please track down your son and ask him to meet me here?”

  “Of course.” Iris smiled. “Ruth, let’s talk this over. I think it’s a wonderful plan.”

  “So do I,” Lyddie said. “But could you do it at our place, so Ben won’t be alone much longer? And Ruth, could you pick up Tish on your way home and tell her I don’t know how late I’ll be, but I’ll see her in the morning?”

  Ruth stopped in the midst of gathering her purse and looked at Lyddie. “Do I dare ask if you’ll be home tonight?”

  Lyddie never knew it was possible to be both embarrassed and terrified at the same time, but she seemed to have managed. “I don’t—”

  “Oh, for God’s sake,” Nadine said. “The girl has made sure all the kids are fine, and she invited you to move wherever with them, Ruth. As far as I’m concerned, she can do J.T. on the kitchen table if she wants.” She grabbed Ruth by the arm and dragged her to the exit, turning back for a final wink before the door closed behind them.

  Lyddie grinned despite her butterflies. Nadine had just earned herself a huge end-of-business bonus.

  She sat quietly for a moment, preparing herself. J.T. would be there soon. At least she hoped he would.

  In the meantime...

  “Glenn, honey.” She spoke out loud, knowing he could hear her even in silence, and making it more real for her. “I love you. I know that you know that, better even than I do, probably, but I want to say it again. Just for the record and all.”

  The silence didn’t bother her. She knew that if there was any way for Glenn to keep playing a part in her life, he would.

  “I’m glad I brought the kids here. It hurt so much before, and it was so hard to talk about you with them, that this was the right place to be. I didn’t think I could do it myself. Keep you alive for them, I mean.” She swallowed, brushing away the tears that she didn’t want to stop. “But now...now, you know, I can handle it. It still hurts, and I’m scared to death to start over again, but I know I can do it. You’re still helping. This is right for all of us.”

  She patted the sofa. “I’m taking this with me. I don’t think I’ll ever have the nerve to tell Sara we made her on this, but we’ll always know. And your deer head, and your bed for Ben, and—heck, I’m taking your mother along, Glenn. What more can you ask?”

  Tap, tap, tap.

  She laughed softly, swiped a tear from her cheek.

  “And, hon? If you have any superpowers to help me stop throwing up when I think about being in love again, could you send them my way, please?”

  * * *

  J.T. HAD INDULGED in a fair number of sins in his time, but gambling had never been one of them. Too bad. It might have given him a better idea for calculating the odds that he hadn’t blown his last chance for winning Lyddie.

  He rapped on the door and told himself it was probably a good sign that she had asked to see him. Though it would have been nice if Iris had bothered to give him a clue instead of just telling him to get his behind over here.

  His gut lurched at Lyddie’s approach. She looked nervous. Better than furious, but who could tell?

  She looked him up and down from her side of the screen door, eyes lingering on his shorts. “You changed.”

  If that wasn’t the understatement of the year...

  “Yeah. I’m not the GQ type by nature.”

  “I don’t know. It looked pretty natural on you in the boardroom.”

  “Thanks. I’ll forget about teaching and go into the modeling business.” He decided to go for broke. “They approved the sale.”

  “I figured they had to after your performance.”

  For a moment, he debated giving her the light and easy response. But bantering around the bush wasn’t going to get him what he wanted, which was to be put out of his misery one way or the other.

  “Lyddie, I know you’re probably pissed at me for playing it that way, but I—”

  “Hang on.” She pushed the screen door open. “We’d better do this part in private.”

  Oh, hell.

  He walked in slowly, trying to prolong these last moments when he could believe it would turn out fine.

  “In there.” She pointed to the kitchen.

  He stopped in his tracks. “If you’re planning to knife me, just do it here, okay?”

  Her lips twitched but she merely kept pointing. He sighed. Who was he kidding? He would never be able to resist her commands.

  The kitchen was lit only by the exit sign over the door. He moved cautiously in the darkness, but she grabbed his shoulders and guided him forward.

  “Here,” she said. He bumped his hip against something that felt like the large worktable, then felt the hard wooden stool against his thighs.

  Curiosity nipped at him. Hope followed in its path. She was going to an awful lot of work for someone planning to rake him over the coals.

  “There. Are you settled?”

  “Think so.”

  “Good. Close your eyes.”

  “Lyddie, I already can’t—”

  “Close them.”

  He gripped the edge of the stool. “Okay. Closed.”

  “Good.” A refrigerator opened. Something clinked, metal on metal, before the door closed again.

  “Can I open them yet?”

  “One more minute.” A dull thump as something landed on the table, then the scrape of wood against slate. Something warm bumped his knees.

  “Okay. Open up.”

  When he did, he found just enough light to let him see Lyddie perched directly in front of him, knees-to-knees, the way they’d been the day of the test. The day he figured out he was in love with her.

  “Okay,” she said, sounding a little breathless. “First, it took about half an hour after you walked out of here last week for me to realize what a total idiot I was to get mad at you for not telling me about Glenn. I still wish you had said something, but I understand why you kept quiet. And I am so, so sorry for the things I said. For you to think that the only reason I wanted to be with you was for the shock value, I...”

  “It’s okay.” He longed to cup her face in his hands and thumb away the tears he could hear in her voice, but he didn’t dare. Not yet.

  “A lot has happened the last few days. With Sara, and Ruth, and...and me. I knew that I had screwed up, and that I needed to make some changes, but I wasn’t sure how, or...or anything. When I walked into that meeting tonight, I honestly had no idea how I wanted it to turn out. Though that was probably obvious from the way I stumbled around up there.”

  Holy— Did she mean she had wanted the sale to be denied?

  “Then you got up there, and said your piece, and I...I didn’t know what to think. Part of me couldn’t believe you would do that, that you were almost condemning me to everything I didn’t want.” Her voice dropped. “Then I stopped watching you and started paying attention to Jillian. And I realized that there was a lot more going on than anyone was meant to see.”

  Ah, hell. “Lyddie—”

  “It’s okay. I don’t need to know the details. Here’s the important parts.” She raised his hand, his hopes leaping at her touch and ticked off points on his fingers. “One. No matter what happens with us, I hope Mr. Potato Chip still wants this place, because our sale is off. The kids and I are moving.”

  He jerked and almost slid off the stool. “Lyd—”

  “Two. I’m pretty sure Ruth knows the truth about Glenn, but it’s something that will never be spoken. She deserves that peace of mind. You should know this, because she and your mother are planning to share a place together in Ottawa.”

  “What the hell?”

  “Three. This is the biggest, so pay attention.” She drew in a deep breath. “Remember when you said that people do stupid things when they’re afraid? Well, I was the stupidest o
f all when I said that you couldn’t be in love with me. Because, you see, I’m kind of in love with you, too. And that scared the bejeebers out of me, because, well...when you love someone and you lose them, it—”

  Whatever she had planned to say was lost on him. He reached for her in the dark, hands gliding over her face, into the softness of her hair, and then he was kissing her, finally holding her again, finally feeling her in his arms and thanking God with every fiber of his being that for whatever reason, Lyddie loved him.

  “I love you,” he whispered when he could remember how to speak. “So much.”

  “I love you, too,” she said, and framed his face with her strong hands.

  “What?”

  “I love you,” she repeated. “And I’m sorry for not figuring it out sooner. These days without you have been—”

  “I know. When I came to pick up Ben and you turned away—”

  She placed a finger over his lips. “No more. I won’t turn away again, I promise.”

  “I have to go back to Tucson to get things straightened out. But then we’re coming back.”

  “That’s what your mother said.”

  “Oh, yeah. Right.” His head was spinning. “She and Ruth are really planning to move in together?”

  “So far. But listen, J.T. I can’t spring all this on the kids at once. I think they’re going to be happy to move, but it’s still going to be an adjustment. I mean, I don’t know where you see this going, but I’ll need time to—”

  “I see this going all the way to happily ever after, Lyd.” He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed the palm. “But it’s okay. Like I said before, you set the pace.”

  She sighed and rubbed her cheek against his jaw. “Gladly.”

  For a moment he simply held her, taking in the miracle of Lyddie in his arms again. “I still have the keys to the cottage.”

  “Thank God,” she whispered. “I thought I was going to have to jump you right here on the table.”