Her mother parked behind Allie’s Toyota and got out to survey them in mild surprise. “You’re playing basketball?”
“Yes, and kicking Sean’s butt.” She grinned at him. “Sean, this is my mother, Cheryl Wright. Mom, Sean Kearney.” Thank goodness she remembered his last name.
Her mother walked to them, her hand out. “It’s a pleasure, Sean. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
“Yeah, um, hi.” He looked down at his hand as if checking to be sure it was there, then shook. The screen door banged, and he turned in relief. “There’s Nolan.”
“I see,” Mom murmured.
Allie felt really strange watching these two people size each other up. Mom was her usual stylish self, her dark blond hair cut in a wavy cap, her makeup perfect but not overdone. She wore slacks, an open-weave, elbow-length sweater over a camisole and flat shoes—nothing that should have stood out, but it struck Allie suddenly how attractive her mother was.
Petite, like Allie—the dancer’s body had definitely come from her mom. Why hadn’t she remarried? She’d have only been—Allie had to think—forty-five when they left Dad and Jason behind and moved to Washington. Did she feel so betrayed by Dad’s abandonment she wasn’t interested in trusting a man again?
Like mother, like daughter?
Allie swiveled her gaze to Nolan, who, in his usual jeans and athletic shoes and T-shirt, long-sleeved in deference to the changing weather, stood at the top of the steps, smiling at her mother. Allie realized again that he wasn’t handsome, exactly. Mom wouldn’t think so, anyway. At the moment Allie was very much reminded of his stone man statue. This was a strong man. His dark hair was ruffled, the sleeves of his shirt were pushed up to reveal muscular forearms, and the blue of his eyes seemed more vivid than ever.
“I’m glad you could come, Mrs. Wright.” He sounded warm, as if they were old friends. “Why don’t you come on in? Unless you want to watch the tiebreaker game.”
“Cheryl, please,” Mom said. “Tiebreaker, is it?”
Sean snorted. “I’m going easy on her.”
Allie tilted her head. “You wish.”
Laughing, Mom started up the steps. “I’d be glad to help you instead of refereeing, Nolan.”
Allie was aghast to see her mother disappear into the house with Nolan. Alone. What would they talk about?
“Maybe we should quit,” she said to Sean.
“Not a chance.” He shot the ball from where he was standing, and danced in place when it dropped through the hoop. “Match that!”
Her heart was pounding. She was such an idiot. If only she’d confessed to her mother about telling Sean they’d moved here from Oklahoma. That was her only really big screwup. The others were nothing, easily explained. We moved a lot. That’s all she had to say.
I can’t run after them. Sean wouldn’t understand. Nolan would wonder. I am such an idiot.
She was too rattled. Her shot bounced off the rim.
“R,” Sean declared, snatching the ball midbounce. “Try this one.” He stood with his back to the hoop, jumped and shot as he spun. “Yes!”
Allie missed that one, too, and mumbled a profanity under her breath.
“S. One more chance.”
She matched his next shot, although she’d already realized her quickest way to join Nolan and her mother was to lose. Still, she didn’t want to be obvious, and she did have her pride.
Sean dropped a shot in from near the free-throw line, making her suspicious he was going easy on her. Her answering shot banged off the backboard, rolled around the rim...and fell off.
“Crap,” she declared.
“You did good for a girl.”
She blew a raspberry at him. “I did good for someone who hasn’t touched a basketball in years.”
His smugness suffered a jolt. “Really?”
“Really.” Allie started for the house. “I thought I might have lost it, but I guess not. Maybe it’s like riding a bike.”
“Huh. Maybe.”
Cassie was waiting right inside the screen door, her delight obvious at their approach.
“She’s really bonded with you, hasn’t she?”
“Yeah, she likes Nolan, too, but she sticks with me when I’m home,” he said with satisfaction.
“Maybe she had a boy in her last home.” Allie opened the door and the dog flew out as if she’d been separated from Sean for days, weeks, eons.
Laughing, he crouched and ran his hands over her while she slopped kisses on his face.
“I’m really glad you chose her,” Allie said softly.
Sean looked up at her, his expression earnest. “I never told you I was sorry for that day.”
“It’s okay. I understood.”
“I don’t know why I was so mad.” He gave an awkward shrug as he rose to his feet. “Now if we were doing something like that, I’d like it if you came.”
Her face wanted to crumple and her vision momentarily blurred. She swallowed. “That’s nice. Thank you,” she said with reasonable composure.
The rumble of Nolan’s voice came from the depths of the house, followed by her mother’s laugh. What had Nolan said? When Allie reached the kitchen, she saw Mom putting together a salad while Nolan lifted a casserole dish out of the oven.
“Hey, you’re just in time,” he said. “Who won?”
Allie rolled her eyes. “Who do you think?”
“She’s good, though,” Sean said behind her. He grinned at her. “For a girl.”
She lunged toward him and he dodged. “Say that one more time and you’re dead meat,” she threatened.
Allie’s mother chuckled. “She’s always been athletic.”
“Did she tell you about going waterskiing?” Nolan asked. He’d carried the casserole dish to the dining room and was returning. “She got on her feet the first try. Sean did, too. They were both sure they were going to take a header.”
“I did,” Sean reminded them. “Out in the middle of the lake.”
Allie and he went to wash their hands and came back to find the food already on the table and Nolan and her mother waiting for them.
The casserole was something with chicken, broccoli and a curry sauce, accompanied by salad and a flaxseed bread Allie recognized as coming from the bakery a block down from her store.
After murmurs of pleasure over the food, conversation stayed general, Mom rather deftly avoiding any discussion of their family history. Nolan talked about Chicago and Mom said she’d never been there. He did say, “Allie mentioned you lived in Florida at one time.”
Her glance at Allie was razor-sharp. “Oh, briefly. We moved a lot. Allie’s father got restless. There’s hardly anyplace we haven’t lived.” She laughed. “Except Chicago. What brought you out to the Northwest?”
“We came out here on a family vacation once, when I was eleven or twelve. We had a cabin on Orcas Island. I guess that sold me on Washington. When I was ready to strike out on my own, this was the first place that came to mind.”
He didn’t say, This is as far away as I could get from my parents without moving to Alaska or Hawaii, but of course Allie hadn’t expected him to.
Mom asked Sean a few questions, to which he mumbled replies. He blushed when he told her about joining the basketball team and that he kind of liked biology and thought he might be some kind of scientist, although he also liked computers.
Sean went to get the dessert, which Allie gathered was also from the bakery. That was the moment when Nolan struck.
“I don’t think Allie mentioned where the two of you were before moving out here,” he said, pushing from the table. “Coffee?” He began gathering their dirty dinner plates.
“Thanks, I’d love a cup.” Mom smiled. “Montana. Missoula was our last stop. More urban than you’d think.”
Dumbstruck, Allie stole a glance toward the kitchen. Sean was still out of sight and—please God—earshot.
Nolan returned her smile. “I’ve never been there. I guess we’re even.” His gaze
switched to Allie. “Coffee for you, too?”
“Please,” she said. “Why don’t I help clear the table?”
“Nah, let’s finish eating first. I figured I’d grab a few dirty dishes since I’m going that way.”
Dessert was a lemon-filled cake. Allie didn’t taste a bite. Her anxiety had assumed hideous proportions. The fact that the conversation didn’t again touch on events before she and her mother had moved to Washington State didn’t allow her to relax an iota. She was totally consumed by her efforts to remember everything she’d ever told Nolan and which ones she wasn’t supposed to have said.
And Sean. God. What if he’d heard her mom? Allie could picture his puzzled gaze turning to her. “I thought you said...”
It was enough to make her shudder.
“You okay?” Nolan asked.
“Me? Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?” Belatedly she realized how defensive she sounded. Her lying skills were deteriorating, not improving. Wouldn’t you think practice would make perfect?
His eyes were speculative. “Thought you might be chilly.”
“No.” She struggled for a smile. “I’m fine. This is an old house. Maybe a ghost strolled by.”
He flashed a grin. “Interestingly enough, the previous homeowner did die here. Heart attack, I understand. His body wasn’t found for a couple of days, when the newspapers had started piling up in the box out on the road. Apparently he didn’t get enough mail to alert the postal worker, but the Times delivery guy decided to drive up to the house and make sure the old guy was okay.”
Sean was staring at Nolan. “He died here? Like...where?”
“I didn’t ask.” Nolan chuckled. “You should see the look on your face.”
“That’s horrible!”
“No, that’s the cycle of life.” Nolan’s tone was remarkably gentle, reminding Allie that Sean’s father and grandmother had died, the grandmother not that long ago. “The broker said the guy was ninety-three. Good, long life. I’m sure his choice would have been to die at home. He won’t be haunting us. If any part of him is hanging around, he’s probably glad to see the place come to life again.” Nolan gave a crooked grin. “He’s probably wondering why the hell I haven’t gotten somebody out to mow the pasture before the blackberries take over once and for all.”
Sean’s expression changed. “Hey, we could get a horse.”
Now Nolan outright laughed. “Not this week. No boat, no horse.”
“It’d make a great Christmas present.”
“You ever shoveled manure?”
“No.”
“You ever ridden?”
“A couple of times.”
“Hmm.” Nolan sat back and quirked an eyebrow at Allie. “What about you?”
“Never.”
“And you lived in Montana? Tut tut.” His smile transformed his bony, not-quite-handsome face. “Horseback riding sounds like something we’d all enjoy.”
Allie buried her face in her hands. The rest of them laughed.
Mom, her offer to help clean up thwarted, left after some more leisurely conversation. Allie had never in her life been gladder to say goodbye to anyone.
“We’ll do this again,” Nolan said to her just before she got in her car.
Over my dead body was Allie’s first thought, followed by the realization there was no way to avoid it if she was to keep seeing Nolan.
“I’m dragging,” she said, smiling weakly. “Somehow, every time I get together with the two of you I end up going home with new muscle groups aching. I think I’d better take off, too.”
Sean smirked. “You can have a rematch.”
“Darn right I’m going to have a rematch.” She managed an evil grin. “You’re not bad...for a kid.”
Their byplay got her safely in the car. When Nolan braced a hand on the open door and asked in a low voice if she had time for him tomorrow, all she could do was nod. “Of course I do. You cooked tonight. I’ll make lunch.”
He circled the door, bent down and kissed her lightly. “Tomorrow,” he murmured while nuzzling her ear.
Panic beat hard at her while she drove away.
* * *
NOLAN SHOVED HIS hands in his jeans pockets and watched the taillights of Allie’s car flare as she braked at the end of the driveway before turning out onto the road. Something had been really off tonight. She’d been quieter than usual. He’d had to scrape food off both her dinner plate and her dessert plate. In fact, unless he was imagining things, she was losing weight. She’d gotten so slight, he imagined her floating away like a puff of dandelion.
He frowned. She wasn’t that bad off, or she wouldn’t have been able to play a rousing three games of horse with Sean. But his instinct told him something was eating at her.
“That was weird,” Sean said.
Nolan started. He hadn’t realized Sean still stood there in the pool of porch light. “What’s weird?” he asked, turning.
“What her mother said.” His foster son was still staring into the dark where Allie’s car had disappeared. “You know. About Montana.”
Nolan’s attention snapped into focus. “Why is that weird?”
Sean finally looked at him. “Well, because Allie said they lived in Oklahoma before they came here. She said that’s where she went to high school before Lynnwood.”
What the hell? “They moved a lot. You’re sure she said she was in high school there?”
“Positive.” Sean sounded indignant. “I said wasn’t it dusty, and she laughed at me and said there were cities like anywhere else, that it wasn’t like Oklahoma! I didn’t know what she was talking about, so she told me about the musical. I looked it up online. They did it in Seattle at the Fifth Avenue Theatre not that long ago.”
“Yeah, I remember the reviews.” Nolan shook his head in disbelief. “Why the hell...?”
“I don’t know.” The teenager was quiet for a moment. “She wouldn’t lie to me, would she?”
“I can’t imagine why she would.” But somebody was lying, that was for damned sure. And if he had to guess... Allie had been tense from the moment her mother got there. Her smiles looked forced.
But why, why would she lie about something like that? Why prop it up with the talk about the musical? Why tell Sean at all where she’d gone to high school?
He felt sick and tried to tell himself there was an explanation. His gut told him she wasn’t going to want to offer one, though, and that if she did, it would probably be a lie, too. Anyone else that evasive about their background, he’d think they were hiding something ugly. A crime.
God. He felt as if he’d taken a blow to his chest. What if she and her mother had had to move suddenly Allie’s senior year of high school not because of the parents’ divorce, but because Allie desperately needed a fresh start? What if the father had cut her off for a good reason?
What, Nolan asked himself, if I’ve had it ass backward all along?
Could his luck possibly be so bad, he’d fallen in love with a woman as deceptive as his own mother?
CHAPTER ELEVEN
NOLAN CALLED NOT long after Allie had gotten up in the morning and apologized because he had to cancel on her today. He had an emergency rush on a job, he told her; he’d be holding up the contractor until he produced the countertops.
Allie didn’t have any reason to doubt that he was telling her the truth, but he sounded more reserved than usual. Maybe somebody was with him, she tried to convince herself, but didn’t believe it. Could Mom have said things while they were alone together that contradicted what she had told him?
She hadn’t slept well last night. She grimaced at the thought. Okay, she had hardly slept at all last night. How could she go on like this?
I have to tell him.
But she’d promised to talk to her mother first. She’d do that. It was lucky he had canceled today. She would go to Mom’s tonight and argue for the right to open their lives to Nolan. At least now Mom had met him. She’d know how solid and trustworthy
he was.
Anxiety continued to ride her all day, though. She did some errands because she had to fill her time somehow, then settled down to try to piece her new quilt. But after stitching a row of tiny triangles on her machine, snipping the thread and turning to her ironing board to press out the seams and cut them apart, she stared in shock at the blue fabric—which was supposed to be background, not rocking horse. She obviously hadn’t been thinking at all when she’d been cutting or sewing.
“Wow.” She picked up the bundle of sewn squares and dropped it in the trash. Either she had to start over, or do something else. “I vote for something else,” she told her quiet apartment.
She’d quilt instead. Her hands knew what to do. With only diagonal lines, working on Sean’s quilt would take no mental function whatsoever.
As always, she was soothed by the act of quilting. The tiny stitches, the precision, the rocking motion, the way each completed block filled some emptiness in her, too, calmed her. She continued until her back ached, her fingers started to cramp and, despite the leather thimble, she’d punctured her fingertip a few too many times.
Midafternoon she made herself have a bowl of soup, all she could stomach. Despite the mist that wasn’t quite rain, she went for a run later. By the time she showered and dried her hair, she only had another hour to kill before her mother should be home from work.
Maybe she should call in advance, but she didn’t want to. She needed to catch her mother unprepared.
When she rang the bell and her mother opened the door, Allie saw that she’d accomplished more than she had expected. Mom looked more than surprised.
“Allie? Is something wrong?”
“I wanted to talk to you. Is now okay?”
“I was putting dinner on, but...of course it is. Come in. Have you eaten?”
“I’m not hungry.”
She followed her mother to the kitchen, where she turned off a burner then faced Allie.
“What is it?”
“You know I’m not a very good liar.”
Fear. Oh, yes, her mother was afraid. “What are you telling me?” she whispered.
“I’ve said things to Nolan and Sean that I shouldn’t.” The burning in her chest had to be heartburn. “I’m so muddled now, I don’t even remember what I’ve said.”
Anything for Her Page 16
