by Gayle Roper
“What’s wrong with me, Daddy?” Jenna buried her face in his chest. “Why doesn’t she like me?”
My heart broke as I heard her questions and saw Drew’s face contort with pain.
“There’s nothing wrong with you, sweetheart.” He rested his cheek on the crown of her head. “Not one thing. You are a wonder. You’re beautiful and intelligent and all that’s hopeful. You’re the marvelous girl God made you to be, and I love you so much it hurts.” He choked on emotion and had to clear his throat to continue. “You are the best thing in my life.”
“But she hates my blond streak!”
“Your blond streak is beautiful.” His eyes met mine over Jenna’s head, and he gave a slight, rueful, and very sad smile.
They stood together for several moments while Chloe and I waited in the car, both of us wallowing in silent tears. I don’t know about Chloe, but I kept praying over and over, Oh, Lord, help that wonderful child realize how precious she is to her father and to You.
When Jenna and Drew finally got back in the car, we drove in silence, the only words my directions. Jenna rested her head against the headrest, her eyes closed. Chloe stared out her side window. Drew drove, his eyes straight ahead, his expression stoic.
I wanted to make it better for all of them, and it hurt because I knew I couldn’t.
We pulled into the parking lot of the mall that housed Pierce’s Jewelry. Drew parked and I pulled out my wallet, handing Chloe a twenty.
“Why don’t you take Jenna over to the Magical Garden and get whatever you want to eat or drink?” I pointed to the restaurant at the opposite end of the mall.
Chloe took the money, tapped Jenna on the arm, and the girls walked away. I looked at Drew.
“You okay?”
He shrugged. “I’ll live. I just hate the hurt to Jenna.” He blinked rapidly lest he fall victim to that emotional outlet most hated by males, tears.
“Papa bear on duty.”
He caught the reference and nodded. “The thing I hate is that this problem won’t go away. Ruthie will always be there, upsetting Jenna, turning to me for help whenever she feels like it. There are all lengths of cycles for bipolar people from two to three years to two to three days. Ruthie’s cycles are short and seem to be getting shorter.”
“We had a lady who lived down the street from us when I was growing up,” I said. “Mrs. Garborg was bipolar back when they called it manic depression. She’d go off the rails about every three years, leave home, fly to Florida, and buy a souvenir shop, always a souvenir shop. She’d run up all kinds of debt. Then the mania would wear off, and she’d come home, contrite, depressed, and oh so sorry. She’d take her medicine for a couple of years, feel so well she believed she didn’t need it anymore, and soon she was off to Florida again. Not that I realized what was going on as a kid. I just knew Mrs. Garborg disappeared every so often.”
“Poor Mr. Garborg,” Drew said with feeling.
“Slippery Mr. Garborg,” I corrected. “He put all their money in an account in his name, and the third time she left, so did he. When she came home, he wasn’t there. He’d filed for divorce and taken off with his girlfriend. What a scandal! Mom and Nan couldn’t talk of anything else for months.”
“What happened to her?”
“As I understand it, she became a street person in Philadelphia. Mom saw her once when she and Dad went to a play, a matinée. They were leaving the theater, and there was Mrs. Garborg, wearing a dirty skirt and sweater and terribly aged, all her belongings in the grocery store cart beside her. She was sitting on the steps of a building they passed on their way to the parking garage. She was changing her underpants, oblivious to the stream of people walking past her.”
He blinked. “What did your parents do?”
“Nothing. They were so shocked they just kept on walking.”
He swallowed. “I don’t want anything like that to happen to Ruthie.”
“Of course you don’t.”
He gave me a sad look. “It’s a good thing you aren’t my real fiancée. You’d be saddled with her for the rest of your life too, if you married me.”
I merely smiled, though I thought that Ruthie might be a small price to pay for a man like Drew.
“You’re a very nice person, Drew Canfield.” I patted his arm. “The Lord must be very pleased with your caring heart.”
He snorted. “My hypocritical heart. You have no idea how much I resent feeling responsible for her.”
“But you’re still kind.”
“It doesn’t feel kind; it feels like I have no choice. It’s what the Lord’s asking of me, and I have to do it whether I want to or not.”
“Then you aren’t a hypocrite at all. You’re an obedient servant of the Lord.”
He frowned, uncertain, like that was a new thought. He pondered it for a moment, then actually smiled. “Thank you.”
Oh my, but he had a wonderful smile.
“Now let’s take care of your shoebox. No more Ruthie.” He spread his arms like he was erasing her. “I’m Ruthie’d out.”
I clutched the box tightly as I led the way to the store door. I took hold of the handle and pulled. Nothing happened. I pulled again. Still nothing. I looked inside and realized there were no lights on at the same moment Drew said, “Uh-oh.”
“What?”
He pointed to the sign in the window: Closed Mondays in July and August.
I frowned at the sign. Why hadn’t Sam said something? I held a small fortune in my hands, and I’d have to keep it for another night in the big, bad city.
Drew and I were walking back to his car when the girls came running across the lot. Both were giggling. There was only one cause for that kind of noise: boys.
I held out my hand for any change from my twenty, and Chloe slapped a ten in my palm.
“What did you have?” I asked.
“We each got a Coke and a doughnut. Chocolate glazed.”
“And that cost ten dollars?”
Chloe grinned. “I knew you wouldn’t want to be bothered with all the small change.”
“Right. And what were their names?”
“Whose names?” Chloe looked innocently at Jenna, who looked innocently back.
“You keep forgetting that I was thirteen once, and I know a guy giggle when I hear one.”
Chloe and Jenna giggled.
“Aha! See?”
The girls glanced toward the Magical Garden just as two young guys in jeans and tees emerged, one carrying a ladder, the other a toolbox. They climbed into a truck that read Smollens Electrical on the side panels. Even to my jaundiced thirty-year-old eyes, they were cute, if a bit young.
The girls went scarlet at the sight of them, turned their backs, and fell to giggling all over again.
Drew eyed the guys with disfavor. “And I thought the kids next door were too old.”
Ignoring her father, Jenna pointed to the shoebox. “Haven’t you been to the store yet?”
“It’s not open.”
“What?” Chloe raced over and pulled on the door as if Drew and I had been too weak to handle its weight. She cupped her hands over her eyes and peered into the darkened store.
“You’re right.” She walked back to us. “It’s closed.”
I resisted the urge to look at Drew and roll my eyes.
“So what are you going to do with the jewelry?” she asked.
“Hold on to it real tight.”
She grinned. “At least Aunt Tori won’t be back until tomorrow. You won’t have to sleep with it tonight.”
Tori reached for her cell, glancing at the number as she flipped the lid. Luke. How unusual. Luke didn’t call people on the phone. He summoned them to his presence.
“Tori, where did you get that pin you gave me?” he asked without wasting time on a greeting.
She blinked. “Is something wrong?” When she’d given him the pin this morning, he’d been all smiles at her payment on her debt.
“I knew you’d come
through, doll face.” He’d kissed her until her knees were weak.
“Then no more puzzles, okay?” she’d asked when she recovered her breath. She really couldn’t take the nerve-racking things anymore. The one Eddie had given her Saturday night had made her feel sick to her stomach, and she’d had to leave before she disgraced herself in one of Tim and Mark’s flowerpots. She hadn’t even had time to enjoy Libby’s distress.
Luke had looked at her sort of strangely when she mentioned the puzzles, then shrugged. “Sure, no more of ’em if you don’t want. I thought you enjoyed stuff like that.”
“Not those.”
Now he asked again, “Just tell me where you got the pin.”
“I got it from my sister. Why?”
“It’s hot merchandise,” he said.
“What?” If there were two things she could never in this world imagine together, they were Libby and hot merchandise. “You’re kidding.”
“You didn’t know?”
“Believe me, I didn’t know. After all, we’re talking St. Libby of Haydn here.”
“I had Clem take the piece to be appraised, and he comes hurrying back with the news that the pin’s on the stolen jewelry Web sites.”
Tori went cold all over. “I didn’t get you in trouble with the law, did I?”
“Nah. You can thank your lucky stars that Clem went to Manny Gottlieb. Him and me have done lots of business in the past with the goods you’ve used for payments. And other things, of course,” he added. “Don’t worry. Manny gave me a good price.”
Weak with relief, Tori asked, “What’d you get?” It was, after all, her debt that she was whittling away at. She hoped it was at least a thousand dollars.
“Eight hundred fifty dollars. Not too bad for a hot piece.”
But hardly enough to make a dent in her debt, especially with the interest Luke charged. She should never have gone to him for help when she found herself so deeply in hock. Of course, then she never would have met him, and she could no longer imagine life without him.
“Does your sister have more?”
Tori thought of the shoebox full of little boxes. “She does.”
“Get the rest, Blondie, and I won’t charge any interest for the next month. You’ll be a double winner. Debt paid down a bunch, and no more interest added.”
Tori hesitated. That meant stealing from Libby. It was one thing to take a single pin. It was sort of like borrowing without intent to return. But to really steal? To take it all? From her twin?
But then Libby had stolen the goods to begin with. It’d serve her right if someone stole them from her. And then it was Luke who was asking. Libby or Luke? Now there was a hard choice.
“How can I turn down a deal like that?”
“You are a woman after my own heart, doll face.” His voice was husky and warm and sent shivers up her spine. “See you after closing.”
“Absolutely.” She flipped her slim phone shut and slid it into the V-neck of her white Marilyn Monroe ripoff, the one in the pictures with the pleated skirt being blown up. She moved her head in a circle in an attempt to relieve the tension in her neck.
Steal from Libby. And, of course, not get caught. That was the challenge. As she walked to meet her next client, she tried to come up with a plan to get away with getting away with the goods.
When she caught a glimpse of Eddie Mancini in his guard’s uniform standing by one of the exits, she grinned. She wasn’t the offspring of Jack and Mike Keating for nothing.
14
WHEN THEY PULLED UP in front of a white bungalow with a door and shutters of green, Drew studied it with interest. Anything that had to do with Libby Keating interested him, much as Libby herself fascinated him. This house was one more clue as to who she was, this intriguing combination of strength and wishful thinking.
He liked the strength. She had, after all, made a life for herself and Chloe in spite of long odds. As a single parent himself, he knew how unending the pressure was, how demanding it was to provide even a basic life for another dependent being. And he’d had an education to pave the way to a good job. And he hadn’t had Tori.
Yet for all Lib’s depth of character, she couldn’t bring herself to hurt Chloe with the truth about her origins, hoping against hope that she could hold that information secret. It was akin to Ben trying to keep his wife from knowing about his illegitimate son. Not possible. As Philadelphia in that day was way too small, so Libby’s world was much too crowded with people who knew. There was Tori, and that was complication enough, but her parents also must know. And Eddie, who now knew where she was and what a prize she had become, to say nothing of what a cutie Chloe was.
Slimy little moussed-up joker. Drew pictured Eddie strutting across the roof Saturday night with the sole purpose of upsetting Libby. I know Jesus died for him too, Father, but I don’t trust him any more than I trust Tori.
Drew climbed out of the car and followed Libby up the walk.
“It’s not much.” Libby pulled out her keys and unlocked the door. “Only two bedrooms. But it’s ours.” A quiet pride radiated from her.
The door opened directly into the living room, and even though Libby’d been gone less than a week, the house had that shut-up smell to it, all musty and closed.
“Since it’s an old house, it has no central air.” Libby flipped on a window unit in the living room and went through to the kitchen where she repeated the action. “That was one of the reasons the price was something I could manage.”
Drew looked around the kitchen at Formica counters of faux wood and cupboards painted a crisp white. The walls were papered in a blue and yellow plaid, strong and optimistic, just like Libby.
“Want a Coke, Mr. Canfield?” Chloe reached in the refrigerator and pulled out four cans.
Drew took it gratefully and trailed Lib back into the living room as the girls disappeared down the short hall to the bedrooms.
The house had just begun to cool when there was a knock at the front door. Libby checked through the peephole and got an expression of surprise. “It’s my mother and grandmother.” She opened the door, and the two older women came in, frowning.
Drew thought that if the older one would stop frowning, she would be an attractive woman with her short, curly light brown hair and large brown eyes. And the younger one, also frowning, was very pretty with blond hair and blue eyes. It was easy to see where Libby and Tori got their good looks.
“What are you doing here?” Libby’s mother demanded as she all but glared at her daughter. “Aren’t you supposed to be in Philadelphia?”
“Hi, Mom.” Libby hugged the woman who gave a minimal hug in return. “It’s good to see you. And you too, Nan.” Libby hugged her grandmother.
But the older woman wasn’t paying attention to Libby. She was staring at Drew, her scowl making crevices that rivaled the moon’s craters in depth. He tried not to blink as he nodded to her, offering what he hoped was a charming smile.
“Who’s he?” she demanded.
“Mom, Nan, I’d like you to meet my neighbor, Drew Canfield. He’s a Ben Franklin scholar and is in the city doing research. Drew, this is my mother, Mimi, and my grandmother, Cynthia.” She pronounced Cynthia in the British fashion, Chin-see-ah.
“That your car out front?” Cynthia asked. Her frown had eased, but she still looked very skeptical about him.
He nodded, again with the charming smile.
“We saw it on the way to the store, and we were worried,” Mimi said. “We thought maybe someone had broken in.”
Cynthia shook her head. “The world is full of thieves and crooks. You can’t be too careful these days.”
“Rest assured that I’m neither a thief nor a crook,” Drew assured her. “I think Libby has better taste than to hang around with such people.”
Suddenly there was a charged beat of dead air that took Drew by surprise. He thought back over what he’d said, looking for something that might have given offense. He could find nothing.
> Libby, Cynthia, and Mimi all began talking at the same time.
“Chloe’s in the bedroom with Drew’s daughter, Jenna,” Libby said.
“Did Chloe come with you?” Cynthia asked.
“So you’ve been in Philadelphia less than a week, and you’ve already picked up a man?” Mimi looked Drew up and down.
He tried not to squirm.
“Mom!” Libby flushed, embarrassed.
Chloe walked into the room just in time to overhear Mimi’s comment. She went to Mimi and Cynthia and gave them a dutiful granddaughterly kiss. Then she glanced at Libby with a light in her eye that made Drew brace himself.
“He’s not just a man, Mom-Mom. He’s her fiancé.”
“Chloe!” Libby looked horrified.
“What?” Mimi and Cynthia yelped together.
Chloe grinned at Drew. “Right, Mr. Canfield?”
Jenna had walked into the room on Chloe’s heels. “We’re bridesmaids. I’m wearing rose pink and Chloe’s wearing royal blue.”
Drew gave Chloe and Jenna the evil eye, but they merely smiled sweetly back.
“It’s a joke, Mom,” Libby hastened to assure. “A joke.”
Mimi’s and Cynthia’s facial expressions, Drew noticed, were a cross between alarmed and unconvinced.
“Right, Drew?” Libby demanded.
He nodded. “Right.”
“What’s the matter?” Cynthia asked. “She isn’t good enough for you?”
“Nan!” Libby went scarlet all over again.
“She’s wonderful,” Drew said, and he meant it, “but we’ve known each other less than a week.”
“There’s always love at first sight.” Cynthia smiled, the first lightening of her expression since she’d come in. “It was love at first sight for Mike and me.”
Mimi gave a disparaging laugh, and Cynthia turned on her. “It was!”
Chloe threw her arms around Cynthia. “It’s a wonderful story, Great-Nan.” She turned her attention to Mimi, hugging her. “Right, Mom-Mom?”
Mimi hugged Chloe back with more enthusiasm than she’d hugged her daughter, and the tension defused, at least temporarily. Drew suspected that the two women took potshots and probably howitzer shots at each other frequently.
