by Jodi Thomas
Martha Q seemed to know all the places in town, but Liz could never remember seeing the woman eating at any of them.
Liz wasn’t surprised to see her brother climbing out of his pickup when they reached the parking area in front of the bookstore.
“Morning, ladies,” he said, removing his hat.
Liz introduced him to her new client even though she guessed Martha Q already knew who Hank was. To her brother’s credit, he was as polite to Martha Q as he would have been to anyone. He was a man who judged people on what he saw, not what he heard.
Martha Q, on the other hand, was herself. “You’re one fine-looking man, Hank Matheson. If I was twenty years younger, you’d be using that fire hose at the station to cool off after I got through with you.”
Her brother had always been comfortable around women, and he didn’t disappoint Liz now.
“Mrs. Patterson, if you were twenty years younger and looked my way, I don’t know if my heart could take the blow.”
Martha Q laughed. “How is it you’re not married? The women in this town go blind?”
Liz saw the indecision in his glance, but Hank’s honest way won out. “I’ve been wondering that myself lately. I’ve been chasing the same woman for a long time, and I can’t tell if I’m any closer to catching her.”
“Maybe if you stopped chasing, she’d turn around and come to you.”
Hank nodded, but Liz knew he wouldn’t change. She invited him to join them, but he declined. Liz climbed into Martha Q’s boat of a car and spent the afternoon having lunch, touring the B&B, and driving up and down Harmony’s main streets.
When Martha Q dropped her off, the sun had already touched the horizon and Liz had learned things about the people of Harmony that were not in any of the history books. She went up to her office, put three one-hundred-dollar bills in the only locked drawer of her desk, and relaxed. Thanks to Martha Q, Liz had just had her most profitable day.
By the time Liz finished her shower, half the town was probably talking about her afternoon with Martha Q. Not that they’d think it anything unusual. After all, lawyers were supposed to have lunch with all types of people.
When she returned to her office after her nightly shower, she tried to find something clean to wear. She’d been sleeping in the sweatshirts or jogging suits she went back and forth to the gym in for two weeks. She’d also carefully dressed up every day for work in case someone came in. She’d reached the point where she had more clothes in the laundry bags than on hangers.
Slipping into her oldest jeans and a T-shirt, she decided tonight had to be laundry night. She’d wait until she knew the bookstore was closed and then sneak down the back stairs and drive over to one of the apartment complex laundry rooms. With luck, she could be back in two hours.
On her third load down the stairs, she spotted a dark figure standing by her open trunk. For a moment adrenaline exploded across her muscles, and then she recognized Gabe’s lean form.
He didn’t offer to help her. He just watched as she lugged a trash bag full of clothes down the stairs.
Liz had no idea how to start a conversation with the man. Talking wasn’t in his top hundred list of things to do, she guessed, but he’d ended the last conversation by running out on her, so she figured it was his turn to start.
He waited until she stuffed the last bag in her tiny trunk. “I thought you might be carrying down a dismembered body,” he said casually as he crossed his arms over his chest.
“No, just laundry.” She didn’t look at him. “I usually take out the bodies on Monday nights. Fridays it’s always dirty clothes.”
“I know, I checked,” he said.
Glaring at his dark shadow, she fired, “You looked at my laundry?”
“I had to make sure.” He seemed to think his actions made perfect sense. “People are often not what they seem.”
“Right,” she said, still stuffing her bags inside.
“You have any idea whose blue Mustang that is?” He pointed at a car parked on the side street halfway between the front and the back of the building. “Could be a stalker. That parking spot allows whoever’s in the car to see both stairwells. You should really park out front, Elizabeth. It’s safer.”
Liz slammed the trunk. “This conversation is over, Mr. Smith. Stop trying to frighten me.”
He grabbed her arm to stop her retreat, then let go an instant later as if realizing his mistake. “I didn’t mean to. I came to say I’m sorry about what happened the other night. I . . .”
Liz waited several seconds before she realized he wasn’t going to continue. “Let me make it easy on you, Gabe. Let’s try a multiple-choice question. A. You’re sorry you kissed me. B. You are sorry you stopped. C. You’re involved with someone else and figured your wife and kids wouldn’t approve. And of course, D. We should just be friends.” She moved away. “Oh, wait, we’re not friends in the first place, so forget D.”
He followed her, standing just behind her as she opened her car door. “B,” he said as she backed into him trying to open her door. “I’m sorry I stopped.”
She turned to face him. “Let me get this straight. You don’t want to be friends. You don’t want to talk or hang out. You just want to drop by now and then and kiss me.”
He was so close she could feel his breath. “That’s about it,” he said as he shoved her door closed and backed her against her car. “You interested, Elizabeth?”
“You’re nuts,” she answered.
He moved away. “Yeah, you’re right, but I’ve lived alone for so long, one kiss a week is all I can handle right now, and you’re about the most kissable woman I’ve ever met.”
He turned and walked into the shadows close to the building. “I had to give it a shot. No hard feelings.”
Liz had to hurry to catch his arm before he started up the stairs. “How about a bargain?” she whispered. “One kiss. One answered question.” She wasn’t ready to admit that she wanted the kiss, but she knew she wanted to know more about this man. In her world she usually figured out the males within a matter of minutes, sometimes seconds, but this man was different. He wasn’t playing her, or flirting. He wasn’t even trying to be friendly. He was simply attracted to her.
He didn’t move, but she could feel his eyes watching her even in the dark. “What question?”
She said the first thing that came to mind. “Where’d you get that limp?”
“Roadside bomb,” he said slowly, as if he’d never told anyone.
“When?”
“That’s two questions,” he answered as he lifted his hand and slid it around the back of her neck.
Liz felt his warmth just before his lips brushed her cheek and moved slowly over to her lips. For a moment, he hesitated as if finding his way to what he wanted, and then he buckled her knees with the most delicious kiss she’d ever felt. When all thought gave way to feelings, he gently shoved her down on the third step of the stairs and left her.
By the time her mind returned, she realized he was gone. In a world where people went to bed after a kiss like that, he’d walked away. In a strange way she felt rejected and cherished at the same time.
When her body finally cooled, she walked upstairs, completely forgetting about her laundry. She flipped on her computer and began listing all the facts she knew about Gabriel, aka G. L. Smith. He had an office. He could do home repairs. He was paranoid.
With the skill of a professional student, she began to research. She found nothing. Gabriel L. Smith seemed to be the only person in America living completely off the grid. A hundred G. L. Smiths. One a broadcaster in Oregon, one a writer of comics, one a singer in New York. Even a few Gabriel Smiths, but none who lived around here.
She added one more thing she knew about Gabriel L. Smith. He was a liar.
Chapter 11
SATURDAY
JANUARY 26, 2008
HARMONY RODEO ARENA
REAGAN TRUMAN STOOD AT THE EDGE OF THE BLEACHERS so no one would notice h
er as the bull riding started. Noah “Preacher” McAllen was riding tonight. Maybe his last ride before he went to the big time. She wanted to see him. She needed to know he was all right.
Pushing her hands deep into her jean jacket, she wished she hadn’t argued with Noah at school yesterday. They’d both said things they didn’t mean. He’d been her only friend for a long time after she’d moved in with Uncle Jeremiah. He’d been the one who wouldn’t stay mad no matter how she tried to shake him off. He’d been the first boy she’d ever really kissed.
And now, she thought, he’d be her first heartbreak. He wanted to be more than friends, and Reagan didn’t think she could allow anyone that close. During the two years she’d been in Harmony, she’d done a great deal of healing, but the scars were still there, just below the surface, reminding her, warning her, that people are not always what they seem.
“You waiting for Preacher to ride?” a voice said from somewhere in the shadows behind her.
Reagan didn’t turn around. She didn’t need to. “Yeah, what you doing here, Brandon?”
Brandon Biggs was eighteen, but no less a thug than when she’d met him a while back with his younger brother, Border. The smell of cigarettes must be baked into his clothes. His hair needed to be washed and cut. Everything about him reminded her of a big, shaggy dog left outside to face the weather year round.
He pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket but didn’t light up. “I drove over to see what the worthless bums in Harmony are doing tonight. Bailee’s so dead on Saturday night there must be a line for who gets the job of rolling up the streets.”
Reagan guessed Brandon liked talking to her because she was one of the few high school kids not afraid of him. He’d tried to pull the tough-guy routine on her once and it hadn’t worked. Reagan had lived in places where boys like Brandon were minor league.
They watched the first bull rider fall off his bull before he could clear the chute. She turned her attention back to Brandon. “I heard you dropped out of school.”
He laughed. “My stepdad told me I’d learned everything I needed to know. He kicked me out two months ago. Said waiting any longer wouldn’t change anything, I’d still be dumber than dirt and eating up his food.”
Reagan looked at him, trying to read his face in the shadows. “What’d your mother say?”
“She was too drunk to say anything.” Brandon straightened. “I’m better off without either of them. She’s all the real kin I have besides my little brother. She’s not much to want to hang on to, and Border runs off every chance he gets. Half the time she’s telling folks she wished her two boys had never been born. Since I’m gone, he’s probably staying with some of my relatives on my mother’s side. None of them are worth much, but any place is better than with my stepdad without me to run interference for him.”
“If he’s like you, he’s tough. He’ll be fine.” They watched the next rider. He didn’t make the eight seconds.
In the silence between riders, Brandon lit his cigarette, then hid the light in the curl of his hand. “I got a chance at a job working construction. We’ll be just north of Harmony working. I’ll start on flags, but they said if I show up regular and sober I could be running a machine by the time I’m nineteen. Then the real money would come in. Twelve, maybe fifteen bucks an hour.”
She was glad to change the subject. “Great. That’s good money. If you get the job, drop by after work sometime at the Blue Moon. I apparently am working there every Wednesday night. I didn’t apply for the job, it kind of got passed to me, but since I’m there, I’ll buy you a slice of pie to celebrate.”
She saw him nod in the dark. “I’ll do that. You still with Preacher?”
“I’m not with anyone. I never plan to be.”
He seemed nervous, like a ball of dynamite looking for somewhere to explode. “I got to go,” he said as he ground out his cigarette in the mud.
“Keep in touch, Brandon, and stay out of trouble.”
“You too.” He laughed. “Be seeing you.”
Reagan nodded, then turned her back on Brandon Biggs. It was time for Noah to ride. As always, she held her breath counting out the seconds in her mind. He was good, very good. His father’s coaching not only helped him ride like a pro, it also taught him how to be safer, if anyone could ever be safe in this sport of bull riding.
Noah McAllen’s father had been the best in his day. Folks talked about those days when he rode as if he were a legend. Some said riding was in Preacher’s blood, but Reagan knew they were wrong. It was in his heart. Noah McAllen loved the rodeo like he’d never love anything else in his life.
She yelled along with everyone in the stands as he made the ride and jumped off. He waved his hat in the air, and she thought she saw him nod once toward his father sitting on one of the empty chute fences, and then Preacher moved to a blond girl at the corner of the corral.
Reagan didn’t see the girl’s face. She didn’t need to. Who she was didn’t matter to Reagan. She crossed the lined shadows behind the bleachers and walked to her old pickup. Her uncle would be waiting up for her.
Chapter 12
TUESDAY
JANUARY 29, 2008
WINTER’S INN BED-AND-BREAKFAST
MARTHA Q SLIPPED INTO HER WASHER-FADED BLACK PANTSUIT, blue running shoes she’d never run in, and Bobby Earl’s hunting hat with ears. In a few hours it would be dawn, and she had work to do.
Though she’d never tried, she had a real desire to help people, and today was as good as any to start.
She giggled as she lifted an old briefcase that had belonged to husband number five. She’d taken it when she’d left him because she had to have something to keep her makeup in. She’d married number five because she thought he was a businessman, dressing in suits and always carrying the case. But, after six months of wild sex, she’d finally gotten bored enough to ask questions and found out he sold used car parts harvested off stolen cars. Not exactly the banker she thought he might be. So she’d emptied the Play-boys and candy bars out of the case and put it to better use.
Tonight, the black case was the perfect size for her self-printed posters.
She slipped out the back door and slid into the ravine that zigzagged across the old downtown like a scar. No one except a few locals knew the dried-up creek. It wasn’t exactly a tourist destination. She saw only two advantages. One, the creek was lined with huge old trees that offered shade for many backyards and rear parking lots. And, two, it was a shortcut for anyone mindful of the root stumps and loose dirt.
When she’d been married to Bobby Earl, the first time, he’d always say he was going over to the old house to visit his eighty-year-old aunt. Then, he’d go out the back door, across the dry creek, and have a lunchtime quickie with a widow a block down. The third time he came home with a sprained ankle, Martha Q followed him.
Bobby Earl begged and cried, but she divorced him. Later, when she’d married him again while he was dying, he admitted to her that he’d never really been attracted to the widow; he only loved the thrill of sneaking off. Martha Q doubled his sleeping pills and took two days to decide that he was lying and to forgive him all over again.
Now, walking in the creek bed, she decided maybe he was right. It was exciting to be in the center of town and have no one know.
Martha Q moved from telephone pole to community bulletin board putting up her special signs and giggling.
She loved making mischief more than chocolate, she decided.
It was almost dawn when the last poster was stapled to the board in front of the library. Martha Q retraced her steps, stuffed the briefcase in the trash, and hurried back into the house. No one may have seen her, but she’d watched enough crime shows to know to make all the evidence disappear.
An hour later she was sitting at the Blue Moon Diner having her third cup of coffee at a back table when Hank Matheson walked in.
He helped his niece with her crutches and walked to hang up his hat on the rack by the d
oor when he was mobbed.
Martha Q giggled into her cup as every woman in the place hurried to kiss him. Some shyly on the cheek, some boldly on the lips. Hank seemed too shocked to react.
Tyler Wright came in and stood between Hank and the women long enough for Hank to take a seat, but that didn’t stop the women from leaning over to kiss him as they passed his table.
Martha wasn’t close enough to hear what was being said, but from Hank’s face it was obvious he hadn’t seen a poster yet. Tyler Wright, the funeral director, couldn’t seem to stop laughing.
The sheriff stormed in a minute later and plopped one of the flyers down in front of the much-kissed Hank. Martha Q didn’t have to hear a word; she could tell from Alexandra McAllen’s face who the love of Hank’s life was, and that lover wasn’t happy. Jealousy fired her eyes so hot Martha Q thought it could easily burn the toast in the entire diner. Maybe Alex would get the hint and marry that handsome man.
“You want more coffee?” Edith asked as she passed by with a pot in each hand.
“No, thanks,” Martha Q said. “Have any idea what’s going on?”
“Not much. Someone said there are signs all over town saying this is National Kiss Your Fireman Day. No one seems to have ever heard of it before, but that don’t stop the women of this town from doing their duty. I got Willie Davis in the kitchen. He’s been a fireman for a few years, but he’s afraid to come out. He said he got mobbed when he went out this morning to post the flag at the station and he’s in danger of being overkissed.”
Martha Q smiled and collected her belongings, left a ten-dollar tip, and walked out of the diner without even glancing at Hank.
She stopped to admire one of her signs outside the grocery store after stocking up on her weekly intake of chocolate and diet meals. When she pulled into the drive at the bed-and-breakfast, Tyler Wright was waiting for her.
