by Cindy Myers
“Francine wants the glass.”
“Francine?” The woman already had more money than God, and she had Maggie’s husband—now she wanted the Steuben, too?
“Yes, I heard from Jillian Patel, who heard it from Francine’s cousin Michaela Jarvis, that Francine’s best friend and chief rival, Anita Dickson, has this fabulous collection of Lalique glassware. So Francine decided that she needs to one-up Anita with a collection of vintage Steuben. Carter’s job is to get the Steuben. She doesn’t care how, but you can bet she’s reminded him that he bought his first wife a collection of Steuben, so doesn’t she deserve the same consideration?”
“And Carter, being the lazy cheap bastard he is, decided the easiest solution is to give her my collection.”
“Exactly. He’ll buy it off you and present it to Francine, fait accompli.”
“Thanks, Barb. I’ll let you know how it goes.” She hung up the phone and tossed it onto the seat beside her. She’d throw every piece of glass down a mine shaft before she’d sell it to Carter to give to Francine.
She rounded a curve faster than she should have, gravel flying. “Calm down, Maggie,” she told herself. “Deep breaths. You can handle Carter.”
A single taillight glowed ahead. As the dust settled, she recognized a familiar figure on a motorcycle. Jameso hunched over the bike, the set of his shoulders kindling a mix of longing and fury in her. Maybe she’d chase him down and confront him about the way he’d slept with her, then proceeded to ignore her. Or maybe she’d skip the conversation altogether and pound him with a tire iron.
She followed Jameso for more than five miles, fingers white-knuckled on the steering wheel. Maybe he was headed to her cabin right now, to apologize for ignoring her and to beg her forgiveness. She enjoyed a pleasant few moments fantasizing about making him grovel before she granted his wish. But then he turned off on a side road, giving no sign he’d ever seen her behind him.
Fine. Let him be that way. The last thing she needed in her life right now was another damn man.
The anger that had been simmering since Barb’s phone call exploded when she turned into her drive and saw a familiar white rental parked crookedly in front of the cabin. Carter! Damn the man, what was he doing here? She’d tell him exactly what she thought of him and his selfish ass, and then she’d chase him off the property with an ax if she had to.
She skidded to a halt beside the rental and was out of the vehicle while the engine was still backfiring. Winston greeted her at the bottom of the steps, butting her playfully. “Not now, Winston,” she said. “I’m busy.” The ram followed her onto the porch. She shoved him aside to get into the house.
“It’s about damn time you got here!” A familiar, irritated voice greeted her. Carter stalked toward her. One of the boxes of glass sat in the middle of the floor and he shoved it aside with one foot to get closer to her. “Between that damn animal on your front steps and your roommate here, I can’t get out of this town soon enough.”
“Roommate?”
He looked over his shoulder and Maggie stared at Cassie Wynock, perched on the edge of the love seat like an old-fashioned schoolmarm come to tea. “Hello, Maggie,” she said coolly. “I didn’t expect you home until this evening.”
“I forgot something.” Maggie marched to the table and snatched up the flash drive. She addressed Carter first. “What are you doing in my house, uninvited?”
“I came to talk to you about the Steuben. The door was unlocked, so I let myself in.”
“He was going to steal those boxes,” Cassie said. “He would have, too, if I hadn’t stopped him.”
“You had nothing to do with it, bitch. It was that damned wild animal out there on the front porch.”
“Don’t you dare call me bitch!” Cassie rose, but Maggie’s glare silenced her. She’d deal with the librarian later. For now, she wanted to focus her wrath on Carter.
She moved closer to him and stared directly into his beady little eyes. “You are not getting the Steuben,” she said, her voice soft, so that he had to strain to hear. “You are going to leave this house and this county and this state, and never come back.”
“It’s a free country. I can go anywhere I want.”
She leaned closer. “If you ever come near me again, I won’t bother calling the police. Do you know how many mine shafts there are in these mountains? You would disappear and no one would ever see you again.”
His eyes looked less beady, widened in alarm. “You’d be the first person the police would suspect of murder,” he said.
“I don’t think so. After all, I’m just meek little Maggie Stevens. I never so much as hurt a fly. But you could be the first. Now get out before I throw you out.”
He scrambled toward the door but stopped with his hand on the knob. “What about that beast out there?”
She laughed. “What about him?”
“He attacked me before.”
She went to the kitchen cabinet and took out three Lorna Doones. Then she took out three more. Winston deserved a reward for keeping her two intruders at bay. “While he’s eating the cookies, you can leave,” she said to Carter as she passed.
She felt him scoot past her while Winston nibbled the cookies from her hand. The engine on the rental squealed; then the car fishtailed out of the drive, sending up a rooster tail of dust.
Maggie returned to the house and Cassie, who was seated on the love seat once more, as still and upright as an artist’s model. “What are you doing here?” Maggie asked.
“I came to look for my book,” she said. “That man interrupted me before I found it.”
“How did you get in? I always lock the door.”
“There was a key over the lintel.”
Maggie didn’t want to know how Cassie knew about the key. “And you thought you’d use it to come in and help yourself to my belongings.”
“The book belongs to me,” Cassie said. “I wouldn’t have laid a finger on anything else.”
“Wait here a minute.” Maggie went upstairs and retrieved the book from the shelf by the bed. She took it to Cassie. “It’s all marked up inside,” she said. “That’s why I didn’t want to give it to you. I knew it would upset you.”
Cassie paged through the book, the lines around her eyes deepening as she took in the obliterated text. “Why would Jake do something like that?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Maggie said. “I didn’t know him and I don’t understand him—any more than I understand any man.”
Cassie closed the book and nodded. “That man who was here—you were married to him?”
“Yes.” Sometimes it was difficult to believe now.
“He’s not very nice.”
“No.”
“I heard what you said to him. That wasn’t very nice either.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
“But it was very good.” A small smile played around Cassie’s mouth. “It doesn’t pay to let a man get away with too much.”
“No, it doesn’t.” She ran her thumb under the chain around her neck. She’d let Carter get away with too much for too many years. She smiled, remembering the shocked, scared look in his eyes when she’d threatened him. He hadn’t been expecting that from meek little Maggie.
She really hadn’t expected it from herself. But the rage and frustration had taken over. Or maybe she’d been channeling the ghost of her dead father, who no doubt would have tossed Carter out on his ass, and maybe Cassie, too.
She glanced at the woman beside her, who was running her hands over and over the cover of the book, stroking it. She didn’t know what her father had said or done to hurt Cassie; she didn’t want to know. But the cruelty of men could drive a woman to do strange things, so Maggie would overlook this particular lapse in judgment. “Are we even now?” she asked.
Cassie looked up. “What?”
“You have your book back. Are we even now? No more enemies.”
“Of course.” She stood, not meeting Maggie’s ga
ze.
“Come into the library tomorrow morning and I’ll issue you a library card.” She walked to the door and let herself out without a glance back.
Maggie picked up the box of glass and stacked it back with the others. So far the stuff had brought her nothing but trouble. She thought about opening the box and checking to make sure the pieces were intact. Maybe she’d take out a few and find a place to display them. But the idea roused no emotion—not sadness or curiosity or anything at all.
Carter had tried to steal the glass from her, but in the end he’d taken something else. Any sentiment she’d associated with the collection had left with him. She might even say he’d done her a favor. That and a library card weren’t bad for an afternoon’s work.
“How does this stuff get into such bad shape sitting in a box for a year?” Danielle attempted to unfold a clump of red, white, and blue bunting that looked as if it had been run over by a car before being stuffed into the cardboard carton.
“It’s like this every year.” Lucille pulled out a banner advertising Hard Rock Days. “But once everything goes up, it doesn’t look so bad.”
“How old is all this stuff anyway?” Olivia wrinkled her nose at a string of red and blue pennants, their pointed tips bent back on themselves.
“Probably older than you are,” Lucille said. “Is the iron hot? We’re going to have to iron all of this.”
“How did I get appointed to the decorating committee?” Olivia asked. She wet a finger and touched it to the iron, which sizzled satisfactorily.
“You were in the store when I decided it was time to get out the decorations,” Lucille said.
“Lucky us.” Danielle smiled and laid the bunting over the ironing board. “We don’t have to actually hang this stuff, do we?”
“No, the power company sends someone over to handle that.” Lucille smoothed the banner over her front counter. “I think I’ve got some black paint somewhere, to touch up the lettering on this banner.”
“Why doesn’t this cheapskate town spring for some new decorations?” Olivia asked.
“Because we’re broke. And cheap. And these will look fine once we work on them a little.”
The bells on the door of the shop jangled and Maggie backed in, her arms wrapped around a large carton. “Another volunteer,” Danielle said.
“Lucille, you take consignments, don’t you?” Maggie asked.
“I do. What do you have there?”
Maggie deposited the box on the front counter, on top of the banner. “Steuben glassware. I’ve got four boxes I want to sell.”
“Steuben?” Lucille frowned. “You’d get more money for something like that selling it on eBay, or at a shop in Denver.”
“I don’t want to fool with that. Can you sell it for me? I don’t mind paying your commission.”
“I can sell anything eventually. And I know a few collectors who might be interested. Let’s see.”
Maggie ripped the tape off the top of the box and took out several wrapped bundles. Olivia and Danielle put aside their work to watch as Lucille peeled away layers of Bubble Wrap from around delicate vases, goblets, figurines, and bowls in orange, green, blue and pink.
“This is gorgeous,” Olivia breathed, stroking the rim of a pink and white bowl with the tip of one finger. “Why would you ever want to sell it?”
“My ex-husband gave me that bowl for my birthday two years ago,” Maggie said. “The next day he left town on a ‘business trip.’ Turns out he went to Cancun with his mistress. I got the bowl; she got a vacation at the beach.”
“Bastard,” Olivia said. “If I’d known that, I could have slipped something into his drink while he was here.”
“I heard he left town in a hurry,” Danielle said.
“Good riddance.” Maggie replaced the glass in the box. “Can you sell this for me?” she asked Lucille.
“Sure. You say you have more?”
“Three more boxes out in the Jeep.”
“We’ll help you unload it.”
“Only if you stay and help us with the decorations for Hard Rock Days,” Danielle said.
Maggie took in the wads of bunting and pennants. “What do you need me to do?”
“Iron, sew, paint, or join in the general griping about the sad state these things are in,” Lucille said. “You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to, but we could certainly use the help.”
“Sure, I can help. Just show me what to do.”
The women carried in the rest of the boxes of glass, then turned their attention once more to the decorations. Olivia ironed while Danielle and Maggie tugged the bunting into shape and Lucille repainted the lettering on the banner.
“How long have Hard Rock Days been going on?” Maggie asked.
“This is the sixty-third or sixty-fourth year,” Lucille said.
“They may be older than that, but they started out as just informal competitions among the crews from various mines. Over the years it’s grown into an all-weekend affair. But the highlight is still the mining games.”
“I hope Jameso will be back in town by then,” Danielle said. “I’ve been trying to talk him into competing this year.”
“Jameso’s out of town?” Maggie dropped the section of bunting she’d been holding.
“He left a few days ago,” Olivia said. “Came into the Dirty Sally one day and asked for the time off.”
“He didn’t bother saying good-bye to Janelle and me,” Danielle said. “That really isn’t like him. Last time he left town, he asked us to watch his house for him.”
“I got the impression something came up suddenly,” Olivia said. “He was in a big hurry to leave.”
Maggie had gone pale, though Lucille thought she was the only one who’d noticed. She’d suspected there was something going on between those two for some time. Had they had a fight? Something to do with Maggie’s ex-husband?
Maggie noticed Lucille watching her and flushed. She focused on the bunting once more. “So what do y’all think of the Founders’ Pageant?” she asked. “That’s new this year, right?”
“I’m worried the tourists will think it’s a big joke,” Danielle said.
“No, they won’t,” Maggie said. “Tourists love that small-town stuff. They expect it to be amateurish and comical.”
“Cassie will be crushed if people laugh,” Lucille said. “She takes this sort of thing very seriously.”
“Poor Cassie takes everything seriously,” Danielle said.
“Lucas is excited about it,” Olivia said. “He’s been practicing his lines all over the house. ‘Gold! Gold!’ ” She chuckled. “When he’s not doing that, he’s talking about mines and Indians and all that. My little historian.”
Lucille didn’t miss the note of pride in her voice. “Lucas is a remarkable boy,” she said. “And I don’t say that just because he’s my grandson.”
“I got a good photograph of him at the rehearsal,” Maggie said. “I’ll have to get you a copy.”
“I guess you’ll be covering Hard Rock Days for the paper this year,” Danielle said.
“Yes, I’ll have the best of both worlds—the inside track of a local and the experience of a Hard Rock virgin.”
“You’re definitely one of us now,” Lucille said. “I hear you even have a library card.”
“Yes, Cassie has apparently decided I can be trusted with that privilege.”
“Are you going to stay in the cabin this winter?” Danielle asked.
“I don’t know.”
“A lot of the summer places become available after Labor Day if you want to rent one of them,” Lucille said. “I could make some calls.”
“Thanks. I’ll think about it.” She set aside the section of bunting she’d been working on and fished another from the box. “Or I could go back to Houston for the winter.”
“You wouldn’t stay? But you fit in so well here.” Danielle leaned over and touched Maggie’s shoulder. “You’re one of us now.”
Maggie shook her head but didn’t elaborate.
“I’ve been thinking about moving on this winter, too.” Olivia said.
Lucille stared at her daughter. “I thought you liked it here,” she said. “And Lucas already knows the school and your job . . .”
“The Dirty Sally probably won’t be as busy after the tourists leave, so they might not even need me this winter. And it’s not like Lucas wouldn’t do well in any school he’s in.”
“Where would you go?” Lucille asked.
Olivia shrugged. “I don’t know. I could go anywhere.”
Lucille wet her lips, aware of the others watching her. Had Olivia chosen this setting to drop her little bomb because she knew her mother wouldn’t be able to start an argument? But she didn’t want to fight with her daughter. “I’d hate to see you go,” she said quietly.
Olivia ran the iron over the point of a pennant. “I figured you were tired of us by now.”
“No, I’ve enjoyed having you here.”
“We’d all love it if you stayed,” Danielle said. “The town’s different in winter.”
“Because the tourists are gone?” Maggie asked.
“That. And when the snows start, sometimes the passes get blocked and we get cut off from the rest of the world for days at a time. You learn who you can rely on for help in those times. We all look after each other. It’s sort of like a big family. There aren’t many places left where you can say that.”
“Just what I always wanted,” Olivia said. “A bunch more relatives.”
Danielle laughed. “Well, there are always those people who annoy you, but you learn to get along. And you’re wrong about the Dirty Sally not being busy in winter—everyone holes up at the saloon during a snowstorm. There are times when I don’t think Bob comes out of there for days.”
Olivia looked doubtful but said nothing. The door to the shop opened and all the women turned to look at Rick. He had a sheaf of papers in one hand, and a pen tucked behind one ear. “Are the decorations ready yet?” he asked.
“Just about,” Lucille said. “The power company doesn’t need them until in the morning.”
