The Husband She Can't Forget

by Patricia Forsythe

  “He must know something about it, Carly, or he wouldn’t be putting money into it.”

  “Yeah, you’re right.” Troubled, Carly put her elbow on the armrest and propped up her head with her palm while she considered everything she’d learned from Luke, which wasn’t much. “He believes in this Dr. Wayne, which means this scientist has done something in the past worth believing in. But I don’t think Luke would blindly hand out money without some kind of guarantee of a return on his investment.”

  “That’s probably true,” Lisa answered, thinking it over. “He is Robert’s son, after all.”

  “Don’t remind me. Or yourself.”

  Lisa went back to examining the deed and Carly sighed. Lisa was right. She’d been in the real estate business for ten years, working hard to establish her reputation and secure the type of financial security she hadn’t known when they were growing up. She had a head for figures, was smart with money and was bone-deep honest. Any advice Lisa gave would be carefully considered—even if it wasn’t what Carly wanted to hear.

  “But I can file a lawsuit or get an injunction or something, right?”

  “It wouldn’t hurt to talk to an attorney, but filing lawsuits and injunctions costs money, which you should probably save for an emergency.”

  Distressed and exhausted from the roller coaster of emotions she’d been through that day, Carly dropped her forehead into her hand. “In case my garden is ruined and I have to live in my truck—or the back of my Upcycle shop.”

  “On which you haven’t even signed a lease yet,” Lisa pointed out, returning the deed to its folder.

  “But what if...?”

  Lisa placed her hands on top of the folder and tapped her fingers. “Enough with the ifs, Carly. As hard as you work, there’s no possibility that the shop will fail, and its success will be another income stream for you, better than the one you’ve got now with your helter-skelter approach to selling the pieces you’ve renovated.”

  “Helter-skelter?”

  “You know it’s true. That’s why you’ve got a barnful—”

  “Not a barn,” Carly interrupted. “More of a large shed.”

  Lisa ignored the interruption. “Of refurbished pieces sitting and gathering dust. Hoarding them won’t bring you any money.”

  “I’m not hoarding.”

  Lisa gave her a level stare. “Carly, remember my grandparents? The house I grew up in? They didn’t start out as hoarders but they ended up that way because they couldn’t part with anything. Why keep all the pieces you’ve redone when you could sell them and earn money?”

  “Which I’ll need.”

  “My point exactly.” Lisa returned the folder to the clerk then said, “It doesn’t do you any good to borrow trouble. Whatever Luke is planning is going to happen whether you get hysterical about it or not, but it’ll be a lot easier on you if you calm down and focus on the things you can control—like your two businesses.”

  Begrudgingly, Carly stood and followed her. “I hate it when you’re right.”

  “I know,” Lisa answered in a satisfied tone.

  “Let’s go look at that shop space on Main Street again. I’m pretty sure that’s the one I want. It’s got a covered area out back that would be perfect for renovating my stock. I can hire and train someone to help me, maybe a couple of people.”

  “Now you’re talking. Between the gardens and the shop, you’ll be providing jobs.”

  “I know, and that’s something near and dear to your heart.”

  “Of course. It’s my hometown. We need more employment here.”

  “Luke claims his project will create jobs—along with pollution and habitat destruction.”

  “You don’t know that yet, and I doubt Luke said it,” Lisa cautioned.

  “Are you defending him? Whose side are you on, anyway?”

  Lisa’s eyes widened with hurt. “Carly! We’ve been best friends since we were babies. How can you ask whose side I’m on?”

  Carly glanced away. “I’m sorry. I’m hurt, angry and confused.”

  “Which is why you need to talk to an attorney.” Lisa smiled gently. “I’m not choosing sides, I’m telling you that you don’t need to borrow trouble.”

  Carly nodded glumly. “Yeah, I’ll sit around and wait for it to come find me.”

  Lisa put her arm around her and gave a squeeze. “I’ll call Gemma and get her to stop for a bottle of sparkling cider and meet us at your new business. We’ll have a toast.”

  “Tell her to get a pizza, too. I’m hungry.”

  Lisa laughed and made the call. When she hung up, she said, “Pizza is our only fast-food option in this town. We need some fast-casual outfits, not junk food, but healthy, delicious alternatives—who could be customers for Joslin Gardens.”

  “If I’m still in business.” She waved her hands as if she had a magician’s wand. “Well, start looking into it, Lisa. You found a buyer for the Mustang Supermarket and got it reopened. I’ll bet you could get some food trucks, or a falafel stand, to come to Reston.”

  “Don’t mock. I just might do that.”

  They stepped outside, where they were hit by a gust of wind and a sprinkle of rain.

  “More rain,” Carly said, dismayed. “My fields haven’t even dried out from the last storm. Some of my plants are developing leaf rot.”

  “You must have known another one was coming. You study the weather report like someone’s going to give you an exam.”

  “I know, but I wanted to go back to Toncaville and take a swing through the resale shops, see what I can find to renovate.”

  “No. As I said not three minutes ago, you’ve got plenty of stock for now. You’re simply terrified of not being busy enough.” Lisa dashed toward the parking lot. “Come on.”

  Carly watched her and sighed. Lisa was the only person she knew who could jump puddles and run between raindrops while wearing a formfitting dress and four-inch heels. That made her think of Frances Sanderson’s story about somersaulting down the staircase at the prom. She was still deeply troubled by the fact that they’d known about Luke’s plans and hadn’t told her.

  She could call Frances and ask her. Or maybe she could call Luke and talk to him in a calm, rational manner, learn all the facts without getting upset.

  “Well, not yet,” she murmured, heading for her truck. She was a long way from being rational about this.

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE OVERWHELMING SPRING rains relented by the end of June and the summer passed with hot, steamy days and humid nights that seemed to make the season drag on forever. Joslin Gardens prospered, but Carly, Jay and Sheena spent days reinforcing fence posts loosened by the rain and harvesting the rapidly maturing produce.

  Carly hired more help in the gardens, and was at last able to open Upcycle in early fall. The two employees she found for the shop had previous retail experience so she felt confident they could handle her new venture.

  She met with an attorney who confirmed what Lisa had said. She needed to wait and see what Luke was going to do. She couldn’t stop him from extracting natural gas from shale on his own land, and since Sanderson Enterprises owned the mineral rights to hers, he could drill on her property, too. She was, by turns, frustrated, angry and curious.

  It didn’t help that she’d seen him briefly at one of the hospital fund-raisers, an ice-cream social organized by his aunt Frances. He’d said they were in the planning stages and he couldn’t tell her anything yet. She’d stalked away in fury.

  As hard as she worked, and as busy as she kept herself, Luke and his impending project were never far from her mind, especially when the gentle stream that crossed the old Withers place and emptied onto her land turned into a raging creek. It picked up debris from the derelict land and sent it crashing against her cedar fence posts
, slackening their grip in the soil so that they tilted sideways. A few had collapsed all the way to the ground. Carly feared the gaps would be an open invitation to wildlife or even stray cattle if the Sandersons decided to start raising beef along with their real estate and oil businesses.

  The rushing water had also loosened the soil around some of her smaller apple trees and one day, when they had a little time, she and Jay went out to survey the damage.

  “At least the water has gone down,” Jay observed, walking up the bank to the drunken-looking fence and gazing at the neighboring property.

  “And this streambed looks like it’s been scrubbed out with a giant wire brush.” Dismayed, Carly studied the broken branches, torn-out bushes and exposed rock. She had never expected this much rain to fall in a few short weeks or for so much of her precious topsoil to have been stripped away. Most people would have seen that as a concern, but to her, it was also a lost investment and environmental hazard. She glanced down at the now innocent-looking stream. She had been in the organic gardening business for twelve years, but she had never experienced anything like this.

  “I think I can fix these posts, Carly,” Jay said. “But I’ve got some things to do for my dad every day after school so I probably can’t get to it until Sunday afternoon.”

  “Okay. We’ll look at it then and see what needs to be done. We may have to go into town for supplies,” she answered, distracted by the erosion pattern. The water had flooded over from the land on which Luke would be trying out his mysterious new process, only increasing her worries about runoff ruining her gardens.

  “Do you think animals will get in if the fence is down,” Jay asked. “Wild hogs and stuff?”

  “I don’t know,” Carly said. “Why? Do you see tracks?”

  “Not yet, but it probably won’t be long before we see evidence of their little pig feet.” He nodded toward the Withers place. “And once they start building over there, all the wildlife will be looking for new homes.”

  “I know.”

  “What do you think it is they’re going to be doing, Carly?”

  “I wish I knew.”

  Jay found the entire operation fascinating and reported back to her on every new piece of equipment that was trucked over the adjoining property’s recently resurfaced drive and around to the back of a hill, out of sight.

  Carly knew she should stop him, but not a word of information about the project had been released and she was wildly curious.

  “Yesterday they hauled in a mobile office,” Jay announced as they turned back toward their four-wheeler.

  “A mobile office?”

  “You know, the kind you see at construction sites.”

  “Oh?” Carly looked at him curiously as she slipped behind the wheel and headed home.

  “And this morning somebody drove in a motor home—a big, fancy one pulling a trailer with an old VW Bug on it. It’s still there.”

  “Did you see who was driving it?”

  Jay shrugged. “Some lady.”

  Deep in her thoughts about possible runoff, she didn’t realize what he’d said at first. “Wait, Jay. The new road goes all the way around on the other side of the hill. How have you seen what they’ve been hauling in?”

  He avoided her gaze. “Oh, I may have seen someone up there in the woods, and I may have kinda gone to take a little look.”

  She raised an eyebrow at him. “You may have seen someone in the woods? Did it occur to you that it might be someone who actually works over there? Someone Luke hired?”

  “Sure.” Jay gave her an insulted look. “But if he was supposed to be there, why was he sneaking around?”

  “What do you mean, exactly, by ‘sneaking around’?”

  “I think it’s self-explanatory. Running from one tree to another and hiding behind them, trying not to be seen. I didn’t get a good look at him so I tried to get closer.”

  “And did it work?”

  “No, whoever it was disappeared...”

  “But by that time, you were trespassing.”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “Jay, I’m serious. I don’t want to have a conflict with the Sandersons. You know I was once married to Luke, right?”

  “Well, yeah.” He frowned and bit his lip.

  “In spite of that, I don’t know him, don’t really know who he is now or what he’s doing.”

  The sense of anger and betrayal was strong and it extended to Frances and Tom. They had said they were sorry she was hurt, but they’d felt it was Luke’s place to tell her about his plans for the land.

  “So, you guys aren’t friends, huh?” Jay asked.

  She laughed softly. “And never will be.”

  Carly stopped the four-wheeler in front of the shed and stepped out of the vehicle. “I don’t want any trouble with whatever Sanderson Enterprises has going on over there, so please don’t go on their land.”

  Jay frowned. “Okay, but there’s something funny going on.”

  “Yes, I know. My gardens are under threat, and you might get arrested for trespassing.”

  “No, there’s something else going on. I know I saw someone sneaking around over there. Remember when I told you the blueberries seemed to be disappearing?”

  “Yes, but that was months ago, before any of the Sanderson people arrived.”

  “Well, okay,” Jay acknowledged. “Then it can’t be them. But other things have disappeared, too. I thought it was animals, but now I’m beginning to wonder.”

  “What kinds of things?”

  “Come on, I’ll show you.”

  Jay led the way into the field where the pole beans had been staked. The spring’s soggy soil had delayed the full production of the crop, but they were growing well now and Carly hoped to have a full harvest before the first frost. Luck hadn’t been on her side this year, but she was ever hopeful of a change for the better.

  “Did you pick these?” he asked, pointing to the sparse number of pods on one pole about halfway down the row. “I know I didn’t, and Sheena said she didn’t, either.”

  “No.” Carly looked at the plants on either side. “These are full. So what happened?”

  Jay’s eyes lit with triumph. He crossed his arms over his chest and said, “Somebody’s been stealing our produce.”

  “Stealing it?” Carly examined the ground around the pole, reaching down to push foliage out of the way. “I don’t see any tracks or evidence of anyone having been here. Maybe it’s like you said, wild animals.”

  “Might be, but wouldn’t they leave tracks? And look at this.”

  She followed him a couple of rows over to where carrots were growing, their feathery tops bending in the gentle breeze. “About every third carrot is missing.” He crossed his arms and nodded as if that was the last word on the subject.

  Carly swallowed a giggle. “You counted them?”

  “Nah, but they’re farther apart than they were before, not spaced evenly the way you like them, and I don’t think some of them jumped up and ran away.”

  “Again, if it was animals, wouldn’t we be seeing tracks?” she asked, pointing to the soft, unmarred dirt.

  “If it was anything, or anybody, wouldn’t we be seeing tracks?” he countered.

  “Yes, of course.” She paused. “And you think you saw somebody over on the old Withers place?”

  “Yeah, I did. I’m sure of it.” His young face set in determination. “And I’m going to find out who it is, too.”

  Carly considered him for a moment. He was really taking the initiative on this, which would be a good learning experience for him. On the other hand, she wasn’t paying him to track down thieves who really weren’t doing much damage. When she saw his eager look, though, she knew she couldn’t dampen his enthusiasm. “Just don’t trespass.�
�

  Jay answered with a long-suffering sigh but then nodded. He crouched, examining the ground like a detective on the trail of a criminal while Carly grinned to herself and headed for the truck. She had packed it with her most recent refurbished stock and was ready to deliver it to Upcycle.

  While it was true that she couldn’t afford to lose produce, especially in a year when so much of her crop had been delayed by wet weather, she had too many other things on her mind right now to worry about disappearing beans and walking carrots.

  Back inside her house, she picked up a few things she needed to take with her, but as she passed through the living room her attention was caught by Wendolin’s statue and she stopped to pick it up.

  She had held and admired it dozens of times since Luke had brought it to her. The perfection of the tiny girl’s features amazed her and every time she looked at it, she marveled at the artist’s skill. Carly was sure she could see the face of the elderly woman she had loved in the figure’s flawless features. She thought back over every conversation she’d had with Wendolin, all the times she’d fled to her house when trying to be a city dweller, the urban wife she knew she wasn’t.

  “Talking is the only solution,” Wendolin often said in her softly accented voice.

  But it hadn’t been the solution for her and Luke. At least, not then. Neither of them had been able to say the right things.

  Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out her cell phone. She had his number and she’d called him once after seeing him at the ice-cream social. It had been cut short because he’d had to go to a meeting. When he’d called back, they were being hit by an electrical storm, so she hadn’t found the answers she needed that day.

  Carly knew she could have contacted him again, should have contacted him again, in spite of the attorney’s advice to wait and see what would happen, but she had put it off. Glancing at the clock, she found an excuse to delay it again. She had to get this load of goods into Upcycle so that her employees, Janie and Troy, could help her arrange everything.