Cait slid a cookie her way and said, “Want to frost a bell?”
“Sure.” Alessi took the cookie.
“Open this.” Lyn handed her a plastic tub that her tiny fingers could not pry open.
Alessi pulled off the lid and saw that it held white frosting. She took the knife that lay beside it and spread the bell-shaped cookie with icing.
“Now use these.” Cait pushed over an assortment of decorating tubes.
Alessi made drops and squiggles with the colored gels and smiled at her finished project. She’d made cookies one year at a friend’s house. They’d colored their own frosting and decorated with toothpicks, none of these fancy gels in plastic tubes. But the result was the same, a cookie too sweet to eat.
She took the mug of chocolate offered her by Ben. “Thanks.” The steam dampened her upper lip as she blew softly, then sipped.
“Can I have the bell?” Cait leaned her elbows into a scattering of red sprinkles.
“No,” Lyn said. “That’s not fair.”
“I’ll make you a cookie, Lyn.” Alessi handed the bell over to Cait. “What shape do you want?”
Lyn chose a Christmas tree. Alessi spread it with frosting, then sprinkled green sugar all over the top. She dotted it with yellow and red for ornaments, then gave it over to Lyn. “How’s that?”
“Pretty.”
Mary had hung a miniature candy cane over the lip of the mug, and the peppermint melted into the hot chocolate as Alessi warmed herself with careful sips. The girls slurped loudly on theirs, cooled with milk, and pulled their chocolate-crowned lips away, smacking.
Ben and Mary joined them at the table with a plate of crustless tuna-salad sandwiches cut into triangles. Alessi couldn’t be sure, but it seemed some of the frailty she’d noted that morning had gone from Mary. Maybe it was the color whipped into her cheeks, or the way she met and held Alessi’s eyes instead of glancing away the minute their gaze met. And she leaned lightly into Ben’s arm with her shoulder as they sipped from their mugs and nibbled sandwiches. Alessi felt a glow all through her.
This was better than finding her car. She could look again tomorrow, when she wasn’t working for Steve. Maybe on her lunch break. She and the girls decorated cookies until they’d finished the batch. Then she stood and looked out the window. “Look at that!” It had started snowing great lumpy flakes. “I’d better go back now.”
“Do you want Ben to drive you?” Mary cleared the sandwich plate to the counter.
“No thanks. It’s not far.”
“You sure?”
Ben had Lyn on one knee. She was trying to feed him a star with enough yellow sprinkles to choke a horse.
Alessi smiled. “I’m sure. Thanks for the sledding and all.”
Mary walked her to the door. “I’m glad you joined us.”
“Me too.” Alessi touched her arm briefly, then let herself out into the cold.
She figured it couldn’t be more than a mile or so back to Steve’s store, and she would keep her eyes peeled for her car along the way. There was still plenty of daylight, even with the snow coming down. But it was hard to walk with the flakes in her face, and she began to consider the snow enough of a good thing.
As she walked she felt a sudden chill in the back of her neck and spun. Nothing but snow. Shaking her head, she went on, passing a few people heading home with sleds and children in tow, but as she left the neighborhood behind and reached the shops, there was no one but herself out on the street. Of course, the stores were closed on Sunday, even Moll’s. The Best Bakery and Espresso had been open after church but was closed as she approached it now.
Again Alessi had the sensation she was being watched. She resisted turning and acting like a paranoid fool. But as she started past the Laundromat, the creeping sensation up her spine grew, and when she heard a sound, she shot a glance over her shoulder. She thought she saw something move into the shadows between the Hawkeye Gift Gallery and the Bennet’s Books front awning.
She walked faster toward the Mr. Gas station and pulled Steve’s jacket close around her neck. She was probably catching a chill, and that accounted for the quivering in her spine. She focused on the station. She’d have to go past it to the house to see if Steve was there with the key to the store. Just as she reached the gas pumps, a snowball whizzed by her head and smacked the pump with a hard crack.
She spun, but there was no one in sight. She stared down the empty street, then looked at the ground where the snowball had burst apart to show the rock. She crouched down and felt the sharp edges of the projectile. If that had hit her head … She jerked herself up and hurried around the side of the station toward the house, heart racing.
A mean joke? The bad feeling in her spine made her run. She reached the kitchen door and went inside, fighting tears. Why would someone target her? What had she ever done to this town?
Fifteen
STEVE HAD GONE FROM HOME TO HOME as people in Charity frequently did Sunday afternoons. His intent had been less social connection than trying to get a pulse on the situation. Some people, like Stacie, were more sympathetic to Alessi than Cooper Roehr had been, but no one believed, or could admit, her car had been stolen from Ben’s station—except Ben and Dave. And even they doubted the car was in Charity or had been taken by someone from Charity. They would believe it had been lifted by aliens before they would doubt their neighbors or call Alessi a liar.
Ben did admit there’d been other strange goings-on lately. He had lost some videos from the station, and Dave was replacing tools he was sure he never misplaced. They were all little things, and no one talked about it much, but auto theft was not little. Steve wished he had asked Cooper whether he’d checked with the Chambers City police, but he guessed he had. Even if he didn’t believe her, Cooper would want an answer to the missing car. Probably hoped it would show up somewhere with someone else inside.
Steve stopped now at Pastor Welsh’s house, and Burton welcomed him with his perpetual warmth and concern. “How are you, Steve? Holiday getting you down?”
“No,” Steve said. “I’m concerned about Alessi.”
“The young woman with you this morning?” Steve nodded, then said, “Not with me.”
Madeline joined them. “Come in, Steve. Your young lady seems quite nice.”
“She’s—”
“Very attentive, I noticed.”
Burton brightened. “Was she? I hope she took the message to heart.” He motioned Steve to a chair. The stereo played, “Good Christian men rejo-i-ce, with heart and hand and vo-i-ce.” A trio of red candles scented the air with something fruity.
Steve sat down. “It was an appropriate message if her car’s been stolen.”
Burton’s countenance dimmed. “I don’t doubt she’s had trouble. Cooper believes she was deserted.”
Steve jerked his mouth. “He also thinks her a princess out for a fling.”
The pastor threaded his fingers around one knee. “Either way, there have to be hurts to make her behave like this. She deserves our compassion and assistance.” His voice grew rich. “We know the lifechanging power of kindness.”
Madeline handed Steve a mug of spiced cider. “It was good of you to give her a job and a place to stay.”
Steve was hardly surprised by their knowledge. Even more than small-town dynamics were involved in ministry connections. Burton Welsh and his wife were told everything. “Well, I did have extra work with the new estate collection I acquired. And there’s no lodging in Charity.”
Burton said, “I suppose she could be taken to Chambers City.”
“She thinks her car is here. She saw it last night.”
“She’s obviously mistaken.” If you could visualize blind faith, the pastor wore it now. Burton Welsh did not want to hear that anything was awry in his little kingdom. Nor, it seemed, did he leave any opening for doubt among his flock. Steve drank the cider without arguing.
“How is business? A new collection, you say?”
Steve nodded. “It’s one my father watched for several years. The owner named him in the will as having first rights to buy. That included me as his successor.” Steve’s throat tightened up. Why did it still hurt?
“This is a hard time for you. Where are you having Christmas dinner?”
Steve smiled. “Believe me, I’m not out in the cold.”
Burton returned his smile. “Good, good. Well, that’s what we’re about in Charity. If we can’t help each other, what else is there?”
“And now you’ve reached out to Miss Moore.” Madeline gave him a knowing smile.
“Well—”
The door opened and Carl came in, chapped from the cold. He came to stand beside Madeline, whispering, “What’s for dinner?”
She laughed and squeezed his arm. “We have a guest, Carl.”
“Hi.” Carl smiled with a little too much polish for a seventeenyear-old, but Steve guessed that came with the territory, at least the new territory. Carl had grown quickly and matured early. Steve guessed him thirty pounds his better, though he had yet to fill out his substantial bone structure.
Carl said, “I’ve been meaning to go in and see what you have.” Steve raised his brows. “At the store?”
Carl nodded. “I’m getting into literature.”
Steve stood up. “Well, I mostly carry rare editions, but if you had particular titles you wanted, I could look them up for you.”
Carl said, “Maybe I’ll come in sometime.”
“Sure.” Steve made his good-byes and left. That was probably the first time he’d spoken with Carl since he returned from Alaska. Not once had Carl come into the store, but then, old books didn’t do much for most of Charity’s youth. Steve had loved them because Dad loved them. But Carl? With his start? Maybe the pastor was working even more of a miracle than it already seemed.
Steve shook his head and walked to the truck. Maybe he was the only one out of step with it all. Even his father had signed on. “Yes, I signed, son. They are my neighbors and friends, people among whom I’ve lived every day, people who supported us in the loss of your mother.” Loss—not desertion, not betrayal. Even on his deathbed, Dad had not maligned her. And all he would say regarding the pact was, “We all acted in anger. Therefore we share the responsibility. More than that, we have a chance to make a difference, to save a life … in place of the one that was lost.”
Dad had given his word with the others and to the others. Steve recalled all the lessons on honesty, integrity, decency. “Your word is your bond, son. Give it with pride, and never take it back.” Dad had lived by that, in the pact and before.
His dad had been eighteen years older than his mother. She had drifted into Charity, and into Walter Bennet’s heart, like a spring breeze, and had blown out the same way. Yet he’d never said a disparaging word about her or the man she’d run off with. He’d gone to the grave with his wedding band on.
Steve frowned. What did that have to do with anything? His purpose today was to learn what he could about Alessi’s situation and hopefully settle his own mind on the matter. There was one person in town who usually had a broader view of things. That would be his last stop.
Steve parked the truck in the broad tree-lined drive. He climbed the impressive stairs and rang the bell. The door opened to cleavage and pearls. “Hello, Amanda. Is your father home?”
Amanda led him into the spacious entry of their three-story house looking every inch the actualization trainer she was. “May I take your coat?” She had already slipped her hands into the shoulders of his jacket. “Though I do love a man in leather.” Having annihilated every inhibition she may have had, she amused herself by provoking his.
He suffered the removal of his coat, but she didn’t leave it there. She slid her hand over his sweater. “More?” Her mouth turned tease, just as it had from fifth grade on, after she realized the power she had over the boys.
“No thanks.” He wished like crazy he hadn’t led her on the last time they were alone together. They had no more than kissed in his truck in her driveway, but it had been a stupid move nonetheless, a knee-jerk result of his breakup with Barb and Amanda’s failed marriage to a corporate team builder.
“Are you sure it’s Daddy you wanted?” She pressed in close, smelling of musk and skin and forbidden fruit.
He forced his eyes to stay on her face. “Yes, your father.”
“You used to be more fun.” She pouted, an exotic bird preening on a temporary perch.
He had no idea what she saw in him except maybe a challenge, the ultimate aphrodisiac for a chronic dominator. He said, “I need to see Ernest.”
She pushed away, looking bored. “He’s in the gym.”
Steve headed past the atrium and pool to the well-equipped home gym. An Amoco wildcatter and petroleum engineer, Ernest had retired early with seemingly no diminishment of income. People laughingly spoke of illicit connections to OPEC or, on the flip side, secret involvement with the CIA or the FBI. Ernest Bier neither denied nor confirmed anything.
He jogged now on the treadmill, looking ten years under his age. Amanda got her looks from her dad, though her mother was no slouch.
Ernest said, “Take off your sweater and try the bike.”
Would everyone in this house invite him to take his clothes off? “I wanted to talk to you about the stolen car.”
“What stolen car?”
Steve gripped the treadmill handrail. “The red Mustang taken from Ben’s station two days ago.” As though Ernest didn’t know all about it.
“Amanda ask you to dinner?” he puffed. “Marlo’s got Cornish hens roasting.”
Steve’s stomach growled in response. He’d spent hours trying to figure things out. But he shook his head. “I thought you might know something.”
Ernest swiped his forehead with his arm. “Me? I’ve got nothing to do with it.”
“We’ve all got something to do with it. Isn’t that what the pact means? Keeping evil away? Looking out for each other.”
“Each other, yes.”
Meaning Alessi was not included. Steve frowned. “We can’t just pretend she’s not here, that nothing happened.”
Ernest hit the Cancel button on the treadmill. “The pact doesn’t include an outsider’s car, or an outsider for that matter. It’s Charity’s business.”
“But if someone in Charity took the car …”
Ernest reached for a towel and swabbed the back of his neck. “Steve, I like you. I wish you and Amanda would get something going. But you’re on the wrong track with this.”
“I just thought—”
“I don’t have any inside information or any reason to doubt the people of this town and the good work of the pact.”
Steve wasn’t sure what he’d expected from Ernest, but not the same pabulum regurgitated by the rest.
Ernest stepped down from the treadmill and pulled off his shirt. “I’ll need to shower before dinner. Shall I have Marlo set an extra place?”
Steve shook his head. “No thanks, I have to get back.” He retrieved his coat from among Amanda’s furs and left. What had he achieved? Nothing that would bring a solution to the situation. Either Alessi was a fraud, preying on the town’s sympathies, or she’d been put in a desperate situation and was lying her way out of it. Or she was telling a truth no one in Charity would admit.
The house was empty. Alessi turned on lights in the kitchen and den, certain the men wouldn’t mind if she stayed there until she could get into the store. She closed the front curtains and turned on the outside lights as the daylight continued to diminish. She had just heated a mug of water in the microwave for tea when she heard shuffling at the front door.
She froze, staring as the knob turned. The door swung open and, puffing, Dave tugged on a cut tree. Relieved, she hurried over and held the door open for him. “That’s a nice one, Dave.”
“Yeah.” Dave jerked it through the door, almost toppling backward.
Alessi lifted the tip end and helped
him get it to the corner and into the stand he already had positioned. The tree was a few inches shorter than she but nicely shaped. “I didn’t expect three bachelors to have a Christmas tree.”
“If it weren’t for me, we wouldn’t.” He crawled under the tree and started tightening screws.
Alessi held the trunk in place, with her arm engulfed in prickly needles. “It smells nice.” She breathed the pungent pine aroma and thought of Steve’s description of Alaska—“Pine scent so thick it stayed in your nostrils forever.”
“Is it straight?” He tugged it slightly toward the wall.
“Let me see.” She backed away and eyed it from three sides. “Looks good.”
He crawled out. “There. Now Diana can’t complain.”
Alessi stroked the pliant needles of one branch between her fingers. “Why would she complain?”
“She says men have no sense of ceremony and that if women weren’t in charge there’d be nothing festive in the world.”
Alessi could picture Diana saying that. “Do you have lights?”
“Out in my trunk. Just bought ’em.” He took his keys and a moment later came in with a Wal-Mart bag bulging.
“That’s a lot of lights.”
“It’s the whole ball of wax. Lights, ornaments, tinsel.” He set the bag before the tree.
She peeked inside. “Didn’t you have anything from last year?”
“Didn’t have a tree last year.”
“So without Diana, there’d be nothing festive?” She elbowed him.
He ducked his head to the side. “Don’t you start too.”
She laughed. “I was so tired from sledding and walking back, I didn’t think I could do anything more. But just looking at this stuff … Can I help you?”
“Help me! You can do it.”
“What fun would that be?” She pulled out a box of lights. “I think these should go on first.”
He took the multicolored strand from the box and plugged it into a wall outlet. The string burst into a brilliant array of ruby, amethyst, topaz, sapphire, and emerald—luminous jewels to bedeck the tapered tips of the valiant fir.
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