by Holly Jacobs
“That’s true,” she said, not sure she believed his excuse.
“It is, believe me. But in court, I don’t generally indulge in warm-fuzzies. I have a reputation as a hard-ass, and I’ll confess that it works in my favor. So don’t tell anybody, okay?”
She looked at the too-young-to-be-a-judge man, and felt a twinge of guilt. “I won’t tell.”
Right on cue, Chuck walked into the room. “Hey, Mom’s nervous about the two of you being in here alone. And what aren’t you telling, Carly?”
“No idea what you’re talking about.” Carly winked at Anderson, then took her stack of plates into the kitchen.
“She’s an interesting one,” she heard Anderson say, though she didn’t hear Chuck’s response.
LATER THAT NIGHT, as Chuck drove her home, she looked across the seat at him. His face was illuminated by the street lights. Lit one minute, shadowed the next.
It was a nice face.
A very nice face.
Dean’s face had an aristocratic air to it. A suave sort of good looks. Handsome.
No one would say Chuck was handsome. He was…cute.
The thought made her smile. She was pretty sure Erie’s own Lieutenant of Communication and Community Outreach wouldn’t enjoy being described as cute. But there it was…he wasn’t the least bit handsome, but he was very, very cute.
“What are you smiling about?” he asked, after a quick glance in her direction,
Although self-restraint wasn’t one of Carly’s gifts, she managed to practice a bit of it now. “I was just thinking.”
“Carly, we haven’t known each other very long, but I’m thinking your thinking is a dangerous thing.”
“I’ve heard that before.” She sighed.
He pulled up in front of her house. “I do want to thank you for helping me out tonight with my mother.”
“You’re welcome. I had fun.” She was as surprised as Chuck looked to hear herself say those words. “Listen, I love my kids, but it’s nice to have an adult conversation during a meal for a change. And I’ll confess, I’m sort of looking forward to Tuesday. We haven’t talked about it, but I’ve got a lot of information for the kids.”
“Great.”
“Before I get out of the car, I want to say thanks for the invitation. Needling Anderson was fun. I meant to ask where your sister was? I’d really have enjoyed meeting her.”
“Sorry, Carly. I thought I’d explained.” He paused, then said, very business-like, “My sister Julia died last year.”
“Oh.” She thought about how she’d taunted Anderson, and felt horrible. “I’m so sorry.”
“We all were. She and Andy were talking about starting a family, and they thought she was pregnant. I’d never seen them both so happy. Then they found out it wasn’t a pregnancy—she had uterine cancer. By the time they’d caught it, it was systemic.”
Carly went from feeling bad to feeling worse. “Oh, Chuck, how awful.”
“Anderson, well, he’s changed since losing Julia. I don’t think he’s fully recovered yet.”
“And then I come along and spend a family dinner picking at him.” She hadn’t known about Anderson Bradley’s wife, but Chuck had. And Anderson had admitted he’d thrown out the plea in order to help her.
Worse and worse. She turned to Chuck. “You let me do that. You let me go in and spend a meal making his life even more miserable, knowing that he hadn’t recovered. How could you?”
“Carly, that was the most I’ve heard out of Andy in the last year. Maybe he needed a challenge.” Then he muttered, “And let me assure you, you’re a challenge all right.”
“Nice. Use me to torment a man who’s obviously tormented enough without my help, then insult me. I’m going in.” She opened the door, got out of the car and toward her porch.
Chuck unrolled his window and called, “I’ll still see you early Tuesday morning then?”
She turned around. “You wouldn’t if I had a choice, but since I don’t, yeah I’ll be there.” She unlocked the front door and bolted inside before he had time to say goodbye. She locked the door and peeked out the window. Chuck’s car didn’t move for another moment, then slowly pulled away.
Wow, that had been the weirdest night of her life.
For a second in the car, she’d thought Chuck was cute.
A cute cop.
No way was she going down that path. She wasn’t ruling out men forever, but she certainly wasn’t about to jump back on the man-wagon with Chuck. She wanted someone quiet and sweet.
Neither word described Chuck Jefferson.
CHUCK WATCHED AS Carly Lewis hurried into her house.
She couldn’t get away from him fast enough, and he wasn’t sure why. She’d studied him intently on the way from his mom’s to her house. That little smile…he wished he knew what that was all about.
At his house, Chuck couldn’t pull in the driveway because Anderson’s truck was in the way, so he parked out on the street.
As Chuck got out of his car, Anderson shut off his motor and got out of his truck as well. “So, what the hell was that?”
“Come on in, Andy. It’s freezing out here.”
Anderson followed him. Chuck’s home was right on 38th Street. He considered it a public service that he was sandwiched between college rentals. Knowing a cop lived next door tended to make the kids behave in a bit more civilized manner.
Anderson repeated, “Seriously, what was that? Bringing someone I’d had before me in court to dinner without so much as a warning call.”
“Oh, come on. It’s not like I brought some hardened criminal.” Chuck opened the door, stomped the snow off his feet and hurried in, with Anderson on his heels.
“Still.” Anderson took off his coat and tossed it on the stair railing. Chuck threw his coat on top of Anderson’s.
The nice thing about being a bachelor was that no one fussed if you didn’t hang up your coat.
He led the way into the sparsely furnished living room. Two new recliners, a beat-up couch and a TV. What more did a guy need? He flopped into one of the recliners and said, “Hey, you’re the one who set us up, in a work-on-the-Safety-Awareness-Program sort of way.”
Anderson took the other recliner and scowled in Chuck’s general direction. “Yeah, but I didn’t imagine she’d be coming to dinner before your first safety day.”
“Mom’s on a fix-Chuck-up kick, Andy. I needed camouflage, and Carly fit the bill. Mom was practically swooning.” Oh, yeah, his mother would be off his case for a while at least. Maybe he could even talk Carly into coming over another Sunday?
“Yeah, well, after you and Carly left, your mom started on me,” Anderson complained. “She told me it had been a year, that I needed to think about dating again. Julia wouldn’t want me to be alone.”
Chuck didn’t know what to say to that. A real guy would just grunt some response, and that was his initial inclination, but he knew that Anderson wasn’t the type to open up at all to anyone, so he figured if he didn’t say something, no one else would have the opportunity. It looked as if he’d just have to take one for the team.
“Mom and Dad love you,” he managed to say, though he felt more than a little emasculated. Still, he forced himself to continue, “At first, it was just that you were Julia’s husband, but then it was just for you. We all miss her, but all of us want you to be happy.”
Thank goodness none of the guys at the station could hear this conversation. They’d never let him live it down. “Mom and Dad are right, Julia would want you to be happy. And since I’m feeling like some touchy-feely talk show host, let’s just forget I said those words.”
“Happy to. Because I’m not ready. I don’t know if I ever will be ready to move on.” As if that was all he could manage in the let’s-share-our-emotions department, Anderson changed the subject back to Carly. “So what about you and the pyro?”
“Accidental arsonist is her preferred title, if you don’t mind.” He chuckled at the memory of her usi
ng the phrase.
Working with Carly Lewis throughout January was going to be interesting.
Chapter Four
On Monday, Carly hurried home from St. Vincent’s. She was working the seven-to-three shift on weekdays for now. Once she passed her boards, she’d be working three twelve-hour shifts a week if she stayed at the hospital.
She’d had to go to the nurse supervisor with her list of Safety Awareness days and request them off. Thankfully, Claire knew about her legal problems and was sympathetic. As a graduate nurse, Carly was under supervision. Claire had juggled the schedule so that Carly could make the program’s dates.
After she passed her boards and was a registered nurse, it would be harder to have this kind of flexibility.
Of course, she could go look for another job, straight days, in an office, like Samantha. She’d enjoyed her day at Dr. Jackson’s.
Mulling over the pros and cons of both options, she opened her door to chaos. The kids walked home from school and got there about fifteen minutes before she did, but those fifteen minutes gave them time to arm themselves.
“Mom, Mom, Mom,” Sean chanted, as she walked into the house and threw her bag by the door.
Carly knew that particular “Mom, Mom, Mom” meant that Sean was going to ask for something. Something she might not be inclined to grant. She tried to pretend not to notice he wanted something. “Hi, honey, how was your day at school?”
“Fine.”
Fine was Sean’s standard response.
Sometimes, he actually gave her more than a monosyllabic answer and said, okay. Although any description of his day that took more than those one or two syllables was rare, she continued to ask.
“Can we go to Books Galore?” he asked, getting to his Mom-Mom-Mom point. “My new comics should be in and I really need them.”
“You don’t need them, you want them. And I don’t know why you do, comics are dumb,” Rhiana proclaimed.
It was an old argument in this house. Sean was an ardent comic fan, and Rhiana used that knowledge to tease him. Having two kids only ten months apart meant teasing was one of their favorite occupations.
“They’re not dumb,” Sean proclaimed, right on cue. “They’re like today’s mythology. That new Joss Whedon one…”
As Sean waxed poetic about his friend Jake’s theory on comic mythology, Carly tried to escape to her room. All she wanted was five minutes of peace and quiet in order to change out of her scrubs and into her real-people clothes. She didn’t even manage to make it out of the kitchen.
“Hey, Mom, can we go, huh?” Sean pressed.
“And if we’re taking dork-boy to Books Galore, could we stop at the mall afterward? I wanted to get a new hoody at American Eagle. They’re having a sale and I still have that coupon.”
Carly did the math in her head and finally nodded. “I have PTA tonight, so here’s what we’ll do. Give me a few minutes to change, and both of you get ready. We’ll stop at Books Galore, then at American Eagle. We can come down Peach Street on the way home and grab something for dinner—”
“Taco Bell,” Sean practically screamed.
“McDonald’s,” Rhiana retorted.
Carly listened as the debate over comics turned into a debate over which fast-food joint’s food was preferable.
This time she managed to sneak out without being caught. She hurried down the hall, dodging Sean’s boots which sat outside his bedroom—why, she wasn’t sure. They should be in the front hall. Next came Rhiana’s room. The door was firmly closed with a hand-printed warning—Keep Out—firmly in place. Finally, she got into to her own room and shut the door, then fell on her bed and took a deep breath.
There were days when it all got to be too much. When all she wanted was ten minutes to herself. Even now, she could hear the kids’ muted argument, and wished it was quiet.
Which should have made those weekends when Dean had the kids something she looked forward to. Instead, she found those endless hours of silence went from welcomed to oppressive too fast. She longed for a happy medium.
There were thuds on the door. “Mom, can we go through the drive-through at both Taco Bell and McDonalds?” Sean called.
“Yeah, we tried to work out a compromise, like you say we should,” Rhiana hollered.
Carly dragged herself up off the bed, knowing her momentary break was over. “Yes, we can,” she called answered as she started to change, “if you both agree to come home and start your homework right after dinner with no stalling or complaints. I have a PTA meeting tonight, and I want that done before I go.”
“Sure,” they called out together.
Carly finished changing, trying to gear herself up for an evening of chaos. If she was lucky, she’d make the meeting on time.
Luck was not on her side.
Despite her best-laid plans, Carly arrived at the PTA meeting at seven-forty-five. She’d have been close to on time, except that at some point between returning from Books Galore and the mall and leaving for the meeting, it had snowed another couple of inches, and she’d had to shovel out the driveway before leaving.
She hurried into the cafeteria and scanned the room for her friends. She spotted Samantha, Michelle and Michelle’s new fiancé in a far corner. Samantha saw Carly and gave a little wave. Carly tried to look as inconspicuous as possible as she made her way over to them.
“Where’s Harry?” Carly asked quietly as she pulled a chair from a neighboring table over to theirs.
“He’s got to do his duty as principal at these things.” Samantha pointed to Harry, up at the head table with Heidi, the overworked PTA president who’d roped all three of them onto the Social Planning Committee. There was another guy standing at the microphone.
“Who’s the speaker?”
“He’s talking about teaching your kids to be fearless,” Michelle whispered. “He claims they need to be fearless in order to stand up to peer pressure, less-than-perfect home environments, being in a broken family and all the other outside influences.”
Carly nodded, and turned her attention to the speaker.
“…fear can be paralyzing,” he was saying, “but that same fear can push our kids down the wrong path. Bullies for instance are some of the most terrified people there are. They…”
Carly listened to the man as he continued talking about bullies and realized he was describing Dean. Not that Dean had ever physically abused her, but he’d eroded so much of who she was subtly, slowly. And she’d allowed it to happen.
Dean had been there when her parents died, when she so desperately needed something—someone—to cling to. He’d taken over, kept her going during that trying time. And without even knowing it, she’d allowed herself to disappear.
Innocuously, quietly, she’d changed from who she was into who he wanted her—maybe even needed her—to be.
She’d been so afraid of being alone that she hadn’t noticed what was really happening to her.
She’d let herself become a doormat, an extension of Dean.
She couldn’t blame him. And by the time she’d recognized and admitted it, it was too late.
Samantha gently elbowed her. “Hey, what’s that expression all about?”
Michelle was next to Daniel on the other side of the table. They leaned toward each other. Not cuddling, but touching. Barely touching, yet needing that connection.
Something like that was absolutely the last thing Carly ever wanted again. She didn’t want to need anyone. She’d needed Dean and lost herself. She couldn’t allow that to happen again.
“I’m fine,” she assured Samantha, who didn’t look convinced. “Really. I’m better than fine. I’m better than I’ve been in a very long time.”
As the other Erie Elementary parents started to clap, she looked up. The speaker had finished. She clapped as well.
Harry stood and went to the mic. “I want to thank everyone for coming out on such a snowy January night. There are refreshments, thanks to the second-grade parents.” He s
tarted to move away from the microphone, and perpetually perky Heidi jumped up. “I just want to remind the parents to sign their children’s class list. The class with the most parents in attendance tonight will have chips tomorrow.”
“Ah, it’s all about the reward,” Samantha said. “My four make me come because they each want their class to win.”
“Sean and Rhiana asked at the beginning of the year if my attendance counted twice for them, since they’re both in the same grade. They wanted to go protest to Harry when they found out it didn’t.”
They walked toward the refreshment line.
“I’ll probably stick to a diet soda,” Samantha said, even as she eyed the tiny mini cheesecakes longingly.
Harry came up behind her and gave her a discreet hug. “Get the cheesecake. I like a woman with a few curves.”
“Any more curves and I’ll be the Ravine Flyer,” she muttered, naming the new roller coaster at the local amusement park, Waldemeer.
Harry leaned down and quickly, before anyone noticed, kissed the nape of her neck. “You’re perfect just the way you are. Every curve—” He leaned closer and whispered the rest of his compliment.
Whatever he said had Samantha blushing profusely.
Carly felt a warmth spread through her middle…it was almost a longing. A tiny little niggle of a thought that some day, she might want that. What Samantha and Harry had.
She brutally pushed the thought back. What Samantha and Harry had was unique. Special. That didn’t mean everyone was destined for something like that.
Of course, Michelle had found Daniel. She looked at them, farther down the line. They weren’t as openly affectionate as Samantha and Harry, but when Michelle reached out and grabbed a napkin for Daniel, their hands brushed. And they paused. It was only a split second. Carly was pretty sure no one else noticed, but she did. And that pang hit again.
She sighed.
“Something wrong?” Samantha asked, as Harry turned around to talk to one of the parents.
Carly shook her head and reached for a chocolate cupcake. “Nothing at all. Simply looking for a chocolate fix.”
