That Night on Thistle Lane

by Carla Neggers

  “Are you satisfied with what he told you about his reasons for following you?”

  “He didn’t give me any reasons.”

  “So does that mean you’re still on the case?”

  “It does, yes.”

  Phoebe glanced back at her sisters, then shifted her gaze to him again. “Ava and Ruby have so many great ideas for the fashion show. I think they’re enjoying themselves.”

  “And you?”

  She smiled. “Yes, me, too.”

  “You’re an interesting family,” Noah said. “Any idea how Julius Hartley would know about a scar on your knee?”

  Her eyes widened, and then she burst into laughter. “Because everyone in town knows. I have no secrets, Noah. When I was twelve, I cut my knee at the Frosts’ millpond. Maggie, Olivia and Jess Frost and I were swimming. The water was so cold—not that it ever warms up—but it was still early summer so it was especially frigid. They got out and I stayed in. Next thing I knew, one of Brandon’s brothers was pulling me out of the water.” Phoebe tilted her head back, the turquoise of her eyes rich and deep in the gray dusk. “I had mild hypothermia, and I’d slipped on a rock. There was blood everywhere.”

  “Did you get stitches?”

  “No. We just bandaged up the cut. It’s not that bad a scar. I don’t know why people remember that story. It’s not as if a cut knee is any big deal.”

  It wasn’t just the cut knee, Noah realized. It was also staying in the cold millpond and ending up with hypothermia, to the point that she’d had to get pulled to safety by a Sloan.

  It was a big deal because it was Phoebe O’Dunn.

  Everyone remembered her cut knee, hypothermia and rescue because they went against their ideas about her.

  He touched a bit of fringe on her shawl and suspected it, too, was from the piles of old clothes donated for the fashion show. “You’re supposed to be the sensible O’Dunn.”

  She smiled at him. “I am the sensible O’Dunn.”

  Noah let her go and returned to Olivia’s car. When he arrived at Carriage Hill, Buster had, in fact, liberated himself from the back room and was camped out on the sofa. Noah settled in next to him. He wasn’t impulsive. He’d call Loretta. He’d stay focused.

  He knew himself and he had clarity about what he wanted.

  And he wanted Phoebe O’Dunn.

  Fourteen

  Phoebe opened a bottle of merlot and Maggie arrived with a variety of cheeses and crackers. They had fresh vegetables from their mother’s garden, although Ava and Ruby insisted they couldn’t look at another tomato right now.

  They gathered in Phoebe’s small living room and put on To Catch a Thief. They sighed over the beautiful Cote d’Azur scenery, took a poll about who thought Cary Grant was sexy—all but Ava—and argued about their favorite Alfred Hitchcock movies.

  “That’s my dress!” Maggie pointed at the television with an olive-oil cracker topped with goat’s cheese and cucumber. “Oh, my. I’d forgotten how beautiful Grace Kelly was. I looked like a frump in comparison.”

  “You looked great,” Phoebe said.

  “At least I managed to get into the dress and we only had to let out a seam here and there.” She popped her cracker into her mouth. “Don’t you think Cary Grant’s kind of old for Grace?”

  “It’s a movie,” Ruby said with a roll of her eyes.

  They settled down, enjoying the movie. Ava had the small sofa to herself, Ruby a chair, Maggie and Phoebe throw pillows on the floor. Phoebe hadn’t confessed to Ava and Ruby that she’d ventured to Friday’s charity masquerade, but, given their sideways glances at her, she suspected they had an inkling. Maggie slipped up a couple of times, and finally Phoebe just told them.

  They loved the idea. “Oh, excellent,” Ava said. “Now I wish I’d gone, too.”

  Ruby glanced at Maggie. “Did Phoebe dance with anyone?”

  Phoebe reached for a slice of cucumber. “Why are you asking Maggie and not me?”

  “Because Maggie will tell us and you won’t,” Ruby said without hesitation.

  Maggie settled back on her stack of pillows. “Phoebe danced with a dashing swordfighter.”

  “A swordfighter?” Ruby peered down at Phoebe. “Not Noah Kendrick. Olivia says he’s a master fencer. You were out at Mom’s with him, and then on the common—Phoebe. It was Noah?”

  “Are you the reason he stayed at Olivia’s?” Ava asked.

  Phoebe shook her head. “I’m not the reason he stayed.”

  “But he was your swordfighter,” Ruby amended.

  “Yes, but it’s not...” Phoebe jumped to her feet. How could she explain to her sisters what was going on between her and Noah when she didn’t understand herself? “I’ll get more crackers.”

  She disappeared into the kitchen. She should have canceled tonight but she’d thought she needed it. A fun night with her sisters would remind her who she was—and who Noah was.

  At least now Ava and Ruby knew about Friday. Phoebe had thought about it during the day and decided she didn’t like that she, Maggie and Olivia knew but the twins didn’t. Of course, that was before she’d run into Julius Hartley at the country store and ended up kissing Noah in the library attic.

  Phoebe grabbed another box of crackers and headed back into her living room. Her sisters had turned their attention back to the movie, at least for the moment. She set the crackers on the coffee table and resumed her position on the floor, watching Grace Kelly and Cary Grant on their adventures in the south of France.

  When the movie ended, Ruby kicked out her legs and sighed. “That was so much fun.” She wiggled her bare toes. “We’ll have to watch Breakfast at Tiffany’s next time.”

  “You still haven’t told us where you got the dresses, Phoebe,” Ava said.

  Phoebe helped herself to a slice of green pepper from her mother’s garden. “At the library,” she said.

  Ruby took a handful of cultivated blueberries, also courtesy of their mother. “Someone donated them for the show?”

  “I found them in the library attic,” Phoebe said, then told her sisters about the hidden sewing room.

  Ruby sat up straight, tucking her knees under her chin. “A secret room in the library attic? Oh, wow. I love it. You’ll let us see it?”

  Phoebe nodded. “Maybe you can help figure out which outfits are copies from movies and which are original designs.”

  Ava was as enthusiastic as Ruby. Maggie was quiet, frowning at Phoebe. “What about the man you overheard on Friday night?”

  “His name is Julius Hartley,” Phoebe said.

  “The guy who was interested in buying a goat?” Ruby asked. “He was at the masquerade ball, too?”

  Phoebe nodded and brought them all up to speed about Noah and his mystery man from Friday night. “Noah’s still trying to figure out what Hartley wants with him,” she said finally. “I accidentally got in the middle of it. Hartley’s going back to California and I imagine Noah won’t be far behind.”

  Maggie started to say something else but Ava stood up. Her hair was in a long, loose braid that hung down her back. “When we were helping you clean up after you bought this place, I found a box of old books in a corner of that big hall closet upstairs. Novels, books on movies, biographies of stars and directors, a Vogue sewing book, a couple of books in French—I remember one was Le Petit Prince. I wonder if it has anything to do with your hidden room.”

  “What did you do with the box?” Phoebe asked.

  “I left it where it was,” Ava said. “I figured we’d get to it eventually. It’s in back of the closet with some old curtain rods and wool blankets. Phoebe, you know what this means, right?”

  She nodded as she got to her feet. “It’s possible that whoever created that hidden room used to live here.”

  * * *

  After her sisters left, Phoebe sat outside on a wicker chair in the cool night air and called Olivia in San Diego. “I’m watching fireflies,” she said when her friend answered. “What are you doing?
”

  “I’m sitting on Dylan’s porch looking out at the Pacific. It’s quite a view.” Olivia sounded content. “How’s everything in Knights Bridge?”

  “You know the mystery man from the ball is Julius Hartley, a California private investigator, right?”

  “Yes. Noah and Dylan have been in touch.”

  “He was out at my mother’s place this afternoon. Hartley. It must be because I danced with Noah at the masquerade.”

  “Is there anything I can do, Phoebe?”

  “I don’t know that there’s anything to be done,” she said, then told Olivia about the hidden room. “Has anyone in your family ever mentioned a woman who loved Hollywood and was also an incredible seamstress?”

  “Not that I recall. I can ask.”

  “Maggie, the twins and I think she might have lived here—in my house on Thistle Lane.”

  “Maybe my folks remember her. I can ask. Who else knows?”

  “Noah.” Before Olivia could respond, Phoebe changed the subject. “How do you like San Diego, Liv?”

  “I love it. I’m having a great time. Coronado is beautiful. I love Dylan’s house. It’s across from the beach.” She added with a small laugh, “The interior could use some color.”

  “It sounds idyllic.”

  “I don’t see Dylan giving up San Diego entirely. I don’t know that I want him to. We’ll figure it out. It’s not exactly a problem, you know?”

  Phoebe stood up from her wicker chair and looked out at the dark lane, wondered if her seamstress had once done the same. “Sometimes it’s harder to open ourselves up to new possibilities than just to stay put where we are, emotionally, physically. You have so much going for you now. Dylan, too. If you hadn’t left Boston when you did, the way you did...”

  “Phoebe? You don’t sound like yourself. Is something wrong?”

  “No, nothing. It’s good to talk to you. I hope you know I’ll support whatever you and Dylan decide to do.”

  “We’ll be flying back soon,” Olivia said. “We’ll be there for the fashion show, for sure.”

  “I’m sure Noah will head back to San Diego now that he’s found his mystery man. Julius Hartley’s heading back to L.A., too.” Phoebe tried to ignore a rush of emotion. “Maggie and I can see to Buster and your place.”

  “Have you met Hartley?”

  “Just for a few minutes. He was pretending to be interested in buying goats from my mother. Noah and I went over there.”

  “What did he think of your mother’s place?” Olivia asked.

  “He didn’t say but it’s obviously not what he’s used to.” Phoebe sat on the top porch step, next to the trellis and its tangle of roses, and smiled into the phone. “Have you seen his place in San Diego?”

  “Just the NAK offices. They’re incredible. It must be weird for him to go from working night and day to not knowing what’s next.”

  “True.” Phoebe wished she hadn’t brought up Noah’s life in San Diego. “We missed you at movie night tonight. My head’s spinning a little from the wine. We watched To Catch a Thief.”

  “And was Grace Kelly’s dress as much like the one Maggie wore as we thought?”

  “It’s identical. It’s amazing.”

  “I understand Brandon’s sleeping in a tent at Dylan’s place,” Olivia said. “Dylan thinks he’s there to get her back. What are the odds he does?”

  Phoebe didn’t hesitate. “He will. No question. I’m just not telling her that’s what I think.”

  They laughed, Phoebe finally relaxing as she and Olivia chatted for a few more minutes. When they hung up and she went back inside, she realized how quiet the house was, and how alone she was. She’d never felt alone before. How could she, here in the midst of her hometown? So, why did she now?

  “It’s Noah,” she said aloud, knowing that no one was eavesdropping in the roses and hollyhocks outside her windows.

  She and her sisters had gone upstairs and found the box in the closet. Phoebe carried it downstairs. They went through the contents for any obvious clues to their seamstress’s identity. A name scrawled on the inside of a book, an old letter, an old bank statement. But there was nothing except the books themselves.

  Phoebe took a yellowed copy of The Moonspinners from the box and brought it up to bed with her. She’d lose herself in Mary Stewart’s descriptions of Crete, and she wouldn’t think about kissing Noah Kendrick in the library attic.

  * * *

  Brandon Sloan was a damn pirate at heart.

  Maggie held that thought as she watched him come out the front door of her Gothic Revival house. It was just the sort of place the Sloans loved: one in need of carpenters.

  He sat next to her on the steps. The night was cool enough that he had on an old gray sweatshirt. She was chilly in her sundress but tried not to shiver. It was all she needed, him thinking he ought to put an arm around her to help keep her warm.

  “The boys want hockey sticks,” she said. “Did they tell you?”

  “Hockey? I thought you had them baking cupcakes.”

  She resisted elbowing him because touching him in any way would just remind her of touching him in all the ways she had in the past.

  It had turned into that kind of night.

  They’d made such a damn mess of their marriage. It was all she’d thought about walking home from Thistle Lane. Maggie realized that something about the box of books they’d dragged out of Phoebe’s upstairs closet had gotten to her. It was as if the books captured a moment in time of a woman’s life, provided a window into her hopes and dreams. Sewing and Hollywood and adventures.

  What would the odds and ends of her own day-to-day life say about her, now, at this moment?

  Maggie pushed back the thought. “The hockey is probably Dylan’s influence,” she said.

  It was a gibe and Brandon obviously knew it, but he didn’t jump up and storm off. He just stretched out his thick legs and shrugged. “Maybe it is.”

  Maggie regretted her crack. Whatever his faults—whatever her own faults—he’d always been there for the boys. Just not always for her. But she didn’t need him, right? Wasn’t that what she’d been telling herself for months? Telling him?

  “I have ice skates in the budget for winter,” she said. “The town still does the small outdoor rink on the common.” It was just a homemade rink done mostly with hoses and shovels, a Knights Bridge tradition going back at least to when her mother was a child. “The boys and I will be able to walk over there so they can skate to their hearts’ content. I think I even have my old skates.”

  “I remember when you and I would go ice-skating together,” Brandon said.

  Maggie smiled despite a rush of emotion. “You were a maniac. All that energy. What am I going to do if Tyler and Aidan have as much energy as teenagers as you did?”

  “Keep doing what you’re doing.”

  “And watch them like a hawk,” she muttered.

  Brandon grinned. “Like I said, keep doing what you’re doing.” He looked out at the street, just one window lit in the saltbox house, one of the oldest houses in the village, opposite hers. “You like living in town. The boys do, too. They like being able to walk to everything.”

  “You think I’m too soft,” Maggie said, crossing her arms on her chest as she sat up straight. “I’m not raising them to be tough Sloan men. I have them doing story hour at the library instead of roping a steer.”

  “Roping a steer? I guess they could rope goats at your mother’s—”

  “Goats are soft, too, right? She has a well-equipped toolshed, at least. It’s got hammers, nails, drills, saws. No guns and fire hoses, though.”

  Brandon sighed. “What did I say, Maggie?”

  “Nothing. I can tell what you’re thinking.” She stood up, glaring down at him in the dark, on a roll now, her emotions boiling over. “You and your family have always thought I was too soft, because my father was such a dreamer and then he died in a stupid accident and it’s just been my sisters and
my mother and me for so long.”

  “Your father was a good man, Maggie, but he still left you all with nothing.”

  “We have the land. We’ve all worked hard to help Mom hang on to it. Tyler and Aidan love it out there.”

  “I know they do.” He stood, the light from the house casting dark shadows on his face. “You’re coping with a lot on your own, Maggie. It doesn’t have to be that way. I can help.”

  “Help how?”

  “Any way you need.”

  She hadn’t expected him to be so calm, not reacting to any of her barbs, deliberate or otherwise. She blinked back tears. “I never should have had wine with my sisters. I’m sorry if I...” If I what? She didn’t even know. “Never mind. Why are you back here, Brandon?”

  “My father needed the help.”

  “You’re giving up on your dream of wandering the world?”

  His eyes held hers. “I haven’t given up on anything.”

  “What about Boston? You never wanted to live in a small town.”

  “If I hadn’t gotten laid off, I’d have kept working in Boston.” He spoke simply, without any obvious emotion. “I do what I have to do. I always have.”

  “While wishing you were somewhere else.”

  “Not always,” he said softly.

  “Why are you living in a tent? I suppose it helps to have a temporary place, so you can pretend you’re not really back in Knights Bridge.”

  “So I can save money.”

  “For a trip,” she said. “Not for ice skates.”

  He said nothing.

  Maggie regretted her sharp words. “I’m sorry. I know you’d do anything for the boys. It’s me...” She stopped herself, cleared her throat. “You won’t be living in a tent once the snow flies. It’s fine for now but...” She left it at that. He knew what she was saying. What she was asking. Would he be staying in Knights Bridge?

  “Don’t worry about me, Maggie.”

  “I’m not worried about you. I’m trying to figure out what’s next for you. For us.” She waved a hand. “Never mind. Let’s talk about something else.”

  “All right. If that’s what you want.” He glanced back at her house with its “gingerbread” Gothic Revival details. “The place is looking good. Going to paint it shades of pink? It’s what you used to say when we walked past this place as kids. That you’d paint it shades of pink if you lived there.”