by Edie Ramer
He’d taken this job for two reasons: It sounded interesting and he’d get to see Katie again.
For the last reason alone, he would have come. He was doing this for half his usual price, but if Rosa hadn’t budged, he would have done it for free just to see Katie.
He suspected he was setting himself up for heartache, but he hadn’t been able to stop himself from coming. Before he’d taken the first job for Rosa, she’d told him that some people were addicted to Katie’s pies. He suspected he was just addicted to Katie, and one thing he knew about addictions was that they never ended well.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Like a lot of things in Miracle, Mo’s back office wasn’t what Gabe expected. Gabe thought it would be crowded and small. Instead it ran nearly the width of the back of the bar with a wide window that let in plenty of light. Gabe guessed it had been a living room at one time. Despite the table pushed into a corner, it still looked like a living room. There was an old brown recliner with a crack in the seat and a blue wing chair, with a low table between the two.
Gabe immediately decided on the wing chair. Everyone looked good in blue. Anyone sitting in the brown one would look as if they were settling in to watch a football game on TV.
“Why don’t I film you first?” he asked Rosa. They’d talked on the phone once a day for the last four days, and he’d found out more about her. That she was a unique combination of an Italian mom and American mom. That she was a sex bomb and sometimes wasn’t afraid to use it. And last, that she had her own ideas on how the film should go.
“I should be last,” she said. “Earl Raasch, our village president, is first.”
“Anything I should know about him?”
“You want cheat sheets?”
Taz laughed.
“The more I know,” Gabe said, “the better questions I can ask.”
“Maybe you’ll ask better questions if you don’t know the answers.”
“Maybe you’re right. But maybe I’m right.”
She stared at him, the way he’d seen a cat stare at a dog once before it pounced, claws out. But Rosa just shook her head. “You’re the first man that ever said that to me. Even my own sons. Everyone thinks they’re right.”
He shrugged. “The world’s not black and white.”
“I’ll second that.” Taz raised his hand.
“You’re dangerous.” Rosa stared at Gabe, ignoring Taz. “You know women too well. How did that happen?”
“I don’t know women well.” He felt uncomfortable. “I know what matters.”
“What does matter?”
“Who’s doing the interviewing?”
“Can I interview you at the end?”
He went still. “This isn’t about me. This is about Miracle and your friends.”
“You just don’t want to be interviewed.”
“That’s right, I don’t.”
“At least you’re honest.”
“Lies are like acid. They burn holes in your soul.” He glanced at Taz. “I hope you’re listening, grasshopper.”
“Lies are a part of life. Everyone does them.”
“Like women when they tell you you’re cute?”
“I’m very cute. Aren’t I, Rosa?”
She looked him up and down then shrugged. “If you like cute.”
Gabe laughed. “You win. Send Earl in. I’ll wing it.”
Two minutes later he was checking the lighting on Earl. With his wrinkles and grizzled gray hair, the burly village president needed all the lighting tricks Gabe could think of. The red in his black-and-red flannel shirt matched the color of his nose, not helping Gabe’s job any.
Earl plunked his wide butt in the brown chair, saying he used to visit the former owner and always sat in the leather chair. The blue chair was too dainty. A ladies’ chair. He said that last with derision.
Gabe checked the lighting and decided nothing would make Earl look good, so he said they were running. Leaning forward, he told Earl to tell the camera who he was.
“I’m Earl Raasch, the owner of Miracle Taxidermy and Reupholstering. I’m also the village board president.”
“Why do you think you were voted in as president?”
“No one else wanted it.”
Taz laughed.
Earl grinned, his teeth yellow.
“And you did?” Gabe asked.
Earl’s bushy eyebrows slanted down, his grin gone. “I’ve lived in Miracle my whole life. Never married, never had children. But I’ve got a family.” He spread his arms wide. “Everyone in the village is my family. Good or bad.” He leaned toward the camera, his brows bristling at it, as if two fuzzy caterpillars were glued to the tops of his eye sockets. “And you better believe, we got ’em both. The good and the bad.”
Gabe saw why Rosa listed Earl first. And why she hadn’t wanted to explain him. Some people had such big personalities they could only be experienced.
“What do you love?” Gabe asked, expecting something about the village life or, considering Earl’s occupation, hunting.
“Life. Myself. God.”
“You go to church?”
“I did until the preacher cheated on his wife.” His face creased into a satisfied smile, and he nodded. “Guess what? The wife’s going to have a baby. And it’s not the preacher’s.”
Taz made a small choking sound and Gabe held back laughter.
“What are you grateful for?”
“That’s easy. My mom and my dad. They brought me up to be a good man. Me and my brother Herman who died in Vietnam.”
“That must’ve been tough.”
“’Course it was tough. Kids nowadays, they’re babies. Always whining about stuff. They don’t know yet that life doesn’t last forever. You gotta enjoy it while you can.”
“What about money?” With every answer, Gabe liked Earl more.
“What about it? I got enough for myself and some in the bank. I can’t keep up with all the jobs I get. I just hired Gunner Klumb to help at the business.”
“It’s because of Gunner that we’re doing this. You have anything to say about that?”
Earl stared right at the camera, a spark in his eyes, as confident and commanding as if he’d been speaking in front of cameras his whole life. “Gunner and Trish ain’t no freeloaders. They’ve always worked hard. They have two boys. Trish didn’t use any of those baby enhancements to get pregnant. They did it the natural way, and now she’s having quads.”
Frowning, he stopped talking. Then his face smooshed into a wrinkled smirk. “And that should be a warning to all the boys and girls who do it in cars.”
Taz gave another muffled laugh. Earl grinned, then his expression sobered. “It’s not funny what’s happening to Gunner and his family. He had a good job with good insurance, but after they found out Trish was pregnant with four babies, Gunner got laid off.” His face twisted into a scowl. “I don’t know if it’s a coincidence. Gunner said a bunch of other people got the pink slip the same time, so maybe not. Gunner’s paying for his own insurance, and it ain’t cheap, no matter what those idiots in Washington say. He tried hard to find another job, but finally they had to come home, broke and without a whole lot of hope.”
“So you gave him a job to help him out?”
Earl turned his snarl at Gabe. “I gave him a job ’cause I needed him. Don’t think I got a soft heart that I can throw money away.” He shifted to the camera again, and this time he wasn’t smiling. “Maybe five or ten bucks. I can give that away. If you’re watching this, maybe you can, too. If it’s too much, don’t send anything. But if it isn’t, you might want to send what you can, big or little. It will all go to Gunner and Trish. The information will be somewhere, right?”
Gabe nodded.
“He says I’m right.” Earl pointed at him, but Gabe kept the camera on Earl as he returned his gaze to the camera. A guy who knew his audience. “Someday it’s gonna be your turn to ask someone for something. Sooner or later, it happens to everyone. S
end the money, and when you need it, it’s going to come back to you.” He nodded, his lips pressed tightly and his chin set like a mule’s. “And that’s the truth.”
Chapter Twenty-nine
“I lived in Manhattan for five years.” The middle-aged real estate agent with layered, chestnut hair and discreet makeup carried a hint of city air about her as she gazed into Gabe’s camera. “I wanted to be an actress. I waited tables, I bought my clothes at consignment stores. The first year, I used to joke about the small village I came from. The second year, it wasn’t funny to me. I missed Miracle so much it was a dagger in my heart.”
She stopped to swallow, and Gabe thought it was for effect. Gloria had said she was an actress wannabe. This was the kind of thing they did before continuing.
But she didn’t continue, swallowing again. Her face looked suddenly haggard, as if she were staring back at some horrible memory.
He never knew what was going to happen during these interviews.
“But you stayed for another four years,” he said.
She nodded, pulling herself together as if aware of the camera, shaking off whatever memory had dragged her into the dark side. Once more an impeccably made up woman in her prime. “My mother was sending me money to supplement my income. She had the only brokerage firm in Miracle. She was a great businesswoman. A great woman all around.”
A small smile played upon her face, then she shifted in the blue wing chair and looked straight into the camera. “I’d been working my way up from waiting tables to walk-ons to small parts, and I’d finally gotten a second lead role in an off-Broadway play. The day it was supposed to open, I got a call from a friend that my mother was sick but didn’t want to tell me. I called an airline, then the director to tell him I couldn’t make it. I was home that night.”
“Your mom...? How was she?”
“She died two weeks and one day later.” Tears gleamed in Gloria’s eyes. “I was devastated. The village rallied around me. I found out she’d been sick for a year and her friends took her to the hospital, brought her groceries, shoveled her sidewalks, did her laundry...”
Gloria stopped to blink furiously. “I never went back to New York. I heard you were asking what we love...” She swept her left hand out in an encompassing motion. “This is what I love. The way we watch over each other. The way the while village watched over my mother. Right now the village is rallying around Trish and Gunner, but there are only 629 of us and we can’t do it all. A local farmer gave an acre of land to Trish and Gunner. Nearby businesses donated some of the building materials.” She gazed at the camera again. “You can see their names on our website. But they need more. And Trish might have to go to the hospital early and stay there...”
There was another pause while she looked sad, tilting her head so the camera caught her glittering eyes. Gabe mentally applauded as he watched with quiet breaths, waiting to see what she’d do next.
“Aren’t we all one global village?” Emotion thickened her voice. “I can speak for a lot of villagers and say we contributed after 911, Katrina, Sandy, and other disasters. I’m not saying that Trish and Gunner’s situation is as big as any of that. But doesn’t the small stuff count, too? The small towns? The small people?” She smiled with her eyes still glittering. “Whether you contribute or not, God bless all of you.”
“That’s it,” Gabe said. He pushed back from the camera and then he stood and applauded her. Someone else applauded behind him. He turned to see who it was and saw Katie.
He’d expected her, but he hadn’t expected the impact, the way this tall woman who looked at him out of vulnerable eyes took his breath away. He hadn’t expected the punch in his heart. And he really hadn’t expected the lift of his soul, as it said, This woman. This is the one for you.
He took one step toward her, and she took one step back.
“Hey, Katie,” Taz said. “You’re looking good.”
“And you look gorgeous. But you know that.” She turned to Gloria, her arms out. “You were stupendous!”
Gloria fluffed her hair. “I know.” They hugged then Gloria talked about a commercial she did when she was in New York. Gabe stood in place, watching Katie. Not saying anything. Not able to. Still stunned by his reaction to her.
It seemed like moments thumped by before his heart beat slowed and his thoughts regained coherency.
He reminded himself about the kids at the hospital in Chicago and his project there. That was important. He needed to do that. No one else could do that as well as he could.
And Katie needed to stay here with her friends and her father and her dog. And most of all, her pies.
He was supposed to be here for a couple days, then he’d be gone. Starting anything again wouldn’t be good for either of them.
Then she turned to him. And she smiled.
His breath caught again.
His heart felt the punch again.
She took a step toward him, and he took one toward her, as if a string between them was pulling them together.
He couldn’t stop himself, and he knew, deep in the recesses of his sneaky brain, that this was the reason he returned to Miracle. For Katie. Even if it were just for a short time, and afterward they’d both be left in a big hurt.
He was going to hell.
But not until after he experienced heaven.
Chapter Thirty
Katie had woken up that morning with the need to make her Happy Pie.
An awful, awful need. She didn’t want to be happy because of Gabe.
Making it anyway, she told herself it was because the Miracle Project was going to be a huge success. A lie she didn’t believe even as she walked into Mo’s and found an empty bar stool. She was relieved to find out Gabe was interviewing Gloria and he’d finished with Earl. She relaxed slightly. If she were lucky, she might not even see Gabe.
She felt a twist in her heart. She’d never been good at lying to herself.
She was sipping coffee and chatting with a former schoolmate when Rosa announced she was next. Katie gave her a startled look and pushed off her stool reluctantly. Rosa hadn’t warned her that she’d be interviewed. But it wasn’t the worry about being filmed that made Katie’s heart thump.
On autopilot, she stood and headed toward Mo’s office. Once she slipped inside, her gaze zoomed to Gabe, like Happy smelling food and scampering straight toward it as fast as her arthritic feet could move. Never mind that Happy could hardly see. The nose knew.
Something in Katie knew, too. One glance at him and her heart hammered so loudly she was surprised he didn’t hear it. Her skin heated so hot she expected smoke to hiss out of her pores.
She vaguely heard Gloria speaking. Gabe said something and then stood. He clapped and so did the others. Katie clapped, too, doing the monkey see thing.
As if in slow motion, he turned and saw her. His eyes widened and darkened, and he took a step toward her. She stepped back, because if she stepped forward it would be a running step. She would be like one of those girls in a TV commercial who ran toward the boy who would catch and twirl her, her legs floating in the air. But with her tall and lanky body, he would probably grunt and fall backward. And drop her. Mustn’t forget that.
Taz said something to her about looking good. She replied something silly to him, forcing her lips into a smile. Then she hurried to Gloria to tell her how wonderful she was—though her heart was thundering loudly and everyone in the room but Gabe was wallpaper.
Gloria’s two-hundred-watt smile broke through the spell that seemed to have caught her up. Once again Katie told her how good she was, as if Gloria’s response to Gabe’s questions hadn’t been a buzz in her ear, saying “blah, blah, blah.”
With great concentration, flexing her brain like a muscle, Katie had a two-minute squeal with Gloria, who said something about New York, her words turning into more “blah, blah, blahs.”
It seemed like forever before Gloria squeezed her shoulder and headed to the door, leaving Katie with no c
hoice but to turn to Gabe. As she did a ray of sunshine beamed through the window and illuminated him while he stared at her as if he were starving and she were the only food around.
Just like that, as easy as a breath, her worry evaporated. She smiled. No pretenses. Her defenses melting.
So what if she made a fool out of herself? It wouldn’t be the first time. Not even the hundredth time.
He smiled back, as if he was ready to make a fool out of himself, too. They’d be two fools together.
Gazing into his eyes, she stepped toward him and he stepped toward her.
He took her hands and smiled at her. Her heartbeat slowed, her skin turned to normal and her brain seemed to be in control again. As if she’d been spinning out of control and his grip stopped her freefall and the brains rattling inside her head. As if their clasped hands turned wrong into right.
This is the way it’s supposed to be. Then the hurt came, because supposed to be was never going to be. Yet she still smiled at him. Just for today, she would live for the moment.
“It’s your turn,” he said.
“If you say so,” she replied and immediately felt like one of those dippy girls who did whatever the male told her to do. She pulled her hands from his and stepped back, keeping the smile on her face. “Rosa said so, anyway, and once she makes up her mind, it’s like talking to Happy.”
“I thought your Beagle couldn’t hear,” Taz said.
“Exactly.” She headed to the blue chair and sat. She wore a skirt that came just above her knees, but as she sat on the blue chair and crossed her legs, it rose up her thigh. Gabe and Taz’s gazes went straight to her legs.
Feeling warm again, she uncrossed them and set her feet in her bargain store black shoes firmly on the wooden floor.
Gabe grinned at her. So did Taz. Katie wished Rosa was in the room to stare sternly at them.
“Say something,” Taz said.
