“Do you think I should call a hall monitor to break it up?” Becca asked, only half joking.
“The Russells aren’t Eli’s favorite people,” Jamie said.
“So I’ve gathered.” Becca fiddled with the button on her coat. “Mentioning that you and Eli were bowling together wasn’t the only thing my mother-in-law—former mother-in-law—said. She also repeated some nasty gossip about Eli. And included you.”
“I know.” Jamie rubbed her forehead. “I was hoping that if Eli and I avoided being seen with each other, the gossip would die out.”
“And with my pregnancy brain, I didn’t even think about the problems having Patrick on the committee might cause for Eli.”
“I feel badly for both of them, the trouble Charlotte is causing for Eli, and Patrick’s marriage falling apart. He moved out several months ago.” Jamie stopped. She’d forgotten Becca’s husband, Matt, had left her at about the same time. When had she gotten so careless about other people’s feelings? Until now, she’d hardly given a thought to how Charlotte’s actions were hurting Eli, only to protecting her children and her reputation from the woman.
“I’d better get going.” Becca filled the growing silence. “Or Matt’s mother will be giving me another lecture about how little time I spend with Brendon.”
“Yeah, I need to round my kids up from the basketball game.”
The two women walked out into the hall where Anne was waiting for Jamie.
“I thought we could go down to the basketball game together,” Anne said. “Autumn mentioned to her dad that she was taking your kids, so Neal decided to bring Ian.”
“The twins, too?”
Anne laughed. “No, I don’t think the Schroon Lake Wildcats are ready for the twins yet. Neal’s parents are watching them.”
“Well, I’ll leave you ladies to your basketball game.” Becca said goodbye and left.
“Now we can catch up,” Anne said. “Since we’re not next door neighbors anymore, it seems like I never see you.”
“I know what you mean.” A hollow formed in Jamie’s stomach. She and Anne had been close, but after John had died and she’d stopped going to church and the Singles Plus group, they hadn’t gotten together much.
“Eli and Patrick sure shot out of the meeting fast,” Anne said. “I’d planned to ask Eli if he wanted to join us at the game. He and Neal are old friends. They went to high school here. Patrick, too.”
But Jamie was sure Eli didn’t consider Patrick an old friend.
Anne’s expression turned thoughtful. “You haven’t lived here much longer than I have. Do you ever feel like you’re out of the loop, the only one without a script? Don’t get me wrong, everyone—well, almost everyone—is really nice, but it seems like they’ve all know each other since birth.”
“Yes, all those little details that aren’t filled in because everyone else knows them. Like, Leah Summers and I were friends for a couple of years, but I had no idea she was Eli’s mother until I ran into them together at the hardware store. She always called him JR.”
And she’d known Charlotte just as long. Katy had been the first friend Rose had made when they’d moved here. But, while she’d quickly learned Charlotte was a gossip, she had no idea she could be so vicious. Or, until that day at her house, that Eli had such a history with Charlotte and, apparently, with Patrick.
“So.” Anne’s voice dropped. “Did I pick up something between you and Eli?”
Evidently, Anne hadn’t heard the gossip. Maybe it was dying down or wasn’t as widespread as Jamie had feared.
“Come on,” Anne coaxed, “you can tell me. You knew about Neal and me before I knew about Neal and me.”
“No, there isn’t. Not really.” Even though, if it weren’t so complicated, if there wasn’t a chance the Guard could call him to active duty at any time, a part of me might like there to be.
* * *
Eli and Patrick arrived at the diner at the same time and sat at a table in the corner, rather than at the counter. While they waited for the waitress, Eli took the offensive. “You had something you wanted to talk about.”
Patrick turned his head from side to side, scoping out the late dinner customers. “I wanted to thank you.”
“Hi, Mr. Payton.”
Sara, one of his senior students, stood next to the table, an order pad in her hand.
“What can I get you?”
“Just coffee.”
“And you?” she asked Patrick.
“The same.”
She started to flip the page of the pad.
“One check,” Eli said. The interruption had given him time to regroup. “Thank me for what?” he asked once Sara was out of earshot.
“Helping Brett. I know there’s no reason you should. Given Charlie’s behavior lately, you probably have several good reasons not to.”
Eli couldn’t disagree. “Brett seems like a good kid.” Eli shrugged. “I could help him. So I am. No big deal.”
Skepticism flickered in Patrick’s eyes. “You know I would pay for his college.”
“Yeah, Brett told me that, and that his mother doesn’t want you to.”
“I suppose he told you about her cockamamie scheme to sue you for back child support to pay for his college.”
“He did.”
Patrick shook his head and dropped his gaze to the tabletop. “Charlie… She’s not well. She won’t get help. That’s why I moved out, to give Katy and Liam a break from her. I have them every other week, Tuesday through Wednesday, unless I’m traveling for work.”
Eli wasn’t sure why the guy was telling him all this. It wasn’t as if they were close friends or had ever been close friends. “If you’re asking me to cut her some slack, there’s not much to cut. She’s hurt people I care about.”
“Here you go.” Sara arrived with their coffee.
Patrick sat tight-lipped while Sara placed the mugs on the table and left. “Charlie has hurt a lot of people, but…” His voice was raw.
“You love her.” Eli couldn’t keep the surprise out of his voice.
“Yep, I still do.”
It might have been the dim lighting in the diner, but slumped in the chair across from him, Patrick looked ten years older than he had at the committee meeting. “You know Charlie and I—”
“I know Brett is mine. He looks just like my brother, always has. And I’m sure Charlie knows, too, except when it suits her to pretend he isn’t—like when she’s mad and wants to get back at me for something I’ve done or when she’s depressed and slips back in time. Then she wants to punish both of us for your not taking her away from Paradox Lake.” Patrick shook his head slowly as if it were an effort. “I’d asked her to marry me before she found out she was pregnant. She put me off and then wouldn’t give me an answer until you came home from basic training and refused to marry her. Now, as I said, she isn’t well and is bringing it all up again.”
“We never…that night at the Maple Shade Motel, we were drunk. We both fell asleep.”
“We’ve come a long way since then, the three of us, haven’t we?”
They had, but maybe not far enough.
“I’m not making excuses for Charlie. But the boys growing up—Brett moving out and Liam planning to go away to college—dredged up Charlie’s old resentment about being stuck in Paradox Lake. Then, last year I was up for a promotion at the Memphis office until a corporate restructuring eliminated the position. Charlie had her heart set on moving to Tennessee.”
“She always did want to get away from here, and I couldn’t wait to come back.”
“I didn’t see it coming. I thought she was happy here until the possibility of the transfer came up. Things started to fall apart when it didn’t happen.” Patrick took a long draw on his coffee. “While I’m throwing things out, I know you’re active in the Hazardtown Community Church. One of my coworkers has been preaching to me for years. Lately, it’s been making sense. I was thinking about trying church, bringing Katy. She
has friends who go to Sunday school there. Would I be welcome, well, because of Charlie?”
“Of course.” At least by most of the members. “I’m not going to preach to you like your coworker, but would you like to pray together for Charlie?”
A muscle worked in Patrick’s jaw.
“Or for me to pray for you and Charlie?”
“Yeah, it couldn’t hurt.”
As Eli drove home, he prayed for Patrick and Charlie and their kids, but somehow Jamie kept slipping into those prayers. He turned into his driveway. Maybe it was time he did something about that.
Chapter Eleven
“Mom, are you going out again tonight?” Opal whined before Jamie had even gotten all of the way in the door from work the next Friday. You’d think she was out every night, rather than the one night a week she went bowling.
Before she could answer, her cell phone rang. “Hello.”
“Jamie, this is Eli.”
Her coat slipped from her hand as she was hanging it on one of the hooks by the kitchen. She hadn’t recognized the phone number. Eli had always called her from school before.
“Karen asked me to call you.”
Her heart slowed. It was about bowling. What else would it be?
“If you haven’t heard, there was a fire in the kitchen at the bowling alley last night.”
“No, I hadn’t.” She secured her coat on the hook. “Was it bad?”
“Not too bad, mostly smoke damage. But the lanes won’t be open for a couple weeks while they clean up.”
“Oh, okay. Thanks for letting me know.”
“Wait. Do you already have a babysitter for tonight?”
“Myles was going to watch Rose and Opal.” If I decided to go to bowling. “Why?”
“I still owe you that cheeseburger special.”
She smiled to herself, the remembrance of the morning they’d installed the insulation blocking out the embarrassment of their conversation at church. She couldn’t believe she’d let her bitterness about John slip out. “I thought we’d agreed, no cheeseburger special,” she said, wanting back the easy companionship that had been growing between them before the incident with Charlotte.
“We could renegotiate. When I was at the diner last week, I noticed it has a cheeseburger special on Friday nights, too.”
Was Eli asking her out? That didn’t exactly fit their agreement to avoid being seen together.
“Are you still there?” he asked.
“Yeah, I’m here. You’re asking me out to dinner?”
“No.”
Her heart dropped as she went back over their conversation to see what she’d misconstrued.
“That debt for your treating me to lunch at your place is weighing heavy on me. I like to pay my debts promptly.”
She burst out laughing. “You don’t owe me, Eli, really. And I just got home from the birthing center.” She searched her mind for more reasons to put him off.
“I’ll give you an hour to get the kids ready and wind down. You were planning to go bowling, right?”
“Yes.”
“Great, I’ll be there at six. See you then.” He clicked off.
Jamie stared at her phone. It looked like she’d just agreed to go out to dinner with Eli. She turned to Opal. “Yes, I’m going out.”
* * *
Eli sat in his truck a moment before getting out to walk to Jamie’s door. He’d been a little pushy with her, but he didn’t want to give her a chance to say no. He breathed in and released the breath in a frosty cloud before knocking at the door. It opened, but at first he didn’t see anyone.
“Hi, Mr. Payton.”
He looked down. “Hi, Opal. Are you supposed to be opening the door?”
“I looked out the window first and knew it was you. I know your truck.”
The clatter of dishes echoed from the dining room. Jamie must be cleaning up from the kids’ dinner, something Eli thought the kids could do themselves. But he wouldn’t say that to Jamie. “Would you tell your mother I’m here?”
“She’s not ready yet because she had to make us dinner. I told her I didn’t like her going out. But it’s really because I don’t like what Myles cooks. So, Mommy said she’d make us something.” Opal plopped herself down on the couch. “That was before I knew she was going out with you. I don’t mind her going out with you.”
“Opal, ask him to sit down, and get back in here and help Rose clear the table,” Myles called from the other room.
Obviously not everyone was as agreeable as Opal about him and Jamie going out.
“I gotta ask him something first, Myles,” she shouted back. “Brothers!”
“What did you want to ask me?”
She looked up at Eli, a miniature version of her mother.
“Since you and Mommy are going out now, does that mean you can take Rose and me to the dinner-dance? It’s next Saturday, you know.”
“That would be up to your mother.”
“What would be up to her mother?” Jamie walked across the room to them. His heart thumped with each step. She wore the same light purple sweater she’d had on the day they’d insulated the attic—before she’d changed into her Buffalo Bills sweatshirt—and fitted slacks that showed off her attractive figure.
“Whether he can take us to the dinner-dance now that he’s your boyfriend,” Opal explained.
A blush tinged Jamie’s cheeks. “Aren’t you supposed to be helping Rose and Myles with the dishes?”
“But you didn’t answer.”
“Go.” Jamie pointed to the doorway.
“You can call me tomorrow and tell me what Mommy says. She can give you the number,” Opal called over her shoulder as she scooted away to the dining room.
Eli struggled to keep a straight face until the little girl had disappeared into the other room. Then he looked at Jamie and they both burst out laughing. “She doesn’t give up, does she?”
“Never.”
“I could take them. I don’t have any plans for next Saturday.”
Jamie raised her face to him, all traces of her laughter gone.
He should have kept his mouth shut.
“Let’s go to dinner and I’ll think about it.”
“You could come, too. I could take all three of you.”
“For cheeseburgers? No, the girls have already eaten.”
“I didn’t mean…” He stopped when he caught the gleam in her eyes. “Got me.”
He lifted her coat from her arm and held it for her. A light floral scent tickled his nose, enticing him to lean closer. She turned her head and he drew back, but not before he noticed the flash of sparkle on her ears. Jamie’s date-night earrings, Opal had said the last time he was here. A good sign that she had accepted his invitation as a date.
“Thanks.” Her smile lit her face and his heart.
* * *
Jamie was surprised at how busy the diner was. The winter months drew far fewer tourists than the warmer ones. She’d expected only another family or two, not for almost every table to be taken.
“The food here must be really good,” Eli said. “Look at the people.”
Jamie looked around again. He didn’t need to remind her how crowded it was. Crowded with people she knew from the birthing center, from the school when she worked there, from the kids’ activities. Family people. All of whom would see her and Eli together.
“What’s wrong?” Eli asked.
“Nothing.” She covered her concern with a short laugh that came out more like a cough. “I’m just surprised to see half the population of Schroon Lake and Paradox Lake here.”
“A regular Friday night family hot spot.”
Her tension ebbed. Eli was right. It was a family place, not a romantic spot, the kind of restaurant where good friends might go for a meal. Friends like her and Eli.
“Hi,” the hostess greeted them. “Booth or table?”
Eli looked at her.
“Table, please,” Jamie said. The kids always ins
isted on a booth when she took them out. Tonight was Friday, her adult night out.
“You’re going to have to wait awhile. All we have free right now are booths, unless you want to sit at the counter.”
“No, not the counter.” She felt as if all the eyes in the room were on her and Eli standing here. Eating front and center at the counter would be worse.
“A booth will be fine, more private.” Eli took the final decision from her. He shrugged. “What can I say? I’m hungry.”
“This way, please.” The hostess led them to a booth a short distance away.
Jamie slid down the bench on one side of the table. A booth was a better choice. The walls offered privacy. Eli sat across from her.
“Your waitress will be with you in a minute.” The hostess handed a menu to each of them.
Eli flipped open his menu. “You don’t have to get the cheeseburger special.”
Jamie rubbed her finger along the edge of her menu. His insistence on treating her to anything she wanted felt too datelike to her. They weren’t on a date. They were friends having dinner together. “You don’t have to buy my dinner. Why don’t we split the bill?”
“Hey, no reneging now. You said I could buy you the cheeseburger special. Besides, call me old-fashioned, but I think a man should pay for a date.”
The teenage waitress approached their booth. “Hi, Mr. Payton.”
“Hi, Sara.”
“And Mrs. Glasser, Myles’s mother, right? You were at the sledding party. Your little girls are so cute.”
“Thank you.”
“Are you ready to order?”
After Sara had taken their orders, Jamie unrolled the silverware. She didn’t know what had gotten into her. She’d wanted to come tonight, and deep down she knew the evening was a date, despite her rationalization to herself. And she shouldn’t be surprised he took charge. That was Eli. But when he’d said they’d take a booth, something clicked inside her and put up a wall of resistance. Truth was she wouldn’t mind someone else being in charge for a few hours for a change.
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