She blinked, furiously trying not to cry, but Lillo felt like crying herself—for Jess, whose parents were mega-cretins who could never appreciate their compassionate, smart daughter, people who were not capable of real love. And for herself, whose parents were great, did love her, had sacrificed to help her achieve what she wanted, and never once blamed her for being the failure she was.
Lillo turned onto Shandy Way, not because it was the only street that led to the community center, but because she wanted to drive by the clinic. And that was a first. She usually avoided it like the plague, but today she wanted to drive by. As a punishment maybe? She didn’t know, she just needed to drive by the place. But halfway down the block she decided she’d been wrong and vowed not to turn and look as she drove by.
It didn’t do the least bit of good. She couldn’t help herself … she turned, looked, and almost drove into the other lane.
“What happened, Lillo?” Jess’s voice came from far away.
“Just trying to avoid a pothole,” she said automatically.
“I mean with medical school. You wanted to be a doctor, you made all those plans.”
“It didn’t work out.”
“It’s not my business, but was it the money? Because if it was …”
“No, it wasn’t the money. I just changed my mind. We’re almost there, see.” She pointed ahead to a white clapboard building and a large parking lot.
“The church?” Jess asked.
“It used to be a church. Not anymore. Now the sanctuary is a gymnasium and activity room, the Sunday school classrooms are meeting rooms, and the rectory next door is the food bank and other stuff.”
She pulled the van into the parking lot and stopped by a side door. They entered a small hallway and turned right into the old sanctuary, where tables were set up and Sada Jensen was giving instructions to a group of quilters. Sada was tiny and effervescent and one of the few young people who hadn’t left for a larger city, a better income, and a rosier future.
“Hey, Lillo, and you must be Jess. I’ve got the computer all ready for you, connection and everything.” She looked at Jess’s wrist. “Are you going to be okay to type?”
“I think so, thanks.”
Sada led them down the hall to what must have once been the choir room but now served multiple purposes, from office to storage room to lost and found.
“Take all the time you need.”
Jess just stared at the old desktop computer.
Sada leaned in close. “Works just like your laptop, only slower.”
“Ah, thanks.” Jess sat down at the desk.
Lillo and Sada walked back into the hall. “I’ve been meaning to come over,” Lillo began.
“I know, you’ve had houseguests.”
“About your dress. I had to change a tire in the rain; I’m afraid it might be ruined. I’ll get you a new one.”
“I heard that, too.”
“From Doc, I suppose.”
“No, actually, I haven’t even seen him. With Clancy at the hospital, he’s pretty swamped.”
“Don’t look at me like that,” Lillo said.
“Why not? You could help him, if you weren’t so stubborn.”
They’d reached Sada’s office and sat down on the lumpy love seat that she reserved for guests.
“Actually, I almost broke down and volunteered last night, but Barbara Carroll beat me to it.”
“Oh mercy, that Barb. Every time Doc comes to town, she’s all over him like flypaper. The man’s a saint for even being civil to her.”
“Okay, you’ve totally guilted me. I’ll go see if he needs help tomorrow. Maybe.”
Sada grasped her hand. “You can do it. Now, could you help me carry these boxes down to the basement? Lynn Ann’s out with the flu. Whoever heard of having the flu in the summer?”
They carried boxes down the stairs to another large room, once the church’s hospitality room. They were just finishing up when they heard a commotion above them.
“Kids are here.” Sada hurried upstairs. Lillo followed and ran into Jess coming out of the office.
“Get everything done okay?” Lillo asked.
“Yes, I should be safe for now.”
They walked down the hall to find Sada surrounded by kids.
“Are we going horseback riding today? Are we?”
“Yes, once you’ve calmed down and had some lunch.”
“Can Joey go? He got in a fight.”
“Weren’t my fault. That Tommy Clayton started it, him and his gang.”
“Joey,” Sada said. “All of you. How many times have I said to stay away from those boys?”
“Aw, Sada, some of them are okay.”
“Being in a gang is not okay.”
“I know, but you can’t tell which ones are which, can you?”
“So can he go? Sada?”
Sada pursed her lips. “This time, but no more fighting. And stay away from Tommy Clayton. Now go sit down and one of the ladies will bring you something to eat.”
“I recognize those boys,” Jess said when Sada joined them. “And he’s telling the truth. We were downtown after I got this fixed.” She held up her bandaged wrist. “Joey and another couple of boys were walking down the street. I recognized the little one.”
“Joey’s little brother, Bobby. Severe learning disabilities and trauma. A sad story. He gets picked on a lot.”
“Well, they were picking on him, and Joey came to his rescue, and forgive me if I’m out of line, but I say good for him.”
Lillo stared at Jess in astonishment.
“Sorry, but it makes me mad to see that happen. I’ve been bullied all my life and it isn’t right.”
“It makes us all mad. But those boys have got too much time and not enough attention. Not much to do around here except get into trouble. And all this nonsense about gangs. Tommy Clayton is eleven, he and some of the others need a good what-for, but most of them just go along because it makes them feel like they belong. You know. Same old story. Parents mostly have to go to the mainland to work, leave early, get home late. Work two jobs. Kids leave as soon as they’re old enough to find a better life. The little ones just sit around waiting until they can leave, too.
“Whew, sorry for the rant. Guess I just got set off this morning.”
“Sorry if I set you off.”
“No, it’s good to know we have sympathetic friends. Wish I had more to work with than pickup basketball games and free lunches. Well, I better go make sure they’re eating their sandwiches and not throwing them at each other. Glad you came in. And, Lillo. You know what they say. Just do it.”
“Right, and thanks.” Lillo and Jess returned to the van.
“What was Sada talking about, ‘Just do it’?”
“Nothing important. But thanks for showing an interest in the kids.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Lillo shrugged and put the van in gear. “Most people wouldn’t, but I think it’s pretty cool that now you’ve stopped letting your parents bully you, you’re ready to go to bat for kids you don’t even know.”
“Well, someone should. Don’t they have classes in school these days about how to deal with bullying?”
Lillo snorted. “They’ve got classes for everything … doesn’t mean people practice it on the outside.”
“Well, they should,” Jess said. “They just should.”
Diana set off for the stables not knowing exactly what to expect. A situation that she didn’t experience often. She liked to know the score before going in, to have contingency plans in place. But dealing with Ian Lachlan was like sticking a straight line in a non-Euclidean universe. He had his own rules. Or maybe he had no rules.
She was without a clue. They’d actually talked a bit last night at the picnic. He’d seemed to have forgotten that they’d barely shared a word that morning. And he’d resented her presence from the get-go.
They could have been old acquaintances exchanging small talk at a par
ty. Then the Parkers’ goons showed up and Ian disappeared. For a wild second she thought maybe he was hiding out from the law. But for what? And why would a whole town protect a felon?
There was definitely something odd about the man. She had no idea what reception she would receive today or if he would even allow her in the barn.
She’d gotten herself so frazzled by the time she left the cottage—something totally not her—that she’d asked Allie if she wanted to come with her.
But Allie had decided to visit Mac instead. Maybe her sense of self-preservation was better than Diana’s own.
This is nuts, Diana thought as she strode up the dirt road to Ian’s office and stables.
She slowed when she reached the clearing in front of the house where he lived. At least she guessed he lived there; she’d just assumed he did. Not a good habit when dealing with an anomaly like Ian.
She took a fortifying breath and marched around to the horse barn. The door was open, so she stepped inside.
He was there. She could see his dark hair over the top of Clara’s stall. He was talking to the old horse as he might talk to his mother. She decided not to confront him but to act like she belonged there. Most of the stalls were empty; he must have let the other horses out into the paddock in order to clean the stalls. Looked like he was running late today, too.
She went to the tack room, took a manure fork and shovel out to a wheelbarrow, and rolled it to an empty stall at the far end of the row. If my friends could see me now, she hummed, smiling at the ridiculousness of it all. She could be sitting back on the deck with another cup of coffee, looking out to the sea, and doing … nothing. But instead … She actually was enjoying herself.
She thought for sure Ian would hear her and come to either say hello or tell her to hit the road. But he didn’t and she began to feel like a teenager who hung out in a high school hallway on the outside chance that a popular boy would see her and say hi.
That made her laugh out loud.
“Enjoying yourself?”
She turned around and the sight of Ian’s scowling face made her— Oh, get a grip. “Actually, I am,” she said, taking the time to settle her embarrassing reaction to him.
He grunted something noncommittal and strode off down the aisle.
Diana moved to the next stall, angry at herself for being attracted to an incorrigible backwoods loner. This was so not her.
She attacked the stall with a vengeance. She’d completed four before Ian appeared again, this time leading Princess and Loki. Princess came right up to her and nudged her with her nose. Diana laughed. “I know you’re only after my carrots. And the cupboard is bare.”
She caught a glimpse of Ian looking like thunder and confusion and she had the strongest urge to kiss that scowl off his face. But her sense of self-preservation made her walk past him to get Princess’s saddle. She knew how to handle men. But not this one. Even if he did hit all her hot spots.
They took the same route as the day before over the grassy slopes; only today, instead of turning into the trees, he continued straight, Diana following, down a path that ended at a wide sandy beach that stretched around a point of land and continued who knew how far.
Ian gave Loki his head and they galloped to the water’s edge. Princess followed but more sedately, sliding from one gait into another without effort. The horses loved the water and Ian let them take a few minutes to gambol before he reined Loki in and continued down the beach.
The wind was sharp here, challenging the sun to warm them, and Diana was ready when Ian turned Loki up an unseen path back to the bluffs. This path was steeper, and she had to pay attention. Ian didn’t turn around to see if she was okay. But she felt like he was reading her progress through some kind of human osmosis.
When they crested the hill, Diana half expected to see an alien spaceship waiting for them.
Crazy! She’d obviously had too much vacation—or too much hard cider the night before. All too soon they were back in the barn. They unsaddled the horses and took them outside to wash off the salt water. It was a messy job because Princess and Loki had decided to have some fun. Both riders and horses got pretty wet and Diana found herself smiling and wondering how she could prolong the day.
Her thoughts along that route ended abruptly with the sound of a car door slamming and the rowdy high-pitched voices of … children.
She turned to Ian. “Oh no, I don’t do kids.”
He looked deadpan. “You want to come back?”
“That’s not fair,” she said as he started walking toward the car. “I really don’t know anything about kids.”
In what she was coming to recognize as typical Ian fashion, he ignored her.
The kids saw him and broke away from their keeper and raced to jump up around him, pulling him one way, then the other, and talking all at once. And Mr. Taciturn stood there perfectly content to let them carry on.
Amazing. Diana exchanged looks with the woman, who shrugged. “I’ll be back in an hour,” she called to Ian, and got into the station wagon and drove away.
“Okay, line up,” Ian said, and suddenly the clamor ceased and they fell into line.
He walked down the line until he got to one kid who had a serious black eye.
“What happened?”
“Sada said I could come.”
“Good, but what happened?”
“Got in a fight.”
“Tommy Clayton called Bobby a moron,” another boy volunteered. “And Joey popped him one. Then they all jumped him.”
They all turned to look at Joey. A smaller kid was standing in front of him, and Joey put an arm across the kid’s chest and pulled him close.
The little one must be Bobby, thought Diana.
“Just ’cause Bobby said he wanted to climb up to the lighthouse.”
“Come on, guys, you know the lighthouse is dangerous; plus, it’s private property.”
“We know, Mr. Ian, but Tommy said.”
“Said what?”
God, the man had the patience of Abraham … or was it Job?
“Tommy was bragging about how he’d stolen two cans of his dad’s beer and how he was gonna climb up the lighthouse to drink it. And Bobby said he wanted to climb up, too, and Tommy said he couldn’t because he was a moron.”
“Bobby’s not a moron,” Joey said.
These must be the kids Jess was telling them about the day they went to the liquor store. They looked a little young to be involved with gangs.
Bobby cowered back against his brother and Joey held him even tighter. “He’s not a moron, Mr. Ian. Is he?”
“B-B-Bobby’s a moron,” said another boy, whose head bobbed on his neck, making it appear he was searching the rafters.
Diana realized that several of the boys had physical or possibly mental disabilities. And there were seven of them.
“Is he, Mr. Ian?”
Ian knelt down beside Bobby. “Nope, he’s my buddy.” He scooped the little guy up as gently as he’d carried the lamb/goat the other day at his office and swung him to his shoulder.
“Am I your buddy, Mr. Ian?” asked another of the boys. Then they were all asking.
“Am I your buddy?”
“Am I?”
“Me too?”
“Yep. You’re all my buddies.”
Diana swallowed a hideous lump in her throat. She didn’t do compassion. She should quietly go away. And leave Ian with seven needy children?
Ian Lachlan was one big surprise after another. He was the last person Diana would imagine being a buddy to children. The man never talked.
“Who we going to ride today, Mr. Ian?”
“Pete, let’s ride Pete.”
“You won’t let go, will you, Mr. Ian?”
“No, Sam, I won’t let go.”
“Promise?”
“I won’t let go.”
Then they were gone. Headed to the paddock, Diana guessed. Now was her chance to slip away. She wouldn’t know what to do with t
he kids, but Ian certainly did. She might drop one of them getting them into the saddle, or get one trampled while she wasn’t looking. They probably had germs and bugs and she didn’t know anything about kids, especially kids with special needs. What if they fell? Started crying? Got scared?
Mucking out the stalls was one thing. Babysitting? Nope, not happening. She finished putting her tack away, then with every intention of going back to the cottage for a hot bath and a cold drink, Diana Walters, CEO and app designer, urbanite entrepreneur, single childless woman—who intended to stay that way—walked out of the barn and turned right into the paddock.
Chapter 14
Mac settled back in her Adirondack chair. She’d turned it so she could see the lighthouse as well as anyone coming toward the gift shop—not that she expected any tourists today. People just didn’t come like they used to. Even though it was a sunny day, a perfect day for going to the beach and climbing up to the tower to look over the vast ocean. Maybe even see whales or dolphins. But people were busy, their vacations were just strict itineraries of activities.
And it was supposed to rain midweek. Bad for business but at least it would keep the kids from trespassing.
She closed her eyes; the sun was good, it warmed her old bones, made things bright. She’d loaned the van to Lillo and Jess this morning. Watched Diana on her way to the stables. Second day in a row. Diana was also talking to Ian at the barbecue the night before. She was a go-getter, but someone should warn her not to play with Ian. It wouldn’t be fair. To either of them.
Though stranger things had happened, she guessed. Maybe Diana was the one who could unlock that man’s heart. And unlock what else, old woman?
No, it was best to stay out of it. She wished Clancy would get back. He always knew what was what.
She opened one eye to look over at the cottage. Allie must still be inside. Now, she was an interesting one. Easy not to notice. Kind. Helpful. Even-tempered.
And not happy. She must be missing her child and her husband who had been taken from her all too soon. Enough to make anyone depressed, but Mac thought it was more. And it was too bad that in the excitement of Jess’s escape, and Diana’s energy, and Lillo’s doggedness not to look at her own life, Allie was bound to get lost in the shuffle. If Mac didn’t do something.
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