Angels Fall

by Nora Roberts

  good taste."

  "And you're wondering, since it does and I do, why my place isn't spiffier. I'll tell you," she said before Reece could comment. "People come into Angel Food because they want to be comfortable. They want good food, and they want it fast and at a good value. I had that in mind when I opened it, almost twenty years ago."

  "You do a good business."

  "Bet your skinny ass, I do. I came here because I wanted my own, and i wanted to give my boy a good, solid life. Made a mistake once upon a time and married a man who wasn't good for anything at all except looking handsome. While he was damn good at that, he sure wasn't good for me or my boy."

  Cautious now, Reece picked up the tea she'd made. "You've done well without him."

  "It I'd stayed with him, one of us would be dead." Joanic shrugged, took another drag. "Better all around that I kicked his ass out, pulled up stakes. Had some money, a nice nest egg." Her lips quirked into something between a smile and a sneer. "I may have been stupid enough to marry him, but I was smart enough to keep my own bank account and not tell him about it. I worked my butt off from the time I was sixteen. Waitressing, doing short-order work, fry cook. Went to night school and studied restaurant management."

  "Smart. All around."

  "When I got rid of that weight around my neck, I decided if I was going to work my butt off, I'd work it off for me and my boy. Nobody else. So I landed here. Got a job as cook in what was, back then. The Chuckwagon."

  "Your place? Joanie's was The Chuckwagon?"

  "Greasy burgers and overfried steak. But I made it mine within four months. Owner was an idiot, and was losing his shirt. He sold me the place for a song, seeing as he was about to go under. And when I was done wheedling him down, it was a damn short song at that." Satisfaction over the memory showed on her face. "I lived up above, me and William, we lived up above where you do now, for the first year."

  Reece tried to imagine a woman and a small boy sharing that space. "Hard," she murmured, with her eyes on Joanie. "'Very hard for you to start a business, raise a son, make a life on your own."

  "Hard isn't hard if you've got a strong back and a purpose. I had both. I bought this land, had a little house put up. Two-bedroom, single bath, kitchen about half the size this one is now. And it was like a palace after being cooped up with an eight-year-old in that apartment. I got what I wanted because I'm a stubborn bitch when I need to be. That's most of the time, to my way of thinking. But I remember. I damn well remember what it was like to pick up and go, leave what I knew—no matter how bad it was—and try to find my place."

  Joanie gave a halt shrug as she drank more coffee. "I see what I remember when I look at you."

  Maybe she did, Reece thought. Maybe she saw something of what it was that made a woman wake at three in the morning and worry, second-guess. Pray. "How did you know it was yours? Your place."

  "I didn't." With quick jabs, Joanie stubbed out her cigarette, then drank the last swallow of her coffee. "It was just someplace else, and better than where I'd been. Then, I woke up one morning and it was mine. That's when I stopped looking behind me."

  Reece set her mug down again. "You're wondering why someone with my training is on your grill. Wondering why I picked up stakes and landed here."

  "I've given it more than a passing thought."

  This was the woman who'd given her a job, Reece thought. Who'd helped her with a place to live. Who was offering her, in Joanie's no-nonsense way, a sounding board. "I don't mean to make a mystery of it, it's just that I can't talk about the details. They're still painful. But it wasn't a person—not like a husband—that had me pulling up stakes. It was… an event. I had an experience, and it damaged me, physically, emotionally. You could say it damaged me in every way there is."

  She looked into Joanie's eyes. Strong eyes, steely. Not eyes full of pity. It was impossible to explain, even to herself, how much easier that made it to go on.

  "And when I realized I wasn't going to heal, not really, if I stayed where I was, I left. Mv grandmother had already put her life on hold to take care of me. I couldn't stand it anymore. I got in my car one day, and I drove off. I called her, my grandmother, and tried to convince her I was fine. I was better, and I wanted some time alone."

  "Did you? Convince her."

  "Not really, but she couldn't stop me. Over the last few months, she's relaxed with it. She's started to think of it as Reece's Adventure. It's easy for me to color it that way when it's e-mail and phone calls. And sometimes it's true. It's an adventure."

  She turned to take an apron off the hook by the mudroom. "Anyway, I'm better than I was. I like where I am now, for now. That's enough for me."

  "Then we'll leave it at that. For now. I want you to make up some piecrusts. If I see you've got a decent hand with that, we'll move on from there."

  * * *

  Chapter 5

  WITH ONLY a scattering of customers, Linda-gail took counter duty. She dumped a piece of apple pie in front of Lo, topped off his coffee. "We've sure been seeing a lot of you in here the last couple of weeks."

  "Coffee's good, pie's better." He forked up a huge bite, then grinned. "View's not bad."

  Linda-gail glanced over her shoulder to where Reece worked the grill. "Heard you struck out there, slugger."

  "Early innings yet." He sampled the pie. Nobody baked a pie like his ma. "Got any more of the story on her'"

  "Her story, I figure. Her business."

  He snorted over his pie. "Come on, Linda-gail."

  She struggled to stay aloot, but damn it, she and Lo had loved talking the talk since they were kids. When it came down to it, there was no one she liked dishing with more than Lo.

  "Keeps to herself, doesn't shirk the work, comes in on time, and stays till it's done or Joanie shoos her along." With a shrug Linda-gail leaned on the counter. "Doesn't get any mail, from what I'm told. But she did get a phone for upstairs. And…"

  He leaned in so their races were close. "Keep going."

  "Well, Brenda over at the hotel told me while Reece was staying there she moved the dresser over in front of the door to the next room. If you ask me, she's afraid of something, or someone. Hasn't used a credit card, not one time, and she never used the phone in the hotel except for the dial-up, once a day for her computer. Room had high-speed access, but that cost ten dollars per day, so dial-up's cheaper. That's it."

  "Sounds like she could use a distraction."

  "That's some euphemism, Lo." Linda-gail said in disgust. She pulled back, annoyed with herself that she'd gotten drawn back into an old habit. "I tell you what she doesn't need. She doesn't need some horny guy sniffing at her heels hoping to score.What she could use is a friend."

  "I can be a friend. You and me, we're friends."

  "Is that what we are?"

  Something shifted in his eyes, over his face. He slid his hand over the counter toward hers. "Linda-gail—

  But she looked away from him, drew back and put on her waitress smile. "Hey, Sheriff."

  "Linda-gail. Lo." Sheriff Richard Mardson slid onto a stool. He was a big man with a long reach, who walked with an easy gait and kept the peace by reason and compromise when he could, by steely-eyed force when he couldn't.

  He liked his coffee sweet and light, and was already reaching for the sugar when Linda-gail poured him out a cup. "You two wrangling again?"

  "Just talking," Lo told him. "About Ma's newest cook."

  "She sure can work that grill. Linda-gail, why don't you have her do me a chicken-fried steak." He dumped half-and-half in his coffee. He had clear blue eyes to go with blond hair he wore in a brush cut. His strongjaw was clean-shaven since his wife of fourteen years had nagged him brainless to get rid of the beard he'd let grow over the winter.

  "You after that skinny girl. Lo?"

  "Made a few tentative moves in that direction."

  Rick shook his head. "You need to settle down with the love of a good woman."

  "I do. Every chance I
get. The new cook's got an air of mystery." He swiveled around, settled in for a talk. "Some people think maybe she's on the run."

  "If she is, it isn't from the law. I do my job." Rick said when Lo raised his eyebrows. "No criminal on her, no outstanding warrants. And she cooks a hell of a steak."

  "I guess you know she's living upstairs now Linda-gail just told me she heard from Brenda at the hotel Reece kept the dresser pulled across the door to the next room while she stayed there. Sounds to me like the woman's spooked."

  "Maybe she's got reason." His level blue gaze shifted toward the kitchen. "Most likely took off from her husband, boyfriend, who tuned her up regular."

  "I don't get that kind of thing, never did. A man who hits a woman isn't a man."

  Rick drank his coffee. "There are all kinds of men in the world."

  ONCE SHE FINISHED her shift, Reece settled in upstairs with her journal. She had the heat set at a conservative sixty-five and wore a sweater and two pairs of socks. She calculated the savings there would offset the fact that she left lights burning day and night.

  She was tired, but it was a pleasant sensation. The apartment felt good to her, safe and spare and tidy. Safer yet as she braced one of the two stools Joanie had given her for the counter under the doorknob whenever she was in the room.

  Slow again today. Nearly everyone who came in was a local. It's too late to ski or snowboard, though I hear some of the mountain passes won't be open for another few weeks. It's strange to think there must be feet of snow above us, while down here it's all mud and brown grass.

  People are so odd. I wonder if they really don't know I can tell when they're talking about me, or if they think it's just natural. I suppose it is natural, especially in such a small town. I can stand at the grill or the stove and feel the words pressing against the back of my neck.

  They're all so curious, but they don't come right out and ask. I guess that wouldn't be polite, so they hedge around.

  I have tomorrow off. A full day off. I was so busy cleaning in here, setting things up on my last day off, I barely noticed. But this time when I first saw the schedule I nearly panicked. What would I do, how would I get through a full day and night without a job to do?

  Then I decided I'd hike up the canyon as I'd planned when I first got here. I'll take one of the easy trails, go as far as I can, watch the river. Maybe the rocks are still clacking, the way Lo said they did. I want to see the white water, the moraines, the meadows and marshes. Maybe someone will be rafting on the river. I'll pack a little lunch and take my time.

  It's a long way from the Back Bay to the Snake River.

  THE KITCHEN WAS brightly lit, and Reece hummed along with Sheryl Crow as she scrubbed down the stove. The kitchen, she thought, was officially closed.

  It was her last night at Maneo's—the end of an era for her—so she intended to leave her work space sparkling.

  She had the entire week off, and then—then—she'd start Dream Job as head chef for Oasis. Head chef, she thought, doing a little dance as she worked, for one of the hottest, trendiest restaurants in Boston. She'd supervise a staff of fifteen, design her own signature dishes, and put her work up against the very best in the business.

  The hours would be vicious, the pressure insane.

  She couldn't wait.

  She'd helped train Marco herself, and between him and Tony Maneo, they'd do fine. She knew Tony and his wife, Lisa, were happy for her. In fact, she had good reason to know—since her prep cook. Donna, couldn't keep a secret—that there was a party being set tip right now to celebrate her new position, and to say goodbye.

  She imagined Tony had waved the last customers away by now, except for a handfull of regulars who'd have been invited to her goodbye party.

  She was going to miss this place, miss the people, but it was time for this next step. She'd worked for it. studied for it, planned for it. and now it was about to happen.

  Stepping back from the stove, she nodded in approval, then carried the cleaning supplies to the little utility closet to put them away.

  The crash from outside the kitchen had her rolling her eyes. But the screams that followed it spun her around. When gunfire exploded, she froze. Even as she tumbled her cell phone out of her pocket, the swinging door slammed open. There was a blur of movement, and an instant of fear. She saw the gun, saw nothing but the gun. So black, so big.

  Then she was flung backward into the closet, punched by a hot, unspeakable pain in her chest.

  THE SCREAM she'd never loosed ripped out of Reece now as she lurched up in bed, pressing a hand high on her chest. She could feel it, that pain, where the bullet had struck. The fire of it, the shock of it. But when she looked at her hand, there was no blood; when she rubbed her skin, there was only the scar.

  "It's all right. I'm all right. Just a dream. Dreaming, that's all." But she trembled all over as she grabbed her flashlight and got up to check the door, the windows.

  No one was there, not a soul moved on the street below, on the lake. The cabins and houses were dark. No one was coming to finish what they'd begun two years before. They didn't care that she lived, didn't know where she was if they did.

  She was alive—just an accident of fate, just the luck of the draw, she thought as she rubbed her fingertips over the scar the bullet had left behind.

  She was alive, and it was almost dawn of another day. And look, look there, it's… it's a moose coming clown to the lake to drink.

  "Now there's something you don't see every day," she said aloud. "Not in Boston. Not if you spend every minute pushing to move up, move forward. You don't see the light softening in the east and a knobby-kneed moose clopping out of the woods to drink."

  Mists flowed along the ground, she noted, thin as tissue paper, and the lake still as glass. And there, the light came on in Brody's cabin. Maybe he can't sleep, either. Maybe he gets up early to write so he can lie in the hammock in the afternoon and read.

  Seeing the light, knowing someone was awake as she was, was oddly comforting.

  She'd had the dream—or most of it—but she hadn't fallen apart. That was progress, wasn't it? And someone turned a light on across the lake. Maybe he'd look out his window as she was looking out hers, and see the glow in her window, too. In that strange way, they'd share the dawn.

  She stood, watching the light in the east streak the sky with pink and gold, then spread over the glass of the lake until the water glowed like a quiet fire.

  By the time she'd stocked her backpack according to the recommended list for a trail hike, it felt like it weighed fifty pounds. It was only about eight miles, up and back, but she thought it was better to be cautious and use the list for hikes over ten miles.

  She might decide to go farther, or she might take a detour. Or… whatever, she'd packed it now and wasn't unpacking it again. She reminded herself she could stop whenever she wanted, as often as she wanted, set the pack down and rest. It was a good, clear day—a free day—and she was going to take every advantage of it.

  She'd barely gotten ten feet when she was hailed.

  "Doing a little exploring this morning?" Mac asked her. He wore one of his favored flannel shirts tucked into jeans, and a watch cap pulled over his head.

  "I thought I'd hike a little bit of Little Angel Trail."

  His brows came together. "Going on your own? '

  "It's an easy trail, according to the guidebook. It's a nice day. and I want to see the river. I've got a map," she continued. "A compass, water, everything I need, according to the guide," she repeated with a smile. "Really, more than I could possibly need."

  " Trail's going to be muddy yet. And I bet that guide tells you it's better to hike in pairs—better yet, in groups."

  It did, true enough, but she wasn't good in groups. Alone was always better. "I'm not going very far. I've hiked a little bit in the Smokies, in the Black Hills. Don't worry about me, Mr. Drubber."

  "I'm taking some time off myselt today—got young Leon at the mercantile
counter, and the grocery's covered, too. I could hike with you for an hour."