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“Dad called?”
“Yes, after you left the restaurant.”
Huh? “Mom, a minute ago you said that he didn’t call.”
She blinked. “No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did. You said that he must have forgotten to call.”
Her mom sighed and shook her head. “I’m sorry. It’s this darned migraine medicine. It makes me loopy sometimes. What I meant was, he forgot to tell me about the papers. But, yes, he did call.”
That must have been some powerful stuff she was taking. “So, I’m off the hook?”
“Yes, he’s all set for the day shift.”
As much as she wanted to help her parents, she was relieved. It was too much too soon. “I do have a few errands to run. Although I no longer have a car to run them with.”
Her mom tucked the first-aid kit back into the pantry. “Take my car—I won’t be using it.”
“Are you sure?”
“But only if you promise to bring home a gallon of milk. We ran out last night.”
At first she thought her mom was kidding, since she had been the one to send Caitie out that morning. “Mom, you know I got the milk already.”
“You did?”
This was no joke. Her blank expression said she had no idea what Caitie was talking about. “Remember, I forgot the diner key, and it was so early everything in town was still closed, so I had to drive all the way to the twenty-four-hour store at the service station on the highway.”
With a frown her mom pulled the fridge open, and there on the shelf sat the gallon of 2 percent milk. “Darned medication,” she muttered. “I would lose a limb if they weren’t all sewn on.”
“Do they have any idea what’s causing you to have so many headaches?”
“It could be a hormone imbalance, since it seems to coincide with menopause.”
“Have you thought to try homeopathic remedies? Holistic medicine? Maybe you could try cutting processed foods from your diet. Or gluten.”
“I’ll definitely consider that,” she said, though to Caitie it sounded as if her mom was humoring her.
Her mom walked to the stove and lifted the lid off the pan, giving the sauce another stir. She looked fine, but something just seemed...off. Something other than chronic headaches.
“Is everything okay?” Caitie asked.
Her mom turned to her and smiled. “Of course, honey.”
She sounded genuine, so why didn’t Caitie believe her? Could she and Caitie’s dad be having problems?
Her parents had always had a good marriage. Sure, they argued occasionally. What couple didn’t? Mostly about money or the diner. But Caitie’s mom had always seemed happy with her modest, small-town life. At least, that was the way it had always appeared to Caitie.
When Caitie had presented her mom with her college acceptance letter, and finally had the courage to admit her plan to move to the East Coast, her mom’s reaction had surprised her.
“If you want out of this town, if you want something more from life, leave while you can,” her mom had told her. “Don’t let anything or anyone hold you back.”
Caitie had done exactly that, but her mom’s words haunted her for months afterward. Had it been her way of saying she regretted giving up the chance at a lucrative and prestigious modeling career to stay in Paradise? And had that regret begun to cause a rift in her parents’ relationship?
She would ask her sister what she knew, but Kelly had been so self-absorbed with school and her very active social life, she wouldn’t see a tsunami coming until it crashed down over her head. No that was unfair. Kelly had always been self-absorbed. She had inherited their mother’s beauty and her pinup model figure. She had always been the pretty one. Not that Caitie had gone three rounds with an ugly stick. She was attractive in an average way. Pleasant to look at, but nothing to get all excited about.
There had been times when she wondered what it was that Nate saw in her, when there were other girls—prettier girls—who would have given anything to be with him. Those first few months of dating him, she’d lived in a constant state of flux. Happy beyond her wildest dreams, yet always waiting for the ax to fall. For him to realize how much better he could do. She truly believed it was only a matter of time before he dumped her and moved on to someone else.
Her mom replaced the pan lid and set down the spoon, saying offhandedly, “So, did anything interesting happen at the diner this morning?”
Way to be subtle, Mom. “Did Dad tell you?”
“We talked,” she admitted. “He said there was tension.”
A minimalist point of view. “Dad was being kind.”
Her mom winced. “It was that bad?”
“At first Nate wouldn’t even look at me. Like he thought he would turn into a pillar of salt should our eyes meet.”
“What did you expect?” she asked, looking puzzled. “A hug?”
Caitie blinked. Whose side was she on? “No, of course not. But—”
“You knew you would see him. You had time to prepare. Imagine if Nate had just suddenly shown up unannounced. Would you have reacted any differently?”
She sighed. “Probably not.”
“It’s also possible that deep down he still has feelings for you.”
“He has feelings all right. He hates me.”
“He did stop to help you.”
“Only because he had to. It’s his job. It was obvious he didn’t want to be there.”
“He drove you home. And let you wait to fill out a report. He didn’t have to do that.”
Let’s give him a medal. “Why does it seem as if everyone is on his side? Yes, I left, and I didn’t do it very well, but I spent most of those first few months miserable, lonely and missing him, while he was back home knocking up and marrying my best friend.”
“Just remember that there are two sides to every story.”
“I don’t care about his story. It’s done. I’m over it. I’ve moved on.”
“It seems to me that if you had truly moved on, you wouldn’t care what Nate did or didn’t do.”
Oh, ouch. A direct hit. And the worst part? She was right. When it came to speaking her mind, Betty Cavanaugh rarely held back. She didn’t sugarcoat either, sometimes making her keen observations a bitter pill to swallow.
“I really hate it when you use your Vulcan logic on me,” Caitie said, dropping her chin in her hand. She wouldn’t bother trying to deny that she and Nate had unresolved issues. Issues that he clearly had no desire to work through. And she just flat out didn’t see the point. They’d had their inevitable, awkward confrontation—which, if anything, made matters worse—and now it was over. The trick was to avoid him as long as she was here, and then, after she’d returned to New York and got back to her real life, she could forget all about him.
As if.
After seven years, she still hadn’t figured out how.
“Any plans for the rest of the day?” her mom asked, and Caitie was grateful for the change of subject.
“Job hunting.” Caitie grabbed an energy drink from the fridge, but as she was walking through the doorway to the living room, she had a thought. She stopped and turned back to the stove, where her mom was stirring the sauce again. “Just out of curiosity, Mom. Why did Dad send those papers home to you?”
Her mom blinked, looking confused. “What do you mean?”
“Couldn’t he have just brought them home tonight? Since you said yourself it was nothing urgent. Or better yet, why didn’t he just email then to the home computer?”
Her mom sighed, realizing the jig was up. “Your dad said you were very upset after seeing Nate. He just wanted an excuse to get you out of the diner. But he knew if he tried to give you the rest of the day off you would balk.”
He was right. “Did Deb really come back early, or did he have to find someone else to cover the rest of the shift?”
“He called someone in. Though I’m sure he wouldn’t have sent you home if he knew it would become such a fiasco.”
“I could have worked. Yes, I was upset, but I would have gotten over it.”
“He was just trying to help.”
She knew that, and she loved him for it. But she was a grown woman now, and this was one problem she needed to figure out on her own.
* * *
On his way back to the station, Nate checked his phone, which had been ringing almost nonstop for the past thirty minutes or so, and saw that his ex-wife, Melanie, had left him three messages. He didn’t have to hear them to know what they were concerning. Paradise was a hotbed of gossip, and Mel’s salon was the main hub, with Simmons Hardware trailing at a close second.
Nate stuffed his phone back in his pocket. This was a conversation they needed to have face-to-face.
He drove to the salon and steered his cruiser into an open spot on the street out front. The door jingled and the stench of acetone and perm solution assaulted him as he stepped inside. Being the only salon within ten miles, business was steady. All but one of the six hair stations had customers and two nail techs worked on manicures. Meaning fourteen pairs of curious eyes settled on him.
Clearly everyone had heard the news.
Nate usually took comfort in the fact that when he walked down the street, or entered a local business, nearly every face there was a familiar one. Today, he longed for a modicum of anonymity. Or at the very least, a little personal space.
“Good morning, ladies,” he said.
Mel stood at her station finishing a comb-out on Mrs. Samuels, who at ninety-two still kept her flat black hair teased into a beehive and sprayed to the consistency of fiberglass. Which not only added six inches to her four-foot-eleven-inch frame, but gave her papery skin an ethereal, grayish cast. Nate had seen corpses with more color. Once, a few years back, when Mrs. Samuels had dozed off under the dryer, she was so pale that Mel thought she had shuffled loose the mortal coil right there in the salon. Everyone had been too weirded out to try and wake her. Ultimately they’d held a hand mirror under her nose to make sure she was still breathing.
Regina, one of the stylists, smiled sympathetically at Nate and said, “We all heard.”
One sharp look from Mel shut her down, but Nate could feel the silent tension growing.
“All finished, Miz Samuels,” Mel said loudly, helping her client up from the chair. Mrs. Samuels was by no means spry, but considering her advanced age she still got around fairly well. At least once a day she could be seen tooling around town in her mint condition, canary-yellow 1970 Mustang Fastback. A gift from her husband, Walter—God rest his saintly soul—on her forty-fifth birthday.
As Mel opened the door for her, her eyes snagged on Nathan’s and a silent understanding passed between them. He followed her through the salon, past the nail techs and washbowls to her office in the back.
When they were inside, she closed and locked the door, then leaned against it. “Are you okay? As soon as I heard I called to warn you, but you didn’t answer. You saw her at the diner?”
“Yes. And I’m fine,” he told her.
She lifted a questioning brow.
He sighed. If there was one person he trusted with his true feelings, it was Mel. They were best friends. “Okay, I’m coping.”
“I guess we both knew Caitie coming back was a possibility.”
Yet they had never discussed how they would handle it if she did. An oversight he now regretted.
“How does she look?” Mel asked. She had once admitted to Nate that deep down she had always been a little jealous of Caitie. It had seemed to Mel that all the good stuff happened to her best friend. She did better in school than Mel, who, like their son, had a mild form of dyslexia. Caitie’s hair, a natural pale honey blond, always seemed to fall perfectly into place with hardly any effort while Mel had to wrestle with her naturally curly auburn locks for an hour every morning. Caitie’s creamy smooth complexion had been flawless while Mel battled teenage acne and oily skin. Caitie was also tall, slender and lithe, and never had to watch what she ate. Mel was forever battling the bulge and swore she gained weight just looking at food. And no matter how many times he told her she was beautiful—which she was, both inside and out—she’d wrestled with her insecurities. And still did, which is why he chose his next words very carefully.
“She looks...the same.” He didn’t mention her weight, since it was such a sore spot with Mel. She had tried every diet craze and exercise gimmick known to man, yet she never lost more than ten or fifteen pounds. Which was twenty to twenty-five pounds less than she wanted to lose.
A deck chair off the Titanic, she’d called it.
“I heard she’s in some sort of trouble,” Mel said. “Someone even suggested that she’s on the run from the FBI.”
He’d heard that, too, when he stopped by the station after breakfast. But no one as intelligent as Caitie would be dense enough to hide from law enforcement in her hometown right under her parents’ roof. And if there were a manhunt to find her, as local law enforcement, he would have heard about it by now. “I seriously doubt that.”
“So she’s probably not going into witness protection, either,” Mel said.
“Not that I’m aware.”
“Do you know how long she’s staying?”
Hopefully not long. “Nope.”
Mel gnawed her bottom lip. “What was it like to see her again?”
He shrugged and told a little white lie. “It was disturbing to see her again...at first. But now I don’t feel much of anything about it.”
“This could get awkward,” she said. “And complicated.”
Story of his life.
“I’m not going to let it come between us,” he assured her. “Our friendship means more to me than Caitie ever could.”
She didn’t look as if she believed him. “I was invisible to you until she left.”
“Mel—”
She stopped him midsentence, brushing away the tear that leaked down her cheek. “That wasn’t fair, I know. Please, ignore me. I’m feeling sorry for myself. I just can’t help thinking, now that she’s back, you’re going to forget all about me and Cody.”
“That will never happen.” He pulled Mel into his arms and kissed the top of her head, his heart hurting for her, wishing he could have loved her as something other than a friend. He did try, but after six months of marriage counseling, even the therapist agreed they would be better off as partners in parenting and good friends. Divorce had been the only viable option if they had any hope of preserving their friendship. It hadn’t been easy, but they were in a good place now. And to this day he had no regrets, not when he looked at their son. “If Caitie never left, Cody wouldn’t even exist.”
“That’s true,” she said.
Nate never knew how much he wanted to be a father until he watched his son being born, held him for the very first time. He had been totally unplanned, and three weeks premature. And so tiny and fragile Nate had been terrified he might drop him. Cody had gazed up at Nate with the wisdom and patience of a very old soul, as if to say, Don’t worry, you’ll do just fine. I have faith in you.
Nate fell instantly in love and from that day forward, his boy was all that mattered. Nate knew the first time he held his son that he was destined for great things. And now, at six years old, Cody had an innate patience and a deep understanding of people that left adults scratching their heads. Sometimes he would get this look, as if he knew something no one else did. And though his reading difficulties set him apart from other kids his age, he took it all in stride.
“Are you still in love with her?” Mel asked, her voice muffled against Nate’s shirt.
The question was so out of the blue, so ridiculous, he snapped his head back hard enough to give himself whiplash. “I can’t believe you asked me that.”
She looked up at him, her eyes—which could never decide if they wanted to be blue or green—swimming with tears. “Is it really that unusual a question? You loved her before.”
“Without trust, there can be no love.”
“You never got closure. Neither of us have.” Her arms tightened around him. “Now I’m so confused. This morning, when Regina told me Caitie was back, my first instinct was to run down to the diner, throw my arms around her and hug her. I was actually excited at the idea of seeing her, and for a split second I desperately wanted my best friend back.”
Mel’s first instinct involved hugs and reconciliation. The only thing Nate had wanted to do was hurl. That had to mean something, didn’t it? “If that’s how you feel, maybe you should talk to her.”
“I’m not sure what I feel. I never imagined that her coming back could be so—”
“Disruptive,” he finished for her.
“Yes! It’s all I can think about. I’m so preoccupied I nearly used the wrong color dye on Mrs. Newburg.”
“For what it’s worth, seeing her for the short amount of time that I did made me realize that we’re two completely different people now. She’s changed.” It had seemed that way to him at least. Or maybe that was what he preferred to believe. He resented her coming back and disrupting the quiet, orderly life that he had spent the past seven years building. She had no right.
“No matter what happens with Caitie, you and Cody will always be the most important people in the world to me.”
“I know.”
He held his ex-wife close, wishing there was something he could say, a way he could assure her everything would be okay and nothing would change.
Only problem was, things had begun to change already.
Chapter Four
“Let her die with dignity,” Jake—of Jake’s Garage—told Caitie later that evening after supper.
“The front end is pretty smashed up,” she said, surprised that so much damage had been done at such a low speed.
“That’s not even the worst of it.” He lifted the hood. “Your block is cracked.”
She didn’t really know what that meant, but it didn’t sound good. “So what you’re saying is, it’s definitely not worth fixing.”
“I wouldn’t waste my money.”
She trusted his judgment. It wasn’t the first time her car had been to that garage. Jake had worked on it years ago when his dad owned the business. Jake Senior retired and of course Jake Junior took over. That was the way it worked in Paradise. When the parent retired, the oldest child took over. And in Jake’s case, they didn’t even have to change the sign.
“What should I do with it now?” she asked him.
He slammed the hood and wiped his hands on the greasy rag hanging from the pocket of his pants. “I know a guy who owns a junkyard. He’d take it off your hands, give you a hundred bucks cash for it.”
Someone would actually pay her cash for this pile of junk? “That would be awesome. What do I owe you for looking at it?”
“It was fifty bucks for the tow. No charge to look at it.”
So she would actually make money on the deal? Go figure. Granted not much money, but these days every penny counted.
“Do you take Visa?” she asked Jake.
“Sure do. Let’s go in the office.”
Back in high school Caitie’s car hadn’t been the most reliable thing on four wheels, so she had seen the inside of the garage office enough times to know that virtually nothing had changed. He had the same grimy cash register that had gone out of date sometime in the past century, printed ads on the walls for car products that dated back to before she was born, and the entire office was covered in a fine coat of greasy dust. Even the floor felt sticky under her flip-flops. And though she wasn’t sure what color the walls were originally, now they were a filthy grayish-yellow.
She watched Jake fill out the paperwork. His hands were dry and calloused with painful-looking cracks on his knuckles and grease caked under his nails.
“Fifty bucks even,” he said, and she handed him her credit card.
“When did your dad retire?” she asked as he ran the charge.
“Three years ago.” He gave her the slip to sign, then handed over her receipt, leaving a greasy fingerprint on the edge. “You’ll need to sign the title over.”
“I’ll have to find it.” She was sure her mom had it filed away somewhere safe. “So, do you like owning the business?”
Leaning with one hip propped against the counter, he shrugged. “It is what it is. What else am I gonna do?”
She wanted to say, Hey, I got out, and you can, too. But she would probably just insult him, or come off as uppity. Besides, she wasn’t exactly the poster child for making it in the big city. What Jake did with his life—or didn’t do—was none of her business.
They chatted for a few more minutes, mostly about superficial things. He’d been four years ahead of her in school, so they didn’t have many friends in common. She was a little relieved when she finally said goodbye and left the garage.
Many of the businesses in town closed their doors at five, but the thrift store stayed open until nine on weekdays. Needing several personal items to get her through the next few weeks, Cait parked her mom’s car in the street and walked the two blocks. She encountered a few familiar faces, but with a baseball cap hiding her hair and dark sunglasses shading her eyes, no one seemed to recognize her.
As she stepped through the automatic door, a wall of cool air enveloped her. The thrift store, as with the rest of town, hadn’t changed much, and it was practically deserted.
She took a quick look around to get her bearings, then located the personal care aisle exactly where it had been the last time she’d visited.
She walked briskly to the aisle and grabbed a cheap bottle of both shampoo and conditioner and a package of disposable razors. Next she headed to the toy/gardening aisle, hoping to find some sort of book on landscaping.
About halfway down the aisle, an adorable, towheaded little boy with curly hair stood intently studying a display of Legos, most of which were on a high shelf just out of his reach.
“Do you need help reaching something?” Caitie asked, and he turned to look at her with bright green inquisitive eyes. Eyes that narrowed suspiciously as he gave her the once-over. She put him at seven or eight years old, and something about him seemed distinctly familiar, though she was almost positive she had never met him.
“I’m not a’sposed to talk to strangers,” he said, so matter-of-factly it made her smile. Smart kid.
“I’m Caitie,” she said, taking off her sunglasses, thinking it would make her look less intimidating.
Like a lightbulb switching on, recognition lit his face. “You’re the lady in the pictures,” he said.
“Pictures?” Feeling suddenly self-conscious, she shoved her sunglasses back on. “What pictures?”
“In the box in Daddy’s closet.”
Uh-oh. There was only one man in town who would have any reason to have photos of her in his closet. She suddenly realized why the boy looked so familiar.
“Shopping incognito?” a familiar voice said from behind her.
She winced and the spaghetti she’d eaten for dinner tossed around in her stomach. Three times in one day? What were the odds? Paradise was a small town, but come on.
She turned to Nate, who was in his street clothes—a pair of navy chino shorts and a white polo shirt. In one hand he held a package of cookies, and in the other a box of tampons, of all things.
“Great disguise,” he said.
Not so great that he hadn’t recognized her. “Now I get it,” she said.
“Get what?”
“Why you were so cranky this morning.” She gestured to the items he was holding. “PMS.”
“Daddy, what’s PMS?” Cody asked.
He shot Caitie a look, then cut his eyes back to his son. “Never mind, Cody.”
Cody was a miniature version of Nate but with Mel’s striking green eyes. Caitie couldn’t help wondering, if she and Nate had stayed together and had a child, who would it look like? Him? Her? A combination of the two?
What was the point in wondering about something that never had and never would happen? Only a man smitten with a woman would buy her feminine products, meaning he must be involved with someone new.
She wrote off the sudden churning in her belly as indigestion, when the truth was, it felt a lot more like jealousy. And that was unacceptable. But rather than walk away, she heard herself ask, “So, I hear you keep pictures of me in a box in your closet.”