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Shut up, Diana, she instructed herself.
It appeared as though her long-winded explanation had piqued Chris’s curiosity instead of sating it. But when he spoke, it wasn’t of Tyler. “Getting back to the career training center you mentioned, what are you planning to study?”
She relaxed slightly. That question was simple enough to answer. “Business administration.”
“Do you have a job lined up?”
Another easy question. “Yeah. I was waitressing at a Scarlet Pimpernel in Nashville. Do you know the chain? There’s a restaurant in Gaithersburg.”
He tapped the top of the table with the fingertips of one hand, and she could almost see gears turning in his brain. “What I’m going to say might sound crazy, but would you consider working for me instead?”
She felt her jaw drop. “Here in Bentonsville?”
He smiled. “That is where the community center is located.”
Bentonsville was also the place of so much hurt for her, the place where Tyler and her mother still lived. Merely driving here had been emotional. “Working in Bentonsville never occurred to me.”
“That’s because you didn’t know I’d offer you a job. My office manager left last week. Doing both jobs is getting to be a strain. I wouldn’t expect you to step into her position right away, but I could sure use the help, and from someone I know I can trust.”
“You’re serious.” She read the verification on his face. “But don’t you have an application process where you need to interview other candidates?”
“We’re a nonprofit organization that operates under a grant that comes up for review every few years. I don’t answer to anyone other than myself on personnel issues.”
“But you don’t know anything about me anymore.”
“That’s not true,” he said. “I know you’re a single mom with secretarial experience who used to live in Bentonsville. I also know you’re the sister of the guy who used to be my best friend.”
Chris and J.D. had once been as tight as two people could be, hanging out in the weight room, on the football field, in the halls at school. But they hadn’t been close at the end. If guilt festered inside Chris, it was a different variety than the kind Diana lived with every day of her life.
“This is just about J.D., isn’t it?” she asked quietly. “That’s why you’re offering me a job.”
He glanced briefly away before his eyes settled on her once again. “I’ve always felt bad about how we drifted apart. So, yeah, J.D. has something to do with it. The fact that I used to think of you as a kid sister does, too. But the bottom line is I need to hire somebody soon, and you need a job.”
“I have a job lined up.”
“Not in the field you’re planning to study, you don’t. I’ll show you the ropes, teach you some things about running an office. Think of it as on-the-job training.” He named a figure on par with what she expected to earn as a waitress. Then he threw in better benefits.
She had to admit the job sounded like a godsend, but the allure of the position warred with panic at the thought of being back in Bentonsville. “I couldn’t work nine to five, because my classes are in the mornings.”
“Then work one to nine. Nine o’clock is when the community center closes. We’re open seven days a week, but you can have two days off. Say, Sunday and Thursday.”
“That would mean driving back to Gaithersburg every night on the dark, country roads.”
“Don’t live in Gaithersburg. Live in Bentonsville. You could even stay with your mother.” He must have picked up on her tension, because he added. “Or rent an apartment. Housing costs in Bentonsville are relatively cheap. I might even know of a place.”
She fidgeted with her coffee cup. The people who remembered her would recall that she’d been pregnant and unmarried when she left home, subjecting Jaye to unwanted curiosity once the child moved in with her. But while Diana’s mind rejected Chris’s suggestion that she live in Bentonsville, she didn’t entirely dismiss the idea of working in town. It might be awkward for her, but she’d faced a lot worse than awkward the last few months and survived.
“I’m tempted,” she said, thinking aloud.
“Wait ’til you see the center. There’s not much going on today because of the holiday weekend. But come with me, have a look around first.”
“You sure you have the time to give me a tour?”
“For you, Tag-Along, I’ll make the time.” Chris stood up, extending his hand to her. “So what do you say?”
The safe thing would be to refuse on the spot, but instead she placed her hand in his. What could it hurt to look?
DIANA INSERTED a chicken marsala frozen dinner in the compact microwave, set the controls on high for five minutes, then flopped down on her hotel bed.
A rerun of the pilot episode of Everybody Loves Raymond played on the television set across from the bed. As she watched the hectic beginning scenes, she vaguely remembered the plot. Ray’s wife’s birthday was approaching, and she wanted peace and quiet away from ringing phones, demanding kids and friends and family dropping by unannounced.
Three shrill beeps signaled her food was ready. Diana grabbed the remote and flicked off the TV before getting up from the bed.
Spending a quiet birthday wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. She should know. She’d had one last month. It had been only slightly more bearable than the lonesome Labor Day weekend that was finally coming to an end. But she had only herself to blame for that. If she were really through being a coward, she’d have accepted Connor’s invitation to spend the holiday with him. And Jaye.
Setting the packaged dinner down on the desk, she removed a cola from the small refrigerator and sat down. Through the walls, she could hear a young girl’s high-pitched giggle and the deeper voices of a man and a woman.
She glanced at the streamlined phone by the bedside, longing to pick it up and make a connection with her own daughter. But the reason she’d given Connor for not being in touch with Jaye still stood.
She was like a leaf swirling in the wind, without a place to touch down. How could she even think about having Jaye with her until she’d landed?
She cut off a piece of chicken with her plastic knife, put it in her mouth and chewed. The taste didn’t compare to the chicken marsala served by the Scarlet Pimpernel, which is what she could be eating tomorrow night after she’d attended her first day of classes and started her new job.
But the position the restaurant manager in Nashville had lined up for her no longer seemed as attractive. Supposedly the Scarlet Pimpernel had prospective waitresses lining up at the door, but Diana kept thinking about the Bentonsville Community Center.
She’d make about as much money as she would at the restaurant, which would still enable her to afford a nice-sized unit in the apartment complex she’d chosen. But not only would she have more scheduling flexibility, she’d have better health coverage for Jaye.
She heard a door opening, then closing, and the voices of the family that had been in the next room growing softer as they moved down the hall toward the elevator. Then the quiet was so pronounced, she could hear herself chew.
When she and Chris stopped by the community center on Saturday, the place had been, to use one of Chris’s words, hopping in spite of the holiday weekend. Small children and their parents had gyrated to the music in one of the all-purpose rooms hosting a Mom & Me exercise class. Senior citizens had congregated in the great room for their weekly Saturday afternoon bingo game. And a raucous basketball game had been going on at an outside court.
Pushing her half-eaten container of food away from her, Diana got to her feet and picked up her purse from the floor beside the bed. She rummaged through it, finally pulling out a business card.
Not giving herself time to change her mind, she punched in the number on the hotel phone and counted the rings. One. Two. Three.
“Hello,” Chris Coleman said, his voice coming through bright and jovial. Commotion reined in the background, as though the community center had hit a particularly busy spell.
“Hi, Chris. It’s Diana Smith. Is the job you offered me still available?”
TYLER BENTON RUSHED through the Bentonsville Community Center in the direction Valerie, the receptionist, had directed, aware of minutes ticking by that could be spent preparing for trial.
It couldn’t be helped. He needed to take care of this today.
The high-pitched chatter of the children in center-based day care mingled with the rusty voices of seniors playing bridge as he stood at the head of a large room, scanning the crowd.
“Yoo hoo, Tyler.” The greeting came from one of the women at the nearest card table: his sixth-grade teacher, the white hair piled on her head adding inches to her height.
“Hello, Mrs. Piper.” He tamped down his impatience and smiled at her. The other women at the table looked up from their cards. Tyler knew two of them, who he greeted by name. Mrs. Piper introduced him to the third, Mrs. Ruth Grimes, a plump woman with old-fashioned horn-rimmed glasses.
“Tyler here is an assistant state’s attorney,” Mrs. Piper told her, “although we all know he’s destined for even better things.”
Mrs. Grimes peered at him with interest over the top of her glasses. “Oh, really? Then perhaps you’d like to meet my granddaughter. She’s a peach.”
“I’m afraid that adorable Lauren Fairchild got to him first.” Mrs. Piper lowered her voice as though confiding a secret. To Tyler, she said, “I saw you two together at church on Sunday. You make a lovely couple.”
Tyler’s father, who’d invited the omnipresent Lauren to sit with them, had voiced the same sentiment. Tyler let Mrs. Piper’s comment slide, the same way he’d ignored his father’s verbal shove in Lauren’s direction. If he claimed not to be serious about Lauren, he’d find himself on a blind date with Mrs. Grimes’s granddaughter.
“Have any of you seen your director?” he asked. “I’ve got some business with him.”
“I wondered what you were doing here in the middle of the day.” Mrs. Piper craned her neck just as Chris Coleman stood up from a chair he’d pulled up to one of the other tables. “There’s Chris now. He’s such a sweetheart.”
The three other woman nodded, their assessment of Chris unanimous.
“Don’t let me interrupt your bridge game any more than I already have,” Tyler said, his mind on taking care of business and getting back to work. “It was a pleasure to see you ladies.”
He moved toward Chris, who excused himself from the foursome to whom he’d been talking. The charming smile the director had bestowed on the ladies of Bentonsville disappeared.
“Benton,” he said in lieu of a greeting.
“Chris.” Tyler inclined his chin. “I’ve got to talk to you.”
“Now? It couldn’t have waited until tonight?”
Tyler spent some of his very limited free time on the center’s outdoor basketball court, playing ball with the teen boys who congregated there. “I can’t make it tonight. Or any time soon, I’m afraid. I’m about to go to trial.”
“Then what’s so important you’re here now?”
Tyler looked around, encountering a half-dozen sets of interested eyes. He indicated a nearby hallway with a jerk of his head. Receiving his silent message, Chris walked with him until they were out of hearing range of the card players.
“Okay, what’s up?” Chris asked.
The director’s manner was friendly. His eyes were not. Although they’d never run in the same social circles, Tyler had graduated from high school the same year as Chris. The animosity he sensed rolling off the director hadn’t appeared until recently. Lately, it seemed as though Chris plain didn’t like him. Well, Tyler didn’t like what Chris had done.
Tyler carefully kept his next statement non-accusatory. “Jim Jeffries told me you backed out of buying his pool tables.”
Jim owned a bar and two regulation-size pool tables he was about to replace. He would have sold them to the center at well under retail. Tyler should know. He’d negotiated the price.
“That’s right. I took a closer look at the budget and decided the center couldn’t afford it.” Chris crossed his arms over his chest, as though reluctant to explain himself. That didn’t make sense. Chris often stated that the community deserved a say in matters concerning the center.
“Jim says he has another offer. The center can’t afford not to buy those pool tables,” Tyler argued. “As soon as the nightly basketball game’s over, the kids scatter.”
“Pool tables aren’t enough to make them stick around.”
“They’re a start,” Tyler snapped. He ran a hand through his hair, frustrated at himself for raising his voice. Every good lawyer knew cool logic got better results than heated words. “We’re on the same side here, Chris. We both want to keep kids off the street. But how can we do that if we can’t keep them at the center?”
“I don’t disagree.” Chris’s body language said differently. “But I have to consider what’s good not only for the teen program, but for the center as a whole. Our grant’s up for renewal in a few months. How can I justify spending such a large chunk of money on our least represented group?”
“By explaining that you’re trying to increase attendance.”
“Except I believe you can’t solve a problem by throwing money at it. Look at some of the things we’ve tried since the center opened. Paid speakers who talked to mostly empty rooms. Dances where nobody came. A study lounge hardly anybody uses.”
Tyler addressed only his last concern. “That’s because there are no computers in the study area.”
“Computers cost money, which we don’t have much of. I’ve got a tight budget. And, like I said, a lot of other programs to consider.”
“Then I’ll donate the pool tables,” Tyler said, surprised the solution hadn’t occurred to him before now. He’d sunk most of his disposable income into the house he’d bought last year, but he could afford used pool tables. “And maybe you could do some fund-raising for the computers.”
“Any fund-raising I do is global, benefiting the center as a whole. I can’t—”
“What if I get somebody to donate the computers?” Tyler asked, although he could ill afford the time. His work schedule was jammed.
Chris transferred his weight from one foot to the other. “That’d be great. But I’m still skeptical that pool tables and a couple computers will increase attendance.”
“It can’t hurt.”
“I hope you’re right,” Chris said, then nodded to him. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some things I need to do.”
Without another word, Chris headed down the hall. Tyler turned to leave and saw what he thought was a mirage. Walking toward him was a grown-up version of Diana Smith, the girl who’d broken his heart. He blinked, expecting her to disappear, but she kept coming.
Her figure was curvier, the glossy brown hair she’d once worn parted in the middle feathered around her face and her features more mature but there was no mistake about it. It was Diana, who’d left Bentonsville—and him—ten years ago.
Memories slammed into him. Of Diana’s tears dampening his T-shirt while she cried over her dead brother. Of her hazel eyes reflecting the attraction he hadn’t been able to deny. Of her face infused with pleasure and passion as he made love to her.
Of her lips telling him she’d cheated on him with countless other guys.
The last memory was the strongest, perhaps because it had been the impetus he’d used to get over her.
And he had gotten over her. Years ago. But that didn’t mean he hadn’t thought about her and wondered what had become of her. Especially recently when her mother had been on a quest to keep her brother’s killer from getting parole, gathering signatures on a petition in front of the grocery store and placing ads in the local newspaper.
With her clear skin, apple cheeks and gently arched brows, Diana had a natural quality that had always captivated him. She’d gotten even more appealing with age, something his infatuated teenage self wouldn’t have thought possible.
Her step didn’t falter, her slight smile didn’t waver, as though seeing him again hadn’t unduly affected her. It could have been because she’d done the spurning, although he could no longer blame her for that. With the wisdom that comes with age, he understood that she’d turned to him out of grief. But it still stung that he hadn’t mattered much to her while she’d been vital to him.
“Hello, Tyler,” she said, her voice still low, still smoky.
Annoyed at his reaction to her, he tried to pull himself together but still couldn’t manage to smile. “Hello, Diana.”
He knew he was staring, but couldn’t help it. Although her oval-shaped face appeared virtually the same, her eyes seemed different, as though they’d seen more than she’d bargained for. His gaze slid downward to the tiny mole to the left of her mouth that he used to like to kiss. Before she’d told him he hadn’t been the only guy she’d granted access to it.
The thought snapped him out of his embarrassing stupor. He wasn’t a teenager anymore but an accomplished adult who prided himself on his poise. He could deal with the unexpected appearance of a girl from his past.
“This is quite a surprise,” he said, pleased his voice sounded the way it always did. “I hadn’t realized you were in town visiting.”
A few beats of silence passed before she shook her head. “I’m not visiting. I’m working here at the center.”
“You’re working at the center?” he repeated numbly, barely keeping the incredulity out of his voice. “Since when?”
“Since today, actually.” She slipped one of her hands in the front pocket of her slacks, where she seemed to be fiddling with something. He tried to wrap his mind around the startling revelation that she wasn’t only back in Bentonsville temporarily. She was back to stay. “I’m going to school in Gaithersburg. My plan was to work there, too. But I ran into Chris over the weekend, he offered me a job and here I am.”
Yeah, here she was. Back in Bentonsville for a reason that had nothing to do with him.
Blindsided that he’d subconsciously wished she’d returned to town because of him, he felt the need to put space between them. He wasn’t that naive kid who’d once stupidly confused a grieving girl’s dependence for something it wasn’t.
But for the life of him, he couldn’t make himself move.
“How about you?” She broke the deafening silence between them. “What are you doing here?”
“I needed to talk to Chris.” His spinning brain furnished a reason why he was still frozen in place. Should he prepare himself to run into her around every Bentonsville corner? “Are you living here in town?”
“No, I’m not. I’m in a hotel right now but I’ll probably get an apartment in Gaithersburg.”
“I hope it all works out for you,” he said shortly. Move, Tyler, he told himself. Leave before you say something you’ll regret. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to be getting back to work.”
“Oh, of course,” she said, taking a step sideways so he had more room to pass. The way she turned her head subtracted years from her face, peeling the decade away and taking him back to the time he was trying to forget. A time when he’d dreamed of a perfect girl, a girl he cared about and who cared about him.
He walked determinedly past her, banking his urge to speed up. His vaunted poise hadn’t held up as well as he’d hoped, but a hasty retreat might give her the idea that her long-ago betrayal still hurt.
Which, unfortunately, it did.
CHAPTER THREE
DIANA SAT on the tall stool behind the welcome counter during a temporary lull, nursing her third cup of coffee of the day and turning over and over a smooth, flat stone with a psychedelic design.
Jaye had painted it last year during art class, then gravely presented it after Diana crashed into the tree. Amidst all the upheaval in their lives, Diana had forgotten the stone’s existence—until she’d found it inside a box last night, its bold slashes of red, blue and yellow demanding to be noticed.
Her daughter had insisted it was a good-luck charm. After Diana’s earlier encounter with Tyler, during which she’d held onto the stone like a lifeline, she seriously doubted it held hidden power.
She’d wondered if Tyler had thought to ask about her child, paving the eventual way for her to tell him he had a daughter. But he’d been silent, showing no more interest in the subject than he had a decade ago.
Disappointment rose up in Diana. He’d seemed like a stranger and not the boy she’d loved.
She hadn’t remembered him being over six feet, but then he’d been young when they were together and possibly still growing. His chest and shoulders had filled out, changes apparent despite his well-cut gray suit. His face was different, too. The shape more rectangular, his clefted chin squarer, his blue eyes warier.
Once she’d been able to tell him anything, but she’d had a hard time getting out any words at all, let alone about Jaye.
She pushed off the floor with her right foot, sending the stool revolving in a complete three-sixty. She couldn’t let their difficult first meeting deter her. Her reasons for telling Tyler about Jaye hadn’t changed. Clearing her conscience so she could start her life anew constituted only a minor part of it. Doing right by her daughter—and, by extension, Tyler—made up the rest.
When the stool faced frontward again, a vaguely familiar woman with dyed red hair and a matronly figure was approaching.
“Aren’t you Elaine Smith’s daughter, Diana?” the woman, who was probably in her sixties, asked in a voice Diana recognized at once.
Diana’s hand closed around the stone. She’d told Chris filling in at the welcome desk while the regular receptionist went on lunch break wasn’t a problem, but she’d lied.
She’d gotten through her initial meeting with Tyler, but she wasn’t ready to face her past and the rest of the people who populated it.
Please, God, she prayed, don’t let the woman have worked at the high school. Teachers talked, and Bentonsville High’s insulated community ensured that everybody knew Diana had been trouble. After Diana abruptly left town amidst rumors that she was an easy lay, speculation that she was pregnant must have been rampant.
“You’re right,” she admitted slowly. “I am Diana Smith.”
The woman smiled broadly, causing the tension in Diana’s shoulders to ebb but not entirely abate.
“I thought that was you. Elaine and I used to volunteer together in the school library when you were in elementary school. Have you worked here long?”
“Chris just hired me.”
“He’s such a dear, isn’t he?” The woman didn’t wait for her answer. “I’m Jake Wilson’s mother. You remember Jake, don’t you?”
Diana faintly recalled a boisterous kid with strawberry-blond hair, but Mrs. Wilson chattered on before Diana could respond. “Jake’s an engineer in Baltimore. He’s married with two adorable kids. How about you?”
Diana squeezed the stone tighter. “I have a daughter.”
Mrs. Wilson’s expression softened. “I know, dear. It’s too bad about your fiancé dying in that car accident right after your brother died, God rest both of their souls. What a tough time that must have been, with you being so young.”
Her fiancé?
“Your mother was beside herself, poor dear, especially because she was the one who insisted it’d do you good to get away from Bentonsville. You went to live with an aunt, didn’t you?”
Speechless, Diana nodded. That was the only true part of the entire story.
“I’d love to meet your little girl one day,” Mrs. Wilson said. “Please tell your mother I said hello and that she should give me a call. Or, better yet, I’ll call her.”
Diana had yet to inform her mother she’d returned to Bentonsville, a fact she wouldn’t have revealed even if her mind hadn’t been on the fiction the older woman had spun. Was Mrs. Wilson’s version of events what everybody in Bentonsville thought had happened? Is that what Tyler believed?