Someone To Watch Over Me

Plus, there was that whole mad-at-God thing Gwen had going on, which her mother really disapproved of. The attack had somehow become a test of faith that Gwen had failed, at least in her mother’s eyes.

Things had gone from bad to worse at home, and Gwen had just wanted to get away. So when her aunt had decided to move, Gwen had jumped at the chance to come to Magnolia Falls.

She curled up on her couch, her head on a pillow tucked into one end, all the lights still burning, the music still playing softly to cover all those pesky little night sounds, her little figurine seeming to watch over her in a way she found comforting beyond any kind of logic, and in that moment, the day didn’t seem so horrible or overwhelming.

She needed someone to listen, to say that yes, sometimes life was really scary and so very difficult, and that people on Earth really didn’t quite understand why; she needed someone to even be a little angry on her behalf.

As if what had happened to her had been so bad, it could make God mad? It hadn’t been. Not in the grand scheme of things.

It had just shaken her to the core, left her feeling vulnerable and alone. It was like being dropped in a deep, dark hole and not knowing how to get out.

So she’d come here, to a place where no one really knew her, a place she’d visited a few times and always felt safe. To a place where the man who’d attacked her wouldn’t be able to find her once he got out of prison. That had been important to her—that he wouldn’t know where she was.

She’d told herself she’d rebuild her life here, that she’d get better.

Maybe she would.

In the meantime, she curled up almost in a ball and miserably poured out her troubles to an empty room and wondered if anyone was listening.

I’m so tired, Gwen said. Everything seems so hard, like such an effort. Sometimes, I don’t know how I’ll be able to go on, if things are always this hard. Help me. Please. Couldn’t you just help me? Couldn’t you just take all the pain away?

And when she was done, she cried a little bit, closed her eyes and imagined someone stroking her hair, telling her everything was going to be okay.

Jax woke disoriented, with the sun blazing into his eyes. He groaned and rolled over, to get away from the light, then realized he was on the sofa in his mother’s living room.

Wincing at the pain in his head, he stared at the clock, and saw that it was six-thirty. Late for him.

He rolled up and onto his feet, shrugging out the kinks as he walked down the hall, had the bedroom door open and actually stared at the empty bed for at least fifteen seconds before he remembered his mother was gone.

It hit him once more, as if it were happening all over again. He’d counted on this day being a tiny bit easier, but it didn’t seem to be working that way. He didn’t know how to do this, how to say goodbye to the woman who’d taken care of him his entire life, how to be without her.

The bedsprings creaked ever so slightly, and his heart gave a lurch, thinking maybe it had all been some horrible dream. He rushed over to the bed and started digging through the covers.

And uncovered the dog.

“Romeo?” he yelled. “What are you doing?”

The dog whined and laid his head down on the pillow. Big, sad puppy eyes seemed to ask where Jax’s mother was, why she wasn’t in her bed where she belonged and when she’d be coming home.

“She’s not coming back,” Jax said. “She’s gone.”

How would he ever make this ridiculous creature understand, when Jax didn’t understand himself?

Romeo made a pitiful squeaking sound and buried his nose in the pillow, as if he might find Jax’s mother there.

Jax was getting ready to yell at the dog again, when he heard a sound behind him. His sisters, all three of them, standing in a row like the little stair-step girls he remembered, crowded into the doorway watching him with the dog.

They’d spent the night, not wanting to be alone any more than he had, and now they looked bleak, exhausted, angry, as surprised as he’d been to see that today might even be harder than the day before and probably wondering how they, too, would get through it.

There was nothing to say. The reality of the situation said it all.

Romeo started whining again, low, heartbroken sounds, something like Jax might have made himself, if he’d allowed himself the luxury.

He was getting ready to yell once more, but Kim got to Romeo first. She knelt by the side of the bed, fussing over the dog and hugging him and crying.

Fine.

She could comfort the canine, offer him something Jax denied himself. He looked back at his other two sisters, who gave him a look that said plainly, What else is there to do?

Katie finally offered to go make coffee. Kathie said she was getting dressed because they had so much to do. Jax walked out onto the back porch, just to get out of the house and all the misery that seemed to be contained inside it. He stood there and listened to the birds making a racket, a car being started down the block, a siren blaring in the distance.

Day One without his mother.

It had to get better, because if it didn’t, he wouldn’t be able to stand it.

Jax got elected to go to the funeral home, something that made cutting off his right arm sound not so bad. He shoved open the door and marched down the hall, determined to get it over with as quickly as possible. He didn’t care what the funeral cost, and he really didn’t care what the service was like.

Sorry, Mom, he whispered, as if she might hear.

Jax knew the director, John Williams, who also served as the county coroner. How in the world did he handle those two jobs day after day?

John met him at the door and tried to put him at ease with small talk, but Jax cut him off.

“I need to do this and get out of here,” he said, taking a seat in John’s office.

“Sure,” John said, opening up a file on his desk. “I understand. And I have some…well, relatively good news. Your mother wanted to spare you and the girls as much as possible, so she came to see me a few months back and took care of all the planning herself.”

“She did?” Jax asked.

“Yes.”

“Thank you, Mother,” he said aloud, sagging into the chair, thinking he might just slide right out of it if he wasn’t careful. Then found himself near tears thinking about her, able to think clearly enough and unselfishly enough to do this herself to make things easier for him and his sisters. “She tried to make the whole thing as easy on us as possible. I mean, there she was, dying, and still trying to take care of us.”

“I know. That’s the kind of woman she was.” He went over all the details of the service, then said, “That’s it, really. Unless there’s something else I can do?”

Bring her back to life? Jax thought.

Wasn’t going to happen.

Explain to him why it was that people had to die?

He doubted that was in the funeral-home instruction manual.

Tell him how people got through this?

That was an idea. This man faced death every day. He had to know so much more about it than Jax did.

Tell him what was left of his mother was nothing but flesh and bones. That it wasn’t really her. That she wasn’t here and she wasn’t dead? That she never would be?

That would help. But Jax didn’t think he believed that, either, although right now, he very much wanted to. He wanted something to hang on to, and it just didn’t feel as if there was anything.

“I wish there were more I could say.” John shook his head. “But the only real thing I’ve learned in this business is that life is precious. Every day is. A lot of people spend so much time worrying about silly, inconsequential things or chasing after things that, in the end, really don’t mean a thing.”

“The make-every-day-count stuff?” Jax asked.

“Yeah. Something like that. Your mother did that. She was a happy woman, walked in here with a smile on her face while she made all the arrangements. She brought two of her favorite blouses—a pink one and a yellow one—and asked me which one I thought she’d looked better in. She went with the pink because she thought it was the cheeriest color, nothing dark or gloomy or anything like that. And a pretty, matching scarf for her head. I guess she hated all the wigs she tried.”

“Yeah. She said they were all too hot and itchy.” She’d used the most brightly colored scarves she could find. They’d turned it into a joke, all of her friends and family trying to outdo each other in finding the loudest, funniest scarves they could for her, and she’d worn them all with a smile on her face, refusing to feel sorry for herself.

“That reminds me,” John said. “She wanted you to spread the word for her—no black at the funeral. Her request.”

“Okay.” He could do that and he even managed not to blurt out, Like that’s going to help?

He found tears welling up in his eyes once again. What a horrible day.

“I have to go,” he said abruptly, getting to his feet.

“Sure. Take this,” John said, handing him a piece of paper. “Everything’s written down. Call me if you have any questions. We’ll take good care of her, Jax.”

“I know. Thanks.”

He drove back to his mother’s house, but it was empty except for the dog, who looked up hopefully when the door opened, only to be severely disappointed when he realized it was only Jax.

Jax went to the refrigerator and found neat, precise notes from his sisters, all of whom had set off to take care of their assigned tasks, plus a note that Gwen Moss called, saying she’d be at the flower shop anytime after 1:00 p.m.

Flowers were the only thing left on his list, and it just so happened that the flower shop was on the edge of the park where he and Romeo ran.

Jax changed into a pair of running shorts and shoes and a ratty T-shirt, and ran until his legs absolutely burned and even Romeo looked exhausted. He stopped, dripping with sweat and dying for about a gallon of water, near the edge of the park not far from the flower shop, frowning. He hadn’t planned to run quite that far or to be this much of a mess when he got done. Did he have to go home to shower and change, or would Gwen take pity on him and let him into the shop this way? He thought she probably would.

“All right, Romeo. Time to turn on the charm, and we can probably get in the door. What do you say?”

Romeo had plopped down beside him, sprawled on the grass, panting heavily. He gave Jax a look that said, You expect me to move? Now?

“She’s a nice lady. Look sad and she’ll fuss over you, like she did yesterday.”

He took off toward the shop, urging the dog to follow. The flower shop was in a row of old, brick buildings, renovated completely about fifteen years ago and now prime town real estate. A few doors down, the café had built a tree-shaded patio overlooking the park, and people had taken to eating outside on nice days. The sidewalks were wide and prettily landscaped, the shop owners often setting up merchandise outside, too, on nice days. People lingered here and chatted with neighbors and enjoyed the view. His mother had loved coming here, when she wasn’t sick.

Petal Pushers was an eccentric little place, its windows decorated with cartoon girls and boys playing with flowers, something new every couple of weeks drawn by its owner, Joanie Graham. Today, there was a tiny, stick-figured girl holding a bouquet behind her back, shyly ready to present it to a stick-figured boy on the windows.

Jax should own stock in the place, with as much money as he’d dropped at Joanie’s over the years, but he’d never come to pick out flowers for a funeral before.

He tried the door but found it was locked. When he knocked on the glass, Gwen appeared out of the back room and came to let him in.

“Romeo, too? Is that okay?” Jax asked, halting in the open doorway. “He won’t bother anything.”

“Of course.” They came inside, and Gwen knelt down to talk to Romeo. “Hi, baby. Did you have a good run?”

Romeo made sad-puppy eyes at her and touched his nose to her cheeks, first the left then the right. Gwen grinned at him.

“His version of a kiss.” Jax rolled his eyes. “My sister Kim taught him that trick.”

“What a sweet thing.” Gwen fussed over him some more, petting him and kissing his snout. “He looks tired. Is he thirsty, too?”

“Oh, yeah. We’re both kind of a mess. Sorry about that.”

Gwen glanced up at Jax. He’d wiped himself off as best he could.

“It’s okay. Come on into the back. We’ll see what we can do.”

Romeo trotted after her, taking only a moment to sniff at a few of the more outlandishly bright sprays of flowers in big, bright pink containers spread around the room. Joanie often mixed her bouquets right out here in front of her customers, letting them point and choose what they wanted and her filling in with whatever it took to finish an arrangement.

The shop was done in a wildly bright palette of colors—teal, lime green, pinks and purples. It positively shouted cheerfulness and made the woman who stood before him stand out all the more in contrast to the attitude and color of the shop.

He wondered why Joanie had hired her, because she definitely didn’t seem to fit in. Gwen was a study in browns. Brown hair, brown eyes, khaki slacks and a plain, loose, chocolate-colored T-shirt beneath a trademark green Petal Pushers apron with more stick kids and flowers on it, a very plain, tentative woman in a shop that was anything but plain or tentative. She stood in the back room looking serious and uneasy, as if Jax might do just about anything in the next few moments. He stopped where he was, a quick glance telling him they were alone among the refrigerated compartments and industrial-size sinks.

He didn’t want to spook her, as he had last night.

She found a bowl that was probably meant to hold flowers and filled it up with water and sat it on the floor, for the dog, then handed Jax a small, white towel and a bottle of water from one of the big refrigerators in back.

“Thanks,” he said.

“You’re welcome.”

“And thanks for meeting here today.”

“It’s no problem. I didn’t have anything to do and…” She frowned, looking away. “It’s fine.”

Scared and at loose ends, in a town where she probably didn’t know a lot of people, Jax figured. And kindhearted, just as he’d suspected.

He took a long drink of water and then started dabbing at the sweat on his arms and face with the towel.

She glanced at him, and then just as quickly looked away.

Shy, scared and lonely, he corrected himself. Not at all his type. “I’ll hurry,” he promised.

“Okay. I’ll be uh…I’ll be out front. Whenever you’re ready.”

Jax wiped off the worst of the sweat. When he came back to the front of the shop, with Romeo trotting after him, Gwen had her head stuck in a cooler full of flowers by the front window.

“Gwen, is it okay for me to be here with you?” He hesitated five feet away once again. “Last night…I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

She whirled around to face him. He saw heat blooming in her cheeks. She closed her eyes for a moment, then managed to give him the barest of smiles. “It’s all right. And it’s not you. Not your fault.”

Yeah, but it was some man’s.

“So…” She put a determined smile on her sad face. “Did your mother have a favorite flower? Do you have any idea what she would have wanted?”

Which meant she didn’t want to talk about this with him, which was fine too. Her right. He was just curious, thinking there might be something he could do to help. But he’d leave that for another day.

Not one when he was planning his mother’s funeral.

“She liked anything bright and cheery,” he said, frowning at the flower case, full to overflowing. “You know, I just thought of something. She made her own funeral arrangements, and she might have specified something in her instructions. Which I just left on the refrigerator at home.” He frowned yet again. “Sorry.”

“It’s all right. I know how difficult this is. I mean, I don’t really know. My mother’s…She’s fine. But we do a lot of flowers for funerals, so I’ve seen a lot of people trying to handle this and…I understand. You’re welcome to use the phone by the cash register, if you think anyone’s home.”

“Sure. I’ll try that.” He found the phone, made the call. Kim was there, and he frowned as she read the arrangements his mother had made.

“Couldn’t find it?” Gwen asked once he hung up.

“No. We did. She didn’t want any flowers. She said people had already spent a fortune on flowers for her, while she was sick—”

“They had. She had a lot of people who cared about her.”

“Yeah. And she was really into her cancer support group, said the group needed money for their programs a lot more than she needed more flowers, so she asked everyone to make a donation instead.”

“Lots of people make requests like that. If you’ll leave a name and address for the support group, we’ll keep it here, in case people call to order flowers.”

“Okay. Thanks.” He rubbed his hands against his forehead, which absolutely ached, and then remembered. “I’m sorry. I took up your Sunday afternoon for nothing.”

“No,” she said. “It’s fine. I didn’t have anything planned, and honestly, it’s…Well, sometimes the days are so long, you know?”

“Oh, yeah. I know. Cancer time, we called it, like the regular rules of time didn’t even apply.” Days could creep along so that every minute was agony.

“You miss her terribly, don’t you?”

He nodded. “And it’s selfish of me, that I’d wish one more day like that on her, but…I guess everybody thinks they’re going to have time to say everything they wanted to say, and now I wonder if anyone ever gets enough time to say it all or to do everything they always thought they’d do.”

Jax looked up self-consciously, realizing he’d said a lot more than he intended. Judging from the look on Gwen’s face, he’d either said way too much or something terribly wrong.

“I’m sorry. Did you lose someone recently?”

“No.” She hesitated. “Not really. I just…I almost lost myself.”

Chapter Five

She said it with a sad, apologetic smile, as if that wouldn’t really count, losing herself. And he wondered if she meant it literally—if she’d nearly died—or if she was talking figuratively.

How out of line would he be to ask that question? Not that they seemed to be observing any of the boundaries of what ordinarily constituted polite conversation. He supposed having someone die did that to people.

“Gwen, just so you know, I’m going to be staying at my mother’s for a while. The lease on my apartment was up two months ago, and she really didn’t need to be alone then, so I moved back in. I haven’t even started to think about finding my own place again. So if you need someone to talk to or if anything happens, anytime at all, just give me a call or come knock on the door. Or you can always call the police department and ask for me. I’m off this week and maybe next week, but I’ll be back there soon.”

“Thank you,” she said. “It’s good to know there’s someone I can call. Especially someone around the corner.”

“Anything I should know about this situation?” he tried. “I mean, if I were keeping an eye on the place, watching out for trouble, it would help to know what to look for.”

“You don’t have to do that,” she offered.

“Sure I do. It’s my job.”

“Oh. Okay. It’s…It’s a man….” She turned pale and hugged her arms around her own waist. “But then, you probably guessed that much.”

Jax nodded. “What does the guy look like?”

“White. Five-ten, a hundred and eighty pounds, short brown hair, brown eyes, nineteen years old. I could get you a picture.”

“Okay.” Sounded like she’d given out that description more than once. “Is this guy on the loose or locked up?”

“Locked up. In Virginia.”

“Good. Is he going to stay that way?”

She looked truly frightened then. Her eyes got so big, and she looked like he’d just knocked the breath out of her. “He’s supposed to.”

“I mean, has he been convicted and sentenced already?”

She nodded.

“Okay. No reason to think he wouldn’t stay locked up. I know that’s easy for me to say, when I’m not the one he hurt or whatever it was that he did to you.” Jax really didn’t want to know exactly what the guy had done. “He’ll stay there, Gwen. Trust that. And I’ll keep an eye out for you.”

“Thank you,” she said.

Romeo came up to her and nudged her hand until it was resting against his head. He looked up at her with something that bore a remarkable resemblance to a smile and made silly dog noises at her that Romeo probably thought were both soothing and charming, and she just ate it up.

His mother swore Jax could do the same thing in a heartbeat with a skittish female crime victim and that his father could, too. Jax was highly skeptical of that notion, and offended, too. He didn’t flirt with women who’d just been traumatized by crime. That would be crass, and he tried never to be that. And he wasn’t nearly as shameless as Romeo.

Gwen rubbed the dog’s ears and hugged him to her side for a moment. Romeo gave her his poor-misunderstood-hound-dog look. He got a lot of affection out of that expression, too.

Shameless. The dog was absolutely shameless.

And women were never skittish around Romeo.

Not that Jax was jealous of a dog.

“Give it a break, Romeo,” he said finally.

Romeo made a face at him, then turned back to Gwen and most likely laid his poor-misunderstood-hound-dog look on her again.

“He really is the sweetest thing,” Gwen said.

“Oh, yeah. He’s a prince. He’ll help watch your house, too.”

“Thank you, sweet boy,” she said, fussing over him some more.

“I’ll get you the name and address of my mother’s cancer support group. And you bring me the photograph, Gwen.”

“I will.”

“Thanks for today.”

“You’re welcome.”

He took a long, slow breath and escaped, one more thing taken care of.

Fighting off an odd, restless energy, Gwen watched Jax and the dog leave. Hearing him talk about how he wished so much for just one more day with his mother made Gwen think she’d squandered the past year, like a woman who had all the time in the world to pull her life back together. Or a woman waiting for things to magically get better on their own.

How often did that happen?

Impatient with herself and her fears, she locked up the shop, marched off through the park, across Falls Creek and to her aunt’s house, suddenly impatient with everything.

It was an absolutely beautiful spring day, with plenty of sunshine and a perfect temperature, birds chirping, flowers blooming, the whole world seeming welcoming. And she was going to lock herself away inside her aunt’s dreary house again? Surely not.

Although her aunt had assured Gwen that she was free to make any changes she liked, Gwen hadn’t done anything, and the house was truly dark and dreary. No wonder Aunt Charlotte had wanted to get away.

In the meantime, she was happy to have Gwen here, so her house wouldn’t be empty.

That was how Gwen had come to run away to Magnolia Falls.

It had seemed like a smart move, an easy move, a furnished house just waiting for her, in a little town where she’d always felt safe, a chance to start over. Except she hadn’t started over. She hadn’t really done anything.

What if things weren’t going to get better unless she did something to make them better? What if she couldn’t afford to wallow in her own misery anymore?

Gwen went to the picture window at the back of the living room and pulled open the curtains she’d always left shut tight to keep anyone from seeing inside. Afternoon sunshine poured in, and bits of dust flew off the curtains and a nearby table, floating freely on a ray of light.

She went and found a feather duster and got rid of all the dust she could find in every room in the house. Then she pulled open all the curtains and shades, then the windows themselves. The spring breeze was strong and felt as if it was capable of stirring up all sorts of things, which surely wouldn’t be a bad thing.