Carolina Moon (8 page)

The car lights clicked off as the driver yanked open the door. “What do you want?” Snatching the flashlight again, Tory shoved at the switch. “What are you doing here?”

“Just visiting an old friend.”

Tory aimed the beam at the figure that stepped out of the car. Her knees went weak, her skin clammy. “Hope.” She choked out the name as the knife slipped from her fingers and clattered to the floor. “Oh God.”

Another dream. Another episode. Or maybe it was just madness. Maybe it always had been.

She stepped up to the porch. Moonlight shimmered onto her hair, into her eyes. The screen door creaked as she opened it. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, or were expecting one.” She bent down, picked up the knife. With one elegant finger she tapped the tip of the blade.

“But I’m real enough.” So saying she held up the finger, and the tiny drop of blood gleamed. “It’s Faith,” she added, and simply walked in. “I saw your light as I was driving by.”

“Faith?” There was a rush like the sea in her head. The joy in it, that frantic leap of it, ebbed as she said the name again. “Faith.”

“That’s right. Got anything to drink around here?” She wandered into the kitchen.

As if she owned the place, Tory thought, then reminded herself that the Lavelles did indeed own the place. She ran a hand over her face, into her hair. Then bracing herself, followed Faith into the kitchen.

“I have some iced tea.”

“I meant something with a little more punch.”

“No, I’m sorry. I don’t. I’m not exactly set up for company as yet.”

“So I see.” Intrigued, Faith did a turn around the kitchen, laying the knife on the counter as she passed. “A little more spartan than I expected. Even for you.”

This was how Hope would have looked if she’d lived. Tory couldn’t get the thought out of her head. She would have looked just like this, deep blue eyes against clear white skin, hair the color of corn silk. Slim and beautiful. And alive.

“I don’t need much.”

“That was always the difference, one of them, anyway, between us. You didn’t need much. I needed everything.”

“Did you ever get it?”

Faith arched a brow, then only smiled and leaned back on the counter. “Oh, I’m still collecting. How does it feel to be back?”

“I haven’t been back long enough to know.”

“Long enough to come to the door with a kitchen knife in your hand when someone pays a call.”

“I’m not used to calls at three in the morning.”

“I had a late date. I’m between husbands at the moment. You never did marry, did you?”

“No.”

“I swear I heard something about you being engaged at one time. I guess it didn’t work out.”

The sense of failure, despair, betrayal wanted to come. “No, it didn’t work out. I take it your marriages—two of them, weren’t there?—didn’t work out, either.”

Faith smiled, and this time meant it. She preferred an even match. “Grew into your teeth, I see.”

“I don’t want to take a bite out of you, Faith. And it seems pointless for you to take one out of me after all this time. I lost her, too.”

“She was my sister. You never could remember that.”

“She was your sister. She was my only friend.”

Something tried to stir inside her, but Faith blocked it off. “You could have made new friends.”

“You’re right. There’s nothing I can say to make up for it, to change things, to bring her back. Nothing I can say, nothing I can do.”

“Then why come back?”

“They never let me say good-bye.”

“It’s too late for good-byes. You believe in fresh starts and second chances, Tory?”

“Yes, I do.”

“I don’t. And I’ll tell you why.” She took a cigarette out of her purse, lighted it. After taking a drag she waved it. “Nobody wants to start over. Those who say they do are liars or delusional, but mostly liars. People just want to pick up where they left off, wherever things went wrong, and start off in a new direction without any of the baggage. Those who manage it are the lucky ones because somehow they’re able to shrug off all those pesky weights like guilt and consequences.”

She took another drag, giving Tory a contemplative stare. “You don’t look all that lucky to me.”

“You know what, neither do you. And that’s a surprise.”

Faith’s mouth trembled open, then she shut it again and smiled thinly. “Oh, I travel light and travel often. You just ask anyone.”

“Looks like we’ve landed in the same place. Why don’t we make the best of it?”

“Long as you remember who got here first, we won’t have a problem.”

“You’ve never let me forget it. But right now this is my house, and I’m tired.”

“Then I’ll see you around.” She started out, trailing smoke. “You sleep tight, Tory. Oh, and if staying out here all alone gives you the willies, I’d trade that knife in for a gun.”

She stopped, opened her purse, and lifted out a trim, pearl-handled pistol. “A woman just can’t be too careful, can she?” With a light laugh, she dropped the gun back into her bag, snapped it closed, then let the screen door slap behind her.

Tory made herself stand in the doorway, even when the headlights blinded her. She stood there until the car reversed out of the lane, swung onto the road, and sped away.

She locked the door, then went back in the kitchen for the flashlight, and the knife. Part of her wanted to get into the car, drive into town, and knock on her uncle’s door. But if she couldn’t spend this first night in the house, it would be that much easier to avoid the next, and the next.

She lay with her back to the wall, her eyes on the window until the dark softened and the first birds of morning woke.

He had been afraid. When he’d crept so quietly to the window, he’d felt what he felt so rarely. A fist of fear squeezing at his gut.

Tory Bodeen, back where it had all started.

She was sleeping, curled on the floor like a gypsy, and he could see the curve of her cheek, the shape of her lips in the slant of moonlight.

Something would have to be done. He’d known that,
had begun to plan for it in his quiet and steady way. But what a jolt to see her here, to remember it all so vividly just by seeing her here.

He’d been startled when she’d woken, coming out of sleep as fast and straight as an arrow from a bow. Even in the dark he’d seen visions in her eyes. It had brought sweat to his face, to the palms of his hands. But there were plenty of shadows, plenty of shelter to slide into. Cracks in the wall.

He’d folded himself into one of the cracks and watched Faith arrive. The bright hair gleaming in the moonlight in such an interesting contrast to Tory’s dark. Tory who seemed to absorb the light rather than reflect it.

He’d known, of course, in that instant when they’d stood together, when their voices had mixed, where they would take him. Where he would take them.

It would be as it had been the first time, so long ago. It would be what he’d been trying to recapture for eighteen long years.

It would be perfect.

She’d planned to be up early. When the knock at the front door woke her at eight, Tory wasn’t certain if she was more irritated with herself or the new visitor. Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she stumbled out of the bedroom, blinked at the sunlight, and fumbled with the lock.

She gave Cade one bleary stare through the screen. “Maybe I shouldn’t be paying rent if the Lavelles have decided to make this their home away from home.”

“Sorry?”

“Nothing.” She gave the screen one halfhearted push that wasn’t entirely an invitation, then turned away. “I need coffee.”

“I woke you.” He stepped in to follow her into the kitchen. “Farmers tend to think everyone’s up at dawn. I—” He stopped by the open door of the bedroom, swore. “For Christ’s sake, Tory, you don’t even have a bed.”

“I’m getting one today.”

“Why didn’t you stay with J.R. and Boots?”

“Because I didn’t want to.”

“You prefer sleeping on the floor? What’s this?” He walked into the room, taking over, Tory thought, much as his sister had the night before, then came out holding the knife.

“It’s my crochet hook. I’ve got a hell of an afghan going.” When he only stared at her, she hissed out a breath and stomped into the kitchen. “I had a late night, and I’m surly, so watch your step.”

Saying nothing, he slid the knife back into its slot in the block. While she measured out coffee and water, he set the plate he carried on the counter.

“What’s that?”

“Lilah sent it over, she knew I was coming this way this morning.” Cade peeled up a corner of the foil. “Coffee cake. She said you had a taste for her sour cream coffee cake.”

Tory merely stared at it, shocking them both when her eyes filled. Before he could move, she held up a hand, kept it aloft like a shield as she turned away.

Unable to resist, he ran a hand over her hair, then let it drop when she stepped quickly, deliberately out of reach.

“You tell her I appreciate it very much. She’s well, is she?”

“Why don’t you come by and see for yourself?”

“No, not for a while yet. I don’t think for a little while yet.” Steadier, she opened a cupboard and took down a cup.

“You gonna share?”

She glanced back over her shoulder. Her eyes were dry now, and clear. He didn’t look like a damn farmer, she thought. Oh, he was tanned and lean, and his hair streaked from the sun. His jeans were old and his shirt faded blue. There were sunglasses hooked carelessly by one earpiece in the breast pocket.

What he looked like, she decided, was some Hollywood director’s image of a young, prosperous southern farmer who could ooze charm and sex appeal with one easy smile.

She didn’t trust images.

“I suppose I have to be polite.”

“You could be rude and greedy,” he said, “but you’d feel terrible about it later.”

She had four cups, he noted, four saucers, all in solid, sensible white. She had an automatic coffeemaker, and no bed. Her shelves were already tidily lined, again in white. There wasn’t a single chair in the house.

Just what, he wondered, did such matters say about Tory Bodeen?

She took out another knife, then lifted her eyebrows at him as she measured a slice. He wagged his fingers until she widened it. “Got an appetite this morning?” she asked as she cut through.

“I’ve been smelling that all the way over here.” He picked up the plates. “Why don’t we have this out on the front porch? I take my coffee black,” he added, then walked out.

Tory only sighed and poured two cups.

He was sitting on the steps when she came out, resting his back against the top riser. She sat beside him, sipping her coffee and looking out over his fields.

She’d missed this. The realization came in a backward slap of surprise that was more shock than pain. She’d missed mornings here, when the heat of the day had yet to smother the air, when the birds sang like miracles, and the fields lay green and growing.

She’d had precious mornings like that even as a child, when she had sat on what had been a cracked concrete stoop, studied the coming day, and dreamed foolish dreams.

“It’s a nice smile,” he commented. “Is it the cake or the company that tugged it out of you?”

It vanished like a ghost. “Why were you coming this way this morning, Cade?”

“I got fields to look after, crews to check.” He broke off a corner of coffee cake. “And I wanted another look at you.”

“Why?”

“To see if you were as pretty as I thought you were yesterday.”

She shook her head, took a bite of cake, and went straight back to Miss Lilah’s wonderful kitchen. It cheered her so much she smiled again, took another bite. “Why, really?”

“You did look a sight better yesterday,” he said conversationally. “But I have to take into account you didn’t get much sleep on that floor. You make a fine cup of coffee, Miz Bodeen.”

“There’s no reason you have to feel you need to check up on me. I’m fine here. I just need a couple of days to settle in. I’m not going to be here half the time anyway. Setting up the store’s going to take most of my time.”

“I imagine so. Have dinner with me tonight.”

“What for?” When he didn’t answer, she turned her head. His eyes were amused, his lips faintly curved. And in that mild and friendly expression she saw something she’d successfully avoided for years. Frank male interest.

“No, no. Oh no.” She lifted her cup, gulped down coffee.

“That was pretty definite. Let’s make it tomorrow night.”

“No. Cade, I’m sure that’s very flattering, but I don’t have the time or the inclination for any sort of a … of a thing.”

He stretched out his long legs, crossed them at the ankles. “We don’t know what sort of a thing either of us has in mind at this stage. Me, I enjoy a meal now and again, and find I enjoy one more in good company.”

“I don’t date.”

“Is that a religious obligation or a societal preference?”

“It’s a personal choice. Now …” Because he looked to be settling in, entirely too comfortably, she got to her feet. “I’m sorry, but I have to get started on my day. I’m already behind schedule.”

He rose, watched her eyes go wide and watchful when he shifted just an inch closer. “Somebody roughed you up plenty, didn’t they?”

“Don’t.”

“That’s just the point, Tory.” Because he didn’t care to
have her flinch away from him, he eased back. “I wouldn’t. Thanks for the coffee.”

He walked to his truck, pausing to turn back when he’d opened the door. He gave her a good long stare, figuring it would do them both good for her to get used to it. “I was wrong,” he called out as he climbed in the cab. “You’re just as pretty today.”

She smiled before she could help herself, watched him grin before he backed out of the lane.

Alone, she sat back down. “Oh hell,” she muttered, and stuffed more cake into her mouth.

I
ndependent small-town banks were a dying breed. Tory knew this because her uncle, who’d managed Progress Bank and Trust for twelve years, rarely failed to mention it. Even without the family connection, she would have chosen it for her business. It was just good politics.

It sat on the east side of Market, two blocks down from her shop. That added convenience. The old redbrick building had been carefully and lovingly preserved. That added charm. The Lavelles had established it in 1853, and maintained a proprietary interest.

There, she thought, as she turned toward the front door, was the politics. If you wanted to do business successfully in Progress, South Carolina, you did business with the Lavelles.

It was a rare pie their fingers weren’t dipped in.

The interior of the bank had changed. She could remember visiting her grandmother and thinking the tellers worked in cages, like exotic animals in the zoo. Now the lobby area was open, almost airy, and four tellers manned a long, high counter.

They’d added a drive-through window in the back, and behind a waist-high wooden rail and gate two employees sat at lovely old desks topped with sharp and efficient-looking computers. There were several nicely executed
paintings of South Carolinian land and seascapes adorning the walls.

Someone, she mused, had figured out how to modernize without deleting the soul. She wondered if she could gently nudge her uncle into one of the paintings or wall hangings she’d soon have for sale.

“Tory Bodeen, is that you?”

With a little jolt, Tory turned her attention to the woman behind the rail. She worked up a smile as she tried to place the face, and came up blank.

“Yes, hello.”

“Well, it’s just so nice to see you again, and all grownup, too.” The woman was tiny, could barely have topped five feet. She came through the gate, held out both hands. “Always knew you’d be a pretty thing. You won’t remember me.”

It felt so rude not to in the face of such sincere delight. For a moment, Tory was tempted to use the connection, grab on to a name. But she couldn’t break a vow over something so trivial. “I’m sorry.”

“Now, there’s no need for that. You were just a bit of a thing last I saw you. I’m Betsy Gluck. Your grandma trained me when I was just out of high school. I remember how you used to come in now and again and sit quiet as a mouse.”

“You gave me lollipops.” It was such a relief to remember, to have that quick, sweet taste of cherry on her tongue.

“Why, imagine you remembering that after all this time.” Betsy’s green eyes sparkled as she gave Tory’s hands a squeeze. “Now, you’re here to see J.R.”

“If he’s busy, I can just—”

“Don’t be silly. I’ve got instructions to take you straight into his office.” She wrapped an arm around Tory’s waist as she led her through the gate.

She’d have to get used to this, Tory reminded herself. To being touched. Handled. She couldn’t be a stranger here.

“It must be so exciting, opening a store all your own. I just can’t wait to come shopping. I bet Miz Mooney’s just
so proud she could pop.” Betsy rapped on a door at the end of a short hall. “J.R., your niece is here to see you.”

The door swung open, and J.R. Mooney filled it. The size of him always astonished Tory. How this big, brawny man had come from her grandmother was one of life’s mysteries.

“There she is!” His voice was as big as the rest of him and boomed out as he made his grab.

Tory was braced for it, and still lost her breath when he scooped her off her feet into his wild grizzly hug. And as always, the surprise came as her toes left the ground and the rib-cracking embrace made her laugh.

“Uncle Jimmy.” Tory pressed her face into his bull’s neck, and finally, finally, felt home.

“J.R., you’re going to snap that girl like a twig.”

“She’s little.” J.R. winked at Betsy. “But she’s wiry. You make sure we got us a few minutes’ quiet in here, won’t you, Betsy?”

“Don’t you worry. Welcome home, Tory,” Betsy added, and closed the door.

“Here, now, you sit down. Want anything? Coca-Cola?”

“No, nothing. I’m fine.” She didn’t sit, but lifted her hands, then dropped them. “I should have come to see you yesterday.”

“Don’t you fret about that. You’re here now.” He leaned back on his desk, a man of six-two and a muscled two-fifty. His ginger-colored hair hadn’t faded with age, but there were thin wires of silver woven through the mass of it. The brush mustache that added a bit of dash to his round face had grown in pure silver, as had his woolly caterpillar eyebrows. His eyes were more blue than gray, and had always seemed so kind to Tory.

Abruptly, he grinned, big as the moon. “Girl, you look like city. Just as pretty and polished as a TV star. Boots is gonna love showing you off.” He laughed at Tory’s automatic wince. “Oh now, you’ll indulge her a bit, won’t you? She never did have that daughter she pined for, and Wade just won’t cooperate and get married to give her little granddaughters to dress up.”

“She tries to put a lace pinafore on me, we’re going to have trouble. I’ll go see her, Uncle Jimmy. I need to get settled first, get into the shop and roll up my sleeves. I’ve got stock and supplies coming in over the next few days.”

“Ready to work, are you?”

“Eager. I’ve wanted to take this step a long time. I hope the Progress Bank and Trust has room for another account.”

“We’ve always got room for more money. I’ll set you up myself, and we’ll get to that in just a minute. Honey, I heard you rented the old house.”

“Does Lissy Frazier hold the record for biggest mouth in Progress these days?”

“She runs neck and neck with a few others. Now, I don’t mean to crowd you or anything like that, but Cade Lavelle wouldn’t hold you to that lease if you wanted to change your mind. Boots and I wish you’d come stay with us. We got room, God knows.”

“I appreciate that, Uncle Jimmy—”

“No, hold on. Don’t say ‘but’ just yet. You’re a grown woman. I got eyes, I can see that. You’ve been on your own some years now. But I can’t say as I like the idea of you living out there, not in that house. I don’t see how it can be good for you.”

“Good or not, it feels necessary. He beat me in that house.” When J.R. closed his eyes, Tory stepped closer. “Uncle Jimmy, I don’t say that to hurt you.”

“I should’ve done something about it. I should’ve got you out of there. Away from him. Should’ve got you both out.”

“Mama wouldn’t go.” She spoke gently now, because he seemed to need it. “You know that.”

“I didn’t know how bad it was, not then. I didn’t look hard enough. But I know now, and I don’t like to think about you being out there, remembering all that.”

“I remember it wherever I am. Staying there, well, that proves to me I can face it. I can live with it. I’m not afraid of him anymore. I won’t let myself be.”

“Why don’t you come on to the house, just for a few
days then. See how you settle?” He only sighed when she shook her head. “It’s my plight to be surrounded by stubborn women. Well, sit down so I can do this paperwork and take your money.”

At noon the bells of the Baptist church chimed the hour. Tory stepped back, wiped the sweat off her face. Her display window sparkled like a diamond. She’d carted boxes in from her car and stacked them in the storeroom. She’d measured for shelving, for counters, and made a list of demands and requirements she intended to take down to the realtor.

She was working on the second list, one she would take to the hardware store, when someone tapped on the cracked glass of the shop door.

She studied the spare man in workman’s clothes as she approached. Dark hair, well cut, a smooth, handsome face with an easy, crooked smile. Sunglasses hid his eyes.

“I’m sorry. I’m not open,” she said as she opened the door.

“Looks like you could use a carpenter.” He tapped his finger at the crack again. “And a glass man. How’s it going, Tory?” He took off his sunglasses, revealing dark, intense eyes, and a tiny hook-shaped scar just under the right one. “Dwight Frazier.”

“I didn’t recognize you.”

“Few inches taller, several pounds lighter than the last time you saw me. Thought I should come by, welcome you as mayor, and shift hats to see if there’s anything Frazier Construction can do for you. Mind if I come in a minute?”

“Oh, sure.” She stepped back. “Nothing much to see just now.”

“It’s a good space.”

He moved well, she noted. Not at all like the awkward, chubby boy he’d been. The braces were gone, and so was the ruthless buzz cut his father had insisted on.

He looked fit, and he looked prosperous. No, she thought. She wouldn’t have recognized him.

“It’s a solid building,” he continued, “with a strong
foundation. And the roof’s sound.” He turned back, flashing the smile that had helped his orthodontist buy a cabin cruiser. “I should know, we put it on two years back.”

“Then I’ll know who to come after if it leaks.”

He laughed and hooked his sunglasses in the collar of his T-shirt. “Frazier builds to last. You’re going to want counters, shelves, displays.”

“Yes, I was just measuring.”

“I can send you a good carpenter, at a fair rate.”

It was smart, and again political, to use local labor. If, she thought, local labor met her budget. “Well, your idea of a fair rate and mine might not connect.”

His grin was lightning and full of charm. “Tell you what. Let me get some things out of my truck. You can tell me what you’ve got in mind, and I’ll give you an estimate. We’ll see if we can make them connect.”

He was aware she was measuring him, even as he measured her walls. He was used to it. As a boy, his father had measured him, and had forever found him just short of the mark.

Dwight Frazier, ex-marine, avid hunter, town councilman, and founder of Frazier Construction, had high standards for the fruit of his loins. His disappointment when that fruit had turned out undersized and soft had been keen.

Young Dwight Junior had never been allowed to forget it.

The truth was, Dwight mused, as he scribbled numbers on his clipboard, he
had
been short of the mark. Short, fat, clumsy, he’d been a prime candidate for jokes and sneers, and his father’s tight-lipped disappointment.

Worse, he’d had a brain. As a boy, there was no more deadly combination than a pudgy body, clumsy feet, and a sharp brain. He’d been the darling of his teachers, which meant he might as well have painted a kick-my-ass sign on his back.

His mother had struggled to make up for it the best way she knew how. By shoving food in his face. There was nothing like a box of Ho Ho’s, in his dear mama’s thinking, to make all right with the world again.

His salvation had been Cade and Wade. Why they’d befriended him had never made full sense to Dwight. Class had been part of it. They had come from three of the town’s most prominent families. For that he had been, and continued to be, grateful.

Perhaps there was, still, a tiny splinter of resentment in his gut over the whims of fate that had made those two tall, handsome, and agile, while he’d been plump, plain, and awkward. But he’d made up for it. In spades.

“I started running when I was fourteen.” He said it casually as he drew out his measuring tape again.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re wondering.” He crouched, noted on his pad again. “Got sick of being the fat kid and decided to do something about it. Took off twelve pounds of blubber in a couple of months. First few times I ran, I did it at night when no one could see me. I got sick as three dogs. Stopped eating the cupcakes and candy bars and chips my mother packed in my lunch every day. Thought I’d starve to death.”

He rose, flashed his grin again. “First year of high school I started going out to the track at night, running there. I was still overweight, still slow, but I didn’t puke up dinner anymore. Seems that Coach Heister used to come out there at night, too, in his Chevy sedan in the company of another man’s wife. I won’t mention who, as the lady remains married and is the proud grandmother of three now. Hold this end for me, sugar.”

Fascinated, Tory took the end of the measuring tape as Dwight walked backward to span the projected counter area.

“Now, it so happened that on one of our mutual visits to the Progress High School track, I got an eyeful of the coach and the future grandmother of three. It was, you can imagine, a rather awkward moment for all parties involved.”

“To say the least.”

“And the least said, the better, which is what Coach suggested to me as he clamped his hands around my throat.
I had to agree. However, being a fair man, or perhaps just a suspicious one, he offered me a token in return. If I continued to train, and could take off another ten pounds, he’d give me a place on the track team come spring. This was our tacit agreement, that I would forget the incident and that he would refrain from killing me and burying my body in a shallow grave.”

“Seemed to work for everyone.”

“Sure worked for me. I took off the weight, and shocked everyone, including myself, by not only making the team but blowing the competition to hell in the fifty- and hundred-yard dashes. I was a hell of a sprinter, it turned out. I won the All Star trophy three years running, and the love of pretty Lissy Harlowe.”

She warmed to him, one outsider to another. “That’s a nice story.”

“Happy endings. I think I can help you get your own here in your shop. Why don’t I buy you lunch and we’ll talk about it.”

“I don’t—” She broke off as the door opened behind her.

“Don’t tell me you’re hiring this two-bit hustler.” Wade strolled in, swung an arm around Tory’s shoulder. “Thank God I got here in time.”

“This puppy doctor here doesn’t know a damn thing about building. Go give a poodle an enema, Wade. I’m about to take your pretty cousin, and my potential client, to lunch.”

“Then I’ll just have to come along and protect her interests.”

“I need shelves more than I need a sandwich.”

“I’ll see you get both.” Dwight winked at her. “Come on, sugar, and bring this dead weight along with you.”

She took thirty minutes, and enjoyed herself more than she’d expected. It was a pleasure to see the adult friendship between Dwight and Wade that had its roots in the boys she remembered.