One Track Mind (2 page)

Well, she couldn’t do anything of the kind. She wasn’t a heroine, only an ordinary woman, and not a very successful one at that. Her father had left her a failing business, and she couldn’t stop its failure. She’d been married at twenty-two to the athlete who’d been the homecoming king in high school his senior year.

Her husband came to realize that he’d peaked in high school. He worked for his father’s insurance company, but he made only middling money, and he felt as if all his promise had somehow deserted him. He began to drink and mourn his lost youth.

When he reached thirty, he tried to cheer himself up with younger women, a long, embarrassing series of them. Lori divorced him when she was thirty-three. They’d had no children, and she realized that was probably a good thing.

She had no family left except her aging Aunt Aileen, her father’s sister. Martin Grott was right; dammit, it was time to get on with her own life. Maybe she’d go back to teaching high school again. The thought cheered her.

The Mustang rounded a curve, and Lori saw a full vista of the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. That was one thing the Halesboro region had a wealth of—natural beauty. And high up on the highest peak, was one unnatural beauty, McCorkle Castle.

Over the years, North Carolina’s scenery had attracted millionaires, even billionaires, who’d built opulent and historic homes, including the world-famous Biltmore House at nearby Asheville.

McCorkle Castle was far more modest, but it was still a castle, a thirty-five room residence built in the Scottish revival style. It had a breathtaking view of the surrounding mountains, and its grounds included hundreds of acres of forest, a lake, brooks, gardens, stables, and a carriage house.

The property was formerly the estate of Junior McCorkle himself. Uncle June had inherited it from his father, a mogul in the textile business. Lori once knew the castle well, for her father and McCorkle had been close friends from boyhood. Now both men were dead, and Halesboro seemed diminished by their loss.

The castle, like the speedway, had fallen into neglect. It stood uninhabited, but wonder of wonders, it had recently been purchased by a mysterious buyer who planned to restore the buildings and grounds. Did he mean to make himself a truly lordly retreat? Or did he have grander plans—ones that might help the whole community?

And who was this person? Among guesses were a politician, a famous entertainer, a reclusive millionaire, an Arab potentate, an award-winning film director—gossip abounded, as always in a small town.

In the meantime, the buyer’s people—architects, decorators, landscapers and so forth—were busy, but the buyer, it was said, wouldn’t appear until renovations were complete.

Well, Lori reasoned, if McCorkle Castle came back to its full glory, maybe that would help at least the city of Halesboro. Uncle June used to give special tours of the gardens and
part of the castle itself on special weekends. Lori had loved going to the castle, where Uncle June always teased her by calling her princess.

Well, she was far from a princess now. Her whole life had changed. On a plateau below Bin Birnum, the mountain dominated by the castle, was Halesboro Speedway. She looked at it from the distance, not believing that the Devlin Corporation would wipe away every sign of its existence.

Well, whatever happened, she’d pick herself up and go on. Somehow. But the taste of failure was like bitter ashes. She headed for the road to the speedway, and the Mustang tried to distract her from her larger troubles by sounding as if it were gargling bottle caps.

She finally reached the parking lot. She tried not to notice how badly the building needed paint, the fence needed repair, and that ragged verges of grass, untended, were balding in spots. The lot should be repaved. And inside? Inside, she knew that things were worse.

She pulled into her parking place. Other vehicles were in the lot because she had to rent the track out for summer sessions of driving school, and she heard the sound of motors that roared and buzzed like giant wasps.

The battered Ford truck belonged to Morrie, the caretaker, and the perfectly restored ’57 pickup was Clyde’s. Clyde was the aging maintenance supervisor, who’d somehow kept the place patched up enough to handle the little business it had. The rusting foreign compact belonged to Jimmy Pilgram, a young high school dropout and Morrie’s part-time assistant.

When she put the Mustang into Park, it tried to keep moving. She stopped it, at last, and swore under her breath, for she had to admit it, the car was giving off signals of transmission trouble. And what would
that
cost?

She got out, slammed the door and went to find Clyde. Well, the Devlin money would pay for the transmission, she supposed, trying to find the silver lining in the cloud. She met Clyde, his Halesboro cap pulled down to cover most of his
gray hair. His basset-hound expression told her there was more bad news.

“Clyde?” she said apprehensively.

His seamed face twisted in disgust. “Last night, some kids or somebody shot out two sets of the night lights. I don’t know what gets into kids these days. And there’s graffiti on the outside of the east fence. I got paint to cover it, but those lights are expensive, and this is the fourth time this year somebody’s done it. Damn delinquents…”

Lori patted him on the back, thanked him for keeping her informed and asked if he had time to glance at her transmission. He said yes and he’d ask the driving school’s chief mechanic to look, too. He shambled off, looking depressed. He, too, knew the track’s end was near.

She went inside to her father’s old office, which also needed painting, and sat at the antique desk that had belonged to her grandfather, Judge Simmons.

She’d been outlining the next year’s events calendar. She’d hoped to line up seven more driving school sessions, a 500-mile race, and a car show—pretty much the same as this year’s schedule.

But now there wouldn’t be a next year’s schedule. She stared, half-sad, half-philosophical, at the tentative list. She picked it up, folded it neatly in half and dropped it into her dented waste can.

She looked at the room’s dull green concrete walls lined with photos from better times. In a folder on the left hand side of her desk was the contract from Devlin. She supposed she should phone their representative and say she was going to accept it so they’d start the final procedures.

But then she pushed the folder farther away, setting her mouth at a rebellious angle. She’d tell them later. At the last possible minute. She’d take them down to the last lap before giving them the satisfaction of letting them know they’d won.

What she needed to do was start drafting letters that Hales
boro Speedway was shutting down. The employees should know first. She was down to a skeleton staff, but at least with Devlin’s money she could give them two weeks’ severance pay.

But it was going to be hard, and it would hurt. Some of these people had been with the speedway for more than twenty years. Clyde had been there thirty-one. She’d hoped to give him a retirement party in four years; it wasn’t going to happen.

That almost made her teary, but she brushed angrily at her eyes and started making a list about closing down. The driving school would have to find a new home, so would the Super Stang Fest in August…

Would there be contractual troubles? Lawsuits? She prayed not, thinking again of Martin Grott’s question: did she know how close she was to bankruptcy?

Until her father’s decline, she’d never had to worry about money. She’d never had to
understand
money, and she and Scott were at least comfortable on two salaries. When she could no longer bear her husband’s coldness, lies and affairs, she’d been too proud to ask for alimony or any more than her fair share of what they owned.

She kept the house and the furniture she’d inherited from her grandmother. She was naive, for she’d never wanted for anything in her life.

Like Uncle June used to tease, she’d been a princess. Well, she was a princess no longer. That wasn’t as painful as failing to save the Halesboro Speedway, even though she knew now she’d been playing Don Quixote, tilting at windmills, believing she could triumph over giants.

Yes, pride
did
go before fall, didn’t it?

Well, suck it up and get to work. She gritted her teeth, picked up her pen and on a legal pad began to draft the hardest letter she’d ever written in her life.

“Dear staff and friends,

“I deeply regret to inform you…”

She’d written and scratched out and rewritten, and re-scratched her way through a paragraph when the phone
rang. Startled, Lori almost jumped, for few people called her these days.

Who needs money from me now?
she wondered, but she thought she knew. Clyde was calling her to tell her the transmission was fading fast and had to be replaced. She picked up the receiver with foreboding.
Not the transmission,
she thought.
Please.
She’d have to buy a whole kit. How many hundreds would that cost?

“Hello?” she said, trying to disguise the quaver in her voice. “Lori Garland here.”

But it wasn’t Clyde; the voice belonged to a stranger. “Miss Garland, this is Judith Stribley of Jennings, Jennings and Jennings Law Firm…”

“Yes?” Dark thoughts danced through Lori’s mind. This must be another agent of Devlin. They were out of patience and withdrawing their offer. The bank would foreclose. She
would
file for bankruptcy.

“Ms. Garland,” said the Stribley woman, “You have a property, a speedway for sale about two hours from Charlotte. I’ve asked about for information on the property and the terms. My client would like to offer you a contract to buy. He’s willing to pay the full asking price, and the speedway, as per your wishes, stays a speedway.”

“Good grief,” Lori said, light-headed with disbelief. Was she dreaming? “Who? Who’s offering to buy?”

“I’m not at liberty to say at this point,” Ms. Stribley stated firmly. “But I assure you it’s a legitimate deal. The buyer prefers to stay anonymous for now to avoid publicity. He’s a very private man and a long-respected client of our firm. He’ll personally introduce himself to you and offer you the contract.”

Lori, too astounded to be businesslike, said, “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.” Her hands shook so hard that she had to grip the phone more tightly.

“Well, I hope there’s no need to cry,” said Ms. Stribley kindly. “Our client does have one condition of his own. He knows the speedway’s been a family business for years, and
that you, as acting president, know it better than anybody. He wants you to stay on for one year, with pay, to help him make the transition to get the facility fully functioning again.”

“He’ll
pay
me to stay on?” Lori asked in amazement.

“Yes. Three and a half thousand a month.”

Good grief—that’s a lot more than I’m clearing now,
Lori marveled. It seemed like a fortune. The speedway, to her sorrow, had become a bottomless money pit.

“Our client is an efficient and decisive man. He wants to meet you and have you give him a tour of the place.
Tomorrow.
At 10 a.m. sharp. Are you amenable to that?”

“Oh, yes,” Lori answered, fighting to keep from stammering. “I’m amenable. I’m completely amenable. I couldn’t be more amenable.”

I’d meet him at 3 a.m. I think I love him.

“Very good,” said the woman. “I hope that this works out well for both of you. You’ll see him at the facility tomorrow at the designated time. I’ll give you our number in case you need to get in touch with us later…”

When Lori set down the phone, she was ready to fall to her knees in thanks. She was saved. She put her face in her hands and indulged herself in a few tears of gratitude.

Who was her rescuer, her knight on a white horse? A wrinkled old millionaire who remembered Halesboro Speedway in its heyday and didn’t want its rich history lost? Or some eccentric who wanted to keep a once-great track open and functioning?

Whoever he was, she blessed him. She hadn’t failed her father after all.

Again she thanked this unknown champion. Even if he were as odd and ugly as a troll, she wanted to hug him and give him the longest and most heartfelt of kisses.

T
HE NEXT MORNING, AT
fifty-nine minutes to ten, Lori sat tensely in her father’s office.

In summer, she usually came to work in shorts and a T-shirt, but she hoped she looked like a semiyoung professional who had neither overdressed nor underdressed. Feminine, but not too feminine, sensible, tidy, and orderly—that’s how she hoped to appear.

She wanted to impress the man who’d be the new owner, so she’d rooted through the pathetic contents of her closet until she’d found a modest white linen sundress with cap sleeves and only a barely visible stain at the hem. It had been a long time since she’d had money to spare. A very long time.

Her old white sandals were polished to a snowy sheen. She wore her hair pulled back and pinned decorously into place with a white barrette. And once again she’d covered her freckles.

She’d given the staff orders that she didn’t want to be interrupted for any reason that morning, although she’d told nobody of her mysterious visitor. For the last thirteen minutes, she’d been doing deep-breathing exercises to calm herself.

She didn’t want to show her anxiety or to burst into tears of relief—or, as she was still tempted to do, fall on her rescuer’s neck and embrace him as if he were a hero delivering her from barbarian captors.

So she sat very straight in her chair, her hands on her knees, her eyes closed.
Breathe in to the count of fourteen seconds. Hold breath seven seconds. Exhale smoothly for eight. Breathe in to the count of fourteen seconds—

A knock shook the door so hard that it rattled on its elderly hinges. Lori’s eyes snapped open. The clock on her desk told her that it was exactly ten.

“Come in, please,” she said, forgetting to exhale. It made her voice come out too high, almost squeaky.

She leaped to her feet, moved quickly to the door, and swung it open to meet her guest. She looked straight at a male chest clad in a slate-gray silk shirt. She raised her eyes to meet those of the visitor. Their eyes locked, hers green, his dark brown.

“Ms. Garland,” he said. “I came to make you an offer on your speedway.” His face was lazily expressionless, except for a hint of a sardonic quirk at the edge of his mouth. There was a slight scar next to that quirk.

She blinked in disbelief. She now found herself wanting to weep with rage rather than relief.

She no longer felt impelled to kiss him, but wanted to turn him around forcibly and kick him in the seat of his obviously expensive pants.

He cocked a dark eyebrow. She could tell he enjoyed her dismay, even savored it. “We used to know each other,” he almost purred in the low voice she remembered all too well. “You were Lori Simmons then. We were in high school together. I’m—”

“Kane Ledger,” she supplied. She wished she could pry up a few tiles from the office floor and burrow down into the earth, deep out of sight.

He was the boyfriend from her past that she most regretted and most wanted to forget.

“May I come in?” he asked in a tone that was half-silky, half-sarcastic.

“Please do,” she replied with her finest imitation of calm. She waved him inside, and suddenly the little office looked twice as shabby as before. She gestured for him to sit in the extra chair. It was upholstered in ancient imitation leather, and its seat was patched with an uneven
X
made of duct tape.

Kane nodded and stepped into the room, laying a black leather folder on the edge of her desk. He still had the long, lean body he’d had as a teenager and that air of being at once both casual and dangerous.

And, to her discomfort, she saw that he still had that same sell-me-your-soul grin. It made her pulses quicken and her nerve ends tingle. His presence galvanized the little room like a gathering lightning charge.

She sat and gestured for him to do likewise.
Get control of yourself,
she scolded.
What happened was half a lifetime ago. We’re adults now. We were hardly more than children then.

But there was no longer any vestige of boyishness in him. His shoulders had broadened, and his face no longer bore the haunted, too-thin look of someone who knew what it was like to go hungry. He’d finally grown into those beautifully carved cheekbones, and they no longer cast hollow shadows on his face.

As a teenager, he’d already had frown lines etched between his brows. But as poor and underprivileged as he’d been, he’d been handsome. Oh, how handsome. And he was more so now.

He looked tan and fit, and the frown lines were balanced by the laugh lines at the outer edges of his eyes. His hair was no longer ill-cut and tousled. He still wore it a bit long, but it was expertly barbered and still as dark as night, no hint of early graying.

Long ago, there’d often been something troubled in his expression, an almost constant wariness. That air was gone now; he seemed confident. Perhaps too confident and too hard-edged.

He crossed his leg over his knee and studied her. “You haven’t changed.”

Liar,
she thought, with a twinge of deep sadness. She was twenty-one years older; her marriage had failed; she was no longer the town’s princess; and although she hated to admit it, he frightened her more than a little.

All those years ago, she’d encouraged him to want her. She’d loved him, but in the end she’d treated him abominably.
He’d quit high school and disappeared from town, and for more than a decade she’d worried that she’d ruined his life.

Then word had come that, in spite of the odds, he’d made a success of himself. He’d become a lawyer, then a sports agent, a powerful one. She’d been sincerely glad for him, but to tell the truth, she’d felt more glad for herself—she wouldn’t have to carry so much shame over what she’d done. But she still felt guilty and knew she should.

Something in his face told her that he knew it, too. She’d made him suffer. Was that why he was here? Had he heard about her distress and decided that it was payback time? She didn’t like the cold gleam in his eye or the self-satisfied twist of his mouth.

“I’ve changed, all right,” she said. His sudden reemergence had shaken her, but she held his stare with one as steady as his own. “So have you. You’ve obviously done quite well for yourself,” she said.

He gave a small, noncommittal nod. “Well enough.”

“I’m happy for you.”

“Thank you,” he said. “But you deserve much of the credit.”

He said this so coolly, with such studied poise, that she felt a palpable sense of menace.

But Lori refused to play the ingénue. She didn’t widen her eyes or act innocent or ask him what he meant. She simply studied that impossibly handsome, unreadable face and waited. Let him explain himself.

He stretched the silence out for half a minute and then smiled, almost to himself. But he kept watching her.

“You did me a big favor once,” he said. “You threw me over.”

Oh, good grief,
she thought.
He doesn’t want the speedway. He came here to get even somehow, to play some twisted game.
But he’d always known where her thoughts were heading. “I’m not trying to play some sick joke here,” he said quietly. “You found somebody else. And it was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

She lifted her chin. “Am I supposed to be flattered by that? I’m not.”

He gave a low chuckle. “But I mean it. Back then, I actually wanted to get you pregnant so you’d have to marry me. Then where would I have been? A teenage father with no prospects.”

He shrugged. “Your dad might have put me on the payroll here—for your sake. And I would’ve ended up spending my whole life in this lousy town. I’d have watched your father run this place into the ground and be right where you are now. And you’re in a pretty helpless situation, princess.”

Lori’s ire rose dangerously. “Kane, don’t pull your punches. Just rub my nose in it really hard, why don’t you?”

He grinned, showing those dimples that could seem so cheerily sinister. “You’re something,” he said approvingly. “They could tie you to a stake to burn you alive, and you’d be trying to spit in the eye of the guy lighting the match.”

“It’d be smarter to spit on the match, wouldn’t it?” she retorted.

The dimples deepened. “No. Because you’d be tied up, and there are too many matches in the world. Like I said, Lori, you’re trapped.”

“I’m glad you’re not gloating over it,” she said acidly.

He laughed again, which infuriated her. She wished she had a brick to throw at him.

But he said, “I didn’t come to gloat, babe. I came to help. I have the offer in that folder.” He nodded at the black leather folder on her desk. “I came to buy this place. At your asking price. And to keep it a speedway. To restore it.”

He was being deliberately cruel. Tears smarted in her eyes, but, furious, she blinked them back. “Why?” she demanded. “Why would you want to do such a thing? A minute ago, you called this a lousy town. You said…you actually
said
my father ran this place into the ground.”

She put one fist on her hip. “And that
my
situation, which means being in charge of this speedway, is like being condemned to burn at the stake. You want to take my place at the bonfire?
You
want to go up in flames? Why?”

He narrowed his dark, dark eyes. “I don’t think I’ll go up
in flames. Bring this place back to what it was? You can’t do it. But I can.”

“You
think
you can,” she shot back.

“I
know
I can.”

“But,” she said, more frustrated than before, “why would you
want
to?”

Any trace of a smile he’d had faded. “I told you. I owe you. And frankly, I don’t like owing you. Let’s call it paying off a debt.”

She squeezed her eyes tightly shut. “Again, this is not flattering, Kane. Nor funny.”

“I’m not trying to be funny,” he said. “I’ve got no reason to flatter you. But I do have reason to do you a favor.”

She opened one eye and studied him suspiciously.

“I know exactly what you’re facing,” he said. His half-smile flirted near his scarred cheek. “I know how much Devlin offered you. I know when their deadline is.”

She opened both eyes, now more distrustful than before.

He raised a speculative brow and looked her up and down. “I know you have to take Devlin’s offer—unless you get a better one. Otherwise, at the end of June, the bank owns this speedway.”

“You’ve been spying on me,” she accused, her voice flat, yet accusing.

“My business is in sports. That includes motor racing. I know what goes on in the racing world, Lori. I know what happens. And who it happens to. And why.”

She shook her head dubiously. “And you think
you
can transform Halesboro?”

“It can be turned around with enough sweat, money—and connections. I’m an agent. It’s a good life. I enjoy it. But my accountant says it’s time I diversify. Invest. I’m making some extremely safe investments. And I’m also making this one. Because I also enjoy a challenge. And Halesboro Speedway is a big one.”

Lori frowned. Had his wealth made him insufferably
smug? Was he working out some crazy adolescent issues about growing up poor in Halesboro? And some even more crazy fantasy about evening the score for how she’d treated him so long ago?

A small, icy, pragmatic voice inside her head whispered,
To hell with his motives. Make him prove he means it.

“I want to look over the contract,” she said.

“Fine,” he said. “Look it over. Take your time. Take all day. I’m staying over. Meet me tonight for a business supper. We’ll talk about it.”

“A business supper?” she echoed.

There was no so-called fine dining left in Halesboro; all such restaurants had closed. And she didn’t intend to go out of town with him. He unsettled her too much. She wanted to be on her own turf.

Again, he seemed to know her thoughts. “I saw that The Groove Café’s still open. Does Otis still run it?”

“Otis died ten years ago. His son runs it.”

“Do they still make that hamburger steak with fried onions and hash browns?”

“Yes,” she said. The menu hadn’t changed in almost thirty years. Nor had the décor. It was the Eatery That Time Forgot.

“Then let’s eat there. It’ll almost be like old times.”

She couldn’t help flinching. She and her friends used to buy cheeseburgers and malts there on their nights out. They’d linger and giggle and use half a bottle of ketchup on their French fries. The most popular boys would seek them out and linger with them.

Kane had been in the kitchen, washing ketchup off the plates and the lipstick prints off the glasses. But he gave her that mysterious half smile of amusement.

“Should I pick you up? What time?” he asked.

“I’ll meet you there,” she said crisply. “How about five o’clock?”

Five o’clock was too early for most diners. She wasn’t looking forward to having people stare at them. And stare
they would, even if nobody recognized Kane at first. And when they did recognize him, they’d stare like the very devil. All of them.

S
HE OFFERED
to show him around the speedway, but he asked if Clyde was still there. He remembered Clyde, had worked with him and would like to see him again; where could he find the older man? She called Clyde, her throat tight, and told him Kane Ledger was here and wanted to be shown around. “Yes,” she said uncomfortably. “
That
Kane Ledger. I’ll send him to you.”

She closed her phone. “He’s out by the scoreboard,” she told Kane.

“Fine. You want me to keep quiet about the offer?” Kane asked, standing by the door.

“Please. He’ll know soon enough,” she said and sighed. If the offer was for the asking price, she’d have no choice but to take it. Then the bank would know, the title company would know, her whole staff would know and the news would be all over town in minutes.