The house had had a small side yard, but that was now occupied by a brand-new foundation and a framed-up first floor. A couple of dead, uprooted rhododendrons, tossed on the rubble of a brick barbecue pit in a corner, suggested that the house had a history of being loved and cared for.
By Jim Hodene? Sure, why not? But Jimmy Hayward? Fat chance. Bastards like him didn't care about anything except themselves.
Zack continued slowly past the house, then circled the block one more time before parking down the street from the construction, where he was able to sip his coffee at a leisurely pace while he watched and waited to see what developed.
The coffee was long gone and his boredom threshold reached and crossed when Zack jerked to sudden attention. A brand-new monster Ford
Expedition
, gleaming with optional trim, had slowed to a halt in front of the mint-green house.
Rubbing the growth of new beard since his predawn shave, Zack squinted into th
e afternoon sun and saw a dark-
haired woman jump from the driver's seat to the ground like a guerilla soldier from a low-limbed tree. She didn't look used to the high-slung SUV, which was consistent with the vehicle's temporary plates.
The contractors were making a four-thirty beeline for their trucks, but the woman managed to intercept the last one out, apparently the boss. She gestured toward the bare studs of the first floor. The contractor nodded and turned around while she climbed back into the truck and pulled off the street and into the half-empty drive, blocking the guy's exit—no doubt intentionally, Zack thought wryly. He had worked in construction himself before turning to creating replicas of antique furniture; he knew all the owners' tricks.
The woman wasn't young, wasn't old. Somewhere in her mid-thirties was Zack's guess. She was in good shape, whatever her age; there was something in the way she'd jumped down from the SUV. His guess was that she didn't come from wealth, though, despite her
pricey
transport.
Again, there was just something in the way she walked, the way she gestured. Her hair bounced too much, for starters, and she lacked that quietly confident air that his own wealthy clients either had or faked. She was too
... intense, that was the word. It was obvious, even from where Zack sat, that the addition to the humble house meant a lot to her. She was
into
it.
Zack continued to watch, curious about the woman and her story, as she scrambled up a short ladder and joined the contractor on the first floor of the addition. She knew what she wanted, no doubt about it. She was pointing to a roughed-out window frame and was gesturing to her left: she wanted it moved.
"You're right to do it now, lady," Zack found himself murmuring in agreement. "Later, it'd cost you twice as much."
Whatever her contractor said in response, it pleased her. Zack saw her clasp her hands together and thump them once against her chest while she grinned and nodded. It was a weirdly endearing gesture; he felt almost gratified that she looked so pleased. There were some customers who wouldn't be happy no matter what you did.
The contractor tried to make a break for it then, but she wasn't done with him yet.
Ah. Something about the fireplace. She was pointing to the jut in the foundation where the chimney would eventually go. God, wasn't that always the way. The day was over, the tools were stowed, and that's when the owners wanted to groove. Never mind that you were tired, grimy, aching for a shower and a beer. They much preferred that you hang around and discuss mantel styles and hearth materials and give them your opinion on just the right shade of white paint, even though those decisions were months away. He knew the type so well. Once they plunked down their deposits, they figured they owned your soul.
"Lady, give the poor guy a break," Zack muttered. "Can't you see he wants to get out of there?"
She couldn't, and Zack was genuinely bothered by it. And then, right about the time he decided that she was just another self-absorbed client, the woman reversed herself and began shooing her contractor off the site, urging him to go home, go home.
All right. That was more like it. Zack wanted to believe that she wasn't a jerk, he didn't know why.
There was another round of musical cars, after which the contractor finally left. Two minutes later another car, this one a five-year-old Taurus, rolled down the street and pulled alongside the house, and this time Zack felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up.
****
Wendy was still standing in
the middle of her family-room-
to-be, marveling at how quickly the framework had gone up, thrilled by the realization that she'd finally have room for a three-cushion sofa.
"Thanks for picking up my car, Jim. You can take your
SUV
back; I was getting a nosebleed up in that driver's seat. You just missed Pete, by the way," she added, still smiling as her husband walked around to the front of the site.
"I know; I saw his truck turn the corner. No big deal,"
Jim answered with a shrug. "I didn't have anything to go over with him, anyway." He ascended the four-rung ladder and looked around cursorily.
"How can you not have anything to go over with him? I had a list as long as my arm. I never did get through it; only the most important things. Pete hates to be bothered when he's working, and then he hates to be held up when he's done. It's maddening. I keep wanting to throw a net around him."
"You wanted to hire him as much as I did," Jim said quickly.
"I know. And he's good. He's great. But he drives me a little crazy. Oh, well; I'll get used to it," she said happily. "As long as they keep making progress. Just
look,
Jim," she said, throwing her arms out and whirling in place. "We have walls! We have a family room! Isn't it wonderful?"
Jim didn't seem to be nearly as impressed. "The framework always goes fast," he said knowingly, the way men do. "Once the studs are up, that's when it starts slowing down. And keeps slowing down."
Wendy shook her head. "Nope, you're wrong. Pete was just telling me that he has way more work than he can handle; he's trying to hire more help, in fact. With or without more help, he's going to have to work like a maniac to get our addition done, otherwise he won't be able to go on to the next job."
Jim threw his head back in a loud, good-natured laugh and then took her in his arms. "You really believe that?
Wendy.
Everyone's not like you, you know—keeping at something until it's done. Definitely not contractors; it's just not how they operate. They're jugglers, Wen, better at it than anyone out of a circus."
"We'll see," she said, but she felt a little less smug than before.
They stood in their embrace in the middle of their family-room-to-be, each of them caught up in his own thoughts, savoring the last warm rays of the afternoon sun. Wendy decided—for the first time, really, since the night that Jim found out that he'd won the lottery—that she was truly, unreservedly happy.
She was more convinced than ever that she didn't need a mansion, she didn't need a boat. All she needed, all she wanted, was room for a three-cushion couch. They could take all of the money back, but if she had her husband and her son and the rest of her family—and that little bit of extra room—then Wendy could honestly say she had everything her heart desired.
"Honey?" Jim murmured in her hair.
"H
mm
?"
In a soft, sober whisper he said, "Quitting that job was the best thing I ever did."
"You don't miss it," she murmured, stating the obvious.
"Miss it? In retrospect, I hated it. Now I can figure out what I really want out of life."
"Isn't that funny?" she asked in a dreamy voice. "I think I already have."
****
Twelve years. It could have been twelve days. He was sporting a few more pounds, a little less hair, but
holy cow
, it was Jimmy Hayward. Jim Hodene was Jimmy Hayward. Zina was right, poor kid; as right as rain. After all those years and all those red herrings, she'd actually stumbled across the man of her dreams, the bum who'd left her eight months pregnant and disappeared in broad daylight.
Zack wanted to jump out of his truck, throw the guy in a bamboo cage, and parade him through the streets for everyone to see. And then he wanted to beat him bloody. If he thought he could obliterate him and get away with it,
he'd damn well give it a shot.
Bastard!
Bigamist!
He forced himself to sit until the adrenaline fury subsided and until the couple climbed down from the addition and went around to the front door and entered their house.
Zack was so unprepared for the possibility that Jimmy and Jim were the same asshole that up until then he did not have a plan. And now suddenly a hundred different options had begun roaring through his brain—so many that they were canceling one another out.
And he still didn't have a plan.
One thing Zack knew.
Hayward
or Hodene or whoever the hell he was—that guy was going to pay. With blood or money or preferably both, but he was going to pay.
"Good heavens, how can you stand the
noise
?"
"It's music to my ears, Mom," Wendy shouted. "As long as they're making progress."
Grace O'Byrne Ferro followed Wendy, who had a tray with two mugs of coffee and a greasy, sugared doughboy cut in halves, out of the kitchen and into the living room, as far from the din as they could get.
"Wendy, there is a table saw on the other side of your kitchen wall," her mother pointed out. "There are strange men wandering in and out of your house all day. There's no place to park a car anymore. And—I don't know if you've noticed it or not
—there's a bottle of suspicious-
looking yellow fluid sitting outside by the lilac bush."
"Is it corked?" Wendy asked lightly.
"I didn't
notice
," her mother answered in a deadly voice.
"Yeah
... it's too bad they haven't installed the Porta Potti yet. I'll ask Pete about it. But, you know? Whatever works. Just as long as they're making progress," Wendy repeated serenely. It was her mantra.
Exasperated, her mother said, "Why don't you just move out until they're done with construction? For goodness' sake, you can afford it."
Wendy licked sugar from her fingers and shook her head. "No rush. It won't be bad here
—
at least, not until they saw through the kitchen wall and open the old house to the new. To be honest, I'm enjoying this. Of course, Tyler's not crazy about having a crew hammering outside his bedroom window, and Jim thinks it's beneath us to stay here, but—I like it. Call me an idiot."
"You're an idiot. You'll just be in their way."
"I don't care. Really, I'm fascinated by it. I'm in awe of people who work with their hands to make something out of nothing. Every day I learn something new. Oh! And wait'll you see."
Wendy jumped up and ran out to the kitchen; when she came back she was holding a rusted horseshoe that was completely encrusted with dark, mysterious matter. "Look what the men found in the cellar foundation when they cut through. Pete says that in these old houses they used to throw anything they could find into the concrete to reinforce it—rocks, bricks, obviously horseshoes. Isn't it cool?"
"It's junk," her mother said, staring at the thing with distaste. "Throw it out. And wash your hands."
"It's a horseshoe! It'll bring us good luck."
"It'll bring you tetanus. You've already had ridiculous luck. Throw it out."
"I will not. I'm going to nail it above the cellar door."
"Go ahead, then. Be greedy. See where it gets you."
"I don't want more
money,
Mom," Wendy said, embarrassed to be suspected of it. "That's not the kind of luck I meant."
"You are tempting fate, missy," her mother warned ominously. "I don't know why you can't see that."
Gracie Ferro had a way of perpetually cutting her kids down to size. It was an old habit, established during the raising of three boys and two girls, none of them particularly timid or shy. Everyone wanted his fair share of everything, and since that wasn't usually possible, Grace O'Byrne Ferro had to use what she had to keep her kids in line: the guilt trip. It was cheap, effective, and in endless supply.
Wendy had already figured out that sixty percent of the problem she was having with her sudden, unearned wealth came from feelings of guilt. What she couldn't figure out was why she couldn't crush feelings like that once and for all. For most of her life, fighting guilt had been a daily, ongoing war, won or lost one small skirmish at a time. It was no surprise that she found herself back in the trenches
just then
, ducking her mother's missiles.
"This gets nailed over the cellar door. For luck in
general,
okay?" Wendy
said doggedly. She returned the horseshoe to the shelf at the top of the cellar steps
—
but then washed her hands extra long as a kind of penance before going back to her mother and
their
deep-fried treat.