74 Seaside Avenue Part 11

"Grace!"

"It's just that we're so happy and I don't want anything to upset that."

"Knowing Cliff, he'd be far more upset if he learned Will's living in Cedar Cove and you didn't tell him."

"I will tell him, I promise." She'd do it as soon as she got home. This was too important to leave to chance. She wouldn't jeopardize her marriage over someone as deceitful and dishonorable as Will Jefferson.

They finished their coffee and stood up to go, leaving a bigger than usual tip for Goldie. As they started walking to the door, Olivia gave her a hug. "Congratulations, Grandma."

"Thank you, my friend."

Olivia yawned. "Now let's go home and get to bed. I have to be at work in the morning."

"Me, too." Grace wasn't sure she'd be able to sleep. First, there was the birth of Emma Grace and now this distressing news about Will Jefferson. Olivia had warned her weeks ago, but Grace hadn't believed Will would actually do it. Hadn't believed he'd dare. Yet here he was.

The light in the barn was off when she pulled into the yard and parked in her usual spot. Grace figured Cliff must be in the house. She hoped he hadn't gone to bed.

"Is that you, Grace?" he said, coming to meet her in the entryway, accompanied by the dog.

"It's me." She stooped to pet b.u.t.tercup, then walked into her husband's arms. After a lengthy hug, she asked, "How's Suns.h.i.+ne?"

"Fabulous. She has a handsome son and she's doing well. How's Kelly?"

"She has a beautiful daughter and she's doing well, too."

He chuckled and hugged her again. "Little Emma Grace-she couldn't have a nicer name."

Grace smiled. "Olivia and I celebrated with pie and coffee at the Pancake Palace."

"That's what your message said."

"Olivia insisted we set a date for our wedding reception so I suggested mid-October. Is that okay with you?"

"Sure-as long as this is something you want to do."

She nodded. "I want the world to know I've got the best husband in the world."

Cliff kissed the top of her head. "I'm the lucky one."

"You think so, do you?" Try as she might, Grace was unable to stifle a yawn.

Slipping his arm around her waist, Cliff led her down the hallway to their bedroom. "You must be exhausted."

"I thought I'd be too keyed up to sleep, but..."

Cliff yawned, too. "I thought the same thing. Come on, honey, let's go to bed."

She should tell him now, Grace realized. But because they had so much to celebrate, she decided she couldn't. Not then. Perhaps in the morning. Right now they were both too tired. They were happy. To destroy the evening with news of Will Jefferson just seemed wrong.

All she could do was pray that Cliff didn't learn it from anyone else.

Twelve.

"Can Rachel take me shopping?" Jolene asked for the sixth time.

"I said that would be fine," Bruce muttered, leafing through the Cedar Cove Chronicle. He worked hard at his computer support business and needed this quiet time in the evenings. Just half an hour to regroup; that was all. Since Stephanie's death he'd developed a routine with their daughter. He got home from work, watched the news and read the paper while Jolene entertained herself with a book or a jigsaw puzzle. Afterward they prepared dinner together. Their meals weren't always the meat-and-potatoes variety, either. Some nights it was bacon, eggs and waffles. More than once they'd had cookies and milk with popcorn for dessert, but he didn't make a habit of that.

"You didn't phone her," Jolene whined.

"Why don't you?" he said. She'd called Rachel Pendergast often enough in the past. Rachel had stepped in as a surrogate mother after Stephanie's death and spent many evenings and Sat.u.r.days with them both.

At age seven, Jolene had decided she needed a mother and she'd chosen Rachel. Bruce smiled as he recalled the day they'd met Rachel at the beauty salon-and how embarra.s.sed he'd been by his daughter's p.r.o.nouncement. But Bruce gratefully accepted Rachel's involvement in their lives, as long as nothing was required of him. He wasn't interested in a romantic relations.h.i.+p, he told himself again. He was a one-woman man, and Stephanie was that woman. Now that she was gone he had no intention of marrying again. Rachel understood that, although most women didn't. Since he was what people considered prime marriage material, various friends had taken it upon themselves to find him a wife. Bruce had been in more than his share of uncomfortable social situations with women whose objectives were explicit-if not explicitly stated. Sooner or later, they all learned that he wasn't interested.

"I want you to phone Rachel," Jolene said.

Bruce lowered the newspaper. "Why?"

"Because then she'll know you approve."

Bruce could see that the peacefulness of the evening was already shattered. Jolene talked to Rachel on a regular basis; the two of them seemed to get together at least once a week for one reason or another. More often now that Lover Boy had departed for San Diego. Nate Olsen was no loss as far as Bruce was concerned, although he hadn't said that to Rachel. She could date whomever she wanted.

"Here." Jolene handed him the portable phone.

"Okay, okay," he muttered. If he was truthful, he'd admit he wasn't opposed to contacting Rachel. He considered her a friend-a good enough friend to be on speed dial.

"Hi," he said when she picked up. "Are you doing anything special this Sat.u.r.day?"

"What do you have in mind?"

"Jolene needs to go school shopping and she'd like you to take her."

"Count me in."

Bruce grinned at her enthusiasm. He didn't understand this thing about women and shopping. He didn't know a single one who wouldn't leap at the opportunity to dash to a mall. A sale on bedsheets, some kind of giveaway, a makeup demonstration-any excuse would do.

"What's so funny?"

"You women and your shopping."

"Listen, Bruce, you don't want to go there. Men have their own preferences. I'll bet you're sitting in front of the television right now with the remote control on the arm rest. I'll bet you're reading the paper at the same time as you're watching the TV news."

How did she know this much about his evening routine? He supposed it shouldn't surprise him. Rachel had often been to his house over the past few years and he'd been to hers. She was the only woman who'd breached his defenses. Suddenly he wondered if she was right about other men's routines being the same as his. And if she was, how had she found out?

"What do you hear from Lover Boy?" he asked.

"I wish you'd stop calling Nate that," she said, the humor leaving her voice.

"Okay, your Sailor Man," he revised. The truth was, Bruce had never much cared for Rachel's navy boyfriend. For one thing, he couldn't imagine them as a couple. For another, Nate seemed to resent the time Rachel spent with Jolene. In fact he'd tried on more than one occasion to come between them. So far, that hadn't worked; Rachel wouldn't allow it.

"We talk almost every day. He misses me."

"Do you miss him?" Bruce asked, although he already knew what she'd say.

"Like crazy. I'm going to fly down to California to visit him soon. Or he'll fly up here for a weekend. We're miserable without each other."

Bruce had to bite his tongue to keep from making a sarcastic remark. He wasn't sure why he'd bothered to ask. Thinking about Nate Olsen and Rachel invariably put him in a bad mood, although he refused to delve any further into the reasons for that.

"What's new in town?" Rachel asked, abruptly changing the subject. "You're reading the paper, aren't you? Give me an update."

"All right," he said, looking at the front page. "The school board's bringing a new bond issue to the ballot in September. You'll vote for it, won't you?"

"Of course. Anything else?"

"There's an article here by Jack Griffin about the Harbor Street Art Gallery. Apparently the owners are closing it, at least for the winter months, and maybe for good."

"Oh, no," Rachel murmured. "Maryellen Bowman's going to feel awful about that. She's the one who built it up. A lot of local artists depend on that extra income."

"There's also a short piece about a farewell party for Linnette McAfee," Bruce went on. "Apparently her last day at the Medical Clinic is next week."

"I'm sorry she's moving away," Rachel said. "If anyone should move, it's Cal," she added indignantly.

"Who's Cal?"

She launched into a rather involved explanation of Linnette and Cal Washburn and their relations.h.i.+p, ending with, "He broke her heart and now she's leaving town?"

"Why?" That didn't make sense to Bruce, either, but then he was the last person who'd understand the whys and wherefores of a relations.h.i.+p. Rachel explained why she thought Linnette had decided to move. It still didn't make sense to him. So Linnette and this Cal broke up. So what? This wasn't junior high. Everyone should be able to coexist and behave like the adults they were.

"Martha Evans's funeral was this week," Rachel said next. "Anything in the paper about that?"

"Who's she?"

"She was an elderly woman. Around ninety. I did her hair for the funeral."

He didn't like thinking about it. "That's something you do?" he asked hesitantly.

"Of course. She was a lovely woman. I'll miss her."

"But why-"

"The funeral home occasionally hires me. And I was very fond of Martha so I wanted to do it."

They chatted for another while, joking back and forth, filling each other in on what was happening at work. When he replaced the phone, Bruce was shocked to realize they'd talked for more than an hour.

"What did Rachel say?" Jolene asked. She'd been waiting patiently, completing a jigsaw puzzle of horses grazing in a field. Five hundred pieces! He was impressed.

"She said she'd be by to pick you up at nine-thirty on Sat.u.r.day morning," he said absently. An hour. He'd spent an entire hour on the phone with Rachel?

Something was wrong.

Bruce didn't even like talking on the phone. Five minutes, tops. Say what's necessary and hang up. He could barely remember a conversation in his entire adult life that had lasted more than fifteen minutes.

"Dad?" Jolene cut into his musings.

"What?"

"You're standing up but you're not going anywhere."

"I am?" He hadn't been aware that he was on his feet until Jolene pointed it out.

"Are you okay?" his daughter asked.

Bruce sat back down. "I-I don't know." He felt dizzy, and that was unusual for him. In fact, his head was spinning. Maybe he had the flu. Yeah, a flu named Rachel. Where did that thought come from? Squinting at his daughter, he noticed she was looking at him strangely.

"Should I call 911?"

"No." He forced a laugh. "I'm fine. I do have a question for you, though."

"Sure." She knelt in front of him, her hand on his knee. "Do you want me to get you a gla.s.s of water?"

"No, no, it's nothing." His heart felt like an oil-rig pump that had gone berserk, but he chose to ignore that. "You like Rachel, don't you?" But Jolene didn't need to answer. Rachel had taken Stephanie's place in her life. His own parents lived in Connecticut, and Jolene had only seen them two or three times. Stephanie's parents had divorced when she was young and she'd never had a good relations.h.i.+p with her father. Her mother had died within two years of Stephanie; she'd never recovered from the loss of her only child. So it'd always been just Bruce and his daughter. Except for Rachel...

"Dad, of course I like Rachel," Jolene said. "You like her, too, don't you?"

He narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean?" he asked suspiciously.

"You're not mad at her or anything?"

"No, no, everything's...fine."

The relief in his daughter's eyes quickly turned to fear. "She's not marrying Nate and moving to San Diego, is she?"

Not if I can help it, his mind shouted. With Jolene studying him intently, he shook his head and pretended nothing was amiss.

Together they made dinner. Jolene prepared a green salad while Bruce fixed tuna sandwiches. Dinnertime had been important to Stephanie. Because he knew this was something his wife would've wanted, Bruce had continued the practice of having dinner with Jolene every evening. While she described her day, he did his best to pay attention. During the summer she attended a church day camp, which she loved. She launched into a long, complicated story about a little play she was in, and he forced himself to nod and exclaim in the right places.

Summer bedtime was nine-thirty and Jolene went without an argument. He cleaned up the kitchen, then thought about going to bed himself, only he wasn't tired. After was.h.i.+ng a load of laundry and dumping it in the dryer, he cleaned the bathroom. This burst of nervous energy wasn't a bad thing, he decided. Rare and surprising, perhaps, but nothing to be alarmed by.

Once in bed, he tossed and turned for another hour, then realized he wouldn't sleep until he'd talked to Rachel again. Her phone rang four times before she answered.

"h.e.l.lo." Her voice was soft with sleep.