Sunshine and Shadows (23 page)

Connie had long since sobbed herself to sleep, and Adele had departed for her room. Lisa was beginning to be concerned because Jay was not answering either the phone at his office or the one at home. A quick check of her email showed nothing new from him.

After yet another fruitless attempt to reach Jay, Lisa scooped her car keys off the top of her dresser. It was late, but she was too worried about Jay to let this slide by; it wasn't like him to disappear completely from view.

She sped along the winding river road, switching off the radio when the music became too distracting. She drove past Jay's office first. Her quick drive-by yielded nothing, so she headed toward the development where he lived.

She slowed her car at the guardhouse at the entrance, but the guard only looked up briefly from his crossword puzzle and, smiling in recognition, waved her quickly through. She braked under the palm tree beside Jay's town house, noting with relief that Jay's car was parked in its usual parking spot. When she knocked, however, no one answered the door. She stood in the small courtyard and looked up at the window of his studio, which was dark. Finally she decided that he wasn't going to answer her knock on the door, and she went and got in her car, feeling troubled.

She drove slowly past the guardhouse, then backed up. The guard glanced up from the puzzle.

She rolled down the car window. "Jay Quillian's car is at his town house, but he doesn't answer when I knock. Do you know if he left?"

"Sure, he went for a walk about a half hour ago. Headed toward the beach. I wondered about it when I saw you come through a few minutes ago—I thought you must have just missed each other."

"We did," Lisa said before pulling her car into one of the parking spaces reserved for visitors.

This late at night there were no skateboarders on the path beside the beach; in fact, aside from one lone dog walker ahead of her, no one was on the ocean path. Jay was on the beach, she decided, so she headed straight for the steps to the sand.

She looked for his solitary figure silhouetted against the sea, but she saw no one. She stood indecisively for a moment, then turned her resolute footsteps northward. It was the way they had walked on the night of their first kiss.

Tonight the surf was up, and great white-tipped breakers crashed upon the sand. Overhead a curved moon tilted out of the darkness. The scent of iodine, borne upon the steady wind, made Lisa's nostrils twitch.

She almost didn't see him sitting on the driftwood log and might have passed him by if he hadn't jerked his head up in sudden recognition.

He cleared his throat. "Lisa?" he said.

"Jay! I've been worried about you," she said. "I called your office and you weren't there, and I called your house, and—"

"You were worried about me?" he asked. He was still sitting, and she stood in front of him, feeling out of place and out of sorts. He might think she'd been spying on him, and she didn't want him to think that.

"Well, of course I was worried," she said testily. "I thought something might have happened to you."

"I can't recall the last time someone was worried about me," he said, sounding bemused. "Come and sit down, Lisa." He edged over on the log to make room for her, and hesitantly she joined him. He was idly toying with a piece of driftwood that he had picked up somewhere, and something was clearly wrong.

"Is it Hildy?" she asked gently. "Are you still thinking of her?"

"Yes, it's going to take me a while to get over her death. I tried working tonight, but I just couldn't pay attention. Not only because of Hildy, Lisa. Because—" He stopped. He couldn't finish what he was going to say. He couldn't tell her how worried he was that she wouldn't, couldn't love him if she knew the truth—that he had killed someone.

He tossed aside the driftwood twig and reached over to take her hand. Lisa was good, kind, beautiful and desirable. He loved her.

"You have a lot on your mind right now with deciding to get married, and Connie's problems, and losing Hildy," she said. He saw that she was determined to be understanding, even though he knew she couldn't understand at all. Someone like Lisa, so sweet, so loving, couldn't know what he'd been through.

Her eyes were brimming with trust, and he looked away, ashamed that she was making excuses for him.

"Yeah," he said, feeling like a heel. She thought he was wonderful, and he wasn't.

"I know one way to make the problems go away," she said, and when he looked back at her she was smiling up at him, and he was sickeningly aware that he should have told her the truth before she fell in love with him, and then she could have made up her mind about whether to move ahead in the relationship. But when had they not been in love with each other? It seemed to him that he had loved her from the moment he'd first seen her.

He pulled her close and drew her head onto his shoulder. She kissed his neck, and he sighed. She was so warm and alluring, so lovely. And she was so in love with him.

"I love you, Lisa," he said, striving to keep the panic out of his voice.

"Then why are we sitting out here on this damp beach?" she said.

It was a lighthearted remark, but he could not reply in kind. Instead he pulled her close so that she wouldn't see the anguish in his eyes.

* * *

One night about a week later Connie sat at Lisa's kitchen table and circled ads in For Sale—Dogs, Cats, Pets column of the daily newspaper.

"Here's one—'Free to a good home, female chow,'" Connie read out loud. "That sounds like the kind of dog that a dietitian might own, not a lawyer. What kind of dog is a chow, anyway?"

"Large," Lisa said. "But not as large as Hildy."

"Chows have black tongues," Adele added. "We had one when I was a girl."

"Black tongues—ugh," Connie said. "Here's another one. I wonder if Jay would like a dachshund."

"Too small," Lisa said, vetoing it.

"Maybe a golden retriever mix?"

"That sounds more like it. Let me see that, Connie."

"Can we go look at them, Lisa? Please?"

"I suppose you could call and make an appointment if you like," Lisa said.

"Oh, good. Jay's so lonely without Hildy. I hate to think of him living at his town house all by himself." Connie looked sad.

"We could give him some of the hangers in my closet," Adele said.

Lisa blinked. "What?" she said.

Connie took it upon herself to explain. "Oh, it's funny. Adele says that she has a coat-hanger farm in her closet. That the hangers in her closet multiply. That they breed in there. She says she's never lonely because she has all these hangers, and I think it's the funniest thing! I never heard of hangers keeping anyone from being lonely!" She dissolved into giggles.

"I recall that you were going to help me by adopting some of my hangers, Connie," Adele said, standing up. "I'll give you the pick of the litter if you'll come along right now and get them."

Connie's effect on Adele had been nothing short of miraculous. Ever since Adele had so skillfully comforted Connie after Hildy's death, they could often be found together. Adele was knitting Connie a sweater, and she had even driven Connie to her own hairdresser for a haircut yesterday. They were good for each other. Connie had brought out Adele's innate tenderness and had freed the joyful spirit that had been imprisoned inside Adele for so long.

And if Adele was smiling more, why was Jay smiling less? These days, when they hadn't yet announced their engagement and should be wrapped in their own private bliss, why did Jay seem to want to put distance between them?

Last Sunday afternoon at the beach, for instance. She and Jay had taken Connie with them, and Connie had been sitting far away sketching when Lisa had brought up the subject of a guest list for the wedding. She told Jay that she was sure that her sister Heather would come, and she would invite her great-uncle Richard to walk her down the aisle. They deserved to be told the date of the wedding, since all of them lived far away and would need to make travel plans.

She had mentioned casually that surely Jay's mother and stepfather and their two children would want to travel from Albuquerque for the wedding, and she'd suggested that perhaps Jay should phone them that afternoon and tell them of their engagement.

"Now? Today?" he had said, alarm written all over his face.

"They're your family, Jay. Why shouldn't they be the first to know we're getting married?"

He looked off into the distance, squinting against the hot sun. "Naturally I thought you'd want to tell Adele and your sister before we told anyone else."

Lisa rolled over on her stomach and pillowed her cheek on her hands. "I can telephone Heather anytime, but I don't know when I'd tell Adele. It's 'Connie this' and 'Connie that,' almost as though she's infatuated with the kid. She hardly pays attention to me anymore."

"Is that a complaint I'm hearing?"

"No, only an observation. Connie needs Adele's nurturing, and Connie has restored Adele's sense of humor."

At that point a child had raced by in pursuit of a Frisbee, spraying them with sand, and their discussion never returned to the topic of telling his family about their engagement. She couldn't help puzzling over Jay's reticence, but she forgot about it after a while. She had other important things to think about, such as when to break her good news to Adele. Adele liked Jay; Lisa was sure of that. But how would she react when Lisa told her they were going to be married?

The opportunity to tell Adele of their plans luckily presented itself a few days later while Adele was conducting an elementary swimming lesson in the river. Adele told Lisa, much to Lisa's surprise, that she had worked as a water-safety instructor before her marriage. It was the first time Lisa had ever heard of it, but when she suggested that Adele begin to teach Connie the rudiments of staying afloat in the water, Adele had responded with enthusiasm. She had even bought herself a new swimsuit, a one-piece job with a pert little skirt.

Lisa had gone swimming herself early that morning, and she sat wrapped in a giant beach towel on the bench under the pines at the water's edge while Adele drilled Connie in the dead man's float.

Although Connie came up sputtering once or twice, she learned the float and was mastering the simple frog kick before Adele laughingly claimed that she was getting tired and needed a rest.

"Here, wrap yourself in this—it's chilly here in the shade," Lisa said, tossing a towel in Adele's direction as she waded out of the shallows.

Adele mopped her face and brushed a few locks of hair out of her eyes. "It's been so long since I've been in the water," she said, sitting beside Lisa on the bench and lifting her face to the sunlight that streamed through the web of blue-green pine needles overhead.

"I'd never know it," Lisa said with affection. "You and Connie looked like two tadpoles when you were teaching her the frog kick."

"One tadpole, one tired old frog," Adele said, but she was smiling when she said it.

"Speaking of frogs, I think I've finally kissed the prince," Lisa said.

"Kissed the—Oh, you mean Jay! It's getting serious then?" Adele's eyes were lively with enthusiasm.

"I'm in love with him, Adele. And he loves me. I've never been so happy in my life."

"I knew it. I suspected it the first time I saw you together on the morning when he came over and I taught him to make crepes. The way the two of you were laughing when you were looking for the vase in the garage was a sure clue. I'd never heard you laughing with anyone like that before. Oh, Lisa, I'm so pleased. He's a wonderful man."

"I was worried about telling you. I didn't think you'd be happy," she said.

Adele turned sober eyes upon her. "At one time, maybe I wouldn't have been as glad for you. But now I see that you need someone else in your life. Not just me." Adele's eyes grew moist with tears.

"Shh," Lisa told her softly, putting an arm around her shoulders. "I'm glad things are better for you now."

"It's Connie," Adele said. "You were right about her, and I'm going to miss her terribly when she goes to be with her father. I was thinking—Ginny at the gift shop works full-time and needs someone to pick up her daughter after school when it's in session. Next fall after Connie's gone, I could do it. The little girl is younger than Connie, but she's a darling child, and she could stay with me every afternoon until her mother picks her up after work. What do you think?"

"I think it's a wonderful idea. You're so good with children, Adele."

"Maybe so," Adele said, watching Connie as she practiced floating. "Maybe so."

Lisa glanced at Adele out of the corners of her eyes. "Are you ready for one more surprise?" she asked.

Adele caught her bottom lip between her teeth and stared for a moment, then broke into a smile.

"You and Jay—you're going to get married!"

Lisa laughed out loud. "You guessed! How did you know?"

"The look on your face gave it away," Adele said warmly. "I couldn't be happier for you, Lisa. When's the date?"

"We don't know yet. We've discussed living at Jay's town house, but even though you'll lose me as a housemate, you aren't going to lose the house. You can live here as long as you like, get another housemate or not, whichever you prefer, and you'll be a frequent guest in our home."