Éclair and Present Danger (19 page)

“Her name is Lovey,” Winnie said, awestruck.

“Lovey,” the girl repeated as her hand left the cat's ears and continued down Lovey's full length. “Hello, Lovey, I'm Caroline.”

Caroline?

As in Morgan?

Before she could ask, the girl continued, her voice taking on a wispy, faraway quality that was at times difficult to hear. “I used to think it would have been fun to have a pet—a dog, a bunny, a fish, a cat like this . . . Someone who could lick away all the tears I didn't want my dad to see.”

“Fish don't have tongues,” Winnie pointed out only to berate herself (silently, of course) for having done so.

“I was five. I didn't think that hard.”

“Sorry. I'm not exactly a fish expert, myself.” Winnie crossed to the vacant swing next to the young girl and lowered herself onto the flimsy piece of curved rubber. “I take it you didn't get one?”

“A fish?”

“A pet of any kind.”

Lovey stood up, flopped onto her opposite side, and looked up at Caroline expectantly. Like a trained sea lion, the girl responded, gliding her hand along Lovey's soft fur. “No. No pets. My dad actually offered once or twice when I was like ten, but I said no.”

“Why?”

“He'd already gotten stuck taking care of me all on his own. I didn't think he should have to take care of a pet, too.” Caroline pulled her hand back as Lovey stood, stretched, and wandered over to check out a piece of grass. “When I was five, my mom decided she didn't want me or my dad anymore.”

Winnie opened her mouth to speak, to introduce herself and say that she knew Jay, but something about the way the girl worded her sentence elbowed its way to the front. “I—I don't know what to say. I—”

“It's okay. She's famous now. Just like she wanted to be.” Caroline wrapped her hand around the chains on either side of her body and used her feet to start the swing. “I saw her in a magazine the other day when I was at the store with some of my friends. One of them—Courtney—actually said I kind of looked like her. I thought about telling them right then and there that she was my mom, but I didn't. No one would believe me anyway seeing as how she's never told the press she was married to my dad or that I even exist.”

“Her loss.”

Caroline slammed her feet into the ground, stopping the motion she'd managed to gain. “Excuse me?”

Uh-oh.

“I—I said it's her loss. Because”—she stopped, swallowed, and started again—“it
is
.”

“How do you know? You don't know anything about me.”

“I know you're good with my cat.” It sounded lame the second it left her mouth, but it was something . . . “And I don't think there's a career on the face of the earth that's more important than being a mom.”

“Are you a mom?” Caroline asked.

“No.”

“Married?”

“No.”

“Then you really don't know what you're talking about, do you?” Caroline wiggled off the swing and turned to face Winnie, anger lighting the blue green eyes she shared with her father.

“I know
me
, Caroline. I know what I want for
my
life.”

“And what is that?”

“Right now? It's to get my business off the ground and make it a success. After that, if I'm fortunate enough to meet someone I want to spend the rest of my life with, I'd like to have a family.”

“But your business comes first?” Caroline prodded.

“Right now, yes. Because it's all I have. But once I have a family, that won't be the case.”

“You say that
now . . .
”

“And I'll say that then, too.” She watched Lovey make two laps around an oak tree and then squat in a pile of dirt. It was on the tip of her tongue to tell the cat to wait, but she stopped herself, opting, instead, to stay in the conversation with Jay's daughter. “Being a parent is the greatest gift of all, Caroline. Just ask your dad. I'm quite sure he'll tell you the same thing.”

Caroline shrugged and kicked at the first in a series of railroad ties outlining the play area. “He does. All the time. We're a team—the two of us. Us against the world. Forever
and ever. He won't let anyone hurt me, and I won't let anyone hurt him.”

An odd sensation skittered up Winnie's spine and propelled her up and off the swing just as Caroline looked down at her phone and made a face. “Oh. Wow. It's getting late. My dad will be home from his class in twenty minutes, and he'll be worried if I'm not there.”

“I could give you a lift,” she suggested. “After I round up Lovey.”

“Nah, that's okay. I live on the other side of those trees right over there.” Caroline pointed toward a line of pine trees on the eastern side of the park. “But I can help you get your cat. She seems to like me.”

Sure enough, with little more than a snap of her fingers, Caroline managed to coax Lovey over to the playground and into her arms. Rising up on her feet, the girl jerked her chin toward the parking lot. “Okay, so where's your car?”

Winnie started to answer with the help of her index finger but stopped mid-point. “Don't you have to go home?”

“I do. And I will. But I can carry Lovey to your car first.”

“Okay, great. I'm parked over there,” she said, leading the way. “Under the oak tree.”

Two steps later, Caroline stopped. “But that's an ambulance.”

“It is. But not for people. It's my brand-new—”

“Emergency Dessert Squad,” Caroline said, reading the side of Winnie's ambulance. “That's
yours
—I mean,
you
? The lady who rescues people with desserts?”

“That's me.” She couldn't help but smile at the teenager's description.

The lady who rescues people with—

In a harried whirl of loose fur and incessant hissing, Caroline shoved Lovey into Winnie's arms and took off.

“Wait! Caroline! Are you okay?”

Mere steps from the tree line, the teenager turned around to glare at Winnie, her face contorted with the same rage now spewing from her mouth. “Stay away from my dad!”

“S
ee, this is yet another reason why I never got married.”

Winnie pulled her feet from their spot atop the porch railing and let them drop onto the floor in front of her rocking chair. “Why's that, Mr. Nelson?”

“Because all that silent brooding you ladies do is detrimental to my chess game.” With a sweep of his hand, the pieces on his side of the board went to the right, and the pieces on the opposing side went left.

“Why'd you do that?” she asked. “I thought you were winning.”

“Not hard to do when I'm the only one playing.” Mr. Nelson retrieved his cane from the floor at his feet, righted it, and used it to stand and make his way over to the vacant rocking chair beside Winnie. He pointed up at the ceiling. “So what's so fascinating up there besides the fact we need to paint in a few weeks?”

She looked at him in the last of the day's light and tried
to make sense of what he was saying, but she had nothing. Nada. “I'm not sure what you're talking about.”

Again, he guided her eyes upward with his finger. “You've been staring at that same spot for close to an hour now. I even tried out a few of the jokes I heard at the bingo hall this afternoon and you didn't so much as crack a smile at any of 'em.”

“You told me jokes?”

“Four of 'em.” Mr. Nelson let his hand drift down to the armrest of his rocker as he settled into the chair. “Granted the first three weren't the best, but that last one? I was so tickled by that one, I didn't hear Margaret Mary call B-5. If I had, I'd have gotten myself a five-dollar gift card to Burger Barn!”

“Sorry to hear that, Mr. Nelson. I know how much you adore that place . . . and the waitresses.”

He stopped rocking and leaned across the gap between their chairs. “I adore
you
more, Winnie Girl. Always have, always will.”

Swallowing hard at the sudden tightness in her throat, Winnie dropped her head against the back of the chair and pinned her gaze to the ceiling once again.

Mr. Nelson is right. We do need to paint . . .

“Care to tell me what's bothering you?”

“Nothing is bothering me, Mr. Nelson. I'm fine.”

“And I'm twenty-five and full of muscles,” he groused. “Feel better now? We're both lying.”

He was right.

She felt as lousy at that moment as she had when she first wandered down to the porch after dinner (icing and leftover cake batter). Sitting there, in silence, wasn't helping her, and it certainly wasn't helping Mr. Nelson's chess game.

“I don't know how to put this, exactly.”

“You don't know if you don't try.”

“I clicked with someone the other day.”

Mr. Nelson studied her for a moment. After what seemed like a minute, maybe two, he resituated himself in his chair but kept his focus squarely on her face. “Did he hurt you?”

“No. No! It's nothing like that.” She breathed in the potpourri of scents that was Serenity Lane—Bridget's dinner wafting across the yard, Harold Jenkins's pipe as he rode down the road on his motorized scooter in the hopes of catching Cornelia taking her sheltie, Con-Man, on his last walk of the day—and tried to assemble her thoughts in some sort of easy-to-follow order.

“Then what's got you so down in the mouth?”

She didn't need a mirror to know what her friend saw on her face. And she didn't need a therapist to know what was wrong.

“This guy got me, Mr. Nelson. He got my demeanor, my humor, my drive, my choice in friends—all of it. And something about being in his presence made me . . .
happy
. Really, really happy. Like I am when I'm out here with you and Bridget.”

“You're not happy
now
.”

“It's not the company—I assure you that,” she said over a rumble in her stomach.

“So then what's the problem?”

She pressed a hand to her stomach as a second, louder rumble rivaled the sound of Harold's scooter en route back to his home. “Sorry.”

Reaching into his shirt pocket, Mr. Nelson extracted a pretzel and held it out to Winnie. “Eat.”

“No, I'm . . .” A third and still louder rumble drowned out her protest, and she accepted the offering. After a quick inspection for shirt lint, she popped it into her mouth. “This guy has a daughter. A sixteen-year-old, to be exact. Seems the ex-wife split town eleven years ago and hasn't looked back. The kid has a whole lot of lingering anger—stoked to the surface, no doubt, by normal teenage angst. The last thing he needs and she wants is someone else in the mix.”

“Did he say that?”

He held a second pretzel across the gap. She ate it, sans lint inspection. “No. But the message from the daughter was crystal clear. In fact, her exact words were, ‘
Stay away from my dad.
'”

“That doesn't mean he agrees, Winnie Girl . . .”

“She's sixteen. She's still at home. He kind of has to.” She looked down at her shirt and began plucking off previously unnoticed clumps of Lovey hair. “Besides, I'm despised enough in my own home thanks to Lovey. Why put myself in a position to be despised in someone else's?”

It was a smart decision. She knew this. But still, it didn't negate the disappointment.

“Then look elsewhere. There are plenty more fish in the sea—or, should I say, lake.” Mr. Nelson leaned forward and directed Winnie's attention to the car rolling to a stop in front of their house. “And lookee here, there's a fish a floppin' at your doorstep right now.”

She lifted her hand in a perfect mirror image of Mr. Nelson's and waved at the face peering out from the open window, but other than registering Lance's basic features (long face, strong jawline, curly auburn hair), her gaze was already on to the car—the car she'd obviously underestimated in the dark the previous night.

Whoa.

Actually, no . . . Make that a double whoa.

Mr. Nelson's elbow found its way into her upper arm. “You should have seen the ladies when I got out of that beauty at the bingo hall this afternoon, Winnie . . . You'd have thought I was James Bond or something.”

Pushing off the rocking chair, she crossed to the railing and used it to support her lower body as she leaned forward. “Wow. I could tell it was sporty in the dark last night, but I had no idea your new car was that gorgeous,” she called out to Lance.

“Been wanting one of these my whole life.” Lance ran
his hand along the top of his door as if he, too, was seeing his new car for the first time.

“Funny, I would have pictured you in a Model T with the way you are about American history,” Mr. Nelson said as he joined Winnie at the rail.

Lance grinned so wide Winnie couldn't help but smile, too. “Yeah, but this works better on those days I might otherwise be late for class.” Then, just as quick as his grin had ventured across his face, it disappeared. “Now don't you worry, Mr. Nelson, I won't be racing down Serenity Lane.”

“
Pacing
?” Mr. Nelson echoed in confusion. “Why would you be pacing? That's what us old folks do!”

She turned, pointed at the elderly man's ear, waited for him to adjust the volume on his hearing aids, and then repeated Lance's word. “
Racing
, Mr. Nelson. He said,
racing
.”

“Ahhh. Yes. If you're doing any of that, young fella, I better be in the car with you.”

She shook her head at the both of them and then helped herself to the last of the pretzels Mr. Nelson had stashed in his shirt pocket. “Men! You never grow up, do you?”

“Nope,” Lance and Mr. Nelson said in unison.

“Hey, looks like your Dessert Squad is really getting around, Winnie. I saw you over by Silver Lake Park on my way home from my afternoon classes.”

Silver Lake Park . . .

And, just like that, she was back in her funk.

Or would have been if Mr. Nelson's bony elbow hadn't nudged her right back into the conversation . . .

“I have high hopes for it, but now, standing here, looking at you in that car, I'm wondering if I should go back and get a degree in history, instead,” she joked. “I'll tell them Lance Reed sent me.”

“What? Are you kidding me? I'd be the most despised man in this town if you stopped baking, Winnie Johnson.”

“He's a floppin',” Mr. Nelson whispered. “Flop, flop, flop.”

She rolled her eyes, checked his pocket one last time, and then smiled out at their neighbor. “Thanks, Lance.”

“No problem. Well, hey, I better head out. I've got an eight
A.M.
class every day except Tuesday, and I didn't get to all my grading last night.”

“Good night, Lance.”

“G'night, Winnie. G'night, Mr. Nelson.”

They watched him pull away from the curb and head down the street, the red glow of his taillights brightening and then disappearing as he turned into his driveway.

“He's a nice fish, Winnie.”

“I'm not looking for fish, Mr. Nelson. This other one just kind of jumped on the plate in front of me. And I liked him.”

I still do.

“It'll work out, Winnie Girl. You mark my words.”

It wouldn't, but she still appreciated his concern. “So how are you? Feeling any better about the possibility of getting a new neighbor?”

His smile faltered, but he managed to regroup before she could call him on it. “Better? No. But I can accept it. I have to. We all do.” With one hand on the rail and the other on his cane, Mr. Nelson turned and made his way back to the general vicinity of his chair. “What I can't accept is why someone isn't behind bars for killing Bart yet.”

“Maybe something is happening behind the scenes that we're not privy to,” she suggested. “You know, maybe the police are closing in on a suspect as we speak.”

“There's no closing in, Winnie. Not in this town. We'd all know it if they were.” He ran his free hand along the top of the chair and then raked it across his unshaven face. “No, the chief is too busy running traffic studies to decide whether that four-way stop on the eastern edge of town should actually be a light.”

She wished she could argue, but she couldn't. The powers that be in Silver Lake were focused on revitalization,
not on finding the killer of a man who wasn't too far from death's door to begin with.

“I'm still paying attention, Mr. Nelson. In fact, I want to find out where Sissy Donovan was the morning Bart was killed.” She looked from Mr. Nelson to Bart's darkened house and back again. “You didn't see her that morning, did you?”

“I saw her the day before. When Ava knocked out her tooth running from Bart . . .”

“I know. But it was the next morning he was killed. Sometime between eight and nine, remember?” She considered the usual activity on Serenity Lane at that time and threw out some possibilities. “Ava's bus comes at what? Eight—eight ten?”

“Seven fifty-five. Though sometimes it's been as early as seven fifty-two. You should hear that one yelling at the driver when he shaves off them three minutes.”

“
Ava
yells at the driver?”

“No. Sissy does. In front of Ava.”

“So Sissy is always at the bus stop with Ava in the mornings, right?”

“She is.”

“Does she ever leave Ava to wait alone?”

“Never.”

She tried another avenue. “Have you ever seen them approaching the bus stop from a different direction? Like, say, Bart's driveway?” She knew it was a long shot, especially considering that would have meant Ava being present when her mother suffocated an old man, but it was worth a chance.

Mr. Nelson's brow furrowed in thought as he undoubtedly forced his mind back to the previous week. When his head started shaking, she knew he'd come up empty.

“What about Cornelia?” she asked on the heels of a frustrated exhale that was far louder than she'd intended. “Is she walking Con-Man that early? And if she is, maybe
she . . . or Harold . . . saw an unfamiliar car or an unfamiliar face that morning?”

“If there was someone who didn't belong on our street that morning, I'd have seen him myself,” Mr. Nelson insisted around a series of yawns. “I—I was . . . right there . . . like I always am. Playing chess.”

Playing chess . . .

Translation: in his own little world . . .

She made a mental note to talk to Cornelia and Harold the first chance she got. Maybe they saw or heard something.

Stepping forward, she whispered a kiss across the man's forehead and then gently guided him toward the front door. “Well, keep thinking. If something comes up, let me know. Until then, Sissy Donovan remains a person of interest.”