Six Months (2 page)

I bent my knees when something rapped against the glass at the front of the store. “Do you think the hail will blow out the windows?”

Lexi stood up and peered around the doorway. “Hail doesn’t fly sideways. Well, usually. Someone’s outside—be right back.”

“Lexi, this is the part of the horror movie where I’m supposed to scream
don’t do it!
But that’s okay. Let the serial killer inside. Be sure to show him the cash drawer while you’re at it!” I yelled at the empty doorway.

The bell jingled and I grabbed my oversized brown purse and dug around for my charcoal eyeliner. I flipped open a compact and did a little touch-up. Not that I needed makeup, but it kept me from going into freak-out mode.
Thirty more minutes
, I kept telling myself. Severe storms ended quickly unless there was a squall line.

“You’re paying for those,” Lexi grumbled as she breezed into the room. Her tennis shoes squeaked against the white floor when she spun around and sat on the bench to my right.

I lifted my eyes to a tall man with a mop of wavy blond hair. Not bright blond, but a sexy color with a few dark shades mixed in. He had the face of an angel and the indigo eyes of a devil. He could have been a male model in a fashion magazine. When he raked his fingers through his hair, he revealed a prominent scar on his forehead. But it just added to the allure.

He also had about twenty gummy worms shoved in his mouth. After chewing most of them up, he looked down and grinned. “I don’t believe we’ve met, honeypie,” he said with a mouthful. “I’ve heard a lot about you from Ben.”

Oh. Ben.

Lexi’s new boyfriend had a bunch of brothers. I’d met two of them a couple of months ago when the electric company shut off our power. Ben and Wheeler were identical twins—except Ben had a perverted mouth and Wheeler had tats and chin hair in the shape of a circle beard. The mean-looking one didn’t say much and seemed like a guy who liked to pound people’s faces in. Ben might have been clean-cut, but he couldn’t take his dirty eyes off my ass. If I had to guess their age, I’d say around thirty. The man in the doorway had the same look about him—youthful and yet seasoned, but something flickered in his eyes and made me second-guess myself.

“I’m April Frost,” I said with a subtle wave of my hand.

“Denver Cole,” he replied, swallowing the last bite of candy. “I’m here to save the day, so you girls just sit tight and I’ll protect you.”

Lexi sighed and crossed her legs. “What are you doing on this side of town?”

“Austin sent me to check on you since I was in the area. Your mother ordered curtains,” he grumbled. “Can’t she just get them at Walmart like everyone else? No. She has to
special order
them,” he said, using his fingers to make quotation marks. “They’re in the back of the truck. I hope a tornado blows them all the way to Mexico.”

“Why would you wish something like that?” I wondered aloud.

He quirked a brow. “They’re lacy with flowers and shit on them. Sorry, but men outnumber the women in our house. Every time I see a doily or a new flower arrangement, my balls get a little bit smaller. Speaking of, you got any malt balls in there?”

Denver wandered over to the vending machine and put his hands on top of it, tilting it forward. The lights in the store flickered.

“Stop doing that,” Lexi said, losing her patience.

Then it happened. Total blackout.

A rising tide of panic set in and I catapulted to my feet. Before I knew it, I was unlocking the main door and running into the street. Lexi yelled from behind me, and the wind funneled my short hair around my head, whipping my bangs in front of my face. A few grains of sand stung my eyes as the wind battered me with relentless force.

Suddenly, a strong arm hooked around my waist and lifted me off the ground.

“Are you a bag of nuts?” Denver shouted over the wind as he hauled me back inside.

The lights flickered back on and he set me on my feet. Lexi watched with wide, uncertain eyes as he shut the door and the bell jingled wildly.

My heart pounded against my chest like a drummer in a parade.

Denver grumbled and folded his arms. “Saving damsel in distress: check. Nearly crapping pants while standing in the middle of a fucking tornado: check.”

Lexi wrapped her arms around me and we stood in the center of the room. “Sorry, April. I’m on the verge of freaking out too, even though it doesn’t show much. My coping mechanism is denial. We’ll be fine.”

Denver stuck his hand in a bin full of chocolates and I walked over and grabbed the collar of his T-shirt, yanking him back. “Those are for
paying
customers. We can’t afford to just give it away.”

When he winked at me, I got flustered and let go.

Something hard jabbed into my back and I glanced over my shoulder at the corner of the shelf. I pivoted around and knocked several bags of candy on the floor. Denver chortled, pinching his chin as he watched me step on them.

A flush of heat stung my cheeks.

Handsome or not, I hadn’t made up my mind if I liked him. I certainly didn’t enjoy being a klutz in front of
any
guy. I possessed an inner monologue voice that
loved
to criticize. Now she was saying,
Smooth move
.

Why did I have to turn stupid around men? I’d been in a relationship before. Then again, Nathan had cheated on me constantly, so maybe it hadn’t given me enough experience with men. Who had time to date? I had to focus on work and savings before I ended up living under a bridge, which was a frightening possibility if I suffered one financial misstep. No guy wants a girl with that much baggage at the airport.

“You’re kind of cute,” he said with a handsome smirk. “If I had a tail, I’d wag it.”

“Leave my friend alone, Denver,” Lexi scolded.

“I don’t wear a leash,” he replied. “Nor a muzzle. Ah, hell. Looks like the storm’s over.”

We glanced out the windows and sure enough, sunlight sprayed onto the street through a break in the clouds. Denver angrily tucked the back of his thin T-shirt into his faded jeans, which were so frayed at the ends, long pieces of thread dragged on the ground.

“Maybe I can throw those curtains in the road and tell ’em we got hit hard.”

“Do that and my mom will never cook you another seasoned pork chop again,” Lexi said in an amused voice, folding her arms and tilting her head.

“Am I done saving lives now?” Denver said gruffly. “I came here to be a nice guy for a change and all I get is heat. I’m outta here. Tell Aus I’ll be home later; I’m going to check out a new place up the road. I hear they got a three-story laser-tag room. If that’s true, then we’re going,” he said, circling his finger to everyone in the room and invisible parties not present.

Denver had an easygoing personality with a flair for humor, and sometimes that was a good quality for a man to have. The only thing I didn’t care for was how he’d walked in on a tense situation and had done little to keep me calm. I respected men who knew how to take charge, although I’d never known one outside of a paperback novel. Maybe they didn’t exist.

“Oh, no,” Lexi gasped, staring at her phone. “April, I need to go home early. Can you handle the rest of the shift alone, or do you need me to be here? I have an emergency.”

“Not a problem,” I said.

“What’s wrong?” Denver asked in a serious tone, his brows slanting down.

Lexi’s brown eyes flashed up. “Maizy’s hurt.”

His face tensed and he clenched his fists so tightly his knuckles turned white. “What happened?”

“She fell off the new swing and hit her mouth. They’re taking her to the—”

The bell jingled and Denver jogged toward an old yellow truck. Lexi grabbed her purse and followed close behind.

A few minutes after ten o’clock, I decided to flip our sign in the window to Closed and lock up the store.
The scent of rain hung heavy in the air, and I dreaded the walk home. I absolutely loved getting up early and walking to work, but after dark was another story.

Lexi assumed I rode the bus. She had no idea the bus didn’t go that route. My house was close to a five-mile walk and it gave me plenty of exercise, which I enjoyed. I don’t think my legs had seen muscle tone in all my life until the last two weeks after my car had broken down. The first three nights were a killer, but after that, I’d managed to build up my stamina and it gave me a boost of energy in the morning.

Most of the walk was along a busy street… until the turnoff just beyond the railroad tracks. Then I had to cut across open ground. I got spooked by sudden noises and shadows moving about. Each night, I’d slip on my dark track pants and hoodie so I wouldn’t stand out.

I looked like a burglar.

After three miles of singing “Piano Man” by my all-time favorite singer, tiny raindrops began to dampen my cheeks.

“Shoot,” I said, kicking a small rock as I hurried up the wet sidewalk.

At least we were having a mild October and the cold weather hadn’t kicked in yet. While my goal was to get an apartment, I’d been giving serious thought to buying a car first. It all depended on whether or not I could find an apartment near a bus route. I didn’t think I’d be able to continue walking once the temperature decided to drop.

The steady rain beat a staccato rhythm on the parked cars, and an SUV swerved so close to the curb that a wave of water splashed over me.

“Thank you!” I yelled with a laugh, waving my drenched arm as the car sped away.

Probably a decent guy trying to rush to the store to grab dinner for his wife and kids. I held my elbows tightly as a memory jostled loose in my head—one I’d just as soon not think about.

Every so often, I glanced over my shoulder at a strange clicking sound coming from behind me. Each time I stopped and turned around, I was confronted by a long stretch of shadows and concrete, but no boogeyman.

“
I’m hearing things, I’m hearing things
,” I sang to myself—the sort of thing you do when you’re alone and on the brink of running home like a frightened child. The streets were brightly lit and passing cars provided me with a sense of security, at least until I reached the wooded area.

“This is not my life,” I said to my wet shoes. “I should be like all the other women my age—going to happy hour with friends and flirting with attractive men. Instead, I like to read and play Scrabble. Then again, I’ve never been successful with flirting. Just ask the last guy. He ended up wearing condiments on his shirt after standing beside me in the burger joint. I tried talking to him and wound up slinging a half-opened packet of ketchup on his white shirt. He actually walked off without saying another word! That was so mortifying. Maybe I’d have better luck meeting someone on the Internet.”

I chuckled nervously and peered over my shoulder. A shadow snaked behind a building and my heart palpitated.

No one was there, but I quickened my step.

I pulled out my phone and sent Lexi a text message. She had recently purchased her first cell phone and so we kept in touch more often. She hadn’t figured out all the acronyms, and I’d sometimes make up one just to drive her crazy.

When I finally reached the turnoff that led to my trailer, I was in a full sprint. My purse slapped against my back and my shoes slipped twice in the mud. A gravel road led through the park, but it was too far ahead and not worth the extra walk.

Panting for breath, I reached the door and scraped the mud off my shoes on a large cinder block. Sometimes I wondered how all three of us had lived in that thing. My sister had shared the bed with Grandma, and I’d snuggled up on the built-in sofa.

I stood on the step and tugged off my sopping-wet sneakers. When I unlocked the door and went inside, my nose wrinkled. I must have burned a million scented candles in there, but it’s like the ghost of Grandma Frost was permanently fragranced within. She had a thing about using mothballs and it took five months after she died to get that funk out of there. I’d never been able to expunge of the smell of cigarettes. I think the tar had seared into the walls.

“Hey, little guys,” I said cheerfully, tapping my finger on the round fishbowl sitting on the counter straight ahead.

Hermie and Salvador paddled in sprite little motions, alert and joyful that it was feeding time. I dropped a few pellets of food in the water and moved toward the back of the trailer.

Just to the left of the kitchenette was a hallway that led to the bathroom on the right, closet to the left, and the bedroom straight ahead. I peeled out of my shirt and pants and hung them on a towel rack in my tiny bathroom, which I’d painted a cheery color. I think the name of the paint was called Songbird Yellow. Someday I hoped to have my own garden tub where I could slip beneath a layer of bubbles and read by candlelight. But for now, I made the best of a home that was the length of a few cartwheels.

My cell phone rang and I answered the familiar pop melody. “Rose, I wondered when you’d finally get around to calling me.”

“Hey, sis! You surviving out there?”

I tugged off my wet socks and tossed them by the door. “Couldn’t be better. How about you? Is the weather hot?”

“You wouldn’t believe it! Oh my God, it’s like the freaking desert or something!”

“It
is
the desert, Rose.”

“You’re so literal, April. I’m just teasing. Are you still mad at me for taking off so fast? By the way, I’m coming down for Christmas. I talked Shane into it and he said it’s cool. We’ll just need a place to stay. I um…
you know
.”

I knew.

Our trailer park had been featured on the local news more than once for drug busts. There were a few respectable people living there, but it always attracted the ones with questionable character. One time, an elderly gentleman had wandered down the road as naked as a jaybird and bleeding from his head. Grandma had pushed us inside the trailer and called the cops. Rose had never brought Shane over to visit. They always met up somewhere and I couldn’t say a thing about it because I was guilty of doing the same. People judge.

“Are you doing okay, Rose? Do you need money?”

“Big news! We’re getting married next month.”

“Are you sure? It’s so soon. Why don’t you have a long engagement and enjoy each other before you take the plunge?”

Disappointment seeped in my heart and I hated my initial reaction to her good news; Rose had to live her own life. At least they were getting serious about each other and maybe this would be good for her. Rose had been a capricious child and I used to worry that she’d never settle down. I’d made a silent bet with myself that she’d return in five months and it would be the two of us again. Maybe a tiny part of me was jealous that she’d found someone else to share her life with. Rose had never had to take on the responsibilities I’d been forced to shoulder as the older child, and what a blessing that was for her.

I sat down, dressed in just my underwear, twirling a deck of cards in a circle. “Let me know if you need anything, Rose. I’m really happy for you. I’ve just had a long day, so I didn’t mean for it to come out that way. Shane’s a good catch and you know I’m always here if you need anything.”

“Aces,” she said with a giggle. “Gift cards are fab, but we’re not doing the big wedding gig. Shane wants to drive to Vegas and have one of those drive-through weddings. Gotta run. We’re heading out to the honky-tonk tonight. What kind of mess is that? I thought I’d left Redneckville and all they do out here is two-step.” She giggled again and I knew Shane was in the room with her.

“You guys have fun and stay out of trouble! I love you, Rose.”

“I’ll have fun for the both of us, April. As
usual
.”

I set the phone down and sighed thoughtfully as I lifted a heavy pot of water from the floor. Stupid rain. Water leaked in through a skylight and some dents on the roof and I had no clue how to fix them. The trailer was pretty old and my grandma had mentioned a tree branch falling on it years ago during a storm. She had done some work on it since then, but hadn’t seemed concerned with a little water damage.

I was lingering in front of the sink in my cherry-red bra and panties, dumping out a pot of water, when a knock at the door startled me. The thick brown curtains were closed, so I stood still and waited another second. Nobody ever came over unannounced, and I wasn’t on speaking terms with my loopy neighbors. The insistent knock sounded again.

“Is there an April Frost in there related to Ginny Frost? I have business matters to discuss with you of an important nature.”

“Can you come back in the daytime?”

“I came by this afternoon and again around seven. I can tell you right now that sunshine doesn’t make me any prettier to look at. Your grandma owes me some money. I don’t have time to figure out what your schedule is, and my time is
your
money.”

Oh, crap
. “Um, just a minute.”

I grabbed a white sweatshirt and pulled it over my head. The only pants I could find were yesterday’s jeans, so I yanked those on and answered the door barefoot.

A man wearing a hat looked up at me with steel eyes—one boot in the mud and the other on a step.

“You can call me Maddox,” he said in a burly, Southern drawl.

Maddox looked to be a seasoned man in his late forties. He wore a scruffy beard that was silver and brown. His wavy hair rested on the tips of his shoulders, and his faded brown boots matched the color of his hat. It wasn’t a traditional cowboy hat, but more like what the guys in the Australian outback wore. Maddox looked like he’d stepped out of a time machine.

“Can I help you?” I said through the crack in the door.

“I’m going to cut to the chase. Ginny Frost owed me fifty grand and I know you’re her granddaughter. Open up and let’s have a friendly chat about business. I won’t take but five minutes of your time.”

I drifted away from the door and stood by the sink. Maddox ducked his head and moved inside, shaking water off his hat.

“You mind if I sit?” he asked, motioning toward the sofa on his immediate right. I shrugged and he sat down with his knees apart and forearms resting on them, leaving the door open. “Ginny was pretty good about settling her small loans. I know she died a ways back, and let’s just say I have a soft spot for women and decided to give you a grieving period.” Maddox stared at the hat in his hands. “One thing I’ve got is time. But time’s up and there’s no clean slate with my loans due to death. I’m not insured like the bank. Her debt rolled over to the next in line and that’s you.”

“Fifty? I can’t pay you that much money. I don’t even have enough to buy a car.”

He obscured his mouth with his hat and glanced around the trailer with a contemplative look in his eyes.
Oh please, let this guy have a heart.

“Tell you what. I’ll give you a week to figure it out, then I’ll come back for a visit and see what’s what. You got something you can liquidate? You better do it.”

“Why did she borrow that much?”

“I don’t ask what people do with my money. I don’t care. I baby-step them into my services to see how good they are about paying back the interest. You seem like a smart girl; you don’t know what she would have needed that much money for?”

God. I did. To help put me through school. Grandma had helped pay for college, but I’d assumed she had money stuffed in a savings account or it was coming from her paychecks. Rose had saved up for her VW by working summer and evening jobs, and I shared a car with Grandma. The trailer had been paid off for eons, so I couldn’t think of another explanation.

I never thought it was possible to hate someone for loving me so much.

He scratched his beard, staring at a short stack of paperbacks on the counter. “You got a boyfriend? To help you out, I mean.”

“I think you need to go.”

“I’m a reasonable man,” he said in a smooth voice, rising to his feet. “You’ll see that in no time. Charmed to meet you, April Frost.” He opened the door and peered over his shoulder. “Stay dry.”

***

Early the next morning, I had a banana for breakfast and decided to walk to the local drugstore to shop around before my afternoon shift began. Since morning sales were slow, we usually gave those hours to the part-time girls. That meant I could sleep in, but today my thoughts were in a scramble and I needed to take a walk and clear my head.