Someone to Watch Over Me (4 page)

Gwen was afraid she was trapped. That she’d have to go with him or look foolish for not going. She stalled instead. “You…uh. You get into fights in the alley?”

He grinned. “Not since I was nine. But I think I could handle myself if someone happened to jump us tonight.”

Gwen could feel the blood draining from her face. It was as if her whole being sagged, all the strength going out of her, a paralyzing fear moving in, in its wake.

He saw it all, too. She could imagine exactly what she must look like to him as he watched her turn into a pathetically fearful creature, a grown woman afraid of the dark.

She thought she might actually have swayed on her feet. His hands shot out to steady her. “It’s all right.”

But it wasn’t, and maybe it never would be, and she really hated it when people saw that. How much she truly was not “all right.”

“I have to go,” she said in a shaky voice she despised, as well.

“Okay.”

“That way.” She pointed toward what she thought was the direction of the front door, then added, “By myself.”

“Okay,” he said quietly, using a tone she imagined he might on a spooked child. “Did you drive?”

She nodded, not caring how foolish that seemed. She didn’t walk down dark streets at night.

“Can I watch from the front porch, until you get to your car?”

She nodded again, so very foolish. He was either afraid she’d fall apart before she even made it to her car or afraid she’d freak out if he followed her to the door, because she thought he meant to follow her out onto the street. And she might have. She fought not to cry. It would have been the final humiliation.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“It’s all right. Whatever you need to do to feel safe, you do it.”

He made it not sound so foolish after all, and she was grateful enough for the understanding that it alone might make her cry.

Maybe it was one of those nights when tears were inevitable.

Just not here,
she begged.
Please, not here.

She put a hand in her pocket and came up with her keys. She knew to have them in her hand, her thumb on the panic button that had come along with the alarm system on the new car she’d bought just for that safety feature. And so she could be reasonably assured that she wouldn’t be breaking down anytime soon on any dark roads alone at night, and that if she did and someone tried to get close to her, the alarm would shriek and, hopefully, scare them away.

So many things she did differently these days.

She put her head down, forgetting all about not looking like a victim, and made it down the hall and past all those people in the living room without speaking to anyone. Jackson Cassidy followed her, keeping his distance so he wouldn’t scare her.

He opened the door for her and stood back to let her pass through alone. Romeo waited there by his side, looking concerned for her, as well.

“Sorry,” she said again.

“No problem,” he claimed. Maybe he was used to paranoid, frightened women from his job.

She made it down the stairs and up the sidewalk. Her car was halfway down the block, probably farther away than the walk in the alley would have been. But here she was on a brightly lit street and not alone with a man she really didn’t know. She felt foolish but safer.

As he’d said, seeing so clearly, whatever she had to do to feel safe….

That was a problem she wasn’t about to explain to him.

She wasn’t sure if she’d ever feel safe again.

Jax watched her all the way, Romeo by his side. She sat in the car for a few minutes before turning on the lights and pulling onto the street.

“Let’s go to the backyard,” Jax told the dog.

He headed around the house and climbed the steps to the back porch. He could see old Mrs. Moss’s house from there, waited and watched as the car turned into the driveway, as Gwen got out, opened the door and started flicking on lights in the house. Until she was inside, safe and sound.

Romeo stood beside him, watching every bit as intently.

“Wonder what the story is there,” Jax said.

One thing was certain, it wasn’t the normal reticence a woman would show at the idea of walking down a dark alley in a small town with a man she barely knew. It was fear, pure and simple, the kind that came not in imag
ining what bad things might happen, but in knowing, firsthand.

Someone, at some point, had attacked Gwen Moss.

“You know, Romeo. Some days, life is rotten.”

S
tanding safely in her own driveway, her car locked, house keys in her hand and ready, Gwen glanced back at Mrs. Cassidy’s house. On the back porch, watching her, stood a tall, shadowy figure. She couldn’t see his face, not at that distance and in the dark, but she was certain it was Jax.

Was he worried about her? Or simply wondering if she was capable of getting herself home without falling apart?

Not that it mattered in the least what Jackson Cassidy or any other man thought of her.

But she was caught up in the idea of him waiting and watching to see that she got safely inside, feeling for a moment like it wasn’t all up to her. That if something happened on her way home, he would have helped her.

Gwen turned and unlocked the back door. Inside, she punched her code into the security system she’d had installed and then turned on lights. All of them. Gwen liked lights. Bright ones. Especially at night.

She clicked on the TV, which was usually set to one of the music channels because she didn’t like a completely
quiet house any more than she liked a dark one. It was too easy to hear the normal things that went bump in the night and wonder if they were actually normal or something she should be concerned about.

So she let the music drown out the little sounds.

She’d do anything she could to make it easier on herself, and she didn’t care if that made her a coward or weak. She just didn’t care.

She went into the kitchen, automatically checking to see that everything was in its place, just as she’d left it, reassured to see that it was. Then she made herself a plate with chicken salad and some apple slices, which she ate at the breakfast bar in the kitchen while glancing at a magazine.

She’d look at the pretty pictures of happy people and try to think about whether her skirts were the right length or whether lemon-colored or chartreuse shirts were going to be in this spring. Not that she cared in the least, but it did keep her mind occupied.

Sunday loomed, long and lonely, before her. Usually, she went to church in the morning, more out of habit than anything else. Sometimes she shook up her schedule by trying to sleep in, then going to Sunday-evening services. Either way, the day was long.

Maybe she should join one of the volunteer groups at church. There was one that built or repaired houses for the elderly. That might work. She’d be outside and surrounded by a lot of people. She could whack a nail with a hammer every now and then. That might feel good—to hit something.

Gwen had that urge from time to time, and it didn’t shock her anymore, the way it had at first. It was simply how she felt, and it wasn’t like she was going to actually
hurt anyone. She’d be helping, pounding nails into boards in someone’s house.

Maybe next week she’d find the name and number of the project leader and volunteer.

Gwen finished her dinner, eating no more than half of it, and quickly cleaned her plate and utensils and then faced her tidy, empty house.

She felt safe inside its walls most of the time.

Relatively safe. She might actually be getting better. Oh, she got impatient with herself and just plain mad at the whole world sometimes, but that’s just the way life was. Things happened.

Bad things.

People got hurt. They got scared. They got mad. They ran away. They got lost.

Why was that? Gwen just didn’t know.

She sat down on the sofa, curling up on one end, her head against the left arm, her feet tucked under her. Her eyes wandered around the house that still didn’t feel like her own, and she happened to glance at a figurine on the mantel, one her aunt had left behind. It was an angel.

A woman in a beautiful, long, flowing gown with something that looked like wings. She had the kindest expression on her face.

Gwen was at something of a standoff with God ever since the attack—she didn’t think she really believed anymore—but she liked having her angel on the mantel, liked to imagine a real angel sent by God watching over her. There was something motherly about the idea, and Gwen had been missing her mother since she moved here.

Her mother hadn’t quite understood what had happened to Gwen. Gwen understood not wanting to believe awful things could just happen to people. But when that
led to people thinking she was somehow responsible…That’s when she stopped understanding and was just plain hurt.

Plus, there was that whole mad-at-God thing Gwen had going on, which her mother really disapproved of. The attack had somehow become a test of faith that Gwen had failed, at least in her mother’s eyes.

Things had gone from bad to worse at home, and Gwen had just wanted to get away. So when her aunt had decided to move, Gwen had jumped at the chance to come to Magnolia Falls.

She curled up on her couch, her head on a pillow tucked into one end, all the lights still burning, the music still playing softly to cover all those pesky little night sounds, her little figurine seeming to watch over her in a way she found comforting beyond any kind of logic, and in that moment, the day didn’t seem so horrible or overwhelming.

She needed someone to listen, to say that yes, sometimes life was really scary and so very difficult, and that people on Earth really didn’t quite understand why; she needed someone to even be a little angry on her behalf.

As if what had happened to her had been so bad, it could make God mad? It hadn’t been. Not in the grand scheme of things.

It had just shaken her to the core, left her feeling vulnerable and alone. It was like being dropped in a deep, dark hole and not knowing how to get out.

So she’d come here, to a place where no one really knew her, a place she’d visited a few times and always felt safe. To a place where the man who’d attacked her wouldn’t be able to find her once he got out of prison. That had been important to her—that he wouldn’t know where she was.

She’d told herself she’d rebuild her life here, that she’d get better.

Maybe she would.

In the meantime, she curled up almost in a ball and miserably poured out her troubles to an empty room and wondered if anyone was listening.

I’m so tired,
Gwen said.
Everything seems so hard, like such an effort. Sometimes, I don’t know how I’ll be able to go on, if things are always this hard. Help me. Please. Couldn’t you just help me? Couldn’t you just take all the pain away?

And when she was done, she cried a little bit, closed her eyes and imagined someone stroking her hair, telling her everything was going to be okay.

Jax woke disoriented, with the sun blazing into his eyes. He groaned and rolled over, to get away from the light, then realized he was on the sofa in his mother’s living room.

Wincing at the pain in his head, he stared at the clock, and saw that it was six-thirty. Late for him.

He rolled up and onto his feet, shrugging out the kinks as he walked down the hall, had the bedroom door open and actually stared at the empty bed for at least fifteen seconds before he remembered his mother was gone.

It hit him once more, as if it were happening all over again. He’d counted on this day being a tiny bit easier, but it didn’t seem to be working that way. He didn’t know how to do this, how to say goodbye to the woman who’d taken care of him his entire life, how to be without her.

The bedsprings creaked ever so slightly, and his heart gave a lurch, thinking maybe it had all been some horrible dream. He rushed over to the bed and started digging through the covers.

And uncovered the dog.

“Romeo?” he yelled. “What are you doing?”

The dog whined and laid his head down on the pillow. Big, sad puppy eyes seemed to ask where Jax’s mother was, why she wasn’t in her bed where she belonged and when she’d be coming home.

“She’s not coming back,” Jax said. “She’s gone.”

How would he ever make this ridiculous creature understand, when Jax didn’t understand himself?

Romeo made a pitiful squeaking sound and buried his nose in the pillow, as if he might find Jax’s mother there.

Jax was getting ready to yell at the dog again, when he heard a sound behind him. His sisters, all three of them, standing in a row like the little stair-step girls he remembered, crowded into the doorway watching him with the dog.

They’d spent the night, not wanting to be alone any more than he had, and now they looked bleak, exhausted, angry, as surprised as he’d been to see that today might even be harder than the day before and probably wondering how they, too, would get through it.

There was nothing to say. The reality of the situation said it all.

Romeo started whining again, low, heartbroken sounds, something like Jax might have made himself, if he’d allowed himself the luxury.

He was getting ready to yell once more, but Kim got to Romeo first. She knelt by the side of the bed, fussing over the dog and hugging him and crying.

Fine.

She could comfort the canine, offer him something Jax denied himself. He looked back at his other two sisters, who gave him a look that said plainly,
What else is there to do?

Katie finally offered to go make coffee. Kathie said she was getting dressed because they had so much to do. Jax walked out onto the back porch, just to get out of the house and all the misery that seemed to be contained inside it. He stood there and listened to the birds making a racket, a car being started down the block, a siren blaring in the distance.

Day One without his mother.

It had to get better, because if it didn’t, he wouldn’t be able to stand it.

Jax got elected to go to the funeral home, something that made cutting off his right arm sound not so bad. He shoved open the door and marched down the hall, determined to get it over with as quickly as possible. He didn’t care what the funeral cost, and he really didn’t care what the service was like.

Sorry, Mom,
he whispered, as if she might hear.

Jax knew the director, John Williams, who also served as the county coroner. How in the world did he handle those two jobs day after day?

John met him at the door and tried to put him at ease with small talk, but Jax cut him off.

“I need to do this and get out of here,” he said, taking a seat in John’s office.

“Sure,” John said, opening up a file on his desk. “I understand. And I have some…well, relatively good news. Your mother wanted to spare you and the girls as much as possible, so she came to see me a few months back and took care of all the planning herself.”

“She did?” Jax asked.

“Yes.”

“Thank you, Mother,” he said aloud, sagging into the chair, thinking he might just slide right out of it if he wasn’t
careful. Then found himself near tears thinking about her, able to think clearly enough and unselfishly enough to do this herself to make things easier for him and his sisters. “She tried to make the whole thing as easy on us as possible. I mean, there she was, dying, and still trying to take care of us.”

“I know. That’s the kind of woman she was.” He went over all the details of the service, then said, “That’s it, really. Unless there’s something else I can do?”

Bring her back to life?
Jax thought.

Wasn’t going to happen.

Explain to him why it was that people had to die?

He doubted that was in the funeral-home instruction manual.

Tell him how people got through this?

That was an idea. This man faced death every day. He had to know so much more about it than Jax did.

Tell him what was left of his mother was nothing but flesh and bones. That it wasn’t really her. That she wasn’t here and she wasn’t dead? That she never would be?

That would help. But Jax didn’t think he believed that, either, although right now, he very much wanted to. He wanted something to hang on to, and it just didn’t feel as if there was anything.

“I wish there were more I could say.” John shook his head. “But the only real thing I’ve learned in this business is that life is precious. Every day is. A lot of people spend so much time worrying about silly, inconsequential things or chasing after things that, in the end, really don’t mean a thing.”

“The make-every-day-count stuff?” Jax asked.

“Yeah. Something like that. Your mother did that. She was a happy woman, walked in here with a smile on her
face while she made all the arrangements. She brought two of her favorite blouses—a pink one and a yellow one—and asked me which one I thought she’d looked better in. She went with the pink because she thought it was the cheeriest color, nothing dark or gloomy or anything like that. And a pretty, matching scarf for her head. I guess she hated all the wigs she tried.”

“Yeah. She said they were all too hot and itchy.” She’d used the most brightly colored scarves she could find. They’d turned it into a joke, all of her friends and family trying to outdo each other in finding the loudest, funniest scarves they could for her, and she’d worn them all with a smile on her face, refusing to feel sorry for herself.

“That reminds me,” John said. “She wanted you to spread the word for her—no black at the funeral. Her request.”

“Okay.” He could do that and he even managed not to blurt out,
Like that’s going to help?

He found tears welling up in his eyes once again. What a horrible day.

“I have to go,” he said abruptly, getting to his feet.

“Sure. Take this,” John said, handing him a piece of paper. “Everything’s written down. Call me if you have any questions. We’ll take good care of her, Jax.”

“I know. Thanks.”

He drove back to his mother’s house, but it was empty except for the dog, who looked up hopefully when the door opened, only to be severely disappointed when he realized it was only Jax.

Jax went to the refrigerator and found neat, precise notes from his sisters, all of whom had set off to take care of their assigned tasks, plus a note that Gwen Moss called, saying she’d be at the flower shop anytime after 1:00 p.m.

Flowers were the only thing left on his list, and it just
so happened that the flower shop was on the edge of the park where he and Romeo ran.