Thirty and a Half Excuses (12 page)

When I arrived at the nursery, Violet was already there, humming as she watered the flowers on the sidewalk.

I cast a sly glance at her. “Your date must have gone well.”

Her grin was mischievous. “Mhmm.”

“What did you guys do?”

“Brody took me to Jaspers for dinner, and then we drove over to Magnolia to see a movie.”

“Sounds fun.”

She smiled. “We’re going out again tonight.”

“What about Ashley and Mikey?”

Cocking her head, she lifted her eyebrows. “Well…now that you mention it…”

“Oh.” She wanted me to watch them.

“With Joe being gone, I figured you wouldn’t have anything else to do.”

She was right, and I loved my niece and nephew. They’d help fill the empty evening ahead of me. “Sure, why not? But I don’t know when I’ll be back from truck shopping.”

Violet rolled her eyes. “That again? How are you gonna fit their car seats into your truck?”

“Seeing as how I’m not their mother, I don’t suppose I need to worry about fittin’ their car seats in my truck.”

Her mouth dropped in surprise at my snippy tone.

I couldn’t believe I’d said that to her.

She stared at me, clearly waiting for me to apologize, but I just stiffened my back, staring at her.

I suddenly wondered if I was being fair. Violet was my sister and her husband had left her. She needed help from time to time, and why should I begrudge her that? A good sister would offer without resentment. “Look, Vi. A truck seats three people, so of course the car seats will fit. Besides, I did a little research on the Internet last night and lots of trucks have a back seat. We can fit the car seats there if not in the front.”

My answer somewhat appeased her, but she gave me the cold shoulder most of the morning. When I took off my apron to meet Mason for lunch, she eyed me up and down. “I didn’t mention how pretty you look today. I like your hair like that.”

Since I hadn’t planned on working at the church, I’d worn a sundress, and I’d pulled my hair back into a loose French braid that Neely Kate had taught me how to do. But I wasn’t sure how to address her obvious insinuation. For someone who wanted me to watch her kids, she was acting pretty spiteful. “Thank you.”

“You’re gonna be back in time to watch the kids, right? You can pick them up from Mike’s parents’ house.”

I paused, picking up my purse. “You’re not bringing them over?”

She scrunched up her face. “Why do you think I mentioned the car seats? Mike’s parents have them.”

I stared at her for a full five seconds, wondering where in tarnation my sister had gone, because the woman on the other side of the counter wasn’t her.

“Any other instructions?” I’d meant it as a snide comment, but it went right over Violet’s head.

“Just bring them here tomorrow morning. We’ll let them play for a while, and then we’ll send them off with Mike.”

Since the beginning of our joint venture, I’d wondered how she was going to make the nursery work with her kids. At the moment, it seemed as though her plan was to ship them off to everyone else. But that wasn’t fair. Violet was a single mother, trying to build a business that would support her and her children. It was obvious she would have to spend a lot of time away from them. I had just expected that it would bother her more.

I was so frustrated with her that I didn’t even tell her goodbye when I left. I tried to settle down by the time I found a parking spot on the town square, only one block from the restaurant. I arrived early and was seated by the time Mason showed up at the door. He spotted me right away and made his way through the narrow aisle, a wide grin on his face.

“Ready to get a truck?” he asked, sitting across from me.

“Yeah.” Trying to find enough excitement to match his.

His eyebrows lifted. “Are you having second thoughts? We don’t have to do this today if you want to take more time to think it over.”

“No.” I looked into his face and smiled. “That’s not it. The more I think about it, the more I know getting a truck is the right thing to do.”

“So what’s the problem?”

The waitress came over and took our order before I could answer Mason. A vision popped into my head. When it was done less than a second later, I was staring up at her. “Your mother-in-law is going to call you tonight.”

“Excuse me?” she asked.

Mason’s eyebrows rose.

The waitress put her hand on her hip. “Why would you say that?”

I cringed in embarrassment and lowered my gaze to the table, my hands shaking in my lap. “Just call it a hunch.”

“What a strange thing to say,” she muttered, walking away.

Mason studied me for several seconds as I willed my racing heart to slow down. It had been inevitable that I’d have a vision in front of him sooner or later. How he reacted to it would determine if he’d remain my friend.

He ignored the bizarre interaction, picking up the thread of our previous conversation instead. “Rose, I can’t help noticing that you’re not very enthusiastic about this. If you’d rather go alone, I understand.”

“No, I want you to come. I just wish my sister understood.”

“Ah.” He picked up a sugar packet and twisted it around with his fingers. “What’s the real reason she doesn’t want you to get a truck?”

“Honestly, I don’t know.”

Mason set the sugar on the table and lowered his head so his eyes were level with mine. “The relationship between siblings is fascinating, don’t you think?”

“I’d never really given it much thought.”

“I bet you and your sister fight? Right?”

“You don’t know that half of it.”

“And you drive each other crazy.”

“Yeah.”

“But you’d do anything to protect her if you could, right?” he said with a hitch in his voice.

Something in his eyes grabbed my heart. “Yes,” I whispered.

I wanted to ask him about his sister. Mason had told me something really bad had happened to her, but I didn’t know what. I couldn’t help thinking that Joe was somehow involved. I wasn’t sure why, maybe because this was Mason’s deep, dark secret, and Joe had a secret too. How many deep, dark secrets could there be? But somehow I knew what had happened to Mason’s sister was twined with Joe. It was a deep, gut instinct. And that knowledge scared the bejiggers out of me.

“Well, look at you two!” Neely Kate squealed next to me. She must have seen us and ducked into the restaurant, and I’d been too busy in my staring contest to notice. “Got room for one more?”

Mason looked up at her with a friendly smile. “Of course. You must be the infamous Neely Kate.”

She put a hand on her hip, grinning. “One and the same, Mr. Deveraux.”

“Call me Mason, please.” He stood and grabbed a chair from another table, holding it behind Neely Kate and waiting for her to sit. “I know we’ve seen each other before—the time you applauded after Rose told me off outside my office comes to mind—but I don’t think we’ve been introduced.”

If I were in Neely Kate’s position, I’d probably die of embarrassment, but she was an entirely different girl. “It seems to me you deserved every bit of that tongue-lashing. In fact, there are still people all over the courthouse who lament that it wasn’t caught on video.”

Mason burst out laughing. “Maybe next time Rose will alert someone to whip out their cell phone.”

As Mason slid in Neely Kate’s chair, she shot me an amused and surprised look. The waitress gave our table a wide berth, casting a wary glance my direction, but Mason grabbed her so Neely Kate could make her order.

After the waitress left, Mason turned his attention to my best friend. “We were just talking about you yesterday.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “Were you, now?”

I laughed, thankful Mason was being so nice to her, especially after her declaration. But there was no denying that several months ago he’d been a bear in the courthouse. He was better now, but he was still the assistant DA. His position was probably considered higher than hers. It could have been awkward, but he was going out of his way to make sure it wasn’t.

“Rose was telling me about all the intel you’ve gathered about the goings on in the courthouse, and I confirmed that most of it was true. You have a remarkable accuracy rate.”

She pursed her lips into a smug smile. “I have a way of knowin’ things. But not like Rose. Hers is a true gift.”

Mason’s smile faltered. “What do you mean?”

Neely Kate was lifting a glass of tea, and her hand froze. “He doesn’t know?”

The blood drained from my head, and I struggled with what to say. How could I talk my way out of this one?

Mason continued to watch me, his face becoming expressionless. Every second that passed made it even more impossible to escape this conversational black hole.

Neely Kate set down her glass and turned to me. “I’m so sorry, Rose. I thought he knew.”

“So I’m not the only one with secrets,” Mason finally said, indecision in his eyes as he scooted his chair back, his gaze on me.

I wanted to cry. I had to tell him now. We’d finally started talking again, and now he was going to either call me crazy or think I was lying. Any way I sliced it, this was sure to end badly.

Neely Kate turned to Mason, steeling her back. “If you want her to tell you, you better wipe that hurt look off your face. She’s only told a few people. I only thought she would have said something since you two are friends…”

“He’s been avoiding me since the trial.” I pushed out.

She rolled her eyes. “Well there you go. You haven’t been around for her to tell, have you?” Her eyes narrowed. “She only tells people she trusts. Can she trust you with her secret, Mason Deveraux?”

He turned to me, leaning his forearms on the table. “You can trust me with anything, Rose.”

The way he said it made me think he meant something more than just this secret. But it still wasn’t easy.

A lump burned my throat. “You know I don’t have a lot of friends here in Henryetta. But you don’t know the reason why.”

“I thought it was because you tried your best to annoy them all,” he joked, but it fell flat. The fact he was trying to help ease me into this gave me hope he’d understand.

“Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve
known
things I shouldn’t know.”

He watched me, waiting for me to continue.

“I don’t ask for it.” I looked down at the table and took a deep breath. “They’re visions, like a movie playing in my head. But it’s never for me. It’s always for whoever’s next to me.” I paused, still shocked that I was telling him this. “And after the vision is over, whatever I saw just falls out of my mouth.” I bit my lip and looked up to him hesitantly. “When I told you yesterday that your mother was going to like the plant, I’d just had a vision. I saw her—she’s very pretty by the way—and she was thrilled when you handed it to her.”

Mason swallowed, offering me a weak smile. “Well, that’s good to know.”

At least he hadn’t run away yet.

“And the waitress when she took our order?” he prodded.

I nodded, wanting to cry. “That was a vision.”

“She can’t usually control the visions,” Neely Kate added. “They just pop into her head. That’s how she got into the whole Daniel Crocker mess. She was working at the DMV, and he was her customer. She had a vision of herself dead.”

His eyes narrowed in confusion. “But you didn’t die, obviously.”

“My visions aren’t set in stone. They can change if I alter my behavior based on what I see. I saw visions of myself dead three times during that whole mess, and I—or Joe—did something different than what we would have normally done to change things. The second time, Joe disobeyed orders from his supervisor and saved me when I went to meet Daniel at The Wagon Wheel. Crocker had threatened to kill Violet if I didn’t show up. He thought I had a flash drive with information. Joe gave me a flash drive with false information, but he still suspected Crocker was going to murder me, and I think he was right. I had seen a vision of myself lying in the woods at night with a bullet hole in my forehead. Joe snuck me out the back and hid me when Crocker’s men came looking for me.”

Mason paled. “That had to be terrifying. Seeing yourself dead.”

“You think I’m crazy.”

He shook his head and swallowed. “No. I don’t. This is just a lot to process. Give me a chance to catch up.”

“Okay.”

After several seconds, he sighed. “You told me that you knew Bruce Wayne Decker was innocent because you’d overheard a conversation about the case in the men’s bathroom. You really had a vision.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t know what it meant until the lapel pin I saw in the vision came up as evidence in court.”

He nodded, deep in thought.

“You believe her?” Neely Kate asked.

“Of course, I believe her,” Mason said softly. “Rose isn’t a liar, and she’s not prone to exaggeration. If she says this is true, then it is. But you have to understand that my world is based on black and white. What you’re telling me falls squarely into gray territory. I just need to wrap my head around it, is all.”

“Thank you.” I choked out.

His head shot up. “What did you think would happen when you told me?”

“I thought you’d call me crazy and never talk to me again.”

“No, Rose. Now that we’re friends again, it’s going to take a lot more than that to drive me away.”

The waitress came to the table with our food, and we all watched as she put our plates in front of us. I’d lost my appetite.

Neely Kate squirmed in her seat. I’m sure she was worried I was angry with her. I sort of was, but she was right. If Mason really was going to be my friend, he had to know. Especially if I was going to spend any considerable length of time around him.

I picked at my salad with my fork. “People don’t like me knowing stuff. They think I’m a snoop or a gossip, but it’s like Neely Kate said—I can’t control the visions. They just happen. Other people think I’m demon-possessed. It just became easier to hide away and avoid people when I could. So now I’m the weird Gardner sister. I’d figured I’d probably grow old alone and live in my mother’s house with a pack of feral cats.”

A smile lifted his mouth. “I can assure you that you won’t die alone.”