Woman in Blue Page 34

  In spite of her busy schedule, she still managed to put in some time each week at the book café, lending a hand at author events or during peak hours. It was small repayment for all her sister had done for her, she insisted whenever Lindsay protested that she felt like she was taking advantage. Kerrie Ann had noticed, though, that the protests were growing less frequent. The truth was, her sister needed all the help she could get. Business was better than ever now that she was able to devote all her energies to work. Also, word had spread among publishers, thanks in part to Randall, about her creative promotions and great turnouts, and more high-profile authors were going out of their way to make it a stop on their tours.

  The publicity generated by the article in the Chronicle hadn’t hurt, either. That had led to a segment on 60 Minutes, which ironically had achieved what the planned and since scrapped Heywood resort had failed to: It had put their town on the map. Tourism was on the rise, and two new bed-and-breakfasts had opened in the past six months. It was small, steady growth as opposed to an overnight boom, but enough to allow for a general sprucing up of the shops and eateries downtown.

  And in June Lindsay Margaret McAllister Bishop was to become Mrs. Randall Craig. Lindsay had asked Miss Honi to give her away, which tickled the old woman to no end—she loved the idea of walking one of her girls down the aisle and was already planning her ensemble, which would no doubt include sequins and a pair of stiletto heels. Kerrie Ann was to be the maid of honor. “As long as I don’t have to walk down the aisle in some butt-ugly old-lady dress. I’ve got a reputation to uphold, you know?” Kerrie Ann cracked, though secretly she too was delighted to be asked.

  “Don’t worry,” Lindsay teased. “It won’t be anything I wouldn’t wear.”

  But if a large share of the credit for the new and improved Kerrie Ann went to her family and fellow twelve-steppers, a good part was owed to Ollie as well. First and foremost, if it hadn’t been for him, that awful, endless night when her daughter had gone missing might have turned out very differently. And if she had the program and her own hard work to thank for her newfound sense of self-worth, she credited Ollie with opening her eyes to who she was as a woman. She now knew that she had something to offer besides her body. That she was someone a man wouldn’t be embarrassed to introduce to his parents.

  Which hadn’t prevented her from balking the first time Ollie had brought her home to meet his. It was back in October, shortly after Lindsay had announced her engagement, and Ollie had insisted it was high time he properly introduce his parents to his girl. Kerrie Ann had done no more than shake hands with his dad the day he’d testified in court on Lindsay’s behalf and knew his mom only to say hello to from the times she’d stopped in at the book café.

  “What if they don’t like me?” she fretted aloud on the way over.

  “We’ll just have to elope,” Ollie teased.

  “Be serious.”

  “I am serious.” As they jounced along the dirt road in his Willys, Kerrie Ann knew just how a pioneer mail-order bride would have felt pulling into town in a covered wagon, not knowing what awaited her. Ollie took his hand off the wheel to give her a reassuring pat on the knee. “Just be yourself.”

  She groaned. “That’s what I’m worried about. Being myself is usually what gets me into trouble.”

  “Don’t.” He spoke sternly.

  “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t put yourself down. Why do you always assume people won’t like you?”

  “Let’s just say I’ve had some bad experiences.” She thought of all the times, coming to a new foster home, that she’d had high hopes, only to find herself damned before she could prove she was more than just what was in her case file. After a while, she’d stopped trying to make a good impression and had become the hostile kid they all expected her to be.

  “Well, that’s all in the past. You can be pretty likable when you want to be, you know that?” He smiled at her as they pulled up in front of his parents’ modest shingled house.

  “So could Typhoid Mary,” she muttered.

  “Trust me, I wouldn’t subject either of us to the third degree if I thought that’s what this was going to be. Relax, it’s just lunch. And as far as I know, you aren’t on the menu.”

  The thought did nothing to ease her anxiety.

  She found his father, a big, top-heavy man with wind-scoured cheeks and a shock of black hair going gray, to be a man of few words. Over lunch she struggled to make conversation with him. She was beginning to wonder if she’d made any impact at all when, as she was prying at a crab leg in the delicious if somewhat complicated fish stew Ollie’s mother had prepared, she looked up to find him eyeing her in amusement. “Here, let me show you,” he said, demonstrating how to crack the shell, then extract the meat. “It just takes practice. You’ll get the hang of it.”

  In her nervousness, she blurted, “That’s what my teachers were always telling me in school, but somehow I never did get the hang of it.”

  At his parents’ raised brows, Ollie was quick to inform them, “Kerrie Ann just got her GED.”

  “Congratulations. What’s next?” Ollie’s dad spoke in a mild, conversational tone, but she sensed she was being put to the test and took care with her answer.

  “I’d like to go to college. I thought about a career in nursing but decided I’d rather work with people in recovery, so now I’m looking to get a degree in social work.” She felt her cheeks warm. Had she revealed too much? Or would they think it was just a lot of big talk from someone who wasn’t cut out for a career? Kerrie Ann had her own doubts—a college degree seemed almost like wishing for the moon.

  But Ollie’s dad only smiled and said, “That’s good, honest work.”

  Kerrie Ann found Ollie’s mother easier to talk to but more intimidating in a way. Freddie Oliveira, a tall, angular woman with a freckled face and once-copper hair the color of an old penny, was the opposite of her taciturn husband. She was affable like Ollie, but without his goofy sensibility. Yet her keen gaze missed nothing, and throughout the meal Kerrie Ann felt those sharp blue eyes on her more than once, sizing her up while she did her best to make small talk.

  It wasn’t until they were alone in the kitchen, Kerrie Ann helping her wash up, that Freddie remarked, “So Ollie tells me you two are thinking of moving in together.” She paused in the midst of scrubbing a pan to direct her pleasant, eagle-eyed gaze at Kerrie Ann.

  Kerrie Ann dropped her eyes, busying herself with the drying. “We’ve talked about it,” she replied guardedly. After Lindsay and Randall were married, Randall was going to move in with her and Miss Honi, which meant Kerrie Ann would need to find another place to live, something she’d been planning to do anyway. Nevertheless, she wasn’t sure she was ready to take that leap with Ollie. She cared about him deeply, she might even love him, but shacking up with him was a whole other level of commitment. A lot, too, depended on whether or not her daughter would be living with her.

  “He’s worried about leaving you guys in the lurch,” she told Freddie, which was true as well. “He wants to find a place nearby so he can still help out around here.” At the sharp look Freddie shot her, she hastened to add, “But I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you that.”

  “No, and I don’t need Ollie planning his life around us, either,” Freddie replied crisply. “We’re far from ready for the old folks’ home, whatever my son might have told you. We’ll manage.”

  “I’m sure you will, but he kind of feels responsible. You know?” She added, “I don’t have parents of my own, but I like to think if I did, I’d feel the same way Ollie does.” Kerrie Ann blushed once more, wondering if she’d overstepped her bounds.

  Freddie’s direct blue eyes remained pinned on her. “I understand you have a little girl,” she said.

  Kerrie Ann felt her heart sink, certain her fears were being realized: that this meet-and-greet would turn into a tribunal, not unlike the one in The Witch of Blackbird Pond.

  “Yes,”
she said, with some of her old defiance as she met Freddie’s gaze. “And the main thing right now is making a life for me and my daughter. I’m sure you heard what happened, so I don’t have to tell you why she’s not with me. But I’m working to change that. I’m hoping to have her back before too long.” Whatever Ollie’s mother had been told, Kerrie Ann wanted her to know how important this was to her.

  Freddie nodded. “How’s that going?”

  Kerrie Ann wasn’t normally superstitious, but she hesitated before replying, not wanting to jinx it. “With any luck, she’ll be home in time for the wedding.” Randall and Lindsay were getting married the third Sunday in June, and the date for the final custody hearing was set for the first week in May. Still a long way off, but Kerrie Ann’s lawyer had assured her it was for the best, that it would allow enough time for the dust to settle and for her to show that she’d turned over a new leaf.

  Kerrie Ann braced herself for a blast of contempt—how could an honest, hardworking mother of six begin to understand what it had been like for her?—and was surprised when Ollie’s mother replied, “I’ll say a prayer, in that case.” As if musing aloud, she added, “The only thing I’m wondering is whether Ollie’s ready to be a stepdad.”

  Kerrie Ann was so stunned that she almost dropped the saucepan she was drying. “Um, I … I don’t know if that’s gonna happen. I mean, I really care about him, but …” she stammered.

  “Do you love him?” Freddie asked bluntly.

  Backed into a corner, Kerrie Ann was forced to reply, “I think so. But I’ve only been in one other serious relationship before this, and that didn’t go so well, so I don’t know that I can trust my instincts.”

  Ollie’s mother offered her a piece of unexpected advice: “Well, I wouldn’t wait too long to make up my mind if I were you. I nearly lost out on marrying his father that way.”

  “You did?”

  “I was pretty full of myself back then,” recalled Freddie with a dry chuckle as she plunged her hands back into the soapy water in the sink. “Thought I might do better, same as when you’ve got your eye on a flashy new car instead of appreciating the reliable one you’ve got.”

  “Even if I wanted a new car, I couldn’t afford one,” Kerrie Ann said with a laugh.

  The older woman finished scrubbing the last pot and handed it to Kerrie Ann to dry. She squeezed out the dishrag, folding it neatly over the edge of the sink, a deep cast-iron one enameled in porcelain and with oldfashioned fixtures, which Ollie had pointed out to Kerrie Ann earlier on when showing her around the house. The kitchen sink was where he and his brothers and sisters had been bathed as infants, he’d told her. And where he’d learned the first rule of baking: that if you wanted to use the kitchen, you had to clean up afterward. Now it was the place where valuable advice was being imparted to Ollie’s girlfriend regarding their possible future together.

  At last Freddie turned toward her, wiping her hands on her apron. “What I’m saying is, it’s easy to take a man for granted when he’s always there for you. But you can only get away with it for so long. I learned that the hard way after I’d dragged my heels on giving Al an answer to his proposal and he took a job on a commercial fishing boat up in Alaska. I didn’t hear from him for a whole summer, and by the time he got back, I was beside myself. I didn’t even wait for him to pop the question again. I told him I’d marry him before the words were even out of his mouth.” She smiled then, a smile that radiated outward, lighting up her whole face and deepening the fine lines at the corners of her eyes. “After forty-two years, I can safely say I made the right choice. The ones built to last might not be as fun or flashy as some thrill ride, but they get you where you want to go.”

  Kerrie Ann smiled and nodded. No more was said on the subject, but she felt more relaxed around Freddie after that.

  Now, months later, Kerrie Ann was on her way to San Luis Obispo to find out if she would pass muster with the judge presiding over her case. It was a mild day in May, sunny but breezy, and she was riding with Ollie along the now familiar route while her sister and Randall, accompanied by Miss Honi, brought up the rear in Randall’s Audi. The final custody hearing wasn’t until the following day, but Randall had generously offered to put them all up at a Sheraton near the courthouse, so she’d arrive fresh and rested tomorrow.

  That night, lying in bed with Ollie, Kerrie Ann thought, At least I won’t have to face it alone. She recalled his mother’s words and found herself thinking of how he’d always been there for her.

  “Tell it to me again,” she said.

  “It’s gonna be okay,” he repeated the words he’d spoken so many times that they were like a mantra.

  “What if the judge can’t see that I’ve changed?”

  “He will.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “Because you’re the only one who doesn’t see it.”

  “Is it that obvious?”

  “Uh-huh.” He edged closer, nibbling on her earlobe. “But don’t forget, I liked you to begin with.”

  She turned her head to look at him. The room was dark and his face in shadow. There was only the gleam of his eyes. “What did you see in me?” she asked.

  “I saw someone who’d been down but who never quit trying. That’s what made me fall in love with you—that stubborn streak. You never give up. And you’re not gonna now. Whatever happens tomorrow. One way or another, I know you’ll work it out.”

  “I hope you’re right.” With a sigh, she snuggled up against him.

  They made love that was as tender as it was passionate. Ollie kissed her all over, tiny kisses like a feather brushing over her skin. She’d taught him to rein in his natural exuberance in the bedroom, and he was demonstrating now just how well he’d learned that lesson. She moaned softly, opening herself to him, drawing comfort as well as pleasure from the sweet but insistent pressure of his fingers and exquisitely soft mouth. She gave to him in return, stroking and kissing him all over, taking him into her when neither could hold back a moment longer. As they rocked together in rhythm, she felt closer to him than she ever had to another living being except Bella. When she came, it was with a quiet intensity that was different than anything she had felt with the countless lovers before him; she felt free to just be and not have to fulfill a man’s expectations by making the proper noises and thrashing about as if in the throes of mind-blowing ecstasy. With Ollie, she felt at home, not just with herself but in a safe place where no one could hurt her.

  “That was nice,” she murmured afterward as they lay in each other’s arms.

  “Nice? You mean I didn’t rock your world?”

  “That, too.”

  “Good because, dude, a guy’s got his pride.”

  “Especially a stud like you.” She smiled in the darkness.

  He lifted his head to look at her, his mouth curled in amusement. “You making fun of me now?”

  “No. I’d never make fun of you, Ollie.” She spoke seriously, threading her fingers through his thick shock of hair and pulling his head down to kiss him on the lips. “You’re too good.”

  “I didn’t know there was such a thing as being too good.”

  “Not for everyone. Just some people.”

  “Like who, for instance?”

  “For me. Maybe. I don’t know.”

  “Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?” He pulled her close, holding her protectively.

  But as she drifted off to sleep, her only thought was of the judge to whom she’d have to answer in the courtroom tomorrow. Would he take as benevolent a view? When she stood before him, her deeds—and misdeeds—being weighed, would the good outweigh the bad? She could only hope so. Otherwise, what would have been the point? What would it matter how hard she had worked or how many hours she’d sat in those hard folding chairs at meetings if she didn’t get her daughter back?

  In the morning, she woke to a knot in her stomach. When she joined the others for breakfast, all she ordered was coffee. She
shook her head when Miss Honi pressed a piece of toast on her and urged, “You got to eat, sugar. How else you gonna keep your strength up?”

  “I don’t think I could keep anything down,” she said.

  “I know the feeling,” Lindsay sympathized. “When it was me, I was so nervous, I thought I was going to throw up.”

  “Woulda served them right, those sons a bitches of Old Man Heywood, if you’d upchucked all over their fancy pinstripes,” huffed Miss Honi. She cast a contrite glance at Randall. “Sorry. I know he’s your kin and all, but after what that man put us through …”

  “No need to apologize.” Randall helped himself to a muffin. “My father and I aren’t even on speaking terms at this point. In fact, I think it’s safe to say he won’t be attending the wedding.”

  “At least your stepmother is coming,” Lindsay said.

  “My father’s wife, you mean,” he corrected. “Or ex-wife, I should say.”

  “Whatever; I can’t wait to meet her,” said Lindsay, nibbling on half a toasted bagel smeared with cream cheese. “After all, I have her to thank for the fact that I’m not being evicted from my own home.”

  “Don’t I get some of the credit?” Randall pretended to be put out.

  “Ninety-nine point nine percent of it. But if I let you have it all, I’m afraid it would go to your head,” she teased.

  “Dude, isn’t it enough that you’re rich, famous, and good-looking?” Ollie ribbed him.

  “Not to mention I landed the prettiest bookstore owner in Blue Moon Bay.” Randall reached for Lindsay’s hand, leaning in to give her a proprietary kiss on the cheek.

  Lindsay laughed. “The only bookstore owner in Blue Moon Bay, you mean.”