He called her cell but was sent to voice mail. He wandered about the empty house, saw that she’d made the bed with freshly washed sheets, and he stretched out on it. It was late and he knew he should shower and go to bed, but he didn’t want to. Besides, he didn’t want to wash Gemma off his skin.
He lay there, looking at the ceiling and thinking about her, especially about how she made him feel. That he’d talked to her about Jean, been honest with her and she’d not judged him, had been good. There were so many things he liked about Gemma, how calm she was, how . . . He grinned. How beautiful her body was.
He indulged himself in memory of their time together in bed. He liked the strength of her, the—
He broke off when his cell buzzed. It was his father.
“I hear you were out fighting crime today,” Peregrine Frazier said. “What was it? Kids?”
Colin wasn’t about to discuss a case with his father. His solution to every crime in Edilean was for Colin to turn it over to the Williamsburg police, and go back to selling cars.
“Dad,” Colin said seriously. “I need to talk to you.”
“Yeah? What’s going on?”
“Is Mom there? Will she hear you?”
“No, I’m alone,” his father said as he looked across the room at his wife. She moved to sit on the ottoman near him and put her head beside the phone.
“How upset do you think Mom will be to hear that I’ve broken up with Jean?”
“Well,” Peregrine said slowly while waving at his wife to stop dancing about the room. “Your mother has always liked Jean. In fact, we all love her, but . . .”
“But what?”
“Neither your mother nor I could see her living in Edilean.”
Alea Frazier was mouthing “Gemma! Gemma!” to her husband.
“Look, son, I wouldn’t be too down about this. Breakups happen. I remember one time when I was in college, and I—”
Alea looked at him in threat.
Grinny cleared his throat. “I played golf with Henry Shaw today and he said you were at Sara and Mike’s yesterday.”
“No secret in that.”
“He also told me that pretty little Gemma was so angry at you about something that she wouldn’t speak to you.”
Alea looked at her husband in horror, as that was news she hadn’t heard. She made a grab for the phone, but her husband kept it out of her reach.
Grinny got out of his chair and turned his back on her. “What I mean to say, Colin, is that it isn’t good to mistreat an employee so she gets angry at you. I think you should—”
“We made up,” Colin said.
“Made up? What does that mean?”
“Dad, you aren’t that old. Gemma and I made up,” he said emphatically.
Grinny turned to his wife and gave a thumbs-up. “I’m glad to hear it. Henry said Gemma put on a sort of boxing exhibition. Did she?”
“Oh yeah,” Colin said in a way that let his father know how good she’d looked.
“Sorry I missed that,” Grinny said, and Alea frowned at him. She pointed to her ring finger on her left hand. Grinny looked at her in disbelief, then turned away. “So you and Gemma are now on good terms?”
“We’re friends,” Colin said, “and that’s all you’re going to get out of me. Have you seen her in the last hour or so?”
“No,” Grinny said. “She isn’t with you?”
“Not at the moment. I thought she’d gone back to the guesthouse, but she’s not answering her phone.”
Grinny took a deep breath, as he always did before he started a speech. “You know, son, Gemma is a pretty young woman and she’s fresh blood in this town, if you know what I mean. She’s been seen out a lot with young Dr. Tris. If I were you, I’d make my feelings for her known sooner rather than later. I don’t want you to hesitate and lose your chance.”
“You mean I should hurry up and claim her as my own?” Colin said.
“That’s exactly what I mean.”
“Mom is there, isn’t she? And she’s nagging you to help her get one of her kids married.”
“You’re right on, boy. You hit that nail square on the head.”
“Mom doesn’t care who I marry, just that I do it, is that right?” Colin said.
“I think it’s more the end result.”
Colin groaned. “Not grandkids again. I wish Ariel’d come back so Mom could go after her.”
“You’re the oldest, so responsibility falls on your shoulders.” Grinny was looking at his wife and she was nodding in approval at what he was saying.
“I’m doing my best, Dad. Would you check that Gemma got back safely?”
“Sure,” Grinny said. He paused. “You think Jean will . . . I mean . . .”
“Come and cook for you?” Colin asked. “She probably would, but she might spike the punch with antifreeze.”
“Too bad,” Grinny said. “Too, too bad. You think Gemma can—”
“No, she can’t cook. Good night, Dad.”
“Good night, son.”
As Colin got off the bed and went to the kitchen, he was shaking his head at his father’s phone call and thinking about his mother listening. He knew there wasn’t anything in the refrigerator, but he looked anyway.
The unopened bottle of champagne from Tess was there, and to his surprise, Gemma had filled the refrigerator with food. There was also a note from her. That she’d left it inside the refrigerator made him laugh. She was beginning to know him almost too well.
I had fun at the grocery. Tell you about it later. Sleep well. Gemma
He pulled food out of the fridge, and minutes later, he was sitting at the counter and eating chicken, broccoli rabe, a big twice-baked potato, and drinking his favorite beer from the bottle.
When his phone buzzed, he grabbed it, hoping it was Gemma. Instead, it was a text from Sara.
Did you hear what Gemma did with Mr. Lang today?
Immediately, Colin called Sara. She answered on the first ring. “Tell me everything,” he said.
“I want to, but Mike says I can’t. He says it’s up to Gemma to tell you. Think it’ll get you two back together?”
“Don’t play dumb with me! I’m sure Luke and Rams told you that Gemma and I bought a lot of furniture today. We are back together. Lang didn’t play one of his tricks on Gemma, did he?”
“Calm down,” Sara said. “Mr. Lang is now so in love with Gemma that I thought Mike was going to have to give him a pill to calm him down.”
“In love with her? What happened?”
“I wasn’t there, but—Uh oh. I’ve been caught. It’s impossible to snoop when your husband is a detective. Wait a minute.” As he listened, Colin could hear Mike’s low voice in the background. “My husband says he expects you at his gym tomorrow at six-thirty A.M. He said Gemma said she’d tell you everything then. I’m hanging up now to keep from saying another word. We have to leave tomorrow, so call me and tell me what’s up with that robbery. Good night.”
Colin called Gemma’s cell again, but still only got voice mail. He left a message saying he’d heard that he’d been thrown over for Mr. Lang. Thirty minutes later, Colin had showered but there was still nothing from Gemma.
Finally, his father texted him that Gemma was okay and sleeping—and she didn’t like being waked up. Colin went to bed and drifted into sleep, smiling.
19
AFTER COLIN LEFT to investigate the robbery, Gemma took a shower and put clean sheets on the bed. She couldn’t decide whether she wanted to stay there and wait for him or make her way home.
She wandered about the house, looking at the woodwork and thinking about the furniture they’d bought. She couldn’t help wondering if she’d get to use that furniture. Would she ever live in a house that she liked as much as this one?
She thought about all Colin had told her about Jean and she knew she should feel some sympathy for him. The things Jean had said were hurtful. But then, Gemma was also sure she should feel sorry for Jean.
But she didn’t feel any of what she should. Instead, she was glad of everything that had happened, happy that Colin had broken up with Jean and that he now . . . What? Belonged to Gemma?
It was a ridiculous thought. No one owned anyone else. She’d certainly never before felt that she possessed another person. No, Gemma had always been independent, the master of her own fate, the owner of little except what she carried in her mind.
She sat down on a kitchen stool. The truth was that since her father died, she’d “belonged” to no one.
Suddenly, she remembered that she’d thought that her “deepest wish” was to belong somewhere. And isn’t that what was happening in Edilean? Since the day she’d arrived, she’d been falling into the clutches of the town. It wasn’t just that she’d been meeting people. It was as though she’d been given a key to the very inside of the place.
In the short time she’d been in Edilean she’d seen that there were two sides to the town. There were the “newcomers” as she’d heard them called, and then there were the Fraziers and the McDowells, the Connors, the descendants of the seven founding families.
It was this older group that Gemma was being pulled into. It couldn’t be just because she was staying at the Fraziers. It had to be more than that. What if she’d wanted to stay separate from the family? Or join some of the young women she’d seen in Ellie’s store?
In a way, it was almost as though she’d had no choice in the matter. Almost as if someone had . . . She didn’t want to acknowledge what was going through her mind.
It was as if her wish to belong had come from her heart and had been heard. By what? The Heartwishes Stone?
As she went to the refrigerator, she laughed at the idea. When she saw that the only thing in the fridge was a bottle of champagne, she closed the door and took a set of keys off the wall. The least she could do was get Colin some groceries. She looked at the big truck in the garage and hoped it hadn’t been Frazierized and made into some lurching power beast.
When she backed out the vehicle, she was pleased to find that the truck was standard issue. As she drove, she told herself that the idea that she would be granted a Heartwish was ridiculous.
But then she remembered what Colin had written in his journal.
It works for lady Fraziers too.
What if the Stone granted wishes to women who were going to be a Frazier? she thought. But how could it know that? But then, she thought, if a rock could grant wishes—which it couldn’t—and it read those wishes from a person’s heart—absurd idea!—then of course it could know a person’s future.
Still thinking of all this, Gemma went about the grocery filling her cart. She knew little of what Colin liked to eat, except for, as Jean said, beef, but she could guess. She got one of Ellie’s fat chickens fresh off the rotisserie and put it in the basket.
By the time she got to the back of the store, her cart was nearly full, and all she needed was lunch meat. No one was behind the big glass counter. Instead, standing across from it, his back against the shelves between two aisles, was the oddest-looking man Gemma had ever seen. He was about five foot two, with a big, round head, no discernible neck, and a stout little body. When he turned to look at her, she had to work to keep from gasping. His huge eyes and small mouth made him look like a cross between a gnome and Gollum. His skin was pink and fairly tight, with few wrinkles. He could be forty years old or a hundred and ten; Gemma couldn’t tell which.
Instantly, she knew who he was: the infamous Mr. Lang. And for some reason that she couldn’t define, she liked him. Plain ol’ liked him. She wanted to sit down with him and talk, get to know him.
But she didn’t have to know him to see that right now he was very upset. For as solid as he was, he moved quickly, flitting back and forth from one side to the other, looking down one aisle then another.
Gemma didn’t wait for introductions. “What’s wrong?” she asked as she moved close to him. It was almost as though she wanted to protect him.
“They’ll see me,” he said in a deep, guttural voice that sounded as though it was rarely used.
She didn’t waste time asking who. She looked down the aisle on the left and saw three women dressed as though they’d just come from church. They were in what appeared to be a very serious discussion about a jar of jam. The next aisle contained two women, dressed the same, but studying the label on a can of soup. There was no way Mr. Lang could race past either aisle and not be seen.
Gemma looked back at the little man. He was now lifting one foot after another, looking more desperate for escape with each second.
Gemma’s mind raced. Was there some way she could use her body to conceal him and get him out of the store? If it were winter she could have thrown a coat over him, but she had nothing, saw nothing she could use.
With every second, her protective instinct grew stronger. She had to safeguard him! If she’d had a sword she would have stood in front of him and brandished it.
When she turned back, she saw a young store clerk walking past carrying a huge, empty box that had contained paper towels.
Gemma didn’t give herself time to think but ran the few steps to the young man and grabbed the box. Mr. Lang seemed to have read her mind as he moved to the front of the big glass case. Gemma lifted the box over him and he obligingly sank down and the box rim went flat to the floor.
Seconds later, the five women came to the end of the aisles and they stopped at the sight of the big container in front of the glass case.
“It’s not like Ellie to be so messy,” one woman said.
“I think the overall service here has gone down in the last years,” a second woman said.
“Do you think Ellie’s in financial trouble?”
“For heaven’s sake!” the tallest woman said. “Some clerk left a box behind. It isn’t Ellie’s fault. Let’s just move the thing.”
Gemma stepped around the box to put herself in front of the women. “I think it covers up something that spilled. You’d better not get your shoes near it,” she said quickly.
“I hope it’s not toxic,” a woman said.
Gemma feared she was single-handedly destroying Ellie’s reputation. “Actually, I think it’s a broken bottle of maple syrup.”
“I bet that Hausinger boy did it,” a woman in a pink dress said. “I just saw him with his mother. That child is never disciplined.”
“Where is someone to help us?” one of the women asked. “I need some sliced ham.” She pounded on the bell on top of the case.
Gemma stepped between the women and the counter. Now all she had to do was keep the store workers from lifting the box and taking it away.
When Ellie came out of the back, Gemma wasn’t sure how to tell her to play along. The women all started talking at once, very upset about the big box in front of the glass case. Gemma used the noise to slip to the back of the women and began waving her arms and vigorously shaking her head at Ellie. She pointed at the box and mouthed, “No!”
When one of the women looked back at Gemma, she dropped her hands.
Ellie doesn’t miss a beat. “What can I get for you ladies today? The red snapper just came in.” She had to listen to the women’s complaints about the aisle being blocked, all of it presented in a way that was meant to sound constructive, even caring, but wasn’t. When Ellie encouraged them to give their orders, one of the women looked at Gemma as though wondering who she was and said she was there first.
Gemma put her hand on top of the box, leaning on it in a proprietary way, and said that she hadn’t made up her mind yet.
Ellie filled the orders of the women and dispatched them in record time. When one of them dawdled over the price, Ellie said she’d forgotten that for today only it was on sale at half price.
The second the women turned to leave, Ellie ran to the front of the counter. She told a clerk to follow the women to make sure they didn’t double back, then she looked at Gemma. “What have you trapped? Please tell me it’s not a rat.” br />
Gemma couldn’t help grinning mischievously as the two women lifted the big box straight up. Sitting on the floor, his legs crossed and looking perfectly content, was Mr. Lang.
“That’s recycling at its finest,” Ellie said, making Gemma laugh.
With the agility of a much younger person, Mr. Lang stood up and stared at Gemma for a moment. He started to leave, but then he turned back and said, “Thank you.” He disappeared down an aisle.
“I’m not sure I’ve ever heard him say those words before,” Ellie said as she nodded to a clerk to take the box away.
“You mind telling me what that was all about?” Gemma asked.
“Was Lang afraid the women would see him?”
“He acted like they had rifles and he was their prey.”
Ellie chuckled. “If anyone did that it would be me. I’d go after him for overcharging me for his produce. Anyway, Lang knows about people in Edilean back to the 1930s, and he’s become much sought after to answer people’s questions about their ancestors.”
“He’s a genealogist?”
“Ha! Lang is a snoop, has been all his life. He likes to listen in on people and spy on them.”
“That’s not nice,” Gemma said.
“Lang never tries to be ‘nice.’”
“So who are the women?”
“They are members of the Edilean Ladies League and they want him to speak at their next meeting.”
“But isn’t that an honor? Or is he afraid of public speaking?”
“He’s afraid of being seen. He likes to remain anonymous. If he could be invisible, he would be. Being recognized keeps him from being able to do his spying. He used to be somewhat feared in this town and he loved that, but now he’s almost a celebrity.” Ellie smiled. “Last fall when my daughter caught a couple of criminals, she inadvertently made Lang into a respectable person. It’s been a joy to see his misery.”
“That sounds ominous,” Gemma said, but she couldn’t help smiling at Ellie’s gleeful tone.