He didn’t look much older than me; I guessed twenty or so, the same age as John the fink. But much more … just more.
‘You are Sylvie Davis, yes?’ He waved a hand in front of my face. Gigi lunged playfully, a mile off the mark, but the stranger drew back his hand anyway.
I blinked, and shut my gaping mouth. It was a little harder to get my thoughts back into line.
‘Do I know you?’ It was a rhetorical question. Momentary weirdness aside, I knew I would have remembered if I’d met him before.
‘No.’ The word was blunt, but not unfriendly. ‘I’m Rhys. Rhys Griffith.’ He pronounced it like ‘Reese’, but with a tiny flip of the r. ‘Your cousin Paula sent me in to fetch you.’
I hardly knew Paula, but that didn’t seem right. I was ‘kin’, after all. ‘Is there something wrong?’
He smiled, slightly. Apparently I was easier to read than I liked to think. ‘She’s waiting with the car in the loading zone. Not to worry.’
That was more in keeping with the woman I’d spoken with, albeit briefly, on the phone. It didn’t explain this guy, however.
‘Is it only the one case?’ he asked, while I tried to fix my mental bearings.
‘No. There’s a smaller one for the dog.’ I pointed out Gigi’s suitcase on the conveyer belt, and he grabbed it and set it down in front of me, giving my brain a chance to catch up a bit.
‘How did you recognize me?’ I asked.
He looked me over, teasing, I think. ‘Skinny girl, hair wound up tight in a bun, posture like the Queen of England? There’s really no mistaking you, Miss Prima Ballerina.’
Now my native suspicions kicked in, and I narrowed my eyes. ‘How do I know Paula really sent you?’
‘She said you’d be prickly, and likely too stubborn to admit you needed help with your baggage because of your leg.’
I tightened my jaw – stubbornly. ‘The whole world knows I broke my leg.’
‘Maybe.’ He telescoped out the handle on the suitcase with an efficient twist, then raised one expectant black brow. ‘But who knew you and your designerpurse dog would be in Birmingham, Alabama, today, princess?’
With that sally, he headed towards the exit, wheeling my big fuchsia suitcase behind him. He moved with an easy gait, comfortable in his own skin. I stared stupidly for a moment, then realized he was leaving with all my clothes.
I pulled out the handle on Gigi’s case – it held her collapsible crate, her toys and all her food – and hurried after him, gritting my teeth against the hitch in my step. I didn’t always limp, but it had been a long, tiring day. The physical therapist said it was unreasonable for me to expect bone and muscle to rehabilitate overnight. Obviously she didn’t know me very well. I was used to expecting unreasonable things from my body.
Fortunately, Rhys wasn’t walking very fast. I was able to catch up without too much effort or embarrassment. Gigi, happy to be moving again, gazed around avidly. Airports were full of interesting people – and smells, I suppose, from the canine perspective.
‘She’s not a designer-purse dog,’ I said, panting only slightly.
‘No?’ He glanced down at me, and slowed his steps a little more. I’m tall enough that I can look most guys in the nose, if not the eyes, but my head barely reached his chin. ‘What’s her name?’
I clenched my teeth and answered. ‘Gigi.’ He laughed and I bristled defensively. ‘It’s short for Giselle.’
Actually, she came with the name Gigi, and I’d decided it was short for something less ridiculous. I’d gotten her from a socialite who didn’t want her when she – the dog, I mean – turned out to be inconveniently large. That is to say, too big to fit into Prada’s new ‘it’ bag.
‘She’s a secondhand reject dog, and she’s quite vicious. She’ll bite you if you’re mean to me.’
The vicious dog had propped her front paws on the bag, her ear fluff blowing in the breeze, like she was joyriding from my shoulder in her own mini sports car.
Rhys looked us both up and down. ‘“Though she be but little, she is fierce.” ’
Humour broadened his accent, exaggerating the roll of the r and the length of the vowels until it was almost unintelligible.
‘You’re not from around here, are you?’
‘What was your clue?’ he asked, smiling in profile.
I skirted around a woman with a cell phone and hair like a helmet. ‘The accent. And insulting me with a Shakespeare quote.’
He slanted me an unrepentant look. ‘Is “fierce” an insult on this side of the Atlantic? My apologies.’
‘I meant the “little” part, if you really mean skinny.’ He didn’t answer, which I took for an affirmative. I switched the hand pulling Gigi’s suitcase and shifted the carrier to my other shoulder. ‘How do you know Paula?’
‘My father and I are staying at your cousin’s place while Dad does some work in the area.’
I wrestled with the logistics of that, since I was staying there too. ‘Is her house particularly large?’
‘Large enough.’ He glanced at me. ‘We won’t be getting underfoot, if that’s your worry.’
‘No.’ By which I meant yes, because the other thing in my suitcase besides clothes was books. I intended to park myself on the veranda or under a magnolia tree or whatever they had here and read until it was time to return to civilization. ‘Just worried about bathroom space.’
My steps slowed as we reached the exit – a revolving door flanked by two sets of regular ones. Airports were transitional, an extension of the plane that got you there, and a link to the place you came from. Stepping outside and putting my feet on the ground – the real ground, not the tarmac – somehow seemed a bigger commitment than getting on the plane in New York.
Rhys straight-armed the crossbar and held open the door, standing back to let me pass. With Gigi’s carrier over my shoulder, I had to edge through sideways. I held my breath, not because the fit was so tight, but to avoid the possibility of another head trip. Imagining things while I was drunk was one thing. Weird déjà vu with a stranger in the airport, on the other hand …
I chanced a quick peek up at Rhys and found him studying my face as if there would be a pop quiz later. It was a serious expression, and when my eyes met his, he didn’t look away or apologize for staring. He merely raised his brows from their scowl of concentration, and gave me a quick, rueful smile that stopped me in the doorway.
The sounds of the busy airport retreated. Behind him, I could see the steady spin of the revolving door, people coming and going, while I stood on the threshold with Rhys, neither in nor out. The heat and humidity bathed one half of me; the air-conditioning chilled the other. And from the guy sharing the doorway, a different sort of warmth entirely.
‘Don’t look like that, love.’
The endearment startled me, but he said it like an American guy might say ‘dear’ or ‘honey’ – if a guy could manage to say it without sounding patronizing or sexist. Rhys managed to make it merely a friendly word, like buddy or Mac.
‘Look like what?’ I tried to sound normal, which was a trick, when I hardly remembered what normal was.
‘As if you’re walking into the lion’s den.’ He nodded towards the outside, both punctuating his statement and gesturing for me to get on with it. The intimacy of the moment was gone. ‘Chin up. I’m sure you’ll feel at home in no time.’
I wasn’t sure I had a home any more. It wasn’t merely about Mother and me moving in with Steve. The ballet studio had been where I lived. The sweat-soaked air, the squeak of rosined toes on the floor. Our apartment had only been a place to sleep at night, to kill time until I could get back to the studio.
Now I would never dance again, and my whole life had become about killing time, about waiting. But for what, I had no idea.
Chapter 3
I couldn’t have described Cousin Paula from the single time I’d met her, but I had no difficulty finding her in the loading zone outside the airport. Not once I’d gotten
my sunglasses on and stopped staggering from the heat, anyway.
Rhys wheeled my suitcase towards a white sport-utility wagon. The middle-aged woman standing beside it smiled when she saw me, and came to meet me on the sidewalk. She was medium tall, matronly around the middle, with grey-blonde – I suppose ash-blonde would be more tactful – hair in a ubiquitous Southern style: layered bob, fringy bangs, lots of volume. Big hair. Once again, Alabama did not disappoint.
‘Thank heavens,’ said Cousin Paula, her drawl thick with relief. ‘We were running so late, I was worried we would miss you.’
‘Where would I go?’ I asked, not meaning to be snide. It was a miserably literal question. I had no?where else to be.
‘Well, honey, it doesn’t matter. Rhys found you, and you’re here.’ Smiling, she took my shoulders in her hands. ‘We’ll be on our way back to Cahaba and get you set to rights in no time.’
I think she meant well. But I didn’t need ‘setting’. I just needed – well, that was the question of the hour. My mother, the stepshrink, my real shrink, my physical therapist – everyone seemed to know what I needed, except me.
I caught Rhys’s eyes on me as he placed the suitcase by the rear of the vehicle, ready to load. The scrutiny reminded me of my manners. ‘Thank you, Cousin Paula. It was kind of you to invite me to stay with you.’
That, at least, I could say genuinely, and she seemed pleased, even as she demurred. ‘Heavens, child, it’s your home, too, for all that your daddy ran off to the big city.’
She motioned towards the car, and started to take my arm, but there was a dog in the way. Gigi gave a friendly yip, and my cousin recoiled with a gasp. ‘Good lord.’ She stared at the bag, her hand pressed to her heart. ‘What in the world is that?’
I glanced down as if I didn’t know which ‘that’ she meant. ‘This? My mother’s idea of therapy.’
‘She didn’t mention you were bringing a dog,’ said Paula, not quite aghast, but not exactly charmed.
Gesturing to the airport doors, I said, not quite joking, ‘Is it a problem? Because I can see if the airline will let me fly back early.’
‘No, of course not.’ Her tone, though, was doubtful as she eyed the dog. ‘But where is she going to sleep? She can’t run loose, and the garden fence won’t hold her.’
‘I have a crate for her.’ My small gratitude for Paula’s hospitality was fading, replaced with growing trepidation. ‘But mostly she goes everywhere with me.’
My cousin’s mouth turned down, making long, unhappy dimples. Gigi cocked her head, cranking the cuteness dial all the way up to irresistible.
Rhys cleared his throat. ‘If you’ll let me take that case, Sylvie …’
‘Oh, heavens,’ said Paula, as if only now realizing we were standing in the loading zone. ‘We can talk just as well on the ride to the house. Do you want front or back?’
‘Whichever,’ I said, letting her choose. She sounded so syrupy sweet on the phone, I hadn’t bet on her being such a force of nature. As she slid into the front passenger seat, I noticed that her khaki capris showed a few wrinkles from the drive, but it hadn’t erased the creases of careful ironing. This just kept getting better and better and better.
Wheeling Gigi’s suitcase to the open trunk, I eyed the back of my cousin’s head and lowered my voice to ask Rhys, ‘So, what’s with the soccer mom wagon?’
It wasn’t the smoothest way to look for some hint as to whether or not Paula had kids. But I didn’t think it deserved the coolly sardonic look I got from Rhys. ‘Sorry I couldn’t manage a limousine, your highness.’
I flushed, and pushed my sunglasses onto my nose, painfully aware that the prominent Dolce & Gabbana logo would seem to prove his point. ‘Don’t be silly,’ I said, matching his tone. ‘I would have settled for a Town Car.’
Rhys responded with a sound halfway between a scoff and a laugh as he stowed the last of my luggage, manoeuvring the heavy suitcase easily into the trunk next to the first one. The broad shoulders under his rugby shirt weren’t just for show, then. Where his sleeves were pushed up, I could see that his hands and forearms were corded with muscle, crisscrossed with the fading remnants of scratches and cuts.
It had been so long since I’d felt anything other than miserable, it took me a moment to recognize curiosity when I felt it. ‘What did you say you were doing in Alabama?’
‘I didn’t,’ he said, shutting me down, but with amusement, finding my perfectly logical question funny for some reason.
I cast my mind back through our conversation, filtered through his digs about my diva dog, and realized it was true; he hadn’t said much of anything about himself. That was both frustrating and unnerving. How could I know nothing about him, but feel so familiar with the twitch of humour at the corner of his mouth, as if the expression had irritated and fascinated me for years?
He closed the hatch while I was ruminating, and I found myself staring at a magnetic sign adorning the back of the car. It read: BLUESTONE HILL INN, CAHAWBA, ALABAMA. Under the lettering was a romanticized depiction of an antebellum-style house, overshadowed by a huge, blossoming tree.
‘Bluestone Hill?’ I asked, trying to tie together the picture, the name, the word ‘inn’ with the scraps of things Dad had said about his childhood.
Rhys put a hand on the top of the SUV and turned to me, as if I’d asked a stupid question. ‘Bluestone Hill. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten the name of your family estate.’
I ignored that as another gibe at my divaness, because if the Davises were some kind of landed gentry, surely Dad would have mentioned it. ‘I mean the “inn” part. Paula runs an inn? Is it a bed-and-breakfast or what?’
‘It’s a work in progress, actually, but …’ He broke off and frowned at me, seeming genuinely baffled. ‘How did you not know that?’
I shrugged uncomfortably, relaxing my jaw when it wanted to get tight and defensive. His disbelief was valid. Reasonable people took some interest in where they were going. Like I needed the reminder I wasn’t reasonable. Confronted with my ignorance, I felt worse than stupid for not asking questions. It seemed a little nuts, and since that night in the Park, that wasn’t something I said lightly, even in my head.
‘I had other things on my mind,’ I said, feigning carelessness, justifying my ignorance to both of us. ‘And my mother made most of the arrangements.’
Glancing at Gigi, who panted placidly in the sticky heat, Rhys acknowledged, ‘There does seem to have been some breakdown in communication.’
He smoothly managed the trick of reaching the door before me and opening it. The idea of climbing into another vehicle, so soon after I’d gotten my feet on the ground – or at least the asphalt – twisted another loop into the weary knot in my stomach. I struggled for a moment with how to fold myself into the back seat with any grace or dignity, then gave up and clambered awkwardly in.
‘All set?’ asked Paula, twisting round to look at me.
I set Gigi’s carrier on the seat and tried to find a comfortable position. Alleged divahood aside, a Town Car would have had more legroom. I settled for stretching my leg out beside Gigi, and tried not to groan as I slipped off my shoe and wiggled my toes. ‘Much better.’
‘That’s good,’ Paula said as Rhys circled to the driver’s side. ‘I figured if you wanted to, you could go to sleep back there. Travelling always wears me out.’
‘I can never sleep in a car.’ Or a plane, or a bus. I’d gotten a lot of reading done while on tour with the company.
Gigi wanted to get out of her carrier and into my lap. I needed a better stretch, and a pain pill, but I settled for digging the bottle of Advil from my purse and swallowing three gelcaps with a swig of bottled water.
I waited until Rhys got behind the wheel and buckled his seat belt, then made a stab at needling him in return for that ‘princess’ business. ‘I’m impressed, Cousin Paula. A British chauffeur. That’s very hightoned. Your guests at the inn will be very impressed.’
In the r
earview mirror, Rhys shot me a narroweyed glare, but Paula just laughed. ‘If I could afford to offer him a job, I would. As it is, he’s been so helpful and tolerant with the work on the house, I hardly think of Rhys or his father as guests at all.’
As the chauffeur in question pulled the car onto the road, I took the opportunity to find out whether there would be crack-of-dawn power-tool wake-up calls. ‘How is the work on the inn going?’
Rhys gave a soft snort. He knew that I hadn’t known until two minutes ago that there was an inn at all. He didn’t mention that fact, and thankfully Paula missed his nonverbal commentary.
‘Oh, lord,’ she said, as if revving up for a recitation. ‘You would not believe the work we’ve done on the old place. There’s still so much left to do, sometimes I don’t know where I’ll get the strength. This project is half cursed, half blessed, I think.’
‘What makes you say that?’ I admit that my interest was merely polite. But talking distracted her, and I was able to slip Gigi from her carrier and into my lap, which made us both happier.
Paula shrugged. ‘Oh, I suppose we’ve just met the normal roadblocks. Hundred-year-old plumbing, vintage copper wiring—’
‘Installing an extra loo on the first floor,’ added Rhys, his eyes on the road as we approached the entrance ramp to the highway.
‘Exactly!’ said Paula. She glanced back at me, but didn’t seem to notice the dog. Probably because I’d slipped off my sweater and covered Gigi with it. ‘But your great-great-great-grandfather – or however many it is – knew what he was doing. The house is solid as a rock. There have been some major expenses, but otherwise things have magically fallen into place. And of course, I’m lucky to have Clara.’
Crap. Was I supposed to know who that was? In the rearview mirror, Rhys looked amused at the hole I’d dug for myself. ‘Um … so, Clara’s been a big help?’ I asked vaguely.
‘I couldn’t ask for a better business partner,’ said Paula. ‘It helps that she’s an amazing cook. She’s kept us all fed. And her daughter recruited the Teen Town Council to help with rebuilding the summerhouse. They’ve been great.’