“What did you tell him about, Elaine?” I asked the question softly, not wanting to upset her more than she already was.
“Me.” She met my gaze steadily, her own very bright. “That was all it took, Philippa, to screw up everything. But if you can’t confide in someone, then why the hell would you spend your life with them?”
She went back to work, ducking her head quickly but not quickly enough that I didn’t see the tear glinting on her lashes.
I decided that Jeffrey McAllister and my father deserved each other.
* * *
Elaine scampered out on a mission mid-afternoon, leaving me alone with my pink-free drawings. They were taking a lot longer to finish than should have been expected, I guess because my heart just wasn’t in it.
The silence from Rosemount was deafening—I hadn’t talked to my mother since Wednesday.
It gave me the creeps.
Be careful what you wish for. How many times had I wished that my family would just disappear forever? More than I could reliably recall, and now they mostly had.
Except for Zach, who was more annoying than any brother had any business being. I was tempted to call and make sure the house hadn’t been struck by lightning or something.
But I would have heard about that. And they were probably waiting for me to buckle. Tomorrow would be enough fun for all of us. I forced myself to work and tried not to think too much. Job one was a lovely set of reworked drawings of Mrs. Hathaway’s garden, each devoid of the merest hint of pink. They looked deadly dull to me, but she was the customer.
Hopefully.
A pick-up truck sailed into the lot about four and I was distracted enough to take a good look. It was brand new, shiny, and a shade of dark blue that could have been called “twilight”.
And Nick was driving it.
He looked proud of himself when he strode up to the door, then surprised that I met him right there. I didn’t care that he’d bought himself a new toy—I wanted to know where my baby was.
“Where’s the Beast?”
Nick winced. “The Beast has gone to the big scrap yard in the sky.” He conjured up a paper bag and handed it to me.
It held the contents of the Beast’s glove box and the sight brought a tear to my eye. I sat down on the edge of a desk and fingered through the packs of dried out wipes, the registration, the plastic spoons. There was even a little sewing kit from a hotel and a spare pair of pantyhose, which must have belonged to Elaine because I was never nearly that organized.
If I’d known they were there, I would have used them. Yep, her size. I couldn’t have used them if I’d wanted to.
Nick put an arm around my shoulders and gave me a squeeze. “They wanted $6500 to fix it, Phil. That was too much.”
“I thought they’d give you a better deal.”
“Maybe they would have asked you two for more, I don’t know. But the Beast wasn’t worth half that.”
Beast in past tense. I’d have to get used to that.
“Besides the engine repair that bill would have covered, it would need brakes and shocks any time now. The exhaust was ready to fall right off. You could have spent ten bills easily and it would still have been an old truck, trying its damnedest to die.”
“My truck though. Better than nothing.” I looked at him accusingly.
Nick shook his head. “It wouldn’t have been better than nothing if it left you stranded again like yesterday, and it would have. What if that had been at night? Or out in the country?” He looked grim. “It wasn’t worth it, Phil.”
His protectiveness did nothing to take the edge off my disappointment.
I was still going to miss the old monster.
“You should have asked me.”
“I am. They’re waiting for a call.” He smiled crookedly. “Consider this my biased assessment.”
“I hate when you’re right,” I muttered and heaved a sigh.
“Someone’s got to be a realist around here.”
I was thinking about that truck. “Joel and I found the Beast on a used lot about four years ago.” I stared into the bag and gave it a little shake. The spare keys jangled in the bottom, a sad little sound since they’d never turn in the ignition again. “It was such a good deal, exactly what we could afford. It seemed as though it was destined for us.”
Nick smiled. “Waiting for you?”
“Something like that.” But now, my beloved Beastie gone forever. “You may think this is stupid, but I want to say goodbye.”
“I thought you might.” He touched my cheek, a fleeting gesture of affection that warmed my heart. “And no, I don’t think it’s stupid. I told the garage that I’d check with you about the Beast’s fate and at the very least, we’d come back to get the signage off the doors.”
He was being thoughtful, which always confused me. My brothers—and most of Rosemount—were always nice to me right before they played a trick on me. Suspicion is a learned response.
I slanted a look at the shiny new truck and tried to change the subject. “So you bought yourself a truck? Aren’t they woefully inefficient?”
“You said you needed one for hauling rocks and plants.”
I gaped at him, but he kept looking at the truck, his expression impassive. “You did not buy that for me!”
“No. It’s for your business.”
“That cost more than 6500 bucks.”
“True. It is pretty basic though.”
“So, if we can’t afford to fix the Beast, then we can’t afford that.”
“Put it on the books. Capital investment.”
“That won’t pay for it.”
“It’s a better investment than fixing the Beast, Phil. You won’t have to worry about it breaking down.”
“That doesn’t matter. Coxwell & Pope can’t afford that truck.”
“I know.” He shrugged with that casual air that was always a warning. “Fortunately, I can.”
“You’re not giving me a truck!” I suddenly had a very good idea what was going on here and I didn’t like it one bit. This was my consolation prize for rolling to my back last night. It would also be salve to his conscience now that the matter of Lucia was settled. He was going to walk away, guilt-free.
There was no point in mincing words.
“If this is for last night, you can take that truck, Nick Sullivan, and stuff it sideways...”
He crossed the room fast and caught my shoulders in his hands. His eyes were blazing. “Phil. This has nothing to do with last night. Don’t even imagine that it does.”
I believed him, even though it left me scrambling for another reason for his generosity. “It’s pity, then. But I don’t need any handouts to make this company work. We’re doing just fine, thanks.”
He folded his arms across his chest, his tone reasonable once more. “But you need a truck, Phil.”
Nuts. That fact was inescapable. I shuffled my feet for a minute. “Well, yes.”
“And you probably don’t have the cash flow right now to pay for one outright.” He wasn’t going to make this easy.
I chewed my lip, thinking of the repercussions if Mrs. H. backed out of her project. “We’ll get a used one,” I insisted, not at all sure that any fool would give us credit.
Nick shook his head, probably thinking much the same thing. “And the repair bills to match. Phil, you don’t need any new troubles.” He gestured to the truck. “This has a three year warranty.”
“And let me guess—it’s breathtakingly fuel efficient.”
He grinned. “Consider it my donation to the preservation of the environment.” He held up two fingers. “Two cup holders, just for you.”
I was tempted, but that didn’t matter. It was the principle of the thing. “You’re not giving this to us.” I stalked back across to my desk, not even wanting to look at the truck in question. I dumped the Beast’s bag of goodies in a drawer.
Of course, Nick followed me and perched on the side of my desk. His eyes were real
ly green, which meant I was in for a fight. “Then you can call it a loan. No interest, pay me when you can.”
“That’ll be tough, since I won’t know where you are.”
“Send the check to Lucia.”
I studied him, distrusting his easy manner. “What are you up to? What’s changed? Am I supposed to drag you into bed and ravish you whenever you show up in exchange for the keys?”
“It wasn’t what I had in mind, but...” he teased. I looked away, my heart breaking.
Nick caught my chin in his hand, forcing me to meet his gaze.
He wasn’t joking any more. “Phil, I know where you’re at with this business. You’re on the cusp of making it work, but everything could still go to hell. It’s a bad time for your truck to have died and I understand that. I just want to help.”
“No one gives away vehicles just to help.”
His eyes started to smile. “Maybe they should.”
“Don’t be nice to me. It throws off my game.”
It could really throw my game—I could end up falling for this man and miss him like crazy when he walked off into the sunset. I was already pretty much there and if he kept on confiding in me and being nice to be, I’d be in very bad shape.
Worse than I suspected I was already going to be.
“Are you always so tough?”
“My mother told me to beware of men bearing gifts.”
“How about men trying to say thanks?”
I looked up with suspicion but he shook his head impatiently. “Not for that. For showing me a different side of things. I’d been beating myself up about that valley and you convinced me that I’m not as bad a guy as I thought.” His lips curved and my resistance melted. “So, let me do something good for you, Phil.”
“I don’t know, Nick.” I looked at the truck. “It’s awfully generous.”
“And you’re awfully overdue. When was the last time someone did you a favor?”
I must have looked blank, because I just didn’t know.
“See?” He bent and brushed his lips across mine.
That felt good. “It has to be a loan.”
“Mmm hmm.” He did it again and my knees started to buckle.
“With monthly payments, due on time or else.”
“Of course.” He had his eyes closed when he eased his mouth over mine again.
“No special treatment.”
“None.” This time he lingered and I nipped at his bottom lip.
“And...”
“Phil, enough talk. Say thank you, Nick.”
I smiled back at him. “Thank you, Nick.”
One of his brows quirked. “Care to punctuate that?”
“What about all this talk about moderation?”
“You haven’t kissed me for a good eight hours. If that’s not moderation, I don’t know what is.”
I sighed as though being indulgent. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt.” He didn’t need much more encouragement than that to set to curling my toes and pretty soon, I considered myself persuaded.
The truck was a nice shade of blue.
“I hope you didn’t get air conditioning,” I complained when he lifted his head and I was tingling from head to toe. “I just hate what that freon does to the ozone.”
He laughed then and held me tighter. “That’s my Phil,” he said and I wondered just how far being “his” really went.
Call me a chicken, but I didn’t ask.
* * *
He drove me to visit the Beast, abandoned as it was at the back of the mechanic’s lot. It looked tired and dinged up, rusted and defeated. I hadn’t realized how bad it had gotten. It certainly wouldn’t make a good impression on anyone who saw me driving it up to their house to make a presentation. Nick made them show me what had to be done, and we poked beneath the hood as the mechanic explained.
I don’t know a lot about what goes on in there, but things were pretty corroded. I peeked underneath and saw that Nick was right about the exhaust—it was hanging on by sheer willpower.
The engine wouldn’t even turn over. When the mechanic held up his hands in surrender, the Beast gave a little sputter and a sigh, as though it was tired. It seemed to me that it gave it up then, and that maybe it was at peace.
I was ridiculously glad that I’d visited it at the end.
The signage, of course, couldn’t be taken off the doors. They weren’t magnetic signs, but lettering that had been hand-painted by a friend of Joel’s. I had taken along a can of the paint at Nick’s insistence and painted over the phone number while he watched.
The mechanic gave me a check for $500 for it, for scrap.
I patted the Beast and said my farewells, then turned away with a heavy step. Nick put his arm around my waist and dangled the keys to the new truck in front of me.
“I can’t. Not so soon.”
“Best thing you could do,” he insisted.
“Not in front of the Beast.”
“Show it you’re moving on.” He took the can of paint and got in on the passenger side. He looked about as immovable as Mount Rushmore, so I reluctantly climbed in to the driver’s seat.
He handed me the key and when I didn’t rush to take it, pushed it into the ignition and turned the key a bit. The truck immediately started to complain that we didn’t have our seatbelts on and who knows what else. Nick sat back, and I knew he wouldn’t intervene.
I moved to start the truck.
“Better step on the clutch,” he advised.
Now I must have been really distracted on the way to the garage, because I hadn’t noticed that the new truck had a five speed.
Interest stirred.
“I haven’t driven a car with a manual transmission since Zach took me to turn doughnuts on the ice.”
“Really? It seemed like it would be your preference.”
It was. In fact, the automatic transmission had been one thing I didn’t like about the Beast. It’s fun to shift gears and much much better for aggressive passing on the highway. You can slip down a gear for a little lunge forward that sometimes makes all the difference in the world.
So, maybe I’m fickle. It was a feisty little truck, with nice tight steering and responsive in a way the Beast had probably never been.
I was smitten before we’d gone two blocks.
And Nick knew it. He smiled as I balanced between the clutch and the gas instead of using the brake at the stoplight. The little engine purred like a well-fed kitten, the gearbox was tight and the clutch clicked in with surgical precision. He sure didn’t need me to tell him that he’d chosen exactly right.
“Where to?”
“The dealership. I’m officially on a test drive and the sales guy may be getting nervous.”
“And then?”
“You’re driving.”
I knew then the only place that would do. He had made this transition so gentle for me. The least I could do was respond in kind. There was one place he wanted to go, one rapport that probably wouldn’t be easy for him to re-establish. I’d take the choice out of his hands, supply the energy of activation for him.
I’d take him to visit Lucia.
But I would take that curvy little marvel of a back road all the way to Rosemount. Highways, you know, are for people who don’t really like to drive.
Chapter Fifteen
Evening was falling when we pulled into Lucia’s driveway. Nick hadn’t said anything for a long time, though I knew he’d figured out where we were going miles before. I killed the engine and the sound of sea carried through the window he had rolled down.
“I owe you one more answer,” he said quietly.
The sense of finality was inescapable. Nick was going back to his grandmother, crossing the threshold into a world that excluded me. The truck was his way of settling whatever debt there was between us.
I couldn’t honestly say that I had any regrets about what we had done.
“How about the big one?”
He turned from studying
the house to look at me, his features shadowed. “Which one would that be?”
“Why? Why did you ever cover for him, Nick? Why did you do it?”
He leaned back, his eyes narrowed. I thought he wouldn’t answer me, but he was just choosing his words.
“I saw my father before he died,” he said softly. “Someone called the house in the middle of that night and the sitter got us up to take us both to the hospital. Sean went back to sleep in the car, because no one told us anything.
“But I knew that something was wrong. The sitter was upset and she drove badly, which wasn’t typical of her. She was crying and evasive. In fact, she got angry with me for asking questions, which also wasn’t her way.
“I remember the nurse who came and took my hand. She met us at the door of the ER, as though she had been waiting for us and knew exactly who we were. She had a kindly face and I remember thinking that she was somebody’s mom. She didn’t tell me much either, except that my dad wanted to see me.
“When she let go of my hand, I thought she’d taken me to the wrong place. I couldn’t connect the man all bandaged up in the bed with my father. A few hours before, he’d been whirling my mother around the living room. He’d been wearing his tux and she was wearing this ball gown that was covered with flowers. They liked to go dancing and that’s where they had gone that night.
“But the man in the bed could barely move. I was afraid of him, but the nurse left me there. I might have run but he spoke to me, with my father’s voice.
“I went closer, just as he asked, and saw that he had my father’s eyes. But everything was wrong. There was blood on the bandages and tubes coming out of him and what I could see of his face had no color at all. I guess he knew that he was going to die.
“He told me that he loved me, though it took a long time for him to make the words. And he made me promise to take care of my mother and my brother. He told me that I was going to be the man of the house.”
Nick swallowed as I watched, that memory clearly un-faded by the passing of the years. “I promised, but I didn’t know what he meant. Not then. I wanted to ask him where he was going and where my mother was, but he had a convulsion of some kind. He started to choke and blood spurted. The monitors went wild and people came running. The nurse came back and pulled me outside the curtains around his bed.