Keeper of the Light

  Mary sat down next to her. “Maybe there’s a lesson in this,” she said. “For you and me both. I’ve made it too easy for you. I’ve let you live out my own dreams, which were never meant to see the light of day. I’m just as guilty as you are.”

  “Shh, Mary. Don’t talk about guilt.” Annie shook her head, kneading her hands together in her lap. There was no color at all in her face. “It hurt so much,” she said. “They said it wouldn’t be bad, but it was horrendous, and I deserved every single solitary ounce of the pain.”

  “No, you didn’t,” Mary said. “You…”

  Something crashed against the outside wall of the house and Annie jumped. “I don’t like this,” she said. She drew the blanket tighter around her shoulders as the wind whistled eerily through the room.

  “We should go upstairs,” Mary said.

  Annie was slow on the stairs, in more pain than seemed normal for such a thing. Mary settled her into the small bedroom she had come to think of as Annie’s. She watched as her young friend climbed into the bed, fully clothed and still shaking, covering her ears against the sound of the wind as it screamed through the upstairs rooms. She was beginning to babble, not making much sense at all, and her skin felt hot to the touch. Mary soaked a washcloth in cool water and bathed Annie’s face and hands. She would lace her next cup of tea with Southern Comfort.

  “It’s stopped,” Annie said suddenly, sitting up in the bed to listen. Indeed, the rain had stopped. The wind was still, and when Mary looked out the window, she could see stars.

  “Yes,” Mary said, shivering herself. She would let Annie believe what she wanted, although she knew it was only the eye of the storm passing over them. Soon it would all begin again.

  By that time, though, Annie was asleep. Mary kept watch by her bed, sitting up the entire night, listening to the house strain at its roots.

  Annie’s color was better in the morning, and the fever had broken. Mary left her sleeping while she surveyed the damage. Rain had swept under the doors and through the cracked windows, but otherwise everything inside was in one piece. The electricity was still out, and her phone had died sometime during the night. Outside, she found the crushed metal lid to a garbage can resting against her front porch. The shape of the beach had changed overnight, the sea oats closer to the water, the pitch of the sand steeper. The lighthouse looked unscathed, although she would have to check the lantern room later.

  When she returned to the kitchen, she found Annie mopping the rainwater from the floor.

  “Here,” Mary said, taking the mop from Annie’s hand. “You shouldn’t be doing that.”

  Annie sat down weakly at the kitchen table, folding her white hands in her lap. “I dreamt last night it was Alec’s,” she said quietly.

  Mary stopped mopping to look down at her. “Annie, you felt very certain it was Paul’s.”

  Annie closed her eyes, nodded.

  “Now, I admit I don’t know much about this topic,” Mary said, leaning on the mop, “but that diaphragm you’re using to keep from having babies just isn’t fail-proof enough for—” she hesitated, hunting for the words “—for someone like you.”

  Annie ignored her. “I’m going to get pregnant again as soon as I can.”

  Mary looked at her squarely. “You can’t bring that baby back.”

  “I know,” Annie said in a small voice. “But I’m going to try. And this one will be Alec’s for sure.” She must have seen the doubt in Mary’s eyes, because she added, “I swear it, Mary. This one will be his.”

  The crossword puzzle had fallen from Mary’s knees to the porch, and she did not bother to pick it up. She thought about Paul Macelli, still burdened by things that had happened so long ago. She thought of Annie, and of herself, and she knew that whatever lesson the three of them had learned back then had been all too quickly forgotten.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  There were a dozen yellow roses waiting for Olivia in the emergency room when she arrived for work Friday morning.

  “Are they from Paul?” Kathy asked her, as Olivia opened the card.

  You were right, and I was wrong—Alec.

  Olivia smiled. “No,” she said, slipping the card into the pocket of her white coat. “They’re not.”

  It had been just twenty-four hours since she’d left Alec and Lacey alone to hash out their differences without her. And without Annie. When Alec didn’t call her last night, she figured that either things had not gone well or he was angry with her for her tirade. It relieved her to see that neither was the case.

  Mike Shelley called her later that afternoon. He wanted to take her out to dinner after her shift, he said. “Not a date,” he added, laughing. “My wife’s standing right here, ready to intervene. I just have something I want to talk with you about. Is seven okay?”

  “Fine,” she said, wondering exactly what she was agreeing to.

  He took her to a small seafood restaurant in Kitty Hawk and waited until their entrees were served before satisfying her curiosity.

  “The personnel committee’s made its decision,” he said.

  “Oh?” She could not tell from the tone of his voice whether she should smile or frown.

  “It was hairy there for a while, but I think deep down each of us knew who we wanted. We held off making a decision until the whole Annie O’Neill fiasco had died down. We were all impressed with the way you handled that situation, Olivia. As Pat Robbins on the committee said, Olivia Simon knows how to keep her wits about her in and out of the ER.”

  She smiled at him. “You’re saying I’ve got it if I want it?”

  “Yes,” Mike said. He looked at her quizzically. “Do you have some doubts about taking it?”

  Olivia looked down at her plate. “I’ve appreciated how you’ve stuck by me through everything, Mike. I want to be thrilled. I am thrilled, but at the same time…”

  “What?”

  “It’s my husband. He doesn’t want to stay here.”

  “I thought…you’re separated, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, but I keep hoping…” She shrugged. “Well, I guess this will be the big test. I’ll tell him I’ve got the offer and see what happens. Maybe he and I need a crisis—we just plod along, not together, but not totally apart either. I suppose this will move us in one direction or another. May I have a few days to decide?”

  “Absolutely.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’m not one of those people who thinks you should put career over family, Olivia, regardless of what sex you are. So whatever you decide, I’ll understand.”

  “Thanks.”

  “At the same time, though, you’re the one the ER needs. It’s going to expand—it’s got to—and we need someone there who can handle the changes.”

  She felt a hunger in her that had been missing for a long time. There was a challenge in front of her, tempting her, waiting for her to grab it. She wished she could say yes and be done with it.

  “Mike, there’s one more thing you should know.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’m pregnant. The baby’s due in January.”

  Mike’s eyes widened. “Wow.”

  “I don’t intend to take much time off, if everything goes well. Maybe I should have told you before, but I…”

  He shook his head. “It doesn’t change anything with regard to the offer.”

  She smiled, relieved. “Good.”

  “Well.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’m supposed to bring you home with me for some dessert when we’re through with dinner, on order of the director of my household. Okay with you?”

  “I’d love it,” she said.

  For the first time, Paul was looking forward to the meeting at Alec’s. It might give him a chance to really get a look at Lacey, and sure enough, she was standing in the kitchen with her father and Nola when he arrived. She was drinking a Coke from the can, and she looked at him with more than a passing interest when he walked into the room. Could she possibly know? Was there a chance Anni
e had told her something?

  He said hello to the three of them, unable to take his eyes from Lacey’s face. He tried to imagine her without the Halloween hair. She was Annie, through and through. He could see no one else in her features; certainly there was no trace at all of Alec.

  “Wine’s already in the living room, Paul,” Alec said as he walked past him, with Nola close on his heels.

  “I’ll be there in a second,” Paul said. “I just want to get a glass of water.” He reached toward the cabinet over the sink and looked at Lacey, who had boosted herself onto the countertop. She was wearing a short, hot-pink T-shirt and white shorts. Her feet were bare. “Glasses in here?” he asked.

  “Next one,” she said. “To your right.”

  He filled the glass with water and took a long drink. Then he leaned back against the counter to study her. “I checked the notes I made when I interviewed your mother, Lacey, and for some reason she did say you were twelve.”

  Lacey wrinkled her nose. “That is totally weird,” she said.

  “Maybe she was a little nervous about being interviewed.”

  The girl shook her head. “She never got nervous over anything.” She swung her bare legs out in front of her and studied her pink toenails. “Your wife is really nice,” she said.

  He frowned at her. “How do you know… Oh. You met her at the hospital the night your mother died.”

  “Yeah, but that’s not really how I know her.” Lacey took an annoyingly long drink from her can of soda, and when she finally set the can on the counter, there was a coyness in her smile. “Actually,” she said, “I talk to her every night.”

  “To my wife? To Olivia?”

  “Yeah. She insisted. See, what happened was, one night I slept over her house and…”

  “You stayed at her house?”

  “Uh-huh, and then she said I had to call her at midnight every night, and she somehow talked my father into making all these rules for me.” Lacey grinned, rather happily. “She’s positively wrecked my life, but she’s kind of hard to stay mad at.” She held up her hand to show him a black and silver watch. “She bought this for me.”

  “Paul?” Alec called from the living room. “We’re about to get started.”

  “I’ll be right there,” he called back, but he didn’t make a move toward the door. “Why did you sleep over her house?” he asked.

  “Because my father had to take my brother to college and was going to be gone all night. So Olivia is, like, really close friends with my father and she said I could stay there.”

  Paul stared at the cloisonné horse on the other side of the room. “I didn’t realize she was friends with your… I guess she’s helped him with the talks he gives on the lighthouse, right?”

  “Well, they only did that once.” Lacey held the can to her lips again, leaning back to swallow the last of the soda. “They go out sometimes,” she continued. “You know, to dinner or whatever, and sometimes she comes over here at night to use my mother’s stained glass stuff.”

  “Your mother’s…?”

  Lacey let out an exasperated sigh. He must be sounding as dense as he felt. “Her stained glass stuff,” she said. “You know, her tools and things.”

  There was laughter from the living room. Paul set the empty water glass in the sink, his hand shaking badly. He struggled to make his face unreadable as he turned back to Lacey.

  “But Olivia doesn’t work with stained glass,” he said.

  “God, you must not have seen her in a while. She takes lessons at my mother’s studio every Saturday morning from Tom Nestor. He’s the guy who…”

  “I know who he is.” Paul tried to picture Olivia at Annie’s work table in the studio. He tried to imagine her out to dinner with Alec, laughing with him, telling him…what? She’d been here at Alec’s house. Annie’s house. Playing mother to Annie’s daughter.

  “Paul?” It was Nola this time, an irked quality to her voice.

  “I’d better go,” he said.

  “Yeah,” Lacey grinned. “You don’t cross Nola Dillard and live to talk about it.”

  He knew the moment he sat down on the sofa that he could not stay. His confusion was turning to anger. What the hell did Olivia think she was doing?

  Alec was talking about the upcoming tour of the keeper’s house, now scheduled for the following Tuesday.

  “Alec?” Paul interrupted him, standing up, and everyone raised their eyes to him.

  “I’m sorry,” Paul said, “but I’m going to have to leave. I’m not feeling well. I thought I could make it through the meeting, but…” He shrugged his shoulders.

  “Do you want to lie down for a while?” Alec asked.

  “I have some aspirin,” Sondra Carter offered.

  “Is it something you ate?” Nola asked.

  “No.” He began backing away from them, the color rising in his face. “I’m sure I’ll be all right once I’m out in the fresh air.”

  They were quiet as he walked the few steps to the front door and let himself out. Once outside, he wondered what they were saying about him. Probably not much. They would probably just get on with the meeting, and later Alec would call him to make certain he was all right. That would be exactly like Alec. He wondered what kind of sympathy and understanding he’d been giving Olivia these past couple of months.

  He drove south toward Kitty Hawk, fifteen miles over the speed limit, trying to think of what he would say to her when he finally saw her face-to-face. Anything he said was sure to come out as a growl. There was no way he could do this calmly.

  The house was dark when he arrived, her car gone. Damn. He was ready. He was bursting to have this out with her.

  He sat down on the front deck. Where was she? Who was she off with tonight? Maybe she was at the Battered Women’s Shelter. He could go over there. He closed his eyes, smiling ruefully at the image of yet another irate husband creating a stir at the shelter.

  He sat on the deck for nearly an hour before he gave up and drove home to his little cottage in South Nags Head. He would find her in the morning. Saturday morning. Lacey had told him where she would be.

  Olivia arrived home around ten. She thought of calling Paul to tell him about Mike’s offer, but she needed time to think it through herself. Besides, she did not look forward to talking to Paul these days.

  She had just gotten into bed when Alec called.

  “The roses are beautiful, Alec,” she said. “Thank you.”

  “I really owe you for your help with Lacey,” he said. “It changed things overnight. She’s talking to me, and I suddenly feel as though I have some control in my house.”

  “She’s basically a good kid.”

  “I know that.” He sighed. “This morning she told me she doesn’t want to do anything about birth control, that she doesn’t want to have sex again for a while. I don’t know if that’s realistic, though. Once a kid starts, how does she stop?”

  “If she’s getting more from you, maybe she won’t need so much attention from guys at parties.”

  “I hope you’re right.” He was quiet for a moment. She thought she could hear him stretching, turning, and she knew he was in bed. “Well,” he said, “how are you doing?”

  “I was offered the director position tonight.”

  “You’re kidding! Why didn’t you call me the second you heard? That’s fantastic, Olivia.”

  She could see the moon from her bed. It was nearly full and surrounded by stars. “I’m afraid to tell Paul. It’s going to bring things to a head.”

  “He didn’t stay for the meeting tonight.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He just came for a few minutes and then left. He said he wasn’t feeling well.”

  “Did he say what was wrong?”

  “He didn’t offer any details. When are you going to tell him about the job?”

  “Sometime tomorrow. I need to think about what I really want before I talk to him.”

  Alec was quiet for a mo
ment. “I wish you’d take it,” he said. She heard him draw in a long breath and let it out again. “Olivia,” he said, “are you in bed?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know…sometimes I want to say things to you that I’m not sure I should say.”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, that I appreciate you and admire you. That I miss you when I haven’t seen you for…”

  Her beeper went off, and he stopped talking.

  “I heard that,” he said. “I’d better let you go.”

  Olivia closed her eyes. “I’m sorry.”

  “I have to go to the studio tomorrow to pick up the oval window and make an enlargement of a print. Could you have lunch after your lesson?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I’ll see you then.”

  She hung up the phone and called the ER. There’d been a fire in one of the soundside cottages in Kitty Hawk. Three burn victims were coming in. Expected time of arrival: ten minutes.

  She quickly got out of bed and pulled on her pink and white striped jersey dress. She brushed her teeth, ran a comb through her hair. It wasn’t until she was in her car on the way to the ER that she allowed herself to think about Alec.

  She wished he’d gotten to finish what he’d started to tell her.

  Tomorrow, she thought. Tomorrow at lunch.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  Through the studio door, Olivia saw Alec and Tom standing by the work table. Tom was taping the small oval window between two pieces of cardboard, and Alec was laughing. They looked up when she opened the door.

  “Morning, Olivia,” Tom said, as he set the packaged window down on the table. “I have to give Alec a hand in the darkroom, so go ahead and get set up here and I’ll be back in a minute.”

  Alec didn’t say a word to her, but he didn’t need to. The warmth in his smile said enough.

  Olivia sat down at the table and pulled the piece of glass she’d been working on from her tote bag. She would need Tom’s help on this. She’d already destroyed two pieces of glass trying to make this particular shape.

  She cut out the pattern piece with her three-bladed scissors and had just glued it to the glass when Tom came out of the darkroom. He sat down next to her, and laughed when she told him the problem she was having with the cut.