LITMIR.BIZ

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I know how deeply you care about her. I know it’s you who has been paying some of her bills.”

      He sucked in his breath, annoyed that she knew that.

      She pushed on. “Aside from your Mother’s Day tradition, I know you took her to Paris for her seventyfifth birthday.”

      “Lucy, I’m dripping water on the floor and shivering, so if you could hurry this along.”

      She really had thought she could get through her life without seeing him again. It had been a blessing that he came back to Lindstrom Beach rarely, and when he had, she had been away.

      Because how could she look at him without remembering? But then hadn’t she discovered you could remember, regardless?

      Once, a long, long time ago, she had tried, with a desperation so keen she could almost taste its bitterness on her tongue, to pry his secrets from him. Lying on the sand in the dark, the lake’s night-blackened waters lapping quietly, the embers of their fire burning down, she had asked him to tell her how he had ended up in foster care at Mama Freda’s.

      “I killed a man,” he whispered, and then into her shocked silence, he had laughed that laugh that was so charming and distracting and sensual, that laugh that hid everything he really was, and added, “With my bare hands.”

      And then he had tried to divert her with his kisses that burned hotter than the fire.

      But he had been unable to give her the gift she needed most: his trust in her.

      And that was the real reason she had told him she could never love a boy like him. Because, even in her youth, she had recognized that he held back something essential of himself from her, when she had held back nothing.

      If he had chosen to think she was a snob looking down her nose at the likes of him, after all the time they had spent together that summer, then that was his problem.

      Still, just thinking of those forbidden kisses of so many years ago sent an unwanted shiver down her spine. The truth was nobody wanted Mac to come back here less than she did.

      “I didn’t phone about Mama’s party. I guess I thought I would tell you this when you came. But since you’re not going to—”

      “Tell me what?”

      She had to keep on track, or she would be swamped by these memories.

      “Mac—” she remembered, too late, he didn’t want to be called that and plunged on “—something’s wrong.”

      “What do you mean?”

      “You knew Mama Freda lost her driver’s license, didn’t you?”

      “No.”

      “She had a little accident in the winter. Nothing serious. She slid through a stop sign and took out Mary-Beth McQueen’s fence and rose bed.”

      “Ha. I doubt if that was an accident. She aimed.”

      For a moment, something was shared between them. The rivalry between Mama and Mary-Beth when it came to roses was legendary. But the moment was a flicker, nothing more.

      All business again, he said, “But you said it wasn’t serious?”

      “Nonetheless, she had to see a doctor and be retested. They revoked her license.”

      “I’ll set her up an account at Ferdinand’s Taxi.”

      “I don’t mind driving her. I like it actually. My concern was that before the retesting I don’t think she’d been to a doctor in twenty years.”

      “Thirty,” he said. “She had her ‘elixir.’”

      Lucy was sure she heard him shudder. It was funny to think of him being petrified of a little homemade potion. The Mac of her memory had been devil-maycare and terrifyingly fearless. From the picture on his website, that much had not changed.

      “I guess the elixir isn’t working for her anymore,” Lucy said carefully. “I drive her now. She’s had three doctors’ appointments in the last month.”

      “What’s wrong?”

      “According to her, nothing.”

      Silence. She understood the silence. He was wondering why Mama Freda hadn’t told him about the driver’s license, the doctor’s appointments. He was guessing, correctly, that she would not want him to worry.

      “It probably is nothing,” he said, but his voice was uneasy.

      “I told myself that, too. I don’t want to believe she’s eighty, either.”

      “There’s something you aren’t telling me.”

      Scary, that after all these years, and over the phone, he could do that. Read her. So, why hadn’t he seen through her the only time it really mattered?

      I could never fall for a boy like you.

      Lucy hesitated, looked out the open doors to gather her composure. “I saw a funeral-planning kit on her kitchen table. When she noticed it was out, she shoved it in a drawer. I think she was hoping I hadn’t seen it.”

      What she didn’t tell him was that before Mama had shoved the kit away she had been looking out her window, her expression uncharacteristically pensive.

      “Will my boy ever come home?” she had whispered.

      All those children, and only one was truly her boy.

      Lucy listened as Mac drew in a startled breath, and then he swore. Was it a terrible thing to love it when someone swore? But it made him the old Mac. And it meant she had penetrated his guard.

      “That’s part of what motivated me to plan the celebration to honor her. I want her to know—” She choked. “I want her to know how much she has meant to people before it’s too late. I don’t want to wait for a funeral to bring to light all the good things she’s done and been.”

      The silence was long. And then he sighed.

      “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

      “No! Wait—

      But Mac was gone, leaving the deep buzz of the dial tone in Lucy’s ear.

      CHAPTER TWO

      “WELL, THAT WENT well,” Lucy muttered as she set down the phone.

      Still, there was no denying a certain relief. She had been carrying the burden of worrying about Mama Freda’s health alone, and now she shared it.

      But with Mac? He’d always represented the loss of control, a visit to the wild side, and now it seemed nothing had changed.

      If he had just come to the gala, Lucy could have maintained her sense of control. She had been watching Mama Freda like a hawk since the day she’d heard, Will my boy ever come home?

      Aside from a nap in the afternoon, Mama seemed as energetic and alert as always. If Mama had received bad news on the health front, Lucy’s observations of her had convinced her that the prognosis was an illness of the slow-moving variety.

      Not the variety that required Mac to drop everything and come now!

      The Mother’s Day celebration was still two weeks away. Two weeks would have given Lucy time.

      “Time to what?” she asked herself sternly.

      Brace herself. Prepare. Be ready for him. But she al ready knew the uncomfortable truth about Macintyre

      Hudson. There was no preparing for him. There was no getting ready. He was a force unto himself, and that force was like a tornado hitting.

      Lucy looked around her world. A year back home, and she had a sense of things finally falling into place. She was taking the initial steps toward her dream.

      On the dining-room table that she had not eaten

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