LITMIR.BIZ

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to Phoenix, just a little bit too late.

      Someone knocked lightly on her bedroom door.

      “You awake, Lace?” Clay asked.

      “Yes.”

      “Dad called to tell me,” he said. “Can I come in?”

      “I want to be alone,” she said.

      He hesitated a moment. “I’m sorry, sis,” he said, finally. “And I’m sorry for the things I said about Jessica yesterday.”

      “It’s all right.” She pressed a damp, overused tissue to her eyes. “Clay?”

      “Yes?”

      “I love you. Please don’t die.”

      She heard his soft laughter through the door. “I love you, too, Lacey,” he said. But he didn’t promise her anything. He knew better than that.

      She did not sleep, did not even doze, the entire night. She lay with the box of tissues on the pillow next to her and the phone clutched in her hands, waiting for the return call from Nola. But the call never came, and it would be nearly noon the following day before she understood why.

       11

      LACEY DIDN’T GO INTO WORK AT THE ANIMAL hospital the next morning. It was Saturday, and the hospital would be packed with patients, but she knew her father would understand. Instead, she sat in her home studio trying to reach Nola and getting no answer to her calls, not even an outgoing message on an answering machine. She studied the piece of paper on which her father had written the phone number. Whose number was it, anyway? A friend of Jessica’s probably. She knew Jessica had several good friends in Phoenix, since she’d talked about them over the years. Lacey had always felt an uncomfortable mixture of happiness and envy during those conversations, glad that Jessica had those friends, yet jealous that they had taken her place.

      Between phone calls, she tried cutting glass for a panel she was making, but her heart wasn’t in it. She knew better than to cut glass when she could not give it her full attention. Finally, she took off her safety glasses and settled on staring out the window. She could see Clay working with one of his search-and-rescue clients, a tall man with a skinny golden retriever. She could not make out what they were doing, but the golden could barely contain his excitement. Lacey couldn’t help but smile at the happy, anticipatory dance the dog was performing in the sand near his owner.

      She wanted to call a travel agent to make plane reservations for her trip to Phoenix, but hated to tie up the phone line in case Nola tried to reach her. Finally, though, she took the risk and contacted one of Olivia’s friends who was a travel agent. The fare to Phoenix was exorbitant at this late date, and although she wondered if she would qualify for a discount based on the fact that she was flying there for a friend’s funeral, she didn’t feel like going into the subject with the agent. Instead, she gave the woman her credit card number, wrote down the flight numbers and hung up.

      The instant she got off the line, the phone rang, and she picked it up quickly.

      “Nola?” she asked.

      There was hesitation on the line. “No, this is Charles Rodriguez,” a male voice said. “Am I speaking with Lacey O’Neill?”

      A telemarketer? “Yes,” she said, “but I’m waiting for an important call, so—”

      “Ms. O’Neill, I was Jessica Dillard’s attorney,” the man said.

      Lacey frowned. “Her attorney?”

      “Yes,” he said, “and first let me express my sympathy over your loss.”

      “Thank you.”

      “I was the attorney who drew up Jessica’s will and her other legal papers. She was a very responsible young woman. Amazing for her age, the way she took care of everything. She even had an advance medical directive, although that turned out to be unnecessary. It’s still always good to have—”

      “Excuse me, Mr…. Rodriguez? Can you tell me why you’re calling? I’m waiting to hear from Jessica’s mother, and I don’t want to tie up the line.”

      That hesitation again. “Did Jessica talk to you about this?”

      “About what?”

      “Her daughter Mackenzie’s guardianship.”

      Lacey searched her memory. As far as she could recall, it was a topic she and Jessica had never discussed. Why would they? Jessica was only twenty-seven.

      “No,” she said. “Not that I remember.”

      The attorney sighed. “I’d hoped she discussed it with you long ago. She said she would. She wanted you to be Mackenzie’s guardian if she were to die.”

      “Her guardian? You mean … to make decisions about—”

      “She wanted you to raise her.”

      “I … Me?” She felt a moment of panic. “I live in North Carolina and I’m not even related to her. Mackenzie has a grandmother. And Jessica had some very close friends out there. And I haven’t even seen Mackenzie in three years. I’ve only seen her three or four times in her entire life.”

      “I understand,” the attorney said. “And Mrs. Dillard, Jessica’s mother, was very upset when I told her about this last night. She may try to fight it, but I doubt very much she will win, because Jessica was adamant that she wanted you to be her daughter’s guardian. She stated clearly in the document that she did not want her mother to have guardianship of Mackenzie.”

      Lacey winced, thinking about how hurtful it must have been for Nola to hear those words. No wonder she hadn’t returned her calls.

      “But when did she make out this will?” she asked. “I mean, was it years ago? We were much closer friends years ago, so maybe—”

      “She did initially file all these papers several years ago. That’s what I mean about her being so responsible. What twentysomething-year-old takes care of things like that? But she also updated all the documents only last year. She just made a few minor changes, and she was still clear that she wanted you to be Mackenzie’s guardian.”

      “It doesn’t make sense,” Lacey said. “I’m sure she never thought she’d die this young. Maybe she just wasn’t thinking.”

      “Ms. O’Neill, she and I talked about it at length,” the attorney said patiently. “I suggested her mother might be a better and more logical choice, or failing that, the parents of one of Mackenzie’s friends, perhaps, but she said she trusted you to be the same sort of mother she had been.”

      Lacey started to cry, moved by the sentiment and yet frightened by its meaning. Jessica had been a good mother. A superlative mother. She wanted to tell this stranger how motherhood had forced her to grow up quickly, how beautifully Jessica had risen to that challenge. But she would never be able to get out all those words.

      “Ms. O’Neill? Are you still there?”

      “Yes.” She reached for a tissue from the box on her worktable and pressed it to her nose. “I’m here.”

      “I suggest you plan to stay out here a few extra days when you come for the funeral so that you and I can take care of the necessary paperwork. And more importantly, so you can get to know Mackenzie better before taking her back with you.”

      Bring her back? To Kiss River? The sense of panic was so strong that she could barely breathe. She didn’t want to do this; she had never wanted a child and certainly didn’t want one thrust on her when she was so totally unprepared. Her thoughts shamed her, yet if someone could tell her how she could get out of this new and unexpected responsibility, she would jump at the chance.

      “I don’t know if I’m suited to be anyone’s mother,” she said, more to herself than to the lawyer.

      “Do you think

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