A January Chill

He’d been there every time she had needed him. He’d treated her with every bit as much affection and warmth as he’d treated Karen, and she and Karen had often pretended they were sisters, not just cousins.

Since Karen’s death…well, since Karen’s death, Joni had often felt she needed to fill that hole in Witt’s life, and Witt had seemed to take her even more into his heart. It wasn’t that she had replaced Karen for him, but that, lacking Karen, he had lavished even more love on Joni.

She would have done just about anything for him. So why had she done this? What had compelled her, after all this time, to rock what was a very dangerous emotional boat?

Remembering her reasons now was surprisingly difficult. All she knew was that she had felt compelled, as if some shame deep within her had demanded she act. Shame at having abandoned Hardy after the accident because Witt had blamed him?

Maybe. Or maybe it was something more. But she honestly didn’t know what.

And that scared her a bit, the feeling that something was going on deep inside her that was out of her control.

Hannah came in just as Joni was layering the lasagne. “Oh, good,” she said. “I’m starved, and that’s just what I’m in the mood for.” She paused to kiss her daughter’s cheek.

“Didn’t Uncle Witt buy you lunch?” Joni’s heart had started to race with anxiety.

“Yes, of course he did. But he was so upset I couldn’t really eat.”

“What was he upset about?” She tried to ask casually, and wondered if she sounded natural. She didn’t know. All she knew was that her cheeks felt hot and her heart was pounding.

“Hardy Wingate bid on the hotel.”

“Really?” That sounded too weak. Her hands were trembling as she sprinkled Parmesan and mozzarella over the top of the lasagne. The aluminum foil rattled as she pulled it off the roll and covered the baking dish.

“Here,” said Hannah, nudging her out of the way. “Let me put that in the oven. You’re shaking.”

Joni was beginning to wish she could fall off a mountain.

“What’s the matter?” Hannah asked. “Didn’t you eat lunch?”

“I did. Sure. I’m just…shaky.” Lies. Oh, God, she hadn’t thought about all the lies she would have to tell because of what she’d done.

Hannah put the baking dish on a cookie sheet to catch any spills, then slipped it into the oven and set the timer. “You’d better go sit down,” she said to her daughter. “You don’t look well.”

Joni felt terrible, all right, but only emotionally. Shame at her duplicity was filling her. Her legs feeling weak, she went into the dining room and sat in a chair where she could watch her mother bustle around the kitchen preparing to make the garlic bread.

Hannah put the loaf of French bread on the cutting board and sliced it in two, putting half the loaf back in its plastic bag. Then she paused, her knife hovering over the bread and, without looking at Joni, said, “Why did you give Hardy that bid package?”

“Mom…” But Joni couldn’t speak, neither to tell the truth nor to prevaricate. Her heart slammed hard, and she sat mute.

Hannah turned her head and looked at her. “That’s what you did the night you said you were going to see your friend. When we had the snowstorm? Why did you do it, Joni?”

All the explanations she’d given herself when she made up her mind to draw Hardy into this were gone from her brain as if they’d never existed. Empty, anxious, shamed, she simply looked at her mother.

“I don’t suppose,” Hannah said after a moment, “that we need to tell Witt that. He’s mad enough as it is. I can’t see what good it will do to have him angry with you. What’s done is done.”

That didn’t make Joni feel any better. She watched as her mother began slicing the bread diagonally.

“I suppose,” Hannah said presently, “that you’ll give me an explanation eventually.”

When Joni finally spoke, her voice was a thick, tight croak. “I had reasons.”

Hannah nodded, putting her knife aside and going to the refrigerator for butter. “I’m sure you did, Joni. You always do.”

Joni couldn’t tell if that was a mere statement of fact or a sarcastic comment. And, honestly, she didn’t really want to know. She just wished she could remember why it had seemed so important to her to give that bid package to Hardy a week ago. And wondered why all that determination seemed to have deserted her.

Nothing more had been said by the time they began to dine. Hannah offered no information about the bids she had seen, her silence telling Joni as clearly as any words that her mother wasn’t happy with her.

Well, she hadn’t expected anyone to be happy with her. Even Hardy hadn’t been. But she didn’t like feeling cut off from her mother. Hannah’s disapproval had always cut her like a knife.

Finally, unable to bear the silence any longer, Joni put down her fork. “It’s wrong, Mom, Witt hating Hardy all these years. He didn’t kill Karen.”

“Mmm.” Hannah said no more.

Feeling almost desperate, Joni said, “Witt’s never going to heal if he keeps on hating Hardy.”

“Really.” It wasn’t a question and carried the weight of disapproval. “Have you considered that Witt is grieving in his own way?”

“It’s been twelve years!”

Hannah’s dark eyes fixed her. “Joni, do you think I miss your father any less because it’s been nearly fifteen years? Do you?”

“I…” Joni’s voice trailed off, and her eyes began to burn.

“I think,” Hannah continued, “that you’ve been arrogant. You have no right to decide when someone else’s grief should end.”

“But…” Again words escaped her.

“Grief isn’t measured by calendars. And I thought you understood people better than that, anyway. Witt’s anger at Hardy is the way he keeps himself from being torn up inside.”

Joni looked down, her throat tight and her chest aching. “Karen wouldn’t like it, Mom.”

“No, she probably wouldn’t. But Karen isn’t here, and that’s the whole problem.”

Joni couldn’t even bring herself to raise her head. She was suddenly hurting so deep inside that she didn’t know if she could bear it. “We all miss her, Mom,” she said thickly. “Including Hardy.”

Hannah sighed. “Yes,” she said presently. “We do. But opening up the wounds this way isn’t good for anyone, Joni. Not for anyone.”

She felt like a stupid child who should have known better, and somehow she couldn’t reach into herself and find the force that had compelled her to rush headlong into this situation. Couldn’t feel again the fire that had pushed her. And that left her feeling defenseless.

But still, despite that, she felt that the situation was wrong, that Witt’s anger was a poison not a cure. And that Hardy was being treated unfairly.

“Hardy was my friend, Mom,” she said finally. “He was my best friend, next to Karen. And when she died, I shouldn’t have had to lose him, too.” Then, having said all she could, she went up to her room and sat in the quiet, staring out the window at freshly falling snow.

It hurt, she thought. It still hurt like hell. And maybe that was what had compelled her to reach out to Hardy.

Because, dear God, even after twelve years, something inside her was still bleeding.

5

A couple of days later, Witt ran into Hardy at the hardware store. It wasn’t unusual for that to happen; in a town the size of Whisper Creek, where there was only one hardware store, one pharmacy, one bank and one auto-parts store, such encounters on a Saturday were inevitable. Usually they both just turned away and pretended the other didn’t exist.

But today Witt was in a different mood. When he saw Hardy buying some screws, he didn’t walk away. Instead, he approached.

“What the hell,” he said bluntly, “did you think you were doing bidding on my hotel?”

Hardy dropped a dozen screws into a small paper bag. He didn’t reply immediately, as if trying to decide how much he should say. Finally he shrugged. “I’d like to build your hotel.”

“In your dreams.”

Hardy raised his gaze slowly and met Witt’s angry stare. “Exactly. In my dreams.” Then he went back to counting another dozen screws.

Witt didn’t like being ignored. And he didn’t like being made to feel as if he was behaving badly. Hardy’s calm just annoyed him more. “You have some nerve, boy.”

“I’m not a boy anymore, Witt. Maybe you’d better keep that in mind.”

“Oh, I do keep that in mind, just like I keep it in mind that my daughter would be a woman now—but for you.”

Hardy dumped more screws into the bag, then folded the top of it carefully. Only then did he look at Witt.

“Yes, she would,” he said quietly. Brushing past Witt, he headed for the checkout.

Leaving Witt feeling like an angry ass. What had he expected? That they were going to duke it out in the aisle?

Still disgruntled, he went to get the epoxy he’d come for. Fact was, he’d been gnawing on his anger like an old bone since he’d learned that Hardy had bid on the hotel. It was an anger he never entirely got over, but it had been a long time since it had been this fresh and hot. Mostly, he kept it buried as long as Hardy Wingate stayed out of his way.

But Hardy had just gotten very much in his way, and his anger was like the volcano was erupting again, consuming him with its red-hot heat. After all these years, it was unresolved.

Nobody had paid for Karen’s death except him. The drunk driver hadn’t even lived long enough to be arrested. And Hardy…Hardy, who hadn’t taken good care of Karen, who’d been indirectly responsible for her death, was still walking around whole and healthy.

That stuck in Witt’s craw like a boulder.

Out on the street, with his bag of screws in his hand, Hardy hurried away from the hardware store. He should never have let Joni tempt him with the prospect of building that hotel. All he’d managed to do was push Witt to the brink again.

He didn’t want to do that. And it struck him that he must have been harboring some kind of hope that Witt would get over his bitterness or he never would have placed that bid. Stupid fool. After twelve years, Witt wasn’t likely to change his mind about anything.

Trying to sidestep a dark feeling that was threatening to overwhelm him, he forced himself to consider why it was he cared about Witt’s opinion. The man had never liked him. Never. So why should it matter so much that he was angry with Hardy?

Because, Hardy realized with a sense of shock that seemed to rock him to his very soul, he was never going to be able to forgive himself unless Witt forgave him. Christ.

“Hardy?”

He looked up and saw Joni hurrying toward him down the snow-packed sidewalk. Instinctively, he glanced over his shoulder to make sure Witt wasn’t standing in front of the hardware store watching. He wasn’t.

“Are you crazy?” he asked Joni. Reaching for her arm, he urged her a little way down a side street in case Witt emerged from the store. “Your uncle’s in the hardware store.”

“Oh.” She looked up at him, blinking those huge blue eyes of hers, making him wonder if something about her was going to remain eternally a child. Because right now… He shook his head. Joni was no child, and he wasn’t going to patronize her by thinking of her as one.

“He’s hopping mad about that bid of mine,” Hardy told her. “He was trying awful hard to pick a fight with me.”

“I’m sorry.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her that she invariably apologized too late. She always had. Joni had always been inclined to follow her impulses and to regret many of them later. But he bit back the criticism and said only, “That’s okay. I should have known better than to bid.” Then he summoned a wry smile. “Sometimes this town just isn’t big enough for both Witt and me.”

He’d hoped to get a flicker of a smile in return, but all he got was a sigh. She kicked the toe of her boot against the snowbank beside the walk and finally looked up at him again. “It was stupid,” she said. “My mother figured it out.”

“Figured out that you gave me the request package?”

“Yes. She asked me why I’d done it.”

“And?”

Another sigh. “And all those good reasons I had just kind of evaporated. I couldn’t even remember them. I just know this situation isn’t right.”

“To tell you the truth, I don’t remember the reasons you gave me, either.” He was actually beginning to feel some sympathy for her. “I do remember that your intentions were good.”

“The road to hell and all that.” She looked so downcast. “Well, I just wanted you to know that my mom figured it out, so it probably won’t be long before Witt does, as well. I guess that won’t make any difference in how they feel about you. But it’s going to make my life miserable for a while. Which I guess I deserve.”

There was a small coffee shop down the street, a place frequented mostly by some old hippies who had migrated here to live a more rural life and spent small fortunes on organic foods. The café was part of the Earth Mother Co-op, but anyone could shop there. He took her hand.

“Let’s go get something hot to drink. That wind is cutting right through my jacket.” Mainly because he’d been in a hurry and had grabbed the nearest jacket at hand, one that was better suited to the fall than the winter around here. He hadn’t planned on standing outside having a conversation.

“Okay,” she said. The circles that moved through the Earth Mother Co-op and the circles in which Witt moved almost never intersected. Small town or not, there were a few social boundaries over which gossip seldom passed. Witt would never hear about the two of them having coffee.

The co-op was warm, heated by a Franklin stove that was always well fueled. The floorboards creaked beneath their feet, and the aromas of grains stocked in open barrels filled the air, along with the delicious scent of fresh coffee and baked goods.

“Man,” Hardy remarked, “I’m going to have to buy a loaf of bread.”

Joni was apparently of like mind. She ordered a cinnamon roll with her coffee.

“Have you ever noticed,” Hardy asked, “that many of life’s most important conversations take place over food?”

Some of the sadness lifted from her eyes. “It’s true. Mom and I always have our conversations over coffee or dinner.”

“Yeah. Seems more sociable, somehow.” But his mind wasn’t really on the coffee the waiter put in front of him, or on the aroma of Joni’s cinnamon roll.

“Okay,” he said after a few moments. “If Witt asks me if you gave me the bid package, I’ll tell him no.”

“You don’t have to lie for me.”

“No, I don’t. But I will. There’s no point in having that ugliness fall on your head. I’m a grown man. I didn’t have to bid.”

“No,” Joni said firmly. “I’ll take my licks. I deserve them.”

“You don’t want this kind of trouble with your uncle.”

“Why not? Maybe it’ll clear the air.”

Hardy shook his head. “Nothing’s going to clear the air, not after all this time.”

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