Once More, At Midnight

Lilah was beyond careful when she took the bag. She didn’t want to so much as graze his pinky. She just wanted to get out of there.

Backing away from the counter, she made the mistake of looking up and saw that Gus had transferred his gaze briefly to Bree. He looked at the girl then back at Lilah and his stare was assessing.

The horrible nerves that seemed never to leave her now kicked into overdrive. Run, run, run, they warned, but Lilah had never been good with exits, and sure enough she began to muck up this one.

“Well, Nettie is waiting for us, and we’re running late as it is.” She kept moving toward Bree, but the silence intimidated her. “The store looks great,” she offered in parting. “Good candy selection. And lattes—that’s what I call one-stop shopping. Best of luck.”

Slinging her purse over her shoulder, she grabbed Bree’s skinny arm and dragged her out the door.

“What’s wrong with you?” the girl mumbled as Lilah hauled her to the car.

“Buckle your seat belt.” Jamming the key in the ignition and resisting a worried glance in the rearview mirror, Lilah peeled away from the station as fast as she could.

“Are you always so mental around guys?”

Leaning as far over her knees as her seat belt would allow, Bree gaped at Lilah. “You were, like, practically a retard in there.”

“Don’t say ‘retard.” ’ Lilah glanced from her passenger to the speedometer and consciously slowed her aging vehicle. Not that the car could ever speed, but Lilah was shaking so badly she feared a strong breeze could wrest the wheel from her hands. “That’s horribly rude.”

“Okay. I can’t believe I’m going to spend my formative years with someone who acts like a dork. How am I supposed to learn anything?” Bree complained with classic adolescent drama, but for the first time in ages, she seemed almost cheerful.

If you learn anything from me at all, learn from my mistakes, Lilah wanted to say, but didn’t. Craving freedom from conversation, she put a tape of Broadway melodies in the cassette player.

Bree listened to the music for a full two seconds then asked, “Are you always so mental around guys?”

Lilah gritted her teeth. “Yes.”

“Oh.” Bree scratched at a scab on her elbow. “Me, too.” Punching the eject button on the stereo, she pulled out the Broadway tape and replaced it with Coldplay.

Lilah glanced over. At another time she would have followed the thread of this conversation, used it to establish rapport with Bree, but right now it simply wasn’t in her. Even though they were headed away from Gus, Lilah’s stomach rumbled so violently she thought she might have to stop the car.

Why hadn’t one of her sisters mentioned that Gus had returned? As the owner of a brand-new gas station, Gus must have been in town a while, and no one had said a word to her.

Wiping her brow, Lilah tried to comfort herself with the supposition that if her sisters hadn’t mentioned Gus then perhaps they didn’t remember that she had once been hot and heavy with the least-likely-to-succeed boy in all of Kalamoose county. At that thought, she felt her stomach unclench a little.

If they hadn’t mentioned Gus then clearly they didn’t suspect she’d left town in part to get away from him.

And, if her sisters had not mentioned Gus’s return—in a designer suit—then surely they had no idea that when he’d been escorted from Kalamoose twelve years ago—in handcuffs—Lilah had been at least partly responsible for the act that had sent him to prison.

Chapter Two

If a man wore a suit in the middle of summer it was either because his job compelled him to or because he trusted himself not to sweat.

Gus Hoffman could wear anything he wanted to work; he was his own boss. He wore the suit because it commanded respect, because it said that he was serious about his business and his place in the community, and because these days he didn’t sweat unless he was working out.

He had learned to use his mind to govern his body, his actions and his reactions. He’d learned the powerful art of self-control.

Lilah Owens had just shot that to hell.

Tension made Gus’s voice tight as he spoke to the young woman he’d hired to manage his store. “The daily audits look good, Crystal. I’ll stop in again tomorrow. Call if you need anything before then.”

Crystal nodded. Following his lead, she said nothing about the incident that had just occurred.

“We’ll be fine here.” Crystal was composed by nature, and she was Lakota; she read Gus well enough to know when to converse and when not to.

With a nod in return, he left the minimart. Squinting in the sun, he walked around the building to the open garage, where he’d parked his car, and raised a hand in acknowledgement to Crystal’s cousin Jim, also Lakota, who toiled over the clutch of a Ford pickup and worked the pumps.

The gas station was pulling a decent business in gas and repair work and more business would be coming Gus’s way; he was certain of it. He liked risks, but he didn’t gamble unnecessarily. He’d come back to North Dakota with plans, not only for the station, but for Kalamoose.

Twelve years ago he’d left town with his head hung low, carrying shame and frustration that had dogged him most of his life. He’d owned nothing, had dropped out of school and alienated anyone who might have helped him.

And he’d left town hating Lilah Owens the same way he’d loved her—ferociously, blindly, passionately.

Starting the engine of a Lexus SC, he put the convertible in Reverse, pulled out of the garage and jammed on a pair of hundred-and-fifty-dollar sunglasses to block the glare.

The shock on Lilah’s face when she’d realized he owned the gas station had filled him with satisfaction—and churning resentment. She hadn’t expected him to amount to crap, had she?

Gunning the car’s engine, Gus headed for the highway, toward nowhere in particular.

It had been a long while since he’d craved danger and speed; apparently Lilah still had a deleterious affect on his judgment. He wouldn’t allow himself to think about her for long.

He had learned to manage his thoughts the way he managed his businesses: by allotting time only to that which would bring success and by turning away from distractions.

Starting his mental clock, he decided to allot Lilah two minutes. That would be enough time to assess his feelings.

First, he reminded himself that seeing her again should have come as no surprise, no jolt at all. When he’d returned to Kalamoose, he had accepted as fact that she would be back to visit her sisters some day and that he might run into her. He’d looked forward to the meeting, to showing her he’d moved on—and up—without her love, without her support, without any of the things he’d once believed he needed in order to breathe.

He could live, he’d since learned, without a lot of things. And Lilah Owens was one of them.

Thirty seconds down; a minute and a half to go….

He briefly allowed himself to relive that first moment of seeing her again. She’d been wrestling with a kid who was obviously shoplifting. He could have stepped in—he’d just exited his office when the tussle began—but he’d hung back, taken the opportunity to let his revved senses calm and to study the woman he’d known he would see again one day. Without the perfectly chosen, perfectly pressed clothes she had once favored, without the makeup, without the soft teenage perfection, Lilah was still—

He swore and pressed the gas pedal.

The golden girl of Kal High was still built like every man’s fantasy. She looked tired, as if she hadn’t slept well, but she still had cat eyes—golden-green and blazing—and lips full enough to make most men eschew common sense.

Easing off the pedal when the speedometer hit eighty-five, Gus wondered about the kid. He knew nothing about children, but guessed the girl to be a young teen, or nearly so. She was tall, belligerent and looked a little like Lilah’s older sister, Sara, with whom Gus had never hit it off. Could be Sara’s kid, he supposed, or maybe the younger one’s—Nettie’s. He’d heard she’d married and lived part time in Kalamoose, part time in New York. Beyond that meager information about the Owenses, he had studiously avoided all gossip.

He’d already dismissed the likelihood that the girl was Lilah’s daughter. The tussle over the candy had been awkward, as if they weren’t used to touching. There was no familial spark.

Another thirty seconds down. Don’t waste any more time on the kid.

For his last minute of reflection on Lilah Owens, Gus decided to remember the most important part of their relationship: She had betrayed him. In one unforgettable moment she had cut out the heart he had discovered only by loving her.

For a long, long time, Gus had wished a similar pain befell her. He’d hoped she would fall in love, learn to trust and let herself need someone who would throw it all back in her face.

For a long time, hatred had kept him alive but stupid. He’d made piss-poor choices and asinine mistakes.

Finally he’d realized hatred held a person in the gutter, but that righteous fury could be a powerful motivator. That’s when he began to fight the right way.

He’d battled for opportunities he’d never have hoped for in the past. He’d swallowed his pride—and his arrogance—and worked with integrity when he thought a menial task would lead to something more. He learned how to conform, or at least to give the appearance of doing so when it would benefit him. He’d sought mentors and when they’d advised him, he’d listened.

Over the years, Gus had become more than anyone had ever imagined he would be. More, even, than he’d dared hope to become.

His passion had served him. And once it had, he’d let it go.

Somewhere along the line, he’d stopped picturing Lilah with every job he’d taken, every bank account he’d opened. There had come a time when he’d tried on a thousand-dollar suit and sought his own approval, not hers, in the mirror. In that moment he had known that he was ready to move on personally, not just professionally. He’d finally been able to start living and would eventually try his hand at loving. He’d moved past caring what Lilah Owens felt or thought about, or whether she’d ever regretted her actions….

Until fifteen minutes ago.

“Let me get this straight: The kid’s mother gives you—a woman she hasn’t seen in years—custody of her kid, and you have no choice in the matter?”

Seated behind her broad oak desk, dressed in her sheriff’s uniform, red hair slicked back into an honest-to-God, old-fashioned bun, Sara Owens looked and sounded more like a suspicious law enforcement agent than the warm, supportive sister Lilah needed right now.

“Keep your voice down,” Lilah cautioned, glancing to the jail cells Bree was presently investigating. At least the fact that Sara worked in a jail had scored points with the chronically unimpressed preteen. Sara had given her permission to nose around and that bought Lilah a few minutes to try to explain her current situation to her sister. “Of course I had a choice in the matter. You can’t force someone to take a child.”

“So?” Sara raised her hands. “Why do you still have her?”

Glancing toward the cells, Lilah wondered which details to relay and which to leave out. She hadn’t had the chutzpah to tell anyone the whole story. Not yet.

“I’m going to raise her.”

Sara put her head in her hands.

Lilah’s stomach burned. This was why she had been hoping to tell Nettie first. Nettie was gentle. Nettie was polite. Nettie was the youngest sister, but among the three of them she was the only one who had ever possessed a modicum of maternal instincts. When their parents died, it had been Nettie who’d assumed the role of nurturer and caretaker. Although Lilah and Sara were older and should have been the ones taking care of their baby sis, they had learned to rely on Nettie for their emotional needs, for reminders to complete their homework and for edible meals. Looking back, they had taken her for granted.

After driving across several states with Bree and then seeing Gus Hoffman, Lilah needed Nettie’s comfort and her levelheaded advice more than ever. She’d driven straight to Nettie’s from the gas station, but the house had been locked up tight. On her own, Lilah would have stayed put and waited. Bree, on the other hand, had started complaining about the heat and the threat of starvation, so Lilah had reluctantly come to the sheriff’s station.

Standing before Sara’s narrowed green eyes and their eagle-sharp scrutiny made Lilah remember why she’d rarely trusted Sara with her secrets, even when they were both kids. Sara’s world was black and white. Actions were either right or wrong, good or bad; you did something or you didn’t do it—case closed, end of story, next case. Lilah had never understood that.

Picking her way carefully over the rocky terrain of explanations, she attempted to answer Sara without provoking a cross-examination.

“Grace was my best friend when I first got to L.A. She was the receptionist at the first acting agency I signed with, and she took me under her wing and told me who I could trust and who to steer clear from. She saved my butt lots of times. I owed her any help I could give her.”

Sara squinted as if she were in pain. It made her look like Robert De Niro. “She helped you with your acting stuff, so you think you should take her kid?”

Lilah told herself not to get defensive, but she was exhausted and couldn’t stop thinking about Gus—two conditions guaranteed to put her on edge. And the way Sara said “your acting stuff” reminded her that in her older sister’s eyes she’d failed in just about every area of her life.

“I’m not going to let Sabrina down,” she said, “and you know what? You’re not going to understand this, so just drop it, Sara.”

Sara leaned over her desk, cheeks turning as red as her hair. “I’m not going to understand it? Why?” She splayed a big-boned hand on her chest. “Are you implying that I would let someone down? That I’m not reliable?”

“Geesh, Sara, no—”

“I sure as hell hope not, because as I recall I’m not the one who moved fifteen hundred miles from my family so I could be on the New Dating Game.”

“Oh, that’s it!” Lilah stood and knocked over a half-dead aloe vera plant as she swung her purse onto her shoulder. “Do you have Nettie’s cell number?”

“What for?”

“Because I’m hungry, and I want her recipe for bread pudding.” Lilah reached for the phone on Sara’s desk and held it up, waiting for the number. “She wasn’t home, and I would like to see a friendly face after driving across half the country, so just give me the number.”

Sara rose, too, stabbing her index finger into her own chest. “I’m friendly. I’m one of the friendliest damned people you’ll ever meet.”

“That’s right. Ask anyone.” A rough voice and booted footsteps forestalled a comment from Lilah, who turned to see that Nick Brady, a farmer with property that adjoined Sara’s land, had entered the jail. He walked toward them with an ironic quirk on his handsome lips and a lazy roll in his gait.

Lilah would have greeted her old girlhood neighbor if Sara hadn’t grumbled, “Don’t you ever knock?”

“To enter a public building? Not often.” Nick’s half-hooded eyes mocked her ungently. “Besides, you’re so friendly.” He turned to Lilah and offered a smile. “Good to see you back home. You’re as beautiful as ever.”

She wasn’t, but Lilah knew the comment was intended more to infuriate Sara than to compliment the recipient, so she smiled. “I can always count on your charm to see past my flaws, Nick. How’ve you been?” They shared a brief embrace.

“Fine as always.” He nodded toward one of the open cells on the other side of the small, old-fashioned jailhouse. “I see you’ve got company.”

“That’s Bree,” Lilah said. “She’s with me.”

Nick, being Nick, did not press for more information. He simply nodded. “You planning to be in town awhile?”

“Indefinitely.”

Sara’s auburn brows jacked up.

Taking a moment to eyeball his old nemesis and her shocked expression, Nick commented to Lilah, “Chase had to go to New York on business, so Nettie took Colin to see the sights. I assume she didn’t know you’d be here, or she’d never have left. I suppose that means you’re staying at Sara’s?”

The sisters looked at each other with expressions approaching horror. Sara lived in their old family home, and Lilah had stayed there for brief visits, but always with Nettie present to run interference.

“How long will Chase and Nettie be gone?” she asked weakly.

Nick rolled his large shoulders. “Hard to say. Chase told me he wants to surprise Colin with a trip to Disney World.’ Course, you know Nettie. If she knows you’re here, she’ll hightail it back.”

Lilah’s heart sank. She understood what Nick was telling her. If you call, you’ll ruin their trip. Her baby sister had been through so much pain before she’d met Chase Reynolds and his young son. She was married now and happy again. She deserved every carefree moment she could grab with her family.

Lilah stared at Sara, who stared back. Nick’s wry smile mocked them both. “Well, I’ll leave you two to sort out the sleeping arrangements.” He turned toward Sara, who eyed him ferociously. She hated to be made fun of and Nick always managed to do it without saying a word.

Plopping her fisted hands on hips as slender as a teen’s, she groused, “Why the devil are you here, Nick?”

“To tell you that Kurt Karpoun and Sam Henning are fighting again over that strip of land between their places. I saw Kurt sitting on his roof with a rifle full of buckshot.”

Sara swore. “Well, why didn’t you say so as soon as you came in?” Marching to the door, she grabbed her hat off a rack and jammed it on her head. Drawn by their voices, Bree meandered toward Lilah.

“Are we gonna eat or not?” she demanded, sparing only a single dismissive glance in Sara’s direction and no acknowledgement at all for Nick. “You said we’d eat when we got here. Or did you mean when we got to a real town, with, like, an actual mall?”

Lip curled in disgust, Sara dug into her pants pocket. “Polite little thing, isn’t she?” Withdrawing a set of keys, she tossed them to Lilah. “There’s food at my place. You can take your old room and put Miss Teenage America in Nettie’s.”

“I’m not a teenager yet,” Bree said.

“Did I sound like accuracy was my point?”

Bree didn’t know what to make of that, so she resorted to the classic eye roll.

Lilah thought of the balance in her checking account and decided she couldn’t afford to look a gift horse in the mouth, even if the horse did know how to say “I told you so” in five languages.

“Thanks very much, Sara.” Making a bigger effort, she asked, “Are you going to be home for dinner?”

“Doesn’t look like it.” She waved a hand. “Just help yourselves to whatever. See you later.” Swinging open the door, she headed into the evening sun.

“Suppose I’d better follow her,” Nick said, but without much urgency. “When she’s in a bad mood, your sister’s apt to light more fires than she puts out.”

“And yet you’re still hanging around,” Lilah said, curious and feeling an affection for Nick, who had been their next-door neighbor and adopted big brother for years. Sara found Nick utterly infuriating, and vice versa.

He shrugged an eyebrow noncommittally. “It’s a small town. I feel better when I know where the ticking bomb is.” Smiling, he tipped his head. “We’ll grab a coffee soon.”

“That’d be nice.”

Nick followed Sara outside and Bree moved a few steps closer to Lilah. “Who was he, an old boyfriend or something?” True to the perspective of youth, she emphasized “old.” Lilah could have pointed out that she was only twenty-nine, but since she felt ancient these days, she buried her ego.

“Come on,” she said, “we’ll go to Sara’s, and I’ll feed you so you won’t have to complain to the child welfare people.”

Chapter Three

A quick tour of Sara’s kitchen revealed that peanut butter cups, nacho cheese tortilla chips, two jars of bean dip and several cereal boxes—all offering a toy inside—were her idea of “food.”

“That’s not dinner!” Bree protested, echoing Lilah’s sentiments exactly, so they got back in the car and headed to the only restaurant in town.

Ernie’s Diner was dotted with locals when they entered at half past five. Lilah had changed clothes and repaired her makeup quite deliberately. She was now thoroughly overdressed as she led her charge to a booth all the way in the back of the restaurant.

After scanning the pink plastic menu, she decided on a dinner salad for a dollar ninety-five, because before they’d left the house she’d tallied her checkbook again, hoping she’d added it up incorrectly the first four times. They weren’t broke—yet—but she needed a job and she needed it fast.

“I have to go to the restroom. Will you order for me? Thousand Island on the side,” she told Bree as she scooted off the cracked and taped leather of the aged booth.

Bree shrugged, her nose already buried in a tattered copy of The Hobbit.

With a deep breath for courage, Lilah picked her way to the front of the restaurant on high-heeled white-and-gold sandals, the hem of a filmy white sundress swirling around her knees. Shaking back her hair, which she’d brushed and left loose, she reached into her large straw bag for the gift she’d brought Ernie, the owner of the diner—a signed and framed headshot of George Clooney. She’d been supplying Ernie with autographed studio photos for years. He’d hung them all around the restaurant.

The pictures were easy enough to acquire; Lilah simply wrote a letter requesting an autographed eight-by-ten—like any other fan. To Ernie and his regular customers, however, the Hollywood memorabilia was proof that Lilah had hit the big time. They believed she knew all the stars whose photos she acquired. Lilah of course had never disabused them of the idea. Now she hoped to make Ernie’s unmerited awe work in her favor.

In addition to the money left in her account, there remained a couple thousand dollars in a savings account Grace had left for Bree. Lilah was determined not to touch that money, no matter what. Bree needed to know there was something from her mother. Grace had been so worried. Lilah had performed her best acting job to date when she’d tried to assure her friend that their finances were fine. In fact, she’d lost her waitressing job for taking too much time off when Grace was ill. Lying to a dying woman—Lilah wasn’t sure whether she’d committed her first act of mercy or sunk to a new low. The devoted mother had died assuming there was more.

For years Lilah had lied about her acting credits, simply by claiming that she had some good ones. She hoped that if she told Ernie she wanted a temporary waitress position so she could “research a role for the theater,” he might hire her, and she wouldn’t have to admit she was almost thirty, that her bank account ran on fumes and that by most standards, especially her own, she was a big fat flop.

Reaching the cash register, Lilah glanced around the restaurant, spotting Mrs. Kay, the organist at Kalamoose First Baptist Church, along with several diners who were strangers to her, and she saw a waitress she didn’t recognize…but no Ernie.

The waitress, a ringer for a young Natalie Wood, approached the register. Lilah wondered vaguely if Ernie had hired the girl knowing her looks would be good for business. Fresh and glowing with no sign yet of age or disillusionment. Lilah remembered when people had hired her based on youth and beauty alone.

Feeling a lifetime older than the flawless child before her, she fought to dredge up the smile that had made her Miss Kalamoose Creamery 1990-1992 and asked to see Ernie.

The girl stared at her blankly. “Ernie?” Wrinkling her pert nose, she cocked her head. “Um, a guy named Elmer comes in around five most nights for the chicken-fried steak. Do you mean him?”