The Secrets of Bell River

It had probably half killed Jude when Haley talked him into leaving all this behind for Hollywood. For the hundredth time, Mitch wondered why on earth Jude had said yes.

Of course, Mitch would have left Silverdell, Bell River, everyone and everything, for Bonnie. He had done exactly that, in fact. Bonnie had come to work for Bell River, literally out of nowhere, with no past and no promises that she’d stay. She’d been there only a few months, but during those months he’d fallen in love. When Bonnie told him one day that she needed to run away from Silverdell, he’d chosen to go with her, no questions asked.

But Haley and Bonnie were two entirely different kettles of fish.

At least he hoped they were. Because in the end, what did he really know about who Bonnie was?

To distract himself, he picked up a couple of magazines from the nearby table and leafed through them. Molly must have left them here. He couldn’t imagine Jude reading Behind the Screen or Hair Today.

He flipped through the hair magazine first, hoping he’d see something ridiculous enough to spark a joke or two. And sure enough, he saw women paying big bucks to look like poodles, and San Quentin convicts, and bristlecone pines, but none of it seemed very funny. It made him think about Bonnie again, and that tantalizing glimpse of golden-red sunshine that sometimes had peeked out at the roots right before she touched up the dye on her hair.

Why hadn’t she ever told him the reason she had to hide her real color? Why hadn’t she trusted him enough to tell him what she was running from? Why hadn’t she ever told him...anything? He’d been her lover. He’d been by her side for nine whole months, and he’d kept his promise...no questions.

But why should he have had to ask? He loved her. She loved him. Shouldn’t that have given him the right to know what they were fleeing from?

“Just for the record,” he said, “love is a giant sucking, stinking sinkhole.”

Jude raised his head, lifting his gouge from the spindle he’d been turning. “Very poetic, Shakespeare.”

“No. I’m serious. And I’m not just talking about me. What about Molly and that phlegm-head husband of hers? And what about...yeah, I’m going to say it, buddy. What about you and round-heeled Haley Hawthorne?”

Mitch was pushing his luck. Jude had made it clear when he got back from Los Angeles that he didn’t intend to discuss the romance with Haley, his accident or his years in Hollywood. Not with anyone. The Dellians who were dying of curiosity could just die, for all he cared. He even stonewalled Mitch most of the time. But once or twice, late at night like this, Jude had let enough slip that Mitch understood how crappy the whole thing had been.

Jude’s blue eyes glittered, hard marbles in the bright light over the lathe, and for a minute Mitch thought he was about to get blasted. Weirdly, he almost welcomed it. A bruising, pissed-off fistfight would at least be a sign that he was still alive.

But Jude blinked and his shoulders relaxed. “Okay, but what about Rowena and Dallas? What about Bree and Gray? What about Penny and Max?”

Mitch rolled his eyes. “They don’t count. There’s gotta be something in the water over at Bell River, some kind of love potion that makes everyone go gaga.”

Jude turned to his lathe. “So drink some, for God’s sake, and quit whining. The cure for one woman is another woman. You’ve known that since you were ten.”

Maybe. But that particular “cure” worked only when you were ten. It worked only when all girls were identical bundles of hormones wrapped up in slightly different packages. It didn’t work when...

It didn’t work when you grew up. It didn’t work when you fell in love.

But he didn’t say any of that out loud. Even he was ashamed to whine that bad.

He dropped Hair Today on the table and opened Behind the Screen. He turned two or three pages. And then, out of nowhere, there she was, the biggest picture on a page full of starlets, right under a headline that read, Faces to Watch. Beautiful, pouty-lipped, slutty-eyed Haley Hawthorne.

“Oh, brother.” Without realizing it, Mitch made the disgusted sound out loud.

In the corner, the lathe slowed again. Without turning, Jude spoke tersely. “Don’t waste your time reading trash, Mitch.”

“You saw this?” He held up the magazine, but Jude still didn’t turn around.

“Of course. Molly eats that crap up. But even if she hadn’t shown me, at least six people in town did.”

“Nice.” Mitch felt like spitting onto the picture, though that would be pretty juvenile, and not anywhere nearly as rewarding as spitting in Haley’s actual face. Now that might make him feel fairly buoyant for a minute or two.

“Gossips are saying she called you, earlier today,” he said carefully.

Jude didn’t respond.

“Well, did she? Dang it, Jude. Why are you such a clam about it? I thought she’d promised not to bother you for six months. I thought she had given you that long to heal and—” he chose his words judiciously “—to decide what you really want.”

Jude’s mouth tilted up at one corner. “And Haley always keeps her promises. She’s famous for her patience.”

“Don’t go all sarcastic on me. What did she want?”

“What she always wants—me to come back.”

“You told her you aren’t going to, though, right?” Mitch knew Jude must have done so. Jude had told Haley no for months now, but the delusional brat was so spoiled she didn’t believe it. She always thought she could cast a spell on anyone, and get exactly what she wanted, sooner or later.

“You told her no. Right?” Mitch wasn’t sure why he even asked, except that he lived in fear that one day Haley might prove that she hadn’t been delusional—that Jude was still under her spell and she could dance him straight back to Hollywood.

“Of course I told her,” Jude said softly, his tone indicating his refusal to be drawn into melodrama. “But you know how she is. She cries, apologizes for rushing me and vows not to ask again until the six months are up. She thinks I just need time to—” he looked at the piece of wood he held “—get over what happened.”

What happened. Mitch had heard only bits and pieces, but that was enough.

“I don’t know how you stand it, Jude,” Mitch said, his voice surprising him with its husky anger. But damn it. He and Haley and Jude had been kids together here. Jude had straight-up saved her life, no two ways about it. For her to treat him that way, as if he were a meal ticket, a sugar daddy, a stepping stone on her way to stardom...

Well, it chaffed Mitch big-time. And if she were pretending to be singing another tune now, he hoped Jude was smart enough not to fall for it.

“I don’t know how you listen to everyone carry on about her, ‘such a sweetheart, such a beauty, such a credit to Silverdell’...and never say a word.”

Without answering, Jude angled his gouge and put another scroll in the wood. Frustrated, Mitch stared at his friend’s back, thinking of the scars beneath his ratty sweater, and the limp that showed up at odd moments, when he stepped wrong on that bum ankle.

“I don’t know how you do it,” he repeated harshly. “And frankly I don’t know why you do it.”

There was one explanation, of course, and it chilled Mitch to consider it. Maybe Jude protected Haley’s reputation because he still loved her. Maybe, in spite of everything, he was still the guy who had, once upon a time, faced dragons to protect her, gone hungry so she could eat.

Maybe Jude and Mitch weren’t that different, after all. Both of them still in love with women who no longer existed.

It made him sick. Jude deserved a hell of a lot better than Haley Hawthorne. And if he didn’t find someone soon, he’d be that much more vulnerable to Haley’s siren call. She might be a skank, but she was hot.

“Hey,” he said, suddenly inspired. “I hear you met the new hire, Tess, when she came to interview. I hear you were the guinea pig again.”

“Yep.”

“So what did you think?”

“She’s good.”

“Yeah. But I mean what did you think?”

Jude chuckled. “What is it with everyone? I think she seems very nice. She’s pleasant. She seems to have walking-around sense. She’s talented. She’s fine.”

Mitch let a second’s silence pass. “Not bad-looking, either.”

“You think so?” Jude lifted a shoulder. “Then good. Ask her out. Maybe she’ll take your mind off Bonnie for a while.”

“No. Not me.” Mitch had a feeling Jude was being deliberately dense. But he didn’t want to come right out and say that Tess’s fragile vulnerability seemed like it might be right up Jude’s alley. Mitch had only seen her for twenty minutes or so, but somehow she looked like the kind of gal who could use a knight in shining armor.

And, to put a spin on Jude’s advice to him, the only cure for one damsel in distress was another damsel in distress....

“I was thinking about you, numbskull. I was thinking you might ask her out. She’s kind of interesting. When they offered her the job earlier tonight, I thought she was going to turn it down. But then, at the last minute, she said yes. And you know what’s weird? It was almost as if the clincher, the thing that made her decide to take it, was learning about the ghost.”

Jude turned at that comment. “No way.”

“Yes. They had to tell her, because Isamar had one of her visions. You know, she thinks she sees Moira floating on the staircase.”

“I know. What I don’t know is whether Isamar is loony or just putting everyone on. Or—” Jude smiled “—maybe she has the occasional nip of brandy. I’ve heard that enhances one’s ability to detect paranormal activity.”

Mitch laughed. Everyone knew Isamar was one of those sweet but superstitious types who secretly wanted life to be a lot more exciting than it was. She “saw” Moira, sure, but she also saw the ghosts of her favorite characters in books, and even once insisted that the ghost of Brad Pitt had come to her room asking for milk and cookies.

“Yeah, well, anyhow, she usually keeps her visions to herself, so as not to scare the guests. But this time ‘smart’ Alec came in blurting it out. We all figured that cooked the goose, for sure, but instead Tess seemed positively fascinated, and—”

Before he could finish the sentence, the baby monitor, which sat on Jude’s workbench, never more than a foot or two from him, crackled to life. The static was followed by the sound of a baby’s cries. And then came his sister’s voice, weighed down by the threat of imminent tears.

“Hush, Beeba, hush. Please. Please. Can’t you sleep? Just one night? Can’t you—”

In an instant, Jude was heading toward the house.

“Sorry, Mitch,” he said as he reached the door. “If anyone is going to ask Tess out, it’ll have to be you. My life has way too many females in it already.”

CHAPTER THREE

JUST TWO DAYS. Tess had been on the job for two days when the first crisis hit. They’d been closed on Christmas Eve and Christmas day, so she’d had only Saturday and Sunday to get her feet steady under her. She’d stayed focused, though, and made real progress. She’d begun to believe she could handle it, begun to relax enough to start enjoying herself.

Naturally. That was the kind of cockiness that made Fate itch to bring you down a peg or two.

And so, on the Monday after Christmas, both Darlene, the college kid who was the regular receptionist, and Ashley, the massage therapist, called in sick. Tess had been interviewing as fast as she could. The part-time job she had applied for still needed to be filled. But she hadn’t brought anyone on board yet.

Now, with Ashley and Darlene out, Tess would have to run the spa, do all her own appointments and pick up Ashley’s, too.

She left a voice message for Rowena—to give her a heads-up, not to ask for help. She knew Rowena was far too busy this week between Christmas and New Year’s to pitch in. Everyone was slammed.

They’d all done the best they could to get Tess up to speed. Ashley had taken on extra hours to train Tess about spa services, equipment and clients. Rowena came into the facility at dawn each day so that she could steal a couple of hours to explain bookkeeping procedures and policies. Bree stopped by now and then with supplies, maps, instruction manuals for the various electronic devices. Even the ranch manager, Barton James, visited at lunchtime with salads and sandwiches from the kitchen, and cookies for moral support.

But other than that Tess had hardly seen any of the family these past two days. It had been like jumping into a war midbattle—as a five-star general. And, if the truth were told, Tess had found it thrilling.

Until today. Today was going to be a mess.

She started calling Ashley’s clients to be sure they were all right with a substitute therapist. And wouldn’t you know it...the first name on the list was Esther Fillmore. Lucky lady got a weekly massage, and she was still so grumpy? Maybe her poor husband encouraged the expenditure, in the hopes that someday she’d chill out and be a little easier to live with.

No one answered, so Tess left a message and moved on to the next name. Everyone she reached was friendly and contented either with a new appointment, or with the idea of Tess taking over for Ashley. At eight o’clock, the nail tech showed up and went straight to work. So far, so good.

At 8:05 a.m., Esther Fillmore walked in.

She didn’t look surprised to see Tess behind the counter, wearing the official blue Bell River uniform, so the grapevine had obviously done its work well. She didn’t smile or say hello, of course—she maintained her natural sour frown that seemed to mean almost nothing.

“Good morning, Mrs. Fillmore,” Tess said, with an extra dose of sunshine in her voice, hoping that perhaps being recognized would stroke the woman’s vanity enough to smooth the moment. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t able to reach you before you made the trip over. I called your contact number, but I didn’t get an answer.”

The woman froze in the act of removing her coat. “Why were you trying to call me?”

“I wanted to let you know in advance that Ashley isn’t here today. I’m happy to fill in for her, but I know you prefer your usual therapist whenever possible.”

“I insist on it,” Mrs. Fillmore said flatly, as if, hearing that, Tess would somehow be able to produce Ashley out of thin air.

“Then perhaps you’d like to make another appointment? Ashley will be in again right after New Year’s.”

“After New Year’s?” The older woman lifted her chin. “You expect me to suffer with my sciatica until then? With my nieces and nephews at the house? With family meals to cook, and to clean up after?”

“I can understand how difficult that would be,” Tess said sympathetically. “I’d be happy to do what I can to help. I’ve worked with many clients suffering from sciatica, and—”

“Sciatica is not one-size-fits-all, like the common cold,” Mrs. Fillmore interrupted tersely, as if Tess had insulted her.

Tess took a deep breath, reminding herself that sciatica often caused profound pain. Maybe that accounted for Mrs. Fillmore’s nasty manner. Chronic pain could suck the joy out of life.

“Perhaps, if you told me in detail what procedures Ashley uses, and what you find most effective, we could bring you some relief. Although I know it wouldn’t be the same, maybe it would be better than nothing. And, of course, there would be no charge for the service today.”

As she said that, Tess had to quell a few butterflies, remembering how close to the bone Bell River was operating this first winter season. Rowena was candid about money, which Tess appreciated, because it helped her to know where she stood. Even if they all stood pretty close to the edge.

Still, surely keeping a repeat client happy— especially one who would freely broadcast her dissatisfaction to the whole town—was worth the price of a massage.

If Tess had to, she’d take it out of her own pay. Heaven knew she was making more as director than she’d ever expected to as a part-time therapist.

To her surprise, though, Esther appeared to have lost interest in the conversation. Instead, she seemed to be staring with narrowed eyes at Tess’s necklace. Or was she staring at her chest? Tess’s hand went instinctively up to cover herself, though her uniform was hardly low-cut or revealing.

“Is everything all right, Mrs. Fillmore?”

“I...” The woman dragged her gaze up to Tess’s. “Yes. I was just...I was admiring your pendant. Where did you get it?”

Her tone made Tess uncomfortable, and for a minute she didn’t want to answer. Stupid, but she felt reluctant to even speak of her mother to such a nasty woman.

Besides, surely that wasn’t really what Mrs. Fillmore had been about to say. Her pendant was pretty, but not ostentatious or, surely, unique.

Tess didn’t ordinarily wear jewelry while working, but this modest necklace was special to her, and she liked having it on. She always tucked it inside her shirt, but it must have slipped out.

“It was a gift from my mother,” she said, and tucked the pendant beneath her top.

Not the whole truth, but close enough. She’d found it among her mother’s things after her death. She wondered why her mother had never worn it. The workmanship was lovely—it was a small teardrop-shaped ruby that formed the bud of a rose, its setting designed like a slim gold stem and two curving gold petals.

Maybe, she thought, her mother had never worn it because she suspected that one day she’d have to sell it. Who knew how many other gold pieces might have been stashed away in that jewelry box, but sold off, one by one, to make ends meet?

“Your mother?” Esther frowned, obviously surprised by the answer—and not pleasantly so. “Are you sure?”

“Of course.” Tess was frowning now, too. She wondered what answer the woman had been expecting. A boyfriend, perhaps? But why would she care?

“The necklace belonged to my mother,” Tess reiterated blandly. “Now. Would you like me to take over for Ashley, or would you like to rebook?”

“Neither,” Esther said coldly. “My husband tells me the new resort at Silverdell Hills will have a spa. You people at Bell River might do well to remember that. You won’t be the only game in town anymore.”

Tess bit her lip briefly, then smiled the best she could. “I’m very sorry we can’t help you, Mrs. Fillmore, but I certainly understand your need—”

The polite words were wasted. The older woman had already turned her back and, buttoning her coat as she walked, was heading briskly toward the door.

Though she knew it was irrational, Tess felt deflated by the failure. It would have been so rewarding to overcome the woman’s strange hostility. But oh, well. Let her go home and be her unfortunate husband’s problem for a while.

Tess took a couple of moments to calm herself, then dove into making the calls. The minutes flew, and when the alarm on her phone trilled she was surprised to see it was time to get ready for her first appointment of the day.

She was also surprised to see that Craig had called. Eight times. The divorce had been final for two weeks now, and he’d promised to leave her alone. But she’d become a challenge to his pride, no doubt. He didn’t like failing. He used to be a high school–football star, and he still thought of everything in terms of wins and losses. He despised losses.

Craig was a smooth-talking, self-indulgent former jock who had made it to middle management in her mother’s insurance agency. Their six years of marriage had been a mistake from the start—a rebellion on her part against an upbringing that had been overly strict, big on rules and short on fun.

She knew now, of course, why her mother had been so stringent, so fearful that her daughter might repeat her own mistakes. But back then, her insistence on no freedom, no car, no boys in the house, no broken curfews—nothing that could encourage sex before marriage—had left Tess eager, at twenty, to marry the first man who made her laugh and gave her presents.

She sometimes wondered why he’d been willing to marry her. Probably because, otherwise, she wouldn’t have sex with him. She should have. If she had, she would have realized what an insensitive egoist he was, or else he would have checked “Conquer Tess” off his list and moved safely on. If only her mother hadn’t...

No. She stopped herself right there. Her mother had always insisted on honesty, and the truth was it wasn’t her mother’s fault she’d married Craig. It was her own. She’d fallen for him because he was handsome and a little older, which seemed glamorous, and he gave her nice things. He told her she was pretty. He told her she was smart.

Looking back, she realized she had sold herself far too cheaply. She should have held out for love. Twenty had been plenty old enough to recognize a louse, if she’d been looking hard enough.

She slid her phone into her pocket quickly as she heard Jean, the manicure technician, coming out of her room. Jean, who had been at Bell River only about two weeks longer than Tess, led out her client, made a new appointment for the woman, smiled at Tess, then started to head back to clean her area.

“Jean? You don’t recognize this client’s name, do you?” Tess pointed to the line on the computer screen for eleven-thirty. Marley Baker. “I’m not even sure whether it’s male or female.”

Jean, who was short and curvy and extremely savvy, twitched her nose, as if that might help her remember. “Nope,” she said finally. “I think I took the appointment over the phone, but I can’t really remember anything about it. It has been a little nuts around here this week.”

Tess chuckled. “A little. Oh, well, it doesn’t matter.”

“Sorry,” Jean said as she disappeared into the supply room.

Tess wasn’t too worried about the client’s gender. She never used particularly flowery scents anyhow, so most of her products would please anyone. What did worry her was that Baker was about ten minutes late. Ordinarily it wasn’t an issue, but today...

As she waited, Tess checked on the Blue Room, which was in perfect shape, opened a box of toners that had been delivered this morning, made a couple of notes in her personal client log and then did some deep breathing, to keep herself from pacing.

Fifteen minutes later, she was about to call the contact number for Baker when she heard a soft trill of chimes, and the spa door opened on a swirl of cold air and an odd smell of motor oil. A small, wiry man entered, reeking of aftershave and putting his crooked teeth on display in something he probably thought was a smile.

“Mr. Baker?”

His smile widened, the pink of his gums glistening. “In the flesh,” he said.

“Good morning,” she forced herself to say pleasantly. A frisson of distaste moved down her back as their gazes met, but she steadfastly ignored it. She had worked on unpleasant physical specimens before. Everyone, even people who weren’t as clean as they should be, even people who smiled like that, deserved to have their aches and pains soothed.

“Are you Tess?” He glanced down, and this time she was darned sure he wasn’t looking at her pendant. Either he had a slight twitch, or the man had actually wiggled his eyebrows in some kind of secret salacious joke with himself.

Was he one of those? A few men—thankfully very few—seemed to believe their therapists owed them what they lewdly referred to as a “happy ending.”

Well, if he were one of those, she knew how to make him see his mistake without embarrassing anyone.

And if he were one of the really terrible ones—the dangerous, violent ones, who were only legend for her, so far, thank God—well, she knew how to deal with that, too. Her very first mentor had taught her a couple of moves that would make it unlikely that Marley Baker would be thinking such thoughts, or going to the bathroom on his own, for at least a week.

“Yes, I’m Tess. I’ll show you to the room, if you’re ready.”

As if to compensate for thinking such thoughts based on nothing but her own bias against his type, she gave the man an extra warm smile. Immediately, when he smiled back with that strange, oddly feral curve of his thin lips, she regretted it.