Different Paths (14 page)
Milking went smoothly, if a little slow. Nick had helped enough times he knew the routine and was able to do the things I couldn’t quite manage. The cows accepted him, and he avoided getting peed on or falling in a slippery patch of manure. I stayed upright, too, to both of our surprise. We were finally done and resting on the side yard, talking about how we could go about getting ice cream from Dairy Queen and still keep an eye on the farm when a Camry pulled into the drive, Queenie running circles and barking in front of it. I sat up quickly, staring at the driver. What was
he
doing here?
But it wasn’t just Abe Granger, my childhood best friend and almost-could’ve-been boyfriend who stepped out of the car. The passenger door also opened to reveal a familiar face.
“
Missy
?”
She smiled and raised her hands, like
Ta da
. “It’s me.”
It sure was. She wore the same fashionable, light-colored clothes I remembered from the summer before, free of farm dirt and grime. White sandals, a tank top, and a short skirt. Long blonde hair, tied back from her tanned and conservatively made-up face. Pretty. No…
cute
.
Nick hopped up to greet the two of them, but I didn’t feel like struggling to get upright while they all watched, so I stayed where I was.
Abe came around the car to shake Nick’s hand and offer Queenie a rub before stopping in front of me and looking down at my leg with an amused expression. “So what’s up with you, Princess?”
I groaned. “Ma didn’t tell you?”
“Nope. Did you get mad and kick one too many butts?”
“Ha, ha.” I held out my hand. “Help me up.”
He did, and gave me a hug. “Good to see you.”
“Yeah, you, too. But I didn’t know you were coming down.”
“Neither did anybody else.” He looked over at Missy. “We, um, had some news we wanted to share.”
Oh, no.
He held out his hand and Missy walked over to take it, wrapping her other hand around his arm and smiling into his face.
Abe looked at me. “We’re getting married.”
I stared at him, my mouth open, until Nick stepped up. “Congratulations. That’s great news.” He shook Abe’s hand again, and gave Missy a kiss on the cheek.
Abe continued looking at me.
“Yeah,” I said. “Congratulations.”
Nick put his hand lightly on my back. “So when’s the big day?”
“December twenty-four,” Missy said. “A Christmas Eve wedding.”
“That sounds nice. Here or in New York?”
“At home. New York. We thought if we did it at Christmas Abe’s family would have a better chance of getting there, with kids home from school and everything.”
“Sure,” Nick said. “That’s a good idea.”
It was?
Abe was
still
looking at me, but I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t even know what to
feel
.
“Hey,” Nick said. “We were just talking about getting some ice cream from Dairy Queen. You folks want to join us?”
Missy brightened. “Sure.”
He looked over at me. “How about Missy and I go get it?”
“Great,” Abe said.
I gritted my teeth. “That would be fine.”
“Good. Let me just run and get my wallet.”
He was back in a few seconds, and Abe tossed Missy the keys to the Camry. “Here you go.”
She paused, keys in hand, then smiled, looking from me to Abe. “Requests?”
We gave her our orders, and they left. I sank back onto the ground, Queenie sitting beside me, snuffling at my face with concern.
“I’m okay, girl,” I said, pushing her gently away.
Abe sat next to me. “So what did happen?”
“Huh?”
“To your foot.”
“Oh.” I explained.
He shook his head. “The things you get into…”
That was nothing. But I didn’t feel like telling him everything
else
that had been happening.
I took a deep breath and let it out. “So you’re getting married.”
“Yup.”
“You proposed?”
“Yeah.” He pulled out a piece of grass and started breaking it into little pieces. “I took her to a really nice restaurant and had the waiter bring out the ring with dessert. You know, in case I chickened out during the main course.” A smile flickered on his face.
“I thought you were going to wait until next Valentine’s Day.”
He tossed away the grass. “I changed my mind.”
“How come?”
He pulled his knees up, hugging them to his chest. “Because I’m ready now.”
I looked at the barn and listened to the sound of a cow, mooing in the paddock. “Which means what?”
“Being ready? That I’m tired of waiting. I want to get started with the rest of my life.”
The dusk-to-dawn light flickered on, and I squinted up at it.
Abe tilted his head back, too. “We are almost thirty, you know.”
“Yeah. I know.”
Queenie insinuated herself between us, and our hands met as we both reached out to pet her. Abe grabbed my fingers. “I need you to be happy for us.”
I looked at our hands, then at his face, tense and serious. “She’s really who you want? She makes you feel…complete?”
He didn’t hesitate at all before saying, “Yes.” Then, “I love her.”
I squeezed his hand. “Then I am happy for you, Abe.”
He blinked. “Really?”
I smiled and squeezed his hand back. “Really.”
He let go of my hand and hugged me, Queenie making a little squeak before scooting out from under us. Abe finally let go and slumped backward onto the ground, where he started laughing.
“What?”
He laughed some more. “Now that’s over, I can have fun telling everybody else.”
“You haven’t told anybody?”
He shook his head. “Just Ma. She said I’d better come out and tell you next, before you heard it from somebody else, or I’d wish I’d never been born.”
I grinned. “She knows me pretty well.”
“Plus, I was so scared to tell you I knew I couldn’t enjoy telling anyone else until I got it over with.”
I frowned. “Really?”
He stopped laughing. “Really.”
I rubbed my face, ending up with my face in my hands.
“Stella?”
I threw my hands up. “I don’t mean to be such a bitch. Good grief. Scaring my best friends half to death.”
He smiled again. “I know you don’t
try
to be scary. You’re just…intense.”
I thought of Carla, and how I’d been terrorizing Bryan. But then, I didn’t
know
Bryan. Not like I’d gotten to know Missy.
“But, anyway,” Abe said. “Now Missy and I can spend the rest of the evening telling my brothers.”
“After you eat your ice cream.”
“Of course.”
Nick and Missy soon got home, bringing the ice cream, slightly melted from the drive home. I watched as Missy and Abe shared a look, and her shoulders visibly relaxed. They really had been worried.
Nick handed me my Peanut Buster Parfait and smiled. “Hungry?”
I took it. “Starving.”
We ate our sundaes sitting on the grass, talking about the wedding—they were, thank God, going to spare me the humiliation of dressing up as a bridesmaid—and catching up on all of our lives. They asked Nick only a few questions about his illness, and he responded casually, underplaying the whole experience. Abe cast a few worried looks my way, and I tried to act unconcerned. No reason to get everybody all worked up, especially with Nick playing it cool.
Sooner than I would’ve liked we’d finished and Abe was pulling Missy to her feet, saying they had a lot of people to visit before the evening was through.
Nick helped me up, too.
I reached out to give Abe one more hug. “Thanks for coming by to tell us.”
“Sure.”
“And Missy, welcome to the family.”
She gave a little cry and flung her arms around me. I could feel Nick’s hand on my elbow, keeping me from tipping over. Abe’s eyes crinkled, and I gave Missy’s back a little pat.
“By the way, Missy…”
She stepped back, suddenly tense again.
“You never did show us your ring.”
“Oh!” She giggled and thrust her hand out, ring sparkling even in the dim light.
“It’s beautiful,” I said.
And it was.
Nick and I stood in the drive, his arm around me as we waved good-bye until their taillights had disappeared into the night.
“So,” Nick said. “They’re getting married.”
“Yup. They are. And they seem pretty happy about it.”
He stuck his hands in his pockets and looked at the stars. “Stella?”
Oh, God. Oh, no. “Yeah?”
He smiled and looked down at the grass, rolling back and forth on his toes before meeting my eyes. “You did really well taking the news.”
I shook my head. “What?”
“You did a good job. With Abe and Missy.”
“Oh. Well. I’m happy for them.”
He looked at me some more. “So am I.” He gazed into my eyes for a few more seconds before taking his hands out of his pockets and slapping them together. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go take a shower. Not used to smelling like a barn, you know.”
“Right. Sure.”
And he went inside.
I looked down at Queenie. “What was that that just happened?”
She had no idea, either.
Inside, I puttered around for a few minutes, throwing away the ice cream trash, picking up the living room. I was in the bedroom choosing a T-shirt to wear to bed when Nick’s phone rang. I hunted around for a moment before finding it on the floor next to his dirty jeans. I flipped it open.
“Hello?”
“Stella?”
Oh, great. I should’ve looked at Caller ID. Dumb, dumb, dumb. “Hi, Miranda.”
“Where’s Nick?
“In the shower.”
She paused. “Really?”
“Yes. He helped with milking.”
A growl. “I should’ve known. You’re making him feel
useful
.”
“Excuse me?”
And suddenly she was crying. “You’re making him think you
need
him up there. That he should be there instead of here.”
“Miranda—”
“Well, you can try all you want, but this will always be his home. Where we are. Mom and Liz and me. We care about
Nick
, but all
you
care about are your stupid cows.”
“That’s not true, Miranda.”
But she had already hung up.
I sank onto the side of the bed and stared at the floor.
“Stella?” Nick stood in the doorway, hair wet from the shower, towel around his waist. He saw his phone in my hand. “What is it?”
I shook my head.
“Stella.” He sat next to me, smelling good like soap, drops of water clinging to his shoulders and chest. “What’s wrong?”
“Miranda hates me.”
“Ah.” He sighed. “She called?”
I nodded. “She says Virginia will always be home for you, no matter how hard I try to steal you away.”
“And what did you tell her?”
I gave a short laugh. “She didn’t give me a chance to say anything.”
He smiled. “Sounds about right.” He took the phone out of my hand and set it on the bed before taking both my hands in his. “You need to remember something.”
I waited.
“Miranda can say whatever she wants. She’s my little sister, and she’s going through a rough time. She loves me, even though she has a weird way of showing it.” He stroked my hand with his thumb. “But remember, I’m here with
you
right now. Because I choose to be. I’m not in Virginia, with Miranda.”
I rested my head on his damp, warm shoulder. He
was
here with me. In
my
home. And for the moment that would have to be good enough.
When Doug drove the tanker up to the milkhouse the next morning I had to take a second look. “That’s not your usual rig, is it?”
He jumped down from the cab, his expression dark. “No. It sure isn’t.”
“What’s going on?”
He cut the cable tie from the hose plug with extra force and flung it even farther than usual down the drive. “Someone decided to slash the tires last night.”
“What? Isn’t the truck somewhere protected?”
“As protected as it can be. The whole fleet is in the truck yard behind the office, in a locked wire fence. Can’t fit ’em all in a building, you know.”
He stomped off toward the milkhouse and I followed. “So how did they do it? A knife? A Saws-All?” Those tires were huge and thick. It would take more than a little blade.
Doug took the samples from my tank, unscrewing and screwing the tops and lids jerkily, spilling drops of milk onto the concrete floor. “Cordless drill.”
“A drill?”
“Made holes in the sides of all the tires. If the bastards would’ve at least damaged the treads, we might’ve been able to plug ’em and use ’em some more. But no, they had to go after the sides.”
Wow. “Just the one truck?”
“Nope. Started with it, then moved onto the next one. Got three tires on that one done before something interrupted ’em.” He looked at me with exasperation. “It would’ve taken them over an
hour
to get all that done.”
He went back out and dragged the hose into the milkhouse to hook it up. “I guess we should be glad they didn’t do anything worse to the trucks themselves. Those tires cost two-fifty each, but if they would’ve gone for the tanks…” He ran a hand through his hair. “Those are upwards of ninety-two
thousand
. And that’s not including the semi.”
I shook my head. “So the truck will be okay?”
“Sure. It’ll take all freakin’ day to get those tires replaced, but it’ll be fine.”
“Insurance?”
He checked the hose, then stood back up. “It covers vandalism. But geez, if I could get my hands on whoever did it…”
The milk tank emptied, and Doug pulled out the hose, closing the tank lid and taking the hose back out to the truck. He yanked a new cable tie out of his pocket and fixed it around the hook, checking it twice to make sure it was tight. “Now I’m all paranoid, worrying about somebody getting into the milk.”
I must’ve looked concerned, because he waved his hands in the air. “Don’t worry. I’ve got it covered. I’m just a little nervous today.”
“Don’t blame you.”
He climbed up into the cab, and it hit me.
“Hey, Doug? How was your daughter’s softball game the other day?”
He smiled. “Her team got creamed. But that’s okay. She had fun.”
“Well, good to see you back.”
He shut the door and pulled out the drive.
I turned right around and made a bee-line for my office.
Lucy and Zach looked up as I passed through the parlor, but I didn’t stop until I got to my office, picked up the phone, and dialed. My call was answered in the middle of the first ring. I interrupted Gladys’ usual spiel.
“Gladys, I need to talk to Willard.”
“Stella?”
“Sorry. Yeah. Is he there?”
“Sure. Let me put you through.”
There were only a few bars of Muzak before Willard was on the line.
“There’s been another attack,” I said. “And you can’t say it has nothing to do with women.”
“Tell me,” he said.
So I explained how Patty had driven the truck on Thursday, and had even had her baby girl with her as she made her rounds.
“I don’t know, Stella…”
“Oh, come on. Don’t you
tell
me they’re not connected.”
“But you said she doesn’t usually drive the truck.”
“No, she usually runs the office. And can obviously drive the truck when she needs to.”
He was quiet for a moment. “Okay, where did this happen?”
“Hatfield.”
“All right. I’ll call the police there to get more information. But don’t get your hopes up. I’m not convinced this is part of the same thing.”
But I was. And I was damn well going to find a connection before somebody else got killed.
