Long Summer Nights (7 page)

The cat jumped at the food and sniffed, yowling with hunger, and Didi shooed him away.

“You shouldn’t push him away. The food isn’t for me. It’s his.”

Her eyes widened in alarm. “I carried takeout for your cat?”

“Do you know what they put in cat food?”

She lifted her hands, warding off the thought. “I do not choose to know. Instead of working, you stagnate here playing Top Chef for this ragged monster?”

At that, Two crouched low to the ground and showed leonine teeth.

“He has to eat,” Aaron defended.

“As do I.” Uncaring of the dust, she collapsed in the rocker, her hand over her chest. “I cannot do this any longer.”

Immediately Aaron backtracked, feeling something cold and clammy close up in his throat. “You can’t leave me.”

“I’m an old woman, Aaron.”

“You’ve got a good thirty years of spite left in you.”

She wasn’t amused. “And you? What is left in you? Did he steal it all?”

Quickly he rose and pulled the food from the box, Two perched protectively on the cabinets, overseeing the process. He chose not to answer Didi, because he didn’t know
what was inside him. Whatever remained, he used for his writing, and nothing else. It worked.

Two batted a paw at the lamb, awaiting supper. Unlike Didi, Aaron recognized that this wasn’t companionship but survival. The cat wore his scars on the outside, but Aaron didn’t have any scars. A long time ago, he’d been drained of blood and life. All that he’d kept safe was his imagination, and Cecil Barksdale would never get at that.

“You owe me a book, a chapter, even a sentence. Or I will leave you. Like that,” Didi threatened with a snap of her fingers.

“Do what you need to do,” he said with a careless shrug, seeing the pain in her eyes, but he wouldn’t be cornered, not even by Didi.

She rose just as carelessly, just as heartlessly. Their relationship was back to what it should be, exactly as he needed. Aaron began to breathe once again.

“You’ll be back?” he asked, carefully erasing all trace of expectation from his voice.

Didi being Didi wasn’t fooled, but her smile was old and weary and he wondered how long it would be before she left him for good.

“Thank you for the food,” he told her politely.

She adjusted her shawl, flinging it over her shoulder, and then made for the door, her heels never missing a beat. “When will you learn, Aaron? When will you rejoin the human race?”

“Never,” he said, his voice firm and stubborn, but Didi had already left, and he told himself that he didn’t care.

I
N THE
1960
S, A MERRY
band of psychics had occupied the rolling hills to the north, and when psychics were involved, law enforcement wouldn’t be far behind, and Jenn knew just where to find the truth.

In Harmony Springs, Sheriff Omar Phelps was the long arm of the law, and unsurprisingly enough, his arms were very long. He wore the usual khaki uniform and badge, but on top of his head was a beaten-up Yankees cap.

His office was in the basement of the courthouse and consisted of a wooden desk and chair, a shelf full of baseball trophies and what she assumed to be the Phelps family photo. All in all, the office seemed quiet and serene, no crime, no small-town hijinx, and Jenn tried not to look disappointed.

“Tell me about the psychic community. Were you sheriff then?” she asked, once the introductions were done.

“I was a deputy, and didn’t know shit from shinola, but I’ve learned. Grifters, that was my guess, but they attracted a long following of gullible marks.” He leaned back in his wooden chair, and kicked his boots up on the desk.

“Any colorful anecdotes, famous names that might have been conned?” Jenn asked, because debunked tales of the
paranormal always attracted attention, even better if the rich and famous were involved. If there was a politician, a Rockefeller, a Carnegie, or a Roosevelt, heck, her career woes could be over.

He laughed at her, but his eyes were nice, in that I-bet-you-believe-in-Santa-Claus sort of way. “We didn’t get a lot of real names from the marks. Back then, people didn’t brag about getting conned. Not like today.” He gave her a nod, one professional to the other. “But you know that.”

“What about the literary salons? The group of writers who came up. Any truth to that one?” Jenn braced a hip against the desk, making notes as they talked.

“Maybe,” he answered with a shrug to his beefy shoulders.

“What do you mean?”

“Before I took over, I heard some stories, looked up some reports.”

“And?”

“A lot of drunk and disorderlies, one goat smuggled into the steeple of the church, four cases of vandalism and one desecration of a grave. Nothing serious, but a lot of payoffs.”

“Who was involved?” she asked casually, thinking a governor would be nice. Or a governor’s family.

“Juliet Capulet and Madonna Ciccone and Mamie Eisenhower.”

“The first lady?” she asked, excitement coloring her normally professional tone, because first ladies trumped governors every time.

The man laughed at her, slapping his knee, because apparently this was jaw-dropping fun. “Nah. They were fake names.”

Glad somebody had a sense of humor. “Doesn’t anybody show proper ID in this town?” she mused.

“Not much. The law can be bought,” he answered, scratching his ear. “Or at least, back then it could. But I want to state for the record that I don’t take bribes and never have.”

She studied the man with careful eyes. No. He knew his job, he did his job, and then went on his way. It seemed like everybody in this town knew their place and worked their tail off to stay there. It was a good way to be. She could be that. All she had to do was keep digging.

Hope sprang eternal inside her, or perhaps that was hunger. No. Definitely hope and optimism. Undaunted, Jenn handed the man her number. “If you remember anything, give me a call, will you?”

“Will do.”

After two more trips to the library and the archives of the
Harmony Herald,
she was ready to pursue the promise of food, preferably something high in calories and fat, accompanied by a triple shot of espresso. Healthy? No. Spirit-lifting? Hell, yes.

It was at that moment that her mother called, possessing a maternal ESP that immediately senses the ever-elastic soul in peril.

Certainly when Jenn had been a kid, it had been fun having the loving mother who was always a little older than the other mothers. Jenn’s mother had been the one who made sure she had extra raisins in her lunch, the one that read stories to her every night, and then explained how the intestine clogged up every time it had to process unsaturated fats.

Now that Jenn was out on her own, sometimes her mother forgot.

“Hello, Mom,” she answered, standing outside the Hungry Hobo, trying to decide between a double cheeseburger with avocado and fries or skipping straight to dessert—a
chocolate-mocha cheesecake coated in a white chocolate ganache. The cheesecake was winning.

“How are you doing, sweetie?”

“I’m doing fine.”

“You haven’t been laid off yet, have you? You’d tell me, wouldn’t you?”

The thought of layoffs cemented the decision. Definitely the cheesecake. Life was too short to forget dessert. “I’m not laid off yet, but the day’s still young.”

“I read about the cutbacks at the
Times.
I worried. Did you see that article?”

“Yes, that is my paper. I do read it. Daily.”

“I didn’t think they’d have it up there.”

“Floored me, too. And indoor plumbing, can you believe it?”
Just not in my cabin.
“It’s not the boondocks, Mom. Besides, I get the news on my phone. It’s really cool.”

“You shouldn’t have bought the phone, Jennifer. You can’t afford it.”

“Yeah, but since I’m about to lose my job anyway, what’s a little more red ink?”

“You could come and work at the hospital with me. We need someone in payroll. It’s not as glamorous as journalism, but the salary is better. And the benefits are good, too.”

“I don’t want to work at the hospital. My stomach doesn’t have the Kevlar coating that yours does. I’m a journalist.”

“I know that’s what you think you want to do, but how do you know, Jennifer? When you were seven, you wanted to be an astronaut.”

“And now I’m twenty-seven.”

“When I was twenty-seven, your father and I had bought our first apartment.”

“Real estate was very cheap back then. I rent.”

“But it’s not very smart, Jennifer. How can you be comfortable with that decision?”

“I feel very comfortable with that decision.”

“I’m sorry. I’m pushing, aren’t I? Henry said that I’m pushing you too hard, and I should back off. But these are hard times, and I love you, and I worry about you.”

“I know, Mom. I’m going to be fine.”

“If you need anything…”

“I’ll let you know if I end up starving or without heat—”

“Did they shut off your power? Oh, Jenn!”

“I was joking, Mom.”

“Well, you know your roommate is going to move on without you one of these days, and then where will you be?”

“Without a roommate,” she tried, not that her mother would see the humor.

“Wouldn’t you rather have a cat?”

“A cat won’t pay rent, Mom. People can be useful that way.”

“How’s your room up there? Are you locking your doors? There’s a lot of strangers up there, and you don’t know who you’ll meet—”

“I’m in a great place,” she interrupted, thinking fast. “It’s this huge Victorian with clawfoot tubs and they have a security guard in the lobby, in this bright scarlet blazer with gold tassels. You’d really like him. His name is Oliver, and he’s British.”

“Really?” Out of everything, it was the British that tickled her mother. “Oh, good. I was nervous about you being there alone.”

Sometimes she made up stories to give her mother hope, and it made her mother happy. Perhaps Dr. Dade suspected the truth, but Jenn didn’t think so. Those romantic, idealistic
genes singing happily inside Jenn came from somewhere. Ironic that the very traits that she’d passed onto her daughter were the ones that worried Jenn’s mother the most. Or maybe that was the point of family. You got who you got, no matter who you hoped they’d turn into. And when you finally accepted them, then you knew there was love.

“I love you, Mom, but listen, I have to go.”

After that conversation, Jenn looked over the menu, felt the slow hardening of her arteries, and with a dejected sigh, she walked away.

Twenty-seven years old, and the power of the parental suggestion still worked over distance, cell connections and sometimes without talking at all. Darn it.

J
ENN HAD MADE PEACE
with her decision to forgo the cheesecake. She’d spent the afternoon at the computer with a carrot stick in her mouth, but when her phone struck eleven, she wasn’t so disciplined as to ignore the lure of the rock.

The moon was a slim sliver, the stars obscured by clouds, and still she sat there like the world’s most dedicated Galileo, watching for a man who stirred her senses instead of watching for the stars. In her heart of hearts, she knew that even Galileo took a night off every now and again.

It was nearly eleven-thirty when he showed, and right on target, her pulse leaped.

“How was the day today?” he asked, amazingly polite and cordial, not even bothering to complain about her phone.

She leaned back on her palms, gazing up at the stars. Dedicated, diligent, not wanting to get laid. Hopefully he was fooled. “I discovered that the Psychic Hotline originated up here. And there was a lot of hard-partying bookish
types, all very cute human interest, but I was hoping to find something a little meatier.”

“You could write about your adventures with snakes.”

“Very funny.”

“It’s only day two. How long are you going to stay?”

“Two weeks. Maybe less.”

“You’ll find something,” he assured her.

“Why are you being nice tonight?” she asked because it was possible that he had evolved into Everyman, saying what he thought women wanted to hear to get laid.

“The writing went well,” he stated cheerfully.

“Did you kill me off today?” she asked, secretly hoping that he did. She liked that she was the bane of his existence.

“I did,” he answered, thrilling her more than he would ever know. “You were left alone in the desert, and the vultures came and pecked at your nude body until only a skeleton remained.”

“Fixated on that nude thing, aren’t you?” she taunted, homing in on the important parts.

He shrugged, but she wasn’t fooled. For a few minutes they sat, and she very deliberately played with her phone, waiting for a snide remark or some indication of sexual awareness, but he seemed off someplace else—someplace not on her rock.

When the silence stretched on, she realized that she didn’t have the patience to out-wait him.

“Why did you leave last night?” she asked because it was a conundrum and she wanted to understand.

“Fixated on that analysis thing, aren’t you?”

“Curious. I noticed the large evidence of frustration on your part.”

“You don’t take rejection well, do you?” he retorted
with a hint of frustration. She deemed it sexual instead of personal.

“About as well as you handle sexual frustration. I think we’re both hiding deep neuroses, probably due to some long-erased memory of trauma at an early age.”

“Speak for yourself. I’m normal,” he stated, sounding as if he believed it.

She chose not to correct him because he would argue and protest and she’d had too long of a day for that. Really, all she wanted was to sit in the company of someone who was more unsettled than her. It made her feel…content.

“What’s the problem with your parents?” he asked, breaking the silence, but he seemed genuinely interested, and she liked that he wanted to know more about her. So she told him the truth. The real truth. The one that kept her in cheesecakes and chocolate.

“I don’t want to listen to my parents. I don’t want to think they’re right. But what if they’re right? What if this is a pipe dream? I’ve been busting my butt for five years, and it’s hard. What if I’m not cut out for hard? What if I’m one of those mealymouthed people who always take the easy way out, never actually achieving anything because it’s too difficult, and I don’t think I can do it?”

There. She’d said it, and the world did not explode. The omnipotent ghost of mothers everywhere did not pop out and scream, “Aha! I knew it.”

“You shouldn’t undermine yourself. People will do whatever it takes if they truly want something. Including you.” It sounded incredibly pithy and encouraging. The words she’d hear from a well-meaning friend, not a man committed to absolute truth.

“Ah, yes, words of wisdom from a man who lives his life from an isolated cabin in the woods.”

“You’re mocking me,” he said, which, she noticed, wasn’t
a denial. It was comforting to sit in the company of someone who understood her issues. The doubt that occurred when you flew in the face of conventional wisdom.

She gave him a foolish smile. “You mocked yourself first. I thought that gave me permission to reciprocate in kind.”

“Cheeky.”

“I prefer the words
fearless
and
directed.
”

“And you said that exactly like any fearless and self-directed person would,” he encouraged, daring to touch her hand. It was only a quick skim of her knuckles, but her nerves jumped just the same. She knew what it cost him, that momentary breakdown of his defenses.

Feeling happier, she pointed up at the sky, the very sky that had watched her writhe and moan last night. She liked sitting in the cloak of night, similar to the cloak of anonymity in the city, but here there was a jump in her senses, or maybe that was Aaron.

“Do you know the name of that group of stars up there?”

“Are you really asking me if I want to learn about the world from a phone?” he answered in a tone that indicated pigs would be more likely to fly.

“I won’t ask,” she stated fearlessly. “You strike me as a man who is on a humbling journey to a more enlightened place of being. I’m just going to assume.”

He nodded to her phone. “Why do you like that so much?”

“It’s a GPS, a coffee-finder, a time-management tool and a calorie counter. All the things that I lack.”

“You’re lazy,” he pronounced, but his tone was indulgent and warm, coming from a man who was accepting of his own flawed nature.

“I prefer the term self-aware,” she defended. “And I don’t
think that it’s laziness. More a pattern of distraction in my life.”

“I’m one of your distractions, aren’t I?”