Night Thunder (10 page)

Chapter 9

ADA SCOTT WAS ENJOYING HERSELF IMMENSELY. How she relished having all these laughing, chattering women in her house—relished how pretty her parents’ oak dining table looked set with its lacy white cloth and her Blue Willow dishes and the small cut-crystal bowl in its center brimming with chrysanthemums.

The house smelled good too—thanks to Bessie’s and Katy’s help with the cooking. They’d fixed chicken-and-spinach quiche for lunch, along with a tossed salad of baby greens, pecans, grapes, and mandarin oranges. Roberta had insisted on baking her grandmother’s cranberry muffins, and Ada had contributed dessert: her own special pineapple upside-down cake, along with lemon cookies and ice cream.

Sunlight beamed in through the ivory lace curtains and seemed to crown her small cozy living room with a chestnut glow that made even the worn furnishings look almost lustrous once more.

As much as she loved the peace and isolation of her two-story frame house perched at the secluded end of Angel Road, she often still missed the company of her husband and her son when he was growing up—and of Billy and all his friends now that he was away at college.

She felt her throat closing suddenly and tears threatening. She blinked them back.
Silly, foolish, old woman.
There was nothing to cry over. She’d lived a good long life and there was still some more to go, if God was willing.

She had a good many friends, not to mention Bessie and the Templetons. And a job and a right smart grandson who was going to get a college diploma.

She had no right to cry at all.

Pouring icy lemonade from her mother’s crystal pitcher into tall glasses, she glanced once more around the living room.

Corinne, bless her, seemed as happy as the meadowlark singing in the aspen outside the window. She’d waited a long time for Roy to get over Katy Templeton and get around to popping the question. She deserved to be happy.

“What do you guess she’s thinking about right now?” Katy Brent murmured in her ear, so suddenly that Ada started and almost sloshed lemonade over the side of the glass.

“Who, honey? Corinne?”

“No . . . Josy. Over there by the window. Josy Warner. She looks almost hypnotized, doesn’t she?”

Sure enough, the newcomer to town—who for some reason Corinne and Roberta seemed to have adopted— was admiring Ada’s small array of old family photographs and knickknacks atop the small stone mantelpiece above the fireplace, studying each in abject fascination, as if it were a glittering gold bar dug out of earth and rock.

“Seems a bit odd, if you ask me.” Ada shrugged. “Hard to believe some fancy Chicago interior designer is going to want to copy how I display my little treasures.”

“Why not? She could probably learn a thing or two from you. Your house is my favorite in this whole town— except for my own old home, and my cabin with Jackson and Mattie. I get the feeling Josy is . . .”

Her voice trailed off, and Ada glanced at her sharply. “She’s what? Speak your mind, Katy.”

“I was going to say she’s . . . I don’t know . . . lost. Or . . . looking for something.”

“That one?” Ada adjusted the dessert plates so that they lined up evenly with the edge of the table. “She seems cool as a cucumber to me. Even if she is a fish out of water.”

“You don’t like her?” Katy stared at her in surprise.

“Now, I didn’t say that. She’s nice and quite pretty if you like that city-girl look. And I liked the way she stood up to Tammie when Tammie wanted her to take a look at those guest cabins and give her some ideas for redecorating. Said she charges one hundred dollars an hour for consultations and that included travel time and phone calls.” Ada chuckled. “Did you see the look on Tammie’s face? That did tickle me, I admit.”

They both glanced over at Tammie Morgan, seated on Ada’s faded chintz sofa between Ellen MacIntyre and Roberta. Tammie considered herself the epitome of Western chic and glamour and thought of herself and her husband, Wood, as the self-crowned royalty of Thunder Creek.

True, their ranch was one of the wealthiest in the county—even before they’d turned a ten-thousand-acre parcel into the Crystal Horseshoe Dude Ranch and now even more so—but Tammie tended to go overboard in the control freak and look-at-me-I’m-rich departments.

She’d hired a renowned celebrity chef, Elmo Panterri, to operate the Cowpoke Cafe, which had gone into direct competition with Bessie’s Diner right after the dude ranch opened. Fortunately for Bessie, her customers had remained loyal, and Elmo had soon lost his taste for small-town living. He’d broken his contract within six months and some wannabe überchef had taken his place, but he hadn’t lasted long either.

“I can’t believe Tammie gave Corinne that tacky old weathered-barn-in-the-moonlight print that hangs in half the guest rooms in the dude ranch,” Ada sniffed. “What in the world kind of a shower gift is that?”

“That’s Tammie for you.” Katy sighed. “But that crocheted tablecloth you gave her is lovely, Ada. She was thrilled when she saw it.”

Ada nodded but she was barely listening, for she was distracted by the sight of Josy Warner reaching toward the small painted pitcher at the end of the mantel.

“Oh, no. Don’t—” Ada began, but it was too late.

Josy was already lifting the pitcher by the handle, no doubt to take a closer look, but as she raised it off the mantel the china handle immediately broke off, separating from the rest of the delicate pitcher, which tumbled and crashed onto the polished wood floor.

Josy gasped and stared down at the cracked pieces of Ada Scott’s beautiful little pitcher. The room full of chattering women had all turned to stare at her as the crash resounded through the living room and then a horrible silence filled the warm spring air.

“I’m sorry,” she managed to choke out as Ada approached her and gazed sadly down at the pink and blue and ivory shards.

“You had no way of knowing that the handle was broken.” Ada knelt, gathering the jagged pieces. “It broke off last week and I used a little Elmer’s glue to keep it in place until I could get something stronger to repair it. I shouldn’t have waited.”

Josy stooped to help her pick up the shards, cursing herself for having lifted the pitcher in the first place. “I feel terrible about this. I’d like to replace it for you—”

“No need.”

The words sounded curt. Angry. Josy’s stomach clenched.

Great way to ingratiate yourself with your grandmother,
she thought miserably.
Break something she’s
probably cherished half her life.

Grabbing at pieces of china, she heard Bessie’s and Corinne’s voices above her.

“It was an accident, that’s all,” Bessie stated.

“It’s no one’s fault,” Corinne murmured.

Josy wanted to drop through the floor. “I’m so terribly sorry,” she said again.

For a moment it was hard to breathe. She was remembering the time in the Hammond foster home when she’d dropped her milk glass on the floor after dinner. Not only had the milk spilled all over, but the glass had splintered into a hundred pieces.

May Hammond had screamed at her and then Karl had stormed into the room, drawn from the television by his wife’s shrieks.

He’d grabbed her by the hair, nearly ripping her curls from her head and dragged her downstairs into the damp, dark basement crawling with ants and spiders.

“You’ll stay downstairs until tomorrow morning when it’s time to go to school. We don’t want to see your stupid face for the rest of the night,” he’d told her.

The basement had been terrifying—even with the single bare lightbulb over the sump pump turned on. It only served to show her the ants crawling across the cement floor, the cricket hiding in a dusty corner. There was no furniture down there, no place to sit except the steps or the floor—only boxes of old stuff and a broken grandfather clock.

But as soon as the Hammonds had gone to bed, Ricky had stolen down the stairs. He brought a chair for her, and a blanket. He stayed in the basement beside her the entire night, promising to kill any bugs that came close to crawling on her. He’d sprawled on the steps, dozing off now and then while she huddled on the chair, wrapped in the blanket.

In the morning he’d snuck back up before anyone saw him and returned the blanket and chair. Then, finally, after breakfast, she’d been sprung.

Karl Hammond had insisted she be sent off to school without breakfast, but as soon as she and Ricky were on their way, out of sight of the house, he gave her the Pop-Tart he’d stuck into his pocket instead of eating.

For a moment, kneeling beside Ada Scott in that charming house on Angel Road, gathering broken fragments of a once beautiful china pitcher, she felt just like that little girl who’d been banished to the basement, the little girl who’d so gratefully eaten a cold Pop-Tart on her way to school in the same clothes she’d worn the day before.

But she wasn’t that little girl, not anymore. She’d come a long way from the Hammonds and from quietly taking whatever anyone dished out. And dropping the pitcher truly had been an accident, she reminded herself. She took a deep breath, set her shoulders, and gripped the shards carefully, consciously and deliberately pulling herself out of the past.

And at that moment, Ada Scott straightened, looked down into her face, and stretched out a cool, blue-veined hand.

“Come, child, I’ll get my broom for the rest. There’s no cause to look so mortified.”

“Maybe not, but I wish I hadn’t—”

“No, sirree, don’t you think that way.” Ada wagged a finger in her face. “People are important, not things. Didn’t anyone ever teach you that?”

For a moment Josy was speechless. No, nobody ever had.

“Don’t think you’re getting off easy,” Ada told her before she could reply. “You’ll stay and help me clean up today after everyone’s gone. Unless you have something more important to do,” she added, but there was a gentle twinkle in her eyes.

“I can’t think that you’d want me around all your pretty dishes and things after this,” Josy said ruefully. “You’re taking a pretty big risk, you know.”

“Hmmm, is that so? Well, I’m a gambler—everyone knows that. Me and Bessie, we just love to beat the odds.”

It was midafternoon before all the guests departed, and before Bessie and Roberta drove back to town to reopen Bessie’s Diner, which had been closed from eight this morning until three in the afternoon in honor of the bridal shower.

Roy came by and had ice cream and coffee before helping Corinne load her gifts into his truck. Then Josy found herself alone with Ada as a few clouds drifted across the sky, momentarily obscuring the sun.

“Most of it’s done,” Ada pronounced crisply, surveying the aftermath of the party. “But if you’d shake that tablecloth out back and help dry some dishes, I’ll be all set before my legs give out.”

But she gave no sign that her legs were about to give out. Josy had never seen such energy in a woman—Ada swept the floor, cleaned the sink, plumped and tidied the cushions of her chintz sofa and the blue crocheted throw across the back of a mahogany rocking chair.

“Come over here and let me show you something,” Ada said when Josy had carefully dried the last of the platters and serving bowls and set them on the small kitchen counter beside the dish drainer.

Ada led her into the living room and straight to the mantel. “That pitcher you broke belonged to my mother—this is her in this picture right here.”

She pointed to a photograph in a square silver frame. The photo showed a woman and a man dressed in thirties-era clothing. Josy had examined the picture before and had guessed that it might be Ada’s parents—and her own great-grandparents.

The woman was holding a toddler in her arms, and the toddler eyed the camera with what could only be called a wary expression.

“That’s my mama, my daddy, and me. My brother was born about a year later. We weren’t very well off back then, not many were—it was the Depression, you know. But we made it through. And once, just like you did today, I broke something—a little oval cut-glass jewel box that my father had given my mama on their second wedding anniversary. I sneaked into her room to play with it when I was about five and I dropped it on the floor. She cried when she came in and saw what had happened, and I thought it was because her beautiful present was shattered all over the floor—but you know what?”

Still holding the frame in her hands, she looked intently at Josy. “She was crying because I’d tried to pick up the pieces and had cut my hand on the glass. My finger was bleeding.”

Ada nodded, and Josy could see the memories floating across her gentle face. “Now, some mothers might have been furious, and mine had every right to be, but she was more upset that I had hurt myself, and she told me then— people are always more important than things. I’ve always remembered that.”

Josy’s throat ached. “That’s a beautiful story. Your mother sounds like a very special woman.”

“Oh, she was. She saw me through some tough times and she stood by me, which is more than some people do for their kin. I don’t have patience with that kind. Now,” she added, setting the picture frame carefully back on the mantel, “I saw you looking at all my little treasures up here earlier. Not that I mind, of course, but you seemed so caught up in them, I couldn’t help but wonder why you were so interested.”