Perfect Timing (3 page)

As the start of classes approached, other changes entered Isabel’s mind. The farmhouse, a condemnable structure with fortress-like walls, no longer seemed able to keep the future at bay. Time that ran on an hourglass was about to run out. Isabel would miss that, the louder reasons for being there, like today’s Lovett Street debacle, and the tiniest of routines, like their tutorial swap of irregular verbs. With Aidan’s gift for languages and a sharp head for numbers—which he generally ignored—the hourglass could have easily flipped, at least for a while. But college didn’t interest Aidan. This place, the farmhouse or Catswallow, was not the beat of his heart. Music was Aidan’s passion, making his departure imminent. The only unknown was how long it would take until he’d saved enough nerve and money to go. One thing was certain; he’d have no trouble walking away from Fountainhead.

Catswallow’s premier mobile-home community was where they slept, though both felt more at home in the farmhouse. While it served as Aidan’s music studio, lately, for Isabel, its purpose had expanded. Her mother’s boyfriend, Rick Stanton, was the local-boy-makes-good story and Carrie was crazy about him. It added a third person to the now familiar mother-daughter life. And for reasons Isabel couldn’t identify, she was unable to get comfortable with that. At first she thought it was jealousy, but it didn’t seem to match the awkward emotions in her head. She was truly happy for her mother, pleased she found someone successful, charismatic, and driven. Isabel didn’t like to stereotype, but considering the choices in a trailer park dating pool . . . well, Rick Stanton exceeded the odds. Strapped to his rocket to fame were the half-dozen car dealerships he owned, though it went farther back, having something to do with his years as a football god. Rick was a Catswallow state champion and an all-American linebacker for the University of Alabama. After college he’d parlayed his popularity into a showroom bonanza, making car dealerships look like corporate success. But Rick had loftier ambitions than cornering the Heart of Dixie’s motor vehicle market. Recently, he’d announced his bid for the state senate. He definitely had the following. You couldn’t drive through town without encountering dozens of Stanton Motors car emblems. But even with his success, despite his friendly demeanor, Rick’s increasing presence rattled her. And Isabel didn’t rattle. Only yesterday, while waiting for Carrie, he’d offered Isabel a beer. He smiled as her eyes widened. Then he laughed, saying he’d forgotten she wasn’t quite of age. She brushed it off, excusing herself to run an errand that didn’t exist. She’d gone to the farmhouse, pierced by late-afternoon sun and devoid of Aidan’s presence. Normally, she didn’t spend time there alone. But in that moment, the farmhouse felt different, more like a refuge. Hours later, with no one to confide in, she walked home, glad to find her mother and Rick out. Isabel climbed into bed, where rattled thoughts led to a night of odd dreams, a cast of characters from Rick to Eric Lang to Aidan.

Today she decided that disrupted sleep was reason enough to swipe the beer Rick offered, which she brought to the farmhouse. Isabel would have been fine with a cooler of Diet Coke, but Aidan’s mood would require a stronger pick-me-up than a carbonated beverage. As he came through the door, Isabel saw that she was right. He slammed the warped slab so hard it actually shut, walls wavering as old floorboards creaked. Steam he’d been suppressing since Shanna slapped him hissed from his pores. Sprawled across an old sofa, Isabel kept silent, the tattered piece of furniture having initiated their customary housekeeping. She remained prone in what the two recognized as her spot. She didn’t make room. There was no need. Aidan never sat next to her.

“Give,” he grunted, holding out his hand.

She opened the beer and he guzzled it. Isabel’s eyes trailed over shaggy blond hair. The shade tended to fluctuate, framing a face that had hit the genetic lottery. There was no getting away from it. All of him was veiled in a satiny complexion, a blemish never having the audacity to show up on Aidan Roycroft’s face. His eyes were more cornflower in September than sky in winter. She saw right through them, past the image, beyond his character flaws—which, on occasion, included lazy, indulgent, and slightly self-centered. Aidan didn’t resemble his mother much, except for the hair, making Isabel wonder what his father looked like. Unlike Eric Lang, whom Isabel could see in a mirror, Aidan said he’d never even seen a picture of John Roycroft. Isabel envied that. He’d stood a solid six feet since he turned sixteen, Isabel perceiving his growth as an overnight event. One minute they were of similar heights, swapping spit and a watermelon Jolly Rancher; the next Aidan towered over her. There was a warm April day a couple of years before that when Aidan showed up to the farmhouse in shorts. He had hair on his legs that wasn’t there the summer before. After the hair and height came shoulders. Aidan went from a beanpole stature to having a widest point that balanced his absurdly stunning head, tapering down to . . . Isabel bit her lower lip, picking up her gaze and moving it to the cracked windowpanes. He chugged the beer and belched, the sound echoing through vacant rooms. And from beanpole to the T-shape act of God that was the Aidan she hung out with.

“You should have done that last week when Shanna trotted you out to the family country club,” Isabel said, matching an indifferent tone to her glance. “That way, she could have pitched her fit in front of Catswallow’s better half.”

“Shut up, Isabel.” She crossed her arms, narrowing her eyes. “Sorry, I’m sorry. You know I didn’t mean that.” Everything quieted and Isabel could see, if only from his peripheral glance, that her ruffled feelings were overriding his bruised ego. “So why didn’t you stop me? You knew it was a train wreck.”

“Ha! You flatter yourself, Aidan. Worrying about
your
love life isn’t on my to-do list.” She slumped farther down, flinging a thick wave of auburn hair over the sofa’s arm. It was her crowning glory, prettier than his. “So, are you really
not
going to take her to Catswallow’s main event?” she asked, curious if things were as doomed as the scene indicated.

“You’re kidding, right? I wouldn’t take her across Lovett Street—not unless there was a whole lot of traffic.”

“That’s what I thought.” Along with his reputation for attracting girls, discarding them before they could spell
novelty
, he tended not to rekindle these relationships. In all probability, Aidan Roycroft would forever treat girls like a stick of gum—once the flavor was gone, out it went.

“It won’t be too big a deal, not for me, since I’m working it.” For the second straight year, Aidan handily beat out bands from as far away as Tuscaloosa, earning him single billing at the gala.

“Shanna would have hated it, Aidan, having to share you all night with the stage.”

“Hell, I’m not worried about her either way. If she turns up stag, I’ll see to it that she gets a spotlight dance all to herself.”

“That she’d probably love.” They both laughed, Aidan opening another beer. She watched but didn’t comment.

“Listen, Isabel, it, um . . . it does leave me with one problem.”

“What’s that?” She rolled onto her stomach and stretched over the sofa arm, reaching for the cooler. Glancing back, maybe unexpectedly, she caught Aidan’s eyes in a radar lock with her butt. Faster than a flapjack, she flipped back over. She didn’t look at him. Her gaze was trained on dark-painted toenails, inching up denim-covered legs, bumping past a hole that revealed a blistery mosquito bite. With her stare stuck on the hem of her shirt, she tugged it past her waist. She’d imagined it. The same way she’d imagined Rick’s innuendo. Isabel coaxed herself to look, ignoring an achy pause that only she heard. Aidan was oblivious. He stood on the other side of the room, fiddling with a guitar. “Get a clue, Isabel,” she mumbled.

“What?” he said, absorbed in a chronically flat E string.

“Nothing. So what’s the problem?” Sitting up straight, she tucked her legs tight and stretched sideways. Isabel grabbed for a bottle, but the wet beer slipped from her grip, toppling back into the cooler. She snatched it up and popped the top, the beer gushing like an icy geyser. “Damn it!” Jumping to her feet, Isabel looked toward Aidan, only seeing the guitar. Seconds later he reappeared with a handful of paper towels. It was a natural reaction, Aidan blotting the drenched cotton shirt. A moment into that it became apparent
what
he was blotting, the simple but soaked garment looking primed for a wet T-shirt contest. And instead of an achy pause, there was an alarming stare, Isabel thrusting his hands away.

“Sorry!” he yelled as she grabbed at the soggy paper towels and her breasts. “I didn’t see . . . I was just trying to help.”

There was a wicked arc to his smooth voice and Isabel just wanted it to go away. But because calm was what she did best, she kept talking as if the last few seconds hadn’t happened. “Uh, you didn’t say. What, exactly, is your problem?”

“You’re my f— Oh, right, yeah. It doesn’t matter.” There was a hissing sigh, Aidan pursing his lips. “Why do you always do that?”

“Do what?” Beer dripped from the waded paper towels, Isabel deftly ignoring it.

From the crates that served as a coffee table, Aidan picked up his beer and downed a long mouthful. Cornflower eyes creased into something she couldn’t put a name to, his gaze veering out the dirty windows. “Be so fucking in control—all the damn time.” He glanced back. “Anyway, it’s not important. Forget it.”

“Will you just tell me the problem?” Solving Aidan’s problems was as familiar as tying her shoes, and Isabel stayed the course. “Did you hire a limo, pay for two gala tickets? Rent a hotel room?”

He looked back, Isabel amazed that his eyes could narrow even more. “I’m the entertainment. I don’t need a ticket.”

“Right.” She discarded the paper towels and sat, pinching the bridge of her nose. It cut off the visual of a flashing Motel 6 sign and Shanna dressed in nothing but elbow-length white gloves.

“A date. Now I don’t have a date.”

From her seat on the sofa, Isabel’s hand dropped, her jaw following. She gazed up at him. It was like looking directly into the sun, and she returned the queer expression he offered moments before.
He couldn’t possibly be asking . . .

“I get that you think this whole gala thing is a stale tradition Catswallow can’t let go of—like jaywalking or book banning. I hear you. It’s an excuse for snooty wannabes to perpetuate a fantasy about not actually living in a barely four-corner town. Maybe that’s all true, but I have to go, and I’d rather not go alone so . . .”

His ability to repeat her gala-loathing,
‘rather stick a hot poker in my eye’
chant verbatim was striking, Isabel doubly amazed that he’d used
perpetuate
in a sentence. “Oh, Aidan, I don’t—”

“You’re right, never mind. I shouldn’t ask. I know you turned down Jake Summerfield and Kyle Marsh. They couldn’t figure out why until I explained your point of view.”

“You do? You did?” she said, standing. She’d almost said yes to Kyle, but to what point? To spend $500 that could be used for tuition and books, not to mention the hours of her life wasted as an extra in Shanna O’Rourke’s floor show. She took in his understated stance, hands shoved in the pockets of his jeans, a glum expression tethered to his usually charm-filled face. It was really such a simple request. And what excuse did she have to turn him down? It would be one friend helping out another. Nothing more. “If it’s that important, I’ll do it,” Isabel said firmly, as if she’d just agreed to join the militia.

“You will?”

“Sure, what’s the big deal?” While she did see the gala as something that should have gone the way of pearl necklaces and fat corsages, Isabel couldn’t ignore the smile on Aidan’s face. She supposed it was understandable. The significance of Catswallow’s main event was lost on her. But to everyone born and bred in the tiny town, the late-summer gala was a beloved rite of passage. Isabel tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and smiled back. Inwardly, she wasn’t as comfortable, uneasy about the idea of being Aidan’s date. Distracted, she barely heard her name being called from the doorway.

“Bella! What in the hell are you doin’, girl, all the way out here . . . with him?”

Rick Stanton, who’d opened the twisted door as if it were revolving, stood in the entrance of the farmhouse. Gala thoughts petered to a hard stop. She felt as if her sanctuary had been violated and looked at Rick, who was an imposing sight in every way: size, personality, money . . . male hormones. Initially, Isabel thought those were quality points. Her mother required somebody with an overwhelming allure. Eric Lang was like that; he had an innate ability to get along. Rick possessed this trait too, though differently, more like a smooth talker from the handshake forward.

“Carrie’s been looking for you. I spent the last hour combing this side of town,” he said, coming farther in.

“My mother?” Carrie, an x-ray tech, often worked a double shift, doing her best to excel at the county’s new hospital. Promise of career advancement had been the clincher, drawing them to Catswallow in the first place. “Is something wrong?”

“Nah,” he said, a concerned look traveling from Aidan to the cooler of beer. “We decided to take a ride into Birmingham for dinner. The three of us,” he said, making it clear that Aidan was not on the guest list. “My boys, Trey and Strobe, are meeting us there. Carrie wants you to come home and get ready.” More focused on Aidan than her, he stepped in his direction. “I’ve been meaning to ask. You’re Stella Roycroft’s boy, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, you know my mother?” Aidan said, arms folding across his chest. There was a thickness to him—physically . . . mentally. It seemed new, like it wasn’t there yesterday, like those hairy legs.

“Everybody knows Stella Roycroft.” Isabel’s eyes flicked back, catching an upturn to his lips. “Me included.” Her neck swiveled, seeing Aidan’s mouth twitch. “Guess that makes you John Roycroft’s effort. At least courtesy of a moment or two before he hightailed it out of Catswallow.”

Isabel’s head whipped back. “You knew Aidan’s father?” She sensed that Aidan hated the question, if only from the way his stare was burning a hole through the back of her head.