The Orchard at the Edge of Town (7 page)

Chapter Five

Two of the kittens were missing.

Apricot discovered the horrifying fact a few seconds after she walked into Rose's house. She glared at the lone kitten—Handsome, of course—and lifted him from the box. “Where are your siblings?” she asked.

He yawned.

“Never mind. I already know,” she muttered, placing Handsome on the floor and watching as he chased his ratlike tail. “You need some toys, big boy.”

And she needed to call Simon and let him know what his daughters had done. She didn't have his home number, and that was as good an excuse as any to put the inevitable off for a while longer.

The phone rang, and she answered it, figuring it was either Simon or one of her family members. “Hello?”

“Babe?” Lionel's voice was as unwelcome as a viper in a spring garden. She almost hung up.
Almost
.

“How did you get this number?”

“I had a friend pull up property records for your aunt. I figured you'd probably be at one of her places. Her number is in the directory in Apple Orchards, so I gave it a shot.”

“Apple Valley,” she corrected, because there was really nothing to say. No reason to even be having a conversation with Lionel except to put some closure on what they'd had for five years.

“Right. Whatever. When are you coming home? Someone changed the lock on the door and—”

“Really?” Not surprising. Her family didn't waste time.

“Yes. Really,” he responded in his am-I-speaking-to-a-toddler tone.

She'd always hated it, but she'd ignored it because she'd loved Lionel. At least, she'd thought she loved him. She didn't feel nearly as heartbroken as she thought she should. Not about the wedding being called off, not about him calling because he couldn't get into the condo, not even about him sleeping with her assistant the night before their wedding. All she felt was . . . tired.

“And all my stuff was piled up at the curb. My clothes were on the ground, and a dozen homeless people were picking through them when I got home from work,” he continued, every word he said all about him. Why hadn't she ever noticed that before?

“That's a shame, Lionel.”

“I'm glad you think so. Now, what are you going to do about it?”

“About what?”

“About your family locking me out of our place and dumping my stuff,” he growled. She could picture the scowl on his face, see it as clearly as she could see Handsome scurrying under the sofa and chasing a dust bunny out.

“How do you know it was my family?”

“Don't be obtuse, Anna. Who else has access to our condo? Who else—”

“It's not
our
condo, Lionel. It's mine. I bought it. My name is on the deed. I paid it off last year.”

“I lived in it for five years. By law—”

“By law, if your stuff isn't in it and your name isn't on the title, you don't belong there. So, how about you find another place for you and Diane to sleep?”

“I'm not with Diane,” he protested. “I made a mistake, and I regret it, but it was one night. It didn't mean anything.”

“Not to you, but it means a heck of a lot to me.” She hung up, because she was done with Lionel and his excuses.

When the phone rang she ignored it.

When it rang again, she walked out back.

Dusk shrouded the yard in deep purple and gray, turning old trees into giants and thick bushes into gnomes. She walked across the yard and into the orchard beyond. The air held a hint of apple and the ripe, thick scent of rotting fruit. At one time, the trees had been pruned and tended, but years of neglect had taken their toll. Still, with a little elbow grease and some initiative, the orchard could produce again. After years of working with herbs and leaves, she might just be ready for something new. She snagged an apple that hung from a gnarled branch. Small and tough, it had been overcrowded and had grown accordingly.

“I can fix this,” she said to the evening sky and the cool, crisp breeze that was blowing through the trees. The leaves rustled, and she figured that was more of a reply than she'd have gotten if Lionel had been standing beside her.

“Idiot,” she muttered, and she wasn't sure if she was talking about herself or Lionel.

Somewhere a rooster called a warning, and a bird flew from the tree beside her. She'd spent most of her childhood walking the woods of Happy Dale. Mostly alone. Lots of times at night when her overwhelming family had been too loud and boisterous and she'd wanted nothing more than to escape the little house and all the crazy people in it. She knew night sounds and nocturnal animals. She knew the difference between a deer stepping gingerly through a thicket and a man sliding through trees.

Right at that moment, she was sure she heard footsteps.

She glanced over her shoulder. Rose's house jutted up from the yard, light spilling out of the kitchen window and splashing gold across well-trimmed grass. A shadow moved near the corner of the house, undulating with the branches of an old pine tree that stood near the edge of the yard.

“Hello?” she called, moving toward it.

Something lunged from the shadows, and she screamed, backed up so fast she fell on her butt. She lay there for a moment, stunned, staring up at the dusky sky.

Get up
, her mind screamed.
You're about to be attacked, and you're just lying here like a sack of potatoes!

She was almost on her feet when something landed on her back. Not a heavy weight. Light and purring.

“Handsome?” She gasped, so relieved she sat down again, dragging the kitten off her back and into her lap. His purr sounded like an old-man's snore, his claws digging into her thighs as he tried to make himself comfortable.

“Ouch. Cool it!”

“Cool what?” a masculine voice asked, and she screamed so loudly, Handsome jumped off her lap and ran for cover.

“Sorry. Didn't mean to scare the living daylights out of you.”

She knew the Southern drawl, the broad shoulders backlit by the kitchen light. Simon.

Relieved, she accepted the hand he held out, allowed herself to be pulled to her feet.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, his hand still wrapped around hers, all warm and calloused and nice.

“Do you even need to ask?”

“Yes. No,” she blabbered, her heart beating way faster than it should have been, her cheeks flushed. “The kittens, right?”

“I heard them crying while I was helping the girls with their homework. I guess they weren't happy about being in a box under Evie's bed.” He released her hand, and she had to admit she was just a little sorry about it. Simon was one of those guys her family liked to laugh at—straitlaced, kind, uncomplicated, drama-free.

Dependable
was the word Rose would have used, and she'd have spit it out like it was dirtier than any four-letter curse she'd ever uttered.

“They're all waiting on the front porch,” he continued, heading around the side of the house. “The girls are probably ringing the doorbell sixty-five thousand times.”

“Doorbells are fun when you're eight,” she replied, her insides all kinds of soft and mushy as she watched him scoop Handsome out of a bush that pressed up against the house.

“Here's the other one. I guess the girls didn't think he was worthy of stealing.” He sounded disgusted and just a little tired.

“They weren't stealing. They were giving the kittens a home.”

“Let's not play the semantic card, okay?” He sighed. “They took things that weren't theirs, hid them in their room, and didn't plan to say a word to me about it.”

“You're really angry about a childish mistake.”

“A mistake is when you drop a glass or knock over a cup of water,” he grumbled, stalking up the porch steps.

The twins were there. One had tears streaming down her face. The other looked fit to be tied, her eyes flashing with frustration, her lips pressed together.

“I see my missing kittens have returned. I was wondering where they'd wandered off to,” Apricot said, hoping to lighten the mood. There'd been very few rules when she was a kid, so she had no idea what it felt like to be on the receiving end of a parent's ire, but she had a feeling the twins had already found out.

“They didn't go missing, Apricot,” the sobbing twin managed to gasp. “We took them, because we love them.”

“And Daddy said we had to apologize,” the scowling twin added. Had to be Evie. She seemed to be the feisty one out of the pair. “Even though we didn't do anything wrong.”

“You took someone's cats, Evangeline,” Simon said, and he sounded like he was at the last edge of his patience.

“How about we all go inside for a minute?” Apricot suggested. “We can sort it out there.”

“Into the haunted house?” Rori breathed. “What if the ghosts get us?”

“There are no ghosts.” Simon rubbed the bridge of his nose, and Apricot had the absurd urge to knead the tense muscles in his neck. She clenched her fists to keep from giving in to it.

“Aunt Daisy says—”

“Your aunt has a wonderful imagination.” Apricot cut off whatever Evie planned to say. She didn't think Simon could handle it. “But she's wrong about the house. I spent every summer here when I was a kid, and I can tell you there's not a ghost to be found.”

She opened the door and the girls followed her inside, Simon right behind them, holding Handsome close to his chest. His very broad, very muscular chest.

She should not be noticing that.

But she was, so she looked away, her cheeks hot.

“Are you sure there aren't any ghosts in here?” Evie asked suspiciously, her gaze darting around the living room. Apricot hadn't uncovered the furniture yet, and even she had to admit the cavernous room with its shrouded white furniture looked unlived-in and just a little creepy.

“Positive.”

“How can you know?” Rori asked quietly, tears drying on her cheeks. “Aunt Daisy says that ghosts only show themselves when it's nighttime, but they're even around during the day. She says—”

“Aurora,” Simon said gently, “your aunt needs to stop filling your head with silly stories, and you need to stop believing them.”

“They're not silly.” Rori didn't stamp her foot, but Apricot thought she wanted to.

“They are too silly,” Evie interrupted. “And I knew all along there were no ghosts in this house. Just sheets on sofas.” She plopped down onto the couch, her blond hair a wild mess of fine strands. She needed a comb and something to keep her mind occupied.

That would be Apricot's assessment, but then, she didn't know a whole heck of a lot about kids. She'd been just young enough to avoid being a nanny to the younger children in Happy Dale. By the time she'd been old enough to do her stint as babysitter, Aunt Rose had already taken her under her wing. While her sisters had been shepherding little ones, she'd been learning the difference between mint and clover. While they'd been helping a dozen or more children with homework and chores, she'd been building greenhouses and making candles to sell at farmers' markets.

She eyed Evie.

“You have a kitten in your pocket,” she finally said, because the little girl actually did have a kitten in her jacket pocket, its little white-and-black face peeking out.

“Because Daddy wouldn't even give me one second to find a box for her. He said we had to get these doggone cats out of the house before he blew a casket.”

“Gasket,” Simon corrected.

“That's what you said,” Evie wailed. “And it really hurt my feelings a lot, because Sassafras is not a doggone cat.”

“Neither is Princess!” Apparently, Rori didn't want her sister's grief to outshine hers. She started wailing too. Handsome joined them, yowling with so much passion, Simon set him on the couch and took a step away.

“What a mess,” he muttered.

“The cat or the kids?” she asked.

“All three of them.” He ran a hand down his jaw, shook his head as he eyed his crying daughters. “You know, Apricot,” he said, “I had a feeling you were trouble. It looks like I was right.”

“Me?”

“Yeah. You.”

“All I did was ask you for a reference,” she protested.

“And bring kittens into my house. The one thing the girls want above all else.”

“It's not like I knew that, and it's not like I offered the kittens to the girls. They took them.”

“We're sorry,” the girls cried in unison, and if it hadn't been so sad, she probably would have laughed at the picture they made—two little towheads with tiny kittens in their jacket pockets, crying as if the world were about to end.

“It's okay,” Apricot said.

“No, it's not,” Rori cried.

 

 

Things had gotten out of hand.

Simon wasn't quite sure how.

He'd planned to bring the kittens back, get the girls in the car, and drive away. Instead, he was standing in Rose's living room listening to various howls and sobs.

Enough was enough.

He had a meeting in the morning and plenty to do before the girls went to bed. “Okay, girls. Give Apricot the kittens. It's time to say good-bye.”

Tears poured down the girls' faces, but they carefully removed the kittens from their pockets, smoothed fuzzy fur, murmured good-byes that Simon could only partially hear.

Maybe he wasn't doing the right thing making the girls give up the kittens. Maybe ten years from now, they'd be rebellious young women, living lives of crime and citing this one moment as the thing that had turned them into criminals.