Woodrose Mountain (16 page)

Evie hit the remote on the keychain that extended the automatic ramp on the passenger side of the vehicle. She reached in to release the tie-downs, speaking quietly to Taryn as she did. He couldn’t hear what they said but he saw Taryn’s sleepy smile in response, saw Evie rest a hand on his daughter’s hair, and something tender and fragile shivered in his chest.

“Hi…Dad.” Taryn smiled at him, still half-asleep, reminding him of long-ago snowboard trips when they would wake up early to drive to one of the other ski resorts in Colorado for the day.

“Hi, bug.” He had let too much distance come between them over the years, had allowed himself to become too immersed in building his business and too focused on his own expectations for Taryn. Shame on him that it had taken his daughter nearly dying before he finally realized it.

“Look,” she said, holding out her arm, just as Evie had predicted she would. He saw a bracelet of pretty, colorful pink-and-green beads.

“Nice,” he said.

“Made it with Char…”

“Let’s get you inside,” Evie said quickly, pushing Taryn toward the house and making him curious about her haste.

“You’ve got a package,” he said. “Want to open it?”

“Really? For…me?”

She had always loved opening presents on Christmas, he remembered—until the last few years, anyway, when she had started asking for money to buy her own gifts.

“Why don’t I tell Mrs. O. to bring lunch out back by the pool? You can open your package there.”

“Okay. Bathroom…first.”

“I’m on it.” Evie helped Taryn to her room and the en suite bathroom while he went in search of his housekeeper to ask if she would mind serving lunch outside. He didn’t really have time to stop for lunch since he had only come home for a moment to take care of some loose ends, but he supposed he could find a few minutes to spare for his daughter, especially when he’d nearly lost everything with her.

Ten minutes later, the three of them converged outside at the covered table near the pool. The waterfall built into the landscape gurgled, reflecting flashes of afternoon sunlight.

“Mrs. O. made chicken-salad sandwiches. My favorite,” Brodie said.

“She…loves…you,” Taryn said with a teasing grin.

His eyes met Evie’s and he was embarrassed to feel himself blush. Mrs. O. was nearly sixty years old, for heaven’s sake.

“She appreciates that I pay her a decent wage and that I don’t make her work on weekends.”

“That’s…not all.”

“Why don’t you open your package?” he said quickly. “I’m dying to know who’s sending you things and what it might be.”

“I brought some scissors out to help us,” Evie said. For all her free-spirited ways, she was hyperorganized about things like that, he was discovering. Because of his ADD, he had trouble focusing beyond right this moment and had always greatly admired others who could think ahead three or four steps beyond the now.

With help from Evie and the scissors, Taryn laboriously worked to open the package. Where he wanted to jump in and take care of the situation, Evie helped a little but mostly made his daughter do the work herself. He let her, appreciating her wisdom. Taryn would let everyone fuss and fret over her as long as she could. Evie instinctively seemed to understand that.

Finally it was open and Taryn and Evie both stared inside.

“What is it?” he asked, since the flaps of the box prevented him from seeing the contents.

“It’s a game system,” Evie said. “The kind where you don’t need a remote, just your own motion.”

“And some games,” Taryn said, looking baffled at the gift. He didn’t blame her. She’d never been much of a gamer.

“This is fantastic,” Evie exclaimed. “Think of how much fun we can have with this.”

“Really?” Taryn asked.

“Yeah! We’ll figure out some ways to incorporate beach volleyball or soccer or the dancing one into your therapies. And you won’t even have to hold a remote!”

“Okay.” Taryn didn’t look convinced.

“Who sent it?” he asked. He assumed maybe his mother had ordered the game system and just forgotten to let him know.

“There’s a card,” Evie said, pulling it out of the box and handing it to him. As he reached for it, his skin just brushed hers. A spark leaped between them and she quickly drew her hand away.

“Sorry,” she murmured.

He decided not to mention that, whatever she might think of him, he was as susceptible as the next guy to sparks flying at him from a beautiful woman.

“Welcome home,” he read. At the bottom of the note was a stylized line drawing of a little angel.

Evie looked over his shoulder to read the note and he was fascinated to watch her expressive face light up with excitement.

“Wow, Taryn. You received a gift from the Angel of Hope!” Evie said.

“I did?”

“Looks like it,” Brodie said. “There’s an angel on here.”

“Like…my…flowers.”

“Flowers?” Evie asked.

“While she was in the hospital after the accident, Taryn received fresh flowers once a week, with no name on them—only a little angel on the card,” he answered. “The whole time, without fail.”

He had wanted to seek out the florist and find out who the hell was sending the flowers but Katherine had talked him out of it. She thought the mystery identity of the town’s Angel of Hope added to the fun of the gift.

“Very cool,” Evie exclaimed. “I’ve never had something from the Angel. Claire got a care package after the accident but that’s as close as I’ve come.”

He didn’t understand the whole Angel of Hope phenomenon that had swept through Hope’s Crossing for the last year. Someone had been going around town anonymously doing good deeds for people. An envelope full of money on a doorstep, paying outstanding medical bills, a basket of goodies just when someone was in the middle of a crisis.

Speculation was still running rampant around town about who might be instigating the acts of kindness—and the Angel had even been the inspiration for the town sponsoring an entire day of service, organized by Claire Bradford, his mother and the other women who hung out at String Fever.

To him, it all seemed an exercise in futility. People either helped themselves or they tended to wallow in their misery. “I would have thought the Angel would have given up by now. He—or she—can’t help everyone.”

Evie made a face at his cynicism. “Probably not. But sometimes a single kind gesture can be exactly the handhold someone needs to climb out of a dark hole.”

“That sounds like the voice of experience,” he said, even though it was none of his business.

“Your mom was my angel,” she said simply. “She invited me to visit Hope’s Crossing at exactly the perfect time, when I most needed a lift. I think the Angel is like your mom. I’ve often thought it might
be
your mom. Whoever it is has an uncanny knack for knowing just the perfect thing to help someone when he or she is in need. Frankly, I don’t know how one person could possibly know all that. Claire believes the Angel might be a group of people, working in unison. If that’s true, I think your mother is at least in on it.”

“My mother? Really?”

“Sure. Why not?”

“I don’t know. It might have escaped your notice but my mother has been a little distracted the last few months, helping me with Taryn. She really hasn’t had a lot of time to go around throwing out good deeds hither and yon.”

“Well, whoever it is, I think the Angel is wonderful.”

“This…could be fun,” Taryn declared, inclining her head to the game system, still in the box. “Maybe…my…friends could play.”

Evie touched her hand to Taryn’s fingers, which lay mostly useless on the table. “That’s a great idea. We’ll invite some over first thing, okay?”

Taryn smiled at her and as he watched the two of them together, something soft and terrifying bloomed inside him. He didn’t want this. He had enough to worry about right now without having to wonder if he was falling for someone as completely unsuitable as Evaline Blanchard.

Disconcerted, he pushed his chair away from the table just as Mrs. O. came bustling out with the tray of sandwiches.

“I’m sorry,” he said abruptly, “but I hadn’t realized the time. I’ve got a meeting this afternoon and I told my assistant I’d be back shortly to sign some papers at the office first. Mrs. O., do you mind wrapping my sandwich up? I’ll eat on my way.”

“Of course,” his housekeeper said.

“Do you…have to?” Taryn’s mouth drooped with disappointment.

“I’d better. Practice hard on your new game system and maybe when I come home I’ll let you whip my butt at something.”

“Dancing,” Taryn said firmly and he groaned, even as it warmed him that she was willing to try.

Maybe the Angel was onto something after all.

CHAPTER EIGHT

O
H
,
SHE
WAS
TIRED
.

After a full day with Taryn, all Evie wanted to do was head up to her apartment and soak in the big claw-foot tub, the one she had always suspected was original to the building when it had been a brothel.

Downtown Hope’s Crossing was hopping, for a Thursday night. As she drove down Main Street, she could see crowds in the few stores that stayed open later and a line of tourists waiting outside Sugar Rush, probably for some of the sweetshop’s ice cream flavors or famous blackberry fudge.

Why did people on vacation always glom onto fudge and pulled taffy? she wondered idly. They didn’t touch the stuff three-hundred-sixty-four days out of the year, but suddenly on vacation people couldn’t seem to get enough. Go figure.

Though Hope’s Crossing catered mostly to winter recreationists with its immaculate slopes and après skiing, the town had been making a push the last few years to draw visitors for the summer months to enjoy mountain biking, fishing, hiking and ATV riding.

The town needed the tourists to survive. She understood that. Without any other major industries, Hope’s Crossing would die without those who came to appreciate the town’s charm and spectacular surroundings. Without a doubt, though, the influx of visitors sometimes complicated life for year-round residents—like the endless quest for a decent parking place and having to pay jacked-up tourist prices at the supermarket for a gallon of milk.

Unfortunately, such was the price the year-rounders had agreed to pay in exchange for the chance to live surrounded by gorgeous mountains and endless recreational opportunities.

As she drove down Main Street, she saw quite a few people inside Maura’s bookstore, Dog-Eared Books & Brew. Book-club night, she remembered somewhat guiltily. Traveling the summer art-fair circuit had contributed to her missing the regular book club most of the summer. She would do better in the fall, she promised herself.

And Maura. She needed to be a better friend there as well. Maura seemed to be coping since her daughter’s death. At least she’d returned to work—Evie had spoken with her several times when she had stopped into the bookstore and coffeehouse to grab a latte.

Returning to a regular routine had probably helped with the overwhelming guilt. And really, what else was a grieving mother supposed to do? Life had to go on. Bills had to be paid, obligations met, friendships maintained to the best of one’s ability.

Evie remembered those efforts all too well, erecting that facade to the world, as if she were like some old building in a frontier ghost town somewhere—an elaborate face that concealed emptiness behind it.

As she headed toward her usual parking spot behind String Fever and found it blessedly empty despite the crowds, she made a mental note to take Maura to lunch as soon as she had the chance, perhaps when her time with Taryn was done. Like it or not, she and Maura shared a bitter legacy, mothers who had both lost children. The circumstances of those respective losses were very different but she had some small understanding of the deep and abiding sorrow that would never quite leave Maura.

She headed toward the small walled garden in back of the store, not surprised when Jacques didn’t greet her there. Claire’s adorable eight-year-old, Owen, had agreed to walk him a couple times a day while Evie was working at the Thornes’. Owen had probably let him back into her apartment after they’d walked around Miners’ Park a few times.

Jacques would enjoy the next day at the Thorne house, playing with Taryn under the guise of therapy. She was already coming up with a variety of ways to incorporate him into their routine. How would Brodie feel about a nonshedding dog swimming around in his pool, chasing after whatever she could convince Taryn to throw at him? she wondered.

In the garden, she paused to enjoy the quiet calm there, the mingled scent of flowers and soil and sun-warmed brick and the vast spill of stars overhead that seemed so much closer here in the Colorado mountains than they ever had in California.

Her muscles ached from several days spent working with Taryn and she reached her arms high overhead and behind her back in one of the sun-salutation poses. She held it for a few moments and felt the healing energy flow through her.

Beading sometimes worked just as well to soothe her mind and calm her spirit, but she wasn’t sure she had the energy or focus for anything right now but that long soak and the very pleasant mystery she was supposed to have finished for the book-club meeting that night.

“Excuse me.”

The voice behind her startled her so much she lost the pose and nearly tipped over backward into the garden. She whirled around and in the pale streetlight, she saw Charlie Beaumont standing just outside the gate.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you. I was just, um, riding by and saw you pull up.”

Did the kid do nothing from sunup to sundown but ride his mountain bike around town? she wondered. Charlie was seventeen, beginning his senior year of high school, certainly old enough for a little autonomy, but she had to wonder if his home life was so very unpleasant he had to spend all day trying to escape it.

She ought to tell him to go away. She still felt more than a little guilt at not telling Brodie the truth about who had been helping Taryn that morning at the bead store, and for deflecting the girl’s attention when she would have told her father herself.

The moment hadn’t seemed right, not when Evie and Brodie seemed to have developed this fragile and rather lovely sort of truce between them.

“It’s okay,” she answered, and walked back toward the gate that he was leaning against. He could easily have opened the latch and come inside but for some strange reason, perhaps the fine tension she sensed in the boy, she had the feeling he needed that physical barrier to keep anyone from getting too close.

“Thanks for your help today,” she said. “I think Taryn had a good time. She was showing her bracelet to everyone all afternoon.”

“Yeah. Well. That’s what I, um, wanted to ask you. I was wondering, um, can you, that is, is there anything I can do to help you with Taryn? I was thinking I’d like to visit again, if you thought that would be okay and everything. I could maybe take her for a walk or…or help her catch up with homework or something. Or we could make another bracelet. That was okay.”

She narrowed her gaze at something in his tone. “That depends. Why the sudden offer?”

“I just want to help her. That’s all.”

“It has nothing to do with your trial coming up?”

He looked away. “I told my dad about going to the bead store today and he thought it would be a good idea if I tried to help Taryn some more. Show the judge I have, you know, genuine remorse and stuff.”

“Do you?”

He didn’t answer for a long moment, just turned his gaze to the dark, craggy silhouette of the mountains looming over them and that glittery spread of stars. When he looked back at her, his eyes were as shadowed as those mountains. “Have you ever wanted to start your life over again?”

“Yes,” she answered quietly. “I think everybody probably has at some point. But I’ve learned after three decades on this earth that while you can’t start over, you
can
change direction. It’s not always easy, but it’s possible.”

“I don’t know about that. I just want to come see Taryn again. Do you think it would be okay?”

Evie mulled how to answer him. On the one hand, Taryn had responded to Charlie that morning with amazing enthusiasm. In a week of working with her full-time, Evie hadn’t seen the girl light up like that for anything else, not even the crappy MTV reality shows.

On the other hand, only one word. Brodie.

He would be furious if he knew she was even considering this. He hated Charlie. Really, how could anyone blame him? Charlie had been drinking and driving recklessly and lives had been changed forever because of it.

She understood Brodie’s perspective. If someone had caused any injury to her child, she would be ready to climb up into their faces like Smokey Bear’s vicious mama.

She weighed the decision for a moment longer, then sighed. Bottom line, Brodie trusted her to make the right choices for his daughter. He had given her full authority to oversee Taryn’s care plan while she was directly working with the girl and to organize the treatment for whomever succeeded her. Yes, she had demanded it but he hadn’t been grudging in his agreement.

She could make the argument that by allowing Charlie to visit, she was only doing what she deemed best for the girl. How could he argue with her if Evie told him she had determined the most effective way for Taryn to achieve her goals was through peer interaction with the very person Brodie blamed for causing her injuries in the first place?

Anyway, what was the worst he could do? Fire her? She hadn’t wanted the job in the first place and was only doing it as a favor to Katherine. If he threw her out, she would be right back where she wanted to be, working at String Fever and fighting to reclaim her hard-fought peace and serenity.

The assurance didn’t ring quite as true now as it might have a week ago but she decided she was too tired to dwell on that right now.

“Let’s make one thing clear.”

“Okay,” Charlie said warily.

“If I agree to let you visit Taryn, I’ll insist on one supreme condition. You need to be perfectly clear in your head about this, got it?”

“That depends.”

“You need to decide right now what your motives are in doing this. Are you wanting to help Taryn in order to influence a judge and jury about how remorseful you are, or do you want to help her because in your heart you know it’s the right thing to do and that you owe it to her? Let this be your moment to change direction, Charlie.”

She expected him to say no. The surly, petulant kid she’d seen around town likely would tell her to go straight to hell.

Instead, he looked up at the stars again and the dark mountains and this quiet garden that seemed far from the bustling nighttime activity of the town around them, then turned back to her, his face still in shadows. “Yeah. Okay. I guess that’s fair.”

Her stomach swooped somewhere in the vicinity of her knees. Crap. Now what was she supposed to do? She couldn’t very well tell him she’d changed her mind in the last twenty seconds.

She would just have to let him come to the house, and she would figure out how to deal with Brodie’s wrath later.

“All right. How does ten tomorrow morning work?”

“Okay. What else would I be doing?”

“Not my problem. We’ll see you at ten, then. Plan on about forty-five minutes the first day and we’ll see where things go.”

He nodded and started to go, then turned back. “Thanks, Ms. Blanchard.”

“Don’t thank me yet. Taryn’s not exactly easy to work with right now.” She debated adding the harsh truth, and decided Charlie needed to hear it. If Brodie could hear her right now, even he would have to admit her heart wasn’t always soft and bleeding with compassion.

“You need to prepare yourself, Charlie,” she warned, her voice colder than she intended. “Today at the bead store was a breeze compared to most of our therapy. It’s grueling, painful, frustrating work reteaching someone how to do virtually everything. I haven’t spent one day working with Taryn when she didn’t end up in tears at some point.”

Angry tears, usually, but she didn’t tell him that, especially since his face was ghost-white in the shifting moonlight.

“If you go through with this,” she went on, her tone slightly softer, “you need to be ready to confront, up close and personal, exactly what challenges she’s facing now. You won’t be able to hide from it, Charlie. You will know that every frustration, every single exercise she has to do, every painful muscle spasm I have to put her through, is because of you.”

He looked stricken and she felt a little as if she’d kicked Jacques and Chester and every other innocent dog she’d ever known. Except Charlie wasn’t innocent, she reminded herself. He had made stupid, terrible choices and Brodie was right about one thing, at least. His family was doing him no good trying to protect him from the consequences of those choices.

“I’ll be ready,” he said, his voice low but resolute, and she had to fight the totally irrational impulse to reach across the gate and hug him. “See you tomorrow.”

She watched as he climbed back on his mountain bike and pedaled quickly away. At the end of the street, he turned and rode hard up the hill toward the Woodrose Mountain trail and she whispered a little prayer there in the garden for him—and for Maura and Taryn and Brodie and everyone else who had been affected by that fateful night.

* * *

“
C
OME
ON
, T
ARYN
. S
TOP
complaining.”

Evie was frowning. She was disappointed in her, Taryn could tell.

“You can do this. I know you’re playing games with me. I’ve seen you do this before. I only need you to take five little steps and you can hold on to the bars the whole time. Work with me here.”

Everything ached. Her legs. Her back. Her head. It took too much work, and for what? She would never be right again. It was easier to stay in the chair, where people didn’t expect her to be normal.