Four Weddings and a Fireman (12 page)

Cherie ground her teeth. “The point he's trying to make is he wants you to look on him the same way you would if he was your brother. For instance, if you need help. Right, Vader?”

“Right.” He approached Trixie. “You have anything to write on?”

She held out her arm. “Better write it there, so I don't lose it.” She snatched up one of the Bic pens Cherie kept in a vintage jelly bean jar next to the telephone. “I always wanted to do this. If I had my druthers, it'd be on my bosoms instead . . .”

“Trixie,” said Cherie sharply.

“What? Are you planning to be Pine Creek, the Sequel? 'Cause if that's the case, Mr. Fireman better take me home with him right here and now.”

Vader finished imprinting his phone number on her hand and backed away. “Sorry, that's not going to happen. Now make sure you write that number down somewhere safe before you wash your hand. It's for emergencies, since you don't have any other family around.”

“I get it, I get it.”

Vader gave Cherie one last, lingering look, as if he didn't want to leave her alone with her own sister. She walked with him to the door, where he bent and whispered in her ear. “Something tells me that girl is trouble.”

“Really? What clued you in? The eyelash-­batting or the cute little Southern accent?”

“Her resemblance to you.” With that, Vader stepped onto the porch. “I'll bring Soren back, then leave you alone. But I'm not forgetting your promise. You'd better call me.”

“Look, Vader. She might be trouble, and I'm not going to deny it, but she's
my
trouble. You don't need to worry about us. Don't go all manly and protective on me. I got this. I'll call you soon.” She shut the door on him, steeling herself against his wounded expression, then turned to face her long-­lost sister.

While much of
Vader's job as a firefighter involved putting out fires, it also included a certain amount of cleaning up messes. Fires always left stinking, smoldering chaos in their wake, and firefighters did what they could to leave a fire scene as tidy as possible. Fire engines had to be kept polished, hoses stowed, gear maintained. As first responders, firefighters were used to showing up when things were at their absolute worst, and leaving when some order had been restored.

But Cherie's mess, that was another matter. How had Vader wound up fetching her housemate's underwear, after enduring endless abuse from her other housemate? And what had inspired him to give his number to that little bundle of wild-­girl hormones called Trixie? Especially since Cherie had basically just told him to keep out?

The things a man did for the woman he loved.

Fuck. He loved Cherie, and until ten minutes ago he hadn't even known her real name. How screwed up was that? Did Soren and Nick know her real name? Was he the only one she'd left in the dark?

These and similar thoughts churned through his brain as he hurried down the hospital corridors. Nick was awake, looking much better, and very happy to have his things. Vader had stuffed them in a plastic grocery bag that used to hold potato chips, so Nick didn't think he'd been handling his tighty-­whities.

“I called Serafina. She's my mother,” Nick told him. “She has a gap in her schedule so she's taking the Learjet from LA first thing tomorrow.”

Vader nodded. He couldn't imagine any statement that would make the difference between him and Nick more clear.

“Are you ready to roll?” he asked Soren.

“Thanks, dude,” Nick called as they left. “I don't remember much, but I know you're made of light. We're writing a song about it. ‘Beer Goggle Hero,' we might call it.”

Vader shook his head, more than a little amused. He hadn't done much. Any first responder would have done the same thing. He and Soren headed back to his truck. Vader wondered if there was a way to ask him about Cherie's real name without giving anything away. But by then he was too exhausted to come up with anything. He let Soren ramble on about the song he and Nick were writing about the seizure.

“The whole thing was like, profound, man. Opened my eyes even more than ecstasy. I'm playing with ‘seizure' and ‘seize,' like ‘seize the day,' since you never know what intense shit might go down.”

By the time they reached Cherie's house, Vader's head was pounding like a drum set. Soren hopped out of the truck, but before he could disappear down the pathway, Vader called out. “Soren. Hang on. One of Cherie's sisters showed up. Thought you should know.”

“A sister.” Speculation gleamed in Soren's dark-­rimmed eyes. “I knew Jacob and Cherie had a big family, but they never talk about them. It's all some kind of big secret.”

The promise of knowledge about Cherie dangled before him like the forbidden apple. He shouldn't try to get information from Soren; Cherie wouldn't like that. Besides, she'd promised to answer his questions herself. If he asked Soren any questions, he'd be admitting that he wasn't in Cherie's confidence. And yet, the temptation was too great. “Do you know why they left Arkansas?”

Soren pursed his lips, which made his scraggly soul patch wiggle in the breeze. “All I can say for sure is a man was involved. I used to hear them arguing about a ‘he.' But I was doing a lot of Turkish hashish back then, the fake stuff that has cherry flavor and shit. I kind of dug the hazelnut best.”

Vader had had enough. Already he felt dirty for asking Soren anything. “Okay. Good night.” Barely giving the guy enough time to close the door, he pulled away with a loud squeal of tires, feeling vaguely disgusted. He hadn't liked prying for information about Cherie's life. He shouldn't have to do that.

Most of all, he hated the fact that things between him and Cherie had just been thrown into even greater chaos. For the first time, he actually felt angry with her. He didn't like the way she'd wanted to shove him out the door. Didn't like the fact that she'd hid her real name, as well as just about everything about her family. Who was she, really? Did he even know her at all? Who had he been pining over all this time?

He set his jaw and reminded himself that he'd wanted to pry the truth from her. Now it was coming out in ways he hadn't expected in a million years.
Be careful what you wish for, because you might get it.

 

Chapter Eleven

E
ven though she hadn't seen her sister in six years, Cherie quickly figured out that Trixie had inherited the Harper family willfulness. They'd all gotten it from their father, who was so pigheaded he hadn't been able to function in normal society and had retreated to the backwoods. A big streak of nutty eccentricity also ran in the family. What else could explain how Justice-­Denied had invented a way to turn old dryers into chicken-­plucking machines? And why her sister Faithful sold paper flowers made from dyed toilet paper at the local farmers' market?

Their father, who'd adopted the name Prophesize when he'd settled in Arkansas, did his best to control his progeny, but he wasn't much good at it.

Which was no doubt why Trixie was now the third Harper to make her way to San Gabriel. Remarkably, she'd come alone; at least Cherie and Jacob had had each other.

“You sure no one knows you came here?”

“Mackintosh has no idea, Cherie. I know he still has a grudge against you because of how you hit him on the head and gave him brain damage.”

Cherie winced. “Really? Brain damage?” She hadn't known it was that bad.

“Oh yes. He's not only mean now, he's even crazier. I talked another girl at the station into switching bus tickets, so I bought hers and she bought mine. If anyone asks, they'll think I've gone to Gatlinsburg, Tennessee. Plus I pulled a whole bunch of other tricks. No one followed me.”

“That's good thinking, Trixie.” She and her sister were holed up in Cherie's bedroom. Until she warned Soren and Nick, she had no intention of letting Trixie near those two. Since she had a big four-­poster bed, they had plenty of room. In the old days, they'd slept five to a bed. Trixie wore a pair of Cherie's pajamas—­her favorites, blue silk with capering white lambs—­and sat cross-­legged in a nest of pillows, brushing her long hair.

Cherie couldn't help greedily examining her little sister. She'd missed having her siblings around, especially the girls. They'd had plenty of unauthorized fun behind her stepmother's back. They'd built fairy houses in the woods, made up goofy songs, experimented with forbidden curlers.

“But how did you find me?”

“It was that phone message you left for us with Mr. Olson at the feed store. About the angels and the setting sun. Pretty clever that I worked it out, ain't it?”

She and Jacob had spent hours composing the perfect message that the Harper kids would be able to interpret, but no one else. They'd left the message for this exact purpose—­so that other siblings would be able to escape if they wanted to.

“How are the others?”

“Growin' up fast. Cel's seven, and he's a complete scamp. He drives everyone crazy, especially me since I'm the one that's supposed to watch him.” Trixie drew the brush through her long, honey-­brown hair, the same color Cherie's would be if she let it grow out.

“You're eighteen now, right?”

“Eighteen and ready to rock,” said Trixie cheerfully. “After you left, I set my mind to do the same thing, come hell or high water. Me and Robbie Mackintosh came up with our scheme to pretend to be engaged so everyone would leave us alone. Especially Mr. Mackintosh. Robbie told me he was heading to New York City, can you imagine that? Cherie.” She put down the brush and began braiding her hair. “I'm ready to have some fun. I been feeling like a water balloon ready to burst. I want to jump around and scream and cut my hair and laugh and stay up all night and meet some boys. What about that good-­looking fireman? Vader? He's . . .” She hesitated. Harpers weren't used to talking this way. “Hot. Very hot. I think he might be the handsomest guy I ever seen.”

“That ain't saying much.” Hearing the way she slipped back into their backwoods cadence, Cherie corrected herself. “
Isn't
saying much. You've probably only seen about ten men outside the family.”

“I've seen enough to know the real deal. I'm serious, Cherie. Are you together with him? Because if you're not, I wouldn't mind that he's older, and . . .”

“
No.
Big N-­O. Vader and me . . . it's complicated. But he's definitely off-­limits.”

Cherie got up and went to her dresser, where she kept an assortment of hair dyes stored in a basket.

“Complicated because of Mackintosh?”

Cherie fumbled with the bottles of dye. How much did Trixie know? How much did everyone in the family know? She and Jacob had fled without a single extra second to explain what had happened. “How do you mean?” she asked carefully, eyeing her sister's reflection in the old-­fashioned oval mirror over her dresser.

Trixie blithely finished one braid and tossed it over her shoulder. “Just that he wanted to marry you and you didn't want to, so you bonked him on the head and ran. And Jacob helped. Is that right?”

“Yes, that's about right.”

For certain, it was all her little sister needed to know. As she sorted through her hair dyes, more disgusting images from that night assaulted her. The stench of Mackintosh's sweaty armpits as he grabbed her arms, the suffocating darkness in the henhouse where he'd cornered her, the woozy way the room kept spinning around her.

“What are you doing over there?” Trixie's voice brought her back to her task.

“We're going to dye your hair.”

“Really?” Looking thrilled, Trixie scrambled to her knees. “Sinful red, like yours?”

“I was thinking dark brown. Like a”—­she scrambled for something appealing—­“mink coat.”

Trixie's face fell. “I don't want hair the color of roadkill. Give me platinum blond or nothing.”

“How about a dirty blond?”

“No dishwater. I wanted to leave the boring stuff behind, remember?” She tilted her head, measuring Cherie's determination. “How about we compromise with strawberry blond?”

“Fine.” It would probably be different enough to throw off any pursuers. “But we're going to cut it too. You probably pissed off Mackintosh when you ran away. You need to change your basic appearance in case he's on your trail.”

“Of course I made him mad. But he won't find us. Robbie said he hasn't left Arkansas in twenty years.”

That was good to hear. But she wasn't taking any chances. “Where's Robbie?”

“He said he was off to find the love of his life. Someone he used to be with. He wouldn't tell me who. I have no idea where he is, but if Mackintosh goes after anyone, likely it'll be Robbie.”

“Well, better safe than sorry.”

She beckoned Trixie over and sat her on a chair angled to face the mirror. She lifted one braid, feeling the silky weight of it, so like her own. A tremor went through her. There was nothing like the blood and bone connection of family, of flesh that looked like your own, a voice that sounded like your own. Tears welled, straight from her heart, and she silently thanked the Universe—­she didn't like to mention God, in case He reported back to her father—­that her sister had made it here safely.

And now it was her job to make sure she stayed safe.

As she performed her second haircut of that endless day—­had it really only been this afternoon that she'd cut Vader's?—­she went over the ground rules with Trixie. No talking to strangers. No mentioning Arkansas to anyone. No phone calls home. Keep the door locked. Always tell Cherie where she was going. In fact, try not to leave the house.

Trixie's hysterical laughter was not exactly encouraging.

Fortunately, without a
driver's license or much money, Trixie couldn't get into too much trouble. For the first week, she went out of her way to behave like a perfect angel. She cleaned the entire house while Cherie was at her movement therapy class. She whipped up some biscuits and chicken gravy that had Cherie's mouth watering with the taste of home. Cherie got a little suspicious when Trixie began churning out batch after batch of oatmeal raisin cookies, but decided it was a harmless hobby that at least kept her inside.

They got a stroke of luck when Nick's mother, a paper company heiress, made the executive decision that Nick should stay in her Malibu compound so her own doctors could tend to him. Nick refused to go without Soren, since they were making such good progress on their new, seizure-­inspired songs. With both of her housemates gone, there was plenty of room for Trixie, and Cherie didn't have to worry about boys corrupting her vivacious little sister.

All in all, Trixie's blithe nature made her a pleasure to have around. And when an entire week passed without a peep from the backwoods of Arkansas, Cherie began to relax.

But she still didn't know what to tell Vader, so she didn't call him. It was getting harder and harder to hide things from him. In fact, she hated it—­but not nearly as much as she hated the idea of Mackintosh going after him.

While Vader's goal
of learning the truth about Cherie had hit a major roadblock, things were proceeding well at work. He took the first step toward making a good impression when Captain Brody announced the newest “learn not to burn” program. At lineup, the captain read out loud from the bulletin.

“This is a school outreach program. We need volunteers to talk to kids in kindergarten through third grade at each elementary school in San Gabriel.”

Vader's arm shot up. “Count me in, Cap.”

The entire company looked his way. In the past, he'd been pretty choosy about his off-­shift commitments—­though no one knew the real reason why. They figured he preferred to spend his time partying.

Captain Brody nodded and made a note. “The battalion chief has also asked for a volunteer to coordinate the volunteers. Each school needs two firefighters, and we have twelve elementary schools in town. You'll have to work with the captains from each station to determine availability and—­”

“I'll do it.” Again, Vader shot his hand in the air.

“What'd you have for breakfast, scrambled suck-­up?” Sabina whispered out of the side of her mouth.

“Ha ha. You were a lot funnier before you got married.”

“Really, that didn't work? I guess I left out the side of brown nose.”

“From not-­funny to disgusting. Wrong direction.”

Captain Brody raised his voice over their muttered squabbling. “Next up is a call for committee members for a new community relations manual. As you all know, the fire department is a vital part of this community. The committee will be tasked with writing clear guidelines on how best to interact with the citizens of San Gabriel, including the various ethnic groups that—­”

“I'm in,” Vader announced. “I'm all over that one.”

Stunned silence settled over the crew. Then one of the new guys broke it. “By ‘the citizens of San Gabriel,' the captain doesn't mean just girls.”

Vader stalked toward him, until he was chest to chest with the guy. He wanted to pound him into the ground, of course, but that's exactly what the others would expect from him. He needed to show a different side. A smarter, less impulsive side. “What's your name? Mulligan?”

“Yeah, what about it?” Mulligan, whose broken nose and clenched fists screamed
fighter
, didn't back down.

“You're interrupting the captain. He's asking for volunteers, not wiseass comments.” Vader kept his tone firm, giving Mulligan no leeway to get crazy on him. This was about keeping order in the firehouse, not kicking some guy's ass.

Mulligan dragged his eyes away, nodded in acknowledgment. “Sorry, Cap. I'll sign up too.”

When Vader returned to Sabina's side, speculation glinted in her turquoise eyes. “You're up to something.”

“Don't you worry your little newlywed head about it.”

She made an irritated face at him, but didn't tease him anymore. And she kept giving him odd looks as lineup ended and various groups split off to work out or check equipment. He didn't care. He was used to odd looks; they came with the territory of being Vader.

At his locker, he gave his old video camera a longing look. The crew was used to him sticking the camera in their faces, shooting random moments of idiocy. He only did it for his mother. But if he wanted to be captain, he'd probably have to lighten up on the amateur filmmaking.

So be it. His mother would just have to live without the home movies. If the payoff was a higher salary, she'd understand.

For the rest of the shift, he applied himself with a new sense of devotion to the familiar routines of the firehouse. Truck 1 fielded three calls, none of which posed any challenge. The aerial wasn't needed, but if it had been, Vader was prepared to battle the whole crew for the chance to reclaim his turf. After the third call, a drunk driving accident that didn't wrap up until late, he eased himself into his bed at the firehouse. He gave a deep sigh and stretched every tight muscle in his aching body.