Larkspur Road (9 page)

Don’t even dream you’re getting rid of me that easily, Aunt Winny,
Mia thought.

She shifted her weight on the creaky front porch, noticing the loose board that had caused her aunt’s fall and making a mental note to call Denny McDonald, who owned a construction firm with his father, to come out and fix it.

“Aunt Winny? It’s Mia. I heard about your accident. Ellis Stone told me this morning. Please open the door—I’d like to help.”

Silence as deep as a forgotten canyon greeted her words. Mia felt a stab of worry.

“Aunt Winny, are you all right?” she called again, more urgently.

The faded floral curtain at the front window moved. It was only a tiny, almost imperceptible flutter, but she knew suddenly that Winny was there, listening on the other side of the door, as stubborn and aloof as ever.

“I was sorry to hear about your fall,” Mia called again. “I’ve brought you some supper. Please, won’t you open the door?”

The curtain hung motionless. An almost eerie silence settled over the clearing. With the rough grandeur of the mountain and the vivid color of the flowers, it was actually a lovely spot, marred only by the rusted mailbox leaning sideways toward the road, and the old dank leaves from the previous autumn still matted beneath the tree trunks.

“Aunt Winny, there’s a fresh blueberry pie here with your name on it. Please open the door. I’ve brought roast chicken. A salad, too. And…did I mention the pie? I’m not leaving until I know you’re all right.”

“Since when am I not all right? And what do you care anyway, young lady?”

The barked words rang with surprising force from behind the closed door.

“I do care.” Mia spoke quietly in contrast to her aunt’s harsh tone. “And if you’ll open the door, I’ll show you. Please let me help.”

“Get off my land.”

“I just—”

“
Go away.
And take that food with you. I’ve no use for your pity or your charity.”

Mia closed her eyes a moment. Injured or not, Winny was always the same. Gruff. Ill-tempered. Gram had been so sweet—determined and strong-willed, yes, or she never would have finished such a wide array of intricate quilts—but also gentle and kind and wise. Her sister, on the other hand, had never seemed to possess an ounce of sweetness or a kind bone in her body. But Mia knew nobody could be all sour anger and vinegar.

Not for the first time, she felt curiosity pricking at her. What had gone so terribly wrong between two sisters separated by less than two years in age? What could have caused such a rift, that the younger daughter of Louis and Abigail Sullivan had shut herself off from every other member of her family?

“All right, if that’s what you want, I’ll go. But this basket
is staying on the porch. If you don’t want it, that’s fine—the cat will have it. Suit yourself. But call me if you need something. A ride to the doctor’s office or…anything. I’m writing my cell phone number down, and leaving it in the basket, so put it somewhere safe.”

She might as well have been speaking to the clouds. Reaching into her purse, she dug around for a scrap of paper. She knew she had a notepad somewhere in her bag….

There
. Ripping off a sheet of pink-and-white-striped paper, she scribbled her cell number and stuck it under the plate of chicken. She left the basket and the bakery box on the porch chair, a relic of sturdy wood and peeling blue paint.

There was still no further sound from inside the cabin.

“I’m going now, Aunt Winny. But you know how to reach me. And I’m not promising that I won’t be back.”

She waited a moment, listening, but apparently her aunt had used up her maximum number of words for the day. Mia headed to the Jeep. The orange cat was hiding not five yards away. Lurking in the brush, wary, silent, and still.

Well, at least I tried,
she told herself as she slammed the Jeep’s door.
I did my best.

So why did she feel so guilty about leaving? It was what her aunt wanted. To be left alone. Apparently it was what she’d always wanted.

Reminding herself that she had a runaway niece sleeping in her guest room who’d probably be starving when she woke up, Mia backed up the rough gravel drive and headed toward home.

Winny waited until the sound of the car’s engine faded away. Then she waited some more, her back straight, pressed against the cabin door, the cane the doctor had given her gripped in one spider-veined hand. Her once plush and perfectly shaped mouth was set in a harsh line.

She didn’t want the damned food. Didn’t need it either. Didn’t she have perfectly good soup and ham in her refrigerator? And a loaf of bread she’d baked herself yesterday morning?

She had milk and eggs and cat food. She’d gone to Livingston only last week and stocked up.

Besides, if she
did
need something, she’d call Abner, not that great-niece of hers. Alicia’s granddaughter.

Not for the first time, she wondered what Alicia had told her granddaughters about her all these years. Wondered what she’d told everyone. Did everyone in Lonesome Way and their children and their children’s children know what she’d done? What they
thought
she’d done?

Not that it mattered. She didn’t care. Not anymore. It had been more than half a century ago. She’d been ashamed then, and furious, and had wanted nothing more than to put as many miles between her and her family as possible. And now…

Her mouth twisted into a grimace.

Now it was much too late to ever set things right. So what difference did it make if the girl knew? Maybe she
should
know.

Then she might stay away and not drive out here bothering people with picnic baskets and pies.

The girl who’d come knocking on her door today was no more family to her than the cat who happened by now and then.

She didn’t give a care about either of them.

Or about that letter at the bottom of her dresser drawer. It had been there for the past five years now, and she hadn’t been tempted to open the seal even once.

All it would do was stir up the hurt all over again.

Still, something made her ease open the cabin door and limp out onto the porch with the aid of the cane. She brushed a hand over the wicker basket her great-niece had left perched on the old chair.

Slowly tears filled her eyes.

She shouldn’t have ever come back here. She’d left Lonesome Way once—way back when it all happened—and she should have just stayed away.

There was no point in thinking about any of it now. Lifting the basket in one hand, she hobbled back inside. She set the basket on the small kitchen table and limped back out for the pie.

Against her will, she had to admit it was a lovely pie. A bright circle of berries and golden crust, resting in a white box with red printing that said
A BUN IN THE OVEN
on the top and the side. A Bun in the Oven. That pretty little bakery everyone in Lonesome Way—even Abner—jabbered about all the time.

She’d never stepped inside. Too many people. Some she knew from way back when, but she considered all of them strangers. Strangers who stared at her…

These days she usually drove all the way to Livingston for her groceries and quilt supplies and whatnot so she wouldn’t have to see a soul in Lonesome Way.

The pie did look wonderful, though. And the chicken smelled like heaven, if heaven smelled like lemon and garlic and oregano.

She hadn’t eaten a bite since last night’s supper, before she took that spill.

But the cat was there, a small shadow at her door.

“Here, I’ve got your food,” she muttered, and she left the pie and the chicken on the table while she dug out the cat food bag. She rattled pellets into the bowl she kept on the corner of her old counter.

The cat shot to the base of the porch and stood stock-still, watching warily as she limped outside and set the food down near the top of the steps.

By the time she clumped back over the threshold, the orange tabby was up there, gobbling it down.

Winny saw there was still water left in the other bowl
she put out for the creature. She didn’t know why she bothered.

Maybe, she realized as she sank down onto a kitchen chair and stared at that bright, fresh blueberry pie, it was because next to Abner Floyd, who never bothered her by speaking more than about a dozen words a year, that pesky cat was the closest thing she had to a friend.

A half hour later, she had polished off every bit of the chicken, washed and dried her plate, and sat at the kitchen table savoring a slice of pie with a hot cup of tea.

Then, feeling better for no reason she could explain, she hobbled into her bedroom, set down the blasted cane, and sank down at her sewing machine with the Jubilee quilt she’d begun the week before. She pulled the colorful squares of calico onto her lap and, for the first time since her fall, experienced a small sense of peace. Blocking out the past, the memories, and the rest of the world, she set to work.

One week later Mia combed through racks of jeans and shorts at Top to Toe on Main Street as Brittany scanned the shelves piled with folded tank tops and T’s.

“Don’t worry, Aunt Mia, I promise I’ll pay you back from my next two paychecks,” Britt murmured, examining a turquoise tee with a paisley heart stitched on the center. Her sunglasses were perched on top of her head. “This one’s cute, isn’t it?”

Setting down the khaki shorts she’d picked up, Mia glanced at her niece. “Wouldn’t it be easier to drive home and just pack up some more of your clothes? I don’t mind going with you. We could make a day of it. Have lunch on the deck of that nice restaurant we all went to for your birthday last year and—”

“I’m not going all the way back to Butte for some clothes.” Brittany’s voice rang through the store and she quickly lowered her tone as several other customers and Erma Wilkins, the owner, turned to stare. “I’m s-sorry.” She
bit her lip. “I didn’t mean to sound rude. But we’d just be wasting gas to drive to Butte, wouldn’t we? Besides, I only need a few more things to get through the summer.”

Flushing a little, she hurried to the sales counter and deposited a pink V-necked top and a pair of white shorts, as well as the turquoise tee, a purple tank, and a couple of colorful wispy thongs and bras.

“I have my jeans and the top I wore yesterday. I’ll do my laundry every few days. It’s no big deal.”

What teenaged girl doesn’t want her entire wardrobe of clothes at her disposal?
Mia wondered, trying to study Britt’s face, but the sixteen-year-old whirled away from her and snagged another tank top, a skimpy white one.

“Brittany…,” Mia began in a low tone, “come on. There’s some reason you don’t want to—”

“Please, Aunt Mia.” Brittany’s suddenly pleading expression tore at Mia’s heart. “I need to get back to the bakery really soon. There’s only five minutes left on my lunch break. You don’t want to make Aunt Sophie sorry she hired me, do you?”

Without waiting for a reply, she turned toward Erma, who was arranging some new tops in the window display. “We’re ready now, can you help us, please?”

“Well, to be sure, I can.” Erma bustled over, beaming, and began ringing up the clothes.

“A little birdie told me you’re staying for the whole summer, young lady.” Carefully folding all of the merchandise, the store owner began stuffing each item into a large bag. She’d opened Top to Toe the year before Samantha had entered middle school and she knew every soul in town as well as all of their tastes and sizes. “Isn’t that nice for you, having such lovely young company?” She flashed Mia a smile as she worked.

“And not just any company.” Mia handed over her credit card. “My favorite niece.”

“The spitting image of her mother, too—and that’s a
compliment, young lady,” Erma told Brittany. “I heard your mom’s going on her third honeymoon. All the way to Corfu, imagine that. Well, you know what they say. The third time’s the charm.”

“I thought they said that about the second time.” Britt took the bag the older woman handed her.

“No, it’s the third.” Erma flashed a grin as she returned Mia’s credit card. “But who’s counting? Now, what about you, honey?” She shifted her hawkish gaze to Mia, who was just turning toward the door. “I heard Travis Tanner’s back in town.”