The Chance (Thunder Point #4)(75)

Eric laughed. “Christmas is a long time from now. Let’s see where you are then.”

“Yeah, boss.” He got a kick out of calling this kid “boss.” He wondered if Eric ever thought about that. He could actually have been Al’s son, being eighteen years younger.

It was about four in the afternoon when Ray Anne stopped by for her quarter tank of gas. She was wearing a hot-pink skirt and jacket, Ray Anne’s version of the business suit. And those heels that brought her up to five-foot-seven, when she was really struggling to make five-three. There was a lot of leg, a little cle**age and a great big smile for Al. He liked that; he thought her sexy clothes were cute.

“How’s it going today?” she asked, laying a hand full of hot-pink enamel fingernails on his forearm.

“Better now,” he said, making her eyes sparkle. “I can’t get away early tonight. Eric’s got family business and I have to close the shop and take the calls for tows. There might not be any, that’s my hope. So I can’t get out of here till eleven, but if you’re feeling young and energetic and maybe can sleep in late tomorrow, we could spend a little time on the roof.”

“I can do that,” she said.

“Don’t let me talk you into anything,” he said. “You don’t have to stay dressed up. You can put on your pajamas and lotions—I like you that way, too. Fact is, I like you all ways.”

“Something wrong with these shoes?” she asked, turning an ankle to reveal the heels.

“I think they’re hot,” he said. “You can wear ’em with your pajamas if you want, but it’s not necessary. You keep my attention just fine in bare feet with cotton between your toes.”

“I’ll be up,” she said. “I’ll have a cold beer for you and a glass of wine for myself. I can’t order up a lightning show, but the stars are nice up there on the roof.”

“I’ll see you later,” he said. And he felt better than he had in hours.

* * *

When Al got to Ray Anne’s house she was not in her pajamas but she was dressed casually. She’d managed to get the beanbags up on the roof along with a throw and a couple of candles. They took their drinks and got settled in and all the while Al was thinking, This woman is so sweet to me. She will be so hard to leave.

“Things are kind of upside down around here,” he said. She was snuggled up close to him and just hummed. “There’s the situation with Justin and his brothers—that has his friends from work worried. The kid should catch a break. And Eric said Laine’s pretty worried about her father. She’s going to take him back to Boston, hopefully not gone too long.”

“Tell me more about Justin and his brothers,” she said.

He told her the full story, starting with the day Eric asked him to look out for Justin up to that fateful day the ambulance took his mother away.

“The poor kid,” she said. “I can’t imagine. I never had younger siblings or children of my own.”

“Did you want them? Children?”

“I did when I was younger. But I wasn’t married to men who wanted them so it couldn’t have been a priority. Right?”

“Do you regret it?” he asked.

“Al, I have a pile of regrets,” she said with a laugh. “But I also have a nice big stack of good moments, happy times when I actually mysteriously made good choices for myself. And I’m happy now. That’s enough for me.”

“That’s a good place to be,” he said.

“You’re one of my better choices.”

“Ray, you’re one sweet little honey. That’s for sure.”

“Aw, I like hearing that.”

“You’re awful good to me.”

“That’s the easy part. It’s easy to be good to a good man.”

“You know, there was a time, when I was a young farmer, that I thought the idea of a bunch of kids was exactly what I was cut out for. Life on the farm with a family was all I ever wanted.”

“You must have changed your mind,” she said.

“My mind got changed, yeah. I married real young. We lived on the farm. She got pregnant right away and even though farming is hard, we couldn’t have been happier. We had a baby, a boy, and he died of crib death.”

“Aw, Al, I’m so sorry.”

“Back then I was Mick, short for Michel. When I couldn’t come to grips with the loss, I took a job driving a truck and was almost never home. My wife complained about it, but she had a lot of family and I didn’t think she needed me too much.” He chuckled deep in his throat and pulled Ray Anne a little closer. “In case you ever get the notion it’s a good idea to run away from your troubles, I tried that one—it doesn’t work too well. When I was finally healed enough to put my roots back down, it was too late. Carol figured out she couldn’t count on me and life was hard enough for her. That was pretty much the end of that.”

Ray Anne was quiet for a moment. “Very sad for both of you.”

“Carol did the right thing. A few years later she married a local guy—Tony. They had a couple of kids. They do a little farming but Tony is also an insurance agent and Carol is a nurse in a nursing home. You know that half a farm that was left to me? I didn’t take the money and run—I gave my half to Carol. She earned it. I go back there every summer and I see her. She’s doing well.”