Once in a Lifetime(22)

While he was still sitting there, Jack called him.

“You’re a shithead,” Ben said in lieu of a greeting.

“You made them clean out your truck?” Jack asked incredulously. “Seriously?”

“So I’m fired, right?” Ben asked hopefully.

Jack laughed. “You’re going to have to do a lot worse than that. And don’t even think about it. I need you there. The kids loved you. But Jesus, figure out a craft that doesn’t involve cleaning out your truck.”

Ben hung up on him and put the truck in gear. On the next street he saw a teenage boy slouched against a fence, a huge mutt on a leash in his hand. He pulled over and rolled down his window. “Kelly?”

The kid sneered. “What’s it to ya?”

Ben smiled at the size of the balls on the little idiot. Then he got out of his truck.

Kelly gulped but stayed in place, straightening, trying to add some height.

Height wasn’t going to help him. Only brains could save him, and Ben had his doubts about even that. “We need to talk.”

Kelly gulped again. “’Bout?”

“Your dog,” Ben said. “You let it terrify any more little kids, especially redheaded ones, and I’ll introduce you to my dog. And my dog eats your dog’s breed for lunch.”

Kelly lost a whole lot of his belligerence but tried to keep his bravado up. “Who are you, the dog police?”

“Worse,” Ben said. “I’m not the police at all.” He leveled the teen with the same stare that hadn’t intimidated Pink much.

It worked on Kelly. The kid nodded like a bobblehead. Ben got back into his truck and called Luke. “What’s up with the girls’ parents?”

“What girls?”

“The two sisters from the foster home. Kendra and…” Shit. He still didn’t know Pink’s real name. “The one who wears pink all the time.”

Luke laughed softly. “The one who wears pink?”

“Yeah,” Ben said impatiently. “From head to toe. You can’t miss her. What’s their story?”

“I don’t know,” Luke said.

“But you could find out.”

“Well, yeah.”

“Call me back when you do.”

Luke paused. “You do remember you don’t like kids, right?”

“It’s all Jack’s fault.”

“Of course,” Luke said without missing a beat. “It’s always Jack’s fault.”

Ben disconnected and then, in need of fortitude, drove to the diner. He hadn’t even gotten out of the truck when he saw the flash of a willowy blonde standing in front of the beauty salon.

Aubrey.

As he watched, she stuffed that damn notepad into her purse, turned, and walked away. Quick, sure steps. Determined. She walked the same way she’d kissed him.

A woman on a mission.

He couldn’t imagine what she was up to, but he’d bet his last dollar it involved her list. The one with his name on it.

Aubrey stopped short, said something to herself, and walked back to the salon. She strode inside, back ramrod straight.

Fascinated, knowing he’d seen this game before, Ben waited. While he did, Luke called back.

“Records on the kids are sealed, so I went to the source,” he said.

“Child services?” Ben asked.

“Lucille.”

Ben had to laugh. If anything had happened in Lucky Harbor that Lucille didn’t know about, it wasn’t worth knowing. “And?”

“She knew their grandmother. The kids’ mom is gone. Their grandmother died, too, in a car wreck. The girls were four at the time and in the car. Minor injuries only. Father’s a mechanic in Seattle.”

“What?” Ben asked. “He’s not in prison?”

“Not according to Lucille.”

Ben absorbed the unexpected shock—and the anger. Also a shock. But he was angry. He was furious. The girls had lost a mother and grandmother, and their prick of a father was working less than two hours away while letting them think he was in prison?

Aubrey came out of the beauty shop. “Gotta go,” he said, and disconnected. He studied Aubrey. She didn’t look devastated this time. She looked…well, he wasn’t sure. He looked her over again and then realized what it was.

She was relieved. There was a lightness to her carriage, and damn if she wasn’t almost smiling as she got into her car, without even looking his way, and drove off.

He had to try damn hard not to follow her.





Chapter 8



When the alarm went off several days later, Aubrey had trouble getting out of bed, and she hit SNOOZE on her alarm clock about four times. Finally, Gus sat on her chest and refused to budge until she promised to feed him immediately.

She’d gone to her mom’s the night before and stayed late. They’d had dinner, and then Aubrey had helped paint Tammy’s bathroom a sunshine yellow for “cheer,” as her mom had called it. Aubrey thought it was okay, but if it’d been her bathroom, she’d need sunglasses to take a shower every morning.

She’d planned to beg off early, but then Carla hadn’t showed up, which had saddened her mom. Carla was invited every week and rarely, if ever, showed up, but it still got to Tammy. So it’d been midnight before Aubrey had gotten home, and she’d been shocked to discover that in her absence, the renovation fairy had finished demolition of the closet area.