“This is a bad time for me,” Mary Bliss said quietly. Matt had turned the Explorer’s radio to an all-talk station. The woman host was excoriating working mothers, deadbeat fathers, and everyone everywhere who talked on a cell phone in a restaurant.
Matt kept his eyes on the road. “I know that,” he said finally.
“I haven’t started a relationship with a man in more than twenty years,” she said. “Parker was the first man I was ever with, you know, sexually. To tell you the truth, I always thought he would always be my only.”
He glanced over at her. “You really thought that?”
She sighed. “I was naive. But that’s how I was raised. All of this is so new to me…”
He gripped the steering wheel, his arms locked as though he were trying to push it away. “This isn’t a casual thing for me, you know. I’ve tried to tell you that from the start. I’m not a casual person. I don’t really…date. I want to be with you. I want to be part of your life. Is that so hard?”
She sighed. “I’d like to be with you too. But my life is such a mess…”
Mary Bliss had put Erin’s cell phone on her lap. It rang, surprising her so she jumped slightly.
She fumbled with the right button, finally connecting on her second try. “Erin?” she said breathlessly.
It was Josh. “Mrs. Mac? It’s about Erin.”
“Did she call? Where is she? Is she all right?”
“She’s all right,” Josh said quickly. “She called your house last night. We tried to call you, but I guess maybe you were out of range or something. Anyway, she’s okay. She was at a police station, way down in Waycross, Georgia. She tried to use your Visa card at a gas station there, and like you said, it was no good. And Erin got upset and tried to drive off without paying, so the gas station guy called the cops, and they arrested her.”
“Dear God,” Mary Bliss cried. She turned to Matt. “Erin got arrested for trying to use my credit card at a gas station in Waycross. She spent the night in jail.”
“Josh, is she all right?” Mary Bliss asked.
“I guess,” Josh said. “Mr. Weidman talked to the sheriff, and he was wiring the money Erin owed to the gas station people this morning. Once they get it, they’ll drop the charges and the sheriff says Erin can go. He said he’ll put Erin on a Greyhound bus back home.”
“A bus?” Mary Bliss tried to picture Erin after a night in a South Georgia jail cell. “I don’t want her riding a bus back home after what she’s been through.”
Matt’s jaw tightened. “I’ll turn around at the next exit. We can make Waycross by noon. I used to know a deputy in Ware County. I’ll call, make sure they take care of her.”
“That would be wonderful,” Mary Bliss told him. She closed her eyes and said a silent prayer of thanks.
Matt nodded and put on his turn signal.
“Mrs. Mac?” Josh said, his voice hesitant. “You had another call this morning, just a little while ago. It was Mr. Mac. He said I should tell you the hospital called. It’s kinda bad news. He said I should tell you Erin’s Meemaw died.”
Tears sprang to Mary Bliss’s eyes. “When was this?” she asked, her voice nearly a whisper.
“He just said it was early this morning. He asked to speak to Erin, but I told him she wasn’t here.”
“Did you tell him where she was?”
“No, ma’am,” Josh said. “I just said you guys were out of town, and I’d come over to pick up the newspaper.”
“Good,” Mary Bliss said. Josh was an excellent improvisationalist. Were all teenagers that accomplished at lying?
“Did Parker leave a number where he could be reached?” she asked.
“No, ma’am,” Josh said. “He just said I should tell you he wasn’t dead after all.”
She nearly laughed. It was so perverse. So insane. Such a relief.
“All right, Josh,” she said, dabbing at her eyes. “You did well. We’re down in Ocala, so it’ll take us maybe five or six hours to get back there, after we get Erin bailed out. If Mr. Mac calls back, try to get him to leave a number, will you?”
“Uh,” Josh started.
“I’ll talk to Erin when we get to Waycross,” Mary Bliss said, her voice firm. “I’ll tell her the truth. I won’t keep her from seeing her dad if that’s what she wants. I promise.”
When she turned off the phone, Matt was in the process of heading the Explorer back north.
“Eula died this morning,” she said simply.
He winced. “I’m sorry.”
“I guess it was for the best. She hated being sick. Hated the doctors, hated feeling so powerless. I just wish things had gone differently. I wish…I wish she could have seen Erin one more time. I wish I could have told her that Erin wasn’t pregnant. That she was okay. That we’d all be okay.”
“What about Parker?” Matt asked.
“He’s the one who called the house to say she died,” Mary Bliss said. “Josh actually talked to him. Parker called to tell Erin her grandmother was dead.”
“And that he wasn’t?”
“I guess,” Mary Bliss said. She tilted her head back against the headrest and massaged her temples. “Parker didn’t tell Josh where he was. I know the nursing home contacted him last night to tell him Eula was in bad shape. I just hope he made it to the hospital in time to see her. I’d hate to think she died all alone.”
Matt shook his head in disgust.
“What?” Mary Bliss asked.
“Her son treated you like dirt. She treated you like dirt. Called you names, refused to help you. She knew where Parker was all along, and she wouldn’t tell you. Seems to me, she doesn’t deserve any of your sympathy.”
“I can’t help it,” Mary Bliss said simply. “She wasn’t much, but she was family. My own mama’s been dead a long time now. I guess I just never took Eula personally. It wasn’t just me that she was mean to. She was mean to everybody. Except Parker. She never gave up on him. He was her son, and to her, he could do no wrong.”
“Love is blind,” Matt observed.
Or maybe just stupid, Mary Bliss thought. She glanced surreptitiously over at the man sitting beside her. For some crazy reason, this gorgeous, sexy man seemed to think he loved her. But what did Matt Hayslip really know about Mary Bliss McGowan? They had done everything backward. He knew the intimate things. That she had a small mole beneath her right breast. That she talked in her sleep. That she slept on the right side of the bed. And where she liked to be touched. But he knew nothing about her politics, her past, her passions.
He reached over and took her hand, as though he could read her thoughts. He put the back of her hand to his lips and kissed it lightly. A chill ran down her spine. It was a good kind of chill.
“Quit it,” he said.
“Quit what?”
“Quit coming up with reasons why it won’t work between us.”
“What makes you think that’s what I’m doing?”
“Aren’t you? You’re frowning. And you keep looking at me funny.”
“You don’t know me as well as you think you do,” Mary Bliss said.
“Fine,” Matt said. “You’re a woman of mystery. I like that. In fact, I love it. It’s a major turn-on for me.”
“You’ve got to stop talking like that,” Mary Bliss ordered. “And stop looking at me that way too.”
His lips twitched. “What way?”
“Like you’ve seen me naked.”
“That’s asking too much. I’m gonna carry you naked around in my head for a long, long time. And there’s nothing either one of us can do about that.”
“We’ll be in Waycross pretty soon,” Mary Bliss said, blushing. “It’s going to be bad enough explaining to Erin why you’re with me. If she sees you looking at me like that, she’ll know.”
“I don’t mind her knowing,” Matt said. “I’m not ashamed of how I feel about you. Are you ashamed of me?”
Mary Bliss bit her lip. “It’s complicated. Right now, I need to concentrate on Erin. On fixing things between us.”
“And what about us? You and me?”
She sighed. “Just let me get my child out of jail. All right?”