LORI SHERIDAN’S ARM had a clean break and didn’t take long to set. Nicole exchanged looks with Peter as Cal wheeled a subdued teenager out the door. Tyler followed behind, his shoulders figuratively dragging the floor.
“Stop a minute, Gramps,” Lori said. The wheelchair stopped and the girl turned to them. “I’m sorry, Gramps. And Mr. E., thanks for calling my parents.”
“An apology isn’t going to get you off the hook this time, Granddaughter.”
Nicole squeezed Peter’s hand, hoping he’d take a softer stand.
“Your grandfather is right,” Peter said. “I’m afraid there needs to be consequences for your actions.” He turned to Tyler. “You, young man, are grounded for a month.”
Nicole didn’t think the boy’s shoulders could droop any lower, but they did.
“I’m sorry, sir. Does that include basketball?”
Peter’s lips pressed together in a thin line. “It includes everything. Basketball, after school activities—you think of it and you can’t do it. Not for a month.”
Cal nodded his approval. “Let’s get you home and in bed, young lady.”
After Cal wheeled Lori through the doors, Peter turned to Nicole and Tyler. “Time to get you two home as well.”
They dropped Tyler off at the shelter and waited until he was safely inside, then drove to her apartment. She leaned against the doorframe. “Want to come in for a minute?”
His eyes softened, and his voice was a whisper. “I should go. You need your bed.”
His words didn’t match the desire in his eyes as he rubbed his thumb against her jaw. “Thanks for staying at the hospital.”
Peter leaned in, and Nicole lifted her lips to his. She melted against him as his kiss sent shivers through her. That first kiss at midnight had cracked the ice around her heart, and this one set it on fire. The emotions Peter stirred up were new to her—her ex-boyfriend certainly never made her feel this way.
He stepped back. “Definitely time for me to go.”
He kissed her once more before walking to his truck. “Late breakfast tomorrow?”
“Sounds wonderful.” She didn’t move until he was out of sight.
* * *
SUNDAY AFTERNOON, NICOLE was still remembering those kisses and the others Peter had given her. After brunch on New Year’s Day, they’d spent time at her parents’, and the cold hadn’t stopped them from playing a game of one-on-one. She laughed, thinking how cocky he’d been going into the game. She might have let him win if he hadn’t been so sure of himself.
She sighed. What a difference a few weeks could make. Everything was perfect. While it was a given that her mom liked Peter, her dad liked him as well. For the first time in her life, Nicole believed she’d found a man that measured up to her dad.
Can you really trust him? Briefly, Nicole focused on the question. It wasn’t the first time it had popped into her head. Sometimes in the middle of the night doubt slithered in.
Before she could dismiss it, her cell phone rang and she answered. It was Sarah Redding from the shelter.
“Is there any chance you can help Tyler this afternoon?” Sarah asked. “School starts Tuesday and he’s trying to study for that makeup test in math and not making much headway.”
Nicole remembered promising the boy she’d help after New Year’s. “I’ll be right over.”
She parked at the side of the shelter beside Peter’s pickup and climbed out of her car. Peter hadn’t said anything about coming to the shelter last night when they had dinner at Venelli’s.
A warm feeling spread through her chest. Maybe because they’d been so busy gazing into each other’s eyes. And the good-night kisses weren’t half-bad. Only a couple of days since he’d first kissed her, and so far he hadn’t missed an opportunity to follow up.
She practically skipped up the steps to the back door of the shelter, and Sarah let her in.
“Tyler is in his bedroom, and Peter is in my office. Go see him while I get the boy.”
She hurried down the hall, slowing when she heard voices. Peter wasn’t alone. She glanced in the hallway mirror, which reflected the interior of the office, and saw Allie Jefferies.
Allie was with Peter? Blood drained from Nicole’s face as she watched him slip his arms around his former girlfriend and draw her into an embrace. Nicole covered her mouth with her hand and stepped back. Maybe she saw wrong.
A quick glance told her she hadn’t. They still stood with their arms around each other. Confront him. Demand to know what’s going on. But images of Stuart and his secretary bombarded her brain. With tears scalding her eyes, she turned and fled, stopping only long enough to tell Sarah she had a splitting headache and would return some other time to help Tyler.
She held back the tears until she was inside her apartment, leaning against the closed door. What a fool she’d been. She’d seen the way he looked at Allie on Christmas Day. Deep in her soul Nicole had known Peter still loved his old flame, but that he would act on it...
Nicole stumbled to the couch and buried her face in her hands. She’d been so stupid. First Stuart and now Peter. What? Did she have a sign on her forehead that said Break My Heart?
She raised her head, and the Christmas tree mocked her. He had really played her. But no more. She yanked ornaments off the tree and threw them in the box they’d come in. Once the ornaments were off, she jerked the lights, toppling the tree over.
Forget the lights. She’d buy Jake another set. Nicole wrestled the tree to the door, and stopped there. She didn’t have the energy to carry it outside.
Maybe she should have accepted Jake’s offer for a date New Year’s Eve. At least he didn’t have an old flame.
But she didn’t love Jake.
More tears streamed down her face. “I don’t love Peter,” she murmured to herself. “I. Don’t. Love. Peter.”
No matter how many times she said the words, it didn’t make them true.
The special ringtone she’d just last night put on her phone for Peter signaled loudly. She let it go unanswered. Staring at the fallen Christmas tree, she kicked it hard. Felt pretty good. Maybe she could kick it all the way to the curb.
Her phone rang again. She could not go through hearing his excuses like she had with Stuart. Ignoring the call, she opened her door and dragged the tree outside. By the time she returned, the ringing had stopped. But he’d left her a message. She deleted it without listening to it and pulled out her vacuum. Once she had all the needles gone and the box of ornaments in her car, she felt better.
Peter had called back and left another message. Maybe she’d better text him or he might come over. After all, he didn’t know she had seen him.
Feeling terrible. Will be in touch later.
There. That ought to do it. And it wasn’t a lie. Her phone rang, and she was about to turn it off when she saw it was Sarah. Curiosity got the better of her and she answered, “Hello?”
“Nicole? Are you feeling any better?”
“A little, maybe.”
“Well, Peter was worried that he didn’t get to talk to you. And now he’s driving down to the coast with a deputy to pick up two runaway teens.”
Why did hearing his name make her heart hitch? “Why didn’t he send someone else?”
“You know him. He just hated to ask one of the other case workers to give up their Sunday.”
He was all heart. Except when it came to being true to her. “Do you know when he’ll be back?”
“It’s four hours to the coast and back, and then no telling how long the transfer will take.”
She checked her watch. Only three thirty. “Is Tyler still there? I can come back and help him if he is.”
“I’m sure he’d appreciate it, but if you’re not feeling well—”
“I’m okay. I’ll be there in a few minutes.” The sooner she went, the quicker she could get away. She wouldn’t go at all, except she’d promised the boy she’d help him.
The image of Peter with his arms around Allie haunted her all the way to the shelter. What was she going to do? Peter would want to know why she wouldn’t take his calls. And he’d come up with some convenient reason for what she had seen—men always did, she thought, remembering the lies Stuart told when she found him in an embrace with his now wife.
She just didn’t expect it from Peter. Jake, maybe, but not Peter. No, not even Jake. He had more honor than that. And she hadn’t kissed Jake or almost told him that she loved him. Twice she’d almost said the words to Peter, but held back. What if she had told him? Would it have made a difference? She’d never know.
Pain ripped through her heart again, and she straightened her shoulders. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. And this would not kill her. She parked once again in her same parking space.
“You sure look peaked,” Sarah said as Nicole entered through the back.
“Headaches do that.” Headaches by the name of Peter Elliott. “Where’s Tyler?”
“Gone to get his math book.”
She sat at the table to wait, and the boy ducked his head when he slid into his seat.
“’Lo,” he said.
“How is Lori?”
“I haven’t seen her, but she texted me her arm isn’t hurting.”
“Good.” But he was hurting. Maybe if Tyler passed the test and stayed on the basketball team, the family... No, Nicole was pretty sure it was Cal who must have put a stop to them seeing each other. Maybe he would relent. She opened his math book. “Are you ready to get started?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
As they worked through the problems together, he began to grasp the concepts. “So if I remember that if two angles of a triangle are congruent, the sides opposite those angles are congruent, as well?”
“You have it. Very good.” She couldn’t do anything about her life, but maybe she could make a difference in Tyler’s.
Tires crunched on the gravel drive, then a door slammed, and Nicole looked up. That couldn’t be Peter. The back doorbell rang, and Sarah answered it.
“Come in, Mr. Sheridan.”
“Afternoon, Sarah. Is Tyler here?”
“He’s in the kitchen.”
Beside her, Tyler tossed Nicole a panicky glance. Nicole swallowed hard. “It’ll be okay.”
Cal came into the room. “There you are. Mind if I talk to you, Tyler?”
“N-no, sir.”
“Hello, Nicole,” Cal said and took a deep breath. “Tyler, I just wanted to apologize for the other night, son.”
“Sir?” Tyler’s brows lowered. “What do you mean?”
“It seems I owe you an apology. Why didn’t you tell me Lori wouldn’t listen to you? That you tried to get her to find Peter?”
Tyler lifted his shoulder in a half shrug. “I dunno. I guess I didn’t want to get her in trouble.”
“My granddaughter does a good job of that all by herself, thinking she can do anything.” He held out his hand. “I apologize for jumping all over you. And thank you for getting her to the ER.”
Tyler hesitated, and then accepted the man’s hand. “Thank you, sir.”
“She’s in the truck if you want to go say hi.”
Tyler shot a glance at Nicole. “May I?”
“Sure.”
The boy scrambled out of the chair and raced for the back door. Nicole eyed Cal. “Thank you for doing that. You didn’t have to.”
“But I did. It seems I may have misjudged the boy.”
“We all do that sometimes,” Nicole said. Which might be a lesson for her to learn. Except she knew what she saw, and she didn’t think there could be a plausible explanation for Peter and Allie’s embrace.
* * *
STANDING OUTSIDE THE Harrison county jail, Peter listened as Cal Sheridan asked for leniency for Tyler, not sure he was hearing right. “Thanks, Cal. I appreciate that you called, but Tyler is still grounded because he didn’t let me know about Lori’s arm and he took my truck.”
“Think about letting him play basketball. The team needs him, and I think he’s learned his lesson,” Cal said. “One other thing. I plan to vote for the youth center when we bring it up at the next council meeting. Boyd Anderson and George Bivens plan to, as well.”
That meant he had enough votes to get his proposal through. The youth center was practically a done deal. The memory of how Millie and Gunner and all the others had helped decorate the building dimmed his elation. “How about Jake’s senior center?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me if both of them get approval, but only one of the projects will be funded.”
Effectively killing the other one. It wasn’t enough to get city approval. To win the contest, one of the projects had to get the twenty-five-thousand-dollar financial backing from the city.
After he thanked Cal and hung up, Peter stared at his phone. Nicole hadn’t answered earlier, and she hadn’t responded to the messages he left. He didn’t know what was going on, but he had a sinking feeling it wasn’t good.
He returned to the conference room where a social worker was processing the paper work for him to take charge of the two sixteen-year-olds he’d come to collect. Seems the girl’s mom wouldn’t allow her to see her boyfriend, so the two of them ran away.
Maybe on the drive back, he could help them see the mother’s side. Looking at their angry faces, he doubted it. It was going to be a long two-hour trip. Not to mention he was worried because Nicole hadn’t returned his texts or calls.
* * *
MONDAY MORNING, WORRY awakened Peter at six o’clock. It’d been close to ten when he and the teens returned to Cedar Grove and another couple of hours before he’d finally gotten to bed. Nicole had called him while they were on the road, but she only answered his questions in monosyllables. He’d attributed her abruptness to the election in two days, but now he wasn’t so sure, and the first thing on his agenda today was discovering what the problem was.
Only it didn’t work out that way. Before he could call her, he heard from the runaway girl’s mother. The girl had locked herself in her room, asking for Peter. The rest of the day was spent resolving the issue.
At four, Peter speed-dialed Nicole’s number, and there was no answer. He took a chance and drove to her apartment. Her car was in her parking space, so she should be home. He parked and started up her walk when her front door opened and she came out, carrying trash.
“Oh.” Nicole stopped abruptly.
“Hello,” he said, his heart pounding against his chest. How he’d missed her. Dressed in jeans and a pullover turtleneck, her shiny black hair in a ponytail, she looked fresh and wholesome.
“I was on my way to knock on a few more doors,” she said and looked at the bag in her hands. “After I put this in the bin.”
Her voice trembled, as if she was nervous.
“Can we talk?”
She looked as though she might say no, but her shoulders drooped and she nodded. “Let me take care of this. Go on in.”
He stepped inside the apartment, noticing the tree was gone. Disappointment shot through him at warp speed. He’d told her he’d help take it down. Not a good sign, even if it was the fourth of January—after the last few days, he thought she’d wait for him.
“You took the tree down,” he said when she returned.
“It was time.”
Her gaze skittered away from him, and he studied her face. “What’s wrong, Nicole?”
“Nothing.”
“Look at me and tell me that again.”
“We...” She chewed a fingernail. “Everything was moving too fast.”
That was the problem? He’d thought she was going to tell him she didn’t want to see him again. “We can fix that.”
“I don’t know. Right now, I think we both better focus on the election and you have that contest.” Her hand flew to her mouth.
“How did you know about the contest? Did Jake tell you?”
She shook her head. “There was an affidavit in the box with the ornaments. Jake must have put it in there and forgotten.”
“You haven’t told anyone, have you?”
“No, of course not. But I think you should.”
“Did you read it?”
Color crept into her cheeks. “I read part of it before I realized what it was.” She ducked her head. “Then I read all of it.”
Nicole was cute when she was embarrassed. “Then you know we can’t tell anyone, not until one of us wins.”
“Well, I think it’s horrid that your grandfather would do something like that.”
“I’m sure he had his reasons,” Peter said. “But let’s get back to us.”
“Can this conversation wait until at least Tuesday, after the election?”
“No. I love you and I want to settle whatever is wrong tonight.”
Nicole gaped at him. She shook her head as if she’d misunderstood him. “Is something wrong?” he said.
“I can’t believe you said you love me after what you did!”
Her face was bright red now, and it had nothing to do with embarrassment.
“What are you talking about?”
Her hands curled into fists at her side. “You and Allie. Embracing.”
“What?”
“I saw you yesterday. You and Allie were in Sarah’s office, and you were holding her in your arms.”
He stared at her, understanding unfolding in his brain, right along with anger. “Too bad you didn’t come into the office instead of sneaking away. If you had, you could have spoken to Matt, who was also there. You would have seen the two of us shaking hands.”
“Sneaking?” Her voice rose. “What was Matt doing there?”
“He and Allie had just come to tell me they wanted to adopt Logan and Lucas.” He clenched his jaw, the muscle throbbing. “I can’t believe you don’t trust me. That you believed the worst. Allie is a married woman. I would never—” Pain ripped a hole in his heart.
He held his hands up as if surrendering. “Never mind. Just forget it. Maybe we aren’t right for each other.”
Peter wheeled around and walked to the door. He should have known Nicole was too good to be true.
“Wait... I’m sorry. I—I—Stuart... I caught him—”
He shut the door, cutting off her words. He wasn’t Stuart, and if she didn’t know that by now...