I parked Russ’ truck in the first available space, jumped out, and sprinted toward the building, praying the whole way.
One step inside the door, I skidded to a stop. Dave and the other employees who’d been here when I left were still here, but they’d been joined by people who should have had no reason to be here.
Dana from my Lost Pets group, her baby strapped on her back in one of those carriers that reminded me of a Native American papoose board. Mandy, the owner of The Sunburnt Arms where I’d stayed for the first weeks I was in Fair Haven. The waitress from The Burnt Toast Café whose daughter I’d helped with her application to law school.
Alongside them were a few people I didn’t know.
And Mark and Elise, even though I’d told her she didn’t need to come back.
Despite all the rumors, despite all the stupid things I’d done, it seemed like more people cared about me and Russ and Sugarwood than I’d realized. This sense of community, the connectedness between all of us, was something I couldn’t have found in the city. I’d been afraid that, thanks to the rumors, I wouldn’t find it here either. Thank God I’d been wrong.
Elise must have spotted me standing by the door. She headed in my direction, one of those rare smiles that showed her Cavanaugh dimples on her face.
“The mess looked too big for a few people if you want to be up and running in time to still make syrup this season.” Elise shrugged. “So Mark and I made a few calls. Quincey’s on the night shift, but Erik’s going to come by when he gets off duty if you still need him.”
I was one breath away from busting into tears when Russ huffed in the door behind me.
He let slip a curse word. “Where did all these people come from?”
“Apparently,” I linked my arm through his, “all these people are addicted to our syrup, and they’re afraid they won’t get their fix.”
Russ reached up a hand as though he intended to ruffle his hair, but his fingers hit the bandage and he settled for scratching at it instead. “I’ll take a look at the evaporator and then make a call about repairs.”
In the meantime, I should make sure the path was clear to our other reverse osmosis machine. We’d want to move it into the sugar shack while we still had strong backs to help us. “Where do I find the keys to the secondary shed?”
“You probably have one on Stan’s old keyring.” Russ unclipped the key chain from his belt and handed it to me. “We only had the three copies—mine, Stan’s, and Noah’s. Too much expensive equipment to have extras floating around.”
By the time I made sure a big enough path was cleared to the old reverse osmosis machine and returned to the sugar shack, Tony was bent over the evaporator and legs that I assumed belonged to Oliver stuck out from underneath.
I stopped near the protruding legs. “I appreciate you both coming out.”
Tony grunted, his nose a fraction of an inch from a piece of the machine I couldn’t hope to identify.
“Everything looks good down here.” Oliver worm-crawled out from underneath. “I’ll make sure the other evaporators are okay.”
I followed after him. Noah had his keys on him when he was attacked—I remembered them gouging into my leg when I tried to help him—and his belongings must have gone somewhere once he got to the hospital. Oliver might have them or might know where they were, and we should get the keys back rather than allowing them to float around in the wild.
“Do you know what happened to Noah’s belongings? We need to get his keys back.”
Oliver blink-blinked at me. “They’re probably still at the hospital. No one gave me anything.”
I’d have to check tomorrow, assuming I could get there. My first task would be to have my car towed out of the ditch and to Quantum Mechanics. As much as Tony’s involvement in Noah’s situation was questionable, his was still the shop I trusted since they’d taken care of me the last two times. Besides, Tony would have no reason to hurt me.
A hand rested on my shoulder from behind me. From the size, I knew it was a man’s, and from the angle, it couldn’t be Russ. With Erik not here, that left only one man who would touch me.
From the lewd smirk on Oliver’s face as he turned away, my expression must have telegraphed how I felt about the person the hand belonged to.
I shifted around, breaking the contact. As suspected, Mark stood behind me.
I knew I should thank him for coming, but what I really wanted to do was fall into his arms for a hug. Since my Uncle Stan moved to Michigan and then passed away, there’d been a deficit of hugs in my life. Even when I’d been dating someone, our embraces wouldn’t have been classified as the kind of tell-me-everything’s-going-to-be-alright type of hug I needed now.
Concern flickered across Mark’s face. How long had I been staring wordlessly at his chest?
“Are you okay?” he asked.
A crazy laugh bubbled up inside me. I held it back. If I started talking about how not okay I was, how afraid I was that I was going to lose Sugarwood, I might cry right here in front of everyone, and I was too much my father’s daughter to ever do that. “I’ll be better once we get this mess cleaned up.”
Mark shook his head. “I meant are you hurt. Elise said you ran your car into a ditch because you were on the phone with Russ when it happened.”
Oh. Right. Doctor. He was asking after my physical health. “My shoulder aches a little, but it still works, and it’s starting to feel better already.” I scrubbed my teeth over the corner of my upper lip. “Thanks for asking.”
Mark started to turn away, then stopped. “I know Erik’s busy right now, and Russ shouldn’t drive for a few days. If you’ll let me, I’ll make sure your car gets to Quantum Mechanics.”
A lump clogged my throat, so I answered with a nod. Mark headed back to where Elise had wheeled in a wheelbarrow and was shoveling up bits of glass and metal.
I headed over to the pile of work gloves someone had left on a card table set up in the corner and put my face to the wall for a minute. It was the best chance I’d have at privacy and to get control of my emotions for hours.
Unless Mark Cavanaugh turned from Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde, my chances of falling out of love with him seemed about as good as an eighty-degree day in a Michigan December.
Since Russ wasn’t supposed to be driving anywhere for a couple of days in case his head wound made him dizzy, he gave me free access to his truck. Unfortunately, with getting everything back up and running, I didn’t have time to go by the hospital for nearly a week.
Knowing the keys were out there unprotected was like having a cracked lip. It made it difficult for me to do even the normal tasks without distraction. I called the hospital and asked them to take Noah’s belongings out of the cubby in his room and set them behind their desk. Presumably, no one would think to hunt through the storage cubbies of comatose patients—most next of kin would have taken the items home—and even if someone did find them, they’d need to figure out where to use them. But I still hated them out there unprotected. I’d had too many people invade my “home” to be comfortable with possibly providing them with easy access to everywhere on Sugarwood. At least my house keys weren’t included. The only one who had a key to my house other than me was Russ.
Once again, no one even stopped to ask my name as I entered Noah’s room. The nurses were too busy to be expected to also guard Noah. Though, by now, if no one had come to finish what they started, I had to assume that they were satisfied with putting him into a coma. According to Oliver, the doctors had given up hope that he’d ever wake up.
After stopping in to see Noah, I waited for a nurse and asked after Noah’s belongings. The keys were at the top of the plastic bag that someone had put his belongings in to. The keys technically belonged to Sugarwood, so I felt entitled to take those with me, but I left the rest behind for Oliver to pick up if he wanted.
I was leaving the hospital when Elise’s name flashed across my phone.
“I’m headed to interview Stacey Rathmell, and I was hoping you’d ride along. Mark says you’re great at reading people. You’ve probably noticed that I’m not. I was sure when I arrived at the scene of Noah’s attack that you’d done it.” Her tone of voice had that self-deprecating, I’m going to laugh at my failings so that at least we can laugh together quality to it.
Maybe staying up all night, scrubbing sap off of concrete floors, bonded people. Or maybe I was lonelier here than I wanted to admit. Whatever the reason, I’d almost considered calling up Elise to chat a couple days ago. Her admission of her weakness as an interrogator suggested that we might be able to be friends yet.
Either that, the pernicious little voice in my head whispered, or she’s trying to get you to let your guard down so that she can trick you into admitting you did do it.
This time I was ninety-nine percent certain that my paranoid self was wrong.
I climbed into Russ’ truck and turned it on for the heater, but I didn’t leave the parking lot since his truck wasn’t Bluetooth-equipped.
My first reaction was to say of course! to Elise’s suggestion, but Erik’s concerns about the scrutiny the department was under lingered in my mind.
“If you take me along, won’t that get you into trouble?”
“I got Erik to sign off on it as long as you’re along as potential council should Stacey request it.”
No one could argue with that. I glanced down at my jeans and running shoes. If I was going to be along as a lawyer, I needed to look the part.
Since it might call my validity as a lawyer into question if I showed up in Russ’ mud-spattered truck, I’d probably need a ride there as well.
“I’m out right now, and I’ll need to change. Can you meet me at Sugarwood in fifteen minutes?”