Anything for Her - By Janice Kay Johnson Page 0,100
her head. “I knew how miserable all of you were. I told myself... Well, it doesn’t matter now, does it? I can’t take any of it back.”
“No.” Allie in turn tried to smile. “Maybe you won’t have to go anywhere, Mom. I want you to stay.”
“I want to stay, too. Needless to say, I couldn’t sleep last night. I kept thinking about you and what I was asking you to give up. I decided that I won’t agree to a move unless there is real evidence someone is looking for me and may be close to finding me.
“I want to stay close to you. I want to hold my grandchildren. I like my job and my house and...darn it, I want to be president of the Friends of the Library!”
They both laughed, although Allie for one had a lump in her throat.
The next second, her mother was swiping at new tears. “Oh, damn. I’m crying a river. For goodness’ sake. It’s time I leave you to open the store again. You don’t want to lose customers. We can talk again.”
She’d mostly mopped up all the tears by the time they reached the front of the store. They hugged, whispered, “I love you,” and her mother slipped out and hurried away.
Allie flipped the sign back to Open and crumpled up the handwritten note. She stood for a long time looking out the front window at the surprisingly busy downtown street of this small town. Home, she thought, but knew in the next second that it wasn’t the place that mattered, any more than things mattered.
If she called Nolan, would he come? Remembering again the way he’d looked at her that night, she was afraid she knew the answer. She had to go to him, not the other way around.
As soon as she closed the shop, she would drive straight to his house and pray he was there and willing to listen to her.
* * *
NOLAN PARKED HIS truck at the curb in front of the beauty parlor a couple of doors down from Allie’s store and wondered if this was a really bad idea. He sure as hell didn’t want this discussion to be interrupted.
You’ve come this far, he told himself.
He grunted in something close to amusement. He had yet to display any patience at all where Allie was concerned. Why break a streak?
Finally he grabbed the warm bags from the passenger seat, got out, locked the truck and walked the forty feet or so to her door.
He was glad he’d worn his sheepskin coat. The pale gray sky and biting cold hinted at snow. It wasn’t common at this elevation in November, but ski season did typically open Thanksgiving weekend in the Cascades.
Thanksgiving was less than a week away. Not that long ago he’d assumed he would be celebrating it with Allie and her mother as well as Sean. He’d thought about trying to talk his sister into flying out and joining them. He really wanted to see her, and he’d wanted her to meet Allie.
How quickly things changed.
Pausing outside her store, a part of him noted how effective her window display was, with a quilt draped artfully and surrounded by coordinating bolts of fabrics. Several quilting how-to and pattern books lay scattered as if left in an absentminded moment. Enter, the display whispered. Look at the wonders within. You can do this, too, you know. Don’t you want to find out if there’s an artist inside you? Irresistible.
You planning to stand out here for maybe an hour or two?
He muffled a groan and reached for the damn doorknob. It would be just his luck if there were half a dozen women in there, all of whom would turn and stare at him when he walked in.
The bell tinkled and silence enveloped him.
“Hello, I’ll be with you in a moment,” Allie called from out of sight, and he was thrown back to that first day.
He remembered his astonishment at the multitude of fabrics, the colors, patterns, the femininity of his surroundings. But determination had carried him forward, through the alien landscape, until he’d found...Allie.
Determination set his feet on the same path this time, although his goal had changed. He reached the back room, unlike that first time not even taking in the quilt stretched in the frame.
Allie lifted her head, shock widening her eyes. The black leather thimble she was using dropped to the quilt top and she pushed back her chair with a jerk and rose to her feet.