Years back, when she'd been engaged to Scott Knight, this was how she'd wanted to feel. She'd wanted to love his touch, his laughter, had wanted to feel a little explosion of joy whenever he entered the room. But she hadn't. Not even once.

As she watched, Boone disconnected his phone and plugged it into one of the trio of battery chargers that lay on the counter beside her pickle jar. He stood still for a minute, and Lucy wondered what he was thinking. What had Kelly said?

The front doorbell rang, and Boone went to answer it. Lucy went into the kitchen. She got out plates and forks for the pizza, setting them on the island, and poured gla.s.ses of iced tea. Going through all the motions of ordinariness.

But the truth was that for Lucy, normalcy was as unrealistic as the dreams in the big gla.s.s jar. Like the spot in the driveway, there was nothing left but ashes.

The pizza was good, although Boone hadn't been hungry after his conversation with Kelly. Lucy's face told him she wasn't, either, but they polished off the twelve-inch combination pizza and the small order of breadsticks.

She asked about the conference and he answered her. He asked about the shower that afternoon and she answered him. They discussed the weather. The emptiness of the conversation was pervasive.

Finally, she threw out the gauntlet. "What day are you leaving for Chicago?"

"A week from tomorrow. I have meetings on Monday and I want to spend Sunday settling back into the apartment." He needed to make it home again. It hadn't been, not a single day since Maggie died. No amount of sound, not even music or laughter, had been able to fill the echoing silence.

"Why don't you come up with me for a few days?" He asked the question even though he knew she wouldn't come. The fire in the driveway had destroyed more than Lucy's van. It had burned away whatever self-confidence seven months at Tea on Twilight had given her. He waited, dreading what she would say next.

"I don't think so." She picked up a piece of crust from her plate and began breaking it into little pieces. "It's time for me to move on, Boone, before someone gets hurt." She smiled, although her eyes were dark with pain. "Too bad I don't know how to ride a horse-I could just go off into the sunset with Roy Rogers singing 'Happy Trails' after me like he did in all those old TV shows."

"Like people won't be hurt if you move on?" He got up, feeling hemmed in by the house and the happenings of the day. "Let's go for a walk."

They put on hooded sweatshirts in deference to the coolness of the evening and left the house. Boone lifted his gaze to the trees that canopied the street. Their leaves were beginning to change color, with yellows and oranges peeping through the green. "I'll miss Taft. I always do when I leave it. And I miss Chicago when I come here."

He steered her around a tree root that had split the sidewalk. The next question was obvious, but he didn't want to ask it. If he didn't-if he kept walking without addressing the issue, maybe she'd stay put here on Twilight Park Avenue. Maybe she'd... Oh, for G.o.d's sake, like that was going to work. "If you leave," he said, his voice firm, "where will you go?"

"I don't know. I haven't gotten my mind completely around having to go." The unhappiness in her voice was so deep it was painful to listen to.

"Then don't. No one thinks you started the fires. You weren't even there when they started."

"No one? Kelly does. I think Jack does. Tom Simc.o.x is beginning to wonder. I'm beginning to wonder. I'm afraid to light candles in the house, even more than I usually am. On nights I don't have dreams, I still get up to make sure the oven's turned off. Gert's already said she wants to have fires in the parlor fireplaces this winter while the tearoom's open-it'll drive me crazy."

"So you're just giving up."

He felt her rage, knew she wanted to scream at him that of course she wasn't giving up, she just wanted everyone to be safe. But he also knew the woman who referred to herself as Lucy the Pleaser. He felt her words before they left her mouth and lodged themselves between them.

"Yes," she said. "Yes, I am."

"Stay through the end of the year. We have enough party bookings that we might have to consider remodeling the garage," Gert said firmly, zipping the bank bag that held Tuesday's receipts. "If, after that, you're still determined to go, we'll close the tearoom and cut our losses."

"You don't need to close it," Lucy protested. "It's viable. It's gone like gangbusters ever since we opened. The backup crew is as good as we are. I'll bet Nancy Walker would buy me out in a heartbeat. Jack will help more, both outside and in the house. You know he's always wanting to earn more money."

Gert put the bag into her purse for the trip to the bank the next morning and got up to refill their coffee cups. "I know I could count on Jack, and Nancy probably would buy you out if we suggested it. She'd be an excellent partner, but the truth is that Nancy and I have both retired once. She was a teacher for thirty-five years and I was a financial planner for thirty. Neither of us wants to be a career woman anymore. I like cooking sometimes and having you do most of the work. Nancy wouldn't do that and Jack won't wear ap.r.o.ns, especially the cute ones like yours."

Lucy burst into laughter, thinking even as she did that it had been too many days since she'd laughed without tears pushing the sound out. "You and Nancy both can work me under the table and you know it. And Jack would do anything you asked of him."

"Lucy, dear." Gert's voice was gentle. "Please."

Without answering, Lucy left the room. She went into the den, with its three intimate tables for two that were often pushed together to make a long table for eight, then through the two parlors and the dining room-four tables for four per room. There was room for more, at least in the parlors, but they hadn't wanted the rooms to be crowded.

"I want to be able to wait tables without saying 'excuse me' every time I walk through," Lucy'd said, and Gert had agreed.

The rooms were decorated for autumn, with pumpkins and cornucopias on the mantels and garlands of artificial leaves around every window and doorway. A basket of shiny apples sat on small side tables in each room.

Lucy loved every square inch of Tea on Twilight.

She went back to the kitchen, and stood inside its doorway, watching as Gert emptied the dishwasher, stacking the plates on the open shelves. They still washed the gla.s.sware and flatware by hand, drying them on soft old towels so that they maintained their shine.

Gert was probably seventy or so-no one really knew-but was as lean and energetic as a woman half her age. She had a bigger personality than anyone Lucy knew. And love. Regardless of all she'd lost, her capacity for loving had only grown with those losses.

Lucy loved her too, had wondered in moments of whimsy if not only Crockett but the spirit of Siobhan Dolan had sent her to the house on Twilight Park Avenue. I can't be there for you, Lucy Goosy, she could almost hear her mother say, but Gert can. You be the daughter she lost, and she'll be your mother.

"I think-" Lucy had to clear her throat, "-Christmas trees in the front parlor and the dining room, and a small one in the den. In the second parlor, we could-I don't know. What do you think?"

"We could make it a gift room." Gert's voice sounded a little ragged too. "The crafters and st.i.tchers in town have mentioned it before. They could bring in their Christmas things and we could sell them on consignment. They'd get their eighty or ninety percent, whatever the going rate is, and we could donate our percentage. We could offer gift-wrapping for a further donation."

"Oh, I like that."

"So you'll stay?"

"Till the first of the year." Lucy let the decision slip into a place of semi-comfort in her heart. "After that, we'll see."

Chapter Fifteen.

"Just keep the Jeep. I can fly back to Chicago or you can drive me back." Boone scowled at Lucy, the expression so alien on his face that she couldn't help laughing at him. "The van had hardly any insured value and you can't be going into fall and winter without a vehicle. I, on the other hand, live in the city where I can walk, take a taxi, ride the train, or get delivery. I could even buy another car. Elmer and Myrtle have taken good financial care of me over the years."

It would be their last hike around the River Walk before Boone's return to Chicago the next day. They ambled along in the golden sunlight of early fall.

She wanted the afternoon to never end.

"I'll get a car, a used one, probably next week," she promised, "and I can afford payments. There just hasn't been time this week to go shopping for one. That newspaper ad of Gert's has kept us hopping."

"Have Sims check it out before you buy anything," he advised. "He's the best mechanic around."

"I will."

He stopped walking, pulling her into the warm arc of his arm. "You know I care for you, don't you?"

"I do." She met his gaze, memorizing the planes of his face so she'd be able to close her eyes and see him even after he'd gone. "I care for you too." I love you, is what it is, and I always will, but I'm not what you need. You don't need a pleaser who gets followed around by fires and keeps her dreams and her savings in a pickle jar.

"Are you sure you won't come with me for a few days? We can walk up and down Michigan Avenue and pretend Lake Michigan is really an ocean."

"No." It will be even harder then. To say goodbye. To start over.

"I'll be back down in a month. It's not as though you're getting rid of me."

"I know. The weekend of the soup supper at church. And you're going to help, right?"

"Well, I thought I'd stay outside and tell people where to park. You know, wear one of those nifty orange vests with the duct tape stripes."

"And talk about football and flirt with girls."

Boone nodded somberly. "Yeah, it's a big responsibility. I think Crockett's coming up. He can help with the parking too."

Lucy laughed, the sound ringing in the clear air. Oh, she would miss him when he was being funny. And when he wasn't.

His laughter joined hers and he swung her into his arms, dancing her down the cobblestone path and around the park benches and lamp posts that were interspersed along it. When they stopped, they were both breathless and at the end of the Walk, where the cobblestones segued into a concrete sidewalk that led to the street.

"Promise me."

She met his gaze, startled by the starkness of his words after the laughing dance. "What?"

"That if you ever need me, you will call."

I need you all the time. "Boone, I have to stand on my own."

"Promise me."

"I can't-"

"Listen to me, Lucy. I know you don't even trust yourself right now. You think you might have some kind of weird alter ego who runs around starting fires. My sister the idiot-she's a lawyer, remember, and if her own brother can't make snide lawyer remarks, no one can-is half-inclined to agree with you. And you're both so full of it, I swear. I know-did you hear when I said listen to me?-I know who you are, that you won't even light a match unless there's a bucket of water at your elbow, that you'd jump into the fire yourself before you let someone else get burned."

"If you know that," she said, unable to get her voice above a whisper, "why are you leaving me?" She hated sounding like a woeful, unloved child, but devastation drained her, leaving pride somewhere deep where she couldn't find it.

"I'm not." He framed her face with his hands and bent his head to kiss her. He lingered, his tongue teasing, until she opened her mouth under his. "I'm not leaving you, Lucy." He smiled before kissing her again, but the sadness she remembered from early summer filled his eyes. "I'm finding me."

She found the car she wanted the Monday after Boone went back to Chicago. The "new" SUV was three years old with less than 30,000 miles and a functional CD player and air conditioner. It was canary yellow, which Sims said meant they should've paid her to take it off the lot. And Lucy loved it. It was quiet and comfortable and in only four years, providing she made timely and not-too-big payments, it would be completely hers.

Micah Walker ordered a magnetic sign that advertised Tea on Twilight and she slapped it on the driver's door and left it there.

The days, once she got past the horrific one when Boone left, moved along easily. Business at the tearoom boomed. Tom Simc.o.x said the investigators had found nothing new concerning the burning of her car. "It could be random vandalism," he'd said one day when he and Maria came for lunch. "There's no denying it happens. Just watch your back and make sure 911 is on speed-dial."

"Do you believe I didn't do it myself?" She hadn't meant to ask the question, no matter how badly she wanted to know its answer. Her breath stopped in the middle of an exhale and she bit down on her bottom lip.

"I do."

"Thanks, Tom." She'd smiled past him at his wife. "He's not bad sometimes, is he?"

Maria'd laughed. "No, and he's cute in an ap.r.o.n, too."

Leaves began falling in early October, and as always in the Midwest, its residents remarked that fall was early this year. Or late. Or dry. Or exceedingly wet. The tearoom dispensed as much mulled cider at lunchtime as it did coffee and tea. Homemade soup was so popular they served at least one kind every day. During a business meeting held while Gert counted money and Lucy made piecrust, the idea of opening seven days a week was discussed and dismissed to the great relief of both of them.

The Friday before the church supper, Lucy was loading the day's tablecloths and napkins into the washer when Gert carried the phone into the laundry room. "It's for you," she said, and sneezed.

"Bless you." Lucy took the phone. "h.e.l.lo?"

"Thank you, and bless you too." It was Kelly. "Jack's got a football game tonight."

"I know. We sent cookies over for the team. Do you have any idea how many cookies thirty teenage boys can eat?"

"No, and I don't think I want to know. You should feed the cheerleaders instead of the players-it would be much cheaper. The thing is, Jack doesn't have anybody to be there for him. His dad's in jail and his mother just started working nights at the casino in Rising Sun. Even his little brothers are in foster care. I don't feel like going by myself. Would you go with me?"

Lucy took the receiver away from her ear and stared at it for a moment, wondering if Kelly remembered who she'd called. "Well, sure," she said. "I can do that."

"I didn't ask Aunt Gert." Kelly answered her unspoken question. "She doesn't sound too good."

"She's catching a cold. She'll be happy to stay here with Kinsey, I imagine."

"I'll pick you up at six-thirty."

Still feeling nonplused, Lucy thanked her and hung up, putting the phone in her pocket and turning concerned eyes on Gert. "Why don't you get ready for bed?" she suggested, closing the washer and starting its cycle.

"It's three-thirty in the afternoon."

"And you're about to collapse. Take some cold medicine, or a shot of something. I'll bring you some soup and tea and you and Kinsey can take the rest of the day off." She grinned. "Sims might come over and sit with you if you ask nicely."

Gert snorted. "You and Kelly going out?"

Lucy explained, lifting the next day's tablecloths and napkins off the shelf above the dryer. She had time to set the tables if she hurried. That would keep Gert from doing it while she was gone.

That whole idea didn't work, of course. Gert followed her, sitting down to fold the napkins in artistic shapes Lucy had never mastered. "That's nice you girls are going. Give him a thumbs-up from me."

"I've been here since February, see Jack almost every day, and love him to death, but I still don't know much about him," Lucy said. "I have the impression he's had a rough time. Is that right?"

"Yes, he has. Still is, I think." Sadness settled on Gert's already pale features.

After settling Gert in, Lucy dressed in jeans and a red and black Taft High School sweatshirt she'd bought from one of the St. John children who'd been selling them as a fundraiser. She flat-ironed her hair so that it lay neatly on her shoulders. Kelly was prompt, as Lucy had expected, and she ran down the front porch steps to slide into the pa.s.senger seat of the Volvo.

"I haven't been to a football game since I was in high school," she said, "and not very many of them then. Friday nights were busy in the restaurant."

"Just yell when everyone else does and make sure you don't say anything less than complimentary about a particular player. If his mother hears you, she'll never forgive you and she'll tell all her friends."

Lucy smiled across the car at Boone's sister. Kelly was extraordinarily beautiful. Slim but still curvy, with skin Lucy would have been willing to bet had never seen the business end of a tube of Clearasil. If there were flaws, they were invisible ones. Even her clothes were the prettiest Lucy had ever seen. "Were you a cheerleader?"

"From sixth grade all the way through college. I even tried out for the Colts and the Pacers cheerleading squads, but when I didn't make it, I went to law school instead." There wasn't much humor in her smile. "I'm still not sure that was a good choice, but changing my mind at this point would be a pretty expensive option."