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Fifteen
Brant stood behind everyone else as the pastor dedicated Phoebe Christensen’s grave. He didn’t feel he should be up in the front. He’d barely known the old lady. But he was glad he’d decided to attend this part of the funeral, too, because the way Charlie and Averil were glowering at Talulah certainly wasn’t anything she should have to endure at a family member’s funeral. They kept turning around to glower at him, too, and whenever they did, he’d give Charlie a look to let him know he’d better not do anything unkind.
Although there were several people between them, Brant could see part of the bandage that covered the stitches on Talulah’s arm and once again wondered who’d thrown that rock through her window. Averil was the only other person, besides Charlie, who might feel strongly enough about Talulah’s return to hurl something at her house. But he hated to think Charlie’s sister, who’d been one of Talulah’s closest friends for years, would do that.
Averil wasn’t a vengeful person, was she?
He eyed her speculatively as she turned to look at him once again. He told himself to smile, to be friendly. They’d known each other most of their lives, and he adored her son. But the way she and Charlie were behaving made him mad enough that he gazed coolly back at her, challenging her hostile attitude, and when the ceremony was over and everyone started to drift off to their cars, she walked over to him.
“I didn’t expect to see you at the funeral,” she said. “I didn’t realize you even knew Phoebe Christensen.”
“I didn’t realize you knew her all that well, either.” They’d both had ulterior motives in coming. He wasn’t about to let her pretend she’d cared about Talulah’s great aunt.
“Hey!” Mitch had wriggled out of Charlie’s grasp and was weaving through those who were left to get to Brant. “Can we go riding today?” he asked, reaching out to be picked up.
Brant lifted the kid into his arms. “Not today, buddy. This isn’t your lesson day. But maybe on Sunday. You’ll have to ask your mom about that.”
Averil glanced from her son, who’d put his hands together in a prayer-like pose, begging her to agree, to Brant. “I didn’t know if you’d be free on Sundays now that you’re so caught up with Talulah.”
Brant had avoided even acknowledging the extra attention she’d been giving him and what it meant, but he wasn’t sure he could continue that way. It had to be addressed. “Averil, I’m sorry if my involvement with Talulah upsets you. I care about you, but I’ve never done anything to make you think—”
“It doesn’t upset me,” she broke in before he could finish.
He could tell she’d figured out where he was going with what he was saying and didn’t want to hear it. “Good,” he said. “Because I should have the right to see anyone I want. Why you or Charlie would have a problem with it, I don’t know. I’m supposed to stay away from Talulah even though she broke off her relationship with Charlie fourteen years ago?”
He thought she’d argue about the circumstances, so it surprised him when her shoulders slumped. “Charlie was right, then. It’s not just physical between you. You really like her.”
“I don’t know how I feel, exactly,” he admitted. “But I’d like to continue seeing her while she’s here, and I don’t think that’s anyone else’s business.”
Averil seemed even more crestfallen. “She doesn’t care about her boyfriend in Seattle?”
Brant was tempted to say she didn’t have a boyfriend. But he’d already told Charlie, and it hadn’t made a damn bit of difference. “You’ll have to ask her about that.”
Her expression grew dark. “I have nothing to say to her.”
“Because...”
“She’s a terrible person.”
“The kind of person who’d throw a rock through someone’s window?” he asked.
She took a step back. “What are you saying? You thinkIthrew the rock?”
“I don’t know anyone, other than Charlie, who hates her more. It seems like a plausible conclusion.”
“Well, it’s thewrongconclusion,” she snapped and pulled Mitch out of his arms. “Let’s go,” she said as she set her son on his feet. “You won’t be seeing Brant ever again.”
Mitch looked up at him in confusion.“Why?”
Averil grabbed her son’s hand so he couldn’t escape. “Because he... Because he...”
“Because of you, not me,” Brant said softly, and she didn’t stay long enough to argue. She dragged Mitch away, stuffed him in his car seat and was in such a hurry to get out of the lot she nearly collided with a Toyota sedan that was leaving at the same time.
“What was that all about?”
Brant turned to see that Talulah had walked over from where she’d been thanking the pastor. “I hope it’s not true,” he said, “but I think she may be the one who threw the rock through your window.”
Talulah gazed after Averil’s car as it turned out of the lot. “I know.”
