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Penta’s conversation with her father rankled for several days. She’d been trying to help, and he’d acted like she was smothering him. Oh, he’d been perfectly polite and hadn’t actually used that word, but it was what he’d meant.
Echoes of similar comments made by both Mark and Cash only sharpened the sting. She was a loving, caring person. How could that be a bad thing?
Well, if everyone wanted to be left alone, she could do that. She sent Felix to fetch Cyril from Cash’s shop and though she picked up the phone to call her father several times, she always put it back down without dialling. One night she refused to make dinner for the kids. Since the fridge was full of leftovers, they might not have noticed her mutiny. These small acts of rebellion made her restless and twitchy and irritated. She hated it.
What made it worse was that neither Cash nor her father reached out to her. Had the agreement she and Cash forged at the youth camp meant that little? And how could her father dismiss the hours of work she’d done so easily?
Tears burned at the back of her throat if she thought about it too long. But with the forlorn sense of abandonment came a growing resolution to make changes in her life.
She dug into her home computer and excavated her last resume. It was a terribly thin document and the dates on it made her wince. How had twenty years gone by so quickly? Searching internet job sites made her feel prehistoric. She didn’t know what some of the titles meant, let alone have any of the mysterious qualifications required.
Gradually, her wounded feelings eased and her cheerful temperament reasserted itself. In this cooler frame of mind, she realized she’d been punishing Cash for something he hadn’t done. He may have told her she was too lenient with her kids, but he’d never accused her of overstepping any of his boundaries. In fact, he’d rather encouraged her to do so. Just thinking about their kisses had her cheeks flaming.
Late Thursday afternoon, she parked outside Absolute Motorcycle Repair with the eagerness mixed with angst of a teenager on a first date. When she opened the door, Cash was crouched on the far side of the ancient bike he’d been working on ever since she’d met him. He finished fiddling with whatever he was staring at and straightened, arching his back before finally looking her way. She thought she saw welcome flash across his features before his expression settled into stern blankness.
“Penta.” His tone was gruff and formal. He gripped a screwdriver in one hand like a weapon.
His cool reception dimmed her enthusiasm and her smile slipped. “Cash. How have you been?”
He shrugged, reminding her of Cyril. Were all men just boys with thicker whiskers? “Fine.”
She drifted forward until she stood as close as she could get with the bike between them. Dark shadows pooled under his eyes. “You look tired.”
Another shrug.
For Pete’s sake. Was she going to have to drag it out of him with pliers? “Did I do something to make you angry?”
“No.”
“Is it Elle? Is she still mad at you?”
He tossed the screwdriver onto the workbench with restrained violence. “I imagine so.”
“Imagine so? Haven’t you talked to her?”
Face shuttered, he picked up a rag, put it down again, picked up a wrench, and then simply stood, turning it over and over in his hand. “Linda didn’t return my messages.”
Damn the woman. Penta was getting tired of making excuses. It was all well and good to believe she had valid reasons to shun Cash in the past. But that was different now. He was different now.
His cold behaviour was starting to make sense. He wasn’t angry at her. He was angry at the world.
“What’s your plan?”
A third shrug.
“Right then.” He might not know what to do, but she did. “It’s time to close up shop anyway. We can drop Cyril off at home before we go.”
A comical expression of bewilderment creased his face. “Go where?”
“To talk to Elle, of course.”
PENTA WAS NOT TO BE denied. Despite their size difference, despite his bone-deep reluctance, despite his vocal protests—thirty minutes later he was sitting in the passenger seat of her van parked outside Linda’s house, working up the courage to knock on the door.
“You know it’s Elle’s birthday today.” He stared out the window at the neat and tidy bungalow. “Maybe they went for dinner.”
“Then we’ll wait.” Her soft voice was implacable. “I warned you this wouldn’t be easy. But you can’t let Elle go without an honest attempt to fix things. And I won’t let Linda stop you.”
Her fierce support eased the cramped, fist-tight muscle that used to be his heart. “Thanks. I’d want you on my side in a bar fight.”
