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Chapter Four
“How was school today?” Jenna asked her daughter as they walked through the school parking lot.
“Okay. We had a substitute, so we didn’t have to pay attention…or behave.”
“Jane!”
In eight and a half short years, Jenna had grown to know why people slapped their foreheads with the palms of their hands. Her child was, she liked to think, bright and spirited, but sometimes a handful.
Cheryl Baldwin pattered over. “Jenna!” Her voice was a squeaky chime accompanied by the clip clop of high heels. “Are you taking Jane to gymnastics practice?”
“Yep. Can I drop Tiffany off for you?”
“If you would.”
Tiffany Baldwin, a reed of a girl, barely nine, but with streaked hair and waxed eyebrows, simpered. It was the spoiled child’s rendering of “thank you.” She and Janie trotted off to the car.
“Where are my manners?” Cheryl introduced Jenna to a woman standing nearby. She was heavyset and wore oversized sunglasses. “Jenna Black, this is Anne Mills…Anne, Jenna.”
The woman nodded a curt hello as vehicles cruised a slow journey through the parking lot. Teachers, with totes hanging from their shoulders, escaped to their own cars; and school maintenance men in lime-colored vests directed traffic.
“Anne used to live here in Cromline, but her husband got transferred. Luckily for us, they’re back. I could always use another volunteer for the park’s committee.” Cheryl tipped her head toward Jenna. “I expect to seeyouat the next meeting also.”
Jenna glanced at her watch. “Gotta run. I’ve got to get the kids over to the gym. Nice meeting you, Anne.”
With an expression caught somewhere between curiosity and scrutiny, Anne Mills studied Jenna. “I’ll see you again. I hear your store is the hot spot for all the girls in town.”
“Oh.” Cheryl began to fidget, and her bracelets jangled their usual melody. “I don’t know if the store is right for Riley.”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” Anne turned her head toward her daughter who was sitting, still and quiet, in the front seat of a van. Folding her arms across her weighty bosom, Anne planted her feet an aggressive distance apart. Jenna half expected her to tell Cheryl to “drop and give me twenty.”
“Make no mistake. Riley likes the same things other girls her age enjoy.” Head held high, Anne strode away and climbed into a vehicle the size of a small condo.
“Well…that was uncalled for,” Cheryl said.
“Mmm.” Jenna replied with a cool grin. “You should probably watch what you say.”
She boarded her car and pulled away, curious about the exchange between the two women. Few of Cromline’s ladies dared to risk being on the bad side of Cheryl Baldwin, but Anne Mills didn’t seem to care. Cheryl had obviously said something politely offensive, and Anne politely told her where to go. Her tone matched Cheryl’s, imperious syllable for imperious syllable.Good for her.Maybe there was finally another woman in town, beside Jenna herself, not pining for the chance to attend Cheryl’s exhausting luncheons. The importance the town’s women attached to being part of Cromline’s lofty circle reminded Jenna of high school.
High school. A shiver scuttled along her arms.
Anne Mills’ voice and mannerisms sparked a distant memory that sped forward like a time-lapse photograph.Shit.The little barrel-shaped woman was Annabelle Walker from Pinehill. The bitchy leader of The Snotty Six, and the meanest girl in Jenna’s class.
****
Sleep eluded Jenna that night. The nastiest girl to ever strut the streets of her hometown was living in Cromline.Why here? Why now?
Tabloid television shows continued to flash Jenna’s picture on the screen, resurrecting the story of the fallen starlet Angel. The presence of Annabelle Walker almost guaranteed any privacy Jenna enjoyed in Cromline would be nothing but a memory.
Had Annabelle followed Angel’s career?Will she give up my secrets? Of course she would. Jenna knew how Annabelle operated. She would toy with Jenna; offer her a seat at the cool table and then “accidentally” spill chocolate milk on her white pants.
At barely first light, Jenna got up and showered. The thought of being exposed made her almost choke on the billowing clouds of steam. The thought of what being exposed would do to her daughter made Jenna gag in earnest.
Bundling up Janie and running away was no longer the option it had been when she was a baby. Jenna had run out of excuses for another sudden move. She had run out of money to finance a whole new life.
Jenna Welles Laine Black had run out of options.
Chapter Five
