Only In His Sweetest Dreams(31)

“April?” Mercedes brought her head up as her heart plummeted in shock.

“The baby. Ester.” His shoulder shrugged, the one indelibly printed with a strong, fierce warrior—Zack, she instinctively recognized—and the smaller, curled up angel. His daughter, she now realized.

“Oh, L.C.” She stood and moved to touch his arm, but he immediately side-stepped away, his profile like granite. “I’m so sorry,” she murmured.

“Me too.” He pulled a fresh strip of tape. Bit it off. “But honestly, I don’t know that April and I had much besides a baby between us. We didn’t mean to get pregnant, but we were both willing to give it a go. She left after. Went to her sister’s and didn’t come back. I did my best to disappear into a bottle of Jack Daniels.”

Who wouldn’t, she thought, watching him smooth tape into place. She’d gone on a self-medicating bender when she’d had her surgery, angry with her body for making her choose between fertility and slowly bleeding to death. To lose a baby, though...

The automatic doors opened and Harrison came in. His sharp old gaze took in the two of them standing close then moving apart, pretending to go back to work. A knowing amusement hovered around his mouth, but he only said, “I like what you’ve done with the place, L.C.”

“This is nothing. You should see the garden plots.”

“I’ve caught a whiff,” Harrison drawled, referencing the manure that Zack had shoveled into the repaired beds. “Mercy-girl, can you check if my heart meds are on this week’s order? I’ve run out.”

“Of course. I can pick them up if not, when I get the kids from school.” She sat and tapped into the computer to look it up.

Behind her, Harrison asked L.C. how things were coming along at the duplexes. Her place needed some finishing work with baseboards and the backsplash in the kitchen. He still hadn’t installed his dishwasher and had some work in the en suite bathroom.

“Zack has another fifteen hours of service. That should take us to exam week and end of school. We’ll move on and you can put that unit up for sale. ‘Course, it’ll be a tough sell, given the neighbors.”

“Lemme guess,” she interjected, swinging around in her chair again. “The kids are fine, but the broad who lives there is a nag?”

“At least she’s not hard to look at.” L.C. winked, his half-grin teasing and affectionate.

She smiled weakly and turned back to the computer, heart heavy. That was only a couple of weeks away. He would leave and she would have no one to flirt with or fantasize about.

Glum, she told herself at least she had her job and the kids.

“I don’t see your name on here, Harrison. I’ll call now and pick them up this afternoon.”

“It can wait ‘til Friday,” he dismissed.

“No, it can’t.” Honestly. Men. She picked up the phone and called in the refill.



Edith followed Mercedes’s flustered stride to the meeting room. It was empty of board members, but occupied by the ladies from the cantina as they set up the tea service on the side table.

Edith checked her brooch watch. Either it was gaining time or this was a day of chronic lateness. The cantina ladies should be finished and the rest of the board should be here by now. And what was she to do about Mr. Hilroy’s failure to turn up?

“Oh, good morning, Mrs. Garvey,” Mercedes said, noticing her as she went around the table, setting out her agenda with little slaps of pages to the tabletop. “I’m glad everyone’s running late, because so am I. You know what I can’t understand? Why doesn’t the school simply tell you up front that you have to pay so many dollars per month, rather than nickel and dime you through the week for hot dogs and field trips and fundraisers? I had to raid the kids’ language jar and you should have heard the blue streak when Dayton caught me.”

“Not Dayton,” Edith protested. The boy was good as gold with her. She certainly never heard curses out of him.

“Yes, Dayton. Hi, Mrs. Yamamoto.” Mercedes smiled as the tiny woman hustled in. “How are you today?”

“I am forgetful,” Mrs. Yamamoto said. “But perhaps Mrs. Edith is, too? Mr. Hilroy is waiting for you.”

“He was supposed to be here an hour ago.” Now they would start the meeting without her. Why on earth couldn’t this Hilroy person have arrived on time?

“Not to worry,” Mercedes assured her, setting chairs before each place at the table. “Harrison and Mr. Dol— Hi, Mr. Dolinski. Isn’t Harrison with you?”

“I thought we were walking up together, but when he didn’t come by, I thought I’d misunderstood and he was ahead of me.” Peter Dolinski smoothed his hair.

“There you go,” Mercedes said, turning back to Edith. “Harrison is running behind as well. Do you want me to escort Mr. Hilroy to his apartment while you wait with everyone here?”

“No, no,” Edith said. “I said I would do it and I will. I have to show him the way to adjust the blinds to avoid the late afternoon sun, otherwise he’ll be cooked alive. It will only take fifteen minutes. You’ll wait?”

“Of course. Thanks, Mrs. Garvey.”

She and Mercedes were enjoying a slightly warmer relationship these days, having cleared the air and found a common interest in Dayton’s education. Therefore, Edith didn’t bother correcting the young woman’s dreadfully lazy ‘thanks’ and simply trusted Mercedes would, indeed, wait to start.

Making her way back to Mercedes’s desk, she found a white haired man waiting for her. He wore a shirt in splashes of pink and turquoise, baggy white shorts, and white socks in sandals. He towered over her as she shook his hand in greeting.

Thomas had been one of the few men she had ever met who stood short enough to look her directly in the eye. She privately wished all men were that height. These tall sorts intimidated her.

“You’re laughing at my get-up, aren’t you?” Mr. Hilroy said as she led him through the doors to the courtyard.

“Not at all. That would be rude,” Edith said. And she was working on not making snap judgments of people. “However, you may think me rude for rushing you. I understood you were arriving at nine so we booked our meeting for ten.”

“My house collapsed,” he blurted.

The news was so shocking, Edith halted, instantly forgiving him for both the interruption and his lateness. “That’s terrible. How on earth did that happen?”

“Sinkhole. I almost went in with it. I don’t know how I woke up and got out, but I did,” Mr. Hilroy said. “Here, let me get that for you.” He stepped forward to open the door of the apartment building, waving her to continue leading him. “It’s the most peculiar thing, too. My wife and I bought the house when we married. I’ve been in it alone since Patty died, fifteen years ago. The kids have been after me to cash it in and find something smaller, but I didn’t want to give it up. Felt too much like giving her up, you understand? I was still thinking of backing out a few nights ago. I asked Patty—”

“You speak to your deceased spouse?” Edith asked as they stepped into the elevator. “That was my door on the left, by the way. I should have pointed that out. Number one-o-one.”

Mr. Hilroy nodded once in acknowledgment, then smoothed the front of his flamboyant shirt. “You think I’m crazy for talking to her, don’t you?”

“Not at all, sir. I hear my husband’s voice all the time, despite his being gone two decades.” She had never told anyone that and perhaps shouldn’t have revealed it now. Mr. Hilroy seemed a chatty man. No doubt Harrison would turn her foible into a raging joke when he heard.

“It’s an enormous comfort, isn’t it?” Mr. Hilroy held the edge of the elevator while she exited, then followed her down the hall. “In any case, I asked Patty if I was doing the right thing, or if I should stay with her. Next thing I know, I wake up to a rumble and think it’s an earthquake. I ran outside and—poof!”

Edith paused outside her old door, key at the ready.

“You think I’m crazy for thinking she did it, don’t you?” Mr. Hilroy said.

“I’m trying very hard not to think anything of people that isn’t deserved, sir, but I have to admit that’s a remarkable story.” Edith opened the door for him, but stayed in the hallway. So did Mr. Hilroy.

“See, everyone kept telling me she would want me to move on, but I just couldn’t find the courage. I’d barely started packing because giving up all her things... It was too hard. But she took care of that, didn’t she?”

Now she looked at Mr. Hilroy more closely, she saw his weariness and latent shock. “So you were alone? No one was hurt?”

“No, my neighbors have been turned out of their houses while everything is assessed, but all I had was my pajamas. The victim services people brought me this get-up. It’s not my sort of style at all, but it makes for a fresh start, doesn’t it?”

“So you have nothing, sir? No furniture? No...” She trailed off, unable to comprehend such a tragedy. “No family?”

“My daughter lives in California. She said she would fly out in the next few days to help me furnish this place and get back on my feet. Honestly, I’ve been in shock, not in any mood to shop. I thought I would sleep here until I can think straight.”