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“Could it have been Langston?” Brenna suggested.
“Could have been.” Diana lifted her spaghetti to her mouth. Her eyes widened as she chewed. “Wait a minute.” She swallowed, took a drink of water. “Langston? Isn’t that the name of your new student, the one who came to your house?”
“Exactly. This family, the mysterious mechanic and his daughter, must be related to old Mrs. Langston somehow.”
“And they’re living in her place.”
“Away from town, out of sight,” Brenna said.
“Do you still suspect the worst about the father?” Diana asked.
“No, not the worst. He’s not hurting his daughter, at least in the way I thought when he picked her up at my house on Friday. But something is going on. That girl is unhappy. She’s lonely. She needs...” Brenna couldn’t say the words. They were still alien to her vocabulary.
Diana grinned. “You, Brenna? The girl needs you?”
Brenna sighed. “Yeah, she needs me.”
“Well, holy cow. Look who’s suddenly getting involved. I thought your volunteering to chair the renovation of the Cultural Arts Center for teens was the only extracurricular activity we’d get out of you this year.”
Brenna smirked. “Yes, and it’s a monumental activity, you must admit. I have you to thank for matching me up with that little job.”
What Diana said was true. Maybe Brenna had seen too much of herself in Carrie Langston. Maybe she’d seen just enough of the girl’s reticent, brooding father. Maybe she was ready to move on from her past. Whatever the reason, she was becoming emotionally involved with a student again.
“I’m thinking I need to go to the farm stand on White Deer Trail,” Brenna said.
“I don’t suppose your longing for fresh, local vegetables has anything to do with the fact that the old mill is on White Deer?”
Brenna pretended surprise. “It is? What a coincidence.”
Diana smiled. “You should know, Bren, it’s a little hard to do a drive-by of Mrs. Langston’s cabin. As I recall, once you drive in, the only way out is to turn around and leave the same way.”
Brenna smiled. “I’ll figure something out. I just have to go. I’m developing quite an interest in one of Mount Union’s pioneer cabins.”
CHAPTER FOUR
ON THURSDAY AFTERNOON, seven days after Brenna first met Mike Langston, she called the garage and asked to speak to him. One of the other mechanics told her to hold on, and he shouted Mike’s name. At that point Brenna said, “Oh, I’m sorry. Someone’s at the door. I’ll call back.” She had gotten the info she needed. Mike wasn’t at his cabin.
She checked her watch. School had been dismissed an hour ago. The buses had all left within ten minutes. Carrie would be home, but if Brenna were careful, she wouldn’t run into her. And now she knew Mike was at work, so there was no chance of running into him. She’d see old Mrs. Langston’s cabin and draw her own conclusions about its livability.
She drove into the country, past the Montgomerys’ house, the farm stand and the old mill, one of Mount Union’s most historic buildings and a favorite field trip for elementary students.
Slowing her car just after the mill, she noticed a narrow drive winding into a stand of live oak and magnolia trees. The rutted path was overgrown. Brenna debated the wisdom of navigating it in her Mazda but decided her trusty little car could make it.
She progressed slowly, holding her breath at each bump in the drive. She’d gone about three hundred yards when she saw the roof of a house and a brick chimney covered with ivy and moss. There being no place to pull over, she stopped in the middle of the path and got out of her car. She hadn’t gone too far into the trees that she couldn’t back out safely and return to White Deer Trail.
Since she’d known she was going to make this trek after work today, Brenna had chosen to wear black jeans, a black-and-white sleeveless knit shirt and sensible sneakers. Her hair was caught up on her head with a tortoiseshell comb. She trudged ahead, keeping watch for tree roots that could trip her.
Hiding behind low branches, she approached the cabin. Getting her first look at Mrs. Langston’s “pioneer homestead,” Brenna was pleasantly surprised that the first settlers of Mount Union lived so well. The simple log structure was far from luxurious, but it appeared sturdy. The logs showed signs of wear, some splitting in places that glistened with some sort of patching material. At least someone had maintained the place. The porch had a substantial roof that extended across the front of the house. Two rocking chairs and an assortment of folksy implements sat on the wooden floor.
Brenna crouched down so she couldn’t be seen from either of two windows on each side of the centered front door. A patch of gravel served as a parking area. The cabin’s solid front door was open and a steady hum came through the screen door, indicating an air conditioner was working hard to keep up with the heat coming inside. She smiled, thinking the thoughtless gesture typical of a teenager who didn’t have to pay the bills.
Carrie suddenly appeared in front of one window. Cords hung from her ears as she waved her arms over her head and danced to a tune only she could hear. The girl didn’t appear nearly as miserable as she’d sounded the other night, and Brenna imagined Justin Bieber or Katy Perry blasting from those earbuds.
A slight stinging sensation on her arm drew Brenna’s attention from the cabin. A mosquito the size of a Chihuahua hovered near her shoulder, and Brenna swatted it away. It returned with two or three of its buddies, who flew away with an ample supply of Brenna snack.
“Enough of this,” she said. “I’ve stalked this child sufficiently to know she’s not living in squalor.”
Waving her hand in front of her face, Brenna returned to her car, got in and closed the door after swatting furiously to make sure none of the winged invaders had made it inside. She started her engine, slid the gearshift into Reverse and stepped on the accelerator.
And stopped with a jolt and a resounding thud.
She cringed. Had she hit a rock? A tree? An animal?
No. Unfortunately, she’d crunched into a blue pickup truck she’d seen most recently in front of her house.
Oh, no. Brenna thrust the shift into Park and slid down in her seat. She closed her eyes briefly. The primary rule of backing up an automobile punched into her brain with the force of her driver’s ed teacher’s gravelly voice. “Always look over your shoulder to make sure...”
She was still struggling to calm her pounding heart when a knock on her driver’s-side window made her jerk upright. She stared into Mike Langston’s aviator sunglasses before her gaze slid down to the thin line his lips made.
She mouthed the word Hello through the glass.
He made a twirling motion with his hand, and she rolled her window down a couple of inches. He continued to twirl.
She shook her head. “Mosquitoes,” she said, pointing to her arm, where itchy pink welts had formed in the past few minutes.
“That’s a shame,” he responded. He lifted his glasses long enough to stare into her eyes before performing a cursory check of the items on her car seats. What did he expect to find? A half-empty bottle of wine? There was nothing incriminating there. Her phone, her purse, a Diet Coke.
The glasses dropped back to his nose. “You just ran into me,” he said needlessly.
Common sense should have made her hold her tongue. But apparently common sense had just flown out that two inches of window space. “You’re not even supposed to be here,” she said. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
He frowned. “That’s funny. Since I live here, I thought I had every right to be here.”
“What I meant was...” There was no way out of this. “I’m not supposed to be here.”
He nodded once. “That makes more sense. But seeing as you obviously are here, you might want to pull up a little. Right now my front bumper is close to riding the trunk of your dandy little foreign automobile. I’m thinking that’s not good—especially since you seem to have so much trouble with this car anyway.”
Well, that comment wasn’t at all necessary.
“I expect we ought to exchange insurance cards,” he added. “Though I doubt you need mine.”
She definitely wasn’t going to roll her window down more and invite blood suckers inside. She’d be a mass of swollen spots within minutes. “Can’t you reverse?” she suggested. “We can both back onto White Deer from here and discuss the situation away from these insect-infested woods.”
“I’m not going to let you back your vehicle up anywhere in the vicinity of mine,” he said. “Go forward to the house.”
To his house? She didn’t think so. She rubbed her hand over a bite, hoping to illicit his sympathy.
“I have a bug zapper on the porch,” he said. “You’ll be fine.” He leaned on the side of her car. Only a thin layer of glass separated her from those honey-brown eyes she could imagine staring at her through the dark shades.
His nose practically touched the window when he said, “And since your whole purpose for being on this drive had to be to snoop on my property, this invitation should make you very happy.”
She sensed his mind still churning, as if he weren’t finished proving to her he’d figured out her scheme. She wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d said, “And you’ll never be invited back so you’d better take advantage of this offer right now.”
For some reason, she decided if he did say that, she’d feel the loss, much more than she would have expected. Maybe it was the way he looked in those aviator sunglasses. He had a movie-star quality that she quite inappropriately noticed at this particular moment. Sort of a Gerard Butler cocky masculinity. She had a long way to go before forming a lasting impression of Mike Langston, but she really liked Gerard Butler.
Besides, what choice did she have? If he wouldn’t move his car, she couldn’t go anywhere. The only direction open to her was forward. She could pull in front of the house, wait until he pulled in as well and then maneuver quickly around and head down the drive. If Carrie was still wearing the earbuds, she might not even look out the window. And perhaps Mike wouldn’t tell his daughter about the spy mission.
Brenna spoke out the two inches open at the top of her window. “Fine. But don’t think for a minute that I’m interpreting this as a social invitation.”
He almost smiled. “I know you’re smarter than that. Actually, this is more an intimidation tactic. I’m much better in that arena than I am the social one.”
I’ll bet you are. She eased her car into Drive and gently pressed the accelerator. The Mazda made a mournful screech and cleared a foot or so between it and the truck. Brenna didn’t want to look at her trunk lid. She’d check it out when she was back in her own drive and could cry in private.
A moment later she pulled in front of Mike’s cabin. She waited for him to park and then shifted into Reverse. Her ploy to execute a quick escape was working. Until the front door opened and Carrie stepped out.
“Miss Sullivan, hi!”
Darn it. She stopped, rolled her window down all the way and looked for mosquitoes. The zapper appeared to be doing its job, so she stepped out of the car. Leaving now would look much more suspicious than following through with a good ol’ North Georgia howdy. “Hi, Carrie.”
“What are you doing here?”
She glanced at Mike, who had an elbow on the top of his truck and was watching her through those sunglasses. His full mouth quirked up in a smirk that made the teacher in her want to threaten him with a visit to the assistant principal. And made the woman in her want to—
Stop it, Brenna. Not helpful.
She had to answer Carrie, not let her thoughts careen in another inappropriate direction. “Well, I...I was...”
“Miss Sullivan got lost, Carrie,” Mike said. “I encountered her trying to back out of our driveway and suggested she come up to the house and turn around.”
Carrie gave Brenna an incredulous stare. “But you’ve lived in this stupid town for, like, forever. How could you get lost?”
Brenna shot a quick look at Mike. “I’ve only lived here four years,” she said. “And I...ah, I’ve never ventured beyond the gristmill.”
Mike threw his keys on a rough-hewn table next to the front door. “You must have been daydreaming today, then,” he said. “There aren’t any houses but this one past the mill.”
“We live in the booniest of the boondocks,” Carrie said. “No one ever comes out this far.”
“Why don’t you offer Miss Sullivan some iced tea?” Mike said.
“I r-really shouldn’t stay....” Brenna stammered.
Carrie clasped her hands together. “Oh, please. Other than repair guys, you’re our first visitor. Can’t you come inside and talk for a while?” As an added incentive, she said, “We have air-conditioning.” She swept her arm around the porch, indicating the objects her great-grandmother had probably left behind. “You wouldn’t think so because of all this old stuff, but I swear we do.”
Brenna recognized an old wooden butter churn, handmade baskets, a few primitive iron tools on the wall. “These things are interesting,” she said.
“If you like all these old things, you’ll love the inside.” A hopeful look on her face, Carrie held the door open.
“But your father...” Brenna said. “I’m sure he doesn’t want company after working all day.”
“I suggested the tea, didn’t I?” Mike said. “Besides, after you have a look around, this place will have left a permanent impression on you.” He lowered his voice. “And that should be well worth the trouble of the minor car damage you’re taking home as a souvenir.”
With no way to decline, Brenna preceded him inside and into one large room with a door and a hallway leading from it.
The inside of the cabin was basically Spartan, with a few well-used furnishings that Brenna decided must have been favorites of Mrs. Langston. An antique oak sideboard stood against one wall. A matching washstand and primitive chair occupied another. Facing a rugged stone fireplace was an early-twentieth-century sofa with wood arms and cushions that had been flattened by years of sitting. Only a floppy-eared coonhound lying on the braided rug in front of the hearth would have made the scene a perfect blend of countrified necessity and simplicity. But there was no dog, just the three of them.
Carrie called from the kitchen. “Dad, why are you home? Isn’t it early?”
He glanced at Brenna before answering. “I came to check on things here. I got a call from an unidentified female at the shop, and when I went to answer, no one was there.”
His glance mutated into a hard stare. Feeling her face flush, Brenna began concentrating on native animal prints on the walls.
“It wasn’t me,” Carrie said.
“I didn’t know that,” he answered. “I called here, but no one answered. I was worried.”
Brenna remembered the earbud cords dangling from Carrie’s head. No wonder she didn’t hear the phone ring.
“Sheesh, Dad, you don’t have to check up on me every minute,” Carrie said from the kitchen.
“I’ll try to remember that,” he said, settling on the plaid sofa. “How’s that tea coming?”
Carrie came into the living room with a tray holding three glasses. She set the tray on a scarred but clean pine coffee table and handed a tumbler to Brenna. Brenna sat on the other end of the sofa and smiled at the faded images of deer frolicking around the frosty outside of the glass.
“It’s instant,” Carrie said, looking down at Brenna. “Dad said I should learn to make it from real tea bags, but I don’t see why.”
Mike picked up a glass and took a sip. “I just thought you might like to do things the way your great-grandmother did.”
Carrie gave him an incredulous look. “Why would I want to do that? Everything was such work back then.”
He crossed and uncrossed his legs, cleared his throat, took another sip of tea and finally stood. “I’m going to change out of this uniform.”
“Good idea, Dad,” Carrie said. “You have grease on your shirt.”
“Goes with the job,” he said and headed toward the hallway off the living room. “I’ll just be in there. You ladies talk all you want.”
A few seconds later, Brenna heard a door close. Carrie sat in the spot vacated by her father and leaned close. “Do you see how awful it is out here, Miss Sullivan?” she said, keeping her voice low.
Brenna didn’t want to put herself in the middle of any family dispute. Besides, she truly didn’t find Carrie’s living conditions to be “awful.” Remote, yes, especially for a teen who was still more than a year away from getting her driver’s license.
“I know it’s hard to believe,” Carrie said, “but my father really likes it out here. He keeps talking about nature and fresh air until I just want to scream. Spiders and mice are nature, too, you know.”
Brenna smiled. “Your cabin is really only about three or four miles out of town,” she said. “I’ll bet some of the people in town have spiders, too.”
“I suppose, but we might as well be a hundred miles away for all the times I get to go to the stores and do fun stuff.”
“Your dad never takes you shopping?”
“Oh, sure, to the grocery and the hardware store.” She grimaced. “I guess that’s his idea of fun. And any time I complain he just tells me that we have all we need.”
