A Road Through Mountains (Love's Encore Book 1) Read online

  This time Cecily rolled her eyes. What kind of an idiot did this woman think she was? Rorie arched one eyebrow. Finally, her words connected in Cecily's brain.

  Cecily groaned. “There's no such thing as a wood welder, is there?”

  “Now you’re catching on. So, would you care to revise your statement, Cecily DuPont of Baton Rouge? What exactly did you do?”

  “I really don't know, I swear. We were told to get out our safety goggles and I didn't have any, and that's when I got sent back here.”

  “Well, that might do it. Especially if it was Professor Jackson. He's pretty big on safety. And on coming to class prepared.”

  Cecily slumped her shoulders in defeat. “Great. And now he hates me and I'm going to fail.”

  “I doubt that, drama queen. But wait, you're not one of the new freshman production majors are you?”

  Cecily shook her head.

  “No, you didn't look quite clueless enough to be a freshman. Almost, mind you—” Rorie broke off with a grin.

  “I'm a senior, thank you very much.” Cecily said with a glare. “So, what, are you an instructor or a grad student or something? Or just a know-it-all?”

  “I'm a senior, too. But this is my … third senior year, I think? I'm part time right now. Tuition issues.”

  Cecily gave her a puzzled look. Their college was frequently referred to as the Ivy League of the South and attracted the richest families in the region. Part-timers were a rarity.

  “I have a work study job in the scene shop and help with some of the intro classes for extra cash.” Rorie explained. “It means I can’t always manage a full load of classes, too. But if you're not a production major, why don't you just drop the class? It's not like you need it to graduate, right?”

  “Well, no. See, I'm technically pre-law. My mother insisted on that. If I changed my major, I’d probably have some ‘tuition issues’ of my own.” She used her fingers to trace quotes in the air and Rorie laughed. “But I've taken a few acting classes for fun and I just found out I can get a minor in theater, but only if I take a production class. So here I am.”

  “Christ,” Rorie muttered, “a lawyer and an actress, Cici? God help us.” She studied her silently for a moment with a stare that, despite its ice blue color, was filled with unexpected warmth. “You sure do talk a lot, though. I guess you can use that in either profession.”

  “Hey!” Cecily bristled at the teasing, but the way this stranger had used that nickname,'Cici,' sparked a warm glow through her insides. No one had called her that before. Her family didn't go in much for nicknames, or any other needless informality. Her father used to call her 'Pumpkin' now and then, but it made her mother scowl whenever he did, so he'd mostly stopped.

  “Sorry,” Rorie replied. “But, you know there's an easy fix for all this. You can just transfer to the costume shop for the rest of the semester. It fulfills the same requirement, and that's pretty much what all the other actresses do.”

  “Yeah. That's not gonna work,” Cecily said, feeling the heat of embarrassment burn her cheeks.

  “I'm a little afraid to ask why.”

  “That's where I was last week, which is why I missed the first scene shop class. Which is why I didn't even know I needed stupid safety goggles.” Cecily paused to take a breath. “Last week when I was in the costume shop, they gave me a skirt to hem. You know, one of those big, Victorian-type things?”

  Rorie nodded. “Uh huh.”

  “So I started hemming it,” she continued, “which took the whole class period, and I guess was really slow compared to everyone else, but it's not like I knew what I was doing, right? Only when I got up to leave, I had sewn myself to it.”

  “You'd done what, now?” Rorie asked, choking back a laugh. “Really?”

  “Yes, really,” she replied peevishly. “Pretty much the whole damn thing, sewn right to my skirt. I don't know how it happened, so don't ask. But the shop manager had to cut it off of me, and there was a lot of swearing, and then she handed me a transfer slip and sent me here.”

  Cecily caught the look of incredulity on Rorie's face. The whole situation really was ridiculous, and she knew it. She let out a nervous giggle, which made Rorie laugh in response, and soon they were both doubled over, laughing so hard that tears welled up in their eyes.

  When she was finally able to stand completely upright again, Rorie dabbed under her eyes with the loose edge of her scarf, smudging just a bit of the kohl under her lashes. Cecily's hand twitched with a compulsion to reach out and wipe away the smudge, but she refrained. She wasn't certain why it would even occur to her to behave so intimately with a woman she'd only just met.

  Cecily knew she’d been staring at the smudge for a very long time. She attempted to look away nonchalantly but her gaze only made it as far as Rorie's long jet lashes before tumbling into the sparkling pools they framed. She felt herself frozen in depths of ice blue that gazed back at her, equally transfixed. Lovely eyes.

  All at once it was as if both women became aware that they’d been staring. The power of motion miraculously restored, each glanced hastily away. Cecily felt off balance. She squeezed her eyes shut but could still see those azure blue pools, as if they'd been burned onto her retinas.

  “You must think I'm an idiot,” Cecily mumbled, feeling bashful and insecure.

  “Actually, I think you're kind of adorable, oddly enough,” Rorie said, a tremor in her rich voice. “Something tells me we're in for an interesting semester with you here, Cici.”

  They exited the shop in silence, pausing to shut off the remaining lights and lock the door. As she turned to leave, Rorie reached out impulsively and took Cecily's hand, pressing something firmly against her palm. A pair of safety goggles, the plastic still warm from where they had rested in her back pocket. “Take these, so you don't get in trouble again.” She smiled as she turned to go. “We wouldn't want anything happening to those lovely eyes of yours!” she called back over her shoulder as she walked away.

  Lovely eyes. She had been thinking those very words just seconds before. Cecily grasped the goggles tightly as an electric jolt of adrenaline shot through her and sent her heart racing. She watched Rorie's retreating figure disappear into the shadows. In that moment it felt to her as if this total stranger had been able to see clear through her skull and pluck the words right out of her brain. The thought was both thrilling and unsettling, and she couldn’t wait to see her in the shop again.

  * * *

  Cecily might have been standing in the Oakwood scene shop for a second, or a minute, or possibly a year. She had no idea. Only this time her confusion wasn't from lack of attention, or 'mommy brain', or any of the usual suspects. No, the cause was simple. It was Rorie Mulloy. Standing just a few feet away from her after almost twenty years.

  Cecily tugged self-consciously at her baggy sweater, suddenly aware of the few extra pounds it was meant to camouflage. It's not that she’d let herself go, but the years had brought a softness to her body that hadn’t been there in college. Another casualty of motherhood. But the years had certainly been kind to the woman in front of her. More than kind, really. Frankly, the past two decades deserved to be nominated for sainthood for what they’d done for Rorie Mulloy.

  The woman before her was every inch polished and successful. The brashness of youth had morphed into smoothly commanding confidence. Gone were the messy curls, replaced by sophisticated micro-braids, held up not by chopsticks and cheap scarves but an art deco hair comb that appeared to be vintage and expensive. It gave her just a hint of Hollywood glamor. The rumpled thrift store finds she'd once worn had been replaced by high quality tailoring, though still in her trademark shades of black and gray.

  Cecily found the overall effect intimidating, infuriating. Intoxicating.

  “...but of course I really should introduce you.” Susan was still talking, unaware of the colossal sea change that had just occurred. “Rorie Mulloy, this is Cecily Parker, one of our patrons and a new volunteer th
is season.”

  “Mrs. Parker.”

  Rorie’s words were succinct, polite, betraying not the slightest trace of recognition. Did Rorie not know who she was? Could she have forgotten her? Or did she remember all too well, and this cold-shoulder treatment was just the start of more punishment to come? Cecily’s stomach clenched at the thought. Given what she’d done, punishment wouldn't be undeserved. A shrill ringtone from a cell phone echoed through the shop and Susan turned to answer while Cecily remained rooted in place, barely blinking, hardly breathing.

  “I'm so sorry, but I'm afraid there's a situation in the front office that needs my attention. Rorie, if you wouldn't mind showing Mrs. Parker out?”

  Without waiting for an answer, Susan departed, her stiletto heels clicking rapidly down the hall. Rorie rolled up the paper she’d been holding and handed it to the man beside her. Cecily had forgotten he was there, and if they’d been introduced, she’d missed it entirely.

  “Mrs. Parker?” Rorie prompted, gesturing toward the door.

  They walked silently across the shop to the exit. Rorie held the door and Cecily stepped through as quickly as she could, intently focused on avoiding all eye contact. She'd taken several steps away from the building before she noticed the drops of cold September rain. She paused to fumble inside her bag for an umbrella with hands that defied her with their trembling. The bag tipped, its contents jettisoned across the wet ground. Rorie stood in the open doorway, watching expressionless as Cecily scurried to rescue her possessions from the puddled pavement. Stuffing the last items unceremoniously back in her purse, she shielded her forehead with one hand, determined to dash the several remaining yards to her car, with or without the umbrella. She might barely make it before she melted into the pavement with embarrassment.

  “Cici, wait.” The familiar voice was hardly more than a low, throaty whisper but Cecily's head snapped to look behind her as though it had been a shout. That answered one question. She clearly hadn't forgotten. Rorie extended her left arm from the doorway, as if to shake hands with her. Cecily walked back to the door and offered her own hand cautiously in return, but instead of warm flesh, her fingertips brushed against something hard and cool. She glanced down to see a pair of sunglasses, the final escapee from her overturned bag.

  With a sense of shock, Cecily noticed the chunky silver watch on Rorie's wrist. She knew it well. She'd left it on the pillow for Rorie as a Christmas gift before she left, but never returned to see her wear it. If she'd lived another hundred years, she never would have expected to see that watch again.

  Their eyes locked and it was as if eighteen years had melted away.

  Can it really have been so long?

  Rorie's lips twitched almost imperceptibly at the corners, just a ghost of a smile. “So long, Cici,” she said before retreating behind the door as it swung shut with a thud.

  Cecily ran through the rain to her car, never more grateful for its fancy keyless entry feature. Her hands shook so badly that there was no hope of steadying them enough to find a set of keys in her black hole of a purse. She sank into the driver's seat and tried to remember a deep breathing exercise from yoga class, but her mind just wouldn't clear. It was only after playing the encounter over on an endless loop that the significance of Rorie's parting words sunk in. So long. Cecily had been thinking those exact words just seconds before. After all these years, how was it that this woman could still pluck the very thoughts from her mind? The prospect of seeing her again filled Cecily with a potent blend of excitement and dread.

  3

  Steaming water stung her bare hands as Cecily reached into the kitchen sink with the pad of steel wool. She'd forgotten to put on gloves and her manicured fingers were paying for that oversight, showing blotchy and scarlett between the floating islands of suds. Ruining her nails didn't particularly bother her, but the initial sting was becoming a burning ache and she pulled her dripping hands out and blotted them on a nearby towel. The pan could sit and soak. It's what she'd meant to do with it in the first place, but her thoughts had been elsewhere until the scalding dishwater brought her back to the present.

  Seeing Rorie this afternoon had thrown her, that's for certain. She still felt shaky. It was the last thing she'd expected. The Oakwood Theater was a small regional theater, and though Cecily knew that the new managing director had big plans for it, the place was barely a step above a community theater in terms of prestige. Rorie had always dreamed bigger than that, and certainly had the appearance of someone who'd achieved those dreams. Cecily struggled to imagine what convoluted path to fame and fortune could possibly lead her through suburban Connecticut.

  The sound of footsteps from behind made Cecily stiffen. That would be Chet, home late and looking for dinner. She realized she was staring out the kitchen window into the darkness, still holding the dish towel in her hands. She shoved it aside and turned to face her husband, who stood in front of the open refrigerator door.

  “There's leftover roast on a plate. Tyler and I have both eaten.”

  “Hmm. Ah, yes. I see it.”

  He took the plate and walked to the microwave without looking up, or greeting his wife, nor did Cecily bother to say hello or inquire about his day. It wasn't how they did things in the Parker household.

  “Tyler's home, you said?” There was warmth in his voice when he mentioned their son's name. They agreed on little else, but Tyler was the one priority they shared. Though even in that, they didn't see eye to eye on many of the finer points.

  Cecily nodded. “Downstairs. Working on editing his film.”

  Chet snorted. “Still? Shouldn't he be studying for exams?”

  “School only just started, Chet. I doubt he has exams yet.”

  “Maybe not, but he still spends too much time on that movie stuff. I never should've let you indulge him like you do.”

  Cecily pressed her lips into a thin line at that remark. He manages everything else. Why does he think he gets to manage my parenting, too? It was an old argument, and not one she would win, so she stayed silent. “Anyway, he only went down there because you weren't home. He thought you'd be back for dinner to spend some time with him, since you're leaving so early in the morning for your trip. He came all the way back from school tonight especially to see you before you left, you know.”

  Guilt trip. The weapon of choice for the passive aggressive wife.

  Chet sighed, declining to take the bait. “Don't start, okay? I had to work late. I wouldn't have left without saying goodbye to him and you know it.”

  Cecily nodded. Working late was probably a euphemism for stopping by the apartment of whatever paralegal he was currently sleeping with and then missing the train. However, unlike their disagreements over parenting, this was an area where she couldn't care less, as long as he was discreet. They'd agreed on the arrangement long ago and it suited them both equally well, not that Cecily had ever bothered to take advantage of her own freedom in this regard. Chet worked in the city and could do as he pleased unobserved. Cecily spent her days in a fishbowl and had never been tempted enough by anyone to risk being exposed.

  Besides, there is only one person tempting enough—Whoa, stop right there.

  Given recent developments, that train of thought needed to be pulled right back into the station.

  For a list of considerations as long as her arm, divorce was out of the question. It was the unpleasant reality when political dynasties were involved on both sides. Someone was always in an election year and avoiding a scandal. And after almost eighteen years of letting Chet take care of everything, Cecily wasn't convinced of her abilities to manage on her own, either. She didn't even know how to access their bank account online, let alone pay a bill or call a plumber. Some marriages were about love and passion. Hers was about mutual convenience. But they both accepted it on those terms, so why rock the boat?

  Chet grabbed his hot plate from the microwave and sat with it on a bar stool. Cecily handed him a fork and a glass of wine with the pre
cision of a mid-century housewife. She poured herself a glass, as well, and leaned against the kitchen counter, sipping it slowly.

  “Your mother called earlier,” Chet said after swallowing a bite of roast. “She left a message. You must've been out.”

  “I was at the theater for orientation. I told you about it a few weeks ago.”

  “Orientation? Oh, right. The little volunteer thing. How was it?”

  Cecily might normally have chafed at his dismissive tone, but she was too busy trying to untie the knot that had formed in her stomach at the mere thought of her day. “Okay, I guess. I ran into someone I knew.”

  “Cecily,” he said in a warning tone, “we've talked about this before. You can't avoid all of the other mothers from St. George's just because you find them unpleasant. It isn't good for Tyler, or for anyone else. Curtis Schroeder is one of my firm's most influential clients, and he's got the necessary clout if I decide to run for state Attorney General in two years' time. It's not his fault his wife's a bitch.”

  She hadn't meant Polly this time, but it wasn't a bad guess, and Chet's assessment of her nemesis made Cecily smile. Finding that woman unbearable was another small point of agreement between them, though Chet thought she should smile and try to get along, while Cecily favored the running and hiding approach. Running was also her first impulse upon realizing that she would see Rorie daily for the next two months. Chet had come to the wrong conclusion on the source of her ambivalence about the day, but she saw no reason to correct him, or to talk about the situation right now.

  “What did my mother want?” she asked instead, changing the subject.

  “For you to call her back, presumably,” Chet replied, popping the last bite of roast in his mouth.

  “No doubt. Do I have to?”

  Chet chuckled, their feelings about Cecily's mother being the final point on which they shared similar views.The woman had all the warmth of a dragon wearing lipstick and kitten-heeled pumps. “If you don't, she'll definitely be showing up for Thanksgiving.”