The Secret Ingredient of Wishes (5 page)

The first soothing tendrils of relief worked their way through Rachel's chest at her friend's support. Not that she expected anything less from Mary Beth, who had been estranged from her parents and sister for almost as long as Rachel had known her. They'd become each other's family and swore to make each other's happiness a priority in their friendship.

“Believe me, I wish I could,” Rachel said.

“Well, yeah, when all you do is halfheartedly wave your hand and kind of mumble ‘shoo' at it, you can't actually expect it to go anywhere. You have to mean it, Ray.”

“I'm pretty sure I told it to ‘get.' But you're right, the hand motions could've been a little more emphatic.”

“Seriously, try to let it go, okay? For me,” Mary Beth said. Without waiting for Rachel's assent, she said, “So, back to this town. Think you'll stay longer than a night?”

Rachel hugged the spare pillow to her chest. She had no real reason not to stay. And Catch's theory that being lost in Nowhere could do her some good had apparently taken root while Rachel slept and didn't seem as far-fetched as it had the night before. “I might. I mean, I'll have to find a job because I don't have a lot of money saved, but I'll be okay for a few weeks.”

“Whoa. I didn't mean for good.”

“Who's to say I'll find someplace better? I could end up driving all over the country looking for the perfect town. And that would take money, which I'd need a job to get. And I can't get a job if I'm skipping town every few days.”

“I know. But you don't have to settle for the first place you find either.”

Rachel tossed the pillow aside and dropped back into the rumpled sheets that smelled of lavender. “I know I don't have to. But I have to do something, Maeby.” And Nowhere seemed as good a place as any. If she was lucky, the wishes hadn't followed her to Nowhere and everything she'd run from would stay firmly in her past.

“Just promise me if you're not happy, you'll try someplace else.”

“Someplace else meaning home?”

“Obviously that would be my preference. But I understand how starting over somewhere without all of the bad memories and constant reminders of things you can't change could make you happy. If it's what you need, I'll be okay with it. And I'll eventually forgive you for not saying bye.”

Rachel laughed. Mary Beth could hold a grudge, but thankfully never against her. They were all each other had for a few heartbreaking years in their teens and neither of them ever forgot it. Rachel would sooner hurt herself than Mary Beth. Which was precisely why Rachel couldn't be anywhere near her friend if she couldn't control her ability.

*   *   *

The voices in the kitchen grew louder the closer she got to them. Rachel kept her steps light, only a slight hitch in her breath at eavesdropping on Catch and Ashe.

“This is just crazy,” Ashe said. “One night I can understand, but living here? You can't take in some strange girl just because she needs—”

“Yes, I can,” Catch cut in. “Where would you or your brother be if I'd left you to fend for yourselves while your parents were too busy spitting at each other to notice y'all?”

“That's different, Catch. You'd known us our whole lives. And we were kids. She's a grown woman, fully capable of taking care of herself.”

Rachel pressed against the doorframe between the foyer and the dining room. She could slip back upstairs, pack her bag, and be out the front door before either of them realized she was gone. And she might have given in to the urge if she'd had anyplace else to go.

“Just because she should be able to doesn't mean she is. That girl needs my help whether either of you realizes it. Now, I don't want to hear another word about it. Got me?” Catch's raspy voice was firm, determined.

Ashe's loud sigh carried to Rachel. “Yes, ma'am.”

“And when she comes down here, I want you to be nice to her. No arguing.”

“Yes, ma'am,” he said again.

Someone set a plate or something on the counter. The ceramic scraped along the granite with a shrill scratching. Rachel crept back up the stairs to the landing. She'd been right the evening before when she'd guessed Ashe thought it was a bad idea she was staying in the house with Catch. Well, she'd just have to prove him wrong. As she started back down the stairs, she let her flip-flops slap each step so they wouldn't think she'd overheard them when she walked in.

Ashe sat at the island, digging in to a plate of breakfast pie. He glanced up, nodded.

She took the seat next to him and said, “Not even a good-morning pat down to make sure I don't have my ax hidden in my shirt? I must not be giving off my menacing vibe today.”

He cracked a smile, then buried it in his coffee cup.

She added a check mark to the Rachel column of her mental scorecard for the small victory. “How's the bribe working?” she asked Catch.

“I hadn't gotten to that yet, Little-Miss-Big-Mouth. Shoulda shoved this plate in front of you the second you sat down.” Catch dumped a plate with a triangle of pie and a few slices of pear in front of Rachel. Silverware clattered down a second later.

Rachel stuffed a forkful of hot egg pie in her mouth, and Ashe turned to her, eyebrows raised in curiosity.

“I thought something tasted funny about this pie,” he said. He cut off another hunk and inspected it on the end of his fork. “Yep, there it is. Artificial guilt flavoring.”

“Oh, shut up, you,” Catch said.

“Whaddya need?”

Catch smacked at his arm with a damp dish towel, then did the same to Rachel, who couldn't help but laugh. “Since you're here, I was thinking it would be nice if you showed Rachel around town.”

“You didn't tell me I was part of this bribe,” Rachel objected.

“You'll learn,” Ashe said to her. He polished off the last bite of his breakfast, eyed her barely touched piece, and said, “That's worth at least two servings, I think.”

He leaned across Rachel to reach the pie dish. His arm grazed hers as he sat back and carved out a piece almost twice the size of his original one. He shrugged at her when she continued to stare at him.

“I'm in if she is,” he said.

“Oh, she's in,” Catch said.

*   *   *

Twenty minutes later, Rachel followed Ashe through the backyard to his house. It was barely past eight, but the air was already thick with humidity. A bird jabbered at them from one of the trees before taking flight. The cherry tree shook, its plush leaves stirring up a tart, ripe scent that tickled the back of her throat. Another tree, thick with bright pink and yellow peaches in varying stages of ripeness, rubbed against her arm as she passed, almost as if it had reached out to pet her.

“So, Catch got you to stay, huh?” he asked. He flipped his sunglasses down to block the early-morning glare.

“For now,” Rachel said, squinting without the sunglasses she'd left at Catch's. “Mostly because I don't know where else to go.”

He was a step ahead and turned to look at her when he asked, “Were things bad in Tennessee? I mean, did you leave a bad situation?”

“No.” Even if she'd wanted to explain what she could do with the wishes, she would have no idea how to. So she just said, “But they weren't really good either. They just were.”

“Sorry, I shouldn't have asked. Catch is always telling me to mind my own damn business.”

“It's okay.”

They walked in silence the rest of the way. A few steps out of the trees and they were at the back deck of the gorgeous house she had glimpsed from the attic room at Catch's. Windows ran along the back of the house from floor to ceiling. The glare from the sun made it impossible to see inside. The tiered roofs created subtle overhangs for the levels below and she could imagine leaving the window open even when it rained. On the second floor, a minuscule balcony jutted off the back of the house with enough room for one chair to fit between the wall and the railing.

Ashe stopped at the base of the deck stairs, as if deciding whether or not to invite her inside.

She shielded her eyes from the sun with a cupped hand and looked at him. Thanks to the reflectiveness of his sunglasses, she couldn't tell if he was looking back, but if she had to guess, she'd say he was. And that he had no intention of making the next move.

So it was up to her.

All she had to do was talk to him. And if she was steering the conversation, she could keep topics off of ones that would lead to questions she couldn't answer.

“How'd you end up living in the family home?” she asked. When he quirked an eyebrow at her, she added, “Catch told me you grew up here and I assume you don't still live with your parents.”

“I've always loved this house.” He ran a hand over the porch rail. “My mom was always trying to change things. Take out a wall here, add a bathroom there, rip out the eighty-year-old mahogany floors to put in Travertine. I needed to get it away from her before there was nothing of the original architecture left. So, for their twentieth anniversary, I designed a new house for them with all the details she wanted and none of the ones she didn't.”

He inched the back door open, keeping an eye on something across the room as the hinges sighed, and held the door for Rachel.

“How old were you then?”

Ashe gave her that smile again. The one that said,
Yep, I'm as good as you think
. She hated that she believed it so easily. She was a master at keeping people out, or so her ex-boyfriend attested. How Ashe could get through her defenses with a damn smile both baffled and unnerved her. Turning away, Rachel focused on the curved wood railing that led to the second floor. The rungs were dusty, but the banister itself gleamed.

“Twenty-three,” he said. “I was pretty young when Dad and Carol Ann got married, but since my real mom took off when she found out about my dad and Carol Ann, Carol Ann's the only mom I've got. I've just got to grab something real quick.” He ducked into a room to his left and came out a moment later stuffing a handful of papers into a legal-size envelope.

Rachel followed him back across the room. A folded blanket and pillow sat on the pool table that separated the kitchen from the living room. “I guess since you're in this one, she liked it. The new house.”

“She loved it at first,” he said, tucking the envelope under his arm. He held the back door open for her and followed her outside. “Until she went out there one day to check on the progress and found my dad screwing another woman on the granite countertop she'd picked out.”

Rachel cringed and said, “Sorry,” but Ashe waved it away. “You know, I've heard that's the only way to really test out granite to make sure it's installed properly.” The words were out before she considered how he'd take them.

“That was not at all the reaction I was expecting.”

Her face burned when she realized he thought she was making a suggestion instead of a joke.

Before she could set him straight, he added, “Well, if it's what you've heard I might have to try it out next time.” She dropped her gaze to the ground to avoid eye contact, and he chuckled. Whether at her reaction or because he was joking too, she didn't know. “Anyways,” he said, “after that she didn't really want the house anymore. She moved about an hour away, so my brother, Scott, has to split his time off from college between there and here.”

The sun soaked through her shirt and heated her skin as they followed the stone path to the driveway. She rubbed at a dribble of sweat on her neck with sticky fingers. “Do you think he'll come back when he graduates?” Rachel asked.

“He's got a few more years, then vet school, but yeah. This is home.”

Ashe reached the door handle of his pickup before she did. She stepped back from the passenger door and waited.

“You gonna get in?” he asked.

“Sorry. I thought you needed to get something out,” Rachel said.

“Nope. Just gettin' the door for you.”

Rachel told herself it was just because he was a gentleman and not because he thought she'd been flirting with him. But she couldn't deny the sweetness of the action.

She stepped onto the running board and pushed off the door to maneuver into the bed of the truck. Even with the added half foot of height, she was still barely eye level with him. When she wobbled, Ashe steadied her with a hand on her lower back. His fingers brushed a swath of skin as her shirt rode up an inch.

“So, where are we headed?” she asked, trying to ignore the jolt of heat that traveled up her back from where his fingers had been.

“Downtown. I've gotta drop this off at my dad's, but then we can walk around a bit. Show you enough that Catch knows we upheld our end of the bargain.”

She cut her eyes to him without turning her head. “Is there going to be a quiz at the end? Because I didn't bring anything to take notes.”

Ashe closed the door, cutting off his laugh.

She watched out the window as they passed old house after old house with doors propped open in welcome and rockers waiting patiently on front porches for friends to stop by for a long chat, deciding she might be able to imagine why someone would want to make this place home.

 

6

The converted warehouse that housed Ashe's dad's law practice had been sectioned into office and retail space. With its gritty brick exterior, small square windows, and metal doors, it stood out from the quaint wood buildings that occupied most of downtown.

Ashe tapped the envelope against his palm. He tried to smile, but his look carried a chill despite the warmth of the sun beating down. “Okay, so I need to run in here for just a minute. And I know this is shitty of me to do, but I was wondering if you minded waiting out here? This isn't something I want an audience for.”