“Tanni is Shirley Bliss’s daughter,” Olivia said as if the connection had suddenly clicked. “Will is dating Shirley.”
“How’s that going?”
“I don’t know. My brother doesn’t talk to me about his relationships.”
Grace was naturally curious. She wanted to warn Shirley but didn’t feel it was her place to speak to the other woman. If Will had changed—and there was reason to believe he had—she didn’t want to do anything to ruin his chances. “I had my doubts when I learned Will was returning to Cedar Cove,” she said.
Olivia gave her an assessing look. “I did, too. After that…situation with you, I didn’t feel I could trust my own brother.” She slowed her steps. “I’m just relieved it didn’t do any lasting damage.”
She meant damage to Grace’s relationship with Cliff. Ultimately it hadn’t, but Will’s interference—and Cliff’s reaction to it—was one of the problems they’d needed to resolve.
Changing the subject, Grace asked, “What does Jack have to say about you stepping down from the bench?”
Olivia grinned. “Not much. He says he’s fine with whatever I decide. But I feel that if I retired, he’d start thinking along those lines himself, and I’m not sure that’s a good idea for Jack.”
“Why not?”
Olivia was thoughtful for a moment. “Sometimes I think he’s got ink running in his veins. Jack’s a completely different person at the newspaper office. He comes alive when he’s working to a deadline, and he has great instincts about stories. He might be tempted to hand over the reins, but I suspect he’d regret it after a few months.”
Olivia had always had such empathy for others and such an unerring sense of what motivated them; it was one of the reasons she was so effective—and highly respected—as a judge.
“Look at Goldie,” Grace said, smiling as she pictured their favorite waitress at the Pancake Palace. Goldie had been waiting tables at their longtime hangout from the first year Olivia and Grace were in high school. She had to be in her seventies and still worked three or four days a week.
“I doubt anyone would dare mention the word retirement to Goldie,” Olivia said.
“Who’d serve us our coconut cream pie?”
“Exactly.”
They strolled a little longer, and then Grace noticed that Olivia was slowing down. “Shall we sit for a while?” she said.
Olivia nodded, and they found a big log, tied the horses to a nearby tree and sat gazing out over Puget Sound. The Fauntleroy ferry, tiny in the distance, was steaming toward Vashon Island.
“I miss our aerobics class,” Olivia said.
“What you miss is the coconut cream pie afterward.”
Olivia chortled. “Perhaps you’re right.” Suddenly she slugged Grace in the shoulder.
“Hey, what was that for?” she said, rubbing her upper arm.
“Because you quit going.”
“I need an exercise buddy,” Grace protested. “You don’t expect me to trudge down to the gym all by myself, do you?”
“I guess not. But we’re going back, so don’t get soft on me.”
“Me?” Grace yelped. “I can run circles around you any day of the week.”
“Wanna bet?”
Grace shook her head. “Maybe not.”
At that they both smiled and lapsed into a companionable silence.
The year before, Grace had been terribly afraid she’d lose Olivia to cancer. She hadn’t, and Olivia’s prognosis was good. Her bout with cancer had taught both of them many lessons, but none as profound as the knowledge that nothing would ever stand between them. Their friendship was for life, in every sense of those words.
Thirty-Three
Megan was beginning to look pregnant, Troy thought. He’d stopped by the house after work on Wednesday afternoon because he had an important favor to ask.
“It won’t be much longer before you’ll need to wear maternity tops,” he said when she let him into the house.
A sweet smile lit up her face. “Do you think so, Daddy?”
“I do.” He felt a surge of excitement at the prospect of his first grandchild’s birth.
“I noticed this morning that it’s getting difficult to zip up my pants. Look.” She turned sideways and placed one hand beneath the barely discernible roundness of her belly.
“Yup, you’re pregnant, all right.” How Troy wished Sandy had lived to hold this baby…
“I have a favor to ask you,” he said, all business now.
“Anything, Daddy, you know that.”
He followed Megan into the kitchen, where she’d just started dinner preparations. Craig, who worked as an engineer at the navy shipyard, wasn’t home yet, but he would be soon. “I want Faith to spend the night with you.”
His daughter didn’t hesitate. “Of course. I love Faith.” Then, frowning slightly, Megan said, “She can’t stay with her son?”
“Scott’s kids are on spring break and he took the family to Disneyland.”
“Oh, heavens, you know Faith’s always welcome.”
This would be more than a simple visit. “Is the bed in your spare room made up?”
Megan nodded. “I hope you don’t mind me asking why.”
“I want her safe.”
His daughter, who’d been stirring spaghetti sauce, instantly looked up. “Safe from what?”
Safe from whom was more accurate. “I’m going to spend the night at her house. I have cause to believe the intruder may come back tonight—if it’s the person I think it is.” He’d been giving the pattern of the break-ins a lot of thought. The man he’d become convinced was the intruder had been spotted in town by one of his deputies that afternoon. On at least one other occasion—the day Faith’s tires were slashed—he’d been sighted at the biker bar on the edge of town.
“It’s a long story.”