If Tomorrow Never Comes (Harper Falls Book 2) (7 page)

Which brought her back to Alex Fleming and the dream.

It was always the same. She was warm and could feel his arms around her. She had gotten used to having him near while she slept, but that morning it was a false sense of security. His arms weren't really holding her, he was gone. He had kept his promise, and Dani had been devastated.

She left her bed, but not her memories. A long shower helped, and by the time she had dressed, grabbed her camera bag and headed out the door, Dani felt her perspective starting to return. Seeing Alex had been a shock—he wasn't supposed to be in her hometown. His presence disrupted her view of normal.

Dani crossed the busy street, waving at friends as they passed. Harper Falls was a small town. Almost one hundred years old and founded by a man with enough money to build from the foundation up. At one time, Harper Falls had been home to some of the richest Americans west of the Mississippi. North of town, they built their over the top mansions, having bought into Russell Harper's vision of Utopia. The land was cheap, the labor cheaper. Before the building of Grand Coulee Dam, the Columbia River, which ran parallel to the town, was a thriving waterway. Why wouldn't the elite make their homes where they could have their privacy, travel at will, and enjoy the grandeur of the Pacific Northwest?

Things had changed in the last century. Most of the opulent homes still existed, but they no longer stood on acres of uninterrupted peace and quiet. Money was needed to maintain such a lifestyle, and not all had survived the ups and downs of the stock market. Mansions changed hands, land was sold and condominiums built. But through it all one thing never changed—Harper House.

Russell Harper had wanted his home to stand out. He built it to reign over the town that bore his name, and he'd built it to last. To this day, it served as the focal point for anyone first arriving in town. The woman who lived there, though not related by blood, insisted on rigidly maintaining both the standards and the control the first Harper had wielded.

Like most people who had been born there, Dani seldom noticed the imposing building. Harper House sat on a bluff on the west side of the river—the first thing touched by the sun's morning light, and the last to feel its waning glow. She sometimes imagined Regina Harper looking out the third-floor windows, mentally honing her methods of keeping her status as queen bee. Not that anyone had ever really challenged her. A few had tried, but they had slunk out of town, singed—if not downright burned, by Regina's ruthless vengeance.

Through spies, Regina kept close tabs on what happened in her town, and quickly squashed any rumbling of unrest. Her only child, Andrew Russell Harper, had been reared since birth to take over and maintain Regina's iron-fisted rule. It had been a shock when the rebellion hadn't come from the town but inside her very own fortress. The day before his eighteenth birthday, Drew had left Regina, Harper House, and the Falls. He had taken only the clothes on his back and what little money he had been able to earn behind his mother's back.

It had taken years, but the scandal of the prince's departure had died down. It flared up again when he and his business partner, Jack Weston, had moved the hub of their billion dollar company to Harper Falls. Speculation had run rampant. Had there been a reconciliation between mother and son? Was Drew going to take his rightful place as town leader? It didn't take long for both questions to be answered with a resounding
no
! H&W Security had bought most of the mountain side directly opposite Harper House, the partners building their headquarters and homes among the abundant pine trees.

Dani had never been, but according to Rose, Drew's office was on the east side of the building. It might have been his intent to give his mother a metaphorical finger every time she looked across the river, but he refused to look back. It was a screwed up situation, but having been raised by a woman once described as ice encased in another layer of ice, it was amazing Drew had turned out as normal as he was. He'd had the strength to get away, but Dani only wished he hadn't battered her friend's heart along the way.

It might have been ten years, but the embers of Drew and Tyler's romance still smoldered. In fact, things had been heating up between them, especially the past few months. The bets were fifty-fifty as to whether it would end with clothes being ripped off or hearts being stomped into dust. She'd known Tyler her whole life, and still Dani had no idea what was going to happen.

As she did most mornings, Dani made her first stop her parent's house. On her lucky days, she would get there in time for breakfast, the one her mother had fixed almost every morning for the past thirty-three years. Sometimes it was bacon and eggs, sometimes hot oatmeal, but it was always delicious, filling and the perfect start to any day.

Then there was the company. If she had just wanted a good meal, there were several excellent options between her place and the house that she grew up in. Sitting down at the old kitchen table that had the same old nicks and scratches, she would watch the way her father's adoring eyes followed his wife as if they were still newlyweds. It lifted Dani's spirits like nothing else could.

"Hey, there's my girl."

Terry Wilde had never been a man to hide his feelings. A tall, thin man with thick red hair and a ready laugh, he loved his wife, his children, and his dog unconditionally. If a friend needed a favor, Terry would go out of his way to help, but family always came first. Dani sank into his hug, holding on a fraction longer than usual. She knew how fortunate she was to have parents like hers. Rose and Tyler had lived next door, but it was the Wilde household they came to when they needed support. They spent the night so often her father had purchased bunk beds for Dani's room. Neither girl was ever turned away, no questions were ever asked. As far as her parents were concerned, they had been blessed with three wonderful daughters.

"How are you feeling, Dani?"

Roberta Wilde, Bobbi to most, put a plate of steaming pancakes on the table before wrapping her daughter in her arms. She kissed Dani's forehead, surreptitiously checking for a fever. Satisfied that she felt nothing out of the ordinary, Bobbi gave Dani a little push towards the table before taking the maple syrup off the stove and pouring it into a green earthenware pitcher.

"I'm fine, better than fine. But if I hadn't been, a stack of your pancakes would have cured me. I'm surprised Tyler isn't here. She can smell these a mile away."

"Take as many as you want, you know I always make too much batter." Bobbi washed a stray bit of syrup from her hands, drying them on the towel that always hung over her shoulder. "Now, are you going to tell me why you left the picnic yesterday? And before you use that headache excuse, remember who you're talking to. A woman who stands for six hours in the blazing Moroccan sun on the off-chance of getting a picture of whatever it was is not going to wilt under a little Eastern Washington heat."

"It was an elephant shrew."

Her mother just looked at her. Steady and slightly quizzical, it broke Dani every time. It had worked when she was six and it worked today. She found it impossible to maintain the façade of a fully grown adult woman when faced with
the stare
.

"I…," Dani started, but she had nothing to say. Yes, it would have been awkward to explain about Alex—talking sex with your parents was never easy. She could have given them a watered down version, but Dani was afraid once she started everything would come tumbling out. Once that dam burst, she would have to spill every last drop. As such, she chose the only action left—she stalled.

"You're right, as always." Her mother's little knowing smile was as close as she ever came to gloating.

"So?" Her father had finished his breakfast and was sipping one more cup of coffee before leaving for work. He did quite well as an accountant and was able to set his own hours. If the door to his office opened a few minutes late, no one's world would come to an end.

"Will you both trust me enough to let this slide, at least for now? I promise to tell you everything, but I need to keep it to myself for a little longer."

Terry waited while his wife mulled over Dani's words. This was her purview—she had always known instinctively when to push for information and when to let their children work things out for themselves. It had worked beautifully for as long as he could remember. There was no reason to believe now would be any different.

"You know we're here if you need an ear."

With that, the decision had been made. They would trust their daughter to find her own way and would, as always, be here as a safety net. Their door was always open, 24/7.

"And it's such a pretty ear." Dani gave her mother another hug. "Though after years of lending it to all of us, I'm surprised you have anything but a bloody stub left."

"You know I would never let that happen," her mother smiled. "I have too many earrings and I can't stand the thought of letting half of a pair go to waste if I was reduced to wearing only one."

Terry chuckled. "Your mother has an infinite capacity to take on other people's problems without letting it weigh her down. I've told her for years to open an office— they'd be lined up around the block."

"And would clam up the moment they walked in. My advice only works if given freely and accompanied by tea and a chocolate chip cookie."

Terry nodded at the truth of his wife's words. "Fifty cents a cookie and we could have retired years ago."

Dani felt a warm glow as she watched her father kiss her mother and head out the door. She had witnessed the easy affection her entire life but seeing it never grew old. They had established a routine that wasn't routine at all. It had almost been taken from them so Dani knew for a fact that neither Terry nor Bobbi Wilde ever took these little moments for granted.

Her mother practically glowed with health, but Dani could close her eyes and picture her pale, weak, and constantly nauseous from the rounds of radiation and chemotherapy. Nine years officially cancer free. Dani didn't want to contemplate what life without her mother would have been like. She seldom thought of it anymore, but at the time they had all lived in constant dread of the next visit to the doctor, the check-up that might find another tumor lurking in her brain.

Dani had been eighteen, a newly minted high school graduate with a full ride scholarship to a prestigious New York art institute. The doctors were optimistic that her mother would make a full recovery, that after three years of worry and tears and agonizing treatments, the cancer was gone. But when the time came for her to pack her bags and begin her life away from her family, Dani hadn't been able to go.

Though she had protested her daughter's decision to enroll at Eastern Washington University, Dani knew how much having her around meant to her mother. Never one to cling to her children, looking her mortality in the eye had changed that. Bobbi had come to rely on having her family nearby. She had always encouraged Dani's independence, but now she needed something else—she needed her daughter close to home.

It hadn't been a hardship for Dani. She had gotten a good education and watched her mother regain her confidence. After four years, both women were able to let go—Bobbi pushing her baby out of the nest and Dani flying—strong and eager.

"What's on your agenda? Conference call with the editor of the New Yorker? Exchanging emails with Michelle Obama?"

"Sorry, nothing so exciting." Dani put her cup in the top rack before shutting the dishwasher door. "Today, I'm concentrating on pictures for the Harper Falls Centennial."

"You mean Regina Harper's vanity project."

To say that Bobbi Wilde and Regina Harper were like oil and water would be putting it mildly.

They didn't socialize. If they had exchanged more than a dozen words in the past twenty years, Dani would have been surprised. On the few occasions there has been any contact, it hadn't gone well. Bobbi believed in helping those who needed it. Regina was strictly a pull yourself up by your own bootstraps person. Bobbi doubted Regina even knew what a bootstrap was, and certainly had never had to make her way in the world. Born to money, married money, that was Regina. She'd been fed by a silver spoon her entire life, and other than a few
acceptable
charities, she would never contribute money or time to
do-gooder
causes.

"I've had nothing to do with Queen Reggie," Dani told her mother. "Phyllis Overton approached me with the project."

"Phyllis is a dear, but like most of the people in Harper Falls, she's too willing to be pushed around. Regina Harper is picking over every detail of the centennial festivities. She should have spoken to you personally."

"After Rose's experience, I'm glad I got the go-between."

"Imagine inviting Rose for tea on the pretext of writing a piece of music for the festivities and then grilling her about Tyler." Bobbi was scrubbing the counter with such force Dani feared the marble might crack. However she understood her mother's attitude. Regina Harper was the definition of passive/aggressive. She would never go to the source if she could get what she wanted otherwise.

"We could spend a year trying to figure out what goes on inside Regina Harper's head and all we'd get would be a headache." Dani gathered up her camera bag. "Ten years have passed and the woman still has a hair crosswise over Tyler. This time it appears to be because she had the nerve to come back to her hometown."

"Regina is scared to death that Drew is still in love with our girl."

"Well, like Rose told her, if she wants to know anything she'll have to ask Drew." And good luck with that.

Dani kissed her mother goodbye and resumed her walk.

Today was about capturing the casual, everyday side of Harper Falls. She had no real plans, no destination. She would ramble and shoot whatever caught her eye. It was sunny and mild, and Dani felt all her worries and cares drop away. Today she had nothing to worry about except filling the digital card in her camera. Tomorrow would be soon enough to figure out what she was going to do about Alex Fleming.