Like Never Before (27 page)

Seconds later, Owen's face appeared at the window. He pushed it open. “What?”

Mission accomplished. “You didn't answer when I buzzed.” She'd hit the buzzer three times, shifting her weight from foot to foot, excitement whittling away every last crumb of patience.

“Because it's seven on a Saturday morning.”

“I've got news.” Raindrops bounced in the grass around her flip-flops.

“And it couldn't wait two more hours?”

She held up the bottle in her non-throwing hand. “I brought OJ. The kind you like, with the pulp.”

“Fine.” The window slammed shut.

With a grin, she dodged more raindrops and dashed her way to the front door, just in time to hear the latch release. Up on the second floor, Owen was waiting in his doorframe, ISU tee above Nike gym shorts, folded arms.

“I've never seen you this dressed down.”

He held out his hand.

She gave him the bottle of OJ. He let her in.

“I don't know how you can drink it with the pulp. It's like little hairs floating around—” She stopped barely two feet into his living room. Bare walls—none of the framed pictures or baseball posters she was used to seeing—and boxes scattered around the room. “You're . . . packing?”

The news she'd been so antsy to share trickled into a puddle.

She turned back to Owen and waited as he capped his juice bottle and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. “Yep.” He moved into the kitchen.

“That's it? ‘Yep'? Were you going to tell me?”

He yanked a cereal box from a nearly empty cupboard. “Of course I was going to tell you.”

“When? When you'd already switched zip codes?”

Bowl, spoon, box. He clunked each item onto the island counter. “I've still got three and a half weeks until I leave. I'm just getting a head start on packing. I was going to tell you Monday. Or maybe today at the Market.”

He poured his cereal—some kind of oat and granola concoction she would've made fun of any other day—and scooted onto a stool. “I've got a letter of resignation written. Wasn't sure whether it went to you or Logan.”

“Owen.”

He looked up from his bowl, and from the twist of his face, she knew he'd heard the petition in her voice. The need for an explanation, but even more, the regret over how off-course their friendship had veered these past weeks.

He abandoned his stool and disappeared into the bedroom off the side of the living room, returning with a piece of paper. It was creased with the faint smudge of inky fingerprints, as if he'd folded and unfolded the letter for multiple readings.

She flattened it now while he poured milk into his cereal, didn't have to read more than a line to understand. She lifted her eyes. “You got into grad school.”

“Three of them, actually, but this is the one I'm going to accept.”

“When? Why didn't you tell me?”

“There was never a good time. Somebody else was always around.”

He meant Logan, of course. But it wasn't true. She'd hardly seen Logan in the last two days. When he was in the office, she found excuses to flit off—photos to take or interviews to do. She'd turned skittish.

Scared of her own heart and the things it wanted.

The things it couldn't have.

“I'm crazily happy for you, Owen. And not at all surprised. Even when your sports pieces made zero sense to me, I knew the writing was good. You're going to have an awesome career.”

He crunched a bite and swallowed. “And you're not mad at me for leaving?”

“Nope.” How could she be? He knew what he wanted, and he was going after it.

That's what she'd thought she'd been doing all this time in Maple Valley. Especially these last two months—trying to salvage the paper any way she could. Begging Logan. Begging the bank.

Because she'd been so sure. Of course it was the right thing to do. The obvious thing.

Like Dani and the baby, the adoption.

Everyone had tried to tell her it was a bad idea, but she'd barreled on, convinced the adoption would save her marriage and maybe somehow complete her at the same time.

And look how that had turned out.

“So what's your news?”

Owen's question jarred her into focus. Her news. Yes, the email. She'd read it a dozen times already. And all she'd wanted to do was call Logan. Better yet, drive out to his father's house and join their family for breakfast and watch Logan's imagination dance as he read the email.

She'd come here instead.

“Remember how Logan's friend's wife is a genealogist? She found Harry Wheeler's granddaughter. I emailed the woman
yesterday and already heard back. The history lover in me about freaked out when I read it.”

It was her turn to pull out a folded sheet of paper. She'd half-memorized the email already.

Dear Amelia,

What a pleasure to meet you via email. I'm not sure how you found my address, and it's rather fortuitous I received your message so quickly after you sent it. I check my email perhaps once a month, twice if I'm feeling ambitious.

You're correct about my grandfather. He is the Harry Wheeler who was at Le Bourget field when Lindbergh landed in Paris. And yes, he was mistaken for Lindbergh. He told us the story over and over when we were children. How he was hoisted onto shoulders and carried through the field. How his clothes were tattered and he got separated from his friend.

And yes, his friend was Kendall Wilkins. I heard about him as a child, too. Only it was a different story Grandfather told whenever he talked about Kendall, though one that also took place in France. You said you've researched Kendall, so perhaps you know he fought in WWII?

According to my grandfather, they lost touch after that day in 1927 . . . but met again in France in 1944. Kendall Wilkins saved my grandfather's life on a battlefield somewhere in France. Grandfather was tangled in a barbed-wire fence, gunfire all around. Kendall rushed into fire to help him.

Grandfather used to say that was the moment that changed his life forever. He'd prayed, you see, to a God he wasn't sure he believed in. Kendall was his answered prayer.

To thank Kendall, Grandfather sent him a memento from the day Lindbergh landed, something he'd brought home with him in 1927. I wish I knew what it was. Perhaps it's the item missing from the safe-deposit box you mentioned. Grandfather said he used to believe it brought him luck. After being spared in
WWII, he no longer needed luck. He had something better . . . a Savior.

And also, a friend. I believe Grandfather kept in touch with Kendall until he passed away in 2001. He was 92, and even fourteen years later, we still notice the hole in our family.

Please feel free to email any other questions you might have, although I'm afraid this is the extent of what I know of your Kendall Wilkins. I never had the privilege of meeting him. But in a small way, through Grandfather's stories, I always felt he was a part of our family.

Best wishes with your story.

—Annalise Wheeler James

Owen looked up. “He was a war hero?”

“I knew he fought in World War II, but not this. And the extra awesome thing is this email supports what I've said all along: There was supposed to be something in that box. I just know it.” She held up the page. “This is proof.”

“Too bad you don't know what.”

“But see, I'm realizing maybe I don't need to know. The real story is that Kendall Wilkins tried to give us something special—the same thing Harry Wheeler gave him. He wasn't playing a prank on the town, Owen.”

And, too, there was something comforting in the thought that maybe Kendall hadn't been so family-less, after all.

“Yeah, but if you're right, what happened to whatever was supposed to be in the box? Did it get stolen? Did he just forget to put it back in the box the last time he stopped by the bank?” Owen's spoon scraped against his bowl, and he chewed on another bite before saying anything more. “And the biggest question I've got: Why'd you come to me with this?”

“What do you mean?”

He set down his spoon. “I mean, I'm happy for you. It's fun.
Your detective work paid off, and you'll probably write a great article.” He pointed at the printout. “But I'm not the one you want to show this to.”

She looked down, his implication perfectly clear and her next words quiet with admission. “You were right. I got too attached, but he's going to leave. So call this a first attempt at detaching.”

She waited for him to say he'd told her so. “Dumb move, Amelia.”

Her gaze shot up. “Excuse me?”

“I've worked with you for two years. I've watched you be all perky and plucky and flit from town event to town event. Friends with everyone. The opposite of old Wilkins.” He tapped his spoon against his bowl. “And yet, not. Did you know I didn't even know until just now that you consider yourself a history lover? And until a few weeks ago, I had no idea you have event planning and marketing in your background. And man, Mae says you were married to Jeremy Lucas. Jeremy Lucas?”

Great, she'd spread that around? “What are you saying, Owen?”

“I'm saying, Logan Walker got past a wall with you that none of the rest of us could, and now you're trying to put it back up for a dumb reason like geography?”

“It's more than geography. What about the paper? You might be going to grad school, but other people actually need their jobs. And doesn't this town deserve a newspaper? I should just drop that and—what?—follow Logan to whatever coast he ends up on?”

Owen added more cereal to his bowl. “You're putting words in my mouth, Amelia. I'm just saying, let go of the need to protect yourself and you might be surprised where it gets you. Besides, you should know, no one's going to blame you if the paper folds. And it might be worth asking yourself why you'd rather fight for paper and ink and other people's futures than your own.”

Don't panic.

But with the wind rattling through tents, and swaying tree branches batting against a now-steady rain, alarm choked Logan. He threaded through the square, Rick on his heels.

“Where did you see her last?”

“I told you, she was playing in the band shell. I just saw her five minutes ago.” Or had it been longer? He and Bear had been talking . . .

Rick's steps crunched over a fallen branch behind him. “Who was she with?”

“Several kids. A couple moms were watching them—”

“Names, Logan.” A crack of thunder punctuated Rick's demand.

And Logan's heart thudded at the thought of Charlie cowering against the sky's growl. Without him. He turned a circle in the middle of the lawn, rain now trailing down his face in rivulets.

Surely she was with one of those parents. With . . . someone.

He scoured the groups of people huddled under awnings—most of them laughing, shaking their heads, this almost-storm a joke.

“Logan!” Rick yanked on his arm, fingers digging into his flesh.

Logan spun at the pull. “You're not helping.” The words came out tense, tight, as he looked past Rick.

“Neither are you, running around half-cocked. Maybe if you'd been watching her in the first place—”

“Don't.”

“What were you thinking bringing her? You knew it was supposed to storm.”

“I didn't think it would roll in so fast.” But he should've
known. As soon as the clouds had thickened, he should've loaded Charlie back into the car so they could sit out the storm at home, where he could rock away her fear.

But no. He'd wanted to be here. Wanted to be a part of the event.

Wanted to see Amelia.

Rick stepped closer. “You didn't think at all.”

“Logan?” Dad's voice barely registered as he jogged over.

“
This
,” Rick said, tone black. “This is why Helen and I asked what we did. About Charlie living with us.”

“I don't have time for this now.” Did Rick really think they were going to argue this out in the middle of the square, in the rain, when he didn't know where his daughter was?

He pictured her then, back in LA, in the walk-in where she always hid. In the tulle of Emma's wedding dress. And the urge to start running, calling for her, nearly overcame him.

Rick was only inches from him now. “She deserves more than a dad who would lose her in a storm.”

Something snapped in Logan then. Something untamed and unchecked.

Something scared.

And he punched his father-in-law, hand connecting with Rick's cheek in a flash that rivaled the lightning. He felt the jolt of his own shock, the flinch of his anger . . .

And Dad pulling him backward. “What in the world is happening here?”

“I can't find Charlie.”

Rick just stood there, working his jaw, one hand on his cheek, the other balled.

“She's terrified of thunder, Dad.”