Right Before His Eyes (8 page)

Her ex-boyfriend had come up with a scheme to con seniors in Florida out of their savings with promises of a posh retirement community that didn't exist. He'd been a controlling and abusive man, and Sheila was so afraid of him, she went along with the swindle—at least until the seniors her ex was so sure were clueless figured out what was going on and went to the police.

“I'm sorry he hurt you,” Gil said, holding her face gently in his hands.

“I'd go through it all over again if that path led me here to you.”

“But I hurt you, too—by not trusting you.”

She grinned. “You can make it up to me with an exotic trip to the beach.”

“Anytime.” He paused, wincing. “Well, after the championship's decided this weekend.”

She angled her head, her lips a breath away from his. “Isn't there a beach near that track?”

Jean Brashear

To all the members of the NASCAR Nation—what a great group you are, and what fun I've had becoming a fan!

To the ever-wonderful Marsha Zinberg, for giving me a chance to come play; Stacy Boyd, who's a force of nature and such fun to work with; and Karen Reid, who's a marvel of efficiency (and always cheerful, to boot.)

And for my beloved Ercel, who's never once complained about race day!

Late August

“C
OME ON, BRO,
I'
M
buying dinner to celebrate,” said Will Branch. “At least one of the Branches is still in contention.”

Bart knew he should be on top of the world because he'd already qualified for the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup with two races left, but he couldn't celebrate, not when his twin had wrecked at Bristol and was now too far back to make the cut.

Yes, they were competitive with each other and always had been—they'd battled over everything from toys to grades to girls all their lives—but Will was also his best friend. This achievement was sweet, but his joy was tempered by knowing his twin's extreme disappointment. Didn't matter that last season Will had made the cut and he'd missed it.

“Maudie's, huh?” he quipped because it was their way to tease, not be sentimental. “Couldn't spring for a steak house, you cheapskate?”

Will grinned. “Mellie doesn't work at a steak house.” His eyebrows rose suggestively as he spoke of the waitress Bart found more intriguing by the day. She wasn't his usual type, too serious, too skittish—not that she didn't have plenty of reason to be serious. She was a mother, a very young one, and that was no easy job.

“You wouldn't be matchmaking, right? Doesn't Mom do enough of that?” Bart complained. “Ever since you discovered Sam was your child and you and Zoe got married, Mom's developed way too much interest in my love life. And when the twins were born—”

“Zoe and I make cute babies, so sue me.” Will's eyes sparkled with a joy that had been missing for a long time before he and Zoe reconnected and he learned he had a ten-year-old son. After their father, Hilton Branch, had embezzled millions and left his family in tatters, there had been little to smile about.

But Bart was not going to think about his no-good father. Hilton was in prison now, and Bart wanted nothing to do with him.

As they approached the door of Maudie's Down Home Diner, Bart hesitated. “Listen, Will, I'm—”

Will clapped him on the back and practically shoved him through. “Don't say it, man. Look, it sucks not to be in the final field, but I'll live.” His expression turned fierce. “Next year, my man. Count on it. But for now, it's all about you. Just the way you like it, showboat.”

Bart had to laugh. Will was the attention hound, not him. “Yeah, well, your ugly mug would stink up the newspaper pages. Better me than you.”

They exchanged grins, back on the safe ground of giving each other grief. Then Will's face lit. “Well, if it isn't Miss Lily.” He pushed past Bart to take Mellie's little curly haired daughter from her and toss her in the air.

Lily squealed and giggled, but the instant she was safely back in Will's clasp, she turned toward Bart and stretched out her arms. “Bart!” The demand was clear.

Bart plucked her from his twin's hold. “Hey, pretty girl. How are you today?”

She began to babble about what the bear he'd given her had done today and what she'd had for dinner. Bart answered her seriously, but he couldn't help glancing past her where Mellie stood a few feet away. Slender and delicate, a pixie with short, spiky black hair and too-old brown eyes, she bore only a faint resemblance to her round-cheeked cherub of a daughter.

For once, Mellie was smiling, all the way smiling, at Bart. “Congratulations,” she said quietly, then cast her eyes down as she so often did. She glanced up again. “I'm very happy for you.”

Bart kept his voice low, too. “Thank you.” His gaze locked on hers. “Want to go out and celebrate?” he found himself asking.

Mellie looked as shocked as he felt. In the months since she'd arrived in Mooresville, they'd done an awkward dance. Bart would tease her, Mellie would blush and shy away. He sensed she was interested, just as he was, yet her innate caution never allowed him to close the gap.

“I'm serious, Mellie.” To his surprise, he realized he was. “Go out with me.”

“I can't. We can't, you know that.”

“I don't know that—and I don't understand why.” An unaccustomed anger rose within him, born of frustration. She'd had shadows in her eyes from the first day, and she was maddeningly unwilling to trust anyone. Her boss, Sheila, maybe, and he thought she and Daisy Brookshire were becoming friends. Recently he'd seen her relax around some members of a group of local women who met at Maudie's once a week, but mostly she kept to herself.

“I—I have to get back to work. Come on, Lily. Louise will be here any second to babysit you.” She took Lily from his arms, and Lily protested.

“I want Bart,” she whined.

Bart nearly argued, but Mellie's beleaguered expression kept him quiet. “It's okay, Lily. I'll see you next time, okay?”

Lily frowned but quieted. The older woman who kept her arrived just then, and Bart heard his brother hailing him from a booth.

Bart shook his head at Mellie's retreating back and wondered yet again why he bothered. A more skittish woman he'd never met.

If only he could dismiss her so easily himself. Or figure out the attraction. He wasn't one for troubled souls. He liked his women cheerful and easygoing, not prickly and reclusive.

“C'mon, hotshot. Your adoring public awaits,” called out Will.

Bart snorted. Then he threaded through the crowded dining room and focused on the handshakes and backslaps of congratulations coming his way.

 

S
EVERAL DAYS LATER, ON
the way to see Daisy Brookshire and her new baby, Lily was pouting in her car seat. “I wanna go see Bart.”

Amelia Parsons, known by everyone in Mooresville as Mellie Donovan, sighed. Why her baby sister—half sister, actually—had formed such an intense bond to Bart Branch was a mystery. He was wonderful to Lily, of course—a surprise in itself for a hot bachelor—but he was way out of their league, to say nothing of the fact that she wasn't in North Carolina to have a fling with a gorgeous man.

She was only twenty years old and on the run. She desperately needed to find Hal Walker, her mother's second husband who'd abandoned them all months before her mother had been diagnosed with an aggressive cancer. Her mother had died, leaving Mellie with no money and a baby half-sister to raise—along with eerie anonymous phone calls and their house turned upside down as though being searched for something…and only her mother's deathbed mumblings about Hal and North Carolina to go on.

Amelia hadn't known what to do or where to turn, but after the day that a dark van tried to drive her off the road, the stakes had risen. She'd reported the incident but with no witnesses and no evidence, the sheriff hadn't been able to help her. It was then that she'd been certain of only one thing: she had to find Hal Walker, whatever it took. At a minimum, he would have to take care of his child. Amelia was terrified that she wasn't up to the job, though she loved her baby sister with everything in her.

So long raven hair was chopped off.

Amelia Parsons became Mellie Donovan.

And a young, terrified girl headed for North Carolina with only her last paycheck to support herself and the little girl she let every assume was her child, for fear Lily would be taken from her. She'd wished to be able to change Lily's first name, too, but at two—just recently turned three—Lily was too young to play along or understand. Thank goodness Lily already called her Mellie, their mother's pet name for Amelia, and not her real name. Everyone who knew Lily understood that Lily had a mind of her own, and that made for an easy explanation of why Lily called her “mother”
Mellie
instead of
Mommy
. Mellie did everything she could to
moderate her little sister's temperamental nature, but Lily had been through a lot in the past year, losing her mother and her home.

Mellie couldn't let herself think about all she, too, had lost.

She was, however, more than grateful for the day she'd stopped at Maudie's Down Home Diner to get food for herself and Lily. Meeting Sheila Trueblood, the owner, being offered a job, a place to stay and a loving grandmotherly woman, Louise, to watch over Lily had been the beginning of a new life Mellie wished she could keep.

But every day of lying was getting harder, she thought as she pulled up in front of the cabin where her friend Daisy Brookshire was staying.

She'd found no trace of Hal Walker. She couldn't wait forever to resume her search. Lily had a father out there somewhere, and Hal should take care of his responsibilities to her.

“I want Bart!” Lily shrieked.

“Me, too, Lily,” she murmured, gathering the child to her and rocking her. “But it's been a long time since I got anything I wanted.” She pressed Lily's cheek to hers.

“We'll be okay, sweetie. I promise we'll be okay.”

A tear rolled down her cheek as she reassured her little sister and wished there was someone to make her believe the same.

Then Sheila walked out the front door.

Lily's eyes went as wide as her grin, and Bart Branch receded in importance. “Sheila!” She adored Sheila and had from the first day.

Sheila came to Mellie's rescue, swinging Lily to the ground and dancing her around as Lily giggled.

Thank you
, Mellie mouthed to her friend and em
ployer who'd become much like a big sister. She and Lily had no family, no one but each other, and unless she found Hal Walker, that wouldn't change.

If only she could figure out exactly where to look.

 

“B
E CAREFUL,
L
ILY,”
M
ELLIE
said as the toddler squatted in front of baby Brianna's carrier a while later, as they sat on the cabin's front porch. She wasn't positive Lily understood that Brianna wasn't a doll to play with, so she couldn't let herself settle back into the hickory rocker.

“She'll be all right,” Daisy assured her.

“I don't know why you're so calm about this.”

“Were you a nervous new mother?” Daisy asked.

Lordy, she was tired of lying to good people. “I don't know, maybe.” She glanced up. “But I do know Lily. She wouldn't mean to do anything wrong, but she's never been around a baby before.” Mellie chewed at her lower lip.

“Come inside, everything's ready,” Sheila called from the screen door.

“Okay!” Lily leaped up, baby forgotten.

Mellie picked up the baby carrier and took Brianna inside. Daisy was still recovering.

“Looks yummy. Thank you, Sheila.”

It did indeed—salads and fresh bread and fluffy key lime tartlets, perfect for a hot, humid late-summer afternoon.

Once they were settled, Sheila turned to Daisy. “There's a NASCAR retrospective on TV that I'd like to see. Do you suppose Quinn will mind if I turn on that gigantic flat screen?”

Daisy shook her head, though Mellie would have preferred to sit and visit. Sheila turned on the TV, but
Mellie focused on fixing Lily a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich. None of them watched very closely, as Mellie teased Sheila about doing her homework on NASCAR for the benefit of one Gil Sizemore, the owner of Double S Racing, who spent a whole lot of time at Maudie's—and not for the meat-loaf sandwiches he claimed to crave.

It was fun watching Sheila get all flustered. Her boss was just about to zing Mellie back when she glanced up. “Hey, look at the TV. There's Bart and his brother, Will, back when they were both driving in the Camping World Truck Series. Get a look at those haircuts. I swear Will's sporting a mullet!”

“No way.” Mellie giggled. “Millionaire playboys? Is that what the headline under the picture says? Is that true?”

“It's true or used to be, anyway,” Sheila said. “Their father was enormously rich, but he embezzled a lot of money from his stockholders a couple of years ago, and the family lost just about everything, including Bart's and Will's car sponsorships. It was a really big deal. Especially when their dad up and disappeared like he did. Took the police, gosh, over a year to track him down. I can't believe you don't know this.”

Amelia, Lily and their mother, Rose, had lived in a remote area of Idaho, and they'd never followed NASCAR, but she didn't talk about her real life or where she'd come from, not to anyone. “So what happened to him?” she asked to get Sheila off the topic of her past.

Daisy glanced up at the screen. “That's him, their dad, Hilton Branch. He's in prison in Texas and probably will be for the rest of his life.”

“If there's any justice,” Sheila added. “Bart hates talking about his dad—both twins do. So here Bart is,
on cloud nine being in the championship hunt, and what do those reporters do but dredge up the old stories?”

Mellie barely heard a word either said, however. Eyes locked on the television screen, she would swear her heart stopped cold—as she looked at the man she knew as Hal Walker, standing with his twin sons.

How on earth could Lily's father also be Hilton Branch? The man she remembered had been very kind to her mother, had genuinely loved her. Had been kind to Mellie, too, even though she wasn't his.

How could that man have embezzled millions and left another family destitute, then eventually wound up in jail?

Poor Bart. Oh, dear God. What would Bart say if he knew—

She would never find out because she didn't dare speak a word about it. She had no idea what to do, where to go now.

Whoever Hal Walker was or had been, he was nowhere nearby. He was in Texas, and she was in North Carolina, halfway across the country. She couldn't begin to afford to travel there—if not for Sheila's kindness, she wouldn't be able to keep a roof over Lily's head.

The trip from Idaho had been grueling, with a toddler who missed her mother, and Mellie herself aching in every cell for her mother's love and guidance, too. She'd been responsible for all of them for many months before her mother's death, and she'd desperately wanted to quit being in charge.