The Aloha Quilt (40 page)

“Did Claire ever seek revenge on her old lover?” Bonnie asked.

“She didn’t tell you?” Midori feigned disapproval, but her mouth quirked in a smile.
“She wouldn’t do such a thing now, and in fact she specifically advises her Internet
friends never to seek revenge, but her emotions were all over the place after that
man confronted Eric in the grocery store parking lot. I think she wanted revenge for
Eric more than for herself.”

Bonnie was almost afraid to ask. “What did she do?”

“She had a box of elephant dung mailed to his office.” As Bonnie exploded with laughter,
Midori added, “Anonymously, of course.”

“Of course.” Bonnie could hardly speak for laughing. “That’s the only way to send
elephant dung.”

“I’m not sure, but I think it might be illegal.”

“If it’s not, it should be.”

“Maybe you should give Claire a break,” Midori said. “Forgive others as you wish to
be forgiven. If she had fooled around with Craig, I could understand if you couldn’t
do otherwise but hate her forever. As it is, she betrayed Eric, not you. If he can
forgive her, maybe you can find it in your heart to do the same.”

Bonnie’s heart softened to hear the echo of Eric’s own words. Was it worth abandoning
a decades-long friendship over a sin long past and long since forgiven by the one
who had been truly wronged? Would Bonnie’s righteous indignation comfort her in the
years to come, when her friendship with Claire was nothing more than a memory?

The aloha spirit made the answer plain.

Bonnie quickly thanked Midori, set her Pineapple Patch quilt top safely out of the
way, and hurried off to Claire’s office. She found Claire in the front foyer instead,
bidding farewell to the last of the quilt campers.

“Claire—” Bonnie fell silent as Claire threw her an inquiring glance as she closed
the front door. How could Bonnie explain that she still loathed what Claire had done,
but forgave her anyway? How did she express her shame that she had not been there
for Claire in her time of greatest need? How did she confront the ugly truth about
herself, that too often she found it far easier to see the world in black and white
than to accept all the shades of gray in between?

But Claire, who did not know what Bonnie was struggling to say, smiled. “It was quite
a week, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” said Bonnie. “Quite a week. Are you—”

Words failed her.

Claire studied her quizzically. “Am I what?”

“Are you ready to read those evaluation forms?” Bonnie managed a laugh. “Maybe we
should have a stiff drink first.”

“Don’t be silly. Everything’s going to be fine. We won’t need anything stronger than
a couple of glasses of iced tea.”

Promising Bonnie that they were sure to read much more praise than censure, Claire
led Bonnie off to the kitchen for iced tea, then on to her office to study the evaluation
forms, to celebrate their accomplishments and reflect upon their weaknesses, to brainstorm
and debate and devise a plan to make Aloha Quilt Camp a haven for quilters, a place
that put the aloha spirit into practice every day.

An hour later, they were engrossed in a camper’s lengthy description of additional
workshops they should consider offering when they were startled by a loud pounding
upon the front door.

“Bonnie,” a man bellowed, “I know you’re in here! Don’t make me come looking for you!”

Frozen with alarm, Bonnie looked at Claire and saw her own shock and fear mirrored
on her friend’s face.

Craig had found her.

Chapter Fourteen
 

What is he doing here?” Claire asked in dismay as Craig shouted again. Both women
jumped as the front door banged open.

Bonnie shook her head, heart plummeting. Suddenly Barry’s cryptic email apology made
perfect sense. He must have told his father where to find her. “I’m sorry, Claire.”
Shakily, she forced herself to stand. “I’ll go out there and try to get him to calm
down.”

“Absolutely not. I’ll talk to him. You stay here.” Claire bounded up from the sofa.
“Lock the door behind me and call the police.”

“I can’t call the police on him. He’s my children’s father.”

“He’s dangerous!”

“Then you shouldn’t confront him either. Stay here.” But what about their guests and
Midori?

They heard hard, deliberate pacing in the foyer. “I’ll tear this place apart if I
have to,” Craig shouted, followed by a shattering of glass and a splintering of wood
as if a table had been overturned. They heard light running and Midori berating Craig
in a mixture of English and Japanese. Quick footsteps sounded
on the floor above, guests startled by the outburst below.

Bonnie couldn’t let it go on. “I have to talk to him,” she said, her stomach in knots
as she forced herself to the door.

“Not alone you won’t,” said Claire, following her into the hallway.

They rounded the corner just in time to see tiny Midori trying to block the passage
from the foyer to the rooms beyond. Viciously Craig shoved her out of the way and
sent her sprawling to the floor. Bonnie gasped and Craig looked up sharply at the
sound. His face was covered with a week’s growth of beard, his eyes bloodshot and
furious.

“You thought you could hide from me,” he glowered. “You didn’t count on my one loyal
son, on the one child you couldn’t turn against me.”

“Craig.” Bonnie held up her hands, appealing for calm. “I didn’t turn the kids against
you. I tried to keep them out of it. They saw what was happening and they made up
their own minds. I tried—”

“Shut up,” Craig bellowed. Bonnie flinched and drew back.

Then Claire’s arm was around her. “This is private property, Craig,” she told him,
quiet but firm. “You’re disturbing our guests. Leave now and I won’t call the police.”

“Maybe you won’t, but I will.” Midori gingerly pushed herself to her feet. Instinctively,
Bonnie and Claire reached out to help her, but Craig stood between them and Midori.
“What kind of man knocks down an old woman? You have no respect. You deserve every
bad thing coming to you.”

Craig spared her a baleful glance before turning his rage back upon Bonnie. “You thought
you could run away and hide. You thought you could ruin my life and get away with
it.”

“You need to go now,” Bonnie said shakily, backing away as Craig strode toward her.
“You’re trespassing.”

“I’m going, but you’re coming with me.” He lunged forward and seized her by the upper
arm. Bonnie cried out in pain as his fingers dug into her flesh and he wrestled her
toward the door.

Suddenly Bonnie felt Claire’s arms about her waist. Claire tried to dig in her heels,
but they slipped on the polished wood floor and Craig dragged them both ever closer
toward the open doorway. Frantic, Bonnie clawed at his fingers but could not peel
them from her arm. Swearing, Craig grabbed Claire’s wrist, flung her arm aside, and
yanked Bonnie from her grasp. As Claire fell backward to the floor, Craig forced Bonnie
outside, slamming her shoulder against the doorframe. Stunned, she stumbled and flailed
about for an anchor, knocking over a chair and grabbing hold of a post on the lanai.
Locking her elbow around it, she brought Craig to an abrupt halt, gasping in pain
as he yanked her so hard she thought he might pull her arm from the socket.

She knew she couldn’t hold on for long, but she was desperate not to go anywhere with
the enraged stranger her ex-husband had become. “What do you want?” she cried, stalling
for time, praying that Midori was even now on the phone with the police.

“You’re coming back to Pennsylvania with me.” Roughly Craig worked to break her hold
on the post. “Then you’re going to tear up our property settlement and give me everything
I want. Then you’re going to tell that judge you made up everything. You faked those
pictures of me and Terri. You wrote those emails yourself. You never saw us together.”

“No one would believe it,” Bonnie choked out. “It’s not my word against yours. The
detective saw you at the hotel. You’ll never get him to lie too.”

Craig wrenched her arm free from the post and dragged her down the front stairs, but
she stumbled and fell, tearing herself
from his grasp. She scrambled backward out of arm’s reach and up the stairs, just
as Claire raced outside.

Claire darted between Bonnie and Craig. “Listen, Craig,” she said, hands on his chest,
barely holding him off. “You’re not thinking things through. This isn’t going to work
and you know it.” Claire’s arms trembled from the strain of holding Craig at bay as
he lunged around her for Bonnie. “How are you going to strong-arm her all the way
to Pennsylvania when you can’t even get her across the street? Do you think airport
security will let you drag her through the terminal? Do you think the judge won’t
know you’re coercing her? Do you think your kids won’t find out? Do you think they’ll
be okay with this?”

For a moment his rage seemed to waver. “I want my life back.”

“That old life is gone. You can’t unkindle a fire, and putting it out won’t restore
what you burned.” Claire planted her feet and pushed him so hard he staggered backward
a few paces. “You aren’t helping yourself by coming here like this, scaring people,
acting like a monster.”

Craig shook with rage. “That’s the same thing
she
said. I am not a monster.” He lunged for Bonnie, but Claire wedged herself between
them again.

“Bonnie never called you a monster,” said Claire.

“Not Bonnie! Terri.”

Suddenly Bonnie understood, remembered—Craig’s visit to Terri’s home, how she had
ordered him to leave her and her children alone.

“Do you really think this will get Terri back?” Claire asked, forcing Craig back another
few inches. “Think it through, Craig. How will forcing Bonnie to tear up the settlement
and telling the judge she faked the detective’s photos change anything? You’ll be
a little bit wealthier, but wealthy enough for
Terri to risk losing custody of her children for you? Do you really believe that?”

Craig began pacing the length of the lanai. Behind him, a black SUV screeched to a
halt at the curb and Eric leapt out. Faint with relief, Bonnie groped for a support
and found the doorframe. Claire made the smallest gesture to her husband, asking him
to hold off; Eric slowed his pace but his jaw was set and he looked ready to tackle
Craig if he made the slightest threatening move.

“This is not the way.” Claire took a step toward Craig, waving sharply behind her
back for Bonnie to go inside, but Bonnie couldn’t leave her alone on the lanai, not
even with Eric only a few yards away. “You can’t have your old life back, but you
can build a new one.”

“How am I supposed to do that?”

“That’s for you to figure out,” retorted Claire. “You’ve got a home, a job, your health—other
people have managed with a hell of a lot less than that. All I can tell you is that
you’re going to do it without Bonnie. She’s not going anywhere with you, and you’re
never going to bother her again.”

“Who are you to tell me what I can do or say to my wife?”

“She’s not your wife, not anymore. As for me, I’m the best friend you’ve got within
thousands of miles, so if there’s even a fraction of the Craig Markham I once knew
still in you, you’ll listen to me.”

Craig suddenly seemed to become aware of the tourists who had paused on the sidewalk
to watch the events unfold, of the guests who had come out onto their lanais and were
looking down upon him with alarm or contempt, of Claire’s stern resolve. His rage
seemed to flicker and fade. With so many former friends and even strangers arrayed
against him, he could not compel Bonnie to go with him. Not that it mattered.
Claire was right. His misguided quest had been doomed to fail from the moment he conceived
it, and watching his expression shift, his shoulders slump, Bonnie knew he finally
understood that.

“You’re going to let me and Eric drive you to the airport, and you’re going to take
the next flight back to the mainland,” Claire said, her gaze traveling past Craig
to her husband. Craig whirled around and spotted Eric, feet planted, an arrow fit
to a bow. “Where you go after that is up to you, but you’re never going to bother
Bonnie again.”

With one last flare of defiance, Craig retorted, “How do you know I won’t catch the
next flight back?”

“I’m counting on you to have at least a shred of self-respect left,” Claire snapped.
“But if I’m wrong and you show up here again, you’ll find the police waiting for you.”

Craig seemed rooted to the spot, his face twisted in consternation. Eric stepped toward
him, and only then did Craig turn his back on the Hale Kapa Kuiki and follow Eric
to his SUV. Pausing only long enough to touch Bonnie reassuringly on the shoulder,
Claire dashed after them. Bonnie watched as Eric escorted Craig into the front passenger
seat before taking his place behind the wheel. Claire climbed in the back, and as
the vehicle pulled away, Claire pressed her hand to the glass and nodded to Bonnie
through the window. Bonnie raised a hand to show her friend that she was all right,
that everything would be all right.