The Cabin (2 page)

“Something happened to me when I was up there—I

don’t know if I can explain it. It’s as if this cabin was

just meant to be. As if I was supposed to buy it.”

“Moved by invisible forces?”

She ignored his sarcasm. “Yes.” She sipped her drink,

which she noticed was not as strong as her first one. “My

roots are there.”

“Roots, my ass. Iris and your dad haven’t lived in the

Adirondacks in, what, sixty years?”

He shook his head, plainly mystified by this latest

move of hers. He hadn’t liked it when she’d set up her

office in Boston with Tess, his daughter who was a

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graphic artist, then stayed on her own after Tess had

moved up to her nineteenth-century carriage house on

the north shore with her new family. Office space im-

plied a permanence Jim Haviland didn’t want Susanna

to establish in Boston. He wanted her back with her hus-

band. It was the way his world worked.

Hers, too, but life wasn’t always that simple.

Plus, she knew Jim liked Lieutenant Jack Galway,

Texas Ranger. No surprise there. They were both men

who saw most things in terms of black and white.

Jim wiped down the bar with his white towel, put-

ting muscle into the effort, as if somehow it might re-

lieve his frustrations with her and make him understand

why she’d bought a cabin. “The Adirondacks are what,

a five, six-hour drive?”

“About that.” Susanna drank more of her margarita.

“I got my pilot’s license this fall. Jack doesn’t know.

Maybe I’ll buy a plane. There’s a nice little airport in

Lake Placid.”

Jim stared at her, assessing. “A cabin in the moun-

tains, a plane, black cashmere—how much damn money

do you have?”

Her stomach twisted into an instantaneous knot.

She had ten million as of the first of October. It was

a milestone. People knew she was doing well, but few

had any idea how well—not even her own husband.

She just didn’t talk about it. She didn’t want money

clouding anyone’s opinion of her. Of themselves. She

didn’t want it to change her life, except maybe it already

had. “I’ve made some lucky investments,” she told Jim.

“Ha. I’ll bet luck had nothing to do with it. You’re

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smart, Susanna Dunning Galway. You’re smart, and

you’re tough, and—” He paused for air, which he

sucked in, then heaved out in a despairing sigh. “Damn

it, Susanna, you have no goddamn business buying a

cabin in the Adirondacks. Jack doesn’t know?”

“You don’t give up, do you?”

“That means, no, Jack doesn’t know. What are you

doing, trying to piss him off to the point he gives up on

you—or comes up here to fetch you?”

“He’s not coming up here to fetch me.”

“Don’t count on it.”

A young couple wandered in and sat at one of the ta-

bles, hanging on to each other, not bothering with First

Night festivities, Susanna thought, for very different

reasons than hers. Jim greeted them warmly and went

around the bar to take their order, but he stopped to

glower back at her. “Did you tell Iris you were buying

a place in her old stomping grounds, give her a chance

to weigh in?” He didn’t wait for her to answer. “No, you

didn’t, because you’re bullheaded and do what you

damn well want to do.”

“I’m not selfish—”

“I didn’t say you were selfish. You’re one of the

kindest, most generous people I know. I said you’re

bullheaded.”

Her head spun. Maybe she should have consulted

Jack. His name wasn’t on the deed but they were still

married. She planned to get around to telling him—it

wasn’t like her cabin was a secret. Not really. When she

was on Blackwater Lake, her husband and her marriage

weren’t the issue. The cabin was about her, her life, her

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15

roots. She couldn’t explain. She’d almost felt as if she’d

been destined to go up there, see the lake on her own,

that somehow it would help her make sense of the past

fourteen months.

Jim took the couple’s order and headed back behind

the bar. Before she said another word, he dipped her up

a bowl of steaming chili and set it in front of her. “You

need something in your stomach.”

“I really want another margarita.”

“Not a chance.”

“I live up the street.” She stared at the chili, spicy and

hot on a very cold Boston night. But she wasn’t hungry.

“If I pass out in a ditch, somebody will find me before

I freeze to death.”

Jim refrained from answering. Davey Ahearn had

come into the bar, easing onto his favorite stool just

down from Susanna. Susanna could feel the cold still

coming off him. He shook his head at her. “Pain in the

ass you are, Suzie, I wouldn’t count on it. We all might

leave you in the damn ditch, hope the cold’ll jump-start

your brain and you’ll go back to Texas.”

“The cold weather doesn’t bother me.”

Of course, the cold wasn’t Davey’s point at all, and

she knew it. He was a big man, a plumber with a huge

handlebar mustache and at least two ex-wives. He was

another of her father’s boyhood friends, godfather to Jim

Haviland’s daughter, Tess, and a constant thorn in Su-

sanna’s side. Tess said it was best not to encourage

Davey Ahearn by trying to argue with him, but Susanna

seldom could resist—and neither could Tess.

He ordered a beer and a bowl of chili with saltines,

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and Susanna made an exaggerated face. “Saltines and

chili? That’s disgusting.”

“What’re you doing here, anyway?” Davey shivered,

as if still shaking off the frigid temperatures. Boston had

been in the grips of a bitter cold snap for days, and even

the natives had had enough. “Go play mahjong with Iris

and her pals. A million years old, and they know how

to party.”

“You’re right,” Susanna said. “It’s not a good sign,

me sitting in a Somerville bar drinking margaritas and

eating chili with a cranky plumber.”

Davey grinned at her. “I eat chili with a fork.”

She bit back an unwilling laugh. “That’s really bad,

Davey. I mean,
really
bad.”

“Made you smile.” His beer and nightly special ar-

rived, and he unwrapped three packets of saltine crack-

ers and crumbled them onto his chili, paying no

attention to Susanna’s groan. “Jimmy, how long before

we can stick a fork in this year?”

“Twenty-five minutes,” Jim said. “I thought you had

a date.”

“I did. She got mad and went home.”

Although she wasn’t hungry, Susanna tried some of

her chili. “Davey Ahearn annoying a woman? I can’t

imagine.”

“Was that sarcasm, Mrs. Jack Galway?”

Jim intervened. “All right, you two. I’m opening a

bottle of bubbly at midnight. It’s on the house. What do

we have, a half-dozen people in here?”

He lined up the glasses on the bar. Susanna watched

him work, the chili burning in her mouth, the two mar-

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17

garitas she’d consumed on an empty stomach making

her a little woozy. “Do you think I had kids too young?”

Susanna asked abruptly, without thinking. It had to be

the margaritas. “I don’t. I think it was just what hap-

pened. I was twenty-two, and all of a sudden, I’m preg-

nant with twins.”

“I bet it wasn’t all of a sudden,” Davey said.

She pretended not to hear him. “And here I am with

this man—this independent, hardheaded Texan who

wants to be a Texas Ranger never mind that he went to

Harvard. We met when he was a student—”

“We remember,” Jim said gently.

“They were cute babies, Maggie and Ellen. Adorable.

They’re fraternal twins—they’re not identical.”

But Jim and Davey already knew that, too. Her chest

hurt, and she fought a sudden urge to cry. What was

wrong with her? Margaritas, New Year’s Eve, a cabin

in the mountains. Not being with Jack.

Jim Haviland checked each champagne glass to

make sure it was clean. “They were damn cute babies,”

he concurred.

“That’s right, you’d see them when we were up vis-

iting Gran. Her place was always my anchor as a kid—

we moved around all the time. It’s no wonder I came

here when push came to shove with Jack and me.”

She shut her eyes, willing herself to stop talking.

When she opened them again, the room was spinning a

little, and she cleared her throat. If she did pass out and

hit her head, Jim Haviland and Davey Ahearn would

seize the moment and call Jack. No question in her mind.

Then Jack would tell them a concussion served her right.

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Susanna’s heart raced. “This is only the second time

Maggie and Ellen have flown alone.” She narrowed her

eyes to help steady the room, imagining Jack there with

one of his amused half smiles. She couldn’t remember

when she’d had two margaritas in a row. He’d take

credit. Say she was lonely. Missed him in bed. She gave

herself a mental shake. “I was a nervous wreck the first

time they flew alone.”

“Doesn’t look like you’re doing much better this

time,” Davey said.

She had to admit that a third margarita would put her

over the edge. She was hanging by her fingernails as it

was. That was why Jim Haviland had glowered and

chatted with her and served her up the chili—not just

to give her a hard time, but to keep her from freefalling.

“What if Maggie and Ellen end up going to college

in Texas?” She gulped for air, looking over at Davey.

“What if I stay up here? My God, I’ll never see them.

And Jack—”

Davey drank some of his beer, wiping the foam off

his mustache. “Are there colleges in Texas?”

His wisecrack cut through her crazy mood. “That’s

not funny. What if Texans came up here and made stu-

pid assumptions about northerners?”

“What, like we’re all rude and talk too fast? Maggie

and Ellen tell me that all the time. Some of us also eat

saltines with our chili.” He winked at her, knowing he’d

made his point. “And you’re a northerner, you know,

Suzie-cue. I don’t care how many times you moved as

a kid. Your dad grew up right here on this street. When

Iris can’t keep up with her place anymore, he and your

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19

mom will move in with her. They’ll board up the gal-

lery in Austin before you know it.”

“That’s the plan,” Susanna admitted.

“A plumber, a bartender and an artist.” Davey shook

his head in amazement. “Who’d have thought it? Al-

though Kevin always was good with the graffiti.”

Susanna smiled. Both her parents were artists, her

mother also an expert in antique quilts. They’d surprised

everyone seven years ago when they opened a success-

ful gallery in Austin and started restoring a 1930s home,

a project seemingly without end. But they still spent

summers on the New York shore of Lake Champlain.

When Susanna was growing up, they’d moved from

place to place to teach, work, open and close galleries

and otherwise indulge their wanderlust. They’d been a

little shocked when Susanna had gone into financial

planning and married a Texas Ranger, but she’d always

gotten along well with her parents and had liked hav-

ing them close by in Austin. They didn’t interfere with

her relationship with Jack, but she knew Kevin and Eva

Dunning didn’t understand why their daughter was liv-

ing with Gran. Their response to both Susanna and Jack

had been the same: they’d come to their senses soon

enough.

Jim examined a frosty bottle of champagne and said

idly, as if reading Susanna’s mind, “You’ve never ex-

plained what it was that made you come up here. Did you

and Jack have a big fight, or did you just wake up one

day and decide you needed to hear a Boston accent?”

“Maggie and Ellen had already planned to spend a

semester up here—”

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“Like it’s Paris or London,” Davey said. “Their se-

mester abroad.”

“Their semester with Gran,” Susanna corrected.

“Yeah, now it’s a year,” Jim said, “and it doesn’t ex-

plain you.”

“There was a stalker.” The words were out before she

could stop them. “I suppose technically he wasn’t a

stalker—he turned up where I was a couple of times, but

I can’t prove he followed me. I didn’t even know who

he was until he showed up in my kitchen. He said

things.”

Davey Ahearn swore under his breath. Jim stared at

her, grim-faced, neither man kidding now. “What did

you do?” Jim asked.

Susanna blinked rapidly. What was wrong with her?

She’d never told anyone this. No one. Not a soul.
This

was a secret, she thought. “I tried not to provoke him.

He wanted me to talk to Jack on his behalf. He said his

piece and left.”

Jim looked tense. “Then what?”