The Potluck Club (3 page)

“Well, I wouldn’t know. I haven’t seen Vernon in over a month and haven’t had a decent conversation with him in I don’t know how long.”

“He looked healthy.”

“I’m sure he’s fine, Evie. I’m also sure you were shamelessly flirting.”

I reached for the utensil drawer and pulled out my can opener so I could open the cans of onion soup. “So? He’s not married anymore, and I’m not married period. Where’s the problem?”

“You know the answer to that as good as I do. It’s not fitting for a woman of our age . . .”

Not fitting. I poured the two cans of soup over the rice and thought how easy it is for a married woman to say how a single woman should act. What does she know about the loneliness or the emptiness? What does she know about eating cold sandwiches in a dark living room by the light of the television or holding a pillow close to her breast and pretending a warm body is next to her? “Maybe he’s got financial problems.”

“Evie . . .”

“Or maybe he’s bored with his job.”

“That I can imagine.”

I pulled the telephone cord as I walked across the kitchen toward the pantry, where I pulled two cans of beef bouillon soup off the shelf and returned to the counter where the rest of the necessary items waited.

“Poor Vernon. In all these years not one serious felony.”

“Thank the good Lord.”

I picked up the can opener and began to open the third and forth cans of soup. “Vern’s probably thanking the good Lord for tourists. If he didn’t have them and all the problems that come with them, his sole job would be dusting the courthouse all day.”

“At least he has his work with the volunteer fire department. That keeps him out of trouble.”

“Yes, what would we do without our snow bunnies who manage to get lost in the mountains at least once before they go back to wherever they come from.” I added the soups to the mixture, then popped the top on the mushrooms and threw them in as well. Cooking the way I like it. Simple, simple, simple. “I’m done with the rice. Other than cooking it, I mean, and I don’t really have to do that part. What are you bringing tomorrow?”

“I have a new pork chop and potato dish.”

I sighed.

“What’s wrong with that?” she asked.

“Well, I’m making rice.”

“And?”

“Rice and potatoes?”

Vonnie laughed. “Remember, sweet one, that our purpose is to pray, not eat.”

I laughed along with her. “What do you think that Lisa woman is going to bring? Some Texas dish, I’ll bet.”

“Evie. Lisa Leann is a nice woman. A good woman.”

“I called Jan Moore about it.”

I heard a slight gasp from the other end of the line. “You didn’t.” “I did. She told me she thinks she might have been somewhat responsible for Lisa Leann inviting herself.”

“In what way?”

“I don’t know. That’s just what she said. Had that ‘I’m sorry’ tone in her voice. Well, I’m not happy about it, but who in their right mind could ever be angry with Jan Moore? She’s the sweetest thing . . .”

“That she is. The more I know her, the more I love her. I don’t even want to think about the Moores leaving us for another church. Not ever.”

“They won’t leave. Though if Jan lets one more person into my group, I may drop-kick her through the goalpost of life.” I laughed at my own humor, Vonnie with me. “Still, I say we ought to be able to find some way to get Mrs. Lambert out of the club. After all, this is her first meeting, and she wasn’t even invited.”

“Evie, we are a Christian prayer group.”

“All right. Let me get this in the oven, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Sounds good.”

I covered the casserole dish with its glass top. “And Vonnie?”

“Yes?”

“Don’t mention to anyone about Vern, okay?”

“Of course not.”

I hung up the phone, then walked the Corningware over to the oven. As soon as I slid it on the center shelf and shut the door, my telephone rang.

“Hello?”

“Aunt Evie?”

“Leigh?” It was Peggy’s daughter, my twenty-five-year-old niece.

“Hi, Aunt Evie.”

I could hear a cacophony in the background. “Where are you?”

“I’m in O’Hare.”

I swung around and rested my bony hip against the counter. “Say that again?”

“O’Hare.”

“What in the world are you doing there?”

“I’ve left home.”

I decided we must have a bad connection. “You’ve done what? You’ve left home?”

“I’m coming to Colorado, Aunt Evie. I’m coming to see you . . . to stay with you for a while, you know what I’m saying?”

So much for lonely
, I thought, closing my eyes. Still . . . “Leigh, you can’t be serious.”

“I am serious, Aunt Evie.”

My eyes widened as if to take in what Leigh was saying. So this was why Peggy had been so quiet lately when I asked her about Leigh. She was always open and honest about her boys, but lately she’d been very secretive about Leigh. “Are you having problems with your mama?”

“Aunt Evie—”

“Answer me, Leigh. You can’t just come out here without telling me something.”

“I’ll tell you when I see you. I arrive in Denver in a few hours. I’ll take a shuttle to Summit View; you don’t have to pick me up at the airport. I don’t want you out this late.” She paused for a moment. “Aunt Evie, they’re calling my flight number. I have to go now. I’ll see you tonight, okay? I love you.”

“I love you—” The line went dead before I had a chance to finish. “Oh, Lord, what in the world?” I hung up my phone and picked it up again, dialing Peggy’s number.

“Hello?”

“Margaret Benson Banks, would you mind telling me what’s going on out there?”

“Good afternoon to you too, Evie.”

I walked over to the kitchen table and sat in one of the chairs. “I just received a call from Leigh.”

There was an audible sigh from the other end. “I should’ve known she’d go there.”

“And?”

“And what?”

“What’s going on?”

“I think you’ll have to talk to Leigh. All I can say right now is that she has broken our hearts, Evie. She has nearly destroyed her father and me.”

“What does that mean?”

“Evie,” Peggy’s voice dropped an octave, “you know how Leigh has always been. Wild . . .”

“Spirited.”

“Spoiled.”

“Unconventional.”

Peggy sighed again. “You’ve always seen Leigh as you want to see her. I’m her mother . . .”

“And you’ve always wanted her to be just like you. Why not let her be who she is?”

“Because.” Peggy’s voice was up again. “You know what, Evangeline? You just keep your condemnations to yourself. I don’t see how you can possibly judge me when you’ve raised not one single child of your own, especially one who came along late in life. I don’t see how . . .” she trailed off. “Why don’t you just call me tomorrow after you’ve talked to Leigh and then we’ll see how you feel about all this?”

I was almost too stunned to respond, but I did, in the most cutting way I knew how. “I think I will. I’ll just do that. I have to go now, Peggy. I have to get your old room ready for your daughter. Looks like I’ll have a child to take care of after all.”

“Yeah, well. I hope you do a better job of that than the job you’ve done caring for Papa and Mama’s graves.”

I slammed the phone down.
How dare she? So I don’t like cemeter
–
ies. She didn’t have to get mean about it, now did she?

Leigh wasn’t really a child, but to me she’d always be a precocious little girl in blond ringlet pigtails. She’s got large blue eyes you could just drown in and the softest, prettiest skin ever to grace a young lady. There were framed photographs of her all over my house, so it didn’t surprise me, either, that she would come here. She’d always known how I felt about her.

I busied myself for the next few hours getting her room ready, then waited in the living room, reading our Beth Moore study book. I just love Beth Moore. She’s—how does Vonnie say it?—deep. The sky had long ago grown dark, so I got up and turned the front porch light on, then walked over to the front window and peered out just in time to see a passenger van pull into my driveway. I turned away, rushing to the front door so I could open it for Leigh as soon as she got up to it. The weather was bitterly cold, and I didn’t want her out there even a second longer than she had to be.

As soon as I heard her nearing the porch, I swung the door open wide. “Hurry. Hurry,” I said as she stepped into the foyer. I closed the door and turned to take a look at her. She carried a small suitcase in her right hand and had a purse slung over her shoulder. Her hair, dyed dark red and cut short and spiked all over her head, carried flakes of snow. When she shook her head, snowflakes fell to the shoulders of her wool coat.

“Let me get you out of that coat,” I said, reaching for it. “Then we’ll go into the living room, where I have a nice warm fire going.”

“Thanks, Aunt Evie,” she said, setting the suitcase on the floor, then turning around as she unbuttoned her coat.

I pulled it from her shoulders and turned toward the foyer coat-rack so I could hang it there to dry. I heard Leigh heading toward the living room, and I called after her. “Are you hungry?”

“No. I grabbed something at the airport.”

I frowned, walking into the living room, where she stood facing the fireplace. “Why did you do that?”

She turned to look over her shoulder and smiled at me. “I was hungry.”

And then she turned all the way around.

What can I say?

There she was, my beautiful Leigh, with a belly as round as a basketball.

3

Does she know
she’s infamous . . .

That Evangeline and the Potluck Club. As ace reporter of the
Gold
Rush News
, knowing what he knew . . .

Clay Whitefield shook his head and tapped his pen on his lip. Well, a man could weep at the sorrow of it all . . . or crack up laughing.

Clay was chuckling.

The legend of Evangeline and Sheriff Vesey was nearly as famous around Summit View as the stories of the old gold rush days—not that Clay believed Ms. Benson knew just how infamous she had become over the years.
Because if she did
, Clay thought,
well, she
wouldn’t set foot anywhere in town, much less in her beloved church.

The ladies of the Potluck. One day he’d crack their story, no matter how many days he had to sit in this one spot, keeping his eyes peeled and his ears open. Or how much he had to imagine before he got to the truth.

4

On a Roll

As I powered down my window to back my Lincoln out of that tricky parking spot in front of Mac’s Video Store, I noticed the sky was sputtering something that looked like slush again.
Doesn’t the
weather around here ever make up its mind?

Just that morning, as I sat in the cedar rocking chair on my balcony and tried to read from the Psalms, the sky was a blazing September blue. The groves of aspen zigzagged glowing yellow up emerald-green mountains. The whole mess reflected like a postcard into the silver mirror they call Golden Lake. Scenery like that called Henry and me to this state of wonder. But now that we’ve actually sold our exclusive home in the Woodlands, near Houston, I’m still in a state of wonder, wondering,
Why? What were we thinking?

I, Lisa Leann Lambert, am only forty-seven years old and still in my prime. I’m not ready to retire to that little ol’ rocking chair. But that’s just what Summit View, Colorado, has done to me. It’s turned me into a rocking-chair granny. Now, I don’t cuss like a cowboy, never have. But shall I daresay Summit View has been a rocking chair . . .

“H-e-l-l-o, Donna!”

Henry says I wave too much. But I can’t help it if I’m friendly. Besides, most folks wave right back. Even Donna Vesey. Seeing her standing out there doing her job, I had to think she looked great decked out in her sheriff deputy’s uniform. Why, see there, she was almost pretty despite that scowl she was wearing. Of course, if I was standing in the icy rain, writing speeding tickets to men in little red sports cars, I’d scowl too. I’d bet that was a rental car, straight from a DIA rental lot with a California driver behind the wheel. That ticket served him right.
You go, Donna girl!

The chill made me power up the window and turn on the heat. While I was at it, I hit the windshield wipers. I turned on the stereo, and Sandi Patti belted out “Majesty,” one of my all-time favorites; and it certainly described the scenery in my new subdivision, Gold Rush Townhomes. None of those puppies around Golden Lake sell for anything less than three quarters of a mill—they’re some digs, I can tell you.

Of course, the thing about our frequent afternoon rain showers is that they always manage to streak my Lincoln Continental with dust. I probably should’ve gotten the tan Lincoln instead of the maroon, but this one has a lot more gadgets, like heated leather seats. And I just know that will come in right handy in a month or two.

This town may not have an automatic car wash, but at least it has a mom-and-pop video store. I guess it would be too much to ask that it carry DVDs too. Thank goodness I kept my old video player.