Part 23 (1/2)

”I know what you thought,” Samantha said. Okay, don't go any further. Get in touch with your inner Cecily. ”Yes, we've had a few challenges after losing my stepfather but let me repeat-Sweet Dreams is not ready to close its doors. We're an important part of this town's economy. Surely you ladies wouldn't want to see us go under.”

”Oh, no, of course not,” Darla said.

Samantha smiled at her. ”I didn't think so, and I appreciate that you've come to show your support and shop with us.” She opened the front door so they had no choice but to go in. ”We all support one another in this town, don't we?” she added, now turning her attention to Hildy. ”My family's been filling their prescriptions at your drugstore ever since you first opened.”

Hildy got the hint. She pressed her lips firmly together and followed Darla into the gift shop.

Savoring the small moment of one-upsmans.h.i.+p, Samantha poked her head in the door and called to Heidi, ”Give these ladies ten percent off. As our thanks for being such loyal customers,” she told the women. The irony would no doubt escape them but if not, she hoped it made them distinctly uncomfortable and spurred them to spend appropriately.

Fuming, she hurried over to Ed's via the Riverfront Park, opting to avoid the more public streets. It was a beautiful path, playing peekaboo with the river between fir and pine trees and all manner of shrubs and bushes. Some of it was muddy and an icy drizzle did its part to make sure those spots remained that way, but she kept walking.

The weather matched her mood perfectly. First the highway closure and now her mother. What in the name of G.o.diva had Mom been thinking, talking to Del Stone of all people? Del, whose sister was one of the biggest gossips in all of Icicle Falls? Had her mother been thinking at all? Probably not.

”c.r.a.p,” she muttered with every step. ”c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p, c.r.a.p!” Her family was going to be the death of her-if Mother Nature didn't do her in first. She marched on, sourly taking in the sodden landscape that had shed most of its spa.r.s.e snowfall. What a c.r.a.ppy year it had been. And what a c.r.a.ppy new year it was starting out to be! Why couldn't something, anything, go right?

She could feel tears stinging her eyes and fiercely blinked them back. No way was she letting this d.a.m.ned rockslide take her down. No way, no way, no way.

She remembered Trevor Brown, waiting in the wings to absorb Sweet Dreams into his company, and Blake Preston and his gang of bank thugs doing all they could to truss her up like a Thanksgiving turkey and deliver her on a platter. She wanted to run away.

With Blake.

Where had that come from? She wouldn't run away with him if it was the end of the world and he was driving the last working car out of town. And if he and his cronies thought she was just going to lie down and die because of a minor inconvenience like a few rocks on the road, they could think again. She set her jaw and quickened her pace.

She was almost at the footbridge when she caught sight of other people, teenage people, people who should be in school. Instead, they were hanging out here in the park, smoking cigarettes. Samantha frowned in disgust. She'd never tried smoking, never had any desire to. It was an expensive habit that made your clothes smell and shortened your life, so she couldn't understand why anyone would want to suck on the nasty things. But people did all the time. And that was their business, she told herself.

But then she got a couple of steps closer and recognized one of the kids. The girl with the short hair dyed jet-black tipped with red and wearing jeans and a ratty jacket was Ca.s.s's fourteen-year-old daughter, Amber. Ca.s.s had been worried about her. It looked like Ca.s.s had been right to worry.

Samantha hesitated. What to do? Did she pretend she didn't see? Did she say something? Oh, for heaven's sake, did she even need to ask? She marched over to where Amber and another girl stood with two pimply faced gangly boys.

One of the boys had just given Amber a cigarette and she had it halfway to her mouth when she saw Samantha. Her eyes got saucer-big at the sight of her mother's friend and the cigarette instantly went behind her back.

”No point hiding it,” Samantha said. ”I saw.”

The taller of the two boys eyed her with hostility. ”Who are you?”

”I'm someone who doesn't have to be in school,” Samantha said, whipping her cell phone out of her pocket. ”And you have one minute to turn your tail around and get back there before I call and tell your princ.i.p.al you're all cutting cla.s.s.”

The boy raised his chin. ”You don't know us.”

”Nope, but I know her and I bet it won't be hard for your teachers to figure out who's missing.”

The boy hunched inside his coat and stalked off, flipping the old one-finger salute at Samantha as he left. She flipped him right back. The other boy and girl followed, keeping their fingers to themselves, settling instead for shooting her dirty looks as they went. She almost laughed. Like that sample of sullenness was supposed to bother her? She was doing battle with a rockslide and chocolate vultures. A little teenage anger was nothing more than comic relief.

Amber lingered. ”Are you going to tell my mom?” she asked in a small voice.

”Should I?”

Amber shook her head vigorously, making the little hoops in her row of earrings rattle.

”You're smoking.”

”I was just going to try it.”

”And fill your lungs full of tar and nicotine and end up getting hooked and wrecking your health. And your looks. Amber, have you ever noticed how many wrinkles women who smoke have? All around their mouths. It's really ugly.”

Amber shrugged like she didn't care.

Samantha tried another approach. ”You know how much your mom loves you? Can you imagine how unhappy you'd make her if you took up a habit that can wreck your health? And where would you get the money to pay for those cigarettes? They're not cheap. Oh, of course,” she said, snapping her fingers. ”Those terrific friends of yours would help you get the money, probably by shoplifting. It's hard to shoplift in Icicle Falls, though. Everybody knows everybody. You'd get caught for sure. They send you to jail for that.”

Amber bit her lip. She looked like she was going to cry. ”Please, Sam, don't tell Mom.”

Maybe she'd scared the girl enough, at least for now. But for good measure she decided to add some positive reinforcement. ”If you want an addiction, try chocolate. It won't make your clothes stink and it's got endorphins to help you feel good. Come by the shop after school and I'll have a box waiting for you.”

Amber's face lit up. ”Really?”

”Really. And if you bring up your grades by next report card, I'll give you a two-pound box.”

Now Amber was practically jumping up and down. ”Oh, wow, thanks. And you won't tell my mom?”

”I didn't say that.”

”I promise I won't even touch a cigarette.”

”If you do your mom will find out. She'll smell it on you.”

”So please don't tell her,” Amber begged.

”I'll think about it,” Samantha hedged. ”Just like I hope you'll think about the kind of people you want to hang out with. You're old enough to know the difference between a winner and a loser. Which one do you want to see when you look in the mirror?”

Amber dropped her gaze and mumbled, ”A winner.”

”A lot of us think you're a pretty cool kid,” Samantha said. ”I hope we're not wrong.”

Amber nodded. Then, figuring the lecture was over, she turned and fled toward town and, hopefully, school.

If ever there was a walking ad for birth control, it was a teenager. Yes, Samantha had a business to save but she'd take that over raising a teenager any day.

Oh, but she had her mother, which was almost as bad. And dealing with Mom would have to be the next order of business after she finished with the festival committee.

She found them huddled around the oak table in the private room at D'Vine Wines. The cheery Italian mural on the wall behind them, the cheese and crackers, the open bottle of wine and the gla.s.ses-it could have been a party except for the long faces.

”What are we going to do?” Olivia moaned.

”We're going to continue with our plans,” Samantha said. ”The Department of Transportation will have that mess cleared away in plenty of time for the festival.”