Нора Робертс - Blue Dahlia

"Well, she's gone now."

"Good riddance."

Stella took a deep breath. No arguments, she thought, as her stomach clenched and unclenched like a

fist. Too tired to argue.

"The kids are sleeping. They're just worn out. Tomorrow ... we'll just deal with tomorrow. I guess that's the way it's going to be." She let her head fall back, closed her eyes. "I keep thinking this is a horrible dream, and I'll wake up any second. Kevin will be here. I don't... I can't imagine life without him. I can't stand to imagine it."

The tears started again. "Mom, I don't know what I'm going to do."

"Had insurance, didn't he?"

Stella blinked, stared as Carla set a cup of coffee in front of her. "What?"

"Life insurance. He was covered?"

"Yes, but—"

"You ought to talk to a lawyer about suing the airline. Better start thinking of practicalities." She sat with her own coffee. "It's what you're best at, anyway."

"Mom"—she spoke slowly as if translating a strange foreign language—"Kevin's dead."

"I know that, Stella, and I'm sorry." Reaching over, Carla gave Stella's hand a pat. "I dropped everything to come here and give you a hand, didn't I?"

"Yes." She had to remember that. Appreciate that.

"It's a damn fucked-up world when a man of his age dies for no good reason. Useless waste. I'll never understand it."

"No." Pulling a tissue out of her pocket, Stella rubbed the tears away. "Neither will I."

"I liked him. But the fact is, you're in a fix now. Bills, kids to support. Widowed with two growing boys. Not many men want to take on ready-made families, let me tell you."

"I don't want a man to take us on. God, Mom."

"You will," Carla said with a nod. 'Take my advice and make sure the next one's got money. Don't make my mistakes. You lost your husband, and that's hard. It's really hard. But women lose husbands every day. It's better to lose one this way than to go through a divorce."

The pain in Stella's stomach was too sharp for grief, too cold for rage. "Mom. We had Kevin's memorial service today. I have his ashes in a goddamn box in my bedroom."

"You want my help." She waggled the spoon. "I'm trying to give it to you. You sue the pants off the airline, get yourself a solid nest egg. And don't hook yourself up with some loser like I always do. You don't think divorce is a hard knock, too? Haven't been through one, have you? Well, I have. Twice. And I might as well tell you it's coming up on three. I'm done with that stupid son of a bitch.

You've got no idea what he's put me through. Not only is he an inconsiderate, loudmouthed asshole, but

I think he's been cheating on me."

She pushed away from the table, rummaged around, then cut herself a piece of cake. "He thinks I'm going to tolerate that, he's mistaken. I'd just love to see his face when he gets served with the papers. Today."

"I'm sorry your third marriage isn't working out," Stella said stiffly. "But it's a little hard for me to be sympathetic, since both the third marriage and the third divorce were your choice. Kevin's dead. My husband is dead, and that sure as hell wasn't my choice."

"You think I want to go through this again? You think I want to come here to help you out, then have your father's bimbo shoved in my face?"

"She's his wife, who has never been anything but decent to you and who has always treated me kindly."

'To your face." Carla stuffed a bite of cake into her mouth. "You think you're the only one with problems? With heartache? You won't be so quick to shrug it off when you're pushing fifty and facing

life alone."

"You're pushing fifty from the back end, Mom, and being alone is, again, your choice."

Temper turned Carla's eyes dark and sharp. "I don't appreciate that tone, Stella. I don't have to put up with it."

"No, you don't. You certainly don't. In fact, it would probably be best for both of us if you left. Right now. This was a bad idea. I don't know what I was thinking."

"You want me gone, fine." Carla shoved up from the table. "I'd just as soon get back to my own life.

You never had any gratitude in you, and if you couldn't be on my back about something you weren't happy. Next time you want to cry on somebody's shoulder, call your country bumpkin stepmother."

"Oh, I will," Stella murmured as Carla sailed out of the room. "Believe me."

She rose to carry her cup to the sink, then gave in to the petty urge and smashed it. She wanted to break everything as she'd been broken. She wanted to wreak havoc on the world as it had been on her.

Instead she stood gripping the edge of the sink and praying that her mother would pack and leave quickly. She wanted her out. Why had she ever thought she wanted her to stay? It was always the same between them. Abrasive, combative. No connection, no common ground.

But God, she'd wanted that shoulder. Needed it so much, just for one night. Tomorrow she would do whatever came next. But she'd wanted to be held and stroked and comforted tonight.

With trembling fingers she cleaned the broken shards out of the sink, wept over them a little as she poured them into the trash. Then she walked to the phone and called a cab for her mother.

They didn't speak again, and Stella decided that was for the best. She closed the door, listened to the

cab drive away.

Alone now, she checked on her sons, tucked blankets over them, laid her lips gently on their heads.

They were all she had now. And she was all they had.

She would be a better mother. She swore it. More patient. She would never, never let them down. She would never walk away when they needed her.

And when they needed her shoulder, by God, she would give it. No matter what. No matter when.

"You're first for me," she whispered. "You'll always be first for me."

In her own room, she undressed again, then took Kevin's old flannel robe out of the closet. She wrapped herself in it, in the familiar, heartbreaking smell of him.

Curling up on the bed, she hugged the robe close, shut her eyes, and prayed for morning. For what happened next.

She couldn't afford to be intimidated by the house, or by its mistress. They both had reputations.

The house was said to be elegant and old,with gardens that rivaled Eden. She'd just confirmed that for herself.

The woman was said to be interesting, somewhat solitary, and perhaps a bit "difficult." A word, Stella knew, that could mean anything from strong-willed to stone bitch.

Either way, she could handle it, she reminded herself as she fought the need to get up and pace. She'd handled worse.

She needed this job. Not just for the salary—and it was generous—but for the structure, for the challenge, for the doing. Doing more, she knew, than circling the wheel she'd fallen into back home.

She needed a life, something more than clocking time, drawing a paycheck that would be soaked up by bills. She needed, however self-help-book it sounded, something that fulfilled and challenged her.

Rosalind Harper was fulfilled, Stella was sure. A beautiful ancestral home, a thriving business. What was it like, she wondered, to wake up every morning knowing exactly where you belonged and where you were going?

If she could earn one thing for herself, and give that gift to her children, it would be the sense of knowing. She was afraid she'd lost any clear sight of that with Kevin's death. The sense of doing, no problem. Give her a task or a challenge and the room to accomplish or solve it, she was your girl.

But the sense of knowing who she was, in the heart of herself, had been mangled that day in September of 2001 and had never fully healed.

This was her start, this move back to Tennessee. This final and face-to-face interview with Rosalind Harper. If she didn't get the job—well, she'd get another. No one could accuse her of not knowing how

to work or how to provide a living for herself and her kids.

But, God, she wanted this job.

She straightened her shoulders and tried to ignore all the whispers of doubt muttering inside her head. She'd get this one.

She'd dressed carefully for this meeting. Businesslike but not fussy, in a navy suit and starched white blouse. Good shoes, good bag, she thought. Simple jewelry. Nothing flashy. Subtle makeup, to bring

out the blue of her eyes. She'd fought her hair into a clip at the nape of her neck. If she was lucky, the curling mass of it wouldn't spring out until the interview was over.

Rosalind was keeping her waiting. It was probably a mind game, Stella decided as her fingers twisted, untwisted her watchband. Letting her sit and stew in the gorgeous parlor, letting her take in the lovely antiques and paintings, the sumptuous view from the front windows.

All in that dreamy and gracious southern style that reminded her she was a Yankee fish out of water.

Things moved slower down here, she reminded herself. She would have to remember that this was a different pace from the one she was used to, and a different culture.

The fireplace was probably an Adams, she decided. That lamp was certainly an original Tiffany. Would they call those drapes portieres down here, or was that too Scarlett O'Hara? Were the lace panels under the drapes heirlooms?

God, had she ever been more out of her element? What was a middle-class widow from Michigan doing in all this southern splendor?

She steadied herself, fixed a neutral expression on her face, when she heard footsteps coming down the hall.

"Brought coffee." It wasn't Rosalind, but the cheerful man who'd answered the door and escorted Stella to the parlor.