Darlene Gardner - Anything for Her Children

The biggest sale of the year, she typed into a text box. Wasn’t that the way of the world, she thought. Everything cost less after the holiday shopping season.

“Morning, Keri.” Jill McMann approached from behind her and set a fragrant cup of cappuccino on the desk next to Keri’s computer. Mocha, her favorite flavor.

Keri breathed in the familiar scent, then smiled at her friend. “You’re too good to me.”

“Then it’s your turn.” Jill swept a hand down the lime-green sweater dress that looked great with her short black hair and pale skin. “Tell me you still can’t see my baby weight.”

“What baby weight?”

“Good answer.” Jill sank into her seat at the computer in the cubicle across from Keri’s.

Because Jill had filled Maddy’s position after Maddy died, Keri hadn’t been prepared to like her. But Jill had slowly won Keri over with her wry wit. It helped that Jill didn’t like sports and never talked basketball, two things Keri got enough of at home.

“I’ll deny this if you repeat it, but I’m glad I don’t have to change any more diapers until tonight. I swear Amy’s going for a world record.” Only a year older than Keri’s twenty-five, Jill had packed a lot of living into the past three years. She’d fallen in love, gotten married and had a baby girl who was now five months old. “So now that you’ve heard what I did this weekend, what did you do?”

“The usual. Laundry. Grocery shopping. Cleaning. Oh, and I helped Rose with a history project. She remembered on Sunday that it was due today.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Jill said as she logged on to her computer. “Did you do anything for you? ”

“I saw a movie.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere.” Jill gave Keri her full attention, her amber-colored eyes sparkling. “Which movie?”

“Romancing the Stone.”

Jill groaned. “That movie’s twenty years old. I thought you went out to the movie theater. Possibly with a man.”

“I don’t have time to date,” Keri said.

“You don’t make time to date.” Jill swiveled in her seat and crossed one long leg over the other. “Why, even Bryan’s dating. Did I tell you I saw him at Mario’s Pizza double-dating with Becky Harding and her boyfriend?”

Keri snapped to attention. “When?”

“Let’s see.” Jill tapped the end of a pen on her desk. “Over Christmas break. The Saturday before last.”

That didn’t make sense. The Snowball Dance had been before the break. If Becky was upset about not going with Bryan, why would she be hanging out with him? “Are you sure?”

“Positive. That Saturday was Kevin’s birthday. He got to choose the restaurant. Last year he picked La Fontaine, that fabulous French place about an hour from here.” Jill carried on, unaware she’d temporarily lost Keri’s attention.

“But this year we had Amy so he settled for Mario’s. Good thing, too, because she started screaming bloody murder when the waiter brought the food. Probably because she doesn’t have teeth yet.”

“Are you positive it was Becky Harding?”

Jill seemed taken aback by the question. “Yeah. I know Becky. The Hardings are neighbors of mine.”

“And Bryan was with her?”

“Not ‘with her’ with her,” Jill said. “Bryan was with some blonde. Becky was with her boyfriend. Jeremiah something or other.”

“Jeremiah Bowden,” Keri supplied. She didn’t know the boy personally but had heard Bryan mention his name several times.

“That’s it. Jeremiah Bowden. I remember Becky’s mom saying he’s on the football team.”

“What’s Becky like?” Keri asked.

“I couldn’t say, really. But I like her mom and her younger sister’s a sweetie. Her sister babysits Amy sometimes.” Jill slanted Keri a probing look. “Why all the questions?”

“No reason.” Keri squirmed in her seat, uncomfortable at the suspicious direction her thoughts had headed. Bryan would have a perfectly logical explanation for hanging out with Becky Harding. “I just like to know who Bryan’s dating.”

“You’re the one who should be dating. Have I told you that you need to get out more?”

“Hmm, maybe once or twice,” Keri joked. “And I do get out. I’m going to Bryan’s basketball game tomorrow night.”

“Like you’ll find an eligible man there,” Jill complained.

Keri pictured Grady Quinlan and wondered if a female had laid claim to him. Disgusted with herself, she shook off her curiosity. So what if the coach was good-looking enough to stop hearts? If Keri were to start dating again, she’d choose a man whose character she could admire.

That wasn’t Grady Quinlan, even if he had extricated her from that awkward situation with Tony.

“I don’t go to Bryan’s games to find men,” Keri said.

“I know. I know. You go to watch Bryan.”

Usually Jill’s comment would have been spot-on, but Bryan wasn’t even playing Tuesday night. Keri would go to the game, though, and not only to support the team.

She intended to get to the bottom of the Becky Harding mystery and to find out exactly why the girl had made so much trouble for Bryan. Even if she had to ask Becky herself.

M ARY L YNN M ARCO EXITED the kitchen of the split-level house she shared with her husband carrying two dessert plates with extralarge pieces of tiramisu.

“Here you go.” The smile she’d worn the entire evening didn’t waver as she put dessert plates decorated with showy flowers in front of Grady and Tony.

“Thanks,” said Tony without much enthusiasm.

“You’re welcome,” Mary Lynn answered in kind.

Grady picked up a fork and tried to look like he wasn’t about to burst from the extra helpings of rigatoni, bread and steamed vegetables she’d kept offering. “Is this the recipe you got from Uncle Vinny?”

Mary Lynn had phoned Grady over the weekend to invite him to dinner, claiming the single day he’d spent with the extended family in Johnstown over the Christmas holidays hadn’t been enough. She told him she’d be using recipes she’d talked Tony’s father into surrendering.

“Yes,” Mary Lynn said. “It’s layers of Italian sponge cake and mascarpone cream, although Tony’s dad’s tiramisu looks a lot better than mine.”

“Looks pretty good to me,” Grady said.

Mary Lynn adopted an even bigger smile, then sat down at the end of the table across from Tony and next to Grady. “I’m so happy you came tonight, Grady. Any cousin of Tony’s is always welcome here.”

Tony caught Grady’s eyes and raised his eyebrows. “You already told him that, Mary Lynn. Three times.”

Mary Lynn’s smile wavered, but only slightly. She was such a champion smiler she would have done well on the beauty pageant circuit. With her long curly blond hair, blue eyes and delicate features, she was certainly pretty enough. She was twenty-four, but seemed younger, partly because she was about five foot two.

She made an odd couple with the much more serious Tony, but Grady didn’t know how they’d hooked up. He and Tony had grown up on opposite ends of Pennsylvania, seeing each other at the occasional family get-togethers as children and even less frequently as adults.

“I’ll never get tired of you saying I’m welcome here,” Grady told Mary Lynn. “I like hearing how much you two enjoy my company.”

“Mary Lynn’s speaking for herself,” Tony said, his fork full of tiramisu suspended halfway to his mouth. “You made my life a living hell this past week by suspending Bryan Charleton.”

“You’re not going to start talking about that basketball player again, are you?” Mary Lynn even smiled when she was complaining. “Isn’t it enough that he’s back on the team?”