JoAnn Ross - No Regrets

“Just for the next week or so,” Molly insisted. “But as soon as I come back to work, I’m returning to my own place.”

“Oh, thank you!” Lena rushed forward to hug Molly, remembering the cracked ribs just in time. “I promise, Molly, I’ll make this up to you.”

“There’s certainly nothing to make up to me. Lounging around your house is not exactly on par with doing missionary work in Zaire.”

“Wait until you spend a few days with Theo.” Lena’s expression of impending doom echoed her glum tone. “I hate this time of year, anyway.” She sighed and began picking at her fingernail polish. “Do you ever think about that night?”

“Of course.” Molly knew Lena was not referring to the recent Christmas attack, but the earlier one.

“I used to think about it all the time. It’s gotten better, but it never goes away. Like a scab I can’t resist picking.”

“May’s almost as bad,” Molly murmured.

“When you walk in the drugstore to buy some aspirin or tampons and get attacked by all those aisles of flowery Mother’s Day cards,” Lena agreed. “I didn’t think it bothered you. That once you became a nun—”

“God automatically took away the pain on my Profession Day?”

“Something like that.”

It was Molly’s turn to sigh. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.”

“I guess not.” Lena walked over to the window and stared down at the parking lot, but Molly suspected it was not the cars she was seeing, but that long-ago scene that had been imprinted indelibly on both their minds. “Do you ever hear Mama’s voice?”

“No. I stopped being able to hear her about the third year after Daddy…after it happened.”

“I do.” Lena glanced back over her shoulder. “Every once in a while, I imagine I hear her singing. Remember how she used to love to sing?”

The memory was bittersweet. “Just like Patsy Cline.”

“Yeah. I remember her once telling me how tragic it was that Patsy had died so young in that plane crash. And then she died too young, as well....

“I think that’s why I turned wild for a while, until I met Reece,” Lena admitted. “Because I have this terrible fear I’m going to die young, too.” She dragged her hand through her thick auburn hair. “I look just like her, don’t I?”

Molly didn’t like where this conversation was going. “I suppose there’s some resemblance,” she hedged.

“I stole a picture the day the social worker took us away,” Lena revealed. “It was a snapshot of Mama in a bathing suit at the beach. I’ve kept it all these years. I look at that picture and it’s like looking in a mirror....

“Then I look in the mirror and it’s as if Mama’s ghost is looking back at me. As if she’s reminding me that I could die anytime, just like she did. Like Patsy did…

“Did you know that I’d planned my funeral when I was twelve?”

“You never said anything.”

“I wrote it all down. So you’d find it after I died. I still update it every year, but I’m always a little surprised when I don’t make all that many changes. I’ve planned your funeral, too. And Reece’s.”

“I didn’t know that, either.” Molly reminded herself that she’d only been a child herself, that she’d done the best she could for her sister under the circumstances. Nevertheless she felt a familiar stab of guilt that she hadn’t managed to provide Lena with the security she’d needed growing up.

“Of course you didn’t. Because I never told you. But it seems as if I’ve spent my entire life waiting to die. Waiting for people I love to die. Which was why I was so terrified of loving Reece.

“If he was ten minutes late coming home, I knew he’d had an accident on the freeway. If I called here and he didn’t answer his page, I was certain some crazed homicidal junkie had taken him hostage and was going to kill him. I was so fixated on all those morbid thoughts that I was too afraid to enjoy life.”

“And now?” Molly asked carefully.

“I think it’s finally sunk in that the secret to life may be living for the moment, but it’s also important to make certain that the moment’s worth living for.”

“And that’s where Reece comes in.”

The thought of her husband was like a bright and comforting sun, burning away the gloomy clouds in Lena’s mind. Her smile literally lit up the room. “Absolutely.”

* * *

Tessa was having no difficulty enjoying life.

“Well?” She twirled around, arms held out, showing off the beaded evening gown as a child might show off a new party dress. “What do you think?”

Jason Mathison sat in a gray suede chair, a pilsner of imported Australian beer in his hand as he gave her a slow, judicious look. “It’s red.”

“Well, of course it is.” Tessa grinned. “You said you wanted me to look sexy for New Year’s Eve. And this is definitely the sexiest dress so far.”

The strapless scarlet gown fit like a glove, plunged to below the waist in back and was slit high on both thighs.

“It’s overkill.” He frowned and pulled a cigar out of the pocket of one of the Armani jackets he favored when off duty. Tessa still hadn’t decided which look she found sexier—the starched blue uniform of authority or this aura of casual money.

The chic blond saleswoman clad in Armani gray herself, immediately leaned forward to light the cigar. “I tried to suggest something a bit more subdued,” she murmured. “But your friend had her own ideas.”

“You should have explained my preferences.”

Tessa didn’t like the way they were talking about her as if she wasn’t there. “You said you liked my Christmas dress.”

“It had a certain gut-level masculine appeal.” The glint in his eyes made her think he was remembering the short skirt and low-scooped neckline. “But if you want to break into the business, we need to upgrade your image.”

“This is Hollywood.” If there was one thing the general had taught Tessa, it was not to surrender without a fight.

“Actually, it’s Beverly Hills.” He puffed on the cigar, and although the noxious smell was bound to get into the fabric of the exquisite gowns displayed around the showroom of the famed Rodeo Drive boutique, Tessa noted the saleswoman didn’t utter a word of complaint.

He turned to the statuesque blonde. “I want to see her in the Bill Blass.”

“Not that one.” Tessa had rejected the dark unadorned gown at first glance. “Why don’t you just see if there’s a nun’s habit hidden away in the back room? Or perhaps some sackcloth and ashes?”

Jason laughed at that. “I’m beginning to understand how Henry Higgins must have felt when trying to turn Eliza Doolittle into a lady.”

When the saleswoman laughed, as well, Tessa became irritated again. “I am a lady.”

Although the smile didn’t fade, his eyes suddenly turned as hard as blue stones. “Then you should dress like one,” he said reasonably.

Realizing that she’d just run up against his professional cop intransigence, Tessa exhaled a deep dramatic sigh, snatched the dress from the woman’s arms and stomped back into the marble-walled dressing room.

Damn him! The change was so dramatic, it took Tessa’s breath away. She stared at her reflection in the three-way mirror, stunned by the sleek, sophisticated woman looking back at her. The black halter-necked gown, which had appeared so drab on the padded silk hanger, skimmed over her body like a jet waterfall and proved a startling foil for her fiery hair. Although she’d always regretted her pale skin, the unadorned black dress made it gleam like porcelain.

Jason instantly confirmed her appraisal. “Perfect. There won’t be a woman in the room who’ll be able to hold a candle to you.” He turned to the saleswoman. “She’ll need gloves. Above the elbows. And those black silk pumps in the window.”