Prodigal Prince Charming

Reaching into the front pocket if his khakis, Cord pulled out his money clip and slipped out a twenty-dollar bill. “Have Suzanne in the construction office call you a cab,” he said, as she stared at the money.

“What about my truck?”

“I’ll take care of it. You just do what you need to do with the van. Hey, Matt,” he called, and left her staring at the hat dent in the back of his golden hair as he walked away.

It took nearly an hour for a cab to arrive. Madison spent most of that time pacing between the trailer and the barricade and trying to reach Mike on her cell phone. Mike had been four years ahead of her all through school, so she’d actually known his sisters better when they were all younger, but Mike had always been like a big brother to her. Since she rented the apartment above the pub from him and used the pub’s kitchen to prepare her food, he was also her landlord.

She couldn’t reach him, though. The pub didn’t open until noon and he wasn’t answering his home phone.

When the cab arrived, she was trying to think of who else had a truck and wouldn’t be at work that time of day. Twenty minutes later she had concluded that even if she did locate a truck, it would take forever to borrow the ice chests she needed. Still refusing to give up, because giving up simply wasn’t something she did, she decided to rent ice chests and was mentally calculating how long it would take her do that when the cab rolled to a stop.

Mike’s Pub, with its familiar green awnings, leaded-glass windows and angled, corner door, sat on a narrow street that reflected the very essence of the Ridge’s roots. There wasn’t a building or business in the Ridge that hadn’t been there for as long as Madison could remember. Corollis’ Deli sat next door to the pub. Next to the deli, the beauty shop still turned out women with perms and blue hair, but had recently updated to add weaves. Across the street, below two stories of apartments, Reilly Brothers’ Produce anchored one corner, the Bayridge Bookstore the other. In between were sandwiched the pharmacy and an Italian bakery that had been run by three generations of Balduccis.

Surrounding them all was the neighborhood, with its tree-lined streets, tidy houses, cracked sidewalks and bicycles lying on neat lawns.

All Madison noticed after she paid her driver was the white van parked near the corner mailbox.

A young man in a blue mechanic’s uniform met her as she stepped from the cab. After confirming that she was Madison O’Malley, he handed her the van’s keys, told her there were ice chests and ice inside it, and left in a beige SUV that had been waiting nearby to give him a lift back to wherever it was he’d come from.

As she stared at the keys in her hand, it took her a moment to realize she could stop worrying about how she was going to make her lunch stops. Cord had actually done what he’d said he’d do. And with time to spare.

Madison had even more time to spare a few hours later. And spare time wasn’t something she usually had.

She usually finished her lunch route by 12:40 and returned to the pub near 4:00 p.m. With her normal routine seriously shot, she found herself back an hour early because she had no truck to gas up and clean, no leftovers to drop off at the seniors’ center and no idea how she was going to salvage her business.

As she pulled up behind the silver Lamborghini parked at the curb, she also had no idea why the fates had seen fit to throw Cord Kendrick into her path.

Three animated preteen boys hung around the racy car in front of her. Only one seemed able to tear his glance from all that horsepower when she walked over to see what they were up to. Sean Bower’s focus, however, had already turned back to the wide black tires when he spoke.

“Isn’t this way cool, Madison? It must go a hundred miles an hour!”

“Way cool, Sean,” she replied, unable to help smiling at the wide-eyed awe behind his little glasses. The Ridge was a Ford-and-Chevy sort of neighborhood. A car that probably cost more than any of their homes necessarily drew attention. Particularly the attention of the juvenile male variety. Personally, she still thought the thing looked as if something heavy had sat on it. “And I’m sure it does.” She ducked her head to see Sean’s face. “You might want to back up so you don’t get drool on that fender.”

Backing up herself, she glanced toward the ten-year-old Balducci twins. She’d never been able to tell them apart. It didn’t help that they both always wore blue navy SEAL baseball caps. “You boys all keep your hands off the car. Okay?”

The one on the right, Joey, she thought, put his hands behind his back. “We didn’t touch anything.”

“Yes, you did, Jason,” his brother insisted, proving that she’d gotten them wrong again. “You breathed on the rearview mirror and made your nose print on it.”

“Did not!”

“Did, too!”

“Boys?” Madison called, stopping with her hand on the pub door’s ancient brass handle. “Wipe the print off. Okay, Jason? And keep your hands to yourself.”

She didn’t wait to see if the boys would comply. Had Cord’s car been parked a couple of miles farther south, she would have reason to be concerned about the safety of his hubcaps. The kids from this neighborhood, though, rarely caused real trouble. When everyone knew who you were, knew where you lived, who your parents were or who your teacher was, it took considerable creativity to stray too far from the straight and narrow.

When she walked through the door, the sounds of the boys’ animated voices gave way to the voice of a sports announcer coming from the wall-mounted television above the bar. Rumor had it that, except for the TV, the neon beer signs and a new mirror behind the bar, Mike’s Pub hadn’t changed much since the first Michael Patrick Shannahan had opened it a hundred years ago. Four generations and four Michael Patricks later, lace curtains still hung over the front windows, dark wood booths still lined the walls, a dozen scarred wooden bar stools still lined the long, brass-railed bar, and pints of beer still flowed from the taps along with the bartender’s sympathy for whatever injustice or woe a patron had suffered that day.

Her eyes were still adjusting to the dimmer light when the men sitting at the bar ahead of her turned to see who’d joined them. Usually when she arrived home, the place was packed with dock workers who worked the seven-thirty to three shift and stopped for a cold beer and conversation on their way home. Since she was a little early, only Ernie Jackson and Tom Farrell were there.

“Hi, Madison.” The craggy-faced Ernie gave her a toothless smile. “Finish up early today?”

“How’s it going, Ernie?” she asked automatically.

“Can’t complain,” he said, and turned back to the beer he’d probably been nursing since noon.

Tom, newly retired from the docks, lifted his coffee mug to her. Madison suspected he was there escaping Mrs. Farrell. According to Grandma Nona, Tom’s wife of forty-three years had drawn up a “honey-do” list a mile long and had harped on him since his first day off to get started on it.

From behind the bar, Mike caught her eye and tipped his head toward a booth near the front door. With his deep auburn hair, green eyes and infectious smile Michael Patrick V was Irish to the core. His smile was missing, though. All she saw in the big man’s freckled features was curiosity.

“You have someone waiting for you,” he said.

She already knew that. “Thanks,” she murmured, and glanced behind her.

Had she not seen Cord’s car, she would have taken the outside staircase to her upstairs apartment as she usually did and, alone and in private, faced the panic clawing at her stomach. Given that she had an audience, she staved off that panic as best she could and walked over to the large and faintly cautious-looking man rising from the booth next to the last.

The way Cord stood at her approach spoke of manners that were more automatic than practiced.

It was a fair indication of how upset she was that something that might have impressed her barely registered. She was too busy thinking that Cord Kendrick looked as out of place in the working-class establishment as his car did out on the street—and wishing she had never laid eyes on his too-handsome face. She structured her entire life around the work that kept her running sixteen hours a day, six days a week. The thought of any part of that structure collapsing had her stomach in knots.

Assuming he wanted the van back, she held out the keys. “Thank you. Very much.”

Rather than taking the keys, he asked, “Did the van work out?”

“It got me where I needed to go.”

“Then, keep it until a new truck can be delivered. That’s what I want to talk to you about,” he said, motioning for her to sit down. “I have no idea what it is you’ll want, so we need to arrange for you to order it yourself.”

Preferring the isolation of the high-backed booth to being the day’s entertainment for the guys at the bar, she slid onto the green Naugahyde bench seat. Cord slid in across from her, his long legs bumping hers.

“Sorry,” he murmured.

As if hoping to coax a smile from her, he smiled himself. It was sort of a half smile really, an expression that held a hint of contrition and male appeal that would have had the hearts of most women melting.

In no frame of mind to be charmed, definitely in no mood to smile, she simply watched him push aside the beer he’d ordered and hadn’t touched.

“So what do you want me to do?”

“Tell me where you want to order the truck from.” Leaning forward, he clasped his hands on the dark and scarred wood, his voice low enough that the men gave up trying to listen and turned their attention back to ESPN. “I’ll get a letter of credit to the dealer. I also need to settle up with you for the food you lost this morning and your lost profits for the day. They took your truck to a salvage yard a few miles from here. I told the owner of the yard not to do anything to it until he heard from you. I don’t know what you had in there that might be of personal value to you, so you might want to check it out. All I was able to get were these.”

He pulled her sunglasses from the inside pocket of his beautifully styled leather jacket, along with his checkbook. The pen he also withdrew looked suspiciously like real gold.

“Thank you,” she murmured, taking the glasses. Considering how flat the cab of her truck had been, it amazed her that they were still intact. He amazed her a little, too. A few hours ago she hadn’t been inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt about much of anything. She had to admit now, that the man seemed to be doing whatever he could.

“I appreciate what you’re trying to do,” she said, voice calm, insides knotted. “And I appreciate the use of the van. But I’m going to lose more than just today’s profits. There are state laws regulating businesses like mine. I can’t meet the refrigeration and sanitation requirements with the van, and I’m not going to risk having my food preparation license pulled. All I’ll be able to sell now is baked goods, fruit and soda,” she told him. “I can’t even sell coffee because I don’t have enough thermoses, and I wouldn’t have any way of filling them on the road. That’s only a third of my business.”

“Coffee is?”