Where Azaleas Bloom

“It’s sweet of you to offer, it really is, but this will work out,” she insisted. “And it’s not going to kill me to work a few more hours every week. It won’t hurt the kids, either,” she added defensively.

“I know you’re a great mother, Lynn,” he replied patiently. “I wasn’t suggesting otherwise. I see enough of Jeremy and Lexie over at Raylene’s to see how well they’re turning out, and I know they have you to thank for that.”

She drank in his praise. She’d heard far too little of it from her soon-to-be-ex-husband. “Thank you for saying that. They’re great kids. I worry myself sick sometimes about how the divorce is affecting them. Lexie’s growing up too fast, that’s for sure. She’s a sensitive girl and no matter how hard I try to keep my problems from her, she picks up on everything.”

“She looks just fine to me,” Mitch consoled her. “You should hear her and Mandy over at Raylene’s. I can hear them giggling over the sound of all the hammering and, even more impressive, over that music they play. She sounds like a happy, healthy teenager to me.”

“I wish I’d heard that,” Lynn said wistfully. “She and Mandy don’t hang out at our house much these days.”

“Could be she feels guilty about having fun when she knows you’re sad,” Mitch said, surprising her with his insightfulness. “Kids are like that. Those first months after Amy died, mine did plenty of tiptoeing around whenever they came home on visits. Surprised the heck out of me. I didn’t think either one of those boys had a sensitive bone in their bodies, but they were raised by Amy, so of course they did.”

She saw the faraway look in his eyes and responded to that. “There’s no mistaking how much you loved her, Mitch,” she said gently. As hard as the divorce proceedings were, she knew it was nothing like losing someone you loved so deeply with such finality.

“Always will, I imagine,” he said. “But every day does get a little easier.”

He seemed to snap himself back to the moment. “Now I’d better get over to Raylene’s or she’ll be wondering what happened to me. She always has some kind of checklist for me before she goes off to work.” He leaned closer and confided, “Don’t tell her, but I stuff ’em in my pocket and never look at ’em again.”

“Is that because you really don’t give a hoot about what she wants or because you have a photographic memory?” Lynn asked.

He shrugged. “Maybe a little of both. I know I’ll get to all of it eventually. I haven’t been in this business my entire life without knowing what needs to be done and when. See you around, Lynn. Thanks for the company.”

“Thanks for the breakfast,” she said, then watched as he walked away. She was still following him with her gaze when Grace appeared just as he was climbing into his shiny new four-by-four parked out front. She couldn’t help wondering if a man who took such good care of his truck would be equally thoughtful when it came to caring for a woman.

“That man does look good in a pair of jeans,” Grace said with a dramatic sigh. She pinned Lynn with a look. “Just in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“Hard not to notice,” Lynn replied, then gave Grace a chiding look. “But don’t go getting any ideas in your head, you hear me? I’m not looking for a man, and he says he’s not looking for anyone, either.”

“And sometimes people lie to themselves because it feels safer,” Grace retorted.

She sashayed off, leaving Lynn alone with the discouragingly paltry list of classified ads. Contemplating Mitch’s sexy butt in a pair of jeans was a whole lot more fascinating than the few menial jobs available in Serenity.

But, she told herself staunchly as she forced her gaze back to the paper, ogling a man wouldn’t put food on the table. And that was what she needed today, not the fleeting and dangerous satisfaction of feeling her pulse race for the first time in a very long time.

* * *

Lynn was down to her last possibility, a cashier’s job at a mini-mart in a dicey section of town. Even in a tranquil community like Serenity, there were places to be avoided. Unfortunately, she was too desperate to take that into consideration.

To her chagrin, she was being interviewed by a girl half her age. She’d probably barely met the twenty-one-year-old age requirement specified in the ad.

“You willing to work nights?” Karena asked, snapping gum as she spoke, her expression bored.

“What are the hours exactly?” Lynn asked, inwardly cringing at the thought of leaving the kids at home alone in the evening.

“Eleven at night to seven in the morning,” Karena replied.

Dismayed, Lynn shook her head at once. That was out of the question. “Sorry. I have kids at home. I can’t do that.”

“Well, that’s all we have.” Karena stood up, ending the interview.

“Thanks, anyway,” Lynn managed to say. “Sorry to have wasted your time, but the ad didn’t mention that it was a night job.”

When she got back to her car, she rested her head against the steering wheel and fought the tears that were never far away these days. She tried hard not to give in to them, but sometimes she simply couldn’t hold back all the pain and frustration. A few minutes later, a tap on her window had her sitting upright, her heart racing.

“Mitch!” she exclaimed. “You scared me half to death.”

He gestured for her to roll down the window. When she’d complied, he regarded her with what looked like real distress. “Please tell me you were not even thinking about applying for a job here,” he said, heat in his voice.

She frowned at his tone. “I did apply, but the only thing available is overnight. Obviously, I can’t do that.”

“You shouldn’t be working here at any hour. It’s dangerous.”

“If the clientele’s so rough, what are you doing here?”

“I was on my way to my plumbing supplier’s and saw the HELP WANTED sign in the window and your car in the parking lot. After our conversation earlier, I stopped to check it out, make sure you weren’t about to do anything crazy.”

“There’s nothing crazy about needing a job.”

“Of course not, but not here, Lynn,” he said flatly.

Annoyed by his attitude, she retorted, “I already told you I couldn’t take it because of the hours. What business is this of yours, anyway?”

“Just one friend looking out for another,” he said, clearly not fazed by her attitude. “Do you know the reason they need a new night clerk? The last one was shot a week ago during a robbery.”

Lynn started trembling uncontrollably. “Good God,” she murmured. “I had no idea.”

“It was in the paper, the same one you were reading this morning.”

“I just checked out the ads.”

“Well, I imagine if I hadn’t come along to tell you, Carter would have stepped in. He has more problems around this area than anywhere else in town.” He hesitated, clearly waging some sort of internal debate with himself. “If you’re this desperate for a job, work for me,” he said with unmistakable reluctance.

She almost laughed, but the expression on his face said he was serious. Not happy, but definitely serious. “You? Doing what? The last do-it-yourself job I tried to tackle at the house was such a disaster, it had to be redone by a professional.”

He had the audacity to smile at that. “I wasn’t suggesting putting you on one of my construction crews. I could use the help with paperwork.”

She studied him skeptically. “Don’t you already have someone?”

“Nah. In the winter I can usually keep up with the billing and payroll myself, but with spring coming on and more jobs, it’s harder for me to manage all that and the paperwork, too.”

“I doubt I’d be much better at that than I was at wallpapering the kitchen,” she told him candidly.

“It’s an easy system,” he assured her. “I can teach you in an hour.”

“You have an office?”

“No, that’s the beauty of it. You can work at home. I’ll just bring my laptop and a printer to your place and leave ’em. How about we give it a trial run, see how it goes? If you’re comfortable with it, we’ll take it from there.”

Lynn felt a faint frisson of hope. “And you swear you’re not making up work just to give me a job?”