Beware Falling Rocks Read online

  “What else?”

  “It doesn’t matter now.”

  “It does.”

  “It doesn’t. It serves me right. Justin’s a lucky guy, and congratulations. I wish you nothing but happiness. Lord knows, after the crap I put you through, you deserve to be happy. It’s just Fate’s revenge on me for what I did, missing my chance by weeks.”

  She wasn’t sure she was hearing him right. “Huh? What are you talking about?”

  “Justin. Your boyfriend.”

  Lynn froze, mystified. “My whut?”

  Now he sounded confused. “I…I thought you said you guys were moving your boyfriend down to Florida.”

  The giggles erupted from her, so hard that she thought she might piddle her panties. “My boyfriend Justin?”

  “Um…yes?”

  “You thought Justin was my boyfriend?”

  “Yeah. Isn’t he?”

  It took her a long moment to compose herself. “Justin’s gay.”

  “Uh…oookaay?”

  “And he’s not my boyfriend. He’s Rachel’s little brother. He just graduated from college with his doctorate, and he’s moving down to Florida to be near her. Rachel and Andrew are getting married. Terrie, Mark, and I are helping Justin move.”

  “Oh.” Another long pause. “So—”

  Lynn was still giggling. “So he’s not my boyfriend, you dumbass. I don’t have a boyfriend.” Now reality slammed back into its painfully familiar place. “I haven’t had one…since.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry.”

  “You’re really divorced?”

  “Yeah. It’s over. I moved out and everything.”

  She looked at the airline app and started to book the flight before her nerves fled and before Terrie got out of the bathroom and killed her for doing this. “We need to talk.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And we need to do it face-to-face.”

  “I agree.”

  She plugged in his name and date of birth. “I need your social security number.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m booking you a flight leaving tomorrow morning from St. Pete-Clearwater to Sioux Falls. I’ll meet your plane here.”

  “What?”

  “Give it to me.”

  She didn’t think he would, but then he recited it.

  She plugged it in. “I also paid for you to have a second carry-on and a checked bag. If I don’t see you step off that plane tomorrow morning here in Sioux Falls, barring they cancel the flight on that end because of circumstances beyond your control, then do not ever contact me again. Understand?”

  “But I can’t let you buy—”

  “You’re not ‘letting’ me do anything, Paul. This is what’s going to happen.” Her pulse galloped, heart pounding. “You’re right that we have to talk in person. We have a hell of a lot to talk about. You’re going to get to do it while we drive a moving truck from South Dakota to Florida. So take off next week, too. Tell them it’s a family emergency or something.”

  If he couldn’t or wouldn’t do that, then she could cancel what she’d punched in, and that would be the end of it.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll be there.”

  His quiet tone sounded nothing like the man she knew and loved. Part of her hoped he’d been suffering as much as she had. More, even. It might make her vindictive, but she didn’t care.

  She also hated hearing him sound like that, ripping her soul into shreds at the thought of him being in pain.

  With trembling fingers, she plugged in her credit card info and received the confirmation screen. She inputted her e-mail address and then scrolled to where additional e-mail addresses could be added to receive copies of the itinerary. “Is your e-mail address the same?”

  “Yeah.”

  She punched that in, too, and hit send. “Check your e-mail.”

  “Hold on.” A moment later, he was back. “Okay. I see it. Thank you. I’ll pay you back.”

  Lynn bit her tongue to keep from mentioning the lottery winnings. “You don’t need to do that.”

  Paul couldn’t have heard the news about the boom. No one in her group of friends had yet. Or, if they had, they didn’t realize it. She hadn’t yet received any weird texts or calls or anything on her cell phone. Her mailing address was a PO box out of a shipping store, and her condo and car titles were listed as being owned by the trust Ed had set up for her years ago after her divorce. Her cell phone was also owned and paid for by the trust.

  In other words, it would be difficult for someone to track her to her home address or to her cell phone unless they had a secret contact inside the lottery commission’s office to give up her info or they staked out her PO box to see if she picked up mail. The address on her license, which was probably easily obtained by a public records request, was the shipping store where her PO box was listed. One of the reasons Ed had told her to use the place early on since she was a writer who wanted to protect her privacy. Ed was the agent for her trust and LLC, so his information appeared on the state incorporation paperwork.

  Which was also why Ed was now having all her mail forwarded to his office for the immediate future. A service the shipping store provided for a nominal extra charge and an additional benefit over using a “real” PO box. He would hold it there until she got back then have someone from his office deliver it to Terrie’s for her to pick up there.

  She wouldn’t be able to escape notice forever, probably, but she wanted to delay it as long as possible.

  There was the added bonus that very few people knew her real first name. She’d been Lynn to everyone since high school, and that was the name she gave everyone.

  Although Paul would probably remember that fact.

  She shoved the doubt trying to creep in out of her mind. No, he couldn’t know about the boom yet.

  Unless someone published her driver license photo, chances were she could fly under the radar for a while. Then again, her photo was over four years old, when she’d been dyeing her hair blonde, and it had been shorter then. Plus she’d changed the style of glasses she wore. The picture barely resembled her.

  “Look,” Paul said. “I’ll admit I’m not as well off as I was before the divorce, but I can and will pay you back for this.”

  Another familiar dance. They’d always kept finances separate, except when he’d wanted to and insisted on paying for something for her, like a weekend away or dinner or whatever. She’d wanted to stand on her own two feet, despite knowing at the time he was making more a year than she was. So alike in that way, and it’d been something they’d joked about a lot.

  “Okay,” she finally said. “If you’ll feel better.”

  “I will.”

  “Then I’ll see you tomorrow when you get here.”

  “Thank you, Lynn.”

  His use of her real name, not one of several sweet nicknames he’d used for her, sliced through her.

  She fingered her collar.

  “You’re thanking me now,” she said. “Terrie doesn’t know about this yet. Lucky for you, she’s driving down to Omaha tomorrow to meet up with Mark and visit her in-laws, so that will give us alone-alone time to talk.”

  She shoved any thoughts of doing anything but talking out of her head.

  “Ah. I’m guessing from her reaction Sunday I’m not her favorite person.”

  “Gee, ya think?” She checked the snark in her voice. Sure, it was expected and understandable, but that’s not the person she wanted to be. “No, she’s not fond of you. Neither of them are. In fact, most of our mutual friends have expressed interest in separating you from your testicles if given a chance.” She blew out a breath. “Sorry. I’m…understandably edgy right now.”

  “It’s okay,” he gently said. “I deserve it.”

  Her eyes stung from the tears threatening. “I need to go. Terrie will be out of the shower in a minute. I’ll see you tomorrow. Good-bye.” She hung up before he could say anything else, before the I love you, Sir trapped in her thr
oat could escape.

  She quickly shut down her iPad and put it away. She’d pulled herself together and was watching TV when Terrie emerged from the bathroom.

  Terrie had to leave for Omaha early the next morning.

  Bonus.

  “You sure you want to stay up here by yourself?” Terrie asked as she stood in front of the mirror and towel-dried her hair.

  Lynn hoped her face didn’t go red. “Yeah,” she said. “I want to explore downtown and drive around. I might even drive over to Mitchell and see the Corn Palace. Who knows, I might even drive all the way over to Rapid City. Go antiquing. I’ll have a way to get anything I buy home.”

  “I don’t recommend going to Rapid City. We’re only going to be here until Monday, not all week. I mapped the drive to Rapid City. That’s like a day over and a day back from here, more or less.”

  “It was just a thought.”

  Terrie’s gaze narrowed. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine.” Terrie’s bullshit meter had been finely honed by raising two girls. Lynn knew she’d have to be careful. “I needed this change of location.”

  Until Lynn could speak to Paul alone, face-to-face, she didn’t want Terrie anywhere around him.

  Terrie’s expression softened. “You don’t have to come back with us. Go over to Rapid City for a while, if you want. Mark and I can drive the truck by ourselves. Just keep me posted where you are so I don’t worry. He said there’s a lot to do over there. You could research another book.”

  “No, I want to do this.” Lynn’s plan was to fly Mark and Terrie back to Tampa or St. Pete or Sarasota via Omaha. Which airport she flew them into would depend on what flights were available.

  That final part of the plan would have to wait until she saw how her talk with Paul went.

  “Are you sure you can drive the truck?” Terrie asked. “It’d only take a few hours for me and Mark to come back up and he could drive it.”

  “I’ve got it. I drove one bigger than this one when I left Ron. I had no problems driving it to Justin’s from the rental place.”

  “Yeah, I remember you moving out from Ron’s, you stubborn thing. And Mark yelled at you for not waiting for him to come help, remember?”

  “I drove it. I didn’t load or unload it by myself.”

  “You also didn’t tow a car hauler.”

  “I towed a boat on a trailer countless times. I’ll be okay. You’ve been bugging me for how long to get out of the EWLE? Well, here I am. I want to do this.”

  Terrie laid the towel on the vanity counter and reached for her comb. “Okay. If you say so.”

  “I do. If I couldn’t do it, I would have asked Mark.” She reached up and touched her collar.

  * * * *

  Paul immediately grabbed a shower when he returned home that evening from work. He’d already made himself a reservation at a hotel just around the corner from the airport in Clearwater. After checking the weather reports in Sioux Falls, he packed and headed out again, grabbing drive-thru for dinner and eating on the road.

  He tried not to get his hopes up. His boss had not been happy about the last-minute leave request, especially considering how sketchy his schedule had sometimes been while going through everything with Sarah.

  He’d deal with that fallout, if there was any, when he returned.

  This was more important. She was more important.

  The past several days, he’d tried to come to grips with the fact that the distant dream he’d held on to ever since he’d upended his life completely to start over wouldn’t come true.

  That Lynn had moved on and he’d missed his chance by weeks.

  Which would have been a deservedly sickening irony.

  If she would hear him out and give him another chance, no way in hell would he fuck it up. He’d fight to win her back every bit as hard as he’d fought to save his marriage. That Lynn had bought him a plane ticket was completely unexpected and humbling.

  He’d been dodging calls from Sarah over the past week, sending them to voice mail to pick up and then responding to her with short texts hours later or even the next day.

  He had no doubts she was up to something, but he didn’t have the energy to expend trying to figure it out. He’d been down that dark path once already and wouldn’t be drawn onto it again.

  He wished Sarah well, but it was time for her to move on. If she didn’t care enough to fight as hard as he had for their marriage, that was on her, not him.

  She’d played him after he’d done nothing but try to work on things in good faith. Yes, Sarah had mental health issues, but she also had a choice to seek help and had turned away from that choice of her own free will.

  He wasn’t her father there to baby her, he was her husband. He couldn’t and wouldn’t force her to do the things she’d promised to do. If he had to force her to do them, she wasn’t doing them willingly.

  A marriage couldn’t work when only one person was deeply invested in its success.

  Sarah hadn’t been invested in their marriage so much as she’d been invested in the security she’d thought it provided her.

  As he lay in his hotel bed and stared at the dark ceiling, he tried not to envision all the ways his reunion with Lynn might go. At the very least, he expected a slap in the face. He kind of hoped she got mad, yelled at him.

  He’d take every last bit of her rage. He knew he deserved it, and more.

  It wouldn’t even surprise him to find she wouldn’t take him back. All he could do was try.

  He also knew he probably wouldn’t sleep at all that night. Despite having set not only three alarms on his phone and requesting a wakeup call from the front desk that would awaken him over two hours earlier than he’d need to be up, he still panicked about oversleeping.

  He wouldn’t fuck this up over his inability to get moving in the morning.

  This might be the last and only opportunity he had to get Lynn to give him another chance.

  A chance he absolutely would not waste.

  Chapter Twelve

  The next morning, Terrie stared at Lynn from across their table in the hotel’s breakfast area.

  “You all right?”

  Lynn forced a smile she didn’t feel. “I’m good. Just tired and achy from everything we did yesterday.”

  “I can call Mark’s brother and have him pick Mark up and stay behind with—”

  “No, Mom. I’m fine.”

  “You say that like you’re joking, but I could always tell when the girls were up to something, too. Still can.” She arched an eyebrow at Lynn that almost had her confessing the whole thing.

  Except Lynn instinctively knew that would lead to World War III. Although Terrie wasn’t completely innocent, since she’d held back her knowledge of Paul’s divorce from Lynn.

  Yes, Lynn understood why she had, but she also knew Terrie wasn’t the most objective person on this subject.

  Lynn wanted time to talk to Paul, alone and without distractions, and without worrying if Terrie was going to kill him.

  If worse came to worst, Lynn knew she could ship him to another hotel, buy him a plane ticket to fly back on Monday, and Terrie would—hopefully—be none the wiser.

  Or…not. If Lynn ended up keeping Paul there with her, she’d have to deal with the nuclear fallout on Monday when she met up with Terrie and Mark in Omaha.

  “I’m still thinking about Paul,” Lynn finally said, which wasn’t even a lie.

  Terrie sighed. “I don’t know why the hell he showed up when he did, but that boy has the world’s crappiest timing.”

  At least her friend didn’t sound like she wanted to murder him.

  At that exact moment.

  Terrie’s phone buzzed with a text, Mark’s custom tone chirping. She picked it up and read it. “He’s at the airport now and said to pay attention to the weather. We might have storms up here this afternoon. Shoot. I’d better get my ass moving, then. I don’t want to be on the road if it’s going to storm.”
r />   Relief. “Yeah.”

  “Hey, you be careful, all right? If you see the skies start to get dark, come back to the hotel. These aren’t like Florida spring storms. They get nasty here.”

  “Florida storms get nasty.”

  “I’m talking tornado nasty. We were at Carl’s place visiting one Easter and those damn sirens went off and scared the crap out of me. Didn’t even know what the hell they were, at first. Lisa, Carl, and Mark were laughing their asses off at me. It was only later I realized how scared they were and they were trying to keep me and the kids from panicking while we were cowering down in their basement.” She finished off the last few bites of her breakfast and her coffee.

  They headed back to their room so Terrie could grab her things and use the bathroom one last time. After she opened the door, she handed her key card to Lynn. “You’ll want that when you check out.”

  “Thanks.” Lynn slipped it into her back pocket with the other one.

  Then she kicked off her shoes while Terrie was in the bathroom, stretched out on her bed, and pulled out her laptop like she was going to work. When Terrie emerged and washed her hands, she noticed.

  “Promos?”

  “Yeah, wanted to go through my e-mail before I start wandering around town. Let breakfast settle.”

  “Ah. Seriously, if the skies get dark—”

  “I’ll be careful. Don’t worry. Get moving, or Mark will spank you in the bad way if you’re not there when he lands.”

  “Yeah. True story.” She smiled. “We’re staying at a hotel down there tonight after we go out to dinner with his family. It’ll be fun to get our freak on. He hinted he packed some toys and—”

  Lynn covered her ears with her hands and laughed. “Don’t want to hear it! Love you guys, but that’s a little TMI.”

  “It’s good to hear you laugh. I wish you did it more.”

  Lynn desperately tried not to think of the man currently winging his way over southeastern Missouri at that moment, if the FlightAware app’s tracking map was accurate.

  Paul had always been able to make her laugh. She’d never laughed so hard or so much in her life as when they were together.