“Oh, they want to know everything,” Lucia goes on cheerfully. “Whether he’s from here. Where he went to high school. Whether he went to college. Who his people are, because Blake and Rick couldn’t place a Wheeler clan, but theydidmove away ages ago, so their memories might be at fault with that one.”
“I… can ask?” I say, even though it’s pointless, because Lucia clearly knows I’m lying.
“Is there a particular reason you didn’t tell them you’re up there with Gideon Bell, or is it the same reason you haven’t wanted anything to do with him the last couple months?” she goes on, sounding determinedly casual. I can practically see her leaning over a houseplant and subjecting the poor thing to her scrutiny while she skewers me via satellite phone.
I let my head drop back against the arm of the couch, bodice ripper falling to the floor.
“Fuck,” I say.
“Sweetheart, it’s literally front-page news,” she goes on. “Below the fold, but still. ‘Forest Service Employee Enacts Daring Rescue.’”
“I didn’t want them to worry,” I tell the ceiling. “More, at least.”
Lucia sighs dramatically, the way only a southern sixty-something woman who has Seen Some Shit can sigh.
“Look, I didn’t think it through,” I go on.
“You don’t say.”
“How was I supposed to know it was going to bein the newspaper?” I ask, because honestly. “Isn’t there anything else going on in Sprucevale right now?”
“Course there is,” she says. “They held a vote to name the snowplow, andSnow Money, Snow Problemswon, but the old farts in charge don’t want to use that so now they’re fighting. That’s above the fold.”
“My daring rescue lost to a snowplow?”
“The debate’s very heated,” she says. “And Andrea, if you didn’t want them worrying, that ship has sailed and is halfway to Australia by now. Do you know how many voicemails I had when I got back? Twenty-three, and I’m shocked it wasn’t more.”
I cringe atAndrea, because while Lucia never wanted kids of her own, she can sure say a full name like it’s a guilty verdict.
“Don’t tell them, I’ll do it,” I say.
“I don’t get involved in your business,” she says, inaccurately. “But make no mistake: itisbusiness. And I’m more worried about why you lied about who you’re with.”
“Because of,” I start, acutely aware of Gideon’s footsteps in the next room and the thinness of the interior walls. “…what happened.”
Lucia’s quiet a moment.
“Ah,” she finally says. “Is that also the reason you never want to talk about him?”
Guess I wasn’t subtle about changing the subject whenever he came up, then.
“You noticed?”
“Andrea.”
“I figured there was a good chance he’d turned out like the rest of his family and I didn’t want to know if he did,” I say, as quietly as I can.
“And?”
“He didn’t.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re not up there with a shit-for-brains bigot who can’t think past the end of his own dick,” she says. “I’m not on speaker, am I?”
“What if I said yes?”
“I reckon it would be time to start apologizing,” she says serenely. “Though I meant every word I said.”
Lucia doesnotget along with Gideon’s father, William Bell.
