The Secrets of Rosa Lee. Jodi Thomas
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“Straighten up, Lora. You look round-shouldered. I swear you’ve a model’s form when you hold your head up, but when you slouch, all I see is Lurch from The Addams Family,” Isadore whined. “And hurry up or you’ll be late for the committee meeting.”
Lora Whitman pretended not to hear her mother and wondered if she could special order an ejection seat for the passenger side of her next Audi. Sometime during college, she’d become an Olympian at ignoring Isadore Whitman. Before Lora had hit puberty, her mother had thought her ideal, dressing her up like a doll and bragging to her bridge club about the perfection of her only child.
Then the awkward years had hit and perfection had slipped, never to be reclaimed, no matter how hard Lora had tried to please. Even the night she had been named homecoming queen, Isadore had leaned to hug her daughter and had reminded her how bad her nails looked. While any other mother might have been proud, Isadore had whispered another comment about how fat Lora looked in taffeta.
Lora honked as Old Man Hamm rolled through the town’s only stoplight in his rust bucket of a car. For a moment, she visualized him hitting the passenger side of her Audi, sending Isadore into terminal silence. As always, Lora colored her daydream with detail. Blood the same shade as her mother’s lipstick. The volunteer firemen trying to pull Isadore out without damaging her Escada suit.
Lora steered left toward the eyesore of a house at the end of Main. Her mother continued to rattle. The plans for what she’d wear to her mother’s funeral faded as Isadore began her list of what Lora should do at the meeting. Her mother seemed to believe that if Lora left her sight without instructions she might—even though she was twenty-four years old—wander off the face of the earth.
“I know you think this committee appointment isn’t important,” Isadore stated as if she had an audience. “But you’ll see. One thing will lead to another. You can help decide what to do with the old Altman house. The next thing you know, you’ll be moved to some important board seat. Why, in ten years you could be on the town council.”
The only goal Lora had was to accumulate enough money to get out of this place. She could see no way that serving on a civic committee would help her accomplish that. But in the six months she had been back handling advertising for her father’s car dealership, she’d learned one thing. If she didn’t play the game, she had no chance of breaking free. Her father held as tightly to his money as her mother wanted to hold to her.
“Don’t park in the dirt.” Isadore waved her hand, shooing the car as she might an animal. “There’s probably mud.”
Lora stopped in the center of the street and threw her silver Audi into Park. “You think you can drive my car home?” She opened the driver’s side door with doubts about her mother’s ability to handle anything other than a Cadillac. Lora’s ex had told her she’d picked the car just to anger her father, but in truth, Lora loved the feel of it.
Isadore tried not to look as if she were hurrying when she circled the car and took Lora’s place. “Of course I can drive this thing, but don’t you want me to pick you up? I’m just having my nails done. I could be back in an hour, provided the girl does the job right. Last time I told her I wanted a French manicure in another color. I swear she looked at me like—”
“No.” The last thing Lora wanted was to stand around like a schoolgirl waiting for her mother to pick her up. “I’ll walk over to the dealership and ride home with Dad.”
She heard her mother’s “but” as she closed the door. With Isadore, there was never an end to conversation, only abrupt halts.
It frightened Lora to think she might end up like her mother, constantly harping on something of no importance. Before the divorce, when Dan wanted to really land a blow, he’d mention how much she sounded like her mother.
With determined steps, Lora forced herself not to run as she heard the sound of the window being lowered. At five foot ten, her long legs carried her swiftly to the porch and out of reach of her mother’s final instructions. Her high heels clicked across the wood as she squared her shoulders and resigned herself to get this duty over with as quickly as possible.
Lora’s car still sat in the middle of the street as she opened the door to the old Altman house and hurried inside.
Air, cold and stale, closed around her. A wisp, thick as a sigh, rushed past. Escaping. She had the feeling she’d be wise to do so, as well. This place, or more accurately the grounds behind the house, held nothing but bad memories for her. She’d just as soon turn her vote in now to demolish the landmark. Anything, even a vacant lot, would be better than having this old mansion shadow Main.
Lora blinked, trying to adjust to the filtered light shining through dirty windows. Dark paneling, rotted in spots. Dusty floors. Silence. She fought the urge to turn and run but remembered her mother probably still waited outside and decided even a haunted house would be preferable company.
The floor creaked when she stepped into a wide hallway with doors on either side. Stairs rose from the back wall of the entry. Huge bookshelves, too large for vandals to steal, lined the corridor as if guarding long-forgotten secrets. A surprising dignity reflected in the room’s architecture, like an old soldier still standing proud in the uniform of his youth.
Lora forced another step, telling herself she’d already lived through hell being married to Dan for three years. What else could happen to her? He’d taken everything except her car, and he would have gotten that, too, if it hadn’t been in her father’s name. Dan had made it necessary for her to quit her job without references. He’d fought until she’d had no option but to do what he knew she hated most—to return home. He’d learned, in the law school she’d worked to send him to, how to cut deep and once he was set up in a practice, he’d cut her out of his life.
Straightening, Lora smiled. She might be down but she was a long way from out. What could one houseful of old stories do to her? She wasn’t some frightened fifteen-year-old. She was a battled-scarred divorcée.
At slumber parties when she’d been small, girls had told stories of how old Rosa Lee would kill any man who set foot on her property and cut him up so she could dribble his blood over her roses. In Lora’s current state of mind, she didn’t consider Rosa Lee’s actions all that terrible.
“Hey, lady,” a low male voice echoed through the passage. “This the place for the committee meeting?”
Lora fought down nerves as she spotted a kid, maybe late teens, leaning against the banister. Half his body stood in shadow, but nothing about the half she saw looked good. Dirty jeans, worn leather jacket, hair in his eyes.
“It is,” she answered. “Why?” She thought of adding, “Shouldn’t you be out robbing some quickie mart?” but held her tongue.
He shifted, stepping more into the light. The chain that held his wallet in place clanked against the rivets running along the seam of his jeans.
Lora held her ground. He was a few years older than she’d thought, a little more frightening. A three-day growth of beard darkened his chin. Angry gray eyes watched her, studying, judging, undressing her. If she’d been in Dallas, she would have reached for her Mace. But Clifton Creek didn’t have muggers, she reminded herself.
“I’m on the committee.” He turned, showing more interest in the house than in her. His hands spread wide over the paneling and caressed the grooves in the wood. “I’ve always wondered what it would be like inside here. One of the guys I spent a weekend in the drunk tank with says his grandfather told him they sent all the way to Saint Louis for the carpenters on this place. Had to bring most of the wood out on wagons.”
Lora forced her heart to slow. So much for her mother’s idea of it being an honor to be on one of the mayor’s committees. They appeared to be emptying the jails in order to fill the chairs.
“I’m on the committee, too,” she said needlessly. No one would be in this old place at ten in the morning unless they’d been asked to serve. “I’m Lora Whitman.”