Chapter Eighteen
Rebecca had no sooner made it to the end of Main Street, and the sky let loose. A torrent of fat, cool raindrops doused her, the road, and everything else within seconds. The whoosh as the storm hit Vallantine was a roar against her ears and heaviness settled in her chest.
Cursing, she cut left toward the library instead of her neighborhood since it was closer. Ankle-deep puddles had already formed since the rain was coming down faster than the ground could absorb. Her shoes squished in grass as she crossed the lawn and bounded the porch steps. Fumbling with the key, she let herself in, shut the door, and…
Screamed. She screamed. A frustrated, angry, gutted bellow because it was all she was capable of doing to vent. Long, loud, and rattling her ribcage, she let it rip until there wasn’t any air left in her lungs.
Damn Graham Roberts, anyway.
Heaving oxygen, she glanced around. The already dismal light in the library from very few windows as a natural source was made darker by the storm. Shadows creating shadows. The tall, vaulted ceiling and empty shelves made the patter of pouring rain echo throughout the space. The electricity had been cut to prepare for renovations, so she couldn’t use the overhead chandelier. For some, it might be a location for an epic horror flick, but to her, it was welcoming. The place was built out of love, and love had kept it standing.
Setting her purse and laptop bag on the center station, she wiped water from her eyes and pulled out her phone. With shaking hands, she roused it from sleep mode, grateful it hadn’t been damaged in her back pocket from rain.
She sent an SOS text to her besties. Emotional Emergency: I’m at the library and fit to be tied. Please bring alcohol and dry clothes.
She paused after sending the text, then swiftly sent another. If you can. If you’re busy, no worries. I’ll deal. Worst case, she’d put her phone in the bag and walk home. Take a hot shower and read until her mood and the storm passed.
She really didn’t want to be home, though. She wasn’t sure the reason, other than Graham would find her there. If he bothered to come look for her, anyway. Judging by how he’d treated her at The Gazette, maybe he wouldn’t.
Clenching her teeth, she stalked the creaky floorboards, trembling with pent up rage. How dare he? How dare he accuse her of vying for his job? Of going behind his back with the mayor? As if she’d ever be that sneaky and underhanded. He’d looked at her as if they’d not shared secrets, their hearts, and a bed. Like he’d not known her at all.
Her phone pinged multiple texts.
Scarlett: Whose ass I gotta kick?
Dorothy: We’ll be there in under 30 mins.
Scarlett: What she said.
She thumbed a thank you, and set her phone down to pace some more.
Twenty-eight minutes later, she was no calmer when her besties rushed through the door, both smart enough to wear raincoats.
Thunder clapped overhead, followed by flashes of lightning. How Rebecca despised storms. Her parents had died during one just like this. Ever since, they made her edgy and uncomfortable, as if she needed that on top of her current mood.
“What happened?” Dorothy set a thermos on the station and shrugged out of her coat. “Why aren’t you at work?”
Before Rebecca could reply, Scarlett handed her a duffel bag. “Yeah, spill it. You have us more than a lot worried.”
Dry clothes, thank goodness. Cold plus wet did not equal a happy body with regards to Rebecca’s fibro.
“I’m sorry.” She set the bag on the floor and peeled the wet garments from her body. They hit the ground with a thwap. “Graham Roberts is what happened and why I’m not at work.” She stepped into a pair of pink sweats and a matching hoodie, then tried to balance to apply socks. Rummaging in the bag, she was grateful they’d thought of shoes, too. Hers were soaked, like everything else. “I could murder him.”
“I have plenty of land to bury a body,” Scarlett professed.
Tempting.
Turning around, she noted Scarlett had spread out a blanket on the floor with a battery-powered lantern in the middle. A muted yellow glow encased the small area.
Dorothy poured mixed drinks from the thermos into disposable glasses, passing one to each of them.
Rebecca downed hers in one swallow, not even tasting the Georgia Sunset cocktail.
“Well, goodness.” Dorothy took the empty cup and refilled it. “It must be bad.”
She sat with Scarlett on the blanket while Rebecca paced anew. From the door to the back wall, passing the floor-to-ceiling shelves, and back again. Her skin itched and her face burned and she shook with rage.
Where to start? “First, Gunner Davis came into the office, while he knew Graham was gone for lunch, and offered me The Gazette—”
“Hold it.” Scarlett tilted her head. “What does that mean, he offered you The Gazette?”
Rebecca threw her arms out and let them drop. “Heck if I know. It came out of nowhere. The way it was presented struck me like he was checking my reaction more than what he actually said carrying weight. I assume he wants me to take over Graham’s position as editor.”
Dorothy hummed a sound of disagreement. “As if you’d do that.”
Whirling on her, Rebecca pointed. “Thank you! I would never take Graham’s job out from under him, even if he wasn’t doing it right. Which he is. He’s an amazing editor.”
Dorothy crossed her legs. “What did you tell Gunner?”
“To take the offer and shove it. Not in those words, but anyway.” She resumed her pacing. “I said no, thank you, and told him if he fired Graham, I’d leave, too.”
Scarlett nodded approval. “Well, there’s a stand for you. Good girl. The both of you have done a bang-up job of bringing The Gazette back from the brink.”
“Why are you angry at Graham, then?”
Rebecca paused by the window, watching sheets of water pummel Main Square. “He walked in on the tail end of the conversation.”
“Ruh-roh.” Scarlett took a sip of her cocktail. “Let me guess. Graham overheard Gunner’s offer?”
“Worse. When Graham asked what was going on, Gunner just spit it out. La la la, offered your lover and subordinate your position. How’s your morning?” She growled. “Poor Graham looked like his head might blow off, and that was after thirty seconds of the someone-kicked-his-puppy expression.” The memory made her nauseous all over again. “Then,” she laughed without mirth, “in a pissed-off tone, he asked me what was my response to the offer. And let me tell y’all, it was a rhetorical question.”
Dorothy bared her teeth in a clear eesh reaction.
“Oh, hell no.” Scarlett flipped her hair over her shoulder, obviously as affronted as Rebecca.
“Oh, yes.” She downed her glass and set it on the windowsill. Physically and mentally drained, she leaned her butt against the frame and slouched. “How could he believe that of me? After all we’ve been through, how could he believe I’d betray him? Our field is so cut-throat. He’s experienced it. I’ve experienced it. Neither of us liked that aspect, and vowed to help one another, to work together instead of against. There was only the two of us with no one else to compete against.”
“Is that why you left Boston?”
She whipped her gaze to Dorothy, and found abject curiosity wrapped in sympathy staring back at her. Still, she couldn’t push words past her lips to reply.
“Is it?” Dorothy gently prodded. “Is the cut-throat atmosphere why you left?”
Tears stung her eyes, but Rebecca attempted to shove them aside. “No. I left because my throat had been cut on day one, and I was merely a ghost walking around mimicking a human that mattered. I was just too stupid to notice.” For almost ten years.
Lord, feeling it and saying it aloud were entirely different things. Only in the dark recesses of her mind had she allowed herself to admit that fact. She’d told Graham, but to bear the truth, her brutal truth, was eviscerating. Shame sliced through her midsection.
“You’re not stupid.” Scarlett glared at her. Hard.
Rebecca stared at her, at Dorothy, and could only shrug. No, she wasn’t stupid, but she hadn’t followed her instincts or made something of herself, either. It had been something she’d battled for a long time. She’d failed. Over and over. Day after day. Month after month. Year after year.
Until she barely recognized herself in the mirror.
“It took guts to try.” Dorothy set her drink on the floor beside her hip. “A small town like Vallantine wouldn’t prepare you very well for the rest of the world. You had goals and a dream for yourself, and you tried. That took grit and determination and guts. If you didn’t catch a break, if they didn’t give you one, that’s their loss, and our gain. Most people never would’ve made it out the front door.”
“She’s right.” Scarlett drew a breath and let it out, her gaze searching. “I know you feel disappointed in yourself, but we don’t. Never have. If the Rebecca from our childhood had met the you of today, she wouldn’t, either. You made it on staff at a newspaper, and now, look at you. You’re practically your own boss. You were just offered an editor position. You write what you want, when you want, and there’s twenty-five hundred residents anxiously awaiting your words every morning.”
Rebecca nodded, some of the weight in her chest lifting. Her besties were right, but it would take a bit for belief to sink in. Wounds didn’t heal overnight. Not even self-inflicted ones.
“Based on what you’ve told us, Graham has battled his own demons.” Dorothy leaned back on her hands. “It doesn’t excuse his behavior, but what Gunner did probably fed into Graham’s insecurities, and he lashed out at you.”
She was right, yet again. They’d hash it out later when Rebecca wasn’t so raw.
Up went Scarlett’s brows. “Bettin’ he regrets it.”
Rebecca smiled despite the turmoil in her chest. She’d talk to him later. If need be, she’d accept the offer from Gunner, then hire Graham so they could continue the same roles they’d had the past couple months. Something. She didn’t know, but she needed space to think.
“You love him, don’t you?” Scarlett grinned. “The kind of swoony, head-over-heels love we’d made up stories about as girls on the couch back there while Mr. Brown rolled his eyes.”
“The kind of stories you made up,” Dorothy corrected.
Rebecca huffed a laugh and tilted her head to stretch her neck. The achiness was more pronounced, but she’d worked herself into a tizzy, and it was storming.
“Fine.” Scarlett dramatically waved her hand. “Don’t answer me.”
“I do love him.” It was jarring, admitting it to another soul.
Rebecca sighed, recalling the happily-ever-afters Scarlett had profusely touted in her dreamy tone in this very library. Fiction, nothing more. Or so Rebecca had thought, until they’d played matchmaker for their favorite teacher and their favorite librarian. Fairytales hadn’t seemed so unrealistic once they’d proven their theory and succeeded. But love wasn’t about throwing two people together. They required proper pairing, chemistry, interests, and respect. They had to be the correct fit for it to work.
She had zero doubt in her mind Graham was her fit, her missing puzzle piece. Had she not chosen now to come home, had Gammy not passed away, had Graham not been exposed in a scandal that wasn’t his fault, they may never have met. What an irrevocable shame that would’ve been, them not coming together or ever crossing paths.
Perhaps Scarlett had been correct, after all. Vallantine had some magic to it.
“I’m not sure he feels the same, but I love him.”
“He does.” Dorothy winked. “When we were setting up The Gazette, making copies and such, I caught him watching you more than once. And when he found out about your fibromyalgia, I swear, he was in just as much pain. He might not know it yet, but he loves you.”
One could only hope. Then again, he treated Rebecca with kindness and reverence like he was invested, like she mattered to him an awful lot. He tried to take care of her. That was the other thing about love she was coming to discover. Sometimes, the proof was in the details.
Scarlett glanced around Rebecca. “The rain stopped.”
A check of her watch had Rebecca realizing a couple hours had passed since the besties had come to the rescue. No wonder she hadn’t noticed the storm had passed. The air was still sticky with humidity, but the tangible pressure had abated.
She smiled. “You two can head out. Thank you for coming.”
They got to their feet.
“You sure?” Dorothy asked.
“Yeah. We can stay as long as you need.”
How Rebecca adored these two. What would she do without them? “Yep. I’m going to stay a bit. I’ll clean up. Go on. Thank you, though. Seriously.”
A hug, some more quick witty banter, and her friends left.
The silence was both cumbersome and welcome. So sudden, it seemed like someone had flipped a switch. Yet, the sanctuary of the library wrapped her in its arms. No matter how long she’d been away, it understood. It would heal her hurts and mend her heart, and it would stand like it had for centuries long after she was gone.
Melancholy, she glanced at the blanket, noting the besties had left the thermos with their Georgia Sunset mix on the floor beside the lantern. She grabbed her wet clothes and shoved them in the bag, then threw away the cups. Switching off the lantern, she set it by her purse on the counter and decided to fold the blanket in a moment.
She wasn’t ready to go yet, and she’d done her best thinking here as a girl. Ideas and whimsy. Perhaps she could stand for more of that in her life again. Reality hadn’t been nice.
Walking back to the window, she gazed at the town center. Dusk would descend soon, and the lampposts would cast a romantic yellow glow on the wet cobblestone street. For now, the cobalt sky shone its last legs of late day, fluffy clouds drifting as remnants of the storm moved on. Flowers in the curbside boxes and leaves on the cherry blossom trees reflected sunlight off the rain droplets. People milled about again, in and out of shops, stopping to chat.
She wondered how many times Katherine Vallantine had stood here in the library her husband had built for her, staring at townsfolk and the bustle. There were sketches of the town the way it had looked back then, but Rebecca hadn’t seen them in years. The Historical Society had possession of them at the mayor’s office if memory served. There certainly hadn’t been as many shops, colorful awnings, or decorative additions, for sure. Time marched on.
Which was what Rebecca needed to do. Let go of past aspirations and carve new ones. Remain true to herself, yet grow. Expand. The perimeters of Vallantine weren’t as small as she’d recalled when she’d left. Her besties had been right. She should give herself more credit. She had achieved most of what she’d desired, but she’d done it within the confines of home instead of elsewhere, and through the eyes of an adult more versed in the world than with the ones of an altruistic child.
How would she do that, though? How could she shuck whatever doubts or regrets lingered to blend old dreams with new ones?
A noise came from behind her. Delicate. A rustling, noticeable only because the library was vastly somber. A sound that she’d recognize if deaf, dumb, or blind.
Pages flipping.
The fine hairs on her arms rose, and she slowly turned around.
Notebook pages, at least twenty of them, littered the blanket.
And they’d appeared from nowhere.
Expelling a shaky breath, she walked closer and glanced around. No white mist, shadows shifting, or spooky vibe. She was alone, just as she’d been before, and she didn’t sense any sort of malice. In fact, traces of a lingering scent of roses wafted over that of dust and mildew.
“Katherine?” She swallowed, her pulse thumping. “Katherine Vallantine?”
Had to be. Rosemary and Sheldon Brown had experienced something similar. Many generations of Vallantine descendants, actually. A book or something would appear just when they’d needed it most. An answer to what they’d been searching for. Rebecca always waffled on whether she believed the legend or not, yet it was hard to dispute this. She’d been alone, and standing by the window, next to the only entrance or exit. These papers certainly hadn’t been there before.
Utterly surreal.
“She assists all who enter seeking knowledge,” she whispered to herself. What did Katherine want Rebecca to know?
Kneeling, she grabbed one of the pages.
Why Kittens Are Better Pets Than Dogs by Rebecca Moore
Nuh uh. She’d written these in one of her blogging phases. Gammy hadn’t had the money to buy a computer back then, so Rebecca had written “articles” on notebook pages and had hidden them in books throughout the library. Old school media via a kid. There were still creases from where she’d folded them in half. The paper was slightly yellow-tinged, the ink faded. Gosh, she had to have been twelve, maybe thirteen. She’d completely forgotten.
Laughing, she gathered the rest, reading the titles and shaking her head at her penmanship. Little hearts to dot every other lower case “i” and underlining certain words for emphasis. She cringed at the amateurish musings. My, how far she’d grown in ability. Her stories were obviously more targeted for blogs, not journalism, as they were personal jots of random opinions with some information thrown in.
Sitting on her haunches, she stared off into space, the papers in hand. Even when she’d gone away to college, her goal had been to make it big. Win awards, gain recognition. Breaking news stories that would stand the test of time. Many of her professors had tried to steer her towards creative writing, but she didn’t have the skill or interest. Yet, the articles she’d turned in had been much like these. Come to think of it, so had a lot of the pieces she’d tried sending to editors in Boston. They had edge, distinction, but too much…heart.
Had she been heading in the wrong direction from the start? Admittedly, she’d hated the competitiveness of reporting. Climbing over colleagues to get to the top. The back-stabbing. She’d never had it in her to betray someone. It might’ve been one of the reasons she’d never earned her way out of the Obituaries section. She wanted to inform, educate, but not at the expense of others, and not while losing herself in the process. There was an abundance of depersonalization in journalism, and being from a small southern town, she hadn’t adapted to taking character out of the story.
Perhaps she hadn’t failed, after all. Maybe she’d merely succeeded in staying true to herself, her nature, and listening to her instincts.
When she and her besties had first learned the library had been turned over to them, while still in Boston, Rebecca had reached out to an acquaintance about the myth. A bigwig blogger with thousands of followers. She’d told her how, during their courting period, William and Katherine Vallantine had played the Truth/Lie game. The objective was to get to know a person on a deeper level. Tell one truth, one lie, and something they wished was truth or lie. The other person had to guess which was which. Her acquaintance had made the game go viral, starting with Instagram, and branching out from there.
At the time, Rebecca had been pretty peeved the game had been the blog’s focus, and not the history behind it. William and Katherine’s love story, how the library came to be, her spirit who haunts it, and the Miss Katie wishing tree in the center of town were all absent. They’d all been left out. Her besties had told her to write it, tell the tale, but she’d dismissed them. She hadn’t been in a good headspace to do anything except exist.
She could now, though.
Chewing her lower lip, she pieced together the ideas into creation for proper execution. Start a blog, ride the game hype by tying it in to the real origins, gain followers from that, and when she wasn’t at The Gazette, write about whatever she wanted. Books, the town, her medical condition. Anything. She’d need a name that would encompass her vast topics. Or something vaguely catchy where it didn’t matter.
Sighing, she glanced at the pages in her hands. Katherine hadn’t been wrong yet. Clues had been leading Rebecca here. It was about time she listened.
Rising, she went to the center station and grabbed her laptop bag, then reseated herself on the blanket. While it booted, she rolled around the pros and cons of an actual site or a free blog, deciding on the former.
For the next few hours, she got a site up and running, with a bio page and links to her socials. Since it was a blog, she changed her Instagram name to the new blog name and made it a professional account. As her fingers flew over the keyboard writing her first piece, a sense of euphoria washed through her. Finally, she was in the right space, at the right time, doing what she was meant to do. It was crazy how at peace she felt with her decision.
Laughing, she closed the laptop and stood to stretch.
And realized how dark the library had become. As in, pitch black.
A glance toward the window, and she pressed a palm to her forehead. Night had fallen without her being aware.
She packed her things, and checked her phone. The besties had texted an hour ago to make sure she was okay. She replied, apologizing for taking so long to respond. Graham had messaged, too, roughly an hour after she’d left The Gazette. She hadn’t noticed.
I’m sorry about earlier. We need to talk about the newspaper and us.
Alrighty, he’d apologized. That was a start. Yet, her belly grew uneasy with the other part. Typically, that kind of blanket statement preceded a breakup. She didn’t want to end things.
Opting not to text back, some things were better done in person, she slung her bags over her shoulder, thinking maybe she’d stop by to see Graham if he was still awake. They could discuss what had happened and work it out.
Hopefully. Worry clawed her belly that he might not believe her about Gunner’s offer.
If he didn’t, then he never really knew her at all.
At the door, she took in the darkened confines of the library from the threshold, and smiled. “Thanks, Katherine. I promise, we’ll make you proud with the renovations.”