“That’s all I want to hear. That and the sound of a cash register ringing.”
“Speaking of which . . . ”
“We’ll get one of those too.” Roan started punching buttons on his cell phone. “Let me talk to Sara’s mom, Elli
e, and she’ll get everything started. You better open the door.”
Sophie turned to see Betsy and Heather outside, buckets and mops in their hands.
“Alice is getting supplies and bringing her husband’s shop vac,” Betsy said as soon as she was inside. “Sophie, we didn’t mean you any harm.”
“It’s just that Dr. Reede can be such a jerk that we’ll do anything to give us some peace,” Heather said. “And when we met you and you are so very pretty, we hoped that—”
“That’s enough,” Roan said. “I’m taking Iphigenia here out to do some shopping. When we get back I want this place to be sparkling. There’ll be furniture here this afternoon. See that it gets placed correctly.”
Sophie was trying to hide her smile over his Iphigenia remark. In Greek mythology she was a young woman who had been placed on an altar to be sacrificed to help others. Whether or not this was carried out differed from one storyteller to the next.
“Ready?” Roan asked Sophie, and she nodded.
Later, when he and Sophie stopped for a late lunch, Roan slipped away to call Reede to tell him that Sophie had found out who he was.
“Who told her?” Reede asked.
That it was hours later and no one from Edilean had told Reede, Roan took to mean that they were too chicken. “She went to your apartment and saw you sprawled on the couch. I don’t know why she didn’t drop something else on that ugly mug of yours. She—” Roan broke off because Reede wasn’t making his usual protests. “You okay?”
“No,” Reede said. “How angry is she?”
“More depressed than angry, but I’m working on her.”
“She probably thinks I’m like Treeborne.” Reede was standing in the hospital corridor, his white jacket rumpled. There were dark circles under his eyes from lack of sleep, from the trauma of his patients, and from Sophie not answering any of his six text messages, three e-mails, or four phone calls.
“Treeborne?” Roan said. “Like the foods?”
“You didn’t hear me say that name. Got it?” Reede said. “Just tell me about Sophie. I was afraid she’d leave town when she found out. That’s why I tried to get her to rent a house.”
“The old Gains place? Al tore up that lease, although I heard that his wife made him pay a deposit plus the first and last month’s rent. But don’t worry about Sophie. We’re taking care of her.”
“What does that mean?” Reede asked. “And who is ‘we’? And what has she said about me?”
Roan had expected to enjoy his cousin’s misery as much as he’d loved seeing beer poured over his head. But there was such sadness, such despair in Reede’s voice that Roan couldn’t derive any pleasure from it. At the Halloween party Reede had been the happiest anyone had seen him in years—which is why the town had played along with his prank.
“It’s all been Al’s idea,” Roan said, and told Reede about the sandwich shop.
“She can cook,” Reede said in a voice that seemed to have no life in it. “But then Sophie can do most anything. You’ll have to see the sculpture she made for me. It’s as good as anything I’ve ever seen in an art gallery.”
“So when are you coming back to town?”
“I don’t know. Today. Tonight maybe. I have office hours tomorrow. If I could I’d get on a plane and—”
“Run away!” Roan snapped and his voice rose as he spoke. “Like you did when the Chawnley girl dumped you? Only this time you deserve what you got. Listen, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’m going to help you. I’ll call some people and see if I can get someone to take over your office here in Edilean. That way you’ll get to run away and lick your wounds for another ten years. And Reede, I want to say that I’m really glad you’re going to leave town because I’m going to do everything I can to get Sophie for my own. She and I spent today together and I like her. And unlike you, I am not a coward. I’ll fight for what I want.”
With that, Roan clicked off the phone and shoved it into his pocket. “Idiot!” he said aloud.
The truth was that Roan knew that Sophie was never going to be his. She wasn’t interested in him, didn’t even seem to see him as a man. Even though they’d spent a day together and he’d worked hard to make her laugh, there was an emptiness in her eyes that was haunting.
They’d spent the day buying necessary equipment for the little restaurant, and try as he might, Roan could never get Sophie to purchase so much as a spoon that she didn’t think was essential. Since Roan also liked to cook, they’d talked a lot about food, but Sophie wouldn’t speak of anything personal. It was as though she was shutting down, putting a wall around herself—and he hated to see that. Maybe Reede was the main culprit of what had been done to her, but so was the town.
When they stopped for lunch and Sophie excused herself, Roan called Sara and told her what was going on.