Hometown Girl Page 2

  And she couldn’t get Nick to leave.

  He and his mother had only been living in Monroe for three months when Janice was killed in the car crash. Now Nick would be uprooted once again, transplanted to the foreign territory of Chicago.

  Her condominium in Lincoln Park was big enough for both of them. There were rooms she never even used. Nick would adjust to the change. Kids were very adaptable. He’d be fine.

  Would he? The small voice nagged at her from deep within her conscience.

  Of course Nick would be fine! He would attend the most exclusive private school in the city, only blocks from her house. He’d get the best education money could buy, much better than Monroe High School. He’d make friends and get involved in all sorts of clubs and activities. What teen wouldn’t love growing up in a city like Chicago?

  Maybe Nick wouldn’t, the mocking voice inside her suggested. She had no idea, because she didn’t know her nephew. Not in any of the ways that mattered.

  “Damn it!” She picked up a tattered pillow from the couch and heaved it against the wall. It struck a picture, which clattered to the floor. The frame cracked and fell into pieces on the wood floor.

  “Good! I always hated that picture,” she said under her breath.

  “What’s going on?” Nick called from the stairs.

  “Nothing.” She pushed heavy strands of hair away from her face. “Nothing at all.”

  He peered over the banister, frowning at the picture and its shattered frame. “What did you do? Why are you wrecking my house?”

  She wanted to remind him that it wasn’t his house, that they owned equal shares. But she clamped her mouth shut. One immature child in the house was enough.

  “I’m not wrecking the house, Nick. The picture came off the wall. It was falling apart anyway.”

  “That was my favorite picture.” He scowled at her.

  She glanced at the canvas leaning against the wall. Dull, dusty fruit, most of it unidentifiable, was painted onto a bilious green background. “Yeah, I can see why,” she said.

  He gave her a sharp look but didn’t respond. After staring at the picture for a moment, he turned and headed back up the stairs. “Make sure you clean it up,” he said over his shoulder.

  She bit off her instinctive, angry retort. Now wasn’t the time to get into a fight. She was tired, upset and on edge. A bad combination. It was the worst possible time for a confrontation with her nephew.

  She lowered herself onto the worn couch, sinking deep into the cushion. She couldn’t stay in Monroe. Ugly memories of fear and anger swept through her in a roiling wave. No one could expect her to stay in Monroe.

  She’d paid her penance in this town for the first twenty years of her life. An ugly childhood followed by an uglier marriage had destroyed any wisps of fondness, any nostalgia she might have felt for Monroe.

  But would Chicago really be the best place for Nick? that small voice asked again. He must have friends here. Maybe he had a job. A girlfriend.

  She’d never asked him, she realized with a surge of shame. She’d assumed he’d gladly pack up and leave.

  “Nick,” she called up the stairs. “Could you come down here for a moment?”

  His door opened. “What?” he yelled.

  “I need to talk to you.”

  “About what?”

  “Just come here, will you?”

  After a moment she heard him on the stairs. As soon as he could see her, he stopped. “What?”

  “Come and sit down,” she said, the effort to be patient grinding against her temper.

  He stared at her for a long moment, then shuffled down the stairs and threw himself onto the chair farthest from the couch.

  “Tell me why you want to stay in Monroe,” she said.

  He studied her, his face wary, clearly wondering what she was up to. Finally he scowled and looked away. “This is the place my mom wanted to live,” he said. “Okay? She said a new start would be good for both of us.” His voice thickened and he stood up, ramming his hands into the pockets of his baggy jeans. The pressure of his fists pulled them even lower on his narrow hips.

  “What else did your mom say?” she asked quietly.

  “She had a job, you know.” He whirled to face her, anger filling his face. His eyes were shiny with unshed tears. “She said we’d be just like everyone else in town. I’d go to high school, she’d go to work. We wouldn’t have to move around all the time. We’d be a normal family, just like the other kids. That’s all I ever wanted to be.”

  His voice caught on the last words and he turned away from her again, furtively wiping his hand across his eyes.

  “You could have the same things in Chicago,” she said softly. “There’s a wonderful school a few blocks away from my condo. I have a job, too, but I’d be home every evening. I’ll never take your mother’s place, but we could make a home together.”

  “I don’t need a home in Chicago. I have one here.” His voice was thick and he cleared his throat.

  “And I have a job in Chicago.”

  Her job as the owner of a small accounting firm gave her a lot of flexibility, she admitted reluctantly. With a few adjustments, it was a job she could do from Monroe.

  She could stay in Monroe for a few weeks. She could give Nick a chance to get to know her before she took him back to the city.

  Her stomach spasmed, and dread rushed through her at the thought.

  Monroe.

  The town she feared. The town where she had never been in control of any aspect of her life. The town that starred in all her nightmares.

  The town where her ex-husband still lived.

  It was a matter of what she wanted versus what Nick needed. Her stomach twisted even tighter. He was a child. His needs had to come first.

  It was the least she could do for Janice. She’d failed her sister when they were children, allowing her older sister to absorb all the punishment from their parents.

  And she’d failed Janice as an adult. She should have made sure her sister and her nephew were provided for.

  She drew a deep, trembling breath. Forcing the words out of her mouth, she said, “How about we compromise? We’ll stay in Monroe for a few weeks while we get to know each other. When you’re comfortable with me, and vice versa, we’ll go back to Chicago.”

  Nick turned around slowly, distrust in his eyes. “I thought you had a job in Chicago.”

  The faint flicker of hope behind the anger and suspicion in his eyes filled her with another rush of shame. She’d been in such a hurry to leave Monroe she hadn’t considered Nick’s feelings at all. “I do. But I can work from Monroe, at least for a little while.”

  She saw his hands bunch into fists inside the pockets of his jeans. “What is this important job you do?”

  “I didn’t say it was important,” she answered, her voice mild. “It’s only important to me.” She hesitated. Would her job make him even more resentful of her? “I own a small accounting company.”

  He scowled. “You’re going to just let your business go to hell?”

  “I can do my job from Monroe,” she said, resisting the urge to tell him not to swear. He would no doubt like nothing better than to redirect their discussion.

  “You’re going to make all the rich people come to Monroe?” he asked with a sneer.

  “Not at all. I can do a lot of my work over the phone, with a fax machine and a computer. I can get by without face-to-face meetings for a while.”

  Hope struggled to surface in his eyes. She watched as he crushed it. “Don’t bother to get everything set up. I’m not going to change my mind.”

  “Let’s not worry about that right now.” She looked around the room as dread filled her again. “School opens in two weeks. Let’s see how we’re doing by then.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “YOU DID WHAT?”

  Incredulous, Claire turned her chair from her computer to face Nick. He stared back at her insolently, the always-present anger swirling lik
e storm clouds in his eyes. Nothing had changed in the three weeks since Janice’s funeral.

  “I joined the football team.”

  “You can’t play football!”

  “Says who?” he sneered.

  “Says me. And your doctors. And the school! They know about your hip and your asthma. I can’t believe they let you sign up to play football.”

  “Coach Hall said I could be on the team.” Nick stuck his chin out. “He said it would be good for me.”

  “And how would Coach Hall know what’s good for you?”

  “Tucker Hall knows everything about football,” Nick responded hotly. “He said he could make me a kicker.”

  “I don’t care what he said he could do. And I don’t care how much he knows about football. He doesn’t know what’s best for you.”

  Was Tucker Hall the same man who’d been the football coach when she’d attended Monroe High School? She had no idea, but the name sounded vaguely familiar.

  “He’s a good coach,” Nick said. “All the guys say so. Of course, you wouldn’t know that. You don’t know a thing about football.” His voice dripped with scorn.

  “Guilty as charged,” she said, her voice dry. “But I do know a few things about you.”

  Beneath her nephew’s defiance she could see his hunger to be accepted, to be merely one of the guys instead of the newcomer with a limp. She’d learned that much about him in the past three weeks. Remembering her childhood as the one who never fit in, the child the other kids whispered about, the one who was different, her heart ached for him.

  But it didn’t mean she could let him play football. It was a dangerous, ridiculous idea. “I guess I’ll have to straighten out this Coach Hall.”

  “Let’s go back to school right now,” Nick said. “You can talk to him after practice.”

  She wanted to refuse, to tell Nick there was no way he was playing football and that was the end of the discussion. But she hesitated. This was the most animated she’d seen him since his mother had died. And even if there was no way she could let him play football, she could at least explain the reasons to the coach.

  “All right, Nick. I’ll go over to the high school and talk to him. I’m sure once he understands your medical problems he’ll agree with me.”

  “I don’t have any medical problems.” Nick’s eyes took on the mulish expression that was becoming too familiar to her. “I keep telling you that.”

  “You have asthma. And your hip is fragile.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with my hip,” he shot back. “I had surgery on it when I was a baby. It’s fine.”

  “Yes, your hip was repaired, but it’s not as strong as it should be. You can’t play a contact sport, even if you didn’t have asthma.”

  “Kids with asthma play sports all the time,” he said scornfully, as if this was something she should have known. “They use inhalers and sh—stuff.”

  “Do you even have an inhaler? I haven’t seen you use it once in the past few weeks.” She noticed the near slip into swearing, and the way he caught himself. He was listening to at least some of the things she’d said. It might be a tiny step, but it was progress.

  He hunched his shoulders and turned away, a response she’d learned was typical when she was right and he knew it. “I haven’t had any reason to use it,” he muttered.

  “All right. I’ll call the school tomorrow and make an appointment to talk to the coach.”

  “No! We have to go right now!”

  He faced her, and for the first time wasn’t trying to hide how he felt. The pleading look in his eyes made her heart constrict. “I need to start tomorrow. I can’t do that unless you talk to Coach today. I’ve already missed two weeks of practice!”

  She glanced at the spreadsheet she’d been working on. It wasn’t nearly as important as her nephew. Clicking it closed, she stood up.

  “All right. We’ll go over to the high school now.”

  TUCKER HALL STOOD on the practice field, watching carefully as the sixty-four players on his team ran laps around the track, still wearing their pads and helmets. The crushing heat of a central Illinois summer had relented just a little today. He didn’t have to worry as much about heat-related illnesses, but he still assessed each boy as he trotted past.

  A car door slammed in the distance, and a voice called, “Coach Hall! Coach Hall!”

  He turned to see Nick Kendall hurrying toward him, trying hard not to limp. The kid’s face was lit with excitement, and Tucker felt something squeeze his heart.

  Trailing behind him was a slight woman. Even from a distance he could see the resolve in her squared shoulders and determined stride. So this was the aunt. The woman Nick described as a combination jailer, tyrant and Cruella DeVil.

  “All right, guys, take a water break,” he yelled to his team. “And keep walking while you’re drinking.”

  He strolled over to the edge of the field and nodded to Nick. “Hey, Kendall. Brought your aunt, huh?” Tucker crossed his arms and waited for the woman to catch up.

  “She says I can’t play football. Tell her she’s wrong.”

  The raw eagerness in Nick’s eyes made him look like a typical fifteen-year-old. It was the most unguarded Tucker had seen him since school had started.

  Tucker watched as the woman approached. She was shorter than Nick—the gangly teen towered over her. And slender in a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. But she had curves in all the right places. He felt a quickening of interest as she got closer.

  Her short, sleek, dark-red hair brushed her cheek as she walked. Her legs were firm and smooth, and her eyes were deep pools of mysterious green.

  And faint, disapproving determination.

  She stopped in front of him and had to look up to meet his eyes. “Mr. Hall? I’m Claire Kendall. Nick’s aunt.”

  She held out her hand. Her grip was firm and businesslike. But her skin was smooth and creamy.

  Startled by the thought, he dropped her hand and took a step backward. The air was suddenly too dense and heavy.

  “I’m Tucker Hall,” he said, and waited for the inevitable recognition to seep into her eyes.

  She frowned, and he braced himself. But all she said was, “Your name sounds familiar. But you’re not the football coach I remember.”

  “Tom Peters retired last year,” he said, letting out the breath he’d been holding. “I took his place.”

  “I see.”

  She continued frowning, as if trying to place him, then shook her head. “That doesn’t matter. Nick says you told him he could play football. I’m afraid that’s impossible.” Her voice was brisk and firm. “He has a congenital weakness in his hip, and he can’t play any contact sports.”

  “Nick told me all about his hip. And his asthma,” Tucker answered.

  He saw the flicker of surprise in her eyes. “He did?” Then she recovered. “So you must see that football wouldn’t be a wise choice for him.”

  “Not at all. I think football would be an excellent choice for him.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Perhaps you didn’t understand, Mr. Hall. Nick—”

  He interrupted, holding one hand up to stop her. “Hold on a minute. Nick,” he turned to the boy, “why don’t you go on over and start walking with the team. You’ve got some catching up to do to get in shape.”

  Nick grinned and his whole face lit up. “Yes, sir!”

  “Johnson!” Tucker shouted. “Walk with Kendall.”

  Nick ran toward the other boys and fell in beside a couple of other sophomores.

  Tucker turned to Claire. “Booger Johnson is a sophomore, too. He’s in a couple of Nick’s classes.”

  “Booger?”

  Tucker grinned. “It’s a teenage boy thing. You probably don’t want to know the details.”

  He glanced over at the boys again, then back at Claire Kendall. “You were saying?”

  Her jaw tightened and her eyes flashed. “You had no right to tell him to go practice with the team. He can’t
play football!”

  “He’s not practicing. He’s just walking. That’s not going to hurt him, is it? Or is walking prohibited, too? With his hip problem and all?”

  He was baiting her and it was a mistake. But he wanted to see those sparks flash in her eyes again.

  He wasn’t disappointed. “Do you understand plain English? Or are you going to prove that dreary stereotype of the athlete as a Neanderthal? Nick can’t play football! It’s cruel to get his hopes up like that.”

  “I don’t agree. Nick can and should play football. Come on over into the shade so we can talk.”

  He touched her arm and she jerked away from his hand. “Didn’t you listen to a thing I said? He was born with a dislocated hip. It’s been surgically repaired, but it’s still fragile. And on top of that, he has asthma.”

  He took her elbow and steered her toward a tree, tightening his grip when she tried to free herself. He wanted to keep touching that velvety skin of hers.

  Don’t do it, a voice warned. She’s definitely not your type. Everything about her says sleek, sophisticated city woman.

  He released her when they reached the tree and she backed up a step, rubbing the spot where he’d held her. He hadn’t held her that tightly, he thought, watching the sweep of her fingers over her skin. His muscles tightened. Apparently sleek city women were his type.

  Was it possible she’d felt the same tiny frisson of electricity when he touched her?

  It didn’t matter if she did. She was here to talk about Nick. And that was all.

  “Ms. Kendall, are you aware that Nick is having trouble in school?”

  Her eyebrows shot up to her hairline. “What kind of trouble?” She took a step toward him, then caught herself.

  “Not the kind you’re thinking of.” He wanted to touch her arm again, to reassure her, but he kept his hands to himself. “He’s in my U.S. history class, and he’s a good student. Bright, hardworking, conscientious. But he isolates himself from the rest of the students. He doesn’t talk to anyone, doesn’t sit with anyone at lunch. And it’s not as if no one tries. I’ve seen several kids make overtures to him, but he pushes them away.”