Rendezvous To Remember by Geri Krotow

Author:Geri Krotow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2007-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Friday, one week after her return home, was Melinda’s favorite kind of Buffalo day. Cold, yes, but nothing her parka and cashmere scarf couldn’t handle. The sun was as bright as it’d get in the November sky, and the remaining leaves that hadn’t been blown away by last week’s snowstorm floated to the ground. The snow had melted and she wondered if they’d have a white Christmas. Still a month away. They could have three feet by then.

She was grateful for the convenience of their neighborhood. She walked to the library, a fifteen-minute jaunt from home. In worse weather she’d have to take the car but today the walk was perfect. No threat of rain or snow with the light wispy clouds that framed the bare branches of the trees.

Melinda could have used her laptop at home, but she couldn’t risk Nicholas walking in on her. She needed to learn what she could about his stint in Afghanistan without his thinking she was spying on him.

It was silly. She could just ask him.

But the Internet wasn’t personal.

The library smelled, as it always did this time of year, of books and damp coats. Melinda smiled at the librarian at the front desk, a new woman she didn’t recognize.

“I need an Internet computer, please.”

“Can I have your driver’s license?”

Melinda handed over her ID, trusting the woman didn’t know her or her family.

No such luck. “You’re Esmée’s granddaughter?” The woman’s blue eyes darkened with compassion.

“Yes. You’re good—my maiden name isn’t on there.”

“Esmée was always talking about you and your husband, Nick.”

“And you’re?”

The woman let out a self-conscious giggle. “I’m sorry. I’m Alice Shapinski. I moved back from California last year, and your grandmother was wonderful to me.”

Melinda racked her brain for a memory of this woman at the funeral. Nothing came to mind.

“Nice to meet you, Alice.”

Melinda stuck out her hand. She hoped Alice was really a friend and not someone who collected facts on the area and its inhabitants.

“I’m sorry we didn’t meet at the funeral. I was in the back during Mass, but I couldn’t bring myself to go to the cemetery. Your grandmother was very special.”

“Yes, she was.”

Melinda put Alice close to her own age.

“What sent you out to California?”

“The same thing that sends us all, I suppose. I wanted to see the world, find the opportunities I thought I was missing here. I went to UC Berkeley, then worked in California library systems for ten years. I got my Master’s while I was out there, too.”

“So what brought you back?”

“It’s more like ‘what drove me away from California.’” Alice’s smile grew tremulous and Melinda hoped she wasn’t going to start crying.

What was it with women her age?

“A man?”

“Yeah.” Alice lifted her chin and drew in a shaky breath. Her fuzzy pink angora sweater trembled. Alice might have been hurt by a man, but not enough to keep her from dressing to attract another.

Including the glossy come-kiss-me lipstick on her lips.

“Now that I’m back, I have no doubt it was the right choice.

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