The Summer Seekers

They’d been driving for half an hour when Kathleen noticed Martha’s phone light up. “Someone called Steven is calling you. Would you like me to answer it?”

“No!” Martha grabbed the phone and turned it over. “Leave it.”

Interesting, Kathleen thought, that Steven was the only thing that had tempted Martha to release her grip on the wheel.

The phone stopped ringing and then immediately started again.

“He’s persistent.”

“One of his many annoying traits.” Martha pushed her hair away from her face with a shaky hand. “Sorry.”

“I have no objection to personal calls. If you want to pull over and call him back—”

“I don’t.” But Martha swerved to the side of the road and stopped the car. Breathing deeply, she grabbed her phone and switched it off. “There. No more calls. At least he can’t turn up at the motel where we’re staying so I suppose I should be grateful for small things.”

It had been a long time since Kathleen had witnessed the fallout of a bad romance, but that didn’t mean she’d forgotten how it looked. “Was he a scoundrel?”

“A sc—” Martha gave a choked laugh. “Yes. He was a real scoundrel, Kathleen. A megascoundrel. A superscoundrel.”

“Scoundrel is an adequate descriptor. Hyperbole is unnecessary. I gather he broke your heart.”

“Along with a few other things, including a teapot my grandma gave me which is something I’ll never forgive him for.”

As a tea lover, Kathleen could understand the outrage. “Describe the teapot.”

“It was white and covered in red cherries. It made me think of summer and smiling.” Martha sucked in another breath and steered the car back onto the road. “I refuse to let him intrude on my life, or this special trip.”

“Was it serious?”

“For me? Yes. For him—it turned out the answer was no. My mother took it as yet more evidence of my inability to make good choices.”

“She clearly didn’t understand scoundrels. They’re charming and convincing and they seem like a good choice at the time.” She should know. “Is he the reason you took this job?”

“What?” Martha braked sharply and Kathleen lurched forward, her seat belt locking.

She should have waited until they’d arrived at the motel before asking the question.

“I assumed you were running away from something. Or someone.”

“You—what made you think that?”

“That day you came to visit, you seemed a little—desperate. Keep your eyes on the road, dear.”

Martha was gripping the wheel. “You noticed? And you gave me the job anyway?”

“You were exactly what I needed. Someone young with enough energy to compensate for my occasional lack of it, and someone who had absolutely no reason to change their minds and go home in the middle of our trip.”

“Kathleen—”

“It was only a suspicion at first, but I’m sure now that nothing less than desperation would have persuaded you to take a job that involved driving when you clearly hate driving.”

Martha wiped sweat off her forehead and mouthed an apology to the car behind who was now leaning on his horn. Fortunately, the sign for the motel flashed up ahead and she pulled in with visible relief and parked.

“How do you know I hate driving?” She turned to Kathleen, stricken. “Am I scaring you? Am I doing something wrong?”

Kathleen was beginning to wish she hadn’t said anything. Liza had wanted her to check Martha’s license, but what she really should have done was utilize some kind of psychological test that would have revealed that her prospective driver was a seething mass of emotions. “You’re not doing anything wrong, but you don’t seem comfortable. Every time a car approaches your jaw is clenched, you lean forward in your seat and you grip the wheel until you almost cut off the blood supply to your fingers. And I don’t understand why because you are an excellent driver.”

Martha stared at her. “Excellent? You really think I’m excellent?”