Skin Dancer by Carolyn Haines Page B

history and now a deep peace.
    Neon lit Bud’s Bar and Lulu’s, as well as the local pharmacy. Almost everything else was closed. Bisonville rolled up every day about five o’clock when the work day was over. Growing up in Rapid City, she would’ve been appalled at the idea that she’d ever find this solitude and isolation comforting. “What would my life be like now if your parents hadn’t taken me in and moved here, away from all the drugs and bad influences?”
    â€œI figured your dad never knew about you,” Jake said as he parked the Land Rover right in front of the café. Red neon advertised barbecue, and green promised short orders.
    She opened the car door and started to get out, but his hand gently stopped her. “If he’d known about you, he would have come back. Nobody had a clue until months later when Junie started showing. By then there was no denying it, and though Dad tried to find your father, he never could get a trace on him.”
    â€œYou ever think I might not belong to Edward Redmond?” It was a question that she’d asked herself a million times, but she’d never asked her mother. “I mean, Mama wasn’t all that particular who shared her bed.”
    Jake’s thumb rubbed the top of her hand. “She wasn’t like that always, Rachel. You know that. I think she got desperate. She loved you. For all of her flaws, she did love you. I think she felt trapped by her life.”
    â€œShe was the most imprisoned person I’ve ever known.” Rachel was impatient to get out of the vehicle and the conversation. Jake wasn’t usually so sentimental, and she was wary of falling too far down the black hole of the past.
    He nodded. “She constructed a perfect hell for herself, but I remember her when you were first born. I was just a kid myself, but she’d sit on the steps of the trailer and bounce you on her knees. You laughed a lot as a baby. And drooled.”
    â€œThanks for the image and the walk down memory lane.” She slipped free of him and stepped into the cold air. “I want to get a workout in later tonight, so let’s grab that burger. I’m starving.”

CHAPTER SEVEN
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    The burger was delicious. Lulu’s husband, Jimmy, charcoal–grilled the meat out back, creating a juicy,
    tender sandwich replete with organic tomatoes and lettuce. In their sixties, Lulu and Jimmy still wore jeans with peace symbol appliqués, beads and headbands to contain their long gray hair. Had Rachel been one to think in certain directions, she might have thought that between the rows of carefully tended vegetables a weed or two of marijuana might have strayed. But Rachel didn’t think that way, and neither did the sheriff. Lulu and Jimmy were valued local residents.
    She bit into the burger again, relishing the taste.
    Jake put his sandwich down. “Jesus, Rachel, you act like you haven’t eaten in a week.”
    Rachel grinned around a mouthful of meat and bun and wiped her mouth. “I’d forgotten anything could taste this good.”
    â€œCheap date. How about another glass of tea?”
    She shook her head. “Coffee and some chocolate pie.”
    Jake signaled Lulu, who personally came over to take the order. “One chocolate pie and two coffees.” He winked at Lulu. “Rachel’s trying to empty my wallet.”
    â€œGet him his own pie because I’m not sharing.” Rachel nodded at Lulu. “Bring him a piece or he’ll eat most of mine.”
    â€œI’ll be sure I make those generous pieces,” Lulu said as she patted Rachel’s shoulder. “You look good in that uniform. Although you turned a few heads when you wore one of my paisley aprons.”
    â€œI like the way you lie.” Rachel smiled up at the older woman. She’d moved with the Ortiz family to Bisonville, and Lulu had given her a job. Waiting tables had taught Rachel a