Met Her Match Read online

  Finally, Terri stood up straight, faced them, then held her arms up, her thumbs pointed to the sky. He was alive!

  Nate started the boat motor and took off so fast that Terri would have fallen if he hadn’t caught her. He grabbed her by the waist and pulled her to the seat beside him. They disappeared around the bend.

  For a while Stacy just stood there, clinging to the lifeguard stand. The people on the beach were laughing and some of the kids were dancing. What she heard most was “Nate and Terri.” Only it was said as one word: nateandterri.

  “You want us to give you a ride back to town?” Brett asked. His tone was as to someone who’d just seen the death of a loved one. Sad and full of caring.

  If there was one thing Stacy didn’t want, it was to be the object of pity. She gave the smile that as a cheerleader she’d learned to put on after the team lost. “No,” she said brightly, “I need to clean up and...” She couldn’t think of an excuse. “My booth.”

  “But how will you get back?” Brent asked.

  “Nate warned me that something like this might happen so he left me his car keys. He told me he and Terri worked together, but I had no idea they were so good. It was like watching a ballet, wasn’t it?” She smiled broadly.

  The twins looked dubious, but then nodded. “You’re sure you don’t need us?”

  “Of course not.” I had no idea I was so good at lying, she thought. I’m an absolute master at it.

  It took a few moments to get rid of them, then Stacy stood by her basket full of uneaten food and looked about the bystanders. Who could she get to tell her the truth of what was going on?

  To one side, digging up shells, was Colby Felderman. He was nine years old, went to her church, was in her mother’s Sunday school class and was a great talker. She knew his parents lived in a house at the lake.

  “Hi, Colby,” she said.

  “Hi, Miss Hartman. Did you see it?”

  “I sure did. I have some food here that needs to go to Nate but I don’t know where he lives. Do you know?”

  “With Terri. Up there.” He pointed toward a house on a bit of land that stuck out into the lake.

  “That’s a pretty place. Have you seen Nate up there?”

  “Sure. He and Terri sit in the chairs and drink beer.”

  “Every night?”

  “No. Sometimes they have parties and everybody goes.”

  “That sounds like fun. Does Nate help around here, at the lake?”

  “He does everything.”

  “With Terri?”

  “Oh yeah. My mom says they’re in love but too dumb to know it. But I don’t think Nate is dumb. He fixed the motor on my dad’s boat. And one night he and Terri took my brother to jail, but Dad got him out.”

  “That doesn’t sound dumb to me either,” Stacy said softly.

  “I gotta go. See ya in church.”

  “Yes, I’ll see you in church.”

  Chapter 15

  “Where’s Nate?” the man asked Terri. It was Saturday and Widiwick was in full swing, with hundreds of visitors.

  “I have no idea.”

  “But I need him to carry one of my sculptures to a truck. It weighs about four hundred pounds.”

  Terri was stapling the side of a tent that had fallen down. “I don’t know where he is. Go ask Stacy Hartman.”

  “What does she have to do with anything?”

  “Stacy and Nate are engaged to be married.”

  “Married?” The man looked shocked.

  “You’ve never heard of it? Marriage has been around for a while.”

  “I thought you two were—”

  She stepped around the man and started toward her next job.

  “Terri, I’m serious,” he called after her. “How am I going to move this thing? It’s a polished tree stump with a piece of glass on the top.”

  “How did you get it there in the first place?” When he started to speak, she put up her hand. “Don’t tell me. Nate did it. I don’t know how we ran this place before he showed up. Go find Stacy and ask her. I haven’t seen him.” She picked up her pace and went to her utility truck and got in.

  For today, no cars or trucks were allowed on the road that encircled the lake. People had to park on the outside and walk. That caused a lot of grumbling but it saved them from running over each other.

  Terri needed a break from the noise and the questions and the general chaos of the fair. They didn’t have a count, but it looked to be the biggest one yet. A vendor said she’d stamped over two hundred tickets as the people tried to get them ready to be put in for the Wish drawing. Summer Hill Residents Only seemed to have been lost along the way.

  Mr. Cresnor had been sitting on his throne chair off and on since yesterday morning. Terri hadn’t okayed it but the kids on the staff had started gluing seashells to the big wooden chair. As soon as the children saw it, they added things. One of the girls who worked in the kitchen was in charge of the glue gun. Matchbox cars, diaper pins, hair clips, feathers, and lots and lots of fake jewels were being glued on. Mr. Cresnor sat in his chair and approved or disapproved what could be added. His wife said he was in heaven.

  Smiling, Terri waved to people as she entered Elaine’s shop. There were six college girls working today and from the sound of it, they were mostly running the register.

  One of them pointed toward the storeroom door. It looked like Elaine was hiding out. Terri went inside, closed the door behind her and leaned on it, her eyes closed.

  “Come on,” Elaine called. “Sit down. Have you had anything to eat?”

  “Not since 6:00 a.m.” Terri stepped around some open boxes, past shelves that were nearly empty, to get to the little table by the back door. It was set with soft drinks and sandwiches wrapped in plastic. Gratefully, she sat down. “Are you going to run out of stuff to sell?”

  “Close. I’ve had eight requests for suits and cover-ups like you wore. I want you to be my model more often.”

  “Sure. I’ll get a tattoo on my forehead that says I got it at Elaine’s.”

  “No one will see it. Now if you put it on your behind, everyone would see it.”

  Laughing, Terri took the drink Elaine held out to her. “Really, how are you doing?”

  “Financially, excellent. I actually have sold out of nearly everything. Next week I’ll have to go to New York to buy more.”

  “Take Dad with you. Have lots of sex and cheer him up.”

  Elaine didn’t smile. “You, Brody and Frank all need cheering up.”

  “A three-way? No thanks.”

  Elaine still didn’t smile. “How are you? And don’t you dare say, ‘Fine.’ What’s going on in that busy mind of yours?”

  “Nothing. I’ve had too much to do to think about anything.” Elaine was glaring at her. Terri gave a deep sigh, picked up a sandwich and unwrapped it. “I haven’t seen Nate since the picnic on Thursday.”

  “You mean, not since you two saved that man’s life?”

  Terri shrugged. “I guess so. We got him to the ambulance, then Nate left.” She finished the sandwich and reached for another one. “To be fair, the picnic was awful. I was angry and I said too much. Poor Stacy. I don’t think she had a clue what was going on.”

  “Have you talked to her since then?”

  “I’m too cowardly for that. I figure that by now she’s been told and I fear her wrath. ‘You lived with my fiancé?’ That sort of thing.” She dropped a crust of bread onto the table. “I am like my mother,” she whispered.

  Elaine stood up and clasped Terri to her.

  Terri clung to her tightly and for a moment there were tears in her eyes. She pulled away. “I’m all right.”

  Elaine sat down across from her. “Terri.” Her voice was terse. “I haven’t been here that long but you have to get over this obsession about