“I don’t want to write off anything,” he declared, a note of impatience in his voice. He drew in a deep breath. “I’m all in, for the duration.”
“Brave man,” she praised.
He frowned at her. “Just promise me one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“When you want out, you’ll tell me. You won’t let me find out some other way.”
She knew he was thinking about the way he’d discovered his wife in bed with another man.
“I promise I will always be straight with you,” she said solemnly. “But I can tell you right now that you might have to wait a long, long time before I go anywhere, if ever.”
He smiled at that, his relief touchingly evident. “Sounds good to me.”
* * *
Laura was in her classroom after hours the next day when Sarah McDonald came charging in with Raylene and Annie right on her heels.
“You are not going to believe what Mariah Litchfield has been up to today,” Sarah said, practically quivering with indignation. “I’d have been here sooner, but I was tied up at the radio station, and then I had to track down Raylene and Annie to see what they’d heard before we came to fill you in.”
Laura sighed and set down the pen she’d been using to grade papers. “Tell me,” she said, resigned.
“She showed up at the radio station this morning and wanted Travis to put her on the air so she could talk about the vicious campaign being waged against her precious daughter. Want to guess who’s at the top of her hit list?”
“Betty Donovan and me, I imagine,” Laura said.
“Bingo,” Sarah said triumphantly. “I wanted to wring her scrawny neck.”
“What did Travis do?” Laura asked.
“Showed her the door, thank goodness,” Sarah said. “If he’d so much as cracked open the door to the studio, I’d have wrung his neck, too. He took one look at me and knew it.”
“I suppose she feels she has to try to defend her daughter’s inexcusable behavior,” Laura said. “She’s desperate to launch an offensive PR campaign before it’s too late to rehabilitate her daughter’s reputation. Catfighting that goes to the extreme the way it did with Annabelle is not an attractive trait. I imagine Mariah recognizes that the sympathy is all going to be on Misty’s side.”
“Don’t you dare defend her,” Raylene said. “Her next stop was Wharton’s, where she tried to put a bug in Grace’s ear. I heard every word, just as she’d intended. Everyone in the place did. It was all about how everyone was misjudging poor Annabelle, and Misty was the real culprit.”
“Was anyone buying it?” Laura asked, her heart in her throat.
“Not for a second,” Raylene said. “Especially not after Grace finished ripping into Mariah for turning her daughter into a spoiled, entitled brat.”
Raylene lowered her voice to mimic Grace when she got worked up. “‘Mariah Litchfield, absolutely nobody’s going to care if that child of yours has the voice of an angel, if she’s behaving like the devil’s handmaiden. You need to stop this nonsense right now.’”
Raylene grinned. “The whole place erupted into cheers after that. I have to say it made me proud to be a part of this community and glad for Carrie and Mandy’s sakes that we’re taking a stand against bullying. I’d hate to have something like this happen to either of my stepdaughters.”
For a tiny, fleeting instant, Laura almost felt sorry for Mariah. It must be awful to realize that there was little to nothing she could say or do to rescue Annabelle from this mess of her own creation. The town’s darling was about to be a pariah at only seventeen. Once again, she wondered if Annabelle wouldn’t be better off at a school far from Serenity where she could have her own fresh start.
“Knowing that Misty has all this support is great,” Laura said, choosing her words carefully.
Sarah frowned. “Why don’t you sound happier?”
“Because Laura’s afraid it could wind up with the rest of us getting caught up in doing a little bullying of our own to get even,” Annie guessed. “Am I right?”
Laura nodded. “What Annabelle did was horribly wrong. Mariah’s just being a mom. She’s trying to defend her daughter. I’d hate to see everyone gang up on them.”
“How can you possibly take their side?” Sarah asked, her expression incredulous.
“I’m not,” Laura insisted. “Far from it. But bullying is bullying. Would we be one bit better than Annabelle if we turn right around and try to demonize her? She needs to be punished, taught a lesson, one from which she’ll hopefully emerge as a more thoughtful, considerate young lady.”
“Eternal optimist,” Raylene said with a shake of her head. “I’m not that hopeful for a major transformation, not with Mariah defending her behavior wherever she can gather an audience.”
“And you should hope that the town stays solidly against her,” Sarah warned. “Because you and Betty are going to need that support to keep your jobs. Ugly doesn’t begin to cover what that woman is capable of doing.”
“But the school board has been fully informed about what actually happened,” Laura said confidently, though for the first time she felt a little twinge of anxiety. “They’re not going to let Mariah target us, or, if she does, I’m certain they’ll defend us.”
“I’m just saying, it wouldn’t hurt to have community support on your side,” Sarah said. “Last I heard Mariah was ranting about going to the state, because the local board and the school administration are obviously biased and incompetent.”
“It’s just ranting,” Laura repeated.
“It is,” Sarah agreed. “Until she finds some idiot with more power than sense who’ll listen.”
“Call Helen,” Annie advised.
“She’s already all over this,” Laura said.
“She’s all over it for Misty’s sake,” Annie said. “Now you need to be sure she’s prepared to defend you.”
“That’s crazy,” Laura protested, still unwilling to believe things would go that far.
“No,” Sarah said. “That’s Mariah. It wouldn’t be the first time she’s managed to get her way, even when every single person in town knew she was wrong. You know that, Laura. You’ve certainly heard the stories. Call Helen. Maybe you’ll never need her, but don’t let Mariah pick up a full head of steam before you have Helen there to cut her off.”
Laura nodded reluctantly. “I’ll call her.”
Annie held out her cell phone. “Now.”
“You really think it’s that urgent?”
All three women nodded.
“We really
