Read Online The Man She Left Behind by Janice Carter - Free Book Online Page B

before Jen Logan had fallen in love with him, too.
    Leigh rolled onto her side, punched her pillow into a ball and wished herself to sleep. But her eyes fluttered against sleep like moths against the screen.
     
    “DID I WAKE YOU?”
    “Hmm?” Clutching the cell phone, Leigh ran her tongue across her dry lips and rubbed her eyes.
    “I did. Oh, dear, but it’s going on nine-thirty. I hated to let the phone ring so many times, but I was beginning to think I had the wrong number and almost hung up. Sorry about that.” A pause. “Oh, it’s Trish calling.” A brief giggle.
    “I, uh, couldn’t find the phone,” Leigh explained, which elicited a peal of laughter.
    “Heavens, I wouldn’t have the faintest idea how to even turn one of those things on. Anyway, sorry to bother you so early, but it’s my day off and I wondered if you’d like to meet for lunch. That is, if you’re not busy?”
    “Oh, sure, thank you.” Then, embarrassed about her lack of enthusiasm, Leigh added, “’Course I don’t have my engagement book handy.”
    There was a fraction of a hesitation before Trish said, “Oh, well, do you want to go look?”
    Leigh smiled. “I’m kidding, Trish.”
    Another guffaw. “You always were a joker, Leigh, even as a little girl. Faye used to tell me about some of the practical jokes you played on her.”
    “She did? Gee, I don’t remember any myself.” Leigh frowned. “But that was a long time ago. Where shall we meet?”
    “Meet? Oh! For lunch. Well, there’s a new plaice—a kind of bakery-deli—or there’s always Howard’s,” she said, mentioning one of the island’s oldest restaurants.
    Leigh closed her eyes. The bakery-deli was probably the place where she and Spence had gone yesterday morning. “Howard’s would be nice.”
    “Great! Twelve-thirty okay?”
    “Fine. See you then.” Leigh put the phone down on the coffee table and bent over to retrieve the sofa cushions she’d hurled to the floor in her search for the phone. Drained by the energy of Trish’s call and her lack of sleep, she slumped onto the sofa, where she’d crashed just before dawn.
    Maybe the idea of an engagement book isn’t so silly, even for Ocracoke. Two days here and what have I accomplished, other than some cleaning and listing the house for sate? The agent had suggested a few practical improvements to make before the first open house on Saturday.
    Leigh took a deep breath and got to her feet with a determined leap. She’d spend the morning sorting out the things she wanted to keep from what could be thrown away. Her bedroom closet was full of boxes of high-school and college memorabilia. There were more boxes in the attic and perhaps in the other bedrooms. The task would take more than a morning, she knew. But if I’m really lucky, I won’t have to spend the whole two weeks here, after all.
    By midmorning Leigh had cleaned out her bedroom closet and started on the attic. The only troubling moment had come when she lifted the lid on a shoe box of photographs, many from early childhood. Leigh, squinting into the sun, her dark hair knotted into two stubby ponytails at each side of her face, with the solemn expression she wore in almost every photo she appeared. She remembered her mother urging her to smile and her father’s patience. Poor Dad, she thought. How difficult it must have been for a photographer to have a child who hated having her picture taken.
    Then she found several of her and Jen. Jen, who’d never needed encouragement to mug for the camera. Blond hair blazing in the sunlight, Jen pranced and posed in every position a kid could think of—on her hands, midcartwheel, making donkey ears behind Leigh. Later, in the midst of adolescence, there was a demure coyness in the photographs, as if Jen had begun to practice her seduction skills on the camera first. Before she got around to Spencer.
    Leigh replaced the lid on the box. Her hand held it over the recycling load, then shifted it suddenly