The Debutante's Second Chance. Liz Flaherty

Jessie’s normally soft brown eyes snapped. “You going to live the rest of your life on maybes?”

      Landy got up, going back to her closet. “Maybe,” she said over her shoulder, and laughed when Jessie raised one finger in a universal gesture.

      “Wear a dress.” Jessie poured more tea.

      “Oh, Jess, I don’t think so.” Landy looked down at the scars left by the surgeries on her leg. “This doesn’t look too pretty.”

      Their eyes met in the mirror. “You’re right. You’ve been hiding from who you are ever since Blake died,” said Jessie. “Why stop now?”

      Stung, Landy reached far into the closet and withdrew a hanger.

      It looked like a basic “little black dress” until the wearer moved and hints of plum shimmered in its depths. Darts and seams made it fit as though it had been tailored for her, even though she’d bought it off the clearance rack at the boutique beside Down at Jenny’s. She’d never worn it, but sometimes she would come into her room and try it on. She’d turn this way and that before the long mirror and imagine herself unscarred and free.

      Maybe, just for tonight, that’s what she could be.

      She slid her feet into strappy black cloth heels and fastened silver hoops in her ears, a silver chain around her throat that nestled inside the scooped neckline of the dress, and a row of delicate bracelets that slipped up and down her arm and captured light when they moved.

      “You look wonderful,” said Jessie, her voice soft.

      Landy looked into the mirror again, almost afraid there would be no reflection there because the Landy Wisdom who wore clothes like this no longer existed.

      “It’s really me,” she said, swallowing sudden, ridiculous tears.

      By the time she reached the bottom of the stairs, she knew the heels were a mistake. She already had one off when the doorbell rang, and she limped to answer, standing with her stockinged foot tucked behind her other leg.

      “Hi,” she said.

      “Wow,” he said.

      She tugged her shoe back on. If she regretted it, so be it. “We should go,” she said. “I’ll turn back into a frump when the eleven o’clock news comes on.”

      “Never in a million years.” He looked up at where Jessie stood on the stairs. “She have a curfew, Jess?”

      She grinned at him. “Before daylight or else park in the garage. We don’t want the neighbors talking.”

      “Eli would be parked on the porch waiting.” Landy lifted a black cashmere stole from the newel post. “He runs the neighborhood watch,” she explained to Micah.

      “Is that all it is?”

      “What else?” she asked, puzzled, but he was opening the door for her. “Later, Jess.”

      “I thought we’d go to the Overlook. It’s warm enough to eat on the porch. That okay with you?” Micah seated her in the passenger side of his Blazer—giving her a boost when her skirt was too narrow for her to negotiate the step up—and pulled the seat belt up for her to fasten.

      “It’s my favorite place,” she said, when he’d climbed in beside her. “I like your Blazer.”

      “My dad wanted me to bring his nice, conservative Buick. He said it was a much better choice for taking a lady out to dinner.”

      She adopted a haughty air. “That’s all right. We debutantes are quite tolerant.”

      They were seated at a table beside the windows that looked out over the Ohio when Micah said, “I was crazy about you, you know.”

      Her eyes widened. “You didn’t even like me.”

      “It made me mad that you couldn’t see what a jerk Trent was, and I knew I’d never have enough money or prestige to ask you out, regardless of him.”

      “Oh, my goodness, no. You weren’t even good enough to kiss my ring in those days.” Anger and disappointment made her voice wobble, which made her even angrier. “Take a look at me, all right?” She gestured toward her body with open palms. “I have wrinkles and scars and a gimpy leg. Most of my grandmother’s money paid for a lawsuit after I killed my husband. Here’s your debutante, Micah.”

      Fury gave flash to her quiet prettiness, and Micah enjoyed her anger even as he did a little internal squirming because he was almost certain it was justified.

      “You’re right,” he said. He picked up the wine bottle that sat between them and poured more into both their glasses. “I’m sorry. Coming back to Taft seems to have brought out the angry young pain in the ass in me.”

      She laughed, as he’d hoped she would. “I’m sorry for blowing up, too,” she said. “Shall we start over?” She extended her hand. “I’m Landy Wisdom.”

      He took her hand and raised it to his lips. “Micah Walker,” he said. “Very happy to make your acquaintance. Lovely weather we’re having, isn’t it?”

      She beamed at him, her eyes tilting, and he felt his heart do a flip-flop.

      Over the main course, he asked, “Do you think Nancy Burnside has designs on my father?”

      Landy dropped her fork. “Designs? Mrs. Burnside? I’m not sure, but I think that borders on blasphemy. She’s a geometry teacher. Isn’t that like a nun?”

      “She was a geometry teacher,” he corrected. “She drank beer at my housewarming party. That’s not nunlike.”

      “She was just being polite,” she scoffed. “Good grief, she’s been widowed forever.”

      He took a sip of wine, looking at her over the glass. “I think it would be great, starting over in your sixties.”

      “It doesn’t bother you, thinking of your father being with someone besides your mother?”

      “No. At least not as much as the idea of him being alone the rest of his life bothers me.”

      “Jessie and Eli and you and I are all alone,” she said. “Not everyone’s meant to walk two by two.”

      “No, but my father is. There are holes in his life that definitely can’t be filled by a thirty-eight-year-old single son who makes bad coffee.”

      There were holes in her life, too. Great empty gaps where self-confidence and two good legs used to be. Not to mention waking in the middle of the night with longing singing through her veins and making her heart pound painfully hard. Though she hadn’t always enjoyed sex with Blake, she missed the kissing, cuddling and full body contact that came before it, the illusion of closeness that came after.

      She looked across the table at Micah and acknowledged the attraction she’d felt since first seeing him again in the church basement. She was honest enough to admit that the attraction went back as far as Taft High School, when she’d smiled at Micah even knowing Blake would be angry.

      She would like, she knew, to kiss and cuddle with Micah, to sleep in his arms and wake beside him. She’d like to cook his breakfast wearing nothing but his shirt, the way they always did in movies. It would do an admirable job of filling some of the holes of being alone.

      But, between the cuddling and breakfast came the act itself, the physical invasion that meant she was being overpowered. Micah would expect that, but she would never be overpowered again.

      After dinner, they sauntered through the gardens of the Overlook. Landy’s leg was killing her, and her limp became more pronounced despite her best efforts.

      “You’re hurting, aren’t you?” he said suddenly, and seated her on a path-side bench before she knew what was happening. He knelt before her, lifting her foot to his thigh and slipping off her shoe. “Why didn’t you say something?