Sweet Home Carolina (37 page)

Stupid thought. If she hadn’t, Luigi would have called.

Amy hadn’t called him this morning.

Absence might make the heart grown fonder, but Zack’s simply
hurt from her rejection. Contemplating strings of lonely mornings like this, he
growled into the receiver when Pascal finally answered.

“Have Brigitte schedule my flight. I am almost done here. We
have enough orders to operate for the next six months, at least. Set a date
with the Versailles committee for next week. I am meeting with the Smithsonian
next month, so I cannot linger over there. We will need to find a manager for
the Versailles project.”

He had spent ten years building his fame and reputation. It
was time he rested on his laurels, picking and choosing his projects. He liked
it in the States. He disliked Versailles. Easy choice. Those in the future
might not be so easily decided.

He clicked on the local news to check the weather while he
discussed arrangements for the project with Pascal. He muted the talking heads
until the weather map appeared, then flicked the sound on in time to hear —

The hurricane hitting
the North Carolina mountains has caused a landslide on the Blue Ridge Parkway,
causing that road to be closed, according to the state police
.

A choppy video of rushing brown waters and toppling trees
followed. An SUV floated past the remains of a home crumbling into the river. A
list of school and work cancellations scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

Zack didn’t wait to see if the mill was listed. Cursing, he
hung up on Pascal and hit the speed dial for Luigi’s cell. And got no answer.

Now wasn’t the time to panic. He’d do that later, after he
found Amy and the children and saw them to safety.

If Amy didn’t see the sense in leaving the mountains now,
and coming to live with him, then his father would be right. American women
were too stubborn and independent to live with.

Zack knew he was kidding no one, not even himself, but he
needed a balm to soothe his rattled nerves, and Amy wasn’t here.

The drive to the mountains would take hours. He prayed there
were still roads left for him to drive on by the time he got there.

* * *

“The cell tower must be down.” Luigi stoically clicked his
useless clamshell closed and with Hoss’s help, heaved a computer server onto a
dolly.

“Leave, now,” Amy ordered. “You and Hoss take the Rover and
go. I’d appreciate it if you’d check on the kids at Jo’s, but get the heck out
of here while you can.”

Hoss snorted. “Flint and Jo can take care of the kids. I’m
not crossing that bridge now.”

“And we’re not leaving you anywhere near those computers,”
Luigi added ominously, pushing the dolly toward the elevator to the second
floor.

A gust of wind and rain swept water under the doors. It
wasn’t enough to cause alarm yet, but Amy didn’t want to risk all of Zack’s new
equipment and their small inventory of cloth. She’d had Luigi drive her to the
office so she could call every employee on their payroll and tell them to stay
home, but some of their workers had insisted on coming in to help anyway.

The mill was their livelihood, and people up here knew how
to fight for what was theirs. As long as the mill building itself held, they’d
be fine. The heavy machinery couldn’t be hauled to higher ground, but they were
moving everything else that could be.

Hoss checked out the second-story windows and yelled down
from the balcony, “Bridge is under water. Hope y’all brought lots of good
food.”

Amy closed her eyes and prayed. She prayed for the safety of
her children first. Flint’s log cabin was sturdy enough, but if the mountain
decided to slide, a cabin wouldn’t stop it. At least they were away from the
river. So was her mother.
She
was the
fool down in the valley.

She wished she could sing like Jo. A good round of “Amazing
Grace” would do wonders at a time like this.

The electricity flickered and went out.

“I didn’t do it!” she shouted into the sudden darkness.

Nervous laughter rippled across the huge echoing room. She’d
counted a dozen employees hauling inventory up the stairs, most of them older
workers without small children at home. The rain would stop soon, she tried to
tell herself. All would be well.

Thunder rolled overhead, and the rain poured harder.

“
Michael row the boat
ashore, hallelujah
!” a voice sang out in the darkness.

Laughter followed, but more voices lifted in the old gospel
song.

“
Sister help to trim
the sail
,” Amy sang with the next verse. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She
loved these people. She couldn’t leave, no matter how much she loved Zack.

Thinking of him had the tears rolling faster. She loved his
charm, his humor, and his intelligence. But most of all, she loved the man
buried deep inside who so desperately craved the love of others. And before she
could even consider all the permutations of that, she had to let him go.

“
The river is deep and
the river is wide
,” she sang with great feeling. The chorus had never held
so much meaning as it did now, with the river slowly covering the floor of the
old building.

Carrying a heavy bolt of tapestry toward the stairs, Amy
splashed through an ankle-deep low spot. The mill had survived floods before,
she told herself.

But cleaning the machinery would take months. They’d have to
shut down production.

“
Chills the body, but
not the soul
,” rang to the rafters.

Amy wanted nothing more than to fling her chilly body into
Zack’s warm arms right now, apologize fervently, and promise she’d never leave
again. She would never again force him into anything his sensible head said not
to do, if only he would speak to her after this was over.

But she knew she lied.

She’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. She couldn’t let
her home die. So she’d simply have to find some way to save the mill by herself.

She guessed that was why bodies had souls. And hearts. Love
and courage would keep them going when all else failed.

“There’s benches over in the Music Barn,” someone called
from the floor. “Maybe we could prop some of these bigger pieces up on benches
and hope the river don’t rise much more.”

Amy glanced out the window. Muddy water swirled across the
parking lot and between the buildings. It wasn’t deep yet, but it would rise
swiftly as the river rushed down the mountain.

“Works for me,” Hoss shouted, clattering down the stairs in
his big boots.

Amy knew she didn’t have the authority to stop him. She
wished Zack was here to tell him they were fools, that machinery wasn’t worth
their lives.

She glanced up the hill where her cottage was hidden by
trees. Without the mill, she’d lose her home.

“If anyone goes out there, I’m following,” she shouted into
the darkness below. “So you better think twice before you open that door, Hoss
Whitcomb! That isn’t white water out there, and you can’t raft on it.”

She could feel the fresh damp breeze and see the rectangle
of light as he defiantly opened the door.

“It’s just a little bitty creek, Ames,” Hoss shouted back.
“You just come right on out and wade in it if you like.”

She smacked her hand into the wall as a line of people
followed him out into the dangerously swirling waters.

“You can’t stop people fighting for their lives,” Luigi said
from beside her. “Zack would have been down there, leading them on.”

Which is why she didn’t belong in his world. She belonged in
her cozy kitchen, with her children at her feet, baking muffins with pig
snoses.

But thanks to Zack, she’d learned she could do what she had
to do. And do it damned well.

Zack steered the newly rented Hummer up the drive to Flint’s
cabin, the first stop on the way up the mountain. He wanted to carry Amy and
her family out to safety, and renting another Hummer had seemed the best means.

The state police had tried to prevent him from driving in,
but he’d circumnavigated their roadblocks. He’d driven over roads that were no
better than creek beds. He’d ground fallen saplings and debris beneath the
vehicle’s huge tires. He should have turned back a dozen times, but he couldn’t
when his life, his future, was up the side of this treacherous mountain.

His knee ached from twisting it the wrong way. He’d worked
it too hard and neglected it too long these last weeks.

Even admitting he was wrong wasn’t sufficient to distract
him from the mud pouring past the Hummer’s wheels as they splattered up the
gravel drive. He prayed Amy was here with her sister and the children. He knew
he could get everyone out safely if they were quick.

He winced as he remembered Amy’s mother had a home farther
up the mountain, on the other side of town. They’d never leave without her.

One thing at a time. Find Amy and the children. If they
weren’t here, maybe they’d be at the apartment above the café. It was a little
too close to the river for comfort, but it was on the main highway, unlike this
mud trap of Flint’s.

There were no vehicles in front of the cabin, and it didn’t
take a second glance to understand why.

The original owner of the land had stripped off the trees,
and now the yard was a running waterfall of silt and rock. The house could wash
off its foundation at any moment.

Don’t panic he told himself, attempting his cell again.
Still no reception. The café next. Surely they were all at the café. Or maybe
they’d taken the children over the mountain to safety. Maybe he was on a wild
goose chase, imagining himself the white knight riding to their rescue when he
was only making a dramatic European ass of himself. Everyone was probably
drinking hot coffee and soup somewhere warm and dry right now, and they’d laugh
themselves sick if they knew the silly Brit was having a nervous breakdown
worrying about them out in this tempest.

At least the wind had died to a low roar, he tried to
console himself as he steered the bulky vehicle down the river of mud to the
road again. Flying debris had dented the Hummer’s door earlier. It was
mid-October, so most of the branches still had their foliage. Now he needed to
fear only rain-laden trees toppling as their roots were sucked from the mire. A
slimy trail of fallen leaves added to the slipperiness of the water and sludge
on the highway.

He used the Hummer’s grill to gently push a young tree trunk
from the road. He should have brought a chain saw in case he came across a
larger obstacle. He’d packed fresh water and blankets and the kinds of things
he’d been taught to have for emergencies, but fallen trees weren’t a common
obstacle in Europe.

He couldn’t live in a country that would subject his family
to hurricanes and tornadoes and earthquakes. England was far more civilized.
He’d simply have to persuade Amy of that.

He knew he might as well talk to wallpaper.

Zack’s knuckles were white by the time he arrived in
Northfork. The day was rapidly sliding into night, but there wasn’t more than a
flicker of light in any window. The electricity had gone out again. Falling
trees and limbs took the wires out, he’d learned.

He didn’t bother parking in the lot on the far end of town
but halted the Hummer on the sidewalk directly in front of the café and left
the emergency lights flashing. The limited local traffic on the blockaded
highway could pull around him.

Sliding across the front seats, he opened the passenger door
and then hopped down, wincing as his bad knee almost gave way. The café door
popped open before he reached it, and cheers rang from inside.

Word of the show’s success had apparently traveled up here.
He admired the strength of a people who could take this hurricane with such
equanimity that they saw it as a passing disaster and cheered the promise he’d
created of tomorrow. He ought to feel pride, but success wasn’t as important as
Amy. Or her children.

Anxiously, he scanned the room. He recognized the new
waitress who’d taken Amy’s place behind the counter and a number of people from
the mill and church. He hadn’t realized he knew so many people here. But among
all the apprehensive faces, he didn’t see the ones he wanted, and his heart
sank.

Jo hurried from the back, shoving long tendrils of blond
hair from her face and looking worried. The effervescent Jo looking worried
sent Zack over the edge.

“Where are they?” he shouted in what sounded like panic even
to him.

“Flint took the kids up to Mama, where it should be safer,
but then the phones went out, and we haven’t heard anything since.”

“Is Amy with them?” he demanded, already turning and heading
back to the door.

Someone shoved a cup of coffee in his hand. Jo ran to follow
him, grabbing a dripping slicker someone handed her. “She and your driver went
to the mill early this morning. The bridge is out over the river, so they can’t
get back.”

The memory of another night on a snow-slick Italian highway
with flashing police and ambulance lights almost paralyzed him. Sick to his
stomach, Zack left the coffee on a table and refused to open the front door for
Jo. “You stay here, on the main road, where you’ll receive communication faster
than anywhere else.”

“My husband and boys are out there somewhere,” she stated
flatly, hands on hips. “It isn’t any safer here than out there.”

“It is the way I’ll be driving if I have to cross the
river,” he retorted. “I’ll not have your life on my hands. You’ll stay here and
call if the tower starts working again. I’ll check on the children first. Give
me directions to your mother’s.”

He knew country music star Joella was considered town
royalty, but he’d reached the end of his patient nonchalance. Beneath his
glare, even she backed down. She gave him a quick description of her mother’s
drive and bit her fingernail as he stalked out.