Pieces of the Heart Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  PIECES of the HEART

  A CONVERSATION WITH KAREN WHITE

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  Praise for The Color of Light

  “[White’s] prose is lyrical, and she weaves in elements of mysticism and romance without being heavy-handed. This is an accomplished novel about loss and renewal, and readers will be taken with the people and stories of Pawleys Island.”

  —Booklist

  “The reader will hear the ocean roar and the seagulls scream as the past reluctantly gives up its ghosts in this beautiful, enticing, and engrossing novel.”

  —RT Bookclub Magazine (4½ stars)

  “A story as rich as a coastal summer . . . dark secrets, heartache, a magnificent South Carolina setting, and a great love story.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Deborah Smith

  “An engaging read with a delicious taste of the mysterious.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Haywood Smith

  “Karen White’s novel is as lush as the Lowcountry, where the characters’ wounded souls come home to mend in unexpected and magical ways.”

  —Patti Callahan Henry, award-winning author of Losing the Moon

  Written by today’s freshest new talents and selected by New American Library, NAL Accent novels touch on subjects close to a woman’s heart, from friendship to family to finding our place in the world. The Conversation Guides included in each book are intended to enrich the individual reading experience, as well as encourage us to explore these topics together—because books, and life, are meant for sharing.

  Visit us online at www.penguin.com

  Praise for the novels of Karen White

  “The fresh voice of Karen White intrigues and delights.”

  —Sandra Chastain, contributor to Blessings at Mossy Creek

  “Warmly Southern and deeply moving.”

  —Deborah Smith, author of Charming Grace

  “Karen White writes with passion and poignancy.”

  —Deb Stover, award-winning author of Mulligan Magic

  “[A] sweet book . . . highly recommended.”

  —Booklist

  “Karen White is one author you won’t forget. . . . This is a masterpiece in the study of relationships. Brava!”

  —Reader to Readers Reviews

  “This is not only romance at its best—this is a fully realized view of life at its fullest.”

  —Readers & Writers Ink Reviews

  “After the Rain is an elegantly enchanting Southern novel. . . . Fans will recognize the beauty of White’s evocative prose.”

  —WordWeaving

  “In the tradition of Catherine Anderson and Deborah Smith, Karen White’s After the Rain is an incredibly poignant contemporary bursting with southern charm.”

  —Patricia Rouse, Rouse’s Romance Readers Groups

  “Don’t miss this book!”

  —Rendezvous

  “Character-driven and strongly written . . . After the Rain . . . marks Karen White as a rising star and an author to watch.”

  —Romantic Times Book Club Magazine

  NAL Accent

  Published by New American Library, a division of

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,

  New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto,

  Ontario M4V 3B2, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:

  80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  First published by NAL Accent, an imprint of New American Library,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  First Printing, April 2006

  Copyright © Karen White, 2006

  Conversation Guide copyright © Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2006

  All rights reserved

  Fiction for the Way We Live

  REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA:

  White, Karen (Karen S.)

  Pieces of the heart/Karen White.

  p. cm.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-11865-8

  1. Mothers and daughters—Fiction. 2. North Carolina—Fiction.

  3. Domestic Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3623.H5776P54 2006

  813’.6—dc22 2005027372

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced,

  stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic,

  mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s

  imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  With love to my wonderful Connor

  because he says he deserves it,

  and because he does.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  A book populated by people who quilt and written by somebody who has never quilted in her life required lots of help. So thank you, Martha Murphy, for answering my sophomoric questions, and also to Lisa McGuire, who showed me my first memory quilt.

  I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Leonard C. Viril, for his help regarding organ donations and the particulars of living with a heart transplant.

  As always, thanks to
Tim, Meghan and Connor, who still endure living with me despite the fact that they know what going through deadline dementia is like. I couldn’t do this without their love and support.

  And thanks to Susan Crandall, Wendy Wax, Jenni Grizzle and Sandra Chastain—wonderful writers all, as well as fantastic readers who help me write the best book that I can.

  CHAPTER 1

  CAROLINE SAT AND WATCHED THE SMALL ROCK DROP FROM HER hand and into the dark, still water of Lake Ophelia, breaking the surface with a small plop. The ripples eddied out in tiny circles, gradually spreading into great gaping spheres of silent water, reaching out toward the depths of the lake until she couldn’t see them anymore. Not for the first time, it reminded her of how a single event in life could reach out forever, drowning you in a circle of memories that never let go.

  Two children, a boy and a girl, ran out onto a dock two houses down on the same side of the lake, the girl’s shrieks echoing in the late-afternoon air as her brother maneuvered to push her in. Their mother stood behind them, saying something and shaking her head, but they ignored her until they both landed in the water, creating small waves that bumped into Caroline’s dock.

  The mother spotted Caroline and waved before picking up discarded socks and sneakers. Caroline hesitated at first, then waved back. Out of habit, her hand fell to her chest to pull the neck of her T-shirt higher, and she felt the ridge of the old incision beneath her shirt.

  She rested her cheek against drawn-up knees and stared at the fading waves as a chorus of cicadas erupted into sound, then quieted just as suddenly. She closed her eyes, seeing the lake against her dark eyelids. I’ve missed the water. She let a toe dip into the surface, smelling her own sweat and the green scent that hovered over the lake in late summer. I’ve been gone too long from the water. And you, too, Jude. Always you.

  The tap of her mother’s heels against the wooden dock announced her presence. Caroline didn’t turn around, but remained staring out at the lake toward Hart’s Peak in the near distance. The sky was clear enough that she could make out the face of the fabled Ophelia on the side of the mountain, a woman supposedly cursed and turned to stone centuries before.

  “There’re a lot more houses than I remember—and a lot fewer trees. It’s hardly the same place anymore.” Caroline sighed and watched a black-and-white loon settle on a dock piling in front of one of the enormous cookie-cutter houses across the lake and wondered if her brother, Jude, would even recognize any of it. He had always loved this place, the pungent smell of the lake and the warmth of the people who lived around it. Only the cold stone face of Ophelia herself seemed not to have changed.

  Caroline could hear her pulse beating in her head, recognizing it as a warning sign from her doctor. Closing her eyes, she took long, slow breaths, focusing on the smell of the water and the sound of the lake nudging the dock under her, and waited for her pulse to slow. With her eyes still closed, she said, “At least we can be thankful for the ban on waverunners.”

  As if on cue, an engine started up across the lake and a teenage boy shot off from a dock on a sapphire-blue waverunner, the solitary loon and other birds rising in a panic all along the edge of the lake.

  Her mother sounded apologetic. “Some of the new people are on the town council. They voted down the ban eight to one.”

  “Damn,” Caroline said, forgetting that her mother didn’t like her to swear. “Who was the holdout?”

  “Rainy Martin. She’s always been such an environmentalist.”

  Caroline looked up at her mother, the ash-blond hair a shade darker than her own. “What about you, Mom?”

  Margaret Collier crossed her arms and met Caroline’s gaze. “They’re my neighbors and I didn’t want there to be any bad will between us. Besides, it’s not so bad. You can hardly hear the noise from inside the house.”

  Caroline shook her head slowly. “Good ol’ Rainy. This world would be a much better place with more people like her in it.” Even saying the name filled Caroline with warmth. Rainy was the one connection to Jude she clung to, the only person who knew what she’d lost.

  “Dad would have voted with Rainy.”

  Her mother’s back stiffened. “Yes, well, your father has made his life in California for the last twelve years, so any speculation as to what he would or would not do is pointless.”

  The waverunner came closer, drowning out Caroline’s thoughts and making her pulse thrum louder in her head. She took another deep breath.

  When the noise had faded enough to be heard, Margaret said, “Dinner’s almost ready. I’m having a steak but I’m making you a skinless chicken breast.” She paused, the air heavy with all the unsaid words that had grown between them in a lifetime.

  Caroline looked up at her mother again. “I was hoping we could stop by Roberta’s Bar-B-Que Shack for dinner. I remember going there every Saturday when we were at the lake.”

  “Oh.”

  Her tone made Caroline snap to attention. It was the same tone Margaret used to tell her daughter news like all the cookies were gone or nobody had called to ask her to the high school dance. She normally delivered the bad news faster, as if somehow Caroline would miss the details and not be as upset. It usually just made Caroline’s stomach turn over and set her teeth on edge.

  “Roberta’s changed ownership about a year ago. I’m sure I mentioned it to you at some point. She was bought out by one of those big chains. I’ve been there a couple of times—it’s not bad. I could put the meat in the fridge if you’d prefer to go there.”

  Caroline swallowed her disappointment, wondering why she suddenly wanted to cry. “No, that’s all right.” She forced a polite smile. “I can eat at a chain restaurant every night in Atlanta. Chicken breast is fine.” She had a brief flash of memory of her and Jude in Roberta’s kitchen, sitting on tall stools and helping her make her famous barbecue sauce, and she felt the urge to cry again.

  Margaret cleared her throat. “I saw you hadn’t unpacked yet, so I put away your things in your old room. I noticed you didn’t pack a bathing suit.”

  Caroline closed her eyes and took three deep breaths, forcing her irritation to flow out of her body from her nose and ears and mouth, as Dr. Northcutt had suggested. She imagined a small puff emanating from her left nostril but that was it. The irritation was definitely still there.

  She stood and faced her mother, plastering her well-worn polite smile on her face again. “I haven’t worn a bathing suit since I was eighteen. Surely you’ve noticed that in the last thirteen years.”

  Her mother’s head pulled back slightly in the way she had of hiding her hurt. But Caroline knew better than to feel guilt, because Margaret Ryan Collier could give as good as she got. Like an offended porcupine with sharpened quills, her mother raised an eyebrow.

  “Now, Caroline—not that I don’t think a woman your age shouldn’t be figure-conscious; I just don’t think it’s necessary with only the two of us around. You know that you could wear a potato sack and I’d still think you were beautiful.”

  Caroline stared at her mother, once again thinking she should have her DNA checked. She took three more deep breaths, and imagined a larger puff of irritation floating out of her right ear. She was not going to argue with her mother. She had been forced into a leave of absence to rusticate at the lake to get away from stress, after all. Although more than once during the two-hour drive from Atlanta in her mother’s Cadillac she’d wondered if giving her mother a quick shove out of the moving vehicle would alleviate most of the stress from her life.

  Caroline smiled again, her face stiff. “My figure has nothing to do with my not wearing a bathing suit.” She thought of the scar on her chest again and how it still hurt her to know that her mother never seemed to remember it. “I’m hungry. Let’s go eat.” She stood and walked toward the house, the familiar feeling of needing to put as much space between them overriding everything else. “I need to wash up first.”

  Her mother’s voice called out to her. “Your chicke
n is almost ready, and I made a salad. You wouldn’t be hurting my feelings, though, if you just had the salad. I have low-fat dressing, too.”

  Caroline’s smile fell as she counted to ten again, but she didn’t turn around to respond. She kept walking toward the house, its weathered gray boards familiar yet strange to her at the same time.

  Damn, she thought, wearily pulling open the back screen door. It had taken only three and a half hours in her mother’s presence to elevate her blood pressure and make her cuss. “Damn,” she said out loud, letting the screen door bang shut behind her.

  CHAPTER 2

  CAROLINE STUMBLED THROUGH THE MUDROOM AND INTO THE great room with its high-beamed ceiling, memories of the old house guiding her toward the small bedroom in the back. Her mind registered the changes her mother had made in the thirteen years since Caroline had been there.

  As she passed through the back of the house, she saw that the pale pink walls were now painted a neutral cream, and the thin metal blinds had been replaced with wooden plantation shutters. After her parents’ divorce and her father’s move to the West Coast, Margaret’s career as an interior designer had progressed by astonishing degrees. She’d even had a living room featured in Atlanta Home magazine. Unfortunately, during the remodeling of her childhood vacation home, Caroline had been forced to listen to the things that were being removed from the lake house and of the new, seemingly improved items that were taking their places. It had been like a debridement of an infected wound to speed healing. Yet it had always seemed to Caroline to be more like putting a Band-Aid on a bleeding artery. She hadn’t returned to see the wreckage.