Northern Lights

minute." Charlene sat on the side of the bed, clothes strewn on the floor around her. "Thank you."
    Hell. Oh, hell. "It was just a phone call."
    "It matters." Charlene gripped her hands together in her lap and stared at them. "It matters so much to me. I was so mad at you for going to Anchorage to . . . to see him. For cutting me out."
    Meg closed the door, leaned back against it. "That's not what I was doing."
    "I wasn't a good mother. I wanted to be at first. Tried to be. But there was always so much to do. I didn't know there'd be so much to do."
    "You were pretty young."
    "Too young, I guess. He wanted more." She looked up then, shrugged. "He just loved you to pieces, and he wanted more kids. I wouldn't let it happen. I just didn't want to go through it all again, getting fat and tired, going through that pain. Then having all that to do. And the money that was never there when you needed it or just wanted it. He pushed for it, and I pushed back with other things, until it seemed we spent half the time pushing each other. And I was jealous because he doted on you, and I was always the outsider, always the one saying no."
    "I guess somebody had to."
    "I don't know if we'd have made it. If he'd come back, I don't know if we'd have stuck it out. We started wanting such different things. But I know if we'd split, I know he'd have taken you."
    As if to keep her hands busy, she smoothed the bedspread on either side of her. "He'd have taken you," she repeated. "I'd've let him. You should know that. He loved you more than I could."
    It was hard, harder than anything she could remember, to walk to the bed and sit. "Enough to scrape the money together to buy me shoes?"
    "Maybe not, but enough to take you camping so you could look at the stars. Enough to sit at the fire and tell you stories."
    "I like to think you'd have made it if he'd come back."
    Charlene looked over, blinked. "Really?"
    "Yeah. I like to think you'd have found a way to make it work. You'd already stuck together a long time. Longer than a lot of people do. I want to ask you something."
    "This seems like the time."
    "Was there a big, hot blast the first time you met him? When you fell for him?"
    "Oh God, yes. Nearly burned me up. And it never stopped. I'd think it was dead, cold and dead, when I got mad enough or tired enough. But then he'd look at me, and it was back. I never had that with anyone else. I keep waiting for it, but I never get it."
    "Maybe you should be looking for something else this time. Somebody told me recently about the benefits of a good, steady warmth."
    She rose, picked up scattered clothes. "I can't go back down there and work tonight."
    "Okay."
    "I'll work breakfast for you, but I need you to get somebody else to cover for Rose. I've got to get back to my place, my life."
    Charlene nodded, pushed to her feet. "You gonna take the sexy cop with you?"
    "Up to him."
     
     
    SHE PACKED UP, tidied the room. Meg considered leaving Nate a note but decided that was a little too rude, a little too wrong, even for her.
    Didn't have her car anyway, she remembered, not that she was above "borrowing" his. Or someone else's. And telling them about it later.
    In the end, she slung her knapsack over her shoulder and hoofed it to the station, after a detour by The Italian Place.
    He'd said he'd be working late, covering the desk. Whatever. Since his car was locked, she debated briefly. She could dig out her handy set of keys, probably find one that would work. But he wouldn't appreciate it if he'd set the car alarm.
    Which, being city bred, he might have done.
    She carried her pack, and the large pizza, into the station.
    Awfully damn quiet, was her first thought. How did the man work without music? She tossed her pack aside, started to call out, but he appeared in the doorway.
    If she hadn't been looking, she wouldn't have seen the way his hand rested on the butt of his holstered weapon—or the way it drifted away when he smiled at her.
    "I smell food—and woman. Gets my caveman instinct going."
    "Pizza, pepperoni. Figured you could use something hot, which includes me, about this time."
    "That's a big affirmative to both. What's the knapsack for?"
    She hadn't seen him look at it. "I'm running away. Want to come with?"
    "Fight with Charlene?"
    "Yes, but that's not why. We sort of made up, actually. I just have to get the hell out of here, Burke. Too many people for too long. Gets me edgy. I thought pizza, then some sex back in my place would