something that Leslie’s crowd just ignored, clearly unable to understand why

Leslie would give Dev the time of day. After all, Dev was a year behind them,

and if that weren’t enough to make her company less than desirable, she was

strange. Different. But for some reason, Leslie and she were always able to talk.

It had started by accident the year before when they’d shared a table during

study hall.

Leslie was having trouble with a math problem, and since it was the

• 34 •

WHEN DREAMS TREMBLE

one subject that Dev could pick up just by sitting in class without doing any

work at all, she’d shown Leslie how to set up the solution. The next day she

helped her again, and somehow they’d started talking about other things.

Everything, really.

Dev had never met anyone she could talk to so easily. Leslie always listened.

Always made her feel like what she had to say was important and interesting.

They never met outside of school, never visited each other’s homes. Never did

anything social together except sit for an hour every few days on the lawn

outside school or walk down to the lake, and talk. Except once. Just once,

Leslie had ridden on the back of Dev’s motorcycle, laughing and pressed up

against her with her arms around Dev’s waist. Dev had been nearly light-headed

from the sensation of Leslie’s breasts against her back. She cherished the

memory, revisiting it nearly nightly before she went to sleep, coming sometimes

while imagining Leslie’s arms around her.

“Go. That’s cool,” Dev said, sensing Leslie’s friend waiting impatiently. “I just

wanted to…” See you again. Tell you how hard it’s going to be when you

leave. How much I’m going to miss you. How empty I feel inside.

Maybe something showed in her face, because Leslie said, “You go ahead, Sue.

I’ll catch you in a little while.”

When Sue made an exasperated sound and melted into the crowd, Leslie took

Dev’s hand and jumped down from the windowsill. “Come on. Let’s go for a

walk.”

Leslie only touched her Þ ngers for a second, but Dev’s legs felt shaky. Mutely,

she followed, tied to Leslie by that invisible string she could always feel, tugging

her back to her even when she knew she should stay away.

“God, I feel so much better out here,” Leslie said as they walked along the

water’s edge, leaving the boathouse and the noise and the smoke behind. She

sat down on one of the park benches her parents had placed around the lake for

the guests and tilted her head back. “I wonder if the stars will look like this in the

city.”

Dev didn’t know. She’d never been to a big city. Her parents never took a

vacation, they never left the store in anyone else’s hands.

“Probably. I think they’re everywhere.”

Leslie turned her head on the bench and smiled at Dev. “Yeah, probably.”

Dev didn’t mean to kiss her. She didn’t even know she’d moved

• 35 •

RADCLY fFE

until her lips touched Leslie’s. She’d never imagined Leslie’s lips would be so

warm and soft. Dev slid trembling Þ ngers over Leslie’s throat, felt Leslie’s heart

racing just beneath her skin. Then Dev was suddenly aware of Leslie’s hand

stroking the back of her neck, of Leslie kissing her back, pushing against her so

that their breasts touched through the whisper-thin layers of their cotton T-shirts.

Leslie moaned softly and the dam inside Dev’s heart broke and everything she’d

been holding back forever spilled out.

“Oh, Les,” Dev whispered. She framed Leslie’s face with her hands, kissed her

again, angling her body onto Leslie so that their legs entwined. Leslie grasped

her waist, holding her close. Dev groaned.

“Les, I lo—”

“Jesus! Fuck!”

Someone grabbed Dev’s shoulder from behind and yanked her off Leslie,

throwing her to the ground hard enough to knock the wind from her. Stunned,

Dev gasped and fought to catch her breath. A foot drove into her side, and she

groaned and curled into a ball.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Leslie’s boyfriend Mike shouted.

Distantly, Dev heard Leslie screaming for Mike to stop. She didn’t care about

the pain in her side or the next blow that landed on her hip, or the next. Or the

next. Nothing that ever happened to her again could hurt as much as what she

heard Leslie shout.

Mike, it was just a joke! I was just fooling with her. She doesn’t mean

anything to me. She’s nobody!

Dev blinked in the bright sunlight and stared at Leslie’s mother.

“…can’t thank you enough,” Eileen said. “As long as you’re sure it’s no

trouble.”

“No,” Dev said, forcing a smile though her face felt numb. “No trouble at all.”

• 36 •

WHEN DREAMS TREMBLE

CHAPTER FOUR

Ten minutes before the Amtrak Adirondack was expected to arrive in

Rensselaer, Dev pulled into a parking slot opposite the metal stairs leading down

from the train tracks. She sat watching the platform, Þ ngers curled around the

steering wheel as if to ground herself Þ rmly in the present, wondering if she

would recognize the girl who had Þ lled her heart and dreams for so long, grown

into a woman now. Had she known it was Leslie arriving in need of a ride when

she’d talked with Eileen Harris, she wouldn’t have volunteered to pick her up.

She doubted it would be a comfortable ride back for either of them.

Even though her Þ rst thought had been of Leslie when she’d received the

memo outlining the details and location of her new assignment, she hadn’t

seriously expected to run into her over the summer. The last time she’d been in

the area—on a one-night stopover six years before to wish her parents well in

their move to a retirement community in Florida—she’d made careful inquiries

about Leslie Harris with some of the locals. The story had always been the

same.

Leslie was one of the young, ambitious up-and-comers who had left the

provincial village never to return, and no one could recall seeing her in years.

Like Dev, she had moved on.

Leslie’s mother had said she was an attorney in Manhattan.

Dev remembered all the hours Leslie had spent explaining to her about

landscape architecture and how she wanted to create outdoor environments

where people could live in harmony with nature. She was going to come back to

the lake area and open a practice. Maybe work with the park services. It

sounded inspiring and meaningful, and Dev had fallen a little bit more in love with

her every time they talked

• 37 •

RADCLY fFE

about it. She had had no such grand designs for her own life, but Leslie hadn’t

seemed to think less of her for it. When Dev had mumbled that she didn’t have

any plans, Leslie had just smiled and said there was plenty of time to decide.

Leslie had apparently made different choices after she’d left Bolton Landing for

Yale. Dev doubted she would recognize the idealistic young girl now. At any

rate, she would soon know, because a series of whistle blows alerted Dev to the

train arriving. A sudden case of nerves set her stomach jittering as she watched

the passengers exit the station.

She’d been wrong about not recognizing her. Leslie had changed, just as Dev

had, but Dev knew her the instant she started down the stairs, an expensivelooking

leather briefcase swinging from a strap over one shoulder and a suitcase

in the other hand. She was far thinner than Dev ever remembered her being, her

face and body sculpted by maturity. An atmosphere of tension surrounded her.

Even at a distance her body seemed tightly coiled, wary and alert—predatory.

Up close, her blue eyes were cool and appraising. She was beautiful in a way

she hadn’t been as a teenager, the innocence having given way to razor-sharp

elegance. But for just a second Dev saw the air shimmering around her and

imagined she felt the tug of the invisible string that had once connected them.

As Dev stepped from the truck, she reminded herself that that tie had only been

in her mind and that it had been irrevocably severed long ago.

v

Leslie stopped at the curb and scanned the parking lot for her mother’s ancient

Jeep. Rensselaer was not a busy stop on the train route, and there were only a

handful of cars waiting. Her mother’s wasn’t among them.

“Damn,” she muttered, sliding her hand into her briefcase and unerringly closing

her Þ ngers around her BlackBerry. She’d just pulled up the lodge number,

since her mother didn’t have a cell phone, when someone spoke her name.

Startled, Leslie looked up into hazel eyes that she knew better than her own and

tumbled back in time Þ fteen years.

• 38 •

WHEN DREAMS TREMBLE

Leslie wasn’t all that surprised that the party was turning into a drag. Mike

was drinking too much as usual and generally being an asshole. Fortunately, he

was off playing pool and at least leaving her alone for the time being. She hated

it when he put on a big show of making out with her in public. As if she was

going to let him feel her up in front of all his buddies. Yeah right.

Restless, not knowing why, she left him to his game and drifted away from the

crowd. It was so hot and stuffy in the room and the beer was already too warm

and she knew she should be having a good time, but she wasn’t. She was sad.

She shouldn’t be sad, and that just made it worse. She’d just graduated from

high school at the top of her class and she was going to a great college.

Everything was turning out just the way she’d hoped. Well, Mike wasn’t going

to the same school.

His grades weren’t good enough. But he wouldn’t be that far away and she

didn’t really mind if she didn’t see him all that often anyhow.

Sometimes, she was glad that she’d be with new people who didn’t know her.

It felt almost as if she’d be starting her life all over again, and that part was

exciting.

So why was she so sad?

She unlatched the huge wooden-paned window, swung it out over the water,

and climbed up onto the broad sill. She leaned her head back as the breeze

washed over her and watched the moon ß it in and out between the clouds. It

was amazing how bright the night sky could be.

It wasn’t really black at all, more like a dark, dark blue. It was beautiful.

She’d miss the lake and the woods and the way the air smelled like it had never

been breathed before. And there was something more important that she would

miss. Something she knew she should understand, but she couldn’t Þ nd the

words. Every time she tried, all she felt was frustration and, oddly, fear. That

was just crazy and, besides, she could always come back, so there was no

reason to feel sad about anything.

Leslie jumped at the sudden cold on her leg and heard the voice she been

waiting for all night but hadn’t expected to hear.

“Dev! I thought you said you weren’t coming.”

Even in the moonlight, the smile in Dev’s eyes was clear. As Leslie reached for

the beer, her Þ ngers glanced over Dev’s, and although she gave it no more than

an instant’s thought, she felt her sadness wash away.

• 39 •

RADCLY fFE

Leslie Harris saw no sign of a smile in those eyes now, not that she would have

expected one. Annoyed at the uncharacteristic slip in her concentration and

where her thoughts had taken her, she kept her expression neutral as she rapidly

regrouped. The fragments of a past that felt as if it belonged to someone else

melted away like frost on a windowpane, leaving nothing behind but an

unnoticed trail of tears.

Then she was herself again, calculating and in control. “Hello, Dev.”