Allison made a face. “Right after I comb my hair,” she mimicked. “You’ll be bald someday from all that combing, and I’ll laugh my head off.”
Laurie shrugged. “I guess you won’t care about how you look until you mature.”
Allison groaned. “I’m going outside. Call me when he comes, Mom.” Her ponytail bouncing, she skipped out the door and let the screen bang shut after her. A few moments later Laurie followed, taking care to close the screen door softly.
“Thanks, Laurie,” Diana said automatically. Bless Laurie for her consideration. But then life would be dull without Allison around. Diana cherished what each of her daughters brought to her life, even when pandemonium ruled.
She opened the oven, removed the tray of fragrant cinnamon rolls and mopped her brow again as she glanced at the kitchen clock. Soon. She tucked the tail of her pink shirt more securely into her tan slacks and fidgeted with her collar. Was she trying to parade her culinary skills for this California beach boy? Shaking her head, she reached for the powdered sugar just as the doorbell chimed. The bag of sugar fell from her nerveless fingers, and a puff of white coated her face and chest.
“Dammit,” she swore softly, grabbing the dishcloth and patting it over her face and the front of her blouse. The doorbell rang again, and she tossed the cloth in the sink before walking quickly to the front door.
This time his cutoffs were denim, and his shirt was green, but otherwise he looked the same—muscular, tanned and smiling. “Something smells heavenly, but I can’t imagine you cooking on—” He paused and his eyebrows lifted. “Who threw you in the flour?”
“It’s powdered sugar.” She brushed at her cheeks. “For cinnamon rolls.”
“You turned on the oven on a day like this? Dear lady, the heat has frazzled your brain.”
“The girls love them.” She ushered him into the sweltering atmosphere.
“So do I, but not in the middle of summer without central air. How big are these girls? Did they tie you to the stove and threaten you with bodily harm unless you baked them cinnamon rolls?”
“No, of course not. I just thought…Never mind.” She whirled abruptly and stalked back into the kitchen.
Zach followed her. “Did you bake these in honor of my arrival?”
“Not on your life!” She ripped a paper towel from the roll and dampened it under the faucet.
“It’s a wonderful gesture. Do you have an electric fan?”
“Three.” Diana wiped the last of the sugar from her face. “And they’re all broken. Why don’t you just move your stuff in and leave me alone in this steam bath of a kitchen?”
He watched her as she brushed the sugar from her blouse. “Why don’t we sit on the porch with some lemonade until the house cools down?”
“Not now. I have too many things—”
With a screech, Allison flung open the screen door and raced into the kitchen. A howling, dripping-wet Laurie dashed after her.
“You’ll pay for this!” Laurie bellowed. “You ruined my hair, you bimbo!”
“But you said you were hot!” protested a giggling Allison, grabbing Diana and using her as a shield. “Protect me, Mom. She’s gonna kill me.”
“You bet I am.” Laurie struggled to get past her mother’s outstretched arm. “With great pleasure.”
“Girls! Stop it this instant.” Diana’s face heated with embarrassment. So much for smooth beginnings. “We have a guest.”
“Oh, no.” Laurie stopped struggling and looked past her mother. “Oh, no!” she wailed again, throwing her arms over her head and running from the room.
“He’s here?” Allison spun around, and her blue eyes widened. “Freaky! I—I mean, glad to meet you. I’m sorry we made so much racket, Mr., uh, Mr. —”
“Zach.”
“Mr. Zach.”
“Just Zach. My last name’s Wainwright.”
“Oh.” Allison digested the information and nodded approvingly. “Mom’s right. You don’t look anything like a history teacher.”
Diana gasped. “Allison!”
Zach chuckled. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“It is,” Allison said, looking him over from head to toe. “Are you a surfer?”
“Sort of.”
“Figures. That’s a great tan. D’ya like rock music?”
“Allison, that’s quite enough questions for now,” Diana said. From upstairs came the whine of the blow dryer. “I assume you doused your sister with the garden hose.”
Allison studied the pattern on the linoleum. “Yeah. Sorry about that. But she kept combing her dumb old hair and complaining about the heat instead of playing with Beethoven, so I—”
“Cooled her off.”
“Uh-huh.”
Diana could have sworn that she heard a muffled snort from Zach.
“Sounds like a great idea to me,” he said. “Maybe after I finish unloading everything from the car, you can turn that hose on me.”
Diana trained an icy gaze in his direction. “Not until she’s apologized for her behavior to you and to her sister.”
Zach composed his face into a grave mask. “Oh. Right. Better do that first.”
Diana knew from the twinkle in Allison’s eyes that Zach had just won a champion for life. From now on Zach would be able to do no wrong as far as Allison was concerned.
“I’m sorry, Zach,” Allison said with an attempt at contrition.
“Apology accepted.”
“And your sister,” Diana prompted.
Allison trudged to the foot of the stairs and waited for the sound of the hair dryer to stop. “Sorry, Laurie,” she called then waited. “Sorry, Laurie,” she said again. “Sorry—” She swallowed her words as the recipient of her apology descended the stairs, fluffing the dark hair that barely grazed her collar.
“It’s only what I’d expect from a child,” Laurie said airily as she breezed past her sister and sailed into the kitchen. “I’m Laurie,” she said with an engaging smile at Zach.
Zach gave a slight bow. “Pleased to meet you, Laurie. I’m Zach Wainwright.”
“I know.” Laurie stood there, not saying anything, smiling contentedly at the man standing in their kitchen.
Diana stared at her daughter. Was this the same girl who worried about how it might look to have a strange man living in the house? All three Thatcher females were literally fawning over Zach Wainwright! Allison drooled over his tan, Laurie restyled her hair, and she—she was worst of all. She’d felt an attraction to the man and decided to bake him cinnamon rolls during a heat wave.
“If you’ll excuse me, Zach,” she said, “I have some shopping to do. Go ahead and unpack, and if I’m not back by lunchtime, the girls can show you where we keep the bread and bologna.” With a smile, she took her purse from its hook by the back door and left without a backward glance. In reality she had no shopping whatsoever to do, but she had to get out of the house before she made a fool of herself in front of the captivating Zach Wainwright.
Having made her speech, she felt honor bound to stay away and window-shop in the White Oaks Mall until early afternoon. She took her time over a hamburger and soft drink, and when she returned, the house was quiet. Two notes rested on the kitchen table. One was from the girls, who had apparently made peace with each other and gone to the pool. The other was from Zach, and she studied the unfamiliar scrawl with interest.
Diana—
Cinnamon rolls are great. The girls helped me move in, and I’ll be studying in my room for the rest of the afternoon if you need to discuss anything. Do you have an extra front-door key?
Zach
So he’d enjoyed the home-baked goodies. That was some consolation.
After the cool comfort of the shopping mall the house seemed especially hot, and she wondered how Zach was faring in his room. Heat rose, and by afternoon the upstairs bedrooms were pretty bad. If he had a fan that worked…
And then it dawned on her that he might be able to fix her broken fans. After all, wasn’t
that the idea, for him to repair what needed repairing? She’d take him the newest one first and see what he could do with it before dumping the others on him. Time for Mr. Zachary Wainwright to earn his keep.
She dug in the hall closet for the best of her three oscillating fans before climbing the stairs to his room. The door stood open, and she tapped on the doorjamb.
“Come in.”
He was propped against the headboard of his bed with open books spread around him and a legal pad on one bent knee. All he wore were his denim cutoffs, and Diana caught her breath at the picture he made—golden skin against the white hobnail bedspread and white lace-edged pillows supporting his broad back. Jim hadn’t had that much chest hair, she found herself thinking, then was ashamed of herself for making the comparison.
Zach finished the sentence he was writing and glanced up. “Hi.” He smiled in welcome, and she clutched the fan to her chest like a shield. “Shopping all done? Don’t tell me you bought me a fan.”
His comment brought her back to earth. She shook her head. “Not quite. This is one of our three broken ones, and I’d like you to take a look at it.”
He grinned. “I’m looking.”
She resisted the soft glow in his eyes. “I meant you might fix it.”
* * *
Show time. “I know. I have a maddening tendency to tease people. Sorry.” Zach put his notepad aside and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. Stall her. You can’t admit to her that you thought a handyman might have to oil a few hinges, caulk around the bathtub, easy stuff like that. She expects you to fix an electric fan, for God’s sake! “Why don’t you leave it, and I’ll see what I can do,” he said, standing barefoot in front of her.
“Um—okay.” She thrust it toward him. “Here.”
He breathed deeply of her violet-scented perfume. It wasn’t his imagination that she wore it. Where? Behind her earlobes, on each wrist, in the valley between her breasts? He struggled to rein in his imagination. Perhaps being alone in a bedroom with her fueled his indecent thoughts. Maybe the heat was getting to him. He wanted to strip off her clothes and his and stand under a waterfall together. But the shower would do.
“I may not get to the fan this afternoon,” he said, grateful that his hands were occupied. He had to get her out of here, and fast. “I’m in the middle of some compelling research material, and I’d like to finish my notes before suppertime.” Compelling research material? He knew exactly what was compelling him at this moment, and it wasn’t his scholarly notes.
“Oh!” Her eyes darkened with guilt. “I’m sorry if I disturbed you.” She scurried back to the doorway, creating a breeze with her perfumed body as she moved.
“No problem, but I do want to complete this one section.” What had he done? Moved in with a tempting goddess and set things up so he couldn’t touch her? Damn!
“Dinner will be at five-thirty,” she said.
“Why not wait until later, when it cools down?”
She looked at him strangely. “We don’t eat fashionably late, I’m afraid. You may be used to that in California. You probably even have happy hour, but we have our evening meal at five-thirty.”
Zach sighed. “I wasn’t worried about fashion, just about heat. I’ll be down at five-thirty.”
“Wear a shirt.”
“Of course.”
With one last glance at his bare chest, she fled down the stairs.
He stood still for a moment, savoring the fragrance she left behind. “Oh, Diana,” he muttered, shaking his head, “if you knew how you affect me, you’d tell me to ride my surfboard out of here before sundown.”
Three
Zach spent the night on sheets damp with sweat, and several times he got up and leaned against the sill of the open window to catch any errant breeze from the park across the street. The curtains hung limp and lifeless in the pale light from a tiny sliver of moon. Was it this hot in Diana’s room downstairs? And did she sleep, as he did, with nothing on? The thought did little to help cool him off.
“Tomorrow the fan gets fixed,” he muttered, flopping back on the twisted sheets.
In the morning he smuggled the fan out and ran through a drizzling rain to his Jeep parked at the curb. Even the rain was almost warm, and he dreaded the muggy heat that would envelop Springfield when the sky cleared. A working fan would make this afternoon’s research session almost bearable.
With the lower cost on room and board, Zach figured he could afford to have the fan repaired. Who would have imagined that Diana expected an electrician, as well as a handyman? But this was the first thing she had asked him to do, and he hated to disappoint her on the very first request.
The repair shop was busy, so the clerk advised him to leave the fan for several hours. He decided to put in some time at one of his favorite haunts, the historical library in the basement of the old capitol building. By the time he emerged from the building, the rain had stopped. The damp sidewalks of the pedestrian mall around the capitol were crowded with produce vendors, and he bought a fire-engine-red tomato and bit appreciatively into the tangy pulp. He hadn’t realized what tomatoes were supposed to taste like until this summer in Illinois. Licking the juice from his fingers, he glanced at his watch and decided the fan should be ready.
As he paid the repair bill and drove home, he tried not to think about the cost or the sneaky way he’d accomplished the task. He was halfway up the stairs to his room when Diana’s voice floated up to him, and he thought he’d have to confess everything.
“Zach? Is that you?”
“Yeah. Be down in a minute!” he called, taking the stairs two at a time to get the fan out of sight. Once safely inside his steamy room, he found a plug and turned the fan on high. Ah, heaven! He stripped off his shirt and stood in the full blast of air with his eyes closed.
His pleasure lasted several seconds before his conscience began to prick him—no one else in the house had a working fan. With a sigh he pulled his shirt back over his head, unplugged the fan and carried it downstairs, where he found Diana making tuna sandwiches in the kitchen.
“Here you are. All fixed. Thought you could use it in here, or maybe in your bedroom.”
“It works?” Diana looked at him with new respect. “You must have done it last night, because I know you were gone all morning.”
So she’d noticed. He liked that. “Yes. I, um, had some work to do at the library.”
“You ought to save that for the heat of the day, considering the library’s air-conditioned.”
“Guess you’re right.” He thought how terrific she looked, standing by the sink in crisp white slacks and a green gauze blouse. Nice, but too formal for this kind of humid heat. “Don’t you have any shorts? I’d think you’d be a lot cooler in—”
“No, I don’t have any shorts.” She continued spreading mayonnaise on the bread.
“Why not? Wait—cancel that question. Too personal. I’m sure you have your reasons.” He busied himself finding the best position for the fan. Diana might have a giant birthmark or something. How could he know what her reasons were?
Her silver eyes were the coolest things in the room as she turned to him. “Shorts are for young girls. And surfers.”
“Good grief, you sound like you’re a million years old.” He felt a wave of relief that she wasn’t hiding some horrible disfigurement.
“Old enough.”
“How old?”
She hesitated. “Thirty-four.”
“The same age as me? Oh, Granny, how do you manage to totter up and down stairs? Diana, thirty-four is not too old to wear shorts.”
“I’m also a widow with two young girls.”
“What’s that got to do with it?” He flipped the switch on the fan and watched with satisfaction as she turned her face toward the cool breeze.
“I have to be careful not to appear to be flaunting myself for any man in sight.”
“Flaunting yourself? You? Whistler’s Mother is more blatant about her sexuality
than you are. I’ve never known a woman so reserved, so…so covered up.”
“That’s because you’re used to California, where they parade around the beaches in next to nothing. This is Springfield, Illinois, and I don’t wear shorts!”
Zach raised both hands. “Okay, okay. But you’d be a hell of a lot cooler if you did.”
“That’s my problem.” Diana washed and dried her hands before walking to the pantry, where she stood on tiptoe and lifted two more oscillating fans from the top shelf. “When you have time, maybe you could take care of these, too. One could be for your room, of course.”
Zach took the fans without comment. At this rate his financial edge would dwindle fast.
“Would you like a sandwich?”
He raised an eyebrow. “If it’s not too much trouble.”
She shook her head. “No trouble. I’ll set the plates out if you’ll call the girls. I think they’re both upstairs.”
The four of them had a noisy congenial lunch at the kitchen table. The meal was much more to Zach’s liking than the previous night’s heavy supper in the dining room. The roast, mashed potatoes and gravy Diana had prepared would have been delicious on a cold winter evening, but not when the temperature was pushing ninety. A few subtle questions directed toward the girls convinced him that eating a substantial evening meal in the dining room was hallowed family tradition, but he thought it was silly. A picnic on the back porch made more sense in this heat.
* * *
Diana bit into her sandwich and watched Zach laughing and talking with the girls. He was so relaxed, so wonderfully casual, and she was frankly envious. Shorts would feel better, now that she thought of it. Or now that Zach thought of it, to be more precise. Maybe a pair of Laurie’s…. But no. She had lessons this afternoon, the first batch since Zach had moved in. Better not send the kids home with tales of a strange man and their teacher’s new mode of dress.
After lunch Zach disappeared into his room to work, and the girls took Beethoven for a walk while Diana taught her first two lessons of the day, one for piano and one for flute. She moved the fan to a corner of the living room, but it had little effect unless she stood directly in front of it. At two-thirty the Bad News Brass arrived, and as the sound of three trumpets, not always in perfect harmony, resounded through the living room, Diana heard Zach’s door close. Too bad, she thought, as the heat and noise took their toll on her good humor. She’d warned him.
The Fix-It Man Page 3