by Jess Vonn
“I did a very good thing that is likely to end up being a very bad thing,” Winnie said, her cheeks flushing as she thought back to the night before. God, had it only been last night that Cal’s hands and mouth had explored her so body so thoroughly?
Well, her upper body at least. Thoughts of him lowering his explorations to her bottom half made her fingers tremble. She’d probably be rendered speechless by the time they rounded third base.
“Spill it now and if you leave out a single torrid detail this friendship is officially over,” Evie demanded, refilling her glass of wine and settling in for a sexy, voyeuristic story, which lasted almost as long in the re-telling as it did in the actual moment.
Winnie was a storyteller by trade, after all, but rarely did she have such extraordinary source material.
“You are officially my new hero,” Evie concluded after Winnie finished the play-by-play, a dopey, pleased look on her face. “That man has never opened up the gates for someone around here. If word gets out about this, some women are going to be very displeased with you—women who’ve been trying to wear that man down for a decade. Then you waltz into town and seal the deal in two weeks, you saucy minx!”
Winnie snorted.
“One, I did not seal the deal. Though I hope to,” she said with a wink. “And two, word cannot get out. That’s part of the deal. So this conversation between us tonight never happened, alright?”
Evie nodded eagerly.
“I can’t remember the last time I had a juicy secret to keep,” Evie said. “This is so much fun. I’m loving being able to live vicariously through you.”
Winnie smiled, but before she could respond, she heard a cry of despair from the family room. Evie sighed as they both realized that the kids had likely entered the time-to-go-to-bed-before-someone-gets-hurt phase of the evening.
“That’s probably my cue to get out of your hair so you can wrangle your beasts into their beds,” Winnie said, standing and picking up their dirty plates. Evie shoulders slumped, but she looked much more relaxed and content than she had when Winnie arrived. “I’d offer to stay and help, but something tells me that it would only make it harder for you.”
“Yeah,” Evie sighed, “it’s probably time to stop pretending that I have no human lives I’m responsible for.” She met Winnie at the sink and gave her a huge hug.
“Thank you for dinner. And grown-up conversation. I can’t begin to tell you how much I appreciate it.”
Winnie was surprised at the tears filling the woman’s eyes, but grateful for the bond that had already formed between them. As much as she missed Bree with every fiber of her being, it was so comforting to be growing a new friendship with someone right in town.
After giving each of the pizza-covered kiddos a hug and a kiss, Winnie made her way to her car and drove the short route home to the She Shed. Getting out of the car, she felt full of contentment after her conversation with Evie. Humming quietly to herself, she didn’t pay much attention to her surroundings as she walked up to the porch. That is until she heard some giggling in the flower bushes in front of the cottage.
She stopped in her tracks, momentarily convinced that she’d lost her mind. She took one more step toward the door before she heard another bout of laughter, this time louder. She turned on her heel and walked quietly over to the noisy bush, where she discovered two tiny fairies peaking from beneath the blooms.
Twin fairies, with matching pairs of sparkling wings on their backs and identical manes of curly, strawberry blond hair, a clear gift from their grandmother’s DNA.
Cal’s nieces.
She glanced quickly over to Rhonda’s house, suddenly remembering that it was Sunday and thus all of the Spencers would be gathered for their weekly family dinner. While she could see figures moving inside through Rhonda’s windows now glowing in the twilight sky, luckily no one seemed to notice her out in the yard yet.
Well, except the fairies. She turned her gaze back to her visitors and her heart skipped a beat when she noticed the matching friendship bracelets both girls wore—the same bracelets Cal had been twirling between his fingers at that first football game.
“I didn’t know this was a fairy garden,” Winnie said, her eyes widening in wonder as she glanced at the girls.
More giggles.
“We’re not real fairies,” said the one on the left.
“We just like to pretend,” her sister elaborated.
“I like to pretend, too,” Winnie confided. “I’m Winnie, by the way. I live in the cottage now. Do you visit here often?”
“That’s our nana’s cottage,” the sister on the left said once more. She clearly seemed to do most of the speaking for the pair. “No one would tell us about you so we wanted to catch you for ourselves.”
“Ahh,” Winnie said. “Now you know I’m real. If you’re not fairies, who are you?”
“I’m Mary,” the talkative one said, before answering for her sister, too. “That’s my sister Lulu. We love to play in our nana’s gardens.”
“I don’t blame you. They’re so beautiful. And they feel a little magic.”
“Yes!” the quieter girl agreed excitedly, before dropping her gaze shyly to the ground.
“Nana is about to serve up cake,” Mary explained, looking back to the house. “You should come over and have some. She makes the best cake in the world.”
“No, that’s not true,” Lulu countered. “Uncle Cal’s chocolate cake is probably the best in the world.”
A crimson blush rushed to Winnie’s cheeks as her brain made the erotic connection between Cal and chocolate cake—memories that felt too naughty to even think about in the presence of innocent children. She needed to hide herself away in the She Shed before she was forced to face the man in front of his family.
“Oh, I hate to miss out on dessert, but I have some work I need to do,” Winnie offered as the girls stood up, preparing to make their way back to the house. “Thank you for the offer, though. I’ll have to take a rain check.”
The girls nodded, prancing their way back through the gardens, the sunset sending soft rays of light bouncing off their sparkly wings. She laughed as she heard one say to the other, “What’s a rain check?”
Winnie wasn’t convinced that the girls weren’t at least part fairy, but there wasn’t time to dwell on that now. She rushed up the stairs, into the cottage, and shut the door behind her, her heart beating wildly, as if she were fleeing from a crime scene.
She turned around and peeked through a tiny crack in her kitchen blinds, watching the girls bound their way up the deck steps toward a sliding glass door leading into Rhonda’s house. The door opened and Cal’s unmistakable frame filled the space. Though she was too far away to see their expressions in the darkening night, she could see the girls tugging on his arms excitedly and pointing back toward Winnie’s cottage.
Winnie could feel his gaze directed at her, even if she couldn’t read his expression from the distance. How would he react to learning that his nieces were just as meddling as his mother?
She’d have to wait to find out. He affectionately tousled both girls’ hair, and then closed the door behind him, separating them once more neatly into their two separate worlds. His night would be spent with his warm, loving family—sharing food and laughter. And she’d be here in the cottage on her own.
Her heart squeezed in a way that it had almost every single day since her parents’ accident. That squeeze that reminded her of the irreplaceable things her life was missing.
Tears threatened. That familiar wave of self-pity and melancholy wanted to wash over her, but she took a deep breath, poured a big glass of wine, and pushed the urge aside. She didn’t have time to feel sorry for herself. She had a story to edit before going into the office tomorrow. And for the millionth quiet, lonely night, work once more served as the dam that held back a tidal wave of grief.
Chapter 16
“I understand, Mrs. Hoffman,” Winnie sighed into the phone, trying to con
jure up a bit of patience for the woman and her endless story tips. It seemed as though no amount of refusals was enough to dissuade her. She was currently trying to persuade Winnie to pursue a story about cat-carrying backpacks. She’d seen a feature story about the trend on a morning talk show and wondered if anyone in the Bloomsburo area was using them.
“It is a very unique product. I’ll tell you what,” Winnie relented. “I’ll keep a look out for anyone using one around town, and if I find someone, I promise to pursue a follow-up story.”
This contented the woman for the time being, though it would be another five minutes before Winnie could get her off the phone due to a meandering story about the origins of the apple slab pie recipe that she used this morning when baking some treats for the fire station.
Winnie huffed as she finally set down the phone receiver that had grown heavy in her hand. For an octogenarian, Esther Hoffman demonstrated a heck of a lot of tenacity.
And even better, her ramblings kept Winnie’s mind of off Cal, which was no small task. Almost daily, the man seemed to occupy a larger and larger part of her mental space, and given the smallest opportunity, her thoughts drifted happily toward memories of chocolate cake and satiny lips and muscles she didn’t know the anatomical names for, but she could now recognize by touch.
Alas, this afternoon was not about any of those things, so when the call ended, Winnie returned her attention to her cluttered desk, sifting through various Post-it notes and a hastily scribbled to-do list. She needed to lay out a two-page photo spread for the next issue. She needed to follow-up on a phone call with a state representative running for re-election. She needed to edit her story on the tax levy proposal by the school board. She needed to review the city council meeting agenda for Tuesday (since they actually bothered to send her one this time) and follow-up with the city clerk on some information requests that could help her begin to untangle some of the mayoral nonsense.
And she needed to make some progress on that special section about Bloomsburo. God, she’d totally forgotten about her lack of progress on that front. She and Cal’s dinner “meeting” had so quickly dissolved into blatant flirtation that they hadn’t so much uttered the words “Bloomsburo Days.”
Despite Cal’s wicked proposition and his delicious follow through on it over the weekend, Winnie knew she’d soon have to face him in a more professional context. They had work to do together that had nothing to do with their bodies. That is unless he passed her off to Danny the Intern again, but she imagined that they’d worked past that particular situation by now.
But something told her that calling up Cal to talk shop wouldn’t necessarily end in professional productivity either. That was a problem she was going to need to solve, because the special section needed to get put together in the next week despite her interest in interrogating the Chamber director in other ways.
She pulled out her phone and began a text message to Cal.
We need to talk about Bloomsburo Days!!
His response arrived in seconds.
We need to do lots of things, Briggs. Did you do your homework?
The smile that spread across her face was involuntary. This was why she shouldn’t have started with the to-do list item related to him. Though if she were honest with herself, this was exactly why she started with him.
A couple of times.
A+
Lord, this man was trouble.
Cal, I have stuff to get done. I need your help.
I have stuff to do too. Stuff = you.
She rolled her eyes, loving every second of his absurdity. He wrote her more.
Promise to meet me tonight and I’ll answer any questions you email me.
Tonight!?
Yes.
One arrogant word. As if she couldn’t deny his beckoning. And dang it, he was right. She told herself she’d have to wait much longer to reconnect with the man. She’d toyed with the idea of avoiding him until the weekend, which seemed torturously far away from where she sat on Monday.
You’ll send me answers to my questions by the end of the day?
I swear.
If you don’t, I’ll stand you up.
OKAY, now I actually mean it.
You’re bad.
I agree. But isn’t that why you’re writing me?
Touché. The man understood his appeal. She texted again.
Where? When?
He stayed silent for a moment and she wished she could read his thoughts. The She Shed would be off limits for the foreseeable future, given that one of the most important clauses of their agreement was that Rhonda couldn’t catch wind of what they were doing. That would prove tricky if she found her son’s car parked outside of Winnie’s cottage late at night. She also didn’t want to overextend her welcome at his house, no matter how nice of a time they’d had there over the weekend.
Cosgrove Hill. Moonlight hike. 8. I’ll bring the blanket.
Winnie’s heart thrilled at the possibility. An outdoor tryst? That’d be a first for her. She had a feeling that Cal possessed an endless string of tantalizing firsts for her to experience. She had a stronger feeling that she’d like to knock them off her to-do list with as much haste as possible, starting tonight.
It’s a plan. Unless I have to stand you up for bad behavior.
Send the questions already, woman.
And she did just that. With the detailed answers returning a mere twelve minutes after she sent them, his response time was record-breaking.
~-~-~-~-~-~-
Winnie didn’t have much time at home between wrapping up her workday and grabbing a burger and some quick conversation with Evie at Dewey’s, but in the twenty minutes she was there, Rhonda Spencer managed to catch her.
The soft knock on the door made Winnie jump, and her nerves didn’t calm even slightly when she saw her landlady’s sweet face at the door. It was less than comfortable to face the mother of a man whose sex appeal was short-circuiting her brain.
Winnie focused on the woman before her who, once again, held a red wicker basket of food—brownies and banana bread and some homemade jam, by the look of it.
The Spencers were a family of feeders, and Winnie wasn’t mad about it.
“For you!” Rhonda said warmly. Today her strawberry-white curls were twisted in braids that hung down her chest. They fit well with the distressed overalls she wore over a striped boat neck shirt. Her feet, like usual, were bare.
Winnie reached out for the basket and lifted it closer so she could smell the goodies inside. “You’re too kind. This looks amazing!”
“I love to bake, and always end up with more than I could possibly use.”
“Do you want to come in?” Winnie asked, moving aside to make room for Rhonda to enter.
“Just for a minute. I don’t want to bother you if you have plans.”
Must. Not. Think. About. The plans.
“I have a bit of time.”
Rhonda took a seat at the round table she’d furnished in the kitchen, and Winnie joined her.
“The place looks wonderful,” Rhonda said as she quickly surveyed the space.
“Oh, it’s a mess.”
“That’s what’s wonderful about it! It looks lived-in. The mantle looks fantastic. I left that clear on purpose. I figured that whoever came here next would appreciate a few blank canvases around the space.”
“Did you have lots of interest in the rental ad when you first put it up?”
“Heavens, yes,” Rhonda laughed. “Far more than I expected. I didn’t know what I was getting myself into.”
Winnie couldn’t bring herself to ask the next obvious question, but Rhonda answered it anyway.
“You were an easy choice. I probably read twenty responses to the ad before I read yours, and the second it arrived in my inbox, I knew you’d be the one.”
“How?” Winnie asked, unable to help herself. She’d never been “the one” in any context.
“You could spell, you had a lovely voice
to your writing, and you said that you were looking for a place to both find yourself and to get lost in. That was it, because that’s what this space had always been to me. Then after we talked on the phone, I knew it was fated.”
Winnie couldn’t help but smile. “So did you just stop by to drop off sweets and lavish me with compliments?” Winnie joked.
“No, I’m afraid I didn’t. Though if they softened you to me a bit, that would only help my cause.”
Winnie’s stomach sank. She had a feeling she was about to be issued another Sunday dinner invitation. Accepting would be more impossible now than ever, given the sudden shift in her relationship with Cal. A sizeable part of her heart ached at the realization that she could have the man, but not his family.
“I have a favor to ask you,” Rhonda said, her brows narrowing slightly in determination.
“What is it?”
“I’m having a special celebration this Friday.”
Butterflies swarmed her stomach. She hated nothing more than saying no to this generous woman, but some things had to be done.
“Before you say no—and you can say no,” Rhonda continued, “let me say that it’s a once-a-year event, so you won’t have to worry about signing up for a weekly commitment for the foreseeable future. Plus some of my other neighbors and friends will be there.”
That made it a little more palatable, even if Cal wouldn’t like it at all.
“What’s the celebration?” she asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.
“It’s my annual equinox feast and bonfire.”
Winnie’s eyes widened.
“Mabon is what the Pagans call it. A time to give thanks for bounty and harvest. And this year, you are part of my bounty. You have to be there.”