Her Passionate Plan B

by Dixie Browning

  “Oh, hush up,” Daisy muttered. Suddenly—or maybe not so suddenly—this game of theirs didn’t seem quite so enjoyable.

  “Too late, I’ve already got someone in mind for him.” Marty leaned in closer as she watched Kell dodge through the moving crowd. “You know Carrie Stovall? She’s been living with this guy and it turns out he’s got a wife up in Suffolk, and they’re not even divorced? Carrie needs someone steady.”

  “Lord knows Egbert’s steady,” Sasha said with a lift of her penciled eyebrows. “Any steadier and he’d have moss growing on his north side.”

  “Maybe Daisy knows of a remedy for terminal steadiness. What about it, hon, you want to try your healing arts on Egg-butt?”

  Oblivious to the good-natured dishing between her two best friends, Daisy didn’t know whether to weep or kick something. To think she could have shared supper with him. It would have been the first step in her campaign.

  “Well, hello there,” Sasha purred as Kell sauntered up to join them. When Daisy glared at him, she added, “Don’t mind her, she woke up on the wrong side of the bed.”

  Daisy had had enough. Ignoring the grinning Kell, who was carrying a big white box full of the food she’d spent the afternoon preparing, she said, “You know what, Sasha? You’re the only woman in the world who would dress like that for a church box supper.”

  “Honey, let’s face it—I’m the only one in town with any fashion sense.”

  “Which one of you lovely ladies do I have the privilege of sharing supper with?” Kell asked. He was looking straight at Daisy, who was purposefully avoiding his gaze. As if I didn’t know was implied.

  “Oh, God, would you just listen to that. Not only a voice to die for, but manners, too,” Sasha murmured. “You get Daisy, but if she doesn’t appreciate you, we’ll be right over there at the table by the magnolia tree. Won’t we, Marty?” She elbowed her friend in the arm.

  “We will? Oh, sure.”

  Ten

  At least, Daisy assured herself, she was surrounded by so many chaperones she could hardly do anything too outrageous. All she had to do was behave sensibly for another hour or so; after that he’d be gone and she could try to smooth things over. The good news—the really encouraging news—was that Egbert had bid on her supper box.

  “Daisy?” Kell was studying her, a quizzical smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

  “All right,” she snapped. A few weeks from now she’d have forgotten all about Kell Magee. By then she should be well on her way to winning Egbert’s—well, if not his heart, at least his very good friendship, which, after all, was the best basis for any marriage.

  “Look, if I made a mistake and messed up your plans, I’m sorry. I can leave and you can join your friends, just say the word.”

  She shook her head. “I’m sorry. It’s just—oh, I don’t know, everything, I guess. I’m tired from rushing to get things ready so we can close up the house, and on top of that, I think my apartment’s going to be sold out from under me. And why am I telling you all this?” She shook her head.

  “Maybe because you need to unload and I happen to have broader shoulders than either of your two friends over there?”

  She relented. It wasn’t like her to be snippy. She’d learned a long time ago never to allow her emotions free reign. It was messy at best, disastrous at worst. “Come on, let’s find someplace where we’re not apt to be hit in the head with a football.”

  “Lead on, MacDuff.”

  “Actually, I think that’s supposed to be ‘Lay on, MacDuff.’” Daisy rolled her eyes, and seeing her expression, Kell chuckled. She told herself that if she’d managed to resist his charms while sleeping under the same roof, she should be able to manage sharing a meal in a public place.

  Taking her arm, he headed for a table down near the creek. And that was another thing—the way he walked. You’d think every moving part in his body had been greased.

  One hundred dollars? For plain old fried chicken tied up with a purple bow? She wished now she’d paid attention to the bidding, but she’d been too busy worrying about Faylene and Gus. How hard had Egbert tried to outbid him? Egbert had a reputation for being a good citizen. He always bought Girl Scout cookies and gave them away because he had a wheat sensitivity.

  Oh, shoot. She’d forgotten the flour in the corn fritters, not to mention the flour she’d dusted her chicken with. Not to mention the piecrust and the homemade cloverleaf rolls. She’d like to think fate was on her side for once, but that would be too great a stretch.

  “After sampling your fried chicken, I’m really looking forward to supper,” Kell said. “This table suit you?”

  She wanted to tell him to stop being so damned…decent! How could any man look boyishly innocent and devilishly sexy at the same time? “It’s fine with me, as long as you don’t mind eating supper next to all those tombstones.”

  “Not a problem. I don’t believe in ghosts, do you?”

  “I don’t know what I believe in, not anymore,” she muttered.

  They could always try again with Faylene, but she’d missed a wonderful chance to get better acquainted with Egbert on a personal level. Of course, if he bid a bundle and then couldn’t eat a single thing she’d prepared, it would’ve been embarrassing, to say the least.

  A picture-postcard setting. Sunset reflected in the creek. Dark fingers of marsh delineated the shoreline, naked cypress trees were silhouetted against the sky. Kell glanced around and murmured, “Nice.”

  Stealing a look at his profile, Daisy had to agree. He had a wonderful nose, just the right size, with the slightest arch to give it character. Her gaze moved on to his lips and she quickly looked away. If anyone ever held a kissing Olympics, he’d win gold, hands down.

  When he took out a handkerchief and brushed leaves and dried pokeberry deposits from the bench, she told herself he was just too good to be true. Which meant he probably wasn’t.

  “What about something to drink?” he asked.

  “There’s a machine in the church basement. Sorry—I should have thought of it sooner.”

  “No problem. Name your preference and I’ll fetch.”

  “Anything diet.”

  He was back in less than five minutes with two bottles of water. “Sorry, this was the best I could do.”

  “It’s fine. The diet drinks always go first. You do know this was supposed to be Faylene’s and Gus’s box, don’t you?” She nodded to the white cardboard box she’d saved from the last time she’d bought a bakery cake. “It had her name on it, and Gus Mathias was supposed to bid on it.”

  “Figured it must be something like that. I saw her drive off just as I was pulling in. She wasn’t looking any too happy.”

  Daisy shrugged. “I guess you think we were meddling.” Well, they were, but only with the best of intentions. “It’s just that when you see someone you like and you think there’s a chance to make her happy, you want to try.”

  He nodded, then lifted his shoulders in an easy shrug.

  She tried unsuccessfully to interpret his mixed signals. “All right, so we have fun matchmaking. There’s not a whole lot to do for entertainment in a place like Muddy Landing unless you like hunting, fishing or bingo.”

  “And you don’t, I take it. Man, are those what I think they are?” He took out a cloverleaf roll and sniffed it, closing his eyes.

  “They’re just plain old yeast rolls.”

  “Hey, there’s nothing plain old about these things,” he said, somehow making ordinary bread sound like hot buttered sex.

  “Store-bought ones are just as good. I’m just trying to use up all the staples. I hate to throw out good yeast and flour.”

  Kell pinched off a bit of roll, then searched in the box to see what else it held. “Ah, geez, is that chocolate cake wrapped up in the napkins? So this thing you planned with Faylene and what’s his name—it didn’t work out, huh? I guess his loss is my gain.”

  “It’s pie. Not cake. Kell, I’m really embarrassed
you had to bid so much for the same old fried chicken you’ve had before.”

  He bit off a bit of corn fritter, chewed with his eyes closed, then said, “Man, oh, man. Didn’t have to. I’d planned on having a sub from that place down the road, but then I passed the church on my way through town.”

  “Yes, but a hundred dollars?”

  “Blalock ran it up to fifty-five. I got tired of playing his game.”

  When it came to playing games Kell was obviously no slouch, but Egbert? She’d never have pegged him as the competitive type. But then, he was a man. With some men it was a survival tactic, a holdover from the Stone Age when the man with the biggest club won.

  “Where’d you learn to cook like this?” He broke off a crumb of chocolate-rum pie, tasted it and closed his eyes. “Don’t tell me you learned to bake like this in nursing school.”

  “I had courses in nutrition, but before that I worked my way through school by helping out in the cafeteria. The women there were wonderful cooks. How about you?”

  “You mean where’d I learn to cook?” He shot her a smile that managed to be both teasing and tempting. It occurred to her that she wasn’t feeling nearly as tired as she’d been when the evening started.

  “Faye said you were a baseball player. Who do you play for? Would I have heard of them?”

  “Played. Past tense. I used to play for Houston. Why? Are you a fan?” He had a way of speaking volumes with the lift of a single eyebrow.

  “Not really. I never went in for sports—never had time.” At age twelve she’d just been getting into track, but then things had started coming apart at her adoptive home. Next thing she knew, she was back in the system again. And while the system might try, it was under-staffed and underfunded. “So how’d you get interested?” she asked. “Aren’t you a little young to have retired? And now you own a sporting goods shop?” As long as they kept talking, she reasoned, she’d be in no danger of falling under his spell again.

  They discussed sports and growing up in a small town and then moved on to choosing a profession versus having one chosen for them. By the time she handed out slices of the sinfully rich chocolate-rum pie with coconut and walnuts, Daisy felt so comfortable she nearly forgot to be disappointed about the way the evening had turned out.

  She’d been telling him about one of her cases, an elderly woman who had served in the Coast Guard during the Second World War—back then the women were called SPARS—when she noticed he was staring past her toward the creek. The sun was already down, the afterglow laying long lavender shadows across the mossy old graveyard.

  Twisting around on the bench seat, Daisy looked to see what had caught his attention. So far as she could tell there was nothing out there but an old two-plank landing used only by a few trappers and hunters.

  Suddenly he rose, stepped over the bench and strode down toward the creek. After only a moment’s hesitation, Daisy followed. “Kell? What is it?” Oh, God, she thought, not a child! Kids loved messing around the water, but surely if a child had fallen in they’d have heard the splash. “Kell?”

  “Gotcha!” He bent over and came up holding something dark and round in both hands.

  “A turtle?”

  “Slider, if I’m not mistaken. She’s been circling around out there ever since we’ve been here. I don’t know much about these critters, but it didn’t look like she could see where she was going. She kept running into things.”

  Much later Daisy would look back on it as the moment she had fallen in love. A muddy little slider, of all things. And Kell had willingly spent the rest of the evening trying to help the poor creature. She couldn’t help but wonder if Egbert would have done as much. Or would he even have noticed the poor, blind thing?

  It was nearly three hours later when they headed back to Muddy Landing, having left one yellow slider with an eye infection and a serious case of malnutrition at the home of a retired veterinarian in Elizabeth City.

  “Kind of makes you feel good, doesn’t it?” Kell said quietly as they turned off on Highway 34 at Belcross.

  It did, but by that time Daisy was half-asleep, the stress of the past few days having finally caught up with her. “Mmm.”

  “Good thing you knew that vet. He said you used to pet-sit for some of his clients.”

  “Mmm-hmm.” Dr. Van had retired years ago, but he’d taken one look and confirmed Daisy’s suspicions. Too blind to find food, the poor creature would have starved, that is if it didn’t blunder out onto the street and get run over.

  “You cold?” He turned on the heater, and a current of warm air flowed over her. Once the sun went down, the air had chilled down quickly.

  He drove fast, probably above the speed limit, but Daisy was too comfortable to complain, especially after he turned on a CD, lulling her with Vince Gill’s dulcet tenor. Why fight it? Feeling warm and safe and—well, comfortable hardly began to describe it, but it would do for now—she gave up and let her eyes drift shut again.

  The next thing she knew Kell was lifting her from the car. Coming instantly awake, she started to protest. He said, “Shh, you’re in no condition to make it up those steps.”

  “Wha’s hap’nin’? Where are we? Kell, put me down.”

  “Now, why would I do that?”

  Twisting around, she looked to see the familiar turreted silhouette of the old mansion that had been her home for nearly a year. “Lemme get the key out,” she mumbled, struggling to find her shoulder bag.

  “Already got it.”

  “How? It’s in my purse.” Her car. Good Lord, she’d left her car in the church parking lot.

  “Daisy—hush up, honey, it’s not worth fighting over. I didn’t mess with any of your other stuff, just the keys.”

  “But my car—you should have taken me back—”

  “Shh, your car’s probably safe enough in a church parking lot. We’ll collect it tomorrow.”

  Evidently somewhere between Elizabeth City and Muddy Landing she had lost her free will, her backbone and her last shred of common sense. She didn’t even argue.

  “You’re bushed, aren’t you? You want to turn in now, or do you want a nightcap?”

  “Turn in,” she mumbled. And then “No, maybe something…” She tried to cut off the thought, but before she could stop it, a picture of a naked couple sharing a bottle of wine and then falling into bed together appeared like a DVD, full of color, detail and animation.

  She shut her eyes. It didn’t help, so she opened them again. In the dim light of the freshly dusted overhead fixture, his features looked as if they’d been carved from some exotic wood and polished to a satin sheen. “Maybe milk,” she said desperately.

  “Milk it is. Warm or cold?”

  She was wide-awake now. Emotionally confused, physically exhausted, but wide-awake. Shaking her head, she said, “You decide, I can’t think straight.”

  “Cocoa, then. Why don’t you get ready for bed while I make it.”

  She stood there like a stump wanting to say, Forget the cocoa, just come to bed with me. Instead, she said, “We don’t have any more mix.”

  “I’ll improvise. You go wash, brush and put on something comfortable and I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

  Kell watched her stumble toward the end of the hall where her quarters were located, then headed for the kitchen. She’d been asleep in the car for the past twenty-five minutes, making soft, puffy little sounds with her lips. He’d been tempted to pull over and try a little mouth-to-mouth, but knowing how exhausted she was, he’d resisted the temptation. She’d been going flat out ever since he’d been there, trying to wind things up so she could move back to town. He’d been torn between trying to stay out of her way and wanting to spend as much time with her as possible before he had to leave. And not just because he liked being in the house where his father had grown up. And then, on top of everything else, she had taken on this box supper thing. Didn’t those two friends of hers have any idea how pushed she was?

  Behind the cerea
l he found a tin of cocoa with maybe an inch or so left in the bottom. Without bothering to read the instructions, he poured milk into a pan, dumped in some sugar and emptied the cocoa tin, listening all the while for sounds to tell him how near ready she was. If she got through in the bathroom and fell asleep before the stuff was hot he’d just have to wake her up. One way or another, he intended to share something with her before he left tomorrow, even if it was only a mug of cocoa.

  He heard the pump cut on, heard the door of the medicine cabinet open and close. He called softly, “Daisy? This stuff’s about ready.”

  “Library,” she called through the closed door.

  Uh-huh. She didn’t trust him to take it to her bedroom. Smart lady.

  Daisy always slept in nylon not because it was sexy, but because cotton pajamas twisted around her. A restless sleeper, especially when she had a lot on her mind, she usually changed positions at least a dozen times during the night. Now shoving her arms in the sleeves of a faded pink terry-cloth robe, she looped the sash twice around her waist and knotted it, then waited until Kell left the kitchen to follow him to the library.

  She smelled the cocoa even before she entered the room, the rich, slightly burnt scent intermingled with floor wax and furniture polish. Kell had set it on the desk and was looking over the rows of books, all dusted and ready for the librarian, the historical society, or whoever ended up with them.

  “Looks like Uncle Harve had a lot of different interests,” Kell said.

  It took her a moment to react to the words, she was so busy reacting to the man himself. Even standing there with his back to her, hip cocked and chin resting in one hand, he reminded her of a big, sleepy cat, trying to make up his mind whether or not to pounce.

  There was nothing at all sleepy about his eyes when he turned to face her. They were glowing like a pair of blue flames. “Judging from all these titles, I mean.”

  Titles? Oh—books. Turn on your brain, woman! “Um…yes, he did. That is, he was. It was one of the things I liked best about him—he had such an—an inquiring mind.” Stop looking at me that way!