by Janet Dailey
“Yeah.” Toby tilted his head way back to frown at him. “I just hope you remember all the things you’re going to tell me ‘some other time.’”
In the kitchen, Luck filled a mug with coffee and helped himself to a handful of the cookies stacked on the table. “What did you and Eve talk about?” Settling onto a chair, he bit into one of the cookies and eyed Toby skeptically. “Did you really make these?”
“Yeah,” was the defensive retort. “Eve told me how. She says you learn best by doing. She’s a teacher. Did you know that? I mean a for real teacher. She teaches music.”
“No, I didn’t know that,” Luck admitted.
“We talked about that some and a bunch of other things.” Toby frowned in an attempt to recall the subjects he’d discussed with Eve. “I told her you were thinking about getting married again.”
Luck choked on the drink of coffee he’d taken and coughed, “You did what?!!” He set the mug down to stare at his son, controlling the anger that trembled beneath his disbelieving look.
“I mentioned that you were talking about getting married again,” he repeated with all the round-eyed innocence of an eight-year-old. “Well, it’s true.”
“No, you’ve been talking about it.” Luck pointed a finger at his son, shaking it slightly in his direction. “Why on earth did you mention it to Eve? I thought it was a private discussion between you and me.”
“Gosh, dad, I didn’t know you wanted to keep it a secret,” Toby blinked.
“Toby, you don’t go around discussing personal matters with strangers.” He ran his fingers through his damp haft in a gesture of exasperation. “My God, you’ll be blabbing it to the whole neighborhood next. Why don’t you just take an ad out in the paper? Wanted: A wife for a widower with an eightyear- old blabbermouth.”
“Do you think anyone would apply?” Behind the thoughtful frown, there was the beginnings of a plan.
“No!” Luck slammed his hand on the table. “If I find out that you’ve put an advertisement in any paper, I swear you won’t be able to sit down for a week! This marriage business has gone far enough!”
“But you said — ” Toby started to protest.
“I don’t care what I said,” Luck interrupted with a slicing wave of his hand to dismiss that argument. “I’ve played along with this marriage idea of yours, but it’s got to stop. I’ll decide when and if I’m getting married again without any prompting from you!”
“But face it, dad, you should get married,” Toby patiently insisted. “You need somebody to keep you company and to look after you. I’m getting too old to be doing all this woman’s work around the house.”
“You don’t get married just for companionship and someone to keep house.” Luck regretted his earlier, imprecise explanation of another’s role. It had started this whole mess. “There is more involved than that. A man is supposed to love the woman he marries.”
“You’re talking about hugging and kissing and that stuff,” Toby nodded in understanding.
“That and…other things,” Luck conceded with marked impatience.
“You mean sex, like in that book you and I read together when you explained to me how babies were made,” his son replied quite calmly.
Luck shook his head and scratched his forehead. “Yes, I mean sex and the feelings you have toward the woman you marry.”
“Would you consider marrying someone like Eve?” Toby cocked his head at a wondering angle. “You said looks weren’t everything.”
“Why did you say a thing like that?” he challenged with irritation. “Don’t you think Eve is an attractive woman?”
“Eve is all right, I like her, but — ”
“No buts!” Luck flashed. “Eve is a lovely young woman and I don’t want you implying otherwise with comments like ‘looks aren’t everything.’ It’s thoughtless remarks like that that hurt people’s feelings.” He should know. He had already wounded Eve when he called her a brown mouse, even though he hadn’t meant it to be unkind. “Don’t ever say anything to slight her!”
“Gee, dad, you don’t have to get so hostile,” Toby admonished, and defended his position. “Eve just doesn’t look anything at all like the blonde we saw on the beach the other day. That blonde could have been the centerfold in Playboy magazine.”
Luck started to ask where Toby had gotten his hands on a magazine like that, but he remembered his own curiosity at that age and decided not to pursue the issue at this time. Instead he just sighed, “I’m not interested in marrying a woman who has staples in her stomach.”
Toby jerked his head and frowned. “Why would she have staples in her stomach?”
“Never mind.” He lifted his hands in defeat. “The whole subject of women and marriage is closed. But you remember what I said about Eve,” he warned. “I don’t want to hear you making any disparaging remarks about her.”
“I wouldn’t, dad.” Toby looked offended. “She’s nice.”
“Don’t forget it, then,” he replied less forcefully, and stood up. “I’m going to get out of this robe and put some clothes on. You’d better find something to put these cookies in.”
“Yes, sir,” Toby agreed in a dispirited tone.
Luck hesitated. “I didn’t mean to be rough on you, Toby. I know you mean well. It’s just that sometimes you make situations very awkward without realizing it.”
“How?”
“I can’t explain,” He shook his head, then reached out to rumple his son’s hair in a show of affection. “Don’t let it worry you.”
THE RAIN had washed the land clean. The sky was a fresh clear blue while the green pine needles had lost their coat of dust to contrast sharply with the blue horizon. After a day’s worth of summer sunshine, the ground was drying out, with only water standing in the low spots as a reminder it had rained.
Sitting on the seat in front of the upright piano, Eve let her fingers glide over the keys, seeking out the Mozart melody without conscious direction. She played from memory, eyes closed, listening to the individual notes flowing from one to another. The beauty of the song was an indirect therapy for the vague dejection that had haunted her since Luck had recognized her as his brown mouse less than two days ago.
When the last note faded into the emptiness of the cottage, Eve reluctantly let her fingers slide from the keys to her lap. The applause from a single person sounded behind her. Startled, Eve swung around on the piano seat to discover the identity of her audience of one.
The wire mesh of the screen door darkened the form of the man standing on the porch, but Eve recognized Luck instantly. An alternating pleasure and uncertainty ran through her system, setting her nerves on edge while quickening her pulse.
“I didn’t hear you come.” She rose quickly to cross the room and unhook the door. “Mom and dad went fishing this morning.” As she pushed open the door to let him in, she noticed the only car in the driveway belonged to her parents. “Where’s your car?”
“I came by boat.” He stepped inside, so tall and so vigorously manly. Eve kept a safe distance between them to elude the raw force of his attraction that seemed to grow stronger with each meeting. “I tied it up at the shore. Toby’s watching it.”
“Oh.” The knack of idle conversation deserted her. It was foolish to let that brown-mouse episode tie her tongue, but it had. She should never have allowed herself to become so sensitive about it. She should have accepted Luck’s explanation the other day and let it die.
“Toby and I decided to take a ride around the lake this morning and thought you might like to come along.” That lazy half smile that Eve found so disturbing accompanied his invitation.
Her delight was short-lived as she read between the lines. “It’s thoughtful of you to ask, but I don’t want you to feel that you’re obligated to do so because you think you should make up for what happened outside the tavern that night.” There was a trace of pride in the way she held her head, tipped higher than normal.
His smile grew more pronoun
ced, bringing a gentleness to his hard-hewn features. “I’m not going to apologize for anything I said or did then,” Luck informed her. “I regret that you felt slighted by the phrase of brown mouse, but I meant it in the kindest possible way. I’m asking you to come with us because we’d like your company. If you feel that I need an excuse to ask, then let’s say that it is my way of thanking you for showing Toby how to make cookies.” Glinting blue eyes gently mocked her as he paused. “Will you come with us?”
Eve smiled in a self-mocking way that etched attractive dimples in her cheeks. “I’d like to, yes,” she accepted. “Just give me a couple of minutes to change.” It would be too awkward climbing in and out of a boat in the wraparound denim skirt she was wearing.
“Sure.” He reached for the screen door to open it. “We’ll be stopping for lunch, probably at one of the resorts along the lake.”
Eve hesitated, wondering if she was being too presumptuous, then threw caution to the wind to suggest, “If you’ll give me another fifteen minutes, I can fix some sandwiches and stuff for a picnic lunch. Toby would like that.”
“Toby would love it,” Luck agreed. “We’ll meet you at the boat in fifteen minutes.”
“I’ll be there,” she promised as he pushed the-door open and walked out.
Lingering near the door, Eve watched him descend the steps and strike out across the road toward the lakeshore, a warm feeling of pleasure running swiftly through her veins. Before he had disappeared from view, she retreated to the kitchen to take the picnic basket out of the pantry cupboard and raid the refrigerator. To go with the ham sandwiches she fixed, Eve added a wedge of Wisconsin Cheddar cheese along with some milder Colby, plus crackers and red Delicious apples. She filled a thermos cooler with lemonade and packed it in the basket, then laid a bag of potato chips on top.
Most of the allotted time was gone when she entered her bedroom. She quickly changed out of the skirt and blouse into a pair of white shorts and a flame-red halter top. At the last minute, she slipped on a pair of white canvas shoes with rubber soles and grabbed a long-sleeved blouse from the closet, in case she wanted protection from the sun.
With her arm hooked through the handle of the picnic basket, Eve crossed the road to the lake. Toby was skipping stones across the flat surface of the lake, a picture of intensity. A cigarette dangled from Luck’s mouth, his eyes squinting against the cuffing smoke as he stood in a relaxed stance beside his son. At the sound of Eve’s approach, the upper half of his body swiveled toward her. His gaze swept her in slow appreciation, setting her aglow with pleasure.
“Hi, Eve!” Toby greeted her with an exuberant welcome, the handful of stones falling from his hands so he could brush the dust from them.
“You still have two minutes to go.” Luck dropped the cigarette to the ground, grinding it dead under his heel.
“Maybe I should go back to the cottage,” Eve laughed in a suddenly buoyant mood.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” Luck denied the suggestion, a matching humor shining in his look.
She surrendered the picnic basket to his reaching hand. A line tied around a tree moored the pleasure cruiser close to the shore. Luck swung the basket onto the bow, then turned to help Eve aboard. Previously she had only guessed at the strength in the sinewed muscles of his shoulders and arms. But when his hands spanned the bareness of her rib cage and lifted her with muscles rippling to swing her up onto the bow as easily as he had the basket, she had her belief confirmed.
The imprint of his firm hands stayed with her, warming her flesh and letting her relive the sensation of his touch as she carried the basket to the stern of the boat and stowed it under one of the cushioned seats. Toby was tossed aboard with equal ease and came scrambling back to where Eve was. After untying the mooring line, Luck pushed the boat into deeper water and heaved himself on board.
“All set?” Luck cast them each a glance as his hand paused on the ignition key.
At their nods, he turned the key. The powerful engine of the cruise boat sputtered, then roared smoothly to life, the blades churning water. Turning the wheel, Luck maneuvered the boat around to point toward the open water before opening the throttle to send it shooting forward.
The speed generated a wind that lifted the swath of brown hair from Eve’s neck, blowing and swirling it behind her. A little late she realized she hadn’t brought a scarf. There was nothing to be done about it now, so she turned her face to the wind, letting it race over her and whip the hair off her shoulders.
Resting her arm on the side of the boat, Eve had a clear view of all that was in front of her, including Luck. He stood behind the wheel, his feet braced apart. The sun-bronzed angles of his jutting profile were carved against a blue sky as vividly blue as his eyes. The wind ruffled the virile thickness of his dark hair and flattened his shirt against his hard flesh, revealing the play of muscles beneath it. Snug Levi’s outlined the slimness of his hips and the corded muscles of his thighs, reinforcing an aura of rough sexiness. Something stirred deep within her.
The instant Eve realized how openly she was staring, she shifted her gaze to the boy at his side, a youthful replica of his father. This day Toby had left behind his mask of maturity to adopt the carefree attitude that was usually so evident in Luck with that dancing glint in his eyes and easy smile.
The loud throb of the engine made conversation impossible, but Eve heard Toby urge his father to go faster. She saw the smile Luck flashed him and knew he laughed, even though the wind stole the sound from her. The throttle was pushed wide open until the powerboat was skimming over the surface of the water and bouncing over the wakes of other boats as the churning blades sent out their own fantail.
Luck glanced over at her and smiled, and Eve smiled back. For a brief moment, she allowed herself to consider the intimate picture they made — man, woman and child. For an even briefer minute, she let herself pretend that that’s the way it was, until realism caught her up sharply and made her shake the image away.
After a while, Luck eased the throttle back and turned the wheel over to his son. Toby swelled with importance, his oversized sense of responsibility surfacing to turn his expression serious. Luck stayed beside him the first few minutes until Toby got the feel of operating the boat. Then he moved to the opposite side of the boat to lean a hip against the rail and keep an unobtrusive vigil for traffic that his son might not see. The position put him almost directly in front of Eve.
His sweeping side-glance caught her looking at him and Luck raised his voice to comment, “It’s a beautiful day.”
“Lovely,” Eve shouted the agreement, because it did seem perfect to her. The wind made an unexpected change of direction and blew the hair across her face. Turning her head, she pushed it away. When she looked back, Luck was facing the front.
A quarter of an hour later or more, he straightened and motioned to her. “It’s your turn to be skipper!” Luck called.
“Aye, aye, sir,” she grinned, and moved to relieve Toby at the wheel.
She was quick to notice that the small boy was just beginning to show the tension of operating the boat. Wisely Luck had seen it and had Eve take over before it ceased to be fun for Toby and became onerous instead. Out of the corner of her eye, Eve saw Toby dart over to receive praise from his father for a job well done. Then her attention was centered on guiding the boat.
Luck said something to her, but the wind and the engine noise tore it away. She shook her head and frowned that she didn’t hear him. He crossed over to stand in a small space behind her.
“Let’s go to the northern side of the lake,” he leaned forward to repeat his suggestion.
“I’m not familiar with that area. We don’t usually go up that far.” Eve half turned her head to answer him and discovered he had bent closer to hear her, which brought his face inches from hers. Her gaze touched briefly on his mouth, then darted swiftly to his eyes to be captured by their vivid blueness,
“Neither am I. Let’s explore strange waters to
gether,” Luck replied, his eyes crinkling at the corners.
“Okay,” But there was a breathless quality to her voice.
It was some minutes after she turned the boat north before Luck abandoned his post behind her. It was only when he was gone that Eve realized how overly conscious she had been of his closeness, every nerve end tingling, although no contact had been made.
Familiar territory was left behind as they ventured into unknown waters. When a cluster of islands appeared, Eve reduced the boat’s speed to find the channel through them. She hesitated over the choice.
“Want me to take over?” Luck asked.
“Yes.” She relinquished the wheel to him with a quick smile. “That way if you run into a submerged log, it will be your fault instead of mine.”
“Wise thinking,” he grinned.
“Look!” Toby shouted, and pointed toward the waters ahead of them. “It’s a deer swimming across the lake.”
In the lake waters off their port side, there was the antlered head of a young buck swimming across the span of water between two islands. Luck throttled the engine to a slow idle, so they could watch him. When the deer reached the opposite island, it scrambled onto shore and disappeared within seconds in the thick stand of trees and underbrush.
“Boy, that was really something, huh, dad?” Toby exclaimed.
“It sure was,” was the indulgent agreement.
With a child’s lightning change of subject, Toby asked, “When are we going to have our picnic?”
“When we get hungry,” Luck replied.
“I’m hungry,” Toby stated.
Luck glanced at his watch. “I guess we can start looking for a place to go ashore. Or would you rather drop anchor and eat on the boat?” He included Eve in the question.
“It doesn’t matter to me,” she shrugged.
“Maybe we can land on one of the islands,” Toby suggested.
“I don’t know why not,” Luck smiled down at the boy, then began surveying the cluster of islands for a likely picnic spot.