by Lori Wilde
THEY SPENT THAT entire Sunday in bed, getting up only to shower, eat, and go back to bed again. It was the most perfect Sunday she’d had in recent memory. By the end of the day, Melody was raw, achy, and happier than she’d been in a very long time.
Who knew? Great sex was a wonderful tonic for what ailed you. Too bad there wasn’t a way to bottle the stuff.
In the dark of night on Sunday evening, Luke left their love nest and crept back to his own condo, after making sure no one was out and about in the complex when he made his stealthy move.
The minute he was gone, the place felt desperately empty. To keep from dwelling on it, she immediately threw herself into the final preparations for the events she was overseeing for the Memorial Day weekend, including the bachelor auction and the Sadie Hawkins dance.
She ventured out on Monday morning, dropping by the radio station to record a commercial spot about the events. While she was there, the DJ asked her to stick around for a short interview. She did so obligingly. In the listener call-in Q&A session that followed, she was surprised to find that most of the questions she fielded were about the Cupid letters she’d put up on the Web site the previous weeks. A lot of people wanted to know if Juliet was a Nielson or a Fant. Melody said that she couldn’t speculate on Juliet’s true identity, but quickly pointed out how universal the issue was from the Hatfields and the McCoys to the Capulets and the Montagues to Scotland’s MacDonalds and Campbells. Juliet could be from anywhere.
Afterward, she headed back to the condo and she’d no more than gotten inside when the doorbell rang. Her pulsed leaped. Luke?
Of course not. He knew better than to show up on her doorstep in the light of day. She opened the door to find a delivery boy holding a box of flowers. Fresh flowers? In a drought?
“Shipped from Houston,” the delivery boy said, reading her mind. “Flown in this morning.”
She tipped him, shut the door, and brought the flowers into the kitchen to find something to use as a vase. The bouquet was roses and stargazer lilies interspersed with baby’s breath.
The card inside read: A night of stargazing I’ll never forget.
Melody put three fingers to her mouth, closed her eyes. “No, Luke. No, no.”
She paced, wrung her hands. Things were getting out of control. She couldn’t let this slide. She had to say something. After putting the flowers in a vase—he’d already sent them, she might as well enjoy them—she picked up her cell phone and called him.
“Hello,” he answered in that deep, sexy voice of his that never failed to turn her upside down.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Is this the part where I’m supposed to tell you I’m sitting on the couch in my underwear?”
“This isn’t a phone sex call.”
“No? Damn.”
“I’m serious, Luke. Why are you sending me flowers?”
“Who says I sent them?”
“Who else would it be?”
“You underestimate yourself, Melly. Every eligible man in town, and some that aren’t so eligible, drools whenever you walk by.”
“Look, we agreed, just sex. No dating, no romance. This is supposed to be a secret affair. Flowers are romantic and the delivery boy now knows someone sent me flowers and you know how gossip flows in this town. If someone really wanted to find out who sent them to me they could.”
“Hey, what if you thought of it as a thank-you for a good time.”
“If you’re going to send flowers and do romantic stuff then we have to stop sleeping together.”
“You’re overreacting.”
“I’m serious about this. From what I’ve heard, you’ve never had trouble keeping things casual before.”
“I give flowers. I’m a flower giver. It’s my thing.”
“Flowers are how men try to get women into bed. You already got me there. No need for flowers.”
“You’re right. It was an impulsive gesture. My bad.”
“I don’t mean to sound bitchy,” she said. “They are nice flowers.”
“I did have a great time this weekend.” He lowered his voice. “You were sensational.”
“You were pretty good yourself.”
“Can we get together tonight? I promise no more sending of flowers or gifts of any kind.”
“Well, you can bring food. Food is okay. Everyone has to eat, right. As long as it’s not romantic food. No asparagus or oysters or anything like that.”
“Where am I going to get oysters in the desert?”
“Where did you get flowers in the desert?”
“How’s this? You come over to my place tonight for another midnight rendezvous. I’ll have supper ready. Nothing romantic.”
“Oh, you can’t cook it either. A man cooking for a woman is romantic.”
“But if I get take-out for two won’t that be suspicious?”
“Hmm, you’re right. Okay, you can cook for me.”
“I’m so happy. See you tonight.” Luke hung up.
Leaving Melody to realize she’d just made a date.
WITH EACH PASSING day the drought grew worse. Old-timers lamented that they’d never seen a time when it was so bad. No matter where you looked, there wasn’t a sprig of green in sight. Temperatures soared during the day and everyone stayed indoors. People murmured in hushed tones about leaving the valley. Melody worried. How arrogant it had been of her to think she could save the finances of a town in the midst of the worst drought in recorded history. Even the die-hard Cupidites were talking about leaving. How could she hope to bring tourists to the town?
But she couldn’t let the Chamber of Commerce see her doubt. She had to put the best spin on things that she could, but as she stood in the meeting room at the converted rail station, watching the board members file in with dire expressions on their faces, she knew she faced a daunting task. It was like being the captain of the Titanic trying to convince the passengers that the ship wasn’t sinking.
And she’d been hiding out in bed with Luke. She wished she were there now. Oh man, she was in so much trouble.
“Good morning everyone,” she chirped.
“What’s good about it?” Pat asked. “You know how many cars I fixed this past weekend?” She held up a finger. “One. Exactly one. And the customer couldn’t pay me outright. I had to agree to installments.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Melody soothed.
“You’re not doing such a hot job of bringing in the tourists.” Pat frowned.
“I’m trying and I do have some encouraging figures to share about the stargazing party.”
“Hmph.” Pat settled herself in a chair.
“Woman’s got a point.” Guy plopped down beside Pat. “I’ve only sold three cars this month. No one can afford a new one. This is getting freaky scary. I’m thinking about moving the dealership to El Paso.”
“El Paso is involved in a drought, the same as we are,” Melody pointed out.
“Yeah, but they’ve got the population to support a dealership. We’re screwed out here.” Guy grunted. “I’m ready to hear what other ideas you have up your sleeve, ’cause what we’ve tried so far ain’t working.”
Melody nibbled her bottom lip. Truthfully, she was out of ideas. The only idea that kept circling her head was about reenacting Cupid’s history, complete with the Greenwood-Fant-Nielson feud. It was the only thing in town that seemed to have staying power. And the letters from Juliet she’d printed on the blog seemed to support that theory, until Luke made her stop.
“We’ll discuss all that today,” she assured them.
Luke walked in and every eye turned to him. “Eloise isn’t here to take the minutes,” he said. “One of her barn cats died from heat exhaustion and even though it was a stray, she’s really torn up about it. Could someone take the minutes?”
“I’ll do it,” Junie Mae volunteered.
His eyes met Melody’s. She hadn’t seen him since four o’clock that morning,
when she left his bed to slip back over to her place. Remembering, her cheeks heated. She ducked her head in case anyone saw.
“You ready to start?” he asked.
“Yes.”
He sat down at the head of the table, swept a hand at her. “Go ahead and take the floor.”
Five pairs of anxious eyes fixed on her. She kept the smile pinned to her face and stood up. “I have some good news.”
“I have some bad news,” Ricardo said. He’d been sitting off to one side, watching and listening as everyone else had expressed their concerns, but not speaking up until now.
“Give us the bad news first,” Walker said. “I prefer to end on an up note.”
Ricardo ran a hand over his scalp, leaving his salt and pepper hair standing up in tufts. “I have tried to think of a way around this decision, but there is none.”
“Maybe we can help,” Melody ventured. “Tell us what’s troubling you.”
“I am beyond help,” Ricardo said. “I have seen a lawyer. In order to save my personal funds, I must file for bankruptcy. La Hacienda Grill will be closing at the end of the summer. I’m only keeping it open that long, because August 31 is the seventy-fifth-year anniversary of when my grandfather first opened the place.”
“Oh no, Ricardo!” the group exclaimed in unison.
“I have had a lot of local support, and I’ve been very lucky,” Ricardo said. “But without tourists, there simply isn’t enough business to keep the restaurant open.”
Walker laid a hand across his belly. “What will I do without my breakfast burrito?”
“Joe proposed to me at La Hacienda,” Junie Mae said. “If he were alive, he would be so sad about this.”
“The place is a Cupid icon,” Pat put in. “Movie stars ate there.”
“How much do you need to keep it open,” Luke said. “Maybe we can help you get a loan.”
Ricardo shook his head, “Failing money falling from the sky, my lawyer says bankruptcy is my only choice. I mortgaged the place to the hilt to send my niños to college. There’s no more money to be loaned. I’m at the end of the road.”
“This can’t be happening,” Melody said. She had plenty of fond memories of La Hacienda Grill herself.
“But it is.” Ricardo sank his face into his upturned palms. “I have failed my family.”
Junie Mae rubbed his back. “It’s not your fault. It’s this damn drought.”
“So.” Pat straightened, fixed her gaze on Melody. “Tell us the good news.”
In light of Ricardo’s bad news, her good news was pathetic indeed. “The stargazing party brought twenty-five thousand dollars into the community.”
“Spread over how many businesses?” Pat asked.
“Thirteen.”
“So that’s what?” Walker narrowed his eyes. “About two grand a business?”
“That’s a general average, some business made a little more, some a little less,” Melody explained.
“Two thousand?” Guy snorted. “Is that all? Two grand doesn’t pay the light bill at the dealership.”
Melody raised her chin. “It’s a start.”
“It’s a drop in the bucket,” Ricardo said gloomily.
“A drop is better than nothing,” Junie Mae said.
“Not in a drought,” Guy countered.
“All right. It’s clear we have a situation and we’ve got to do something to turn things around,” Luke said. “But don’t forget, we still have the bachelor auction and the Sadie Hawkins dance and the Memorial Day celebrations coming up at the end of the month.”
“How are early ticket sales for that looking?” Guy asked Melody.
“They’ve been tepid but it’s still ten days away, I’m doing my best to get the word out. I had a radio interview yesterday in Alpine and Pierce has gotten a Dallas Cowboy to commit as one of the bachelors, so I’m optimistic.”
Guy snorted. “I’m glad someone is.”
No one said anything to that. What could they say? She’d let them all down and they all knew it. She had failed at her job and her community was paying the price.
FOR THE REST of the day, Melody couldn’t stop thinking about Ricardo’s plight and the look of sorrow in his eyes. Losing La Hacienda Grill, a place with such deep roots in Cupid, was going to be a big blow. A blow from which the town might never recover.
Honestly, she was out of ideas. The only thing that held any promise of bringing in more tourists was those letters from Juliet. She had seen a big spike in comments from the first letter to the second, until Luke had made it clear he didn’t want her publishing any more of those letters.
What would it hurt to publish one more? Yes, Luke would be mad at her, but if it boosted tourism he’d have to forgive her.
And if he doesn’t?
Well, in their current situation, they didn’t stand much of a chance for happily-ever-after anyway.
Knowing she was setting herself up for a lot of potential heartache, she waited until everyone had left the Chamber of Commerce for the day, took out the red silk stationery and started to write.
Chapter 19
Dear Cupid,
I would love to take your advice and leave this place. It was a home I once loved but now, it has been ruined by hatred and intolerance on both sides of the fence. I should have left when I had the chance. Now, it’s too late. Why didn’t I listen to you? Why didn’t I leave? Why? It’s simple. I’m pregnant with my lover’s baby. And my parents are livid. They are insisting I get an abortion. I am only sixteen. Where can I go? What can I do? I love this baby so much already, but my parents have forbidden me to see my baby’s daddy again. There are no words to describe the pain inside of me. I want this child. But I’m afraid, so afraid they are going to take it away from me. And if they don’t, what kind of world am I bringing him or her into? A world where people hate and don’t ever forgive.
—Yours in utter despair,
Modern Day Juliet
“Oh my God,” Natalie exclaimed as Melody read the letter in the red silk envelope. “This is terrible. Horrible. Awful.”
“Stuff like that happened all the time when I was a girl,” Great-Aunt Delia said.
“They had abortions back then?” Natalie asked.
Great-Aunt Delia leveled her a look. “What? Just because it was illegal didn’t mean people didn’t do it. Mexico’s less than two hours from here.”
“I never knew that,” Melody’s mother said.
“What, that Mexico is so close or that there were such things as abortions before Roe v. Wade?” Great-Aunt Delia gave her a saucy look.
“That you knew people who went to Mexico to have illegal abortions.”
“What? You thought we were all stiff-lipped virgins back in the day?” Great-Aunt Delia snorted. “People are people the world over. They laugh, cry, have sex, feud, get pregnant, fall in love, get old, die. It’s a tireless cycle.”
“To my way of thinking,” Junie Mae said, “the real question is who is Juliet? I think we should see if we could find her. Reach out to her and her parents. Talk some sense into them.”
“Do you think she’s a Fant or a Nielson?” Natalie asked.
“She might be neither,” Melody offered, feeling guilty now that everyone was getting so worked up over poor fictitious Juliet. “She could be from somewhere else. Marfa. Alpine. Marathon. You never know.”
“Anybody heard of any feuding families from those towns?” Junie Mae asked.
No one said anything.
“Most of us in this room—Junie Mae excluded—are Greenwood-Fants.” Her mother met her gaze. “Our family has enjoyed a prestigious place in Cupid. The Nielsons have always come up second place. There are less of them for one thing. They’re the second richest family in town and no matter what they do they can never seem to match us in money, skills, or talent.”
“That’s from a Fant point of view,” Melody said. “Ask a Nielson and I imagine they’ll have a different s
tory to tell.”
“So.” Great-Aunt Delia rubbed her palms together. “How are you going to answer Juliet this time?”
“I’m going to ask her to reveal her true identity to me in a private letter and I’ll try to intervene between her and her parents.” The weird thing was, Melody was starting to think of Juliet as a real person too. How did the saying go? You tell a lie long enough and you’ll start to believe it? With this move, she was reaching the end of her plan to convince Luke to stop sweeping the family feud under the metaphorical rug. Next step after this, come clean publicly that she’d written the letters. That put a knot in her stomach. He was bound to be mad about what she’d done. But she’d known that when she’d started this.
“Sounds like a busybody move,” Great-Aunt Delia said. “I like it.”
FIVE MINUTES AFTER Melody posted the third letter the phone began to ring off the hook at the Chamber of Commerce.
“Boy, you sure lit a fire under them folks by publishing those letters on the Internet,” Emma Lee said. “All ten lines are blinking and I got more backed up. They all want to talk to the woman who answers the Cupid letters to Juliet. I told ’em it was a bunch of volunteers that do it, so they want to talk to the person who’s been putting the letters on the Web site. That’s you.”
“I’ll field the calls.” Melody picked up the phone.
“Abortion is wrong!” the caller hollered.
“Thanks for your opinion,” Melody said and got rid of the angry one quick.
“That poor girl,” said the next caller. “I just want to put my arms around her and hug her. If I come to Cupid can I meet her?”
“No one knows who Juliet is,” Melody said. Well, except for her. Juliet was a conglomeration of Fant and Nielson women throughout the last ninety years. Or so she told herself. But it didn’t really ease her conscience.
“Where’s that young man in all this?” the next caller asked. “He deserves a vote in what happens to his unborn child.”
Melody plowed through a total of twenty-five calls, every single one of them fired up over Juliet’s dilemma. Wow. She was a better marketer than she realized.