“Um…sure. Let me get some clothes on.”
Once, he might’ve told her not to bother. Tonight, he said, “I’ll wait.”
Five minutes later she was back, opening the door and inviting him in. She wore jeans, a baggy T-shirt and no makeup. Amazing how the woman looked sexy dressed up or down.
“Can I get you a drink? Coffee? A beer?”
“No, thanks.”
She gestured to the couch. “Have a seat.”
“No, thanks.” He kept his hands in his pockets. “I just wanted to ask where you get off ambushing my candidate at his rally this afternoon.”
She shrugged, avoiding his eyes. “My job is news.”
“Reporting, that is. Not making it.”
“All I did was ask a couple of questions.”
“About things that weren’t anybody’s business.”
“You wouldn’t give me any information, so I had to figure things out on my own.”
“By parking outside the Highlander all night?”
“Since that’s what it took.”
“What’s your agenda here? Do you want to see Mayor Tate and his cronies using the city to get rich?”
“I want to be recognized for doing a good job.”
“Why the hell didn’t you go to Chicago, then? Or D.C. or New York—somewhere folks feed on the personal peccadilloes of their elected officials? Why come to a little Southern town to stir up trouble? We really don’t need that kind of journalism down here.”
“You’re suggesting I leave town?”
“I’m suggesting we don’t need brass-balls reporting in New Skye. Adam DeVries is an honest guy whose only vice is working too hard. If you want real meat, look into Tate’s business dealings with L. T. LaRue. Look into city council members taking kickbacks for awarding contracts. Look at all the stuff Adam would like to change in this town. There’s your story.”
“Like I haven’t tried? Do you know how far those stories get? Guess who Tate and LaRue have lunch with every Wednesday. Yeah, that’s right—Ken Montgomery, the publisher of the paper. Kellie’s dad, the mayor’s father-in-law. I’m thinking the only way I’m going to break that news is to slide it into an article on your guy. So I’m keeping my eye on him. He’s got my vote, if that helps any.”
“Gee, thanks. One down, eight or nine thousand to go.” He turned and grabbed the doorknob to let himself out.
“Tommy?”
“Yeah?” He didn’t look back.
“Why did you kiss me the other night?”
“I don’t know. I guess because you make me so damn mad.”
“You’re not going to tonight?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m having enough trouble sleeping as it is.” He slammed the door behind him on his way out.
Then he stopped on the porch and leaned against a post, fighting the urge to go back inside and kiss Sam Pettit until sleep was the last thing on either of their minds.
THE GATE TO SWALLOWTAIL Farm was locked when Adam got there. He sat for a minute and swore, though he would have been just as mad if he’d found it open. Then he locked the truck, climbed the gate and hiked down the drive, wondering if the dogs were coming for him. Would they tear him up, lick him to death…or just sit there and stare, as usual?
None of the above, because the dogs didn’t show— Phoebe must have brought them in for the night. About halfway to the house he stopped and stood still, struck by the quality of the darkness around him. An owl hooted at intervals, a whippoorwill called through the trees, there were frogs chirruping by the pond and crickets sawing in the grass. Stars swam in a black sky made hazy with heat and humidity. That same humidity carried all the smells of the country—grass and pine, hay and horse, plus a freshness that might just be the absence of too much asphalt, too many cars, too many people. After a day spent politicking, Adam really understood the need to escape.
As he started up the final rise toward the house, the thunder of hooves created an eerie counterpoint in the darkness. Marian, the white mare, galloped along the fence line to his right, followed by the darker figures of Brady and Robin. Last came Cristal, black moving against black; a stray beam of light flashed just as she kicked up her heels and gave a shrill, challenging cry. Horse voices answered from across the pasture, then the four of them joined forces, racing corner to corner, and again around the perimeter.
Adam stopped to watch, not sure if his presence had caused the uproar or if this was what horses did after the sun went down. Before he could decide, he heard the porch door open.
And then the ominous rattle of a gun bolt being drawn back. “Who’s there?” She sounded calm. Deadly.
He put his hands in the air, turning slowly to face her. “Ph-Phoebe, it’s Adam. N-no harm intended, I p-promise.”
“Oh.” Finally, she lowered the barrel. “What are you doing here?”
“I wanted t-to t-talk t-to you.”
“You could’ve called.”
“I…d-don’t l-like ph-phones.”
She sighed. “Of course not. I wasn’t thinking.” A long pause. “What did you want to say?”
“C-could we g-go inside? The m-mosquitoes have d-discovered m-my pr-presence.”
Yet another hesitation. “Okay. Come in.”
Phoebe stepped backward into the screened porch and Adam followed. Five pairs of eyes glowed beyond her in the dark, an animal army arrayed at her back. There was no hint of welcome in the air.
“I g-guess I won’t worry about you out here anymore,” Adam said ruefully. “You seem to have plenty of protection, starting with Mr. Remington, there.”
She looked down at the shotgun cradled in her arms. “It has its uses. We see snakes, from time to time.”
“Like m-me?”
The surprise in her glance changed to laughter before she looked way.
“For a s-second, I thought you m-might sh-shoot even after you knew who I w-was.”
“I can’t say I wasn’t tempted.” She opened the kitchen door. “Let’s get inside where it’s cool.”
The three dogs and two cats trooped in at Phoebe’s heels, leaving Adam behind, with a very solid impression of his rank in the pack. In the kitchen, a single lamp on the counter provided a soft light that glinted on the barrel of the gun lying nearby. Phoebe opened the refrigerator and brought out a pitcher of tea while the dogs disposed themselves strategically around the room. Without being asked, Adam took a seat at the kitchen table.
“What did you come to say?” she asked, pouring two glasses. Wearing a long white nightshirt, with her loosely braided hair and bare feet, she looked medieval, mysterious. Even a little magical.
Ice rattled as she set a glass before him. “Adam? What did you come to say?”
He shook his head. “I’m s-sorry. P-pure and s-simple. I m-made a lot of m-mistakes this weekend.”
“Don’t worry about it. The worst is over—you’re on the way to being mayor. Today’s mistake will get buried under the real issues.”
“You m-mean our eng-gagement?”
“Mmm-hmm.” She sat down across the table and sipped her tea, avoiding his eyes.
“You’re b-backing out?”
That got her to look at him. “Of course. You don’t need a fiancée to be mayor.”
“It’ll be tough to explain Tommy’s announcement.”
“Say I broke up with you after the rally. Blame everything on me.” After a long pause, she sighed. “That really won’t work very well, though, will it?”
“If that’s what you want, that’s what we’ll do.”
“But the voters will think…they already think…” She drew a deep breath. “They think we spent the night together at the Highlander.”
“S-Samantha P-Pettit s-saw to that.”
“If we end the engagement, they’ll believe I’m a w-woman who w-would…s-sleep with a man one night and then call it off the next day.”
“N-no one who knows you will g
-give that a second thought” was all the reassurance he could muster.
“I suppose I shouldn’t care, one way or the other. Except that I do. I don’t want to be the ‘floozy’ who dumped New Skye’s future mayor.” She covered her face with her hands. “I-I c-can’t bear the thought that tomorrow m-morning the whole town will be talking about my…our…s-s-sex life. I left Atlanta to get away from just this s-sort of s-situation.”
“Your family was in p-politics in Atlanta?”
“No, but we knew p-people who were. I w-went to pr-private schools with their k-kids. Got teased by them, then when I g-got therapy and l-lost the stutter, they w-wanted to be w-with me because I w-was Dr. Moss’s d-daughter—the famous plastic surgeon, who did their m-mothers’ face-lifts and tummy tucks. Or because they thought my mother the math professor c-could help them g-get into Georgia Tech. Or, sometimes, because they thought I’d be so d-desperate they c-could g-get me into bed.” She straightened up and sent him a small smile. “That was the g-guys.”
“I f-figured.” Now that her hands were free, he reached out and curled his fingers around hers. “I guess it’s n-not f-fair to ask you to think about d-dealing with those k-kinds of people again. But c-continuing with the eng-g-gagement might be the b-best way to f-fight the g-gossip.”
Phoebe stared at their clasped hands for a long time, then took a deep, sad breath. “I s-suppose you’re r-right. Put on a br-brave f-face and d-dare them to stare us d-down.”
“Exactly.” He squeezed her fingers, then kissed her knuckles. “I’ll m-make things as easy on you as I c-can.”
“Thanks,” she said, her voice breathless.
Adam got lost for a minute, looking into her wide, startled gaze. He fought the urge to draw her closer, to eliminate the table between them and take another taste of that pink rosebud mouth. Fought…and regretfully won.
“I’d b-better g-go.” He loosened his hold on her hands and got to his feet. “I c-can’t tell you how m-much I appreciate your help, Phoebe.”
“I want to s-see you win, Adam. I’d hate to d-do anything else to hurt your c-campaign.”
“Lock up,” he ordered as he stepped through the outside door and turned to shut the panel.
“Yes, sir.”
With the light off in the kitchen, Phoebe could see Adam walking along the drive, past the horses and down the hill, until he finally disappeared into the dark behind the pines. After double-checking the door, she got back into bed and lay facing the front window as soft canine snores once again punctuated the night.
She was well and truly caught now…engaged to Adam DeVries. The man who wanted to be mayor. The man she knew she could fall in love with.
The man who didn’t like dogs.
SAM SAT AT HER DESK in the newsroom, regarding the front page of the Local News section with a jaundiced eye. Her picture of Adam DeVries and his fiancée rode high on the page, next to the headline Candidate’s True Love. She’d argued over that one, but the editor always won in the end.
“Pretty good deal.” Photographer Rory Newman leaned on the corner of the desk. “Above the fold and a headline, for a story on a first-time sucker sure to lose.”
“DeVries is a big name in this town.” She pushed the paper away and looked up at her favorite redhead. “You know that—you were born here.”
He tossed one of the peanuts in his hand into the air and caught it in his mouth. “Yeah, yeah. My money’s still on Tate. His reaction’s a masterpiece of statesmanship.” Rory found the printed response piece. “‘I welcome all honest debate on my years as mayor of this fine town,’” the photographer quoted, parodying the mayor’s heavy Southern accent. “‘A democracy works best when all citizens are involved in the process. I’m sure Mr. DeVries and I will have a lot to say to each other over the next weeks.’”
Sam shook her head. “Standard politician bull.”
“Exactly. A little romance will make the campaign interesting, at least. Last go-round, the challenger was over seventy and his hobby was Civil War relics. Bo-o-o-ring.”
“I thought everybody down here was crazy about the War Between the States. Talked it breakfast, lunch and dinner.”
“That’s what all you Yankees think.” He flipped another peanut, gave her a wink and walked off. “Some of us Rebs actually enjoy the twenty-first century.”
“Sounds like a story waiting to be told,” she called after him. Then she glanced at the photograph again. Adam and Phoebe appeared to be holding hands at the diner, laughing and gazing into each other’s eyes. She’d deliberately caught them in a moment of intimacy. But she hadn’t wanted to use it as an engagement announcement.
Tommy had forced her hand, in front of hundreds of people who would confirm his story. Now she had to go along with the fiancée angle, whether she believed it or not.
And, of course, she didn’t. A glance at DeVries’s face, at Phoebe Moss’s horrified expression, had been quite conclusive proof. Neither of them had been prepared for Tommy’s announcement, and not because they wanted to keep the secret. There simply wasn’t an engagement to announce, until that moment. The speech-therapy angle seemed like a non-problem to Sam. He stuttered a little, she smoothed things out for him. Big deal—lots of politicians hired voice coaches. The voters wouldn’t have cared, was her guess, until sex entered the picture.
Maybe she wouldn’t have pushed the issue, if Tommy had been honest with her…if Tommy had asked her out. If that made her some kind of journalistic whore, so be it. She’d used every trick she could think of to get his attention. But except for one angry kiss, he treated her like Lois Lane—untouchable.
So she’d tried to beat him at his own game. And lost. Still, she had something to work with. If the engagement was a sham, it was bound to fall apart under the pressures of the campaign. She only had to be there when the breakdown happened. Shouldn’t be too hard—all she had in her life these days was work, anyway. Tommy certainly wasn’t asking to monopolize her nights.
But, just by doing her job, she could go a long, long way toward monopolizing his.
“MR. DEVRIES IS HERE.”
Phoebe couldn’t help smiling. “Thanks, Willa. I’ll be right out.”
She smoothed her hair, stood up and shook out her dress. This morning, she could almost believe she’d dreamed Adam’s visit last night. Seeing him would be the proof, one way or the other. On a deep breath, she opened the office door and walked down the hallway.
As soon as she entered the waiting room, he looked up. And smiled.
No, last night hadn’t been a dream.
“I saw your picture in the paper,” Willa said, as she had when Phoebe first came in, and produced her copy as proof. “Y’all look so sweet, sittin’ there and holdin’ hands. But why the big secret about the engagement?” She pretended to pout. “We could’ve had a party, Phoebe, dear, if you’d let us know.”
“It was…sudden.” Phoebe tried to think of a reason and drew a complete blank. “We’re still getting used to the idea, ourselves.”
“I understand that. Eddie and me were engaged for two years and five months. He was in the army and stationed in Georgia and we just weren’t sure what was going to happen, so we kept quiet for all but the six months before the weddin’.” She held out a hand to Adam as he walked by her desk. “Congratulations, Mr. DeVries. That’s a wonderful girl you’ll be gettin’.”
He took her hand and smiled. “I’m s-sure of that, thanks.”
In her office, Phoebe retreated to the desk and collapsed into her chair. “I hadn’t even thought about the paper this morning until I got here. Have you seen the article?”
“Don’t b-bother. J-just the usual hype.”
The “usual hype” would definitely bother her. She took a deep breath. “Okay, then what do you want to work on? You must have other speeches to make. Shall we go over those?”
Adam pulled a paper out of his wallet. “We n-need to set some d-dates, f-first. D-do you have a c-calendar?”
> “Set dates?” Her heart skidded, then started pounding. “What kind of dates?”
He unfolded two sheets and slid one across the desk to her. “These are the c-campaign events f-for the n-next week. C-can you j-join us?”
She blinked hard to focus on the words, trying to take a deep breath, hoping the room would stop spinning around her head. “The l-lunches won’t work. I have appointments sc-scheduled until twelve-thirty and after one-thirty. How l-long do the meetings that s-s-start at 8:00 p.m. usually l-last?”
He winced. “Two hours, sometimes three.”
“That would get me home really late.”
“Right.” He marked on his sheet, fully intent on business. “How about S-Saturday? There’s a p-pancake b-breakfast at eight, a p-picnic at lunch, and then a d-dinner d-debate for the chamber of commerce.”
Phoebe realized she had a headache. “If I d-do my chores early, I c-could c-come in for breakfast and stay f-for lunch. Or I c-could come for d-dinner, after my chores.”
Adam looked up from his schedule. “Am I pushing too hard?”
“Um…”
He nodded. “Right.” The folded sheet went back into his pocket. “D-don’t let me pr-pressure you. If you c-can c-come to an event, we’ll be glad to have you. J-just think about it and let us know, okay?”
She smiled. “Sounds g-good.” Except for the “we” and “us” part. But she’d worry about that later. “You’re debating the mayor? That could be tricky.”
“I gu-guess we n-need to work on that, d-don’t we?”
“We’ll do free-speech exercises, get you used to thinking and answering quickly.”
Thirty minutes later, they were both tense. “M-maybe I should c-cancel the debate,” Adam said.
“You can do this. We’ll need to work on relaxation techniques.” Phoebe came back around the desk and bent to put her hand on that stiff right fist. “Starting here.”
He turned his head, and his lips were within whisper of her cheek. “See, I n-need you to hold my hand through this c-campaign if I’m going to get through it.”
The idea of Adam needing her was as exciting as the brush of his breath over her cheek. “I…” She met his gaze, and their mouths touched. Clung.
The Last Honest Man Page 10