Scrimmage Gone South (Crimson Romance)

by Pace, Alicia Hunter

  “Seems like we should be doing something to help Missy,” Nathan said.

  “Believe me, we have all tried,” Tolly said. “She wouldn’t even let me make the Chex mix. I think she was afraid I’d buy it and transfer it to a bowl.”

  “You would have.” Nathan smiled and smoothed her hair.

  “Maybe. Probably. I guess since Thanksgiving got out of her control, she was not taking any chances with this party.”

  The sentiment among the Lees, Braggs, and Harrises had been that it would be better to have Thanksgiving in Merritt than for Missy to travel in her condition, but that she could not be allowed to do the work. So they had arrived with turkeys and casseroles, while Missy’s own mother and grandmother had been in charge of the cornbread dressing, congealed salads, and desserts.

  “I thought she was going have apoplexy when they put the Pyrex dishes right on the table and brought out the paper napkins and plates.”

  Nathan cupped her cheek and gave her that sweet misty look. “It was my best Thanksgiving ever.”

  Tolly felt her face flush with pleasure. Settling into where forever was going to be a happy place was still taking some getting used to.

  “Ah!” Nathan ran his finger over her cheek. “There’s that pretty little blush.”

  Tolly held her hand up and admired the ring on her left hand. It was so perfect, so her — small sapphires and diamonds in an antique gold setting. It was unassuming but of exquisite workmanship. Nathan had worried that it didn’t look like a typical engagement ring but he had not worried that it wasn’t flashy like Missy’s and Lanie’s rings. He knew her.

  “I love this ring,” she said, not for the first time in the four days since she’d had it. They had not settled on an exact wedding date yet, but it would be some time next summer before football season started for Nathan and Kirby. Her wedding, like the rest of her life, would have to be arranged around football. And that was fine with her — more than fine.

  “You should see the ring I wanted to buy you thirteen years ago,” Nathan said.

  “Oh?”

  “It was a little — ” He searched for a word.

  “Flamboyant? Gaudy?”

  “Like I thought our lives would be.”

  “I like our lives,” Tolly said. “And I like this ring. And you.”

  Nathan was about to close in for a kiss when hurricane Missy blew through. She was wearing a number twelve Alabama football jersey with BRAGG lettered across the back. Like the jersey Tolly wore, it had seen real playing time. Tolly ran her finger over the tear at the neck from a holding penalty that had never been called.

  Missy placed on the table a stack of crimson cloth napkins with Roll Tide embroidered on the corner. “What are y’all doing in here alone? Can I get you another drink? Tolly, I love them. I do, but I was so glad when your mother, grandmother, and aunt left this morning!”

  And she was gone.

  “It was really great of your family to take Kirby to the game with them,” Nathan said.

  “They were excited about his scholarship offer from Alabama. They’re hoping he’ll take it.”

  “Bribery?” Nathan said. But Tolly knew Nathan was hoping Kirby would choose his alma mater too.

  “I think they just want to show him a good time and, if he gets a good feeling about the campus, well — ”

  “You know, when they left, your grandmother was in the SUV with your parents and your grandfather and Kirby were in the Jaguar. And Kirby was behind the wheel.”

  “What? Nobody asked me! I don’t want Kirby driving in that game day traffic!”

  But her eyes filled with happy tears. Papa had bought that sports car in 1974 and it was his baby. He’d polished, tuned, and kept it in mint condition all these years. And he’d never let anyone drive it until Harris — and later Tolly — had learned to drive. When her mother and aunt had occasionally complained good-naturedly that they had never been allowed to drive the car, Papa had always laughed and said grandchildren were the only ones special enough to drive his car.

  “Hey.” Nathan gave her a worried look and laid a finger next to her eye. “I think Kirby will do fine. No crying. You’ve cried enough.”

  She laughed. “I’m a crier, Nathan.”

  “I noticed. Give me your grandfather’s cell number and I’ll call him and tell him not to let Kirby drive back. I’m not scared of them like Missy is.”

  “Sure about that?” she asked.

  “No,” he admitted. “Thanks for not telling them when we first met.”

  “Believe me, I would be the one in trouble. They might ground me and take my phone, even now.”

  “We’ll tell them,” Nathan said. “Eventually. Maybe at our youngest child’s wedding.”

  “Sounds like soon enough to me.” She presented her face for his kiss.

  Truth was, though her family was a force to be reckoned with, they loved Nathan and Kirby. Her mother would be a mother to Nathan, just as her grandfather would be a great-grandfather to Kirby. She didn’t need to tell Nathan that. Time would show him.

  Nathan got that I’m going to kiss you really good look just as Missy came barreling in.

  “Knock it off, Cupid and Psyche. You’d better get some food if you want it. Almost time for kickoff.” Lanie and Lucy were behind her, nachos and drinks in hand. Missy adjusted the volume on the television and they settled in.

  Harris stuck his head in the door. “Hey, Nathan, don’t you want to come watch on a decent TV?”

  He tightened his arms around Tolly. “I think I like it right where I am.”

  “Yeah, I’ve been there,” Harris said. “You’ll get over it.”

  “Hey!” Missy said. “Mess with me and I’ll have this baby during this game. I’m willful. You know I can do it.”

  Harris sent her an air kiss and a wink.

  Phillip Pearce, off from Heavenly Confections today, wandered in. His eyes settled on the remaining vacant chair in the room.

  “Looks like the best seat in the house.” He flashed his charming smile around.

  “And it’s yours,” Missy said enthusiastically. She particularly liked Phillip, probably because he had committed to memory her Iron Bowl party rules. You didn’t have to tell him twice.

  “Yes, do come in,” Lucy said. “Missy is always afraid someone she doesn’t like will try to sit with us.”

  Missy shrugged. “There are televisions all over this house. Harris even hooked up one on the back porch. No reason for chatty people to be in here.”

  Phillip wandered over to the window and looked out. “Uh oh.” He turned to look at them. “Do you suppose there are actually people out selling burial insurance today?”

  “Why?” Missy asked.

  Phillip looked out the window again. “Because it’s eight minutes ‘til kickoff and a guy is coming up the sidewalk. And he is not wearing his colors. So I figure it a burial insurance salesman. No one invited to Missy’s Iron Bowl party would dare show up this close to kickoff.”

  Missy was sitting forward, frozen. She had a nacho halfway to her mouth. “I wait all year for this,” she said.

  And the doorbell rang.

  Missy set her nachos on the coffee table in front of her, and, with Nathan’s help, awkwardly struggled to her feet. She walked to the door like an inmate headed to the lethal injection room. They all knew better than to offer to get the door. It was Missy’s house and she would greet her guest — no matter how many rules he’d broken.

  Lanie looked out the window and laughed. “It’s the only person in the universe who could arrive this close to kickoff without wearing his team colors and live to tell it.”

  “Who?” Lucy asked, her eyes wide.

  Just then Missy opened the door and squealed like a third grader on Christmas mo
rning. “Brantley! You said you weren’t coming home!”

  “Really?” Lucy was on her feet talking into her cell phone. “That’s wonderful! I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  She turned to the room. “I have to go. Right now. I got a call from an antique shop in New Orleans. They have a silver tea service that might be just the one I’ve been looking for. It’s for Sophie Ann McGowan. But I have to go. Now. Tell Missy.”

  What? “But, Lucy!” Tolly said. “I thought you went to Mobile for that a few weeks ago.”

  “Didn’t work out. No chocolate pot. And it turned out to be plate, not sterling. Sophie Ann was very specific.”

  “Sophie Ann always is,” Lanie said but Lucy was already gone.

  “Are there always this many teapot emergencies around here?” Nathan asked. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think Lucy was avoiding Brantley.”

  Of course that was ridiculous. Why would she? Tolly was about to express this when a voice said from the TV, “And Alabama has elected to receive!”

  All eyes in the room settled on the television — or almost all eyes. Tolly looked at Nathan as he leaned forward and intently studied the screen. So beautiful, and he was hers.

  She would kiss him, make love to him, and make sure his clothes were ironed. She could curl up under a blanket and watch a movie with him at the end of a good day and rub his back and bring him his favorite ice cream on a bad day. She would make sure he had birthday cakes and a Christmas stocking with his name spelled out in sequins. She would hang that stocking beside her own and Kirby’s and fill it with candy and silly little wrapped gifts — just as he had filled her with everything she’d ever wanted.

  The room erupted in a cheer. Something good had happened.

  “Did you see that?” Nathan grinned at her.

  She didn’t answer. She just smiled, settled in under his arm, and turned to watch the game.

  About the Authors

  Before they began writing as Alicia Hunter Pace, Stephanie Jones and Jean Hovey were friends — not just friends, but the finish-each-other’s-sentences-and-swap-shoes-on-the-sidewalk kind of friends.

  They had no idea their writing styles would be so different but, upon reflection, they could have looked at their travel styles for a clue. Jean once got off a plane in London with eight dollars, an ATM card, no reservations of any kind, and a vague idea that she wanted to go to the Victoria and Albert museum. When Stephanie travels, she arrives with a detailed concrete plan written in a notebook that she carries in a coordinating tote bag that matches her calendar and her shoes.

  There’s something to be said for both philosophies. Traveling by the seat of one’s pants — whether in a foreign country or on the printed page — can lead to adventures never recorded in a guide book, but it seems to work out better if there is a plotter along with her hand on the rudder.

  Writing with a partner — most people wouldn’t do it; most people shouldn’t do it. It could easily lead to hair pulling, lawsuits, and funeral food.

  But it works for them.

  Stephanie lives in Jasper, AL, where she teaches third grade and wishes for a bigger bookstore. She is a native Alabamian who likes football, civil war history, and people who follow the rules. She is happy to provide a list of said rules to anyone who needs them.

  Jean, a former public librarian, lives in Decatur, AL, with her husband in a hundred-year-old house that always wants something from her. She likes to cook but has discovered the joy of Mrs. Paul’s fish fillets since becoming a writer.

  Stephanie and Jean are both active members of the fabulous Heart of Dixie Chapter of Romantic Writers of America.

  Scrimmage Gone South is the second book in their Gone South series.

  For Luke and Lanie’s story, check out Sweet Gone South.

  Visit them at their website, http://aliciahunterpace.com/

  More From This Author

  (From Sweet Gone South)

  The smell of cooking fudge is only sweet if the candy maker isn’t dead tired and sick of the smell of chocolate. Lanie Heaven wearily crossed the floor of the Heavenly Confections kitchen to check the temperature of the vat of dark brown bubbling syrup. Almost there. She looked at her watch. 6:20 P.M. No time to make truffles, but she could do it when she returned home. There was just enough time to pour up the fudge and pack some candy to take to book club.

  There was a knock at the front door. Damn. Why hadn’t she turned off the lights at five o’clock when she’d locked the shop door? Not that it would have mattered. The people of Merritt, Alabama knew she was in here and had no compunction about pounding on the door — or trotting around back and ringing her apartment bell, for that matter. With her luck, it would be Sophie Ann McGowan, who would want a single chocolate star and then complain that it wasn’t as creamy as the ones Lanie’s grandmother used to make. Sophie Ann wouldn’t go away but she could wait; the fudge could not.

  Lanie grabbed the copper pot and headed toward the marble candy table. The throbbing fatigue between her shoulder blades turned to a sharp pain and Lanie shifted the pot. The knocking resumed and escalated to banging. Lanie jumped and the pot began to tip. She jerked it back but not soon enough. Pools, rivers, oceans, of thick chocolate spread at her feet and beyond. Self-preservation made her jump back to avoid being burned.

  She would have cursed if she had known a word bad enough to equal the situation. And that was saying a lot because she knew some pretty bad words. Money, time, and energy gone because she’d let herself be distracted. Another person might have gone into a cleaning frenzy, grabbing towels and mopping up chocolate but Lanie knew better. It was best to let it harden, and then scrape it up and steam clean the floor. It would be hours before the molten liquid would be cool enough to come up easily in chunks so there was no need to even miss book club — not that they got around to discussing books very often. She sometimes wondered why they didn’t just go ahead and call it Drinking, Eating, and Gossiping Club. But either way, she was ready for an evening of good wine, good food, and good gossip with her three best friends.

  The banging at the front door increased to pounding. Sophie Ann must be having a real chocolate emergency. Maybe she’d like to eat off the floor like a starving dog. Lanie wiped her hands on her splattered apron and hurried from the calamity of the kitchen to the cheerful little storefront. She looked out the door and, again, would have cursed if there had been an adequate word in her bad girl vocabulary.

  Not Sophie Ann. Luke Avery. And that was worse, a million times worse. She’d met Luke at a party right after he’d moved to Merritt from Mobile last fall. He’d bitten into one of the peanut butter filled chocolates she’d brought and ended up on the floor with an EpiPen stuck in his thigh. Intellectually, she knew it wasn’t her fault. Yet every time she saw him, she couldn’t stop herself from sheepishly apologizing again — and it clearly annoyed him. Well, she wouldn’t do it tonight. She unlocked the door and jerked it open with more vehemence than she knew she had.

  “I don’t have any espresso made,” she said, “and the machines are clean and ready for the morning.” Seven in the morning was usually Luke’s favorite time to pound on the door and make demands, though she didn’t open until nine.

  He looked her up and down and frowned disdainfully. Luke was a no nonsense kind of man and she suspected he didn’t appropriately appreciate her work clothes. Today her chef’s pants and matching apron were black, printed with multicolored jellybeans. The black chef’s clogs were ugly but they just made sense for anyone who had to stand on a concrete floor. What was she supposed to wear? Stilettos?

  “I don’t want any espresso,” he said, like he was surprised, though she couldn’t fathom why. He never bought anything else. He was probably afraid there were peanuts lurking in all the candy. “I want to talk to you for a minute.”

  “I have just a minute. I’m
on my way to book club.” She stepped aside and allowed him to enter.

  Luke Avery’s eyes preceded him into the room — big heartbreak eyes the color of Windex, accented by dark circles and black lashes that Lanie couldn’t have achieved with an extension job and a triple dose of mascara. Those eyes hadn’t been built for sadness but they had learned it well. His mouth looked sad too and it was a shame — full lips like his ought to be smiling. Even his high cheekbones and the smooth pronounced plains of his face looked sad, probably because he could use ten pounds. A good cut had coaxed his dark thick hair into smooth neat layers but it looked like it would curl when it was wet. His hair might be the only thing about him that wasn’t sad.

  “What can I do for you, Luke?” Lanie crossed her arms and leaned on the wall.

  “I suppose you’ve heard the governor appointed me to Judge Gilliam’s seat.”

  Of course, she’d heard it. This was Merritt; everybody had heard. At thirty-two, he was now the youngest circuit judge in the state. After Judge Coleman Gilliam had dropped dead on the golf course, everyone had said Luke got the appointment because his father, the state senator, was tight with the governor and because people felt sorry for him at being a widower with such a young child.

  “Congratulations,” Lanie said. “Are you here to alert me to start calling you Judge Avery?”

  “Of course not!”

  “Don’t look so offended. I was joking. Sort of.”

  “I’m not offended.” He closed his eyes and opened them again, as if he was signaling that he was closing one subject and moving on to the next. “I’ve been living with my parents on their farm right outside town.”

  “I know. I drove you there that time I nearly killed you. Remember?”