by Unknown
For a moment, she seemed to consider his offer, but just as quickly, a flickering change in her expression signaled she was about to turn him down.
“I’ll even sweeten the pot by paying you outright for your time,” he rushed to add, feeling almost desperate now. “Say, a hundred bucks?”
“A hundred bucks?” she retorted. “Hardly worth it. I’d much rather see you crash and burn.”
She tugged her arm free and took another step toward the booth where her friends’ drinks had just been delivered.
“All right, then,” he called after her, raising his voice enough to be heard over both the music from the jukebox and the distance she’d put between them. “How about a thousand?”
Row 4
All the way home from her knitting group, Charlotte Langan’s mind raced. She kept thinking about every look and every word that had been exchanged between Ronnie and that nice boy, Dylan Stone.
They purported to be mortal enemies—or at least that’s what Ronnie would have people believe. But Charlotte had been around for a lot of years and had seen a lot of things.
Her hair might be gray . . . not that anyone would know her natural red had long ago faded away, thanks to Nice ’n Easy Morning Sunrise Number 86 . . . her eyesight might be waning, and her hearing might not be what it used to be, but she could still spot sparks when they shot ten feet into the air over her head.
Ronnie and Dylan might claim to hate each other, but Charlotte suspected there was more to the situation than that.
Oh, yes, there was something there. She just had to find a way to bring it out . . . and to get two people who were possibly the most stubborn and obstinate in the world to stop fighting long enough to realize that all the bitterness and vitriol they were busy tossing back and forth was really just an overabundance of pent-up desire.
Easier said than done, of course. It wasn’t as if two young people like Ronnie and Dylan were going to listen to an old woman they probably thought was half senile already. They may love her and think of her as an aunt or mother figure, but that didn’t mean they were going to let her give them advice about their love lives. And, frankly, she was afraid that if she so much as hinted to Ronnie that her feelings for Dylan could be more intimate than she realized, Ronnie’s head might just explode.
There had to be some other way, then. Something subtle and sneaky.
A smile curved the pink of Charlotte’s heavily lipsticked mouth as she put on her turn signal to turn into her driveway, even though the long dirt road she was currently on was rarely traveled by anyone but herself, and there were no other cars behind her.
Sneaky could be good, she thought, cutting the engine and stuffing her keys into her purse as she got out and headed for the front door of her small white farmhouse. Sneaky was possibly her very favorite thing.
The house, along with several acres of land, had been in the Langan family for years. It was only five years ago that Charlotte had decided to have the barns rebuilt and turn what used to be a small horse-and-cattle spread into an alpaca farm.
The little critters could spit and kick like the dickens when they got their dander up, but the rest of the time they were downright adorable. They had also provided her with enough fiber to maintain a tidy income.
Most of the time, she cared for the small herd herself. It was nothing she couldn’t handle, and when she did need help with heavy lifting or more difficult aspects of the job—especially once a year at shearing time—she simply hired a few extra folks to come in.
The annual shearing left her with enough fleece to keep her busy, that was for sure. She cleaned, dyed, and spun the fiber herself into soft, wonderful yarns. From there, she both sold a good portion of the yarn and kept some of it for herself. What she kept, she used to knit any number of beautiful items to sell at the booth she kept at the local, year-round craft and antiques mall.
Most people didn’t realize that alpaca fur was five times warmer than wool and five times finer than cashmere . . . but once they discovered those facts for themselves, they often became addicted to the feel of alpaca sweaters and scarves against their skin.
Stepping inside the house, she flipped off the porch light and locked the door behind her. It probably wasn’t necessary, living out here on the rural outskirts of the city with her nearest neighbor a mile away, but being an elderly woman who lived alone, she was taking no chances.
She hung her purse on a hook beside the door and covered it with her jacket before strolling into the kitchen. Filling her chicken-shaped teapot with water, she set it on the stove to heat, then made her way upstairs to change into a long floral nightgown.
Padding back downstairs in her robe and slippers, she poured hot water over an orange spice tea bag and let it steep, unconsciously tugging up and down on the thin string while she gazed out the window above the sink. Everything was dark, only a thin sliver of moon making the outbuildings beyond visible. The alpacas were fed, watered, and taken care of for the night, and all Charlotte had to occupy her mind was Miss Prickly Pear and Mr. Cute as a Bug in a Rug.
She hoped Dylan would attend their knitting group again. Maybe then she could find a way to force the two of them to spend even more time together. But the next meeting was a week away, and that seemed somehow too long to wait.
Her drawn-on dark brown brows crossed as she removed the tea bag from the cup and set it aside. Carrying the steaming mug into the living room, she took a seat in her favorite armchair and propped her feet on the matching ottoman.
She’d never played at matchmaking before, and had to admit she was at a loss. If only there was some way to throw Ronnie and Dylan together, some situation that could be created to force them to recognize the attraction zinging between them.
Sipping her tea, she stared at the spinning wheel off to one side of the room and considered working a bit before going to bed. She was tired, and normally turned in after a nice, relaxing cup of herbal tea, but spinning often helped her to think, and that’s exactly what she needed to do tonight.
Though she enjoyed each part of the process of raising alpacas and preparing their fur, including selling her wares, the actual spinning was one of her greatest pleasures. It was an art, really—not to mention extremely soothing—and she was very good at it.
She supposed one could even say spinning was in her blood, a skill passed down from generation to generation in her family. Her mother had taught Charlotte to both spin and knit, as her mother had taught her, and so on and so on through the years.
There was even—
Charlotte sat up straighter, knuckles going white on the handle of her mug as tea sloshed dangerously close to spilling over.
There was even an old spinning wheel that had been passed down through the family, said to be enchanted and to bring true love to those who used the yarn it created.
Good Lord, how could she have forgotten? It was perfect!
Abandoning her cup on the small table beside the chair, she pushed to her feet and hurried up the stairs to the second floor. The door to the attic was located in one of the guest rooms, and she hurried inside and up the steep, unfinished steps. A single bare lightbulb hung in the center of the attic, not terribly bright, but illuminating enough that Charlotte could make out the shapes of boxes and trunks littering the floor.
In the far corner, beneath a white sheet turned gray with age and covered in a fine layer of dust, was exactly what she was looking for. Slippers shuffling as she crossed the coarse plank floor, she carefully pulled back the sheet.
Charlotte stared in awe at the beautiful, carved wood spinning wheel. It was probably hundreds of years old and needed a good polishing, but otherwise looked to be in perfect condition. She ran her hand over the top of the wheel and was delighted to feel it move smoothly, see the foot pedal bob slowly up and down. Not a single squeak, and if that wasn’t enchantment after being stored away for so many years, she didn’t know what was.
She hadn’t seen the wheel in ages, had
never used it. She’d almost completely forgotten that it was in the attic at all.
Her only clear memories of the wheel were seeing her grandmother use it once, seeing it a time or two in this very house as she was growing up, and hearing the stories of its powers to create luxurious yarns that brought true love.
It took some doing, but Charlotte managed to pick up the ancient spinning wheel and carry it down the narrow attic steps. Rather than taking it downstairs to join her other wheel in the living room, where she normally did her spinning, she put this one in her bedroom.
She didn’t get many visitors, but just in case, she didn’t want this wheel to be out in the open, where someone might see it. And since what she was planning to do was a bit odd, perhaps a bit fanciful, she preferred to keep the activity a secret.
Once the wheel was situated where she wanted it, Charlotte stood back and wiped the back of one hand across her damp brow. There was no guarantee this would actually work, but according to her mother and grandmother both . . . and probably her great-grandmother and great-great grandmother before them . . . the yarn created by this spinning wheel had never failed to bring two lovers together, star-crossed or otherwise.
Of course, the wheel had probably never come up against two people as mulish, pigheaded, and determined to avoid emotional entanglement as Ronnie Chasen and Dylan Stone, but she had faith. She believed in the power and enchantment of the spinning wheel.
And if all else failed, at least they’d have a nice knitted something-or-other to show for her efforts.
Row 5
A thousand dollars.
A thousand dollars.
A thousand dollars.
Maybe if she kept saying it to herself, over and over, she would eventually stop feeling like a pathetic, weak-willed sellout.
She didn’t particularly care about winning another one of Dylan’s trophies. She had the Harrison already, which was the best of the best and the one he valued most.
Plus, in order to take possession of a second award from his collection, she would have to help him enough to ensure that he actually did learn to knit and would most likely win the challenge, and that was just not gonna happen. Not if she had anything to say about it.
But the money . . .
A thousand dollars was a lot of dough, and God knew she could use it. It would make a nice addition to her savings, to the cushion she liked to keep between herself and the poverty line.
But why, oh, why did the windfall have to come from The Jackass?
She should have walked away. She had, actually, just not very far.
Over the loud music thrumming through The Penalty Box, he’d called out that ridiculous figure, but she’d just kept going, returning to the booth where her friends—and drinks—were waiting. She’d sat down, sipped her Cosmo, and carried on a perfectly normal conversation for the next hour or so.
And then, as she’d passed his table on her way out, she’d stopped, leaned close to his ear, and given him an answer to his generous—and, she was beginning to suspect, evil—offer.
“Okay,” she’d whispered so that no one else would overhear her shame. “We’ll start next week, after knitting group.”
She hadn’t waited for a response. Had actually dashed out of the bar as fast as her Dolce & Gabbana knockoff platform wedges could carry her. Because she didn’t want to see his reaction, didn’t want to see him gloat or hear his loud guffaws as he shared the details of her humiliating capitulation with his friends.
Now she was simply waiting for the moment he would walk into The Yarn Barn, into her circle of friends who were all busy knitting their little hearts out, and announce that she’d caved to cash bribery like a house of cards.
Cursing under her breath as she lost another stitch on the sleeve of the sweater she was knitting, Ronnie checked her watch for the fifth or sixth time in less than an hour. Only ten minutes left before the meeting would end, which meant that Dylan was either running extremely late or he’d decided not to take her up on the tutoring sessions, after all.
A part of her was relieved. She didn’t want to help him, so she would be just as happy if he changed his mind and went off to fail this particular challenge on his own.
She would miss that thousand dollars, though. It wasn’t even in her bank account yet, but she’d already imagined it there, happily increasing the amount of her balance.
When the meeting broke up, for the first time in as long as she could remember, Ronnie begged off going for drinks at The Penalty Box. Grace and Jenna both looked at her like she’d gone berserk, but she merely shook her head and promised to talk to them later.
Tucking the lapels of her leopard-print raincoat tighter around her throat, she prepared to step off the sidewalk and head for her car, but Charlotte’s voice stopped her.
“Ronnie, dear,” the older woman called, still standing in front of the craft store doors.
Ronnie forced a smile she didn’t quite feel and turned back around. “Hey, Charlotte. Are you going over to The Penalty Box with the girls?”
“Oh, no,” she said with a deep chuckle. “One glass of wine a week is my limit, and I like to drink that on Friday evening while watching my programs.”
Ronnie smiled indulgently while Charlotte dug around in her tote.
“I spun this just for you,” Charlotte said, handing her a soft, thick skein of black yarn. “I hope you’ll use it.”
“Of course I will.” Ronnie smiled and gave Charlotte a tight hug. “You know your yarns are my very favorite to work with. Thank you.”
Charlotte’s smile was wide and pleased. “I’m glad to hear it. Maybe you can even use it to help that Dylan fellow learn to knit.”
Ronnie pulled back, studying Charlotte’s face. Was she blushing? And why wouldn’t the woman look her in the eye?
“I’m not sure that’s going to happen,” she said slowly, “but thank you all the same. I really will put this to good use.”
Tucking the yarn into her brightly checkered bag, she started toward the curb again. “Drive carefully, Charlotte. I’ll see you next week.”
It wasn’t unusual for Charlotte to give skeins of her homemade yarn to the ladies in the knitting group. Usually, though, she brought enough for everyone and handed them out during their meetings. And she’d never before handed one to Ronnie with such an odd expression on her face.
Maybe it was the weather, or the time of night, or even the amount of pressure Ronnie felt pressing down on her from every direction these days that had her forming conspiracy theories about a dear old woman who was only being nice. She was tired and annoyed and reading too much into the situation.
But when she drove past The Yarn Barn on her way out of the parking lot and found Charlotte standing exactly where she’d left her in front of the double glass doors, her suspicions sprang to life all over again.
Honestly, what was with people these days? Charlotte acting strangely, her archnemesis asking her to help him . . . As she drove home, she let herself remember and long for the days when those around her acted normal and didn’t intentionally try to drive her into the wacko ward of the nearest mental health facility.
Though she probably could have afforded better, she lived in a modest downtown apartment complex overlooking Lake Erie. The wind blew a bit stronger and colder this close to the lake, but then all of Cleveland was positively frigid during the winter months, so she couldn’t see that it mattered much one way or the other.
She let herself into the building, then took the elevator up to the third floor and walked down the short hall to her apartment door. Inside, she shrugged out of her coat, kicked off her shoes, and unzipped her skirt on the way to her bedroom.
Stripping out of her work clothes, she padded naked into the bathroom to remove her makeup, wash her face, and take a nice hot shower. With her hair still wet and falling loose around her shoulders, she put on a pair of cotton lounge pants and matching top, then made her way back to the living room.
&
nbsp; She set up her laptop on the low coffee table before running to the kitchen for a glass of water. Drink in hand, she returned to her computer and sat cross-legged on the floor with her back to the sofa to work on her latest column.
It should have been written already. Would have been, except that she’d been putting it off. She couldn’t seem to land on a decent topic and had been distracted by Dylan’s latest proposition.
Her brows knit as she admitted the last, hating that he had any effect on her at all, especially if it meant muddling her brain when it came to her job.
In the past, she’d covered issues ranging from those as serious as safe sex and self-defense for women to those as inconsequential as nail polish brand comparisons and popular cocktail recipes.
This week, she was torn between writing about how to get rid of a guy you weren’t interested in—but who always seemed to be around, becoming a complete pain in the ass—or warning readers about a popular downtown eatery that was rumored to be bribing health inspectors to stay in business. The idea of venting her frustrations with The Jackass was tempting, but honor—and a fair share of potential guilt—dictated that she alert the citizens of Cleveland that there might be rat droppings in their sandwiches or roaches in their salads.
Reaching for the remote control, Ronnie flipped through channels until she found something with decent background music, then started tapping away. Since everything she’d heard about the restaurant in question was merely rumor and speculation, she didn’t mention it by name, but she gave enough hints that she thought anyone who was familiar with the businesses downtown would put two and two together and choose to dine elsewhere in the future.
Her fingers danced across the keyboard as she hit her stride and was typing out words almost faster than she could read them. She no longer heard the noise of the television, wouldn’t have known if she was in the middle of her living room or Grand Central Station. It was The Zone, one of her favorite places to be.