by Webb, Peggy
Oh, help! Was he ever?
In her haste to get out of his sight, Holly forgot about stepping on his feet. She barely remembered the basket of fruit in her hand.
“No game plan, Mr. Sullivan. I’m merely the Welcome Wagon lady extending you our warmest wishes.” Hot was more like it. Hot, unbridled wishes for things she didn’t have, things she would never have with Mr. Benjamin Sullivan, destroyer of dreams.
“Here,” she said, shoving the basket in his direction. “I brought you some delicious fruit. Enjoy.”
He took not only the basket, but her hand as well. Trapped, with no way out, she stared into eyes as black as a hot tar pit... and just as dangerous.
“Make no mistake.” His voice was soft, silky, and seductive. “I plan to. I plan to enjoy every bit of this to the hilt.”
He released her with such suddenness she almost lost her balance.
As if that weren’t enough, it started to rain. Water soaked through her sweater and drenched her hair. She felt like a soggy mass of dough.
She left him without saying good-bye, left him standing there with a basket of rotten fruit in his hand and a smile on his lips that didn’t bode well, especially for her.
What was he thinking as she walked away?
Don’t be a fool, she told herself. Men like him only thought about women with bleached-blond hair who could eat six doughnuts without gaining an ounce.
As if she needed anything else to go wrong, her shoelaces had worked loose and were dragging in the mud. Trip or tie? That was the question. She opted to bend over and tie the troublesome things.
Some sixth sense made her sneak a peek in the direction of Ben Sullivan, and there he was, bold as brass, making no bones about viewing her from behind—which was a thousand times worse than viewing her upside down.
“Oh, Lord, why did I have that second helping of lasagna last night?” she said.
She gave him a jaunty little wave and a brave smile, then hastened to her car and sat there mortified, a short fat mushroom who longed to be a svelte stalk of celery.
“Shoot,” she said, striking the steering wheel. Even her dreams of being thin involved images of food. In spite of the indignity of being viewed from behind, she cranked her borrowed car and drove off like a real lady.
“At least I’m in a Cadillac,” she said... as if Ben Sullivan would have cared if she had been on a rocket ship full of Twinkles.
Chapter 2
Ben Sullivan stood in the rain watching until the white Cadillac had disappeared down the lane. Then he plucked one of the oranges out of the basket. Its sides caved in, and juice ran over his hand, not the sweet sticky juice of a delicious ripe orange, but the tart-smelling juice of an orange long past its prime.
Suddenly Ben roared with laughter. He laughed so hard, tears ran down his face.
Still laughing, he selected another orange. It was in even worse condition, disintegrating the minute he touched it.
Suddenly Ben became thoughtful. A man in his position had many enemies. Which one of them hated him so much that they would send an impish red-haired dynamo to trample his hand, smear mud all over his shirt, and deliver a basket of overripe oranges?
Maybe there was worse at the bottom of the basket. Cautiously he searched. Nothing there but fruit.
He was being paranoid, of course. Living all those years in D.C. could do that to a man. Dirty deals and dirty politicians. Fast cars and fast women. The only wagons were the paddy wagons, taking in the drunkards, the thieves, and the prostitutes... those that hadn’t found the cushy beds of some high-powered protector.
It was a city that stole a man’s soul. That’s why Ben had left... to see if he still had a soul.
Chance had brought him to Mississippi, chance and a good real-estate agent.
“I’ve got the perfect place for you,” Wayne Fiorelli had told him. “It’s a fixer-upper on the outskirts of a quaint little town off the beaten path, close enough to the Gulf to enjoy the water but far enough off to avoid being trampled by tourists. Sunday Cove. It even has its own legend.”
Some strange little tale about lost love and orange blossoms, if Ben remembered correctly. He wasn’t interested in legends, especially those that had to do with love. But he was interested in the place.
It was exactly what he wanted, not ramshackle but needing enough attention so that he could be as busy as he wanted while turning it into something that was his.
So, get to work, he told himself, instead of standing in the rain like a fool. There were boxes to be unpacked, doors to be properly hinged, front steps to repair... a thousand chores that begged for his attention. He headed to the house to wash up.
His assistant, Hines, was back, standing in the kitchen in his suit and tie, holding two bags of groceries. His eyes swept over Ben, taking in the wet head, the muddy shirt, the hand that was beginning to turn black-and-blue.
“Good grief, sir. What happened to you?”
No matter how many times Ben said that he didn’t want to be addressed as sir, Hines persisted.
“I was born in Virginia, sir,” he would always say, as if that were explanation enough.
A slight dapper man of fifty, Nathan Beauregard Hines was of the old school—hardworking, dedicated, loyal, and respectful toward his elders and toward his employer. He had served as Ben’s man Friday for ten years, and when Ben made the move to Mississippi, Hines had moved too.
“I can help you find suitable employment in D.C.,” Ben had told him. “There are many people here who could use a man of your talent.”
“I wouldn’t dream of letting you go off to the wilderness by yourself, sir.”
“A farm on the Mississippi Gulf Coast is not the wilderness.”
“Anyplace without a convenience store on the corner is the wilderness.”
Hines had never wavered in his opinion, even after discovering that a convenience store was located a mere ten minutes from the farm.
Ben plucked one of the bags from him. “I tangled with the Welcome Wagon lady.”
“The Welcome Wagon lady?”
“The hate wagon lady might be a more appropriate name,” Ben said, grinning. “Man, she had a fire under her tail that wouldn’t quit. A nice tail, too, by the way.”
“And of course you noticed.”
“I’m not dead, am I, Hines?”
“I don’t know, sir. Sometimes I wonder.”
One of Hines’s fondest dreams was to see Ben married with kids.
“You have so much to offer, sir,” Hines said. “A handsome, successful man like you should have a wife and children. It’s a sin.”
Ben had seen sin. Sin was a marriage of mortal combat, like the one his parents had. Sin, D.C. variety, was marriage to one woman and sleeping with six. Sin was fathering children then abandoning them to the care of irresponsible nannies and deadly tutors and careless baby-sitters.
He was a confirmed bachelor by choice. Nothing was going to change that. Still, from time to time Hines tried.
“If this is going to be the short version of your lecture on the joys of marriage, I’ll stay and help unpack groceries. If it’s going to be the long one, I’m leaving.” Hines grunted at Ben’s words. “By the way, I’ll bet you were the only one in the grocery store wearing a suit and tie.”
“Be that as it may, I would look ridiculous in some of those costumes these people call clothes.”
Ben chuckled. Though there was not much for a man of Hines’s considerable organizational and business skills to do on the farm, Ben was glad he had come. Solitude would not have been bad, but loneliness could be brutal.
“Did anything important come in the mail?”
“I wouldn’t know, sir. The postmistress, a Miss Emma Lumpkin, is the befuddled sort. We got two letters belonging to somebody named Hoot Sims and a box of fruit cakes addressed to a Miss Holly Jones.”
“It sounds like an exciting morning, Hines.”
“Oh, you don’t know the half of it, sir. A wom
an from the café across the street bustled in and passed around fresh doughnuts.”
“Did you bring me one?”
“I declined, sir. You never know who your enemies are.”
“Let’s hope we won’t find too many of them lurking in Sunday Cove, Hines. I doubt they could even find their way here.”
“One could hope.”
They set about their business, the only sounds the rattling of paper bags and the slamming of cabinet doors. Suddenly there was a new sound, a loud and raucous braying.
“Did you say something, Hines?”
Hines walked to the window then came back to report. “If I’m not mistaken, there’s a jackass out there in the back forty who requires your attention.”
“I thought I left all of them up in D.C.”
Hines grinned at him. “Sorry to disappoint you, sir.”
“You might want to loosen your tie before you go out there and see what he wants.”
“I daresay he wants feeding. I’m sure you’ll figure it out, sir.”
“If I don’t do any better with him than I did figuring out the tractor, we’re all in for a tough winter.”
“One of the many joys of being a farmer, I hear.”
Ben left Hines in the relative safety and comfort of kitchen and found the donkey’s feed in the barn, right where the former owners had said it would be.
“Piece of cake,” he said, but the donkey would have nothing to do with him or the feed bucket.
Ben had taken over the farm—lock, stock, and barrel. The transfer of ownership had been done so hastily he hadn’t even had time for a crash course in farming. Not that he intended to raise crops, but he did fancy the idea of owning farm animals. There was something extraordinarily peaceful about sitting in a front porch swing and watching cows and sheep graze and donkeys doing whatever donkeys do.
Ben cajoled and begged, but the donkey merely watched him with a jaundiced eye.
“All right. Have it your way.” Ben set the feed bucket inside the open stable door. “If you change your mind, the food is in here.”
Back at the house, Hines had turned his attention to the fruit basket.
“Sir... what do you want me to do with this?” He held the object as if it were a vial of deadly virus.
“Just toss it.” Suddenly Ben remembered the stubborn tilt of a chin, the blue eyes shooting fire. He didn’t even know her name. “Wait.”
He retrieved the brochure from the bottom of the basket. Holy Trinity Church was printed in bold letters across the top, and below was a color photo of the church and grounds, followed by a list of the church personnel, the pastors and staff. Grace, Gladys, Jennifer, Holly, Margaret. Which one was she?
He hadn’t set foot in a church in years, and he wasn’t about to go to church just to find out the name of a woman who had bruised his hand and smeared him with mud.
He was about to toss the brochure into the waste basket when another list caught his eye.
Activities, the heading said. The first thing on the list was a benefit supper. It didn’t list the charity, but that didn’t matter.
“Does the car have plenty of gas?”
“Nearly full. Are you going out, sir?”
“Yes... to a church supper.” His expression dared Hines to comment. “A man has to eat, doesn’t he?”
Chapter 3
Holly saw Ben Sullivan the minute he walked in. Who could miss him? Six feet of gorgeous male. Two yards of pure unadulterated sex appeal. Seventy-two inches of wicked temptation.
“Holly, where do you want me to set this collection box? Holly!”
Loweva was talking to her, but Holly couldn’t have cared less about what she was saying. Ben’s black eyes swept the room as if he were looking for something—or someone. Could she be the one?
Oh, Lordy. She was in costume. Her idea had been to look like a Christmas angel, but Loweva had thrown up her hands when Holly walked in.
“Am I that bad?” Holly said.
“You look like somebody draped you in a bed sheet and threw tinsel at you.”
“I don’t look like an angel?”
“Not so’s you’d notice.”
Would Ben notice? Not if she moved fast. Just as she started toward the kitchen he caught sight of her. There was no mistaking his look of wicked glee.
“Well, shoot,” Holly said.
“If I had a gun, I would,” Loweva drawled. “I smell trouble... and it’s coming from that hunk over by the door. Who is he anyhow?”
The question brought Holly to her senses. How dare he, of all people, show up tonight? If he had come to gloat, he had come to the wrong place.
“Mr. Benjamin G. Sullivan, the Third.” She pronounced each syllable as if she were spitting nails. “New owner of Michael and Jo Ann Snipes’ farm.”
“Well, if that’s not gall, I don’t know what is. What are you going to do about this turn of events, Holly?”
She could think of about a dozen things, all of them totally inappropriate for the fellowship hall of a large and respectable church.
“Hand me that donation box,” she said.
“You’re not fixing to ask him?”
“Watch me.”
“Lordy, Lordy,” Loweva muttered. “All tarnations’s fixing to break loose. And in the church, to boot. If that man’s got a lick of sense, he’ll turn tail and run.”
Bed sheet billowing, Holly bore down on the enemy, an angel of mercy transformed to an angel of vengeance. She figured the costume gave her an advantage. No woman in her right mind would wear such unflattering garb in public. That ought to give Mr. Benjamin Sullivan pause. There was no way to win against a woman with nothing to lose.
“Good evening, Mr. Sullivan.” She gave him a big false smile that showed every one of her teeth. “I see you accepted my land invitation to dinner.”
Mirth lit his face. “You were being kind? I pity the poor soul who feels your ire.”
“Why, thank you, Mr. Sullivan.”
“Don’t thank me. I haven’t done anything.” His black eyes swept over her, pausing at the folds of white over her chest and lingering at the tinsel halo, rakishly askew on her flaming red hair.
“Yet,” he added.
Tightening her hold on the pasteboard box, Holly tried to work herself back into a righteous frenzy. With Ben Sullivan so close, all she succeeded in doing was working herself into a sweat.
“No, but you’re going to,” she said, a cat hiding her sharp teeth and claws behind a soft purr.
“It will be my pleasure...” he said, “and yours.”
Lord, men like him ought to be declared armed and dangerous. They ought to be banned from the company of women, especially redheaded angels.
The wicked smile she gave him would have been warning enough for the people who knew her. Unfortunately for him, he didn’t know her. And she would see to it that he never did.
“Oh, but you’re wrong,” she said. “The pleasure will be all mine.”
“As intriguing as it is to pursue this philosophical discussion on the nature of pleasure”—he paused—”let’s get down to basics first.”
Holly felt hot all over. Ben Sullivan had a way of making the most mundane conversations seem racy and exciting. She had a sudden vision of the two of them getting down to basics—male and female, alone in the garden without even a fig leaf. Her lust and bad judgment were bound to show. She figured she was giving angels everywhere a bad reputation.
Furthermore, she noticed with alarm that she was losing some of her steam. If she didn’t get this over with soon, Loweva was going to have to mop her off the floor.
What was the daring Mr. Sullivan going to say next? Surely something entirely too wicked for the ears of the, Hoot and Clara Sims, standing in the buffet line waiting for a big chunk of roast beef. They were listening too, especially Clara. Holly could tell by the angle of their heads and the way their own conversation hushed when she or Ben spoke. That was the downside of being a part of
a small community: Everybody made Holly’s business their own. Usually the motive was not malicious. The good people of her church merely wanted to make sure she was coming to no harm.
Holly decided to move her discussion with Ben into the safety of the empty hallway.
Ben looked pointedly at the hand she put on his arm.
“What’s the weapon this time?” he said. “Mustard? Catsup?”
“Why, Mr. Sullivan. How you do misinterpret my motives.”
“I was going to ask your name, but I see I’m in the company of none other than Scarlett O’Hara, femme fatale of the Old South.”
He didn’t need any urging to follow her into the hallway. Two fluorescent bulbs in the overhead fixture had gone bad. Their dim flickering seemed exactly right for diabolical deeds... or stolen kisses.
Holly fanned her hot face with her free hand.
“I didn’t tell you my name?” she cooed. “Forgive my lack of manners.” She had no intention of telling her name. After tonight, he would never have occasion to use it.
A fierce and deadly calm came over him. Although he didn’t move, Holly had the sensation of smothering, as if he had stepped close enough to pin her to the wall.
“What’s your game?” he said. “Or is it merely that you want to be kissed?”
His arm snaked out so fast, she didn’t have time to move. At least that’s what she told herself while she still had an ounce of rational thought. Ben Sullivan backed her into the wall, his body so close to hers that she was aware of nothing but texture and sensation—rough tweed jacket and crisp wool pants; chest, wide and solid; legs, long and hard. Inch by inch his mouth came closer, so close his hot breath nearly melted her lipstick.
She went weak-kneed and shaky. As if her capitulation weren’t bad enough, she was on the verge of making a total fool of herself by moaning.
Ben saved her the humiliation by releasing her so abruptly she almost lost her balance.
“You do want to be kissed.”
“I do not, you arrogant back end of a mule! Especially by the likes of you.”
He leaned casually against the drink box. If she hadn’t seen his eyes, she might have been fooled into thinking he was relaxed. They were as flat and flinty as a coiled snake’s.