The Foster Girls

by Lin Stepp

  “If you’ll rinse up the dishes,” she said, starting out of the room. “I’ll go and put some shoes on.”

  Yep, Scott thought. Dr. Delaney was used to setting the tone and having control. He’d indulge her for now, but it would be fun to turn the tables on her later on to see how she liked having someone else strong around her. He wasn’t one of her little students, and he had no intention of staying in his place.

  Chapter 6

  Vivian walked down the hallway and around the corner into the big downstairs bedroom she’d claimed as her own. Then she sat down on the bed and let out a big sigh.

  “What in the world have you gotten yourself into, Vivian Delaney?” she asked herself. “Starting a relationship is not anything you can afford in your life right now. And neither is getting too close to anyone. Besides, you know that never works out, no matter how many goose bumps someone gives you.”

  She pulled her shoes out from under the edge of the bed and started putting them on. Frankly, even if she hadn’t needed to put her shoes on, she’d have sought an excuse to get away from Scott Jamison’s company for a few minutes.

  “First he comes over here and scares the liver out of me with that gun,” she said to herself. “Then he waltzes into my kitchen, nearly scaring me to death again. And then he gets me up against the kitchen counter and kisses me before I have time to figure out what he is doing.” She blew out a long breath again.

  “And I let him.” She shook her head in disbelief. “In fact I almost encouraged him. I don’t know what came over me. It was like something short-circuited my reason.”

  She still remembered with wonder the intensive feeling that had rushed over her with that kiss. When she’d fled the room to get dressed she’d thrown cold water on her face just to get herself back together. You’d think she was a little teenager again with her first boyfriend from the way she was acting. Vivian shook her head firmly to clear her thoughts.

  “Scott Jamison may have a nice boyish charm about him, but there is a sensual danger about him,” she told herself. “Undoubtedly, he’s a big ladies man. Which makes me wonder why he’s bothering with me. Usually his type stays away from the smart girls and finds some silly little blond with big boobs to run after.”

  She shrugged. “I’m just going to have to be careful. There’s a lot at stake while I’m here. And I have a lot of work to do. I don’t have time to give Mr. Scott Jamison a diversion.”

  Vivian squared her shoulders then, and went into the bathroom to brush her teeth before going back to the kitchen.

  Scott had washed up the dishes and was sitting with a cup of coffee in the dining room looking out the window when she returned.

  “That dogwood out there is going to be a mass of blooms this time next month.” He pointed out the window. “It has a lot of buds already. I think this is going to be a banner year for the dogwoods and redbuds.”

  She glanced out at the tree, loaded with buds now, that stood beside a concrete birdbath. “You like nature?”

  “I love it, and I love to be out of doors.” He smiled at her. “I don’t think you could run a camp successfully if you didn’t, do you?”

  “Probably not,” she responded guardedly, reluctant to share too many of her personal thoughts with Scott. She needed to keep her distance. “But I guess it would help if you also liked kids and enjoyed working with them.”

  “Fortunately, I love kids.” He gave her an impish look. “And I was an Eagle Scout and a Scout leader. Were you a Girl Scout, Vivian Delaney?”

  “No, Mr. Jamison, but I was an avid Campfire Girl. That’s about the same thing in California where I come from.” She looked at him consideringly. He was trying so hard to be polite and charming, and she was being almost rude and abrasive in her efforts to stay aloof. She shook herself mentally. There was no need to get carried away, she told herself judgmentally. She could be nice, too.

  “I do love the outdoors, too, Scott,” she admitted then, offering him a smile. “And like you, I went to one sort of camp or another about every summer after I was ten.”

  “And what about kids?” He sent her an easy smile. “Do you like kids, Vivian?”

  “I don’t know very much about kids. My work is with college students, and I was an only child.”

  He got up, put his coffee cup in the sink, and started leading the way out the kitchen door for their tour.

  “Does that mean you’re going to tell me all about your life now?” he asked teasingly, as he started down the back porch stairs.

  Vivian shot him a cool glance. “I might at some time, but now I think you should tell me what I need to know about the farm.”

  Unruffled, he shrugged. “This was supposed to be my mother’s, the realtor’s, job, showing you around the place here.”

  “It still can be,” she told him matter-of-factly. ‘I have her phone number. I did ask if you had time for this.”

  “Don’t get prickly, Vivian.” He raised one brow. “I was just kidding around. I’m pleased to show you around. I love this place.”

  Scott started to walk through the yard behind the house toward an old barn Vivian could see beyond a stand of trees. He talked as he walked, and Vivian followed, listening to his verbal tour.

  “This farm originally had a lot more acreage than it does now.” He spread his arm in a wide gesture as they started up the farm road. “The Jamison farm, which is what most people call the farm here, is only about an acre across and three acres back to the property line up against the mountain. The boundaries are easy to note, two creeks on each side, the road in the front, the mountain ridge behind. Honey Lick Branch is the smaller creek over toward our left there. It separates the farm from Buckeye Knob camp. There’s a low flat bridge across it not far from the back of the farmhouse that takes you right over to the camp.

  “The creek on the other side is deeper and swifter,” he continued. “It’s the one you can hear rushing along its way when you sit out on the porch in the quiet of the evening. It separates the Jamison farm here from the other piece of the original farm property. Everybody calls that section of the farm Spring Farm now, because a little spring comes out of the mountain up behind it. A shallow rill runs from the stream down the mountain to form the western boundary of the old farm property where my great grandparents used to live.”

  “Is that the one that has the starter house?”

  “That’s it.” Scott nodded. “Unfortunately, the old farmhouse burned down one summer. But the starter house remained. When my Uncle Leo started to think about retiring from his law practice, he and my Aunt Mary bought Spring Farm from my grandparents and built a house on the old foundation right where the original farmhouse once stood. It’s a big, white, two-story place, a lot like the first farmhouse was, but much more modern inside. Aunt Mary’s not much for roughing it.”

  “I don’t remember a Leo as one of the Jamison boys’ names,” Vivian interrupted.

  “Leo is a nickname for Lionel.”

  “Oh, I can see that,” Vivian replied, smiling. She was really enjoying Scott’s story-telling ability and this new aspect of him being revealed. Perhaps he had more to him than the playboy image she’d originally labeled him with.

  “So who lives in the starter house now?” she probed.

  “You ask a lot of questions.” Scott’s eyes met hers.

  She kept her voice casual. “I’m interested to learn all I can about this house and the family that lived in it. I like family stories. Just indulge me, okay?”

  He raised his eyebrows suspiciously.

  She smiled at him again, encouraging him to continue by offering yet another question. “Does anyone live in the starter house now?”

  “My cousin, Nancy, does. She’s Mary and Leo’s daughter.”

  “And is she just married and starting out?” Vivian asked, charmed by that idea.

  “No, unfortunately, Nancy is divorced.” He scowled. “She married a resort salesman who proved to be unable to stop selling hims
elf to every female who crossed his path even after he was married. You get my drift?”

  “Yes,” she answered him. “He cheated on her and he hurt her.”

  “That he did. And he also hurt two great little boys, Jordan and Martin. After trying many times to give Doug Wilkes yet another chance, Nancy finally left him and came on back home here with the boys. She moved into the starter house so she and the boys could have their own little place and a little privacy from Mary and Leo.”

  “Is she alright?”

  “Very much so now. Thanks for asking.” Scott reached down to pick up a stick in their path, snapping it and tossing the pieces over the fence beside them. “In fact, I was the lucky one out of the separation. Nancy is a terrific office manager. That’s how she met Doug in the first place; she was managing the resort office where he was working in sales. I had just bought the camp when she moved back home four years ago, so I hired her to run the camp office. She’s great; I don’t know what I would do without her.”

  Scott sent another of those quick, charming smiles Vivian’s way. “Keeping books, organizing records, and running an office day to day are not my strong suits.” He shrugged. “But they are Nancy’s. She’s been a real asset to me. You’ll meet her and the boys eventually, and I’m sure you’ll meet Aunt Mary and Uncle Leo, too. They are your next-door neighbors on the left, although there’s a longer walk from the farmhouse over to their place than to mine. I’m more directly on your right.”

  He kicked a stone as he walked along. “To be quite frank, Vivian. There aren’t many neighbors down here on Stoney Mill Loop. It’s pretty quiet around here. There’s just the camp, this farm, Leo and Mary’s place, and the Greenes’ house on around the bend in the loop.”

  Vivian caught the new name Scott mentioned. “Are the Greenes your family, too?”

  “No. They’re a young couple. Haven’t lived here long.” He stopped to lean up against the fence beside the barn now. “He’s a doctor. Just opened a practice up the highway. She’s got a child and stays home right now. I’m sure you’ll meet Ellen and Quint soon. Actually, if you know anything about country people, you’ll know that most everyone nearby will eventually find some excuse or other to stop by to see you. They’ll bring a jar of honey, a cake, a welcome plant, or just stop around to see if there is anything they can do for you.”

  She smiled at him. “That’s nice that people are so cordial and welcoming.”

  “Well, that’s one way to look at it,” he replied. “Some people might see that type of country custom as simply nosey. It certainly makes it really hard to have any secrets or any privacy around here. People in the valley have a way of finding out things.”

  A little chill passed over Vivian at those words. She thought about her own reasons for being here and her attention wandered away from Scott for a moment as she did. When she came back to herself, she found Scott watching her thoughtfully.

  “Hope you don’t have any secrets you want to hide.” His words sounded probing and he seemed to be watching her expression with interest now.

  She walked past him to peer in the barn door instead of answering him.

  Posing another question, she purposefully shifted the conversation to a more neutral topic. “Do you keep any animals here?”

  “Not now,” he answered her, allowing her to change the subject on him. “My grandparents used to keep a few cows, horses, and chickens here, but after Poppy Stuart died, Gramma let them go. There are only farm machines and storage items here, now, and maybe a few possums and bunnies hopping through.”

  That boyish smile lit up his face again. “You may see those guys sometimes, Vivian. They’re not very fearful of people. Sometimes the possums come right up near the porch in the evening, but they won’t bother you. They’re just curious.”

  Vivian struggled not to stare at him like a silly school girl. He was so cute and he was really hard to ignore. Especially when he smiled. He smiled so easily and freely, too, and it literally lit up his face every time he did so, crinkling up the corners of his eyes. Yet his body movements were so relaxed and easy, like he didn’t have a care in the world. Honestly, he was so charming without any effort, Vivian thought. She wondered if he had always been that way.

  Scott was walking along the fencerow beside the barn now, and he stopped the journey just where the fence line started to turn the corner. He pointed down a well-worn path that followed on beyond the turn of the fence. “If you followed this path on along the fence line and away from the barn, you’d soon start up a trail through the woods and then connect to another trail that winds over the lower ridge of the mountain. The back line of the property is up that way. We’ll walk there someday, if you like, and I’ll show you Slippery Rock Falls beyond the ridge. There’s a great cascade further up above that, as well.”

  Scott turned around suddenly to start back and ran right into Vivian who was following almost too closely behind him.

  “Oops!” she said, starting to laugh. But her laugh stopped quickly as the electricity, that always seemed to happen whenever Scott got too close to her, prickled up her spine again and then simply flooded over her.

  Almost stunned, she looked up into Scott’s face and found him grinning over her reaction. He obviously was delighted. Vivian backed up, annoyed with herself that her emotions could be so easily discerned by him.

  Whatever in the world was wrong with her? Her heart was hammering again. Her breathing had quickened, and all over a silly bump against a man.

  She really ought to have more self-control than this. After all, he was just another pretty boy. She’d seen enough of those in her day. She couldn’t imagine why she was letting herself be so affected by this one.

  She turned away, trying to pretend that nothing was different and trying to ignore the steady gaze of Scott’s hazel eyes on her. Vivian felt a flash of irritation. She didn’t like being uncomfortable in social situations. And Scott made her uncomfortable. It seemed like the man was always watching her, assessing her actions and reactions like a biologist watching an interesting bug.

  He looked away then, giving her a moment to recover.

  “Do you know what these marks mean on the fence rail here?” He pointed out some carved marking on the fence posts, pretending like nothing in particular had just happened between them.

  Vivian felt relieved that Scott wasn’t going to pursue the obvious intimacy of their situation. She turned to study the markings carved in the wood, giving herself a little more opportunity to regulate her breathing and get herself back in control.

  “These little circle marks here?” She traced her fingers over two little circles with a line underneath that someone had obviously scratched into the fence with a knife.

  “Yeah, that one and these other little cross marks here on the rail below it.” He pointed out a second set of marks. “The hobos and travelers put these marks on the fences a long time ago. The circle signs with the bars underneath mean You can sleep in this farmer’s barn. The cross marks mean Good place for a handout.”

  “Really?” she asked, fascinated as she always was with new knowledge and almost forgetting her discomfort of a minute ago.

  “Yes, really,” Scott answered, teasing her a little for her enthusiasm. “Foot travelers through the countryside used to leave marks on the fence posts to let other travelers know what kind of folks lived in the houses along the way. This was especially common during the depression years when times were hard and when so many people were on the road trying to find a better life somewhere.”

  “So these signs told travelers your grandparents were good people who would give them a handout and let them sleep in the barn over night if they needed to,” Vivian replied thoughtfully.

  “That’s it,” he answered.

  “What if the hoboes wanted to warn someone about bad people? What would they put then?”

  Scott shrugged. “Well, I’ve seen danger signs a few times, like a poison sign mark. Once I saw a dagger carved
in a fence. Poppy Stuart said it meant Dishonest man, don’t ask for work.”

  “How absolutely fascinating.” Vivian smiled in delight, beginning to study the fence rail to look for more markings she might not have seen.

  “Well, only you would think so. It doesn’t seem to take much of a story to get you whipped up and interested.” Looking up, she found him watching her.

  “Well, I am a teacher and a bit of a writer,” she returned. “We teachers and writers like stories. We like to hear them and we like to tell them.”

  “And what do you write, Vivian Delaney?”

  “Academic articles and things.” Her reply was evasive. “You know, like most professors write about the things they research and teach.”

  “What do you teach in college?”

  “British Literature, English composition, that sort of thing. You know.” She shrugged nonchalantly.

  “No, I don’t know,” he answered her teasingly. “It’s not my field, so you’ll have to enlighten me a little more, professor.”

  “Well, besides teaching basic English composition, usually for freshmen, and a British Literature sequel that sophomores or juniors take, I also teach an upper level course on Victorian Women Writers, plus courses in European Folklore.”

  “Ahhh,” Scott said. “That latter sounds more like the sort of person who would be interested in the fence carvings of hobo travelers.”

  “I do like legends and stories.” She smiled at him. He really did have a nice side.

  “What did you do your big dissertation on, Dr. Delaney? I know enough about doctoral studies to know you have to do some sort of major research work before they’ll give you your PhD.”

  “I wrote my dissertation on Andrew Lang. He was a Scottish writer of the late 1800s and early 1900s best known for the incredible number of folktales, ballads, and stories he collected and published.”