“Stunned,” she answered. “I was beginning to think he’d be a bachelor for the rest of his life, but I understood the moment I met Sara. Ben’s always been afraid that marriage would be boring, but life with her will keep him on his toes, that’s for certain.”
Heather jerked upright in the window seat. “Have you guys ever heard of a superstition where if someone’s name is mentioned, it means they’ll show up?”
“Superstitions are nonsense.” Sydney repositioned the pillow beneath her head and closed her eyes.
“I always thought you had to say the name three times really fast.” Hillary held out her hands to examine the new shade of her fingernails. “Or maybe three people say the name once at the same time.”
Sydney yawned. “Three people have to say the name three times while spinning in a circle.”
“However it happens, we did it.” Heather sat up on her knees and pressed her hands against the windowpane.
“Ben’s out there?” Gentry stopped trying to make the hat on her head appear less gaudy and took a step toward the window. “But he and Sara are in Hawaii on their honeymoon. They won’t even be back until just before the wedding on Saturday.”
“Not Ben.” Heather tucked her knees under her and leaned closer to the glass for a better view. “I haven’t seen him in a while, but it certainly looks like Jake getting out of that truck.”
Truck had a ring of truth, which sluiced down Gentry’s spine with the chill of winter…even though it was almost July. Just the thought of seeing him again froze her in her tracks. Jake had been out of her life longer than he’d been in it. Their marriage had lasted three months. A turbulent, traumatic, passion-filled three months, the memory of which she had safely buried under a mountain of denial. She would die happy if she could forget she’d ever set eyes on him.
“You’re imagining it, Heather,” Hillary said. “We were talking about Jake and you just thought you saw him.”
“I usually don’t imagine men in this much detail.” Now her nose was flattened against the glass, and she had both hands pressed against the panes. “And they never look this good, even from a distance.”
“Let me see.” Hillary was off the bed, her blond hair swinging in perfect unison around her shoulders as she strolled to the window. “Scoot over, Heather.”
“I was here first.” Heather moved over only slightly. “And don’t fog up the window with your heavy breathing, either.”
As the two women bumped hips, vying for a view of the front driveway and the steps leading to the front doors, Gentry fought a swelling wave of emotion. Panic. Anticipation. Disbelief. Curiosity. Jake wouldn’t come here. Not the week before her wedding. She hadn’t seen or heard from him since the day she walked out of the Two-Penny Lodge and out of his life. If he’d had any desire to see her, he could have come after her then. She’d really expected he would follow…or at least make contact. But he hadn’t. Not unless she counted that one card…and since he hadn’t bothered to sign it, she didn’t bother to count it. She couldn’t believe he’d show up now. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t dare. “Did you figure out who it is?” she asked as if the answer was of no concern to her. “A deliveryman, maybe?”
Hillary glanced over her shoulder at Gentry. “Only if you’re expecting someone to deliver a big black dog.”
Cleo. Ben had asked her to keep the dog while he and Sara were gone. “Oh.” Gentry released a tiny sigh of relief. “That’s only Arthur. He said he’d bring Cleo over sometime this afternoon.”
“Who’s Arthur and who’s Cleo?” Hillary asked, still craning her neck for a better view.
“Cleo is Ben’s black Labrador retriever and Arthur is Ben’s new butler. I’m keeping the dog while Ben and Sara are on their honeymoon. Arthur’s having some kind of butler reunion at the house, and he didn’t want Cleo around. She’s something of a troublemaker.”
“What I’d like to know is why Ben’s new butler looks just like your ex-husband.”
“He doesn’t. Arthur is tall, thin, fiftyish. You’d never mistake him for…” The panic took precedence, and in a sparkle of sequins, she moved to the window and pushed between Heather and Hillary. “Let me see.”
“He’s at the front door now.” Heather wiggled backward and off the window seat. “You won’t be able to see him from the window.”
Gentry swept the view with a narrowed gaze. The truck was really a utility vehicle, one of those fourwheel-drive affairs some people preferred to rent when visiting California. It was exactly the kind of vehicle Jake liked to drive. Whoever the driver was, though, he was already out of sight, blocked from view by the porch overhang. She heard the faint chime of the doorbell downstairs. And with the sound, it occurred to her that at least one of her bridesmaids didn’t seem the least bit interested in verifying the identity of the delivery person.
Gentry turned, protecting the dress with her careful movements. “Sydney? Aren’t you the least bit curious who’s at the door?”
Syd looked up from her magazine and didn’t even have the grace to look guilty. “Can’t say I’m especially anxious to meet Ben’s butler. He sounds a little old for me.”
“But you’d be anxious to see Jake, wouldn’t you?”
“Sure, but you said it wasn’t Jake.”
Gentry fumed, unable to believe she’d fallen for such a shameless pretense. “It isn’t Jake. I’m on to your little joke now, and I don’t find it very funny.”
“Am I laughing?” Sydney asked evenly. “Are Heather and Hil convulsed in giggles?”
“You’re waiting until I rush downstairs and make a fool of myself.”
“I wish I’d thought of that, Gen, but 1 didn’t. I don’t know who those two—” she gestured at the other two women “—think they saw, but, frankly, I can’t imagine why you would believe for a second that Jake would come all the way from Arkansas to play a rather tasteless joke on you, the woman who hardly remembers what he looks like.”
“It’s not a joke,” Heather said sincerely. “I really thought I saw him.”
“Sorry, Gen.” Hillary shrugged. “I thought it looked like him, too.”
Sydney picked up the magazine again. “Look on the bright side, Gentry, Jake probably wants to avoid seeing you as much as you want to avoid seeing him, which means he wouldn’t step foot in this house if he thought you were in it. And if, by some wild, fantastic chance it is Jake, it can only mean he’s come to attend your wedding, which will make it the event of the season.”
“Over my dead body.”
Sydney shrugged. “I, for one, would consider that a noble sacrifice.”
“There’s going to be a sacrifice if I find him in this house.” Taking the longest steps allowed by the tight fit of her dress, Gentry walked across the room, flung open the bedroom door and paused to listen, trying to distinguish an identifying tone or pitch in the murmur of voices below.
“To come inside…” That, obviously, was Teresa, the housekeeper.
“Ben…reunion…dog…couldn’t stay…”
The words drifted up, without context or meaning…except that after all this time, and even at this distance, she recognized his unhurried midwestern drawl. Without conscious effort, she visualized his expression simply by the tone of his voice. His lips were curved in that slightly lopsided smile and his eyes held that down-home, a-word-is-as-good-as-a-handshake twinkle that had first captured her attention. There would be a strand of dark hair drooping onto his forehead, and every so often, he’d reach up and push it out of the way. A gesture she had always found endearing and inexplicably sexy.
Damn Jake, anyway. What was he doing here? Now? Just when she least wanted to think about him.
“Jacob!” Pop’s booming bass rattled the chandelier as he entered the foyer below, and Gentry tiptoed out to the bannister rail to peek over. “How in the hell have you been, stranger? And why haven’t you been to see us before now? Just because our daughter divorced you, doesn’t mean Frannie and I did.”
From her lofty viewpoint, Gentry saw her father slug Jake on the upper arm in one of those malebonding rituals she’d seen so often among her brother’s friends and her father’s comrades. Why couldn’t Pop treat Sonny that way, she wondered, although she knew it would be an exercise in frustration for both men. Her father intimidated the hell out of practically everyone. He was a boisterous, blustery eccentric, who said what he thought when he thought it and made no apology for it afterward. He, like Sonny, was a self-made man who had seized opportunity at every turn, rising from the ranks of movie extras to the height of stardom as a hero of the silver screen. Known to most of the world as Charlie North, former actor, director and producer, Charles Bennett Northcross was still a disciplined mass of energy and enthusiasm. Few men could look him in the eye with complete candor. Few women could resist the vitality of his genuine admiration for their gender. No one, man or woman, could match his lust for living.
Whatever Jake replied to this boisterous greeting was lost in the Jolly-Green-Giant boom of Pop’s laughter. Gentry seethed. Did he have to act quite so pleased to see his former son-in-law?
“Yes, Ben got bitten by the lovebug and we haven’t seen him since. Supposed to be back for Gentry’s wedding, though. Hey, it’s great to see you, Jake. What are you doing here, anyway? Did you come for the wedding? Gonna be quite a dog-and-pony show, if you know what I mean.”
Gentry kept quiet as the other women tiptoed out to join her.
“That’s Jake,” Hillary whispered, pointing…as if Gentry might not have noticed.
Gentry put her finger to her lips, warning them to be silent.
“He’s still a fine specimen of manhood.” Sydney’s voice was low but not inaudible, and Gentry gave her an immediate frown.
“Will you be quiet?” she mouthed. Jake was talking again and she strained to eavesdrop.
“Cleo couldn’t…wasn’t feasible…Arthur didn’t know…and here I am.”
“Well, lucky for us, I say. The guest house is empty and you’re welcome to it. As I said, there’s all kind of nonsense going on in this house lately, but it’ll be over Saturday and you can enjoy the rest of your vacation. Frannie’s out this afternoon at some committee meeting or other, but she’ll be delighted to see you. In fact, we’ll be glad for the company, what with both of the kiddos marrying and taking leave of their senses…so to speak.”
Jake’s protest, if indeed it was a protest, sounded weak and ineffectual.
“Don’t be silly,” Charlie’s voice boomed. “Gentry won’t care. Will you, sweetheart?” He made a grand gesture, revealing her hanging over the balcony rail, shamelessly eavesdropping like a twelve-year-old. For a moment, her panicked eyes met Jake’s startled ones, and then she set her jaw with determination. Her ex-husband meant nothing to her now. She could afford to be polite. Coolly polite.
“Hello, Jake,” she said.
“Hello.” His slow, I’m-in-no-hurry drawl pulled at her, luring her back to a time and place she chose not to recall. “Who’s up there with you? Sydney?”
“Here.” Syd shoved past Gentry to lean over the bannister rail. “It’s great to see you again, buddy. Where’ve you been keeping yourself?”
“The Two-Penny Lodge,” he said. “You know where it is. Why haven’t you been to visit?”
“I’m afraid you’d make me catch my own food.”
“Cook it, too. The lodge is still pretty rustic.”
“Hi, Jake. It’s Heather.”
“And me.” Hillary waved.
He stared up at them from the foot of the stairs as his engaging grin took possession of his lips…and stopped at least one heart in its tracks, despite the silent protest of its owner. “The Four Horsemen, as I live and breathe,” he said. “I thought you all would have disbanded long before now.”
“We’re in Gentry’s wedding,” Hillary explained. “We weren’t invited along when you two eloped, so this time we’re making sure the ceremony goes off without a hitch.”
“No one could do it better.” He scratched his chin and just stood there staring as Gentry scowled at him. “I was just telling Charlie that Ben invited me to spend my vacation at his house. That was pre-Sara, though, and when I arrived, 1 discovered there wasn’t room for me among all the starched white shirts gathering at Ben’s house for some kind of butler reunion. So I’m just dropping off the two things he asked me to bring by, then I’ll be on my way.”
“Oh, no you don’t.” Sydney leaned farther over the bannister rail for emphasis. “You can’t walk in here, turn around and walk out again. We have to catch up on what you’ve been doing with yourself the past couple of years.”
“He’s staying.” Pop used his there-will-be-noargument voice. “I invited him to spend the rest of his vacation in the guest house. No one’s using it. Sonny and his friends are staying across town at a hotel. His uncle rented a whole floor for the out-of-town relatives and a suite for Sonny and his groomsmen…gotta keep the engaged couple honest until the wedding. Makes no sense to me, but Sonny insisted on preserving Gentry’s honor…or some such thing. He’s a strange bird. Hard worker, though. Built his own business from the ground up. Portable johns. I call him the Can King. Let’s have a drink, Jake, and you can tell me fish stories.”
“Well, I…”
“No excuses. I’ll have someone get your things and take them out to the guest house for you.”
“But I don’t think Gentry…”
“Forget about Gentry. This is my house and she’s got nothing to say about who stays and who doesn’t.” Pop dismissed all possible objections with a wave of his hand. “Besides, she won’t know who’s here and who isn’t this week.” Pop looked up and cupped his hands around his mouth, as if his big mouth needed amplification. “It won’t bother you if Jake stays here, will it, sweetheart?”
Before she could weigh the phrasing of the sentence against her very real, very positive knowledge that it would bother her very much indeed, Pop had taken her agreement for granted. He clapped his arm around Jake’s solid shoulders and bent his head to say something in private, then laughed heartily after he’d said it. Jake laughed, too. A warm, husky rumble of humor that strummed her heartstrings with memories. This had to be stopped, she thought. “Wait just a minute.”
The men turned and looked up at the landing again. “What is it?” Pop asked with a frown.
“I want to talk to you. Stay there.” Looping the sequined train over her arm, she moved down the stairs, pacing her steps to keep the scalloped hem from creeping any higher on her thighs. When she reached the bottom of the stairs, her knees were shaking…which was totally ridiculous. Her brief marriage to Jake had been annulled in the eyes of the law and the church. It had been wiped from her heart. She wasn’t afraid to face him, damn it. She’d just pretend he was a friend of Ben’s whom she’d never liked.
That idea carried her across the foyer and right up to the moment when Jake’s eyes met hers. At this proximity, she had little protection against the tender humor that always seemed to be in his eyes, the little twinkle of laughter that made her think he never took anything seriously. Okay, so maybe she once had liked him a little. His gaze dropped, measuring her from sparkling train to bare shoulder, and there was a faint but noticeable quirk at the corner of his mouth…as if he were fighting back a chuckle. She went back to the idea that she’d never liked him at all.
“Hello, Liz,” he said. “You look particularly sparkling today.”
He was the only one who’d ever called her Liz and lived to tell about it. She must have been crazy to think it sounded sexy when he said it. Her temper rose in direct correlation to his lazy and all-too-seductive smile. “Don’t call me Liz.”
“Still as touchy as always, I see.”
“Only when I’m annoyed.”
“I’ve never seen you when you weren’t…Liz.”
A lie, of course. She knew it as well as he. And the very fact annoyed her further. “That could be because you’re so annoying, J
ake.”
“Me?” His eyebrows climbed with innocence. “Nah. I’m the same easygoing guy I’ve always been. Your nerves must be on edge.”
“She always gets this way before her weddings.” Sydney tucked her hand in the crook of Jake’s arm. “It’s so good to see you again. You’re not planning to run off with our bride this time, are you?”
“Only the bridesmaids.” His tone was definite and Gentry’s temper rose another degree. “Are you still available?”
“You can’t afford her, Jake.” Hillary moved closer, edging Gentry aside. “Take me. I’m much more reasonable.”
“Heather?” Jake singled her out for a smile. “Don’t tell me you’re still waiting for Mr. Right.”
She blushed and nodded. “Afraid so. And don’t pretend you want to apply for the job, because we both know better.”
He shrugged. “It’s true. You’re all too good for me. I could never choose among you.”
“You did once,” Hillary pointed out.
His bedroom blue eyes swung unerringly to Gentry. “We all make mistakes.”
“True,” Sydney agreed. “Take Gen’s wedding gown, for example. Someone made a big mistake with that.”
“What wedding gown?” Pop’s voice boomed into the conversation, his forehead furrowed with the question.
“What you see is what you get,” Hillary said matter-of-factly.
Pop’s disbelieving gaze surveyed Gentry’s attire from pillbox to sequined train. “What kind of costume is that? Some kind of a joke?”
Gentry seethed with misplaced irritation. “Sonny had this bridal gown designed and made for me as a wedding gift, and I wouldn’t dream of offending him by not wearing it at our wedding.”
“Well, it’s a good thing I don’t mind offending him, because you’re not wearing that to any wedding in this house.”
“It’s my wedding and I’ll wear any dress I please.”
“It’s my house, and nobody wears anything that hurts my eyes.” Pop nodded, cutting short the argument. “Now, Jake has been nice enough to bring this present to you, and I think you ought to be a little more grateful.”
Two-Penny Wedding Page 2