Love and War

by Peg Sutherland

  Magdalena Murphy and Clarence Stirling almost got married—fifty years ago—but one of them left the other stranded at the altar. The rest was history. The Murphys and the Stirlings were at war.

  Two generations later, Sandy Murphy and Drew Stirling just naturally locked horns when they were thrown together over a yogurt campaign, which prompted a renewed debate in Tyler over the wedding that never was.

  They were destined to feud, it seemed, and to love just as passionately as their kin. But would they at least make it to the altar?

  “Marriage?” Sandy gasped.

  She was staring at him as if Drew were speaking another language.

  “We work together, Drew,” she said, and so far, he was with her. “I’m a professional woman, and my professional reputation is one of my first concerns. If you think I’m coming back to Tyler after a weekend business trip with one of my coworkers to announce what went on…well, I don’t even know what to say!”

  Now Drew was completely lost. “Sandy, I didn’t mean we have to start sending out invitations, but—”

  “Besides which, do you remember who we are, Drew Stirling?”

  Drew groaned. “You’re not going to use that thing about Grandpa and your grandmother again, are you?”

  “You are too obtuse for words,” she said. “And I don’t expect you ever to bring up this subject again.”

  “Don’t you think we should talk about this?” he called to her disappearing back.

  Peg Sutherland lives in an eclectic neighborhood in Charlotte, North Carolina, with her cat, Miss Bailey. In addition to writing, editing and coaching other writers, Peg has also been trained in spiritual direction. You can follow her blog at coachpegnow.com. Many of her novels are now availabe for ebook, including her personal favorite Harlequin Superromance book, Double Wedding Ring, and her most recent women’s fiction novel, writing as Peg Robarchek, In the Territory of Lies.

  Peg Sutherland

  Love and War

  Around the quilting circle…

  Martha Bauer and Emma Finklebaum exchanged glances, studied the faces gathered around the quilting frame, then gazed at one another again.

  “Mag Murphy’s still a no-show, I see,” Emma said, opening the zippered pouch where she kept her quilting needle and thread.

  “Third day this month she’s missed,” Bea Ferguson said. “She’s probably busy keeping Drew Stirling away from Sandy.”

  Everyone nodded. The feud between the Stirlings and the Murphys was nothing new, but recent developments between Mag and Clarence’s grandchildren were eclipsing even the news about the fire at the F and M these days.

  Each of the women seated around the quilting frame formed an image of a wedding quilt in her mind. And then a baby quilt—baby quilts seemed more precious with each year that passed.

  Emma, as the local paper’s one-time social columnist, prided herself on having the inside story on everything in Tyler, and today she had a real scoop. “Well, what I find really interesting is what’s going on over at Timberlake Lodge.” She paused for effect. “When was the last time we had Black Hawk and his warriors in Tyler, that’s what I want to know.”

  WELCOME TO A HOMETOWN REUNION

  Twelve books set in Tyler. Twelve unique stories. Together they form a colorful patchwork of triumphs and trials—the fabric of America’s favorite hometown.

  Unexpected Son Marisa Carroll

  The Reluctant Daddy Helen Conrad

  Love and War Peg Sutherland

  Hero in Disguise Vicki Lewis Thompson

  Those Baby Blues Helen Conrad

  Daddy Next Door Ginger Chambers

  A Touch of Texas Kristine Rolofson

  Fancy’s Baby Pamela Bauer

  Undercover Mom Muriel Jensen

  Puppy Love Ginger Chambers

  Hot Pursuit Muriel Jensen

  Mission: Children Marisa Carroll

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER ONE

  MAG MURPHY DECIDED she must be losing her marbles.

  That was the only explanation for what she saw out the front window of Worthington House. At seventy and holding, she figured her eyesight was still good enough for her to recognize that devil Clarence Albert Stirling when she saw him, even if it had been more than fifty years.

  The only thing giving her pause was the fact that Clarence didn’t look a year older than he had the day he’d left her stranded at the altar. How else to explain it, except that Mag herself had finally started going batty?

  “Nonsense. I’m as sane as I ever was,” she muttered, unable to take her eyes off the tall lean fellow with the shiny dark curls who stepped onto the curb on Elm Street and stared up at Worthington House. “He must’ve struck a deal with the devil.”

  That was a much preferable explanation for this aberration than questioning her own sanity, Mag decided.

  “What did you say, Gran?”

  “Hmm?” Mag barely registered her granddaughter’s query. She couldn’t get over that scoundrel Clarence turning up after all these years. Like a bad debt, her father would have said. Must’ve been years since she’d even thought of him.

  Or last St. Valentine’s Day, at least.

  Well, if he came nosing around here, she’d give him the sharp end of her quilting needle. That’s exactly what she’d do.

  “Gran, are you all right?”

  “Yes, yes.” Mag waved the hand that sported her new topaz ring. Blasted unfair, that she should have to work so hard to keep from turning into an old hag while Clarence still tap-danced around like a dandy. A young Fred Astaire, graceful enough to set her heart fluttering, she’d always thought. Disgruntled at the direction of her musings, she turned to her granddaughter. “Sakes alive, Alexandra! I’m fine. Don’t get your knickers in a knot.”

  Sandy chuckled. Like her father, she never let Mag’s sharp tongue get to her. “What are you staring at, Gran? You haven’t heard a word I’ve said.”

  Mag pulled down the shade on the window, thinking it couldn’t be altogether healthy for a woman her age to be experiencing such a fluttering heart. “I’m watching the snow, girl. Why don’t you come back in the morning and bring your sled? We’ll take a spin.”

  Sandy laughed and Mag enjoyed the sound despite her preoccupation with the man who had mounted the steps of Worthington House. Foolishness, thinking he was Clarence. The old fool had probably gone on to glory years ago. Or to some more appropriate afterlife, if Mag’s fervent prayers had had any effect whatsoever.

  “You might be up for sledding, Gran, but I’d probably throw my back out if I even tried,” Sandy said, succeeding in sounding all grown-up and big-city slick.

  “You’re twenty-five and a long way from back trouble, young lady,” Mag retorted, although it was true that her youngest granddaughter did tend to dress awfully old for her age—in severely cut wool suits and simple silk blouses, usually. To create a professional image, Mag was certain, remembering her own gabardine suits. She and Ellie Gates, who’d run the department store in th
e old days, had been just about the only women in town to wear tailored suits back then. In fact, they had been among the few professional women in Tyler. Ellie, however, had been a spinster, and plenty of people had thought her less fortunate than Mag, who had run the hardware store with her husband, Harry, at her side.

  But Mag had known Ellie Gates quite well, and in fact had sometimes envied her friend the freedom that came from being single. Men could be a trial, unless you managed them well. And one way to manage them was to never forget you were a woman. That, as far as Mag could tell, automatically put you in the driver’s seat.

  “What you need’s a peplum,” she said to her granddaughter, and was rewarded with a bemused frown.

  “A what?”

  “Give you some hips,” Mag said, remembering the once-stylish jackets that had flared so alluringly from a snug-fitting waist. Unlike Ellie, Mag had never figured a businesswoman had to play down her attractions to get on professionally in a man’s world.

  Sandy’s tawny cheeks picked up a hint of color. “I’ve got all the hips I need, Gran.”

  Mag harrumphed. “You’re too bony, if you ask me, all you young women today. In my time, a man liked a woman with a little flesh on her bones. Why, Marilyn Monroe was a size sixteen. Did you know that? I read it just a few months ago in one of those celebrity magazines. It’s a fact.”

  What was also a fact was that her granddaughter, with her wide smile, dark hair and big, shining eyes, was as tall and slender and beautiful as anything Magdalena Halston Murphy had ever seen. Alexandra had her mother’s dark good looks, from the strain of Winnebago Indian that had made its way down through the generations. Even Mag had always thought her daughter-in-law entirely too good-looking for Franklin, her eldest son, who was a little on the plain side like his father.

  Sandy wasn’t a thing like Mag, either, who had a certain flair of her own. Mag was petite, curvy instead of slim and not too shy to show off the fact. She favored bright colors, fabrics that clung and jewelry that sparkled. But her most striking feature, even to this day, was her hair. Thick and wavy, it was the color of butter, a color Tisha Olsen fussed about matching every six weeks when Mag went into the Hair Affair.

  “Honey, a woman your age should go natural,” Tisha always said.

  “A woman my age should do whatever she darn well pleases,” Mag always retorted. “Besides, Tisha, you’re gaining on me. Better watch your back or I’ll snatch Judson Ingalls right away from you any day now. Why, you’re still getting a year older every year and I’ve started subtracting a year each time a birthday rolls around.”

  Tisha laughed. “Be careful, Mag. Before long you’ll be younger than your own son.”

  “I can’t wait.”

  But recently Mag had something else to enjoy. After seven long years of occasional visits, her favorite granddaughter was home to stay.

  “Tell me some more about your new job, Alexandra.”

  Sandy shifted in the chintz-covered chair in the community room of the retirement center, like a squirmy child who could barely contain herself. She had dressed down today, in wool leggings and an oversize Ohio State Alumni Association sweatshirt. Even her hair, usually slicked back into a tidy, no-nonsense bun, was caught up in a ponytail and tied with a strand of purple yarn. To Mag, she still looked like the little girl who could barely wait for the rhubarb pie to come out of the oven.

  “Oh, Gran, it’s such an exciting opportunity!”

  Mag remembered when her own voice had been that melodious, before it had started to creak and crack.

  “Yes! Yogurt has such potential in today’s market,” Sandy exclaimed. “If I can position it right, I’m sure we can go international.”

  After almost fifty years in business herself, Mag understood the gleam in her granddaughter’s eyes and the glow on her cheeks as she launched into her ideas for marketing Yes! Yogurt across the continent and beyond. Mag knew there was a big difference between keeping a small-town hardware store afloat and sailing into the deep waters of cross-border commerce. But she did know that excitement. And part of her was proud to see her grand-daughter heading down that same path.

  As Mag listened to her enthusiastic plans, another part of Mag prayed that Sandy wouldn’t find that path as lonely as Mag herself had. The thought made her feel a little guilty. After all, Harry Murphy had been a good man. It hadn’t been his fault he’d never curled her toes, never made her feel that excitement she’d so longed for.

  Relying on a hardware store for fulfillment had felt a little hollow at times.

  “The only thing is...” Sandy hesitated, her enthusiasm momentarily spent as she reached the end of her litany of grand ideas for new slogans and an updated logo and cable TV ad campaigns.

  “What, dear?”

  “Well, I know I’m young. And I know I don’t have loads of experience.”

  “Why, you were at the top of your class,” Mag protested. “You’ve spent the past year working in marketing for that cookie company, and I still think that ad you created is the best one on television. Everybody in this joint laughs out loud every time that dog sticks his nose in that cookie jar. And you spent so many summers working for Britt and Jake at Yes! Yogurt, who could possibly know the company better?”

  Mag watched her granddaughter brighten with the reassurance.

  “I know, Gran. But director of marketing is a big position. And...what if people think I’m too young?”

  “What people? Britt and Jake Marshack wouldn’t have hired you if they thought you weren’t qualified.”

  “But there might be others, like the vice president of sales. I haven’t met him yet, you know. He’s probably a lot more experienced, and we’ll be working side by side.”

  Mag didn’t know Yes! Yogurt’s vice president of sales. Apparently he was new to Tyler, having arrived after she’d moved to Worthington House. She didn’t recollect ever seeing him, and if his name had been mentioned during one of the weekly quilting-circle gossip sessions, it had probably been before she’d restyled her hair so she could begin wearing her hearing aid. But she couldn’t imagine some stodgy old business poop getting the better of her granddaughter.

  “Stand tall, Alexandra, speak with authority and stick to your guns. If you don’t doubt yourself, girl, neither will anyone else.”

  * * *

  LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE about Tyler, Worthington House met with Drew Stirling’s approval.

  The stately Victorian-era retirement home gave off a dignified but cozy air that made him relax at the idea of bringing his grandfather here to recuperate. The rooms were friendly and comfortable, with live plants and soft pastel wallpaper in the common areas of the independent-living quarters. Lively activities were going on throughout the building, from low-impact aerobics to more intense bouts of chess in the TV room. Both the extended-care unit and the assisted-living quarters seemed adequately staffed with smiling, pleasant nurses and their aides. Just the place for Grandpa to recover from his hip-replacement surgery.

  “I’m sure your grandfather will find his stay at Worthington House to be a pleasurable experience,” said Cecil Kellaway, the heavyset and slightly officious admin-istrator.

  Kellaway faked some kind of phony-baloney accent, but Drew didn’t let that trouble him. He had a good eye for people and figured this guy would run a tight ship. Drew liked the idea of placing his sometimes truculent and always dictatorial grandfather in the hands of people who ran a tight ship.

  Otherwise, Clarence Albert Stirling would be running the place himself in short order.

  Drew chuckled. At Cecil Kellaway’s quizzical look he cleared his throat and smiled. “You’ve never had a resident-led mutiny, have you?”

  Slapping his clipboard against one sturdy thigh, Kellaway drew his lips into an even straighter line. “I can assure you not. Our residents are all happy and
well cared for.”

  Drew smiled, as innocuous a smile as he could manage. He didn’t want Kellaway refusing admission before his grandfather even showed up at the door. “Excellent,” he said, mimicking the director’s very proper tone.

  How long would it be before Kellaway was calling him, frantic over some disruptive behavior from Clarence? Drew wondered, remembering all too clearly the time his grandfather had broken down the door of the neighboring apartment in Chicago, to free a barking dog whose owner was not home. The barking had gotten on his nerves, Clarence had announced, confident in the justness of his actions.

  “If you’ll follow me this way, we’ll make a brief survey of the kitchen. I’m sure you’ll find it scrupulously clean.”

  It was spotless, and filled with some pretty tantalizing aromas, like baked apples, roasting chicken and homemade bread. It smelled like home cooking to Drew, who was beginning to think that everyone in Tyler must be a world-class cook. Kelsey boardinghouse, where he’d stayed the past six months, served up nothing but the best—smothered pork chops or meat loaf, real mashed potatoes and strawberry-rhubarb crisp on Tuesday nights, for example. Even Marge’s Diner regularly beat anything Drew had ever eaten in a restaurant. Small towns, he was deciding, had the corner on good cooking.

  He almost dreaded the day when he finished the house he was building on the outskirts of town and had to start nuking frozen dinners again.

  But not nearly as much as he dreaded the day Grandpa Stirling arrived from the hospital in Chicago.

  “It’s only fair to tell you right now that you’ll see me in blazes before I’ll set foot in Tyler, Wisconsin,” the old man had declared quite calmly and clearly not twenty-four hours after his surgery, when he should have been groggy from medication. Grandpa had gone straight from anesthetized to running the show, with no time in between for woozy.

  “You’ll like Tyler, Grandpa,” Drew had said gently, exchanging glances with his sister and his mother, neither of whom had the time or the resources to care for the old man. “It’s a great commun—”