by Jill Jaynes
Still, the thought of tracking down Puff and Slink’s vet and searching the house for their traveling crates and blankies cast a pall over her day. The idea of pawing through Jake’s belongings without his permission made her shudder, and she wondered whether the town had a pet-supply store.
Early afternoon, while Leonie rearranged some items in the counter display, Slink’s ears perked up, and he walked toward the door.
“Just another Bikini Babes truck,” Leonie told him. “Do you hope they come by to cast you in the show, hmmm? You, who has fear of everything?”
The heavy, solid-oak original front door flew open.
A UPS man barreled through the door. A handcart bounced behind him, its package thud, thud, thudding despite his grip.
The wind chimes banged together. The clanging reverberated against the walls.
The man’s feet tripped over each other. He let go of the handcart. It hurtled toward the glass counter, package teetering.
Leonie vaulted over the counter and twisted as she landed. The package smacked her shoulder like a beehive full of angry bees. “Oomph!” Stinging pain ran down her arm. She gritted her teeth and clutched the tall, top-heavy package with both arms, meanwhile sticking out her foot to halt the handcart.
It tipped over and crashed to the floor.
The leg that bore her weight wobbled. I’m not working out enough here. She thumped the other foot to the floor and lowered the package until it set upright.
As she rubbed her arm, a bead of perspiration trickled down her forehead. She lowered her head to her sleeve to catch it and grinned triumphantly. Nothing had broken! The glass counter was intact, and so was her new display case. “I did it!”
A loud groan came from the floor.
Jorge! Her hand flew to her chest. She’d forgotten the deliveryman. She looked to see how he was.
“You’re not Jorge!” This UPS man was a stranger.
The man groaned again and eased himself up onto his elbow. He looked up at her, blinking, his eyes gazing in slightly different directions. “And you’re not Mr. Hamasaki. At least, I don’t think so.” He lay down again, closed his eyes, and took deep breaths.
Leonie rubbed her palms against her black slacks. She was a traiteuse, and he was hurt. It should be a simple, simple matter—but no one here knows what a traiteuse is, let alone knows the rules. She would have to guide him.
“Did you bang your head?”
He shook his head “no” without wincing.
“I’m fine.” His tone showed his words a lie. He heaved himself onto his elbow again.
“Black waterfall,” he mumbled.
“Pardon?”
“Your hair. It looks like a black waterfall on your white blouse.” Their gazes caught, and as he stared at her, his eyes darkened.
Heat rose into Leonie’s face, and her heartbeat throbbed in her neck. As if she had flipped a light switch, she became aware of him as more than Jorge’s substitute. As a man, with male thoughts and male attributes. She dropped her gaze, only to find herself looking at broad, broad shoulders. She shifted her gaze again and this time saw tanned, muscular legs, revealed by the summer uniform. I’m only attracted to him because I’ve been alone for weeks. I’d respond to any guy who looked at me with interest.
“What happened?” Her words came out more brusquely than she had intended. “One moment the store was quiet. The next moment, you charged in like a buffalo.”
“What happened?” He raised an eyebrow. “Someone fixed the door and the doorknob, that’s what happened. The door’s been swollen and the screws in the doorknob stripped for years. Didn’t you notice the shiny spot on the door where everyone pushed with their shoulder?”
“Yes, I noticed. I was afraid someone would get hurt, so I planed the door edge and put wood putty in the screw holes.” I did that work for my father, and he may never see it, if he’s not planning to come back.
“You should have put up a sign to tell people the door was working,” he grumbled. “You’re lucky I didn’t crash into your counter and break the glass.”
“Do you gripe at all your delivery customers?”
His eyes widened. “What?”
She shrugged. “You’re ruder than the Bikini Babes van drivers. I wondered whether you are always like this.”
He stared at her, and alertness clicked on in his eyes. He sat upright, his face turning red. “I got stuck behind Bikini Babes vans three times today and got behind on my route. Now this happens. I guess I better see how bad it is.”
He cradled his right arm with his left and brought it in front of him. He took one glance at his bloody elbow and looked away.
“Well, that’s revolting!” He swallowed visibly. His gaze flickered briefly to hers, and he smiled wryly. “I’m not making much of an impression yet, am I?”
“Actually, you’ve made quite an impression.” He can take that however he likes. She lowered herself to a cross-legged position next to him. “You should be more concerned with your elbow.”
She leaned a little closer to the joint in question. The wood floor had scraped his elbow and forearm raw, and blood and serous fluid welled and dripped from countless parallel lacerations and abrasions. Swelling tissue had swallowed his elbow. She glanced quickly over the rest of his exposed arms and legs as well as his head and saw no other bleeding or swelling. His elbow had taken the brunt of the fall.
He was kind of cute. She hoped the pain and the surprise of the fall accounted for his confusion and rudeness.
Puff and Slink came over and sniffed the injury. Puff expanded into a Tribble-like ball of white fuzz. Whiskers twitching, Slink sniffed the arm carefully from the top of the scratches to the bottom. Then, before Leonie realized what he intended, the cat stuck out his tongue and rasped the man’s skin.
The man doubled over, his eyes squeezing shut. “Slink! You little orange vampire! No cat treats for you today.”
Leonie pulled the tabby onto her lap and held him down. “How awful! I’m so sorry!”
“Me too,” he gasped.
After a minute, he slowly rolled up. “I still have my route to finish, and I don’t want to mess up my clothes or the packages. Do you have a first-aid kit I can borrow?”
“You won’t be able to bandage that yourself.” Take the hint! Please take the hint!
They sat in silence. A breeze through the still-open door rustled the chimes. The fresh air lifted a few brown waves of his hair and brought his scent to her, a mix of sweat and sandalwood soap and something unique to him. Slink pulled free of her hold and sauntered away.
At last she had to speak. “If you want my help, you have to ask.”
His head jerked back. “Never mind. I can ask someone later on my route to help.” He struggled to stand.
Leonie rested her hand on his shoulder. He looked at her hand and then sat.
“It’s a rule. A person has to request my help. I’m not supposed to tell you the rules for healing, but folks hereabouts don’t seem to know them.”
He looked at her as if he suspected she were playing a joke on him. She thought pride might hold him back, but he asked, “Please, will you help me?”
“Yes.” She brushed her hair back behind her shoulder. “Back in a minute.” She uncrossed her legs as she rose. She went to her room in the back of the bungalow and fetched a first-aid kit and a basket.
Again she sat next to him. She cleaned the swelling and abrasions gently with a cloth soaked in an extract of leaves, roots, and bark she had made from a recipe of Nonc Antoine’s and brought with her. I must use it sparingly because some herbs in it don’t grow here. She especially liked to use it on children because the infusion didn’t sting and smelled sweetly of bee balm. She tweezed out three splinters and rinsed off his elbow again, trying, but failing, to ignore the zings whenever her skin met his.
Does he feel it too? She didn’t dare look into his face. She wrapped his elbow and lower arm thoroughly in gauze and tucked the end in tightly.<
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He blew out his breath. “That should hold me.”
She shook her head. “I’m not done yet.” She took from the basket a ball of string, measured out a length from her shoulder to her wrist, and cut it. As she knotted the string in several places and tied it around his elbow, she chanted an old prayer in a mix of French and Houma nine times.
She looked him in the eyes sternly. “Be sure to leave the string on at least a week.”
Their gazes caught. His warm eyes pulled her in and seemed to search her soul. They were brown, dark and rich as humus left behind by a river. As their gaze held, his pupils enlarged to engulf the irises. He does feel something too. Heat again rose in her face. “A week,” she repeated. “It’s important for the healing.”
The antique mantel clock behind the counter clicked as it always did before chiming. She hadn’t tried to fix the click; she liked the bit of personality it gave the clock.
But her patient glanced toward the sound. The clock bonged out a melody and then tolled three times.
The deep peals resonated inside Leonie’s chest and echoed in the room. Although she knew they had to sound the same everyday, today the peals were poignant, reminding her time ran quickly. She sighed.
“Three o’clock already? I’m even later than I thought. Th—” he began.
She startled at the change in mood in the room and held up her palms. “Don’t thank me. My prayers won’t work if you thank me. It’s another rule.”
He looked at her quizzically but again didn’t ask any questions. “See you later. I mean, if you get any deliveries before Jorge gets back.”
She nodded and bowed.
“Uh, it was good you fixed the door.” He stood and took hold of the handcart. As he walked out the door, he slapped his forehead. “I completely forgot. Please remind Mr. Hamasaki he needs to sign the paperwork for our booth at the art show.”
Chapter 3
Leonie’s heart pounded, and it wasn’t from carrying the display-cabinet carton to the side of the shop and cutting it open. Puff rubbed against her legs, which was not like her—but of course! she was wearing black pants today, and every strand of fine white fur showed—and Leonie sank down next to her.
“What did you think of that deliveryman, minou?” She knuckled Puff’s bony skull, and the cat responded with a long string of vocalizations. “I guess you’re right. We didn’t talk long, and he was rude, rude, maybe something of a canaille. At least at first. Then he turned civilized. Was that your doing, Slink? Did you perform some magic when you washed his elbow?”
No answer came from the corner.
The cats might not approve, or her father either, but the deliveryman had made her heart pound. She put a hand on her breastbone. Her heart had not yet slowed. She licked her lips.
“Some people don’t make good first impressions, you know? I thought Slink was a sneaky devil when I first arrived, and now he sleeps in the crook of my arm at night.” Puff watched her lips with a laser gaze as she talked. “Did you notice his broad shoulders, minou? Those came from real work, not from hanging out in a gym. And his hands. They were… delectable. So large, so well shaped, so calloused and scarred. Hands that have done many things. They show he’s not one who is afraid to live life. I think perhaps he’s not just another California ‘surfer dude’ with a high opinion of himself and an empty head. Eh, sha? Do you agree?”
Puff blinked and yawned at the endearment.
“You are lucky you were spayed, petite minou. You don’t feel sparks. Just now, with the deliveryman, sparks were leaping between us for sure.”
Why oh why didn’t I ask him his name? For true, the company should embroider it on his uniform.
Leonie stood, ignoring Puff’s complaints, and went to the computer. She stared at it for several minutes. She took the mantel clock down, removed its chilly glass dome, and wound the mechanism, even though it wasn’t due to be wound until Sunday. She replaced the dome, wiped away the hint of fingerprints, and set the clock back on the shelf. Then she looked at the computer again.
I will do this.
With damp fingers, she opened the shop’s email program and scanned for the delivery receipt. Not there. How can it not be there yet? We always get them right away.
She waited, feeling like a girl who languishes from love, who sits by the phone for hours, waiting for a special boy to call.
The computer pinged. She rubbed her damp palms on her jeans and looked at the screen. The receipt had arrived. She opened it, her hand trembling, and scanned it eagerly. Day, date, time, location of delivery.
But not who delivered it.
She sighed, weighing whether she felt more relief or more regret. Hunky or not, he made a big fuss about a little abrasion. Back home, I treated five-year-olds with worse injuries but more stoicism.
Not that it mattered one way or the other. Leonie couldn’t get involved with a man. Her future was too up in the air and, much as she hated it, it depended on other people. Not least of whom was Jake.
Her stomach fluttered. She might have a second chance to see the man.
She had ordered two display cases, but only one had arrived today. UPS would be back tomorrow or the day after. Even if Jorge was back on his route, the man today had business with Jake, business his tone implied was important. What would he do when he didn’t get the paperwork he needed from her missing father?
Who do I want this man to turn out to be? Another shallow California guy I can put out of my mind because he has no interests but surfing? Or the man I think he might be, someone hardworking and with dedication in his heart?
Chapter 4
The next day, Leonie passed the time between customers filling out paperwork that took all her concentration. Today she had dressed to impress. Impress the UPS man, that is. Tight black jeans that highlighted her butt, a white shirt that draped and clung flatteringly, and silver beaded earrings that twinkled against her black hair. A simple lily of the valley scent. In the complex Victorian language of flowers, lily of the valley meant a return to happiness.
All this for someone I won’t see after next week unless Jake comes back.
The door opened. The chimes jingled their melody with gentle triumph. The hairs on her arms stood up. I know it’s him without even looking. The thought made her dizzy.
Slink skittered to a corner.
Leonie’s hands shook. Slowly she raised her gaze. It was him, as she had known. She bowed and stayed down too long.
“Hi!” he croaked.
He sounds as nervous as I feel.
She raised her head and brushed her hair behind her ear. “Hi.”
He turned and pulled in the handcart, loaded with her second display stand. “No need to vault over the counter today to rescue your carton. I plan a by-the-book perfect delivery.”
“Great. Please set it over by the other one.”
After setting the new carton next to the other, he walked to the counter to face her and dragged off his hat. Unrestrained curls popped up here and there on his head. He clutched his hat with both hands, twisting it like Puff and Slink making biscuits.
“I was way out of line yesterday. I’m sorry. I was behind schedule because Bikini Babes trucks had blocked several streets I needed, and I was annoyed. Not that my mood was any excuse for how I behaved.”
“Bikini Babes has that effect on people.” She smiled. “Local people who come in complain about the trucks, the crew, and the actors all the time. I hope they all clear out when they’re done filming.”
Now he wrung his hat like a washcloth. “I know you don’t want me to say the t-word. Because rules. At least may I show you my elbow?”
“If you like.” She knew from experience what it would look like and how amazed he would be. But people loved to show off her work to her.
He extended his arm and turned it, elbow side up. “By the time I got home, my elbow didn’t hurt, and the swelling was gone. Look!” He bent it fully. “My arm’s not even tender where the
scratches are. Whatever magic you put in that string worked.”
“Not magic, and not my doing.” She hesitated. She wasn’t ready to explain, and he wasn’t ready to hear.
He cleared his throat. “I noticed you didn’t get your carton completely unpacked yesterday. What if I come back after my route ends tonight and help you take the display cases out and move them where they need to go?”
In truth, she knew nothing about him. She crossed her arms over her chest.
“I’m David, by the way. David Lewys with a ‘y,’ if you want to call UPS and check on me. I’ve been with them six years.”
The name sounded familiar. More than familiar; it evoked faint feelings of awe. Of liking. Of yearning. Puzzled, she stretched out her hand to shake.
David held it a moment too long, turning it in the light as if counting every scar. “You must be a hard worker. Your palm is as calloused as mine.”
She pulled her hand away. “Noriko Leonie Hamasaki.”
“Are you the Noriko Mr. Hamasaki is always talking about? The one who markets musicians, painters, and dancers?”
Jake had paid attention to my life? “I… I guess I must be. But please call me Leonie.”
“Leonie. That’s a pretty name. I thought you lived in Louisiana.”
“My mother passed recently, and my father, he invited me here so we could get to know each other.”
“Is he here today? We’re supposed to share a table at an art show in the fall, but he hasn’t signed the application. If I don’t turn it in soon, we’ll miss the deadline.”
“Art show?” She leaned over the case and twisted to look at a piece of enamelwork. It was a brooch whose swirls of greens, blues, and yellows conjured up the grandeur and the terror of the ocean in a place inside her ribs. The small card next to it read, “artist: David Lewys.”
Her heart rose into her throat. I was already crushing on the artist just from looking at his work. Now he turns out to be the only man in Moonlight Cove to have stirred feelings in me. She swallowed, and the lump in her throat dissolved. “I thought I recognized your name. I love the pieces you have here on consignment.”