Warm Front

by Patricia McLinn

  “You’re doing it again.”

  Anne jumped. Maybe at his accusation. Maybe from the truck hitting a rut.

  Unlike the arrow-straight county roads, this unfamiliar back road wound along a river. Had to be an extension of the Drago River, he supposed.

  He didn’t much care.

  “Okay, you’re not going to talk—” She shot him a look at his stark tone. “—then you will listen. I went to see Fiona’s family. That’s where I was.”

  “Oh.”

  Now what on earth were her feelings behind that syllable? Glad? Worried? Unsettled? Relieved?

  The hell if he knew.

  “It was good.” He considered that. “Really good. Especially talking to her aunt. That woman used to scare the, uh, manure out of me. Still does.”

  “More than Darcie?” She produced a little smile with that.

  “Darcie times two and several more decades of experience. That’s Aunt Justine.”

  “Whoa. That’s impressive.” She turned the truck into an open gate and a rough track that led up an incline. “So what did she say to you?”

  “She said I’m an idiot.”

  “She didn’t.” That sounded more amused than indignant on his behalf.

  “She did. And she’s right. I am an idiot. I was an idiot. An idiot who didn’t do you or Fiona justice. At some level I wondered if I was drawn to your needs, to your vulnerabilities, to—” He met her eyes, knowing he was taking a risk. “—your weaknesses. Wait. Don’t start denying you have needs or vulnerabilities or weaknesses. We all do. The question is how we deal with them. And, I suppose, how other people react to them.” This might be the hardest part. “I thought — I feared — I’d loved Fiona because she was dying. And—”

  “Oh, Quince. How could you think that? If you held back from women you could have loved—”

  “No. It’s safe to say I didn’t love anyone in between Fiona and you — because God knows I didn’t have any trouble falling for you.”

  Eyes wide, she looked at him. Until a hole nearly wrenched the wheel out her hands and she focused again on driving. Damned road.

  “I was in trouble from the start, especially when you said I was no farmer, because I suddenly wanted to be a farmer more than anything. No, no, don’t worry, I’ve gotten past that. No illusions about my farming ability.”

  Though a soft bell rang in his head, because Anne was driving through an open gateway and didn’t stop to close it behind them.

  He started to ask about that, then forgot it when she said, “You’re trying.”

  “I know. Very trying.” That drew a smile from her. “The episode with Grandy was when I fell in love with you, but—”

  “Which one?”

  “The first one. But, as I was saying before I was interrupted,” he said sternly, “something held me back.”

  “You felt guilty about deserting Fiona.”

  “Maybe,” he acknowledged. Glancing back, he realized they’d climbed more than he’d thought from the river level. Ahead was a stand of fir trees. “Probably.”

  “Strange how I can see so clearly that you have nothing to feel guilty about.”

  “Yeah. And I see it so clearly for you with Chris.” She continued to look straight ahead. “Anyway, I went to see Fiona’s family. Learned what I’ve told you I learned, and came back to you, hoping the time I was away—”

  “Fifty-four hours.”

  “—would have let you learn some things, too. Only to find you doing exactly what you were doing when I left.”

  “What?”

  He knew the question was a time-buyer, but that didn’t mean he had to treat it that way. “You’re clamming up, shutting me out, acting like you alone can carry the weight of the world on your shoulders.”

  They passed through a line of windbreak firs to a farmhouse. It looked familiar. But then many of the older farmhouses around Drago were similar.

  “Quince—”

  “Damn it, I thought we were past this. I thought you were done holding back.”

  She chuckled — nervous, but still a chuckle — as she finally ended the assault on his bones by braking the truck to a stop at the farmhouse’s front porch. “Come on, Quince, you can’t accuse me of holding back this morning in the shower.”

  He refused to be sidetracked.

  He refused to be subtle or understanding.

  He refused to talk around this.

  He got out of the truck, waiting for her to do the same before saying, “I’m not talking about sex, and you know it.” He slammed his truck door for emphasis. “If you don’t want a future together, you’re going to have to say it.”

  “Shh. You don’t have to shout.”

  “Apparently, I do have to shout, to make you hear me.”

  She kept walking, staying ahead of him, and taking the front porch steps at double-time, with every appearance of wanting to get away from him. “Quince, can we talk about this later? I don’t want to talk right now.”

  “Too bad, because I do.” She had the front door open, holding it wide. And now he did shout. “I want to talk about it now. Because I love you and I want to marry you, Anne Hooper.”

  He had a split-second vision of Anne holding onto the edge of the open door for all she was worth, her eyes and mouth wide.

  And then all hell broke loose.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  “Surprise!”

  “Surprise, Quince!”

  “Surprise!”

  “Surprise!”

  People came at him from every direction, shaking his hand, pounding him on the back, patting his arm, kissing his cheek, saying things he couldn’t make sense of.

  Automatically, he returned hellos, handshakes, and cheek kisses — all the while, looking at Anne for an explanation.

  Or at least the reassurance that this was all real.

  She smiled. He thought the smile was meant to be reassuring, but the way it wobbled did little to reassure.

  And when Zeke spoke into one of those sudden silences that can strike a gathering, the smile fled.

  “One hell of a way to propose, Quince,” he said.

  Anne sucked in air and froze.

  Jennifer came to the rescue. “Quince, Anne organized this surprise open house here so we could all—”

  She gestured to the group, and he saw not only his personal friends and their significant others, not only the poker-playing group, but a broader range of farmers, Drago residents, and Zeke-Techers.

  And then another recognition clicked into place. He knew where they were.

  The farm he’d bought.

  The farm she and Everett were taking over.

  New Hooper Farm.

  Anne had brought him by an unfamiliar route, which meant they’d approached from a different angle, and the house had been painted inside and out, all combining to delay recognition.

  The open gate.

  Ah. Left open for them purposely.

  “—celebrate this new venture and thank you for helping bring us together to make our town and our county better and stronger.”

  Someone started “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow,” quickly joined by many voices. As it tailed off at the end, he heard Zeke saying to Darcie, “All I said was it’s one hell of a way to propose. And he’s supposed to be so good with people.”

  This time general conversation covered Zeke’s words, and Anne seized the moment, calling out, “Let’s cut the cake.”

  In the general surge toward the kitchen, Vanessa ended up beside him. “I told you to give it a little time.”

  He stopped, drawing protests from eager would-be-cake-eaters behind them. “Good Lord — that’s what those looks between you and Zeke were about the other day? How the hell did I miss that? Either you two have gotten a whole lot more devious, or I’ve become a total idiot.”

  “It’s not devious to keep a secret for a surprise party. As for you being an idiot, you have a lot on your mind.” She smiled up at him. “And in
your heart.”

  Mrs. R tugged at his arm, drawing him down so she could kiss his cheek. “You’ve done a wonderful thing here, Quince. Wonderful.”

  “Don’t be sure until we start selling lots and we see how it goes.”

  “There are already reserves on lots,” Vanessa said.

  “No matter what,” Mrs. Richards picked up, “you’ve done a wonderful thing, because you gave all these people a chance to take back control, when they felt like they were being swamped by a tsunami. Including this crotchety old fellow.”

  She accompanied the final words by tucking a hand in Everett’s arm and beaming at him.

  He smiled back at her, but then turned a frown toward Quince.

  “Took you long enough to get back here after disappearing like a thief in the night. And her—”

  “Like a thief in the night?” He wanted to laugh and be outraged simultaneously.

  “—wearing herself down getting the place painted and all. And these past days, hopping from this foot to that. Should she get everybody to try another date or call the whole thing off or what? Thought her head would spin right off her shoulders.”

  He ignored Everett and looked down at Mrs. R. “How long has she been working on this?”

  “Well, let me see. It wasn’t long after Everett got out of the hospital—”

  “C’mon, Quince, get in here and get cake so the rest of us can have some,” ordered Darcie.

  *

  The hugs and handshakes and kisses didn’t stop.

  Ned and Candy Benzil, their sons, Will Larkin and his son, Jennifer, Trent, Mrs. Zeekowsky, Darcie’s mother and the chief of police, two more farmers he’d played poker with and their wives. He even got a triple-decker, with Josh’s youngest wrapping him around the knees, his son Topher shaking his hand, and his oldest giving him a quick hug. Vanessa added a kiss on the cheek and Josh topped it off with another handshake.

  “You look shellshocked,” Jennifer said quietly, handing him a second cake plate, because the first one had fallen on the floor thanks to an over-enthusiastic hugger.

  “I am. And touched and I’ll never forget this. But I haven’t had a single word with Anne since we walked in, much less talk to her alone about, uh, what happened at the door.”

  Jennifer and Darcie exchanged a look, then a couple words too quiet for him to hear.

  “Leave it to us,” Darcie said.

  Jennifer grabbed his arm and steered him through the crowd.

  “Here,” she said, opening a door. “Wait in here.”

  He looked around. “The pantry?”

  “Yup.”

  He heard Zeke say before the door shut, “He griped about going in our pantry, so why—?”

  This wasn’t as large as Darcie and Zeke’s pantry and the light wasn’t automatic. But he’d seen a cord before Jennifer closed the door.

  He’d just turned the light on when the door opened again and Anne came shooting in, apparently propelled by a push.

  Quince took half a second to admire Darcie’s technique, and reminded himself never to get on her bad side.

  But only half a second. He took her into his arms.

  “Anne—”

  “Quince, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you felt I’d pulled back. I was trying so hard to keep this a surprise.”

  “It’s a surprise all right — a wonderful surprise. But the lead-up was misery.”

  “With the way I feel about you, I knew I’d spill it all if we spent time or … uh, time together.”

  “The way you feel about me? How about sharing?”

  She smiled, starting slow, but spreading with certainty. “I love you, Peter Quincy. I truly love you.”

  He drew in a deep breath. “I love you, too.”

  They looked at each other for a long, long time.

  “Are you going to kiss me or something?” she asked with a smile.

  “Both.” He kissed her. “I’m going to kiss you now and or something later.”

  They kept on kissing.

  Not until oxygen depletion hit did they pause long enough for her to say, “It’s nice to hear the words I love you when you’re not shouting at me.”

  He huffed out a half laugh. “Sorry about that. I have something else to say, not shouting. Will you marry me?”

  “Yes.”

  “For better for worse, but always with a farm?”

  “I’ll marry you without a farm, Quince.” She kissed him quickly, then added. “Since Everett and I will own it. Oh, we have so many things to decide and plan. I have to learn this farm practically from scratch and planting will start soon, though we need more seed, and we could get livestock and—”

  “And I want to hear about every farming choice. But if we start now, in here, there might be a riot by the people waiting outside. That would be a shame since I hear you repainted the place.”

  She smiled at him. “Good point.”

  Hands clasped, they exited the pantry to a packed audience zeroed in on them.

  “Anne and I would like you all to be the first to know that she’s accepted my proposal of marriage.”

  Among cheers, exclamations, and well-wishing, two voices stood out.

  “He must have done a better job of proposing the second time,” Zeke said.

  “Knew this’d happen from the first day I brought him out to the farm,” Everett said. “Saw it all along.”

  EPILOGUE

  “Where’s my nail polish?”

  Quince paused in the act of pulling on his underwear to answer. “The box labeled Anne – Bathroom maybe?”

  They’d moved in two weeks ago during a rainy spell, but the weather had been too good since then to waste any on unpacking boxes.

  She’d gotten a lot done on the Hooper-Macklin Farm — Everett had been the one to suggest including the original owners’ name — and didn’t regret her choices of how to spend her time. It was just that still having things in boxes made it hard getting ready for Jennifer and Trent’s wedding, being held this evening in Darcie and Zeke’s backyard.

  And perhaps she and Quince shouldn’t have made love after their first round of showers, requiring a second round, and putting them way behind schedule.

  Nope.

  Didn’t regret that choice, either.

  “Got it.” She pulled the bottle triumphantly out of a box and set to work.

  Her task wasn’t made any easier by frequently looking up to watch Quince dress. Not quite as much fun as watching him undress — or helping him undress — but still very good watching.

  “Did you hear two more lots sold?” After her “uh-huh,” he added, “That’s more than half, and that’s not counting the extra ones Trent and Jennifer are getting around the house.”

  Trent and Jennifer had bought Hooper Farm’s house and barn, and now were talking about adding a ring of lots around them for more space. They had brought the plans out to show Everett and Anne. Updates in the house would be in keeping with its heritage. The barn was going to be completely renovated with a family room, a workout area, and offices.

  Anne was thrilled for them. And even more thrilled that the limited renovations to this house — their house — were finished. They’d spruced up the first-floor bedroom suite, perfect for Everett and Mrs. R when they stayed at the farm.

  The older couple spent more time in town, however, because Mrs. R was teaching a course called Computers for Farmers at the lab. Its sessions were on an erratic schedule — waiting for bad weather days.

  “Of course Everett only stays with me when Vanessa’s not in town,” Mrs. R had explained to Anne while helping her cook breakfast last weekend. “Don’t want to set a bad example for the girl.”

  “Hah,” Everett had said. “She and Josh’ll both thank us if we spend all our time here on the farm when she’s in town so they can have your house, since he’s got three nosy kids at home.”

  “Everett Hooper,” scolded Mrs. R, wagging a spatula. But then she’d smiled and hugged him.
/>   There’d been hints that she might not be Mrs. R much longer.

  Anne and Quince were talking about a December wedding. With a good cushion after harvest but with enough time before Christmas that they could go on a real honeymoon.

  Quince passed by where she was sitting on the corner of the bed, holding her fingers wide to let the polish dry. He kissed her on the top of the head.

  Then he bent and kissed her mouth, demanding all her discipline to keep from grabbing on to him, which would have required another round of nail polish … not to mention a fresh shirt for him.

  “About ready?” he asked as he put on his tie. He looked almost as good in his clothes as he did out of them.

  “Not quite. This nail polish needs to dry a bit more.”

  “Always liked that red nail polish on you. Noticed it at the New Years Eve party at the computer lab.”

  She giggled. A genuine, mischievous giggle.

  “What?” he asked.

  “You know why farm women wear red nail polish?”

  “No.”

  “Because you scrub and scrub and still it can look like you have dirt under your nails. So this is insurance. Covers all sins.”

  He smiled slow and hot. “Don’t want to cover all your sins … at least not when we get back here tonight.”

  She laughed. He looked at her, and that look brought tears to her eyes even as she continued to laugh.

  He held out his hand to her. “I want to listen to that sound forever.”

  *

  If you enjoyed the story, I hope you’ll consider leaving a review of Warm Front to let your fellow readers know about your experience.

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  The Seasons in a Small Town Series

  What Are Friends For?

  Tech guru Zeke believes he’s left the Illinois hometown where he was known as Zeke the Geek forever. But circumstances, including a favor sought by Darcie — the only girl there who “got” him — conspire to bring him back.

  Book 1 (Spring)