by Darcy Daniel
Since his grandparents’ passing, the Mayfield community had done a fabulous job of pretending his farm was the halfway point between the country outskirts and the center of town. Locals on surrounding farms often dropped in with supplies for the townspeople to collect. Cole knew it was just an excuse to check on him, but never let on. Why would he? It all worked out in everyone’s favor.
Carefully, he inched toward the porch swing until his boot connected with the cooler. He reached in, found a beer and took a seat on the swing.
Just as he raised the bottle to his lips, he heard the shower start. Was she serious?
Fed up with her antics, Cole rose. But when he took a step toward the front door, a strange vibration caught his attention. He tilted his head and frowned. It seemed to be coming from the porch swing. He searched the padded seat and found the culprit.
As the cell phone vibrated in his hand, he investigated its shape, flipped it open and, without saying a word, pressed the device to his ear.
“Anthea?” said a man’s voice.
Cole’s eyes widened. No, he couldn’t have heard right.
“Come on, don’t sulk,” the man said into the silence.
Cole waited, as did the man on the other end of the line.
“Anthea Cane, would you grow up and talk to me!”
Stunned, Cole sank onto the porch swing.
“Okay, fine,” the man said. “Wherever you are, you can stop hiding. Marshall Brand’s people admitted the whole thing was a lie to gain publicity for the movie. So as of tomorrow, everyone’ll know you didn’t have an affair with that—”
The phone went dead. Cole listened, but it seemed he’d been disconnected. He snapped the phone shut and dropped it on the seat.
Anthea Cane.
Oh, it all made perfect sense. Although she told him the truth about being an actress, she lied about her name.
The diva behavior, her expectation that people would do exactly as she wanted them to; those things alone should have tipped him off. Karin talked about her often enough, so he knew all about Anthea Cane’s rise to fame, including the movies she had starred in recently; movies he never bothered with since action films were the hardest to follow. He needed plenty of dialogue to enjoy a movie. Not that he’d wanted to have anything to do with Anthea Cane in the first place.
He didn’t need to be reminded of the pixie-faced, pigtailed little tormentor. How she’d taken great pleasure in letting rip with the insults so the other kids could laugh at him.
His gut churned at the memory. Yes, his parents had struggled financially, but his grandfather had only just begun planting the Paulownias, and although they grew at an astounding rate, it still took time. Now the plantation provided a good living, but now wasn’t what mattered.
Cole rose, shoved the cooler aside and paced the veranda. He could still hear the shower running inside. Anger had been his first reaction, but something else was creeping in.
The tables had turned. Anthea Cane needed him for her stupid research. Did she really think he’d help her after the way she treated him when they were kids? Obviously not, since she’d lied about her identity. The last thing he wanted was to help that horrible woman, but maybe he could do something else. Something for himself.
Like giving her a taste of her own medicine.
Meg brushed against his leg, leaned into him. He reached down and gave her a firm pat. The loyal dog had been given to him by his grandmother just after his grandfather passed away—as if his grandmother knew she might not be around much longer and wanted him to have some company. Just a pup when Meg had first become his, she’d grown to be his most trusted confidante over the last ten years.
“What do you think, Meg? Payback could be fun. You with me?”
Meg licked his hand. He took that as a solid yes.
Before he changed his mind, Cole strode inside, down the hallway, took a left and stopped at the closed bathroom door.
He knew it was closed because the shower sounded muffled. Taking a deep breath, he opened the door, walked right in, grasped the shower curtain and flung it aside. An ear-piercing scream greeted him. Okay, he’d been expecting that.
Reaching into the shower stall, he shut off the faucets.
When Anthea finally stopped screaming, she yelled, “Get out!”
It took a great deal of effort on his part to keep a straight face, but he managed. “Jesus, calm down. It’s not like I can see anything,” he said. “Farm life lesson number one. Two-minute showers. That’s it.”
“Two minutes? Are you nuts?”
She no longer seemed worried in the slightest by his presence while she stood before him naked.
“You’re using precious tank water,” he said.
“How am I supposed to wash my hair in two minutes? It’s impossible.”
“Not my problem. If you don’t like it, leave. Your choice.”
Silence greeted him for a moment, then, “Is that your twisted way of saying I can stay?”
“There’s some steak in the fridge. You can start by cooking dinner.”
“I thought you said you can do everything on your own?”
“I can, but I may as well use you until I can think of something I can’t do myself.”
“So that’s a yes? I can stay?” she asked tentatively.
“On a trial basis.”
Before he knew what hit him, she wrapped him in a bear hug and held on tight. The front of his shirt and jeans grew damp from her wet, naked body.
“You won’t regret it,” she said close to his ear. And just as suddenly as she’d pressed herself against him, she was gone.
Cole almost tripped on his own feet as he hurried from the bathroom and closed the door. He stood there for a few seconds, trying to get the image of a naked woman hugging him out of his mind. He was the one trying to unsettle her, remove her from her comfort zone, not the other way around. How was it then that she managed to tilt his world off center?
He shook his head and told himself he was fine, that she had no affect on him at all. Turning away from the bathroom door, he took a few steps and walked straight into a wall.
* * *
When Cole disappeared into the bathroom for his own shower, Anthea returned to the veranda, found her missing cell phone and discovered the battery had finally given up. With little hope that Cole owned a charger, she found a landline phone on the wall in the kitchen. Conveniently taped to the wall above the phone, a list of speed dial assignments told her number one was for Doctor. As she listened to the phone ring, she realized the list was for anyone who stopped by and needed to call for help in the event that something had happened to Cole. Exactly what she was doing.
After explaining the situation to the receptionist, who assured her that the doctor knew Cole well and would be out to the farm in less than an hour, Anthea decided to explore her new lodgings.
She wheeled her suitcase along the hallway and took a right. The first door opened into a laundry. The second opened into a room that contained nothing but a closet, and the third door was locked. Stomping her foot in frustration, she turned to find the dog watching her.
“Are you kidding me? Where am I supposed to sleep?”
The dog simply cocked its head. She rolled her suitcase into the spare room, opened the closet and, apart from a number of coat hangers, found it bare. After unpacking her clothes, she wandered down the hallway and heard the shower running over the blare of the radio.
“Way over two minutes,” she told the dog as it followed her into the living room.
She stopped at a CD collection, surprised by the number of albums he had that she herself owned. He was obviously a man of good taste.
Next, she noticed the television. Not so impressive. An old twenty-inch analog set.
Moving
on, she stopped at the bookcase. While some old novels lined the top shelf, the other shelves held audiobooks. Well, that made sense, she thought as she checked the titles at eye level and discovered most were mainstream bestsellers.
As she was about to move on, the titles on a lower shelf caught her eye. She knelt, pulled an audiobook from the shelf and stared at it. After a moment, she glanced at the dog with confusion.
“Love of a Lifetime?”
She pulled out another and another.
“Hope of the Heart? Only the Lonely?”
Romance novels? What on earth was a macho man like Cole doing with romance novels?
And then it hit her. Hit her so powerfully, she sat on her behind and stared at the shelf packed with similar titles. Cole Daniel was lonely. That was the only reasonable explanation. He listened to romances to experience how it felt to find love, to be in a relationship. But surely he already knew? Didn’t he?
Feeling as if she’d stepped over some invisible line into Cole’s private world, Anthea quickly returned the audiobooks to the shelf.
As she waited on the veranda for the doctor to arrive, her mind kept drifting to the those romance novels and everything they seemed to be telling her about the man she once had a schoolgirl crush on. Had he never found someone to love? And if not, why? Surely not because he was blind. He certainly didn’t let that stop him from doing anything else.
Before she could contemplate it further, headlights turned into the long driveway and traveled toward the house. A black SUV pulled to a stop and the driver’s door opened.
And out stepped Karin Hayes with a medical bag in tow.
Anthea frowned in confusion. When Karin slammed the car door and turned, the faintest flicker of a smile passed over her face before she bit her lip and climbed the steps.
Anthea met her at the top of the steps. “You’re a doctor? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You didn’t ask. So, why are you here?”
Anthea blinked in confusion. “You…you’re the one who suggested it.”
Karin stared at her in an almost-convincing display of disbelief. “I never suggested any such thing. I told you, you’re the last person in the world he’d want anywhere near him.”
What was Karin playing at? Whatever it was, did it really matter? Not wanting to argue, she said, “I know, okay. That’s why I’m not telling him who I am.”
Karin bit her lip as she strode to the screen door. Anthea grabbed her arm.
“Karin, please. All I want is to do some research. And that means I have to help him out, right? So we both win.”
“Life isn’t all about getting your own way,” Karin said as she brushed off her hand and stepped inside.
Knowing her whole plan was about to be shot down in flames, a plan that she had mistakenly thought Karin had encouraged, Anthea’s shoulders slumped. She couldn’t control what Karin told Cole, but she could control her own behavior. Cole had asked her to cook dinner, so she’d damn well do just that. If he forced her to leave while she was halfway through, then she’d just have to live with it.
* * *
When Cole emerged from the bathroom, Karin’s greeting came as a surprise. Apparently, Anthea Cane cared enough about his injury to call a doctor. But that couldn’t possibly be the case—she just had ulterior motives. Like sucking up to him so he wouldn’t change his mind and kick her out.
After Karin ushered him into his bedroom and closed the door, she pounced.
“What on earth is she doing here?” she demanded.
“I’m letting her stay.”
“Are you out of your mind?”
He heard Karin dump her medical bag on the floor. A moment later, her hand closed around his arm and she marched him to the bed. He sat.
“I’m not out of my mind,” he said.
“What sane person lets a stranger stay in their home?”
Wait a minute. Of all the people on the planet who’d recognize Anthea Cane, wouldn’t Karin? How could she not know? Unless Anthea had somehow disguised herself. Was that it?
“Karin. I know who she is. She might have told me her name’s Anne Sugar—and I’m not letting on that I know otherwise—but that woman is Anthea Cane. Don’t you recognize her?”
Karin remained silent. After a moment, he heard her rifling through her medical bag. Then she took his injured hand and unwrapped the bandage.
“I don’t understand. If she gave you some fake name, how did you—”
“I just happened to answer her cell phone when she wasn’t around.”
“Okay. But that doesn’t explain why you’re letting her stay,” she said. “Now hold still.”
Something cold and wet stung the cut on his palm. “I know it seems crazy. And yeah, my first instinct was to kick her out, but—”
“She’s Anthea Cane, Cole. I know you haven’t forgotten what she put you through when we were kids.” He heard her moving things in her bag again, then she said, “This is going to sting a little. Are you ready?”
He gave a nod. A second later he felt the prick of a needle and clenched his teeth as the anesthetic entered the wound.
“I haven’t forgotten,” he said as she eased the needle out.
“Did you know she’s hiding because the tabloids claim she had an affair with a married man and—”
“No, she didn’t,” he interrupted. “Whoever it was on her phone said the whole thing had been exposed as a lie. Publicity or something.”
“I’m going to start stitching.”
He nodded, felt the pressure of the needle on his palm, but no pain.
Karin sighed as she worked. “Well, even if she’s not a home-wrecker, are you positive you should let her stay? I would have thought that the last thing you’d want to do is give into her wishes.”
Cole blinked with confusion. Karin’s words didn’t seem to match the soft, compliant tone of her voice, a tone that suggested she was hoping she was wrong. But that made no sense. “I’m only letting her think she’s getting her way,” he explained. “I’m actually the one getting my way. Don’t you see? To have an opportunity like this… Maybe I just want to have a little fun with her.”
Karin’s busy fingers stopped moving against his hand. He knew she was looking at him, he just didn’t know whether she was surprised or horrified. Was he doing a terrible thing?
“Hmm, you want to have fun with her?” she finally said, “That sounds very interesting.”
It didn’t take a genius to detect the suggestive undertone in her response. His defenses instantly kicked into gear.
“That’s not what—I’m talking about giving her a little payback, about making her feel the way she made me feel… How can I pass up a chance like this?”
Karin seemed to think about that as she placed a gauze pad over the stitches and wrapped his hand with a bandage.
“You do realize that you have zero experience in such matters,” she said, but he heard a hint of approval in her voice, and maybe even a smile.
He shrugged. “Doesn’t mean I can’t give it a shot. I’ve already thought of a few ideas.”
Karin dropped things into her medical bag and snapped it shut. “Such as?”
“There’s my annual barbie in a few weeks. If she wants to keep her identity secret, she won’t want to be seen. Being excluded, being ignored…she won’t like that.”
“You’re right. That’ll drive her nuts.” He could definitely hear the smile in Karin’s voice. “But that’s two weeks away. What else do you have planned?”
Not only did Karin apparently approve of his plan, she seemed absolutely thrilled by the idea. And he knew exactly why. Karin often talked with him about Anthea when she was mentioned in the media, telling him how proud she was of Anthea’s success, but also remembering how much it ha
d hurt when her best friend left town and never contacted her again. Even so, Anthea’s success had driven her to make something of her own life.
He’d been surprised when she’d returned to Mayfield after becoming a doctor, but she soon explained that she couldn’t find a place that made her feel at home the way she did here. Although, there had been one sour note to her return. She had expected everyone to appreciate her achievement and her return to service the community she loved, but the only thing people wanted to know was what she knew about Anthea Cane. When had she last heard from her? Would she be coming to visit her hometown? Not only did their incessant questions confirm that they were much more interested in Anthea’s fame rather than the family practice Karin was building, but every time someone asked her such a question, it brought up the painful memory of her best friend abandoning her. And it obviously still hurt. What other reason could there be for her enthusiasm?
“Tell everyone she’s here. Let them in on it,” he said.
“What’re you talking about? If they know, they’ll spill the beans and ruin everything.”
“These are the people who think she’s Miss Wonderful, right? So, if they believe she’s the type of actress who needs to stay in character to do her research, if they think she’ll be really upset if they don’t go along with the role she’s playing, then they wouldn’t dare ruin it for her.”