Blaze

by Dale Mayer

  “Yeah, my mother doesn’t have that same fan base,” Camilla said. “I’m not trying to speak badly of her, but she has made a lot of enemies.”

  “They used to say in the military,” Blaze said, “you can judge a man by his enemies.”

  “Maybe,” she said. “But I’d rather judge a woman by her friends.”

  “I like that too,” he said.

  They continued to exchange small talk until the waitress arrived with a bread board and a basket holding a hot loaf and a ceramic bowl of whipped butter.

  Camilla lit up and reached for the bread the minute the waitress let go of it to leave their table. With the loaf in her hand, she said, “I was planning on sharing, you know?”

  He laughed. Great big belly laughs that she watched in fascination. “How about I cut it,” he said, “and then, if we really, truly finish it and need more, we can ask for another one?”

  “I’ve done that too,” she said, wrinkling her nose and leaning closer so only he could hear. “It’s really good bread.”

  He picked up the knife and cut the small loaf into six slices. “There you go, three for you and three for me.”

  She took three and moved them closer to her and then dipped her butter knife into the butter keeper. “I really love bread and butter,” she said. “My mother is forever telling me how it’s carbs and how I shouldn’t be eating them, but I gave up listening to her on that a long time ago.”

  “Carbs are a good source of energy,” Blaze said. “As long as you’re not watching your blood sugar levels, I don’t see why you shouldn’t be allowed to eat them. This looks like very good bread.” He picked up a slice and sniffed the warm center.

  “It is. They make it fresh here themselves. It’s sourdough from Mama’s old sourdough pot,” she said, biting in, sagging back into her seat and closing her eyes as she ate. When she opened her eyes, he was staring at her, an odd look on his face. She blushed. “Sorry,” she muttered, “but I really enjoy my food.”

  “Obviously,” he said, his voice low and husky. “That’s good to see.”

  She wasn’t sure what that meant, but the air had subtly changed between them. It had been a long time since she last had a boyfriend. When younger, every boyfriend she brought home her sisters deliberately finagled out of her life and into theirs. It was almost as if whatever Camilla had, her sisters had to have. The competition continued after she got her inheritance, even when her sisters had moved to California, but now the breakups were the result of her mother’s spies in town spreading gossip.

  Camilla shook her head. Basically she had always had this problem with her sisters—until they both married. But Camilla had been celibate for way too long, and something about this man, his voice, touched her emotional core. The look in his gaze as it reached deep inside her belly and found the responding heat she’d never expected was … surprising.

  She straightened, buttered the second slice before the waitress came back with the carafe of wine and filled their glasses before slipping away. Immediately Camilla picked hers up and had a big drink. She put down her wineglass and realized she had drunk half the glass. She looked to Blaze to see a smile at the corner of his lips. “I’m sorry,” she said abruptly.

  And again his eyebrow shot skyward. “What are you apologizing for now?”

  She frowned and said, “I don’t know, but I’m either fumbling and acting like a two-year-old or a spoiled brat, or … I just don’t know. It feels very awkward all of a sudden.”

  “How about we go back five minutes to where you weren’t feeling awkward.”

  Only five minutes ago, she felt a lot less awkward and a lot more heat. As in, if this restaurant had been empty, she might have crawled across this table and flattened him on the bench seat and had her way with him. Instantly that flashed through her mind, and she giggled.

  He chuckled. “Now I really want to know what you’re giggling about.”

  She shook her head. “Not happening,” she muttered, shoving a large bite of bread into her mouth, chewing like the good chipmunk she was. To Camilla’s relief, the waitress returned with large plates of food and promptly left. “It never ceases to amaze me how they can produce something like this time and time again, and it always tastes fantastic.”

  “Don’t you arrange events time and time again, and it always turns out fantastic?”

  She shook her head. “I try, and they’ll be varying degrees of fantastic, but always? No. Always seems to be that word that just doesn’t fit. It’ll be the flowers that get screwed up, or the music didn’t work out, or the speaker got sick or,” she said, “any number of things happen.”

  “I think that’s the same with cooking,” he said. “They’ll be short one can of tomatoes and use tomato paste instead. They’ll finish with one brand of pasta and open a second one. They’ll forget to salt the pot or not put enough in because they had to run and get another tub of salt.” He shrugged. “Yet none of it matters in the end result.” He looked down at his plate and smiled. “But they certainly didn’t chintz on the seafood.”

  She studied his something-green pasta and asked, “Is that spinach pasta?”

  “I hope so,” he said, “and there are mussels and prawns, and it looks like scallops all through it. And in a cream sauce too.” He dipped his fork into the cream sauce, tasted it and smiled. “With a bit of lemon and white pepper.”

  In spite of herself, she was intrigued. “I’m not terribly adventurous when it comes to food,” she admitted, “but that does look good.”

  He twisted a couple noodles of fettuccine on his fork and said, “Here. Try this.” And then he asked, “Scallop, mussel or prawn?”

  “Prawn,” she said.

  The prawns were massive, so he cut one in thirds, poked the end of it with his fork and handed over the fork.

  She hesitated and then shrugged. “My mother would, once again, be horrified.”

  “But your mother, once again, isn’t here,” he said gently.

  She grinned, snatched the fork from his hand and popped the whole thing in her mouth. She returned his fork as she sat back, giving her mouth a chance to taste what had gone in. And she loved it. “Okay, I’m coming back next week, and I’m having your dish,” she said.

  “Good,” he said. “And I’ll have yours.”

  “Or,” said the waitress, approaching them, “you can split your dishes half and half, and I’ll bring you two spare plates.” The waitress stopped and looked down at them. “You always have the same thing,” she lightly scolded Camilla. “It would do you good to have something like that for a change.”

  “He just gave me a bite,” Camilla said, nodding enthusiastically. “Oh, my gosh, it’s so good.”

  “It is, indeed,” the waitress said. “This time or next time?”

  Regretfully Camilla said, “Next time. You know I come in here often. Just remind me next time.”

  “Will do,” she said and hurried off to help somebody else.

  “We could do that, you know?” Blaze said. “Tonight.”

  She shook her head. “No. It gives me an excuse to come back again.”

  “With me too, I hope,” he asked with a woeful puppy-dog look as he admired her plate.

  She chuckled. “You can come back tomorrow,” she said. “I, on the other hand, will be putting together table settings and ornaments, and the front table all needs to be decorated.”

  “But you can’t decorate tomorrow, can you?”

  “No,” she said. “Sunday morning.”

  They ate in joyful silence, both speaking minimally as they enjoyed their meal.

  She was just about done when her phone rang. She glanced down and her eyebrow rose. “I wonder what that’s all about.”

  “Don’t you think it’s the wedding rehearsal done early?” he asked. “It is nine.”

  “That would be too much luck,” she said darkly. She answered the phone to hear Lizzie’s voice, overexcited still, on the other end.

  “Camil
la, somebody threw a rock through the window,” she cried. “We were right at the climactic moment,” she said with so much melodrama it easily carried across to Blaze, who stared, fascinated, at Camilla’s phone.

  Camilla sighed and whispered, “She’s very much a drama queen.”

  Lizzie continued, “I don’t know if we can have the wedding reception here.”

  Camilla’s heart froze. “What are you talking about?”

  “You don’t understand,” Lizzie cried out, “like, the window’s broken, smashed. It was horrible.”

  “Which window?” Camilla asked.

  “The front one, right where we were standing.”

  Camilla frowned. “I’m just finishing dinner. I can be there in about ten minutes,” she said. “I’ll come and take a look.”

  “We’ve already left,” Lizzie said. “I was way too upset to stay. So, we’re going for drinks now before our dinner. I definitely need the drinks.” She called out, “Ali, I want a few drinks first. My nerves are shot.”

  Lizzie, when she spoke again, was a little calmer. “You need to come up with a solution to this. I want my reception here. I don’t want to move it somewhere else.” And she hung up, just like that.

  Camilla shook her head and laid down her phone. “Let’s not even think about the fact I can’t possibly rent any other place on such short notice, and let’s blame the event planner for a hoodlum throwing rocks into the window when she wasn’t even at the window. She would have been at the fake altar at the back wall. That’s totally normal too, isn’t it?” She sagged back in her chair and looked over at him. “So, it’s back to work already.”

  Blaze had listened to that phone call, wincing at the demands the bride-to-be was making, wondering how Camilla could possibly want to work in this field. Of course she avoided weddings like a plague, and he could understand why. He couldn’t imagine being single and having all these weddings to arrange with all those wedding mamas looking at her and tsk-tsking because Camilla was not capable of finding her own man. Just that thought would make his own stomach revolt. If his father even mentioned once about Blaze finding a partner, he knew he’d shut down that conversation in no time. “If you’re ready,” he said, “I’ll go back with you.”

  “You don’t need to,” she said, gathering up her stuff. She looked over to see the waitress and raised her hand.

  He hid a small smile because he was pretty sure her mother wouldn’t like that I-need-the-check attitude of Camilla’s either.

  The waitress came with both checks, and, before Camilla could take hers, Blaze grabbed them both and placed a card down. “Charge them to my card, please.”

  Camilla hissed, “I can pay for my own.”

  “Yes, you can,” he said, “but I invited you out, and, if I invite a lady out for dinner, I pay,” he said firmly.

  That made her sit back. But she didn’t argue any further.

  He signed the slip, accepted the receipt from the waitress and then said, “We don’t want to forget the wine.” The carafe was mostly empty, but he poured the last bit into Camilla’s glass.

  She picked it up and tossed it off with a smirk. “I needed that.”

  The waitress returned with the remains of the bottle and the leftover food from dinner. He accepted it and said, “Come on, Camilla. Let’s take a look at the damage.”

  She led the way back outside. As soon as she was out of the restaurant, she turned on him and said, “You don’t have to come.”

  “Of course I don’t, but what kind of guy would I be if I didn’t, knowing the place was vandalized, it’s dark out, everybody else has left, and you’re checking it out alone? What if the hoodlum, as you called him, comes back?”

  “Then I’ll call the cops,” she said crossly. She took several steps forward and then stopped, her back stiffening. But then suddenly her shoulders sagged, and she turned, and she said, “I’m sorry. I’m being a bitch. I had a lovely time at dinner. And thank you so much.”

  The switch from irate woman to genteel lady was so fast it caught him by surprise. He handed her the rest of the bottle and the leftovers, saying, “You can finish these when you get home, but right now we’re heading to the center.”

  She nodded, hopped into her Mustang and took off.

  He followed slightly slower. The lady liked speed, but he’d had enough speed in his lifetime. He’d seen the results of what happened when metal smashed against hard surfaces, and he’d heard the screams as limbs were torn off and friends were caught in fires. He’d been out in too many raids with bad endings. He accepted life at a much slower pace now, and he welcomed it. He pulled into the parking lot as she was getting out of her car. He got out and called, “Wait.”

  At the front door, she turned to look at him. “Why?”

  “We should check the outside first.”

  She shrugged but was willing to let him take the lead. He walked to the obviously broken window. “You need to contact the landlord. See if we can get the window in tomorrow.”

  “Except the landlord, of course, won’t answer since it’s a weekend, and the window won’t get a chance to be replaced tomorrow.”

  “Maybe, but there’s another event, isn’t there? And they may not want that window busted like this or boarded up.”

  She nodded. “I never even thought of that.” She pulled out her cell phone, flicked through her contact list, hit the appropriate button and walked a few steps off to make the call.

  He, on the other hand, stopped to take a look. It appeared a rock had gone through the upper portion of the large front-facing window. Jagged glass remained attached to the frame. He studied the window frame, decided it would be a fairly simple job—for two guys—to replace just the glass pane if that density was available locally. He peered inside and could see the rock on the floor. It wasn’t a big rock. Therefore, either female or male could have hefted it. And it hadn’t flown across the room, so again it could have been either sex. Several rocks were in the nearby garden, so it wasn’t like the hoodlum was short on possible projectiles.

  Now for the main question—was this an act of random violence? It was a Friday night in a small town, and he’d seen lots of kids get caught up in the moment, causing destructive forces. Or was this against Lizzie and her wedding, or was it against the landlord who owned the building, or was it a nebulous connection to Camilla herself? And would the law care? He turned to see her still talking on the phone. He walked over to the front door and propped it open, searching for a light switch.

  With both double doors open, and the interior light on, he stopped at the entranceway and surveyed the damage. Again, it was just broken glass and a rock. Nothing inside had been damaged beyond a scratch on the hardwood floor. It was dark wood. If anybody had a walnut that could help hide the problem. He shoved his hands into his pockets and studied the interior. It appeared to be empty. His footsteps echoed in the dark. They had at least turned out the lights before they left. But he could see the flowers were still here, the ones that needed to be collected. He turned to look at Camilla’s small Mustang, considered the number of flowers and shook his head. “No way they’ll all fit.”

  She came up behind him and asked, “What won’t fit?”

  He motioned at the flowers. “All the flowers.”

  She frowned. “I have to get them to her place somehow. Maybe she’ll come and pick them up. Although I know she’s not happy about this in the first place.”

  “She likely already considered this issue. Call her now and see.”

  She shot him a disgusted look. “Doing that now,” she said. She stood on the step and called Wanda—he could hear that conversation too. Wanda would be there in the next ten to fifteen minutes.

  He started collecting the flowers at the farthest end but wasn’t sure if the vases were supposed to come too. As she walked toward him, he asked, “Is the whole decoration going or just the flowers themselves?”

  “The whole decoration,” she said, “so the urns and the va
ses, all up and down this main section.”

  “Kind of ruins it to see it already, doesn’t it?”

  “A full-dress rehearsal will only show a portion of what the wedding does. And, if the bride insists, they can have the full wedding flowers set up too,” she murmured. “Just whatever the bride wants.”

  “And does nobody else think that’s a huge waste of money?”

  “Sure, we all do, but it’s not our wedding,” she said, “and that’s where the difference is.”

  “I guess you’ve seen women turn from the nicest into the worstest,” he said, deliberately mucking up the word.

  “There’s a reason the term Bridezilla was coined,” she said over his chuckles. “But I’ve been basically lucky here, as my two brides have been pretty good. But it takes just one to remind you that you never, ever, ever want to do it again.”

  “And how is this one stacking up?”

  “Middle of the road,” she said, “except for this glass.”

  “What did the landlord say?”

  “He’s on his way. Depends if he can find somebody to fix it.”

  “Any auto glass place, if they do anything other than vehicles,” he corrected, “should be able to fix it. The frame isn’t damaged. The glass just needs to be removed and a new pane put in.”

  “So, like a new window?”

  “No,” he said, “a new pane of glass into the window frame.”

  She looked at him in surprise, glanced over at the window. “Are you sure?”

  He chuckled. “Yes, I’m sure it’s broken, but it’s not destroyed.”

  “That might be easier then.”

  “A lot easier, particularly if you know anybody who deals in glass.”

  “Maybe,” she said. “But I don’t know if he’s open tomorrow.”

  “The landlord might want to pay him extra to fix it first thing in the morning.”

  She nodded.

  “Something we can ask him, for sure. He won’t want to lose business,” Blaze said, “particularly when he’s got to fix this anyway. He might as well get it repaired and keep whatever business is booked tomorrow rather than losing the business and still having that expense.”