by Cathie Linz
A few minutes later, she was on the third-floor landing, in front of David’s apartment. Her knock on his door went unanswered at first. So she pounded harder. Finally, she heard the locks being undone. A second later she nearly came undone as he stood there wearing nothing more than navy gym shorts and a guilty grin.
4
“DID I WAKE YOU UP?” he asked with a blink of his gorgeous blue eyes.
She refused to be impressed. “Whatever gave you that idea?” she drawled mockingly. “The fact that it’s barely five in the morning?” Barely was the operative word here. His chest was bare, allowing her to see the well-formed muscles highlighted by a sheen of sweat.
He was leanly built, but solid. And he wasn’t overly hairy. His legs were bare. Even his knees were great, not knobby like most guys she knew. But then most guys she knew weren’t doing…whatever it was he’d been doing to wake her up in the first place. “You’re making enough noise up here to wake the dead.”
“I was exercising,” he said.
“Alone?” she asked, not sure what constituted “exercising” in his book.
“Yes, alone.” Grabbing a nearby towel, he absently wiped the sheen of sweat from his chest “Why?”
“It sounded like there was a herd of elephants up here. What were you doing?”
“Jumping jacks.”
Must be his fire department background, she decided. Only men in uniform did jumping jacks. Or, in David’s case, men out of uniform. “Try tai chi instead,” she suggested. “It’s quieter.”
“Tie who?” He frowned.
“Tai chi. An ancient Chinese form of exercise for the mind and body.” At his blank look, she muttered, “Forget it. Remember this instead. I’m sleeping right beneath you.”
Not the best way of putting it, she belatedly realized. The image her words had evoked was much more seductive than she would have liked. Hurriedly scanning his face and seeing the passionate intensity of his expression, she suspected he was sharing a similar vision—of her sleeping beneath him, their legs tangled, his weight resting against her like a sexy comforter.
She saw his blue eyes darken, making her very much aware that he was standing there half-naked while she was a mere two feet away still wearing her nightie under her sweatshirt and pants. She was acutely aware of the sensual silk rubbing against her skin as he looked at her as if he could see beneath her clothing, making her tingle from the inside out.
Startled, she took a quick step back, almost tripping on the overly long hem of her droopy sweatpants. Tugging up the waistband may not have been the classiest move, but it brought her back to reality as she lifted her chin in a don’t-mess-with-me move. She just needed more sleep, that was her problem. “No more jumping around up here or I’ll have to complain to our landlady.”
“I’ve known my grandmother longer than you have,” he said. “What do you think she’ll do to me? Ground me?”
“No, I think she’ll give you one of those reprimanding looks that lets you know you’re in the doghouse without her saying a word.”
To her surprise he actually grinned. He didn’t look half-bad when he did that. Okay, so he looked pretty damn good. Not that she was impressed. She was too smart for that “Hey, was that a flash of a dimple I saw?” she teased him. “Naw, must be sleep deprivation giving me hallucinations.”
He responded by leaning forward to flick his white towel at her.
She quickly stepped out of range while warning, “Watch it, buster!” She wagged her index finger at him. “I’m a master towel swatter. You don’t want to mess with me. I grew up with two brothers, so my dad taught me how to protect myself.”
“With shaving cream and towel swatting?”
“Among other things.” A huge yawn caught her unawares, reminding her of her purpose in coming to his door. Not to ogle him, but to keep him quiet. “I need more sleep, so do me a favor and keep your Arnold Schwarzenegger impressions confined to the respectable hours between noon and midnight” She yawned once more before growling ô la Arnold, “Hasta la vista, baby.”
As David watched her amble downstairs, he couldn’t take his eyes off her. He’d never met a woman like her. She certainly had her own way of doing things, and just when he thought he had her pegged, she’d throw him a curveball.
He’d already had a buddy at the police department run a background check on Anastasia. She had one arrest four years ago. She’d been detained, along with twenty other demonstrators, at a sit-in protesting the demolition of a historic building. But that didn’t mean she was innocent of any wrongdoing in the meantime. It could just mean that she was too smart to get caught. Yet.
He aimed on changing that. Starting with their picnic later today.
DAVID CHECKED his watch to make sure it was six o’clock on the money. Only then did he lift his hand to knock on Anastasia’s front door. But before his knuckles made contact with the wood, the door was yanked open and a wild-eyed Anastasia came rushing out, almost knocking him over in her haste to race downstairs.
“Hey!” Concerned, he rushed after her. “Are you okay?”
She didn’t answer and he didn’t catch up with her until they were outside, where he found her in the back, by the gravel alley that ran behind the building. She was acting very strangely, turning around in quick circles and nearly tumbling into a line of skinny shrubs as she did so.
“What is this, that tai chi you were talking about? Are you trying to appease the picnic gods or something?” he inquired.
“I’m trying to confuse the mouse,” she replied breathlessly.
“Right.” The woman was crazy. “It’s watching you from the bushes?”
“No, it’s right in here.” She shoved the mousetrap at him, making him hurriedly back up. It was well-known in the department that he was no fan of mice, or rats, either, for that matter. They gave him the creeps.
“You keep mice?” His voice was raspy as he tried to hide his sweaty palms behind his back.
“No, I’m trying to get rid of it. I’m turning in circles to disorient it so it won’t run right back inside.” She spun around again then opened the trap and let a dizzy mouse scramble out. Once free, it made an unsteady path toward the garage on the opposite side of the alley.
“Why don’t you just kill it?” he demanded. “That would stop it from running back inside.”
“My brother Ryan had a white mouse as a pet when we were kids, so I can’t kill a mouse without remembering Pescado.”
“Pescado?” He frowned. “He had a mouse named Pescado? That’s Spanish for fish not mouse.”
“I know and so did Ryan, But my brother is perverse that way.”
“If you can’t kill the mouse, then get a cat and let it do the nasty deed.”
“I have a cat,” she replied, leaning down to pick up the now-vacated humane trap. “Her name is Xena. But she’s afraid of mice.”
“What kind of cat is afraid of mice?”
She glared at him, daring him to insult her pet. “My kind.”
“Figures,” he muttered.
“What’s that mean?”
“You don’t do anything normally.”
“Normally, I do a great deal.”
It was his turn to glare. He didn’t appreciate having his words turned back on him in a grammatical tugof-war. “You know what I mean.”
“If you were attempting to compliment me on my uniqueness, then I thank you,” she said with a regal air that was soon ruined by her teasing grin. “If it was anything else, I’d say you were in for a rough evening. Remember that I’ll be providing the food, and you don’t want to aggravate the cook.”
“You cooked?”
“Yes, I cooked. Lower your eyebrows. You don’t have to look and sound so surprised about it. I’m a fairly good cook.” Glancing at her Swiss railway watch, she said, “We really should get going, we don’t want to be late.”
Late? he wondered. For a picnic? A second later she was racing back upstairs. Hanging out with her w
as exercise enough, David decided as he hurried after her. While doing so, he couldn’t help noticing and appreciating the way her floral sundress clung to her body in all the right places. She wore a white shirt over top of it, the shirttail tied in a knot around her waist.
She didn’t have that skinny flat look that seemed so popular these days. She was more a throwback to Marilyn Monroe. Especially when the full skirt on her dress swirled up around her great legs as she swung around the newel post going two-forty.
By the time he entered her apartment, she was waiting for him. He took a quick look around but only had time to notice that she didn’t have much furniture in the room, two flowery stuffed chairs instead of a couch and a wildly colorful strange-looking table. Then his attention turned to the paraphernalia on the floor beside her.
“What is all this?” he asked, suspiciously eyeing the things she’d gathered. “We’re only going on a picnic, not a trek in the jungle for a month.”
She reassuringly patted his arm the way Claire often did. “We’ll need every bit of this, trust me.”
That was the problem. He couldn’t completely trust her and he couldn’t get her out of his mind. He’d heard that the best con artists oozed charm. How about sex appeal? She had plenty of that, too. What was she up to?
“Where exactly are we going?” he asked as he hefted two lawn chairs and a huge plastic cooler.
“Ravinia.” She added a long skinny bag beneath his arm. “Have you ever been there?”
He paused. “Don’t they play music or something there?”
“Or something,” she agreed, tucking her long hair behind one ear as she grabbed two more tote bags. “It’s the summer home for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.”
“I suppose it’s too much to hope that a David Bowie concert is playing tonight.”
“Relax.” Another pat, this time on his back. “You’re going to have a great time.”
“Why are you so worried about me having a good time?”
“Because I think you don’t do it enough. Is it okay if we use your Blazer? It holds more than my little red Triumph.”
So that spiffy sports car parked out front was hers? What kind of librarian drove a car like that? Before meeting her, he thought they all wore orthopedic shoes and hairnets, and drove sedate sedans. Looking at her sexy purple sandals, he realized that he had a lot to learn about librarians and a lot more to learn about Anastasia in particular. And with a jolt, he realized he really wanted to know.
THEIR CONVERSATION was easygoing as they drove to the nearby suburb of Highland Park, home of the Ravinia Festival. It wasn’t a long drive. David was surprised at the number of people who were in the parking lot ahead of them. Many trekked their stuff into the park using luggage carts or kids’ red wagons. Anastasia hemmed and hawed about where to settle before finally choosing what she called the perfect spot—on the lawn beneath a stand of oak trees, close enough to the covered pavilion to be able to see the orchestra, or so she told him.
David didn’t care about seeing musicians, he wanted to see some food. He was starving. But apparently Anastasia had a routine to follow first. He helped her lay down a blanket on top of what looked like a plastic tarp. After unfolding the two lawn chairs, she handed him the long skinny bag with the request, “Would you put this together for me, please?”
Wondering if this was some kind of trick question or test, he said, “What is it?”
“A table.”
Five minutes later, he said, “I hate to tell you this, but someone has trashed your table. They’ve cut the legs short.”
“They’re supposed to be short,” she replied as she arranged a pastel tablecloth on it before adding several turquoise candles in glass holders.
“Why?”
“To make it easier to carry.”
As the one who’d had to haul the table, David had his doubts about short legs being any easier. “Seems like a strange way of having a picnic to me.”
“Oh, so now you’re an expert on picnics?”
“I know enough.” Opening the plastic cooler, he peered inside. “I’m starving. Where’s the fried chicken?”
She shuddered. “Do you know what that does to your arteries?”
“I know what it does to my taste buds. I like fried chicken. And you should talk, I hear ice cream isn’t exactly artery friendly.”
“I’d rather have ice cream than fried chicken.”
“What kind of picnic has stunted tables, candles and no fried chicken?”
“Calm down. I’ve got plenty of goodies. Here, try some dip to get you started.” He went through that in about five minutes.
“Sorry to be such a pig.” He gave her a chagrined smile even as he licked a bit of soft cheese from his index finger. “It’s just that I haven’t eaten anything all day.”
“Here, have some more crackers.” She handed him the box. “Give me a minute to set up.” She pulled a glass vase and some fresh flowers from one of the tote bags. Using bottled water, she filled the vase and set it in the middle of the table.
“Seems like a lot of work for a picnic.”
“It’s a tradition here at Ravinia,” she informed him.
Looking around, David had to admit that they weren’t the only ones with a fancy layout.
“Okay, I’ve got some chilled avocado soup for the first course, followed by potato and beet salad, carrot salad, and…” Pulling a thermal case from the tote bag, she said, “Ta-da! Warm baked chicken. Plus some of your grandmother’s homemade pistachio ice cream for dessert.”
By the time the concert started at eight, he and Anastasia were sitting side by side on lawn chairs, and he was feeling more mellow. The food had been great, if unusual to a man more accustomed to eating takeout.
And she was right, most of the surrounding crowd did have candles set out on their blankets or tables, apparently as a deterrent to mosquitoes as well as for atmosphere. The classical music was loud and emotional, not something you could dance to, but it didn’t grate on his nerves. In fact, he sort of liked it.
He also liked the way couples made themselves comfortable on their blankets, women leaning their heads on their guys’ shoulders. David was about to suggest Anastasia join him on the blanket when she tapped him on the shoulder and nodded over her shoulder.
Turning, he saw the last remnants of a crimson sunset and the flickering of hundreds of candles to the farthest edges of the park.
“Nice, huh?” she whispered.
“Not bad,” he agreed.
Anastasia hoped that his words meant that he was finally having a good time. She’d been doubtful at first, but he seemed to have settled in just fine now. Maybe he’d been cranky earlier because he was hungry.
Normally, at this point in the evening, she’d stretch out on the blanket and wrap it around her as the night air turned a bit chilly. But David seemed like a picnictable or lawn-chair kind of guy, although the jeans and denim shirt he was wearing did give him the casual appearance of a man comfortable in his own skin. Maybe she’d misjudged him by thinking he couldn’t relax.
Instead of saying anything, she simply abandoned her lawn chair for the blanket, leaving it up to him whether or not to join her. He did, with surprising alacrity. He stretched out so close beside her that she could feel his body heat.
Feeling awkward, suddenly unsure where to put her arms and hands, she had to smile as David muttered something like “Stop wiggling” and scooted her closer. Her body was now pressed against his side, her head on his shoulder, his arm around her shoulder. It all felt amazingly right.
She barely had time to register that fact before the first raindrops began to fall. The clouds that had made the sunset so stunning were now overhead. A few wimps in the audience hurriedly gathered up their stuff and left, but a majority stayed and simply brought out the umbrellas.
Anastasia would have done that, too, but she’d left her umbrella at home.
“Don’t worry,” she reassured David as she sat up
and tugged the blanket and tarp out from under him. “I’m an experienced Ravinia-goer. I know what to do.”
“Leave?” he suggested hopefully.
“No.” She sat in a lawn chair, now placed directly on the grass, and patted the chair beside her. As David joined her, she handed him the opposite corner of the plastic tarp. He frowned at the ridiculously colorful penguins printed on it.
“It’s an old shower curtain,” she explained as she held the tarp over her head with one hand and spread the blanket over their knees with the other. “We can still listen to the music. Luckily, the rain held off until intermission. I love this next piece. It’s Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade.” Reading from the damp program in her hands, she said, “The Sultan Schahriar, convinced of the duplicity and infidelity of all women—male chauvinist pig that he is…”
David tried to read over her shoulder. “It says that?”
“Okay, I added the pig part,” she confessed. “Anyway, he vowed to slay each of his wives after his first night with them. The Sultana Scheherazade saved her life by telling the sultan a series of continuing stories over a period of a thousand and one nights. Overcome by curiosity, each day the monarch postponed her execution to hear the next part of the tale, until in the end he gave Scheherazade her life.”
David didn’t think it was a coincidence that Anastasia so loved Scheherazade. One storyteller relating to another. Even if she’d done nothing else wrong, she’d filled his grandmother’s head with unrealistic expectations and put Claire’s retirement security at risk. Clearly Anastasia was a bad influence. Why, just the other day, he’d actually caught his grandmother—a lifelong Lawrence Welk fan—listening and bouncing to Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” Anastasia’s influence, no doubt. Filling his grandmother with wild ideas.