Joe realized he would never understand what her inability to walk had to do with her not wanting him to look at her. Stress had evidently short-wired her thought processes. She possibly even knew she wasn’t making sense, but she was caught in some sort of mental loop. He’d seen it before. Mostly in political debates. There would be no reasoning with her until the shock had worn off.
“Okay. Okay,” he said. “You tell me what you want me to do.”
She snuffled loudly. “Could you please bring me the blanket? Without looking?”
“I can try.” He started cautiously forward, sweeping his foot out in front of him as he went.
“A little more to the left.”
He went left.
“Not that much. There. Good. A few more feet. Straight. Almost…Stop.”
He stopped, the blanket still held up between them. “Now what?”
“Just, ah, throw it over me. Really gently. I’m right in front of you about three feet away.”
“Okay.” He held the blanket at arm’s length and tossed. It landed on her head and draped itself over her. “I’m looking now. You’re covered. Mostly.”
“It’s not big enough to cover all of me,” her muffled voice announced. “It’s the size of a shawl and it stinks of mildew.”
He considered. “Hold on. I have an idea.”
He reached into his pocket and took out the silver penknife he carried. Then he put one hand on top of her head.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“I’m going to cut a hole for your head,” he said. “Hold still.”
Gingerly, he plucked the blanket up a few inches above her head and slipped the pointed end of the blade into the material. The polyester didn’t offer any resistance; it sliced open like butter to a hot knife. He sawed a foot-long slit in the blanket and pocketed the knife. Then he reached down and tugged on the blanket until her head popped through the slit. She blinked up at him. She had pretty eyes, dark and luminous. Other than that, it would be hard to say what she looked like until someone turned a hose on her.
“Thanks,” she said and smiled. Okay, he thought. A very nice smile, too, even with the caked mud cracking on her cheeks.
“No problem,” he replied. “Now what?”
“If you could find me a nice sturdy stick I could use to walk, I’ll be fine.”
He looked at her, small and bedraggled and filthy, her legs scratched and bug bitten, barely covered by a GO VIKINGS lap rug. His shoulders slumped with the certainty of what he would have to do. He would have to touch her. It was so clearly his duty. Before she could protest, he bent down and, with what he considered a heroic disregard for his clothing, picked her up. She wiggled.
“Please stop writhing about,” he said as the aroma of lake bottom met his nose. “My shirt is a lost cause, but I still hold out a slim hope that my pants can be saved.”
She gave a little offended gasp but stopped wiggling.
“Now, I’m going to take you to the car and drive you wherever you want to go.” His tone brooked no argument and he got none. He straightened. Slowly. She was heavier than she looked.
“How much do you weigh?” he asked, fervently hoping his back didn’t go out.
“I’m dense,” she said coldly. “My specific gravity is higher than other people’s. And I didn’t ask you to pick me up.”
“You’re welcome.” He made it upright without feeling any back muscles give and bounced her into a more comfortable position. Thank God, the car was only twenty feet away.
He stumbled out of the brush toward the car. He did play it up (a bit) because she was so noticeably lacking in the gratitude department. He stopped halfway to the car, panting noisily. “I’m okay. I’m…fine. I’m just glad…I could…be…of service.”
“Look, if you’re going to have a heart attack, I can hop.” Her tone was stiff, but her expression was worried.
“No,” he gulped.
“Listen, I can’t drag you into that car, and even if I could, the hospital is half an hour away. Let me down.”
“I got it.” He staggered the last ten feet and lowered (dropped) her to the ground.
She lifted her injured foot, bracing herself against the car as Joe opened the back door. She pivoted, plunked down, and pulled her legs in after her. He shut the door and got into the driver’s side, glancing into the rearview mirror as he slid behind the wheel.
“So, where to?” he asked. “Hospital? Home?”
She met his gaze in the mirror and her eyes narrowed. “How come you’re not panting anymore?”
“The doctors tell me I have a really impressive recovery rate,” he said, eyes on the road as he turned over the engine and shifted the car into gear.
“You were faking the groans.”
“Not faking. Exaggerating,” he said. “I did consider faking an attack and letting you perform CPR, but I have delicate ribs.”
She laughed. He looked up into the mirror in surprise.
“I suppose I would have deserved it,” she said. “Let me try to redeem myself.” She cleared her throat. “Thank you very much for rescuing me. You’re a true white knight and I’ve been acting more like the dragon than the damsel. Looking more like the dragon, too. Scales and all.”
He smiled back. “Ah, damsels are overrated. How often do you get to pick up a woman with a higher-than-average specific gravity?”
“True,” she said without missing a beat.
He grinned, enjoying himself in a way he hadn’t for a long time. He’d never really thought much about it, but right now he was struck by the fact that for all its ostensible glamour—the exotic locales, the various cultures, power and wealth—the life he led might be a bit, well, boring. Most of his time was pretty tightly scheduled, he met few people in a strictly social way, and he had few experiences either socially or work related that he didn’t fully anticipate. This place, this situation, but most of all this woman were completely unanticipated.
He turned his head. “I’m Joe.”
“Hello, Joe.” She trailed the name out à la Lauren Bacall. “I’m Mimi.”
“Mimi.” He liked it. “Where can I take you, Mimi?”
“If you just follow this road another quarter mile you’ll come to a Y. Keep to the right and in another few hundred feet I’ll be home.”
“You sure you shouldn’t have a doctor take out that thorn? It might get infected.” You could never be too careful about open wounds.
“Oh, there’ll be some docs at the picnic. True, they’ll be veterinarians, but a thorn’s a thorn, right? Everyone on the lake and half the people from Fawn Creek’ll be there.”
Joe wondered whether Prescott would be there, too. From what Mimi described, this picnic had to be very close to his house.
“Sure?”
“Absolutely. Believe me, I won’t lack for attention.”
No, he shouldn’t think so, he mused as he drove the short distance. As the mud and weeds began to flake off, a nice set of features was emerging. Not classically beautiful, not cute, but oddly attractive.
He followed the Y she described to a narrow, rutted drive lined on both sides with cars and pickups and a few SUVs. Groups of people and flocks of children were passing back and forth through a row of little, dilapidated cabins.
“Told you everyone would be here,” Mimi said. “Pull off here. See the cottage at the far end? The one with the striped beach towel hanging outside the front window? If you could pull your car up really, really close to the door, I can dash in before anyone sees me.”
“You got it,” Joe said, bumping over tree roots and hummocks until the back door of the car was parallel to the screened door on the cabin Mimi had pointed out. He put his arm over the back of the seat and turned to look at her. “There you go.”
“Thanks, Joe,” she said. He wondered what her hair would look like without the shrubbery. “You saved the day. I owe you.”
“My pleasure, Mimi.” Surprisingly, he wasn’t overstating
the matter. Sure, he could have done without the dirt, but he had been richly diverted for a short while.
She pushed the car door open and swung her legs out, putting her injured foot gingerly on the ground. She winced.
“Do you need some help getting in?” Joe asked.
“No. I’ll be fine as soon as I get a pair of tweezers in my hand.” She smiled. “I appreciate the offer this time, though.”
She prepared to bolt, but then stopped. She turned her head to look at him.
“Are you hungry?” she asked.
“Ah…I…Sure.”
“If you’ll wait here while I get this two-by-four out of my foot and clean up a little, I can promise you the best homemade picnic fare you’re ever likely to have. How about letting me repay you a little for your kindness?”
Joe looked down at his shirt. “I’m not company ready. I’m a mess.”
“No one will notice,” Mimi promised. “Not here. Besides, most of the dark splotches were just water and it’s almost dried now.”
Joe considered, which in itself was surprising. Joe was not the sort of man who appeared in public in a dirty shirt. But the shirt wasn’t really that dirty, and as Mimi had pointed out, as it dried the stains were less noticeable, and he was hungry. He’d just be very careful of which home-prepared foods he chose.
Besides, it wasn’t as if Prescott were waiting for him with bated breath. Most likely he’d forgotten Joe was coming. Prescott might not even be there himself. Once Joe had visited Prescott at MIT, where Prescott taught, only to be greeted by a note on his apartment door that said Prescott had gone to New York for the weekend. Prescott had neglected to leave a key.
“What do you say?” Mimi asked.
“Is there somewhere I can wash my hands?”
“You bet.”
Chapter Four
After digging a half-inch-long thorn from her heel, washing her hair, and scrubbing herself clean, Mimi looked for something to wear. Unfortunately, she hadn’t driven into Fawn Creek to do laundry in more than a week. She tried on the sweatshirt and pants she’d worn while scraping the grills that morning, but even by her admittedly relaxed standards the greasy streaks were off-putting. The rest of her clothes were in no better shape. It had been that kind of week.
Finally, in desperation, she’d searched the crawl space above the cottage and hit pay dirt: a long-forgotten beach bag filled with teenagers’ beach wear. The girl who’d worn the clothes might well be a grandmother by now, but Mimi didn’t care. They didn’t smell, they weren’t dirty, ergo they were fit for a picnic. She held up a violently blue terry cloth beach robe with orange starfish embroidered along the yoke and slipped it over her head, then hobbled out in search of her rescuer. She found him standing a short distance from the picnic tables, eyeing the feast spread out on them.
She eyed Joe.
He was absolutely gorgeous in a Fortune 500 sort of way, handsome, sophisticated, and really well-groomed. His dark hair gleamed; his blue eyes gleamed; his square jaw, shaved as smooth as a river stone, gleamed; even his blue dress shirt gleamed with the soft sheen of really expensive Egyptian cotton—where it wasn’t splotched with faintly damp green marks.
In the Land of Ten Thousand Cabela’s catalogues, by dress alone he stood out like a rainbow trout amongst bullheads. His shirt cuffs were rolled up over nice masculine forearms in what she suspected was his nod to “casual,” his camel-colored slacks had a crease in them, and his loafers—doubtless made by some Italian in a little workshop in Florence—looked as soft as butter. She guessed him to be in his early forties, a solid, broad-shouldered man who not only made Armani look good, but even stripped of his couture, she suspected, wouldn’t be anyone you’d be in a hurry to throw a stadium blanket over, either.
Not only did he look good, but he oozed confidence, sophistication, and composure. Lots of composure. In other words, the guy was Cary Grant. Cary Grant on the set of The Beverly Hillbillies. Which, she supposed, made her Ellie Mae—with a few more years behind her.
She must have looked like a complete madwoman, popping up like the creature from the black lagoon on the other side of the poor man’s car and then running away like an idiot. Luckily, she’d never been burdened with much self-consciousness.
“Hi.”
He looked around and smiled. He had a killer smile. It reached right up into his eyes.
“Hi. You’re clean.”
“Soap’ll do that.”
She’d always had a thing for a really good male voice, and Joe had one of the sexiest she’d heard, the sort of voice that affected your body at the cellular level, like twenty-year-old Scotch: smoky, smooth, and intoxicating.
“Someone left it here,” Mimi said, seeing his gaze slip to the smiling starfish romping across her chest. “Mid-seventies, I’d say.”
He looked down at her feet encased in worn, cheap pink flip-flops. She’d wrapped her foot in gauze and secured it with sticky tape. Both foot and gauze were already a little grimy.
“Is your foot okay?” he asked.
“Fine. I popped that thorn out like a pit from a ripe cherry. You know how those things are: the instant they’re gone, you feel better.”
A look of alarm crossed his face. “You didn’t use your fingers, did you? I mean you did sterilize a needle or something?”
She looked at him with amusement. Joe was a germaphobe? Cute. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I fired up the Bic and put flame to metal until it was so hot I dropped the damn tweezers on the floor.”
At his involuntary wince, she laughed. “I’m messing with you,” she admitted, succeeding in making Joe look even more disconcerted. She suspected not many people “messed” with Joe. “How about I take you on a culinary tour of the place?”
She led him between the picnic tables, their faded red-and-white-checkered tablecloths billowing around their legs. At least a hundred people milled around the grounds, strolling along the paths, settled in cheap lawn chairs in front of the cabins, or ensconced within their small screened porches. A group was playing volleyball on the beach, swearing and laughing as those on the sidelines cheered.
Mimi’s favorite cousin, a blond giant named Gerald who’d been tormenting her since childhood, hollered at her to join them, and she hollered back good-naturedly, “Can’t you see I’m limping? There’s a reason I’m limping! I’m injured! Geesh!”
She looked over her shoulder at Joe. “I can’t spike, but I can dig.”
“Me, too.”
She glanced at him sharply, uncertain whether he was now messing with her. He didn’t look like the pickup-game sort. The type who had a personal trainer, yes. Maybe polo. Not beach volleyball.
She brought him to a halt in front of a fragrant, rubicund pile of thinly sliced, garlicky-smelling meat. “I suggest starting with a sandwich.”
Joe regarded her with an oddly uncomfortable expression before carefully surveying the bounty in front of him. Then, just as cautiously, he picked up a plate and speared a slice of spiral-cut ham. Mimi regarded him with pity. With all the spectacular homemade cuisine staring him in the face, he would have to choose that.
“Ah, just so you aren’t disappointed, that ham is”—she glanced swiftly left and right, looking for eavesdroppers, then leaned over the tray of deviled eggs between them and whispered—“water packed.”
“Water packed,” he repeated.
“Yup. Johanna’s been sticking cloves in commercial hams for years and passing them off as her own.”
“Johanna?”
“One of my great-aunts,” she said. “Everyone knows, but no one says anything. No, no,” she said as he withdrew his poised fork. “You can’t put it back! She’s watching. You don’t want to hurt her feelings, do you? Put it on the plate. Good. Now cut off a piece as if you can’t wait. Now smack your lips. Go on, smack them!” she whispered urgently.
He smacked, eyeing Mimi cautiously as she nodded approvingly.
“There. You’ve made her happy. Now le
t me make you a real sandwich.” She slapped down two slices of rye bread on a Chinette plate and heaped the homemade corned beef on one slice before handing the plate to Joe.
A movement at her feet drew her attention. She looked down in time to see a small, hairy, dirty brown face poke out from under the table. It was the same ugly little dog she and Birgie had spied earlier chasing the splotchball assassin. Joe tore a piece of corned beef from the edge of his sandwich and dropped it. The dog snatched it out of the air and disappeared.
“Your dog?” Joe asked.
“No, I don’t know whose it is,” she said, casually uncovering the top of his sandwich and ladling on a creamy sauce. “Horseradish,” she said in answer to his questioning look. “Homemade. Really good.”
“Ah-huh.” He smiled and took a tentative bite. The uneasy expression disappeared, replaced by one of rapture. “I can’t tell you the last time I had anything homemade,” he said. “This is…It’s…”
“Just eat,” she said.
He ate.
“So, is this a yearly ritual?” he asked curiously after finishing the sandwich.
“God, I hope not,” she answered, laughing.
“Why?”
“Because this is a wake.”
Chapter Five
“A wake?” Joe asked, pointedly eyeing the manically grinning orange starfish. “Interesting wake-wear you have on there. Most people just go the easy route and opt for black.”
She laughed. “It’s not supposed to be a solemn occasion. Ardis would have hated that.”
She cleaned up well, Joe thought. Really well. “Who is Ardis?” he asked.
“One of my great-aunts, Ardis Olson.” Some fond memory awoke a fleeting smile. “She would have been eighty-five today.”
“That’s a pretty long life.”
“It would have been a longer life still if she hadn’t tried to squeeze in another nine holes of golf.”
“Stroke?” he asked quietly.
“Nine iron,” she replied. “Her partner nailed her with a Titleist on the fourteenth hole of the Pelican Strand golf course while she was in the rough, searching for her ball.”
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