by Beth Andrews
God save him from interfering old ladies.
She watched him, an expectant gleam in her eyes. He sighed. What would it hurt to play along? The sooner she said her piece, the sooner he would have peace.
“Why do you carry those bottles around with you? To remind you of what you can’t have?”
“And to remind me of how empty my life will be if I start drinking again.”
He rubbed his palms back and forth over his thighs. “Why bring this up now?”
“Audrey expressed some concerns after the party last night.”
“Wait, she followed me around? She spied on me?”
“We prefer to call it an ‘affectionate hover.’ We all care about you, Joe. We’ve been concerned for a while, now.”
He grunted. “Okay, so what did your spy tell you?”
“That you started drinking heavily about a year ago when you thought Allison didn’t care. And now you’re drinking heavily because she does. Kind of a losing proposition, don’t you think?”
She didn’t really want to know what he thought, but he was going to tell her anyway.
“What I think is that this is none of your business, June, and you should have better things to do with your time. I know I do. Just because I like to drink doesn’t mean I’m an alcoholic.” He opened his door.
She rummaged in her purse again, pulled out a brochure and held it out. “Humor an old lady.”
She really was chapping his balls. He grabbed the brochure and slapped it against his palm. “Is there some kind of covenant against drinking? Some Castle Creek bylaw I’m breaking? I don’t drink and drive, I don’t have a wife to beat in a drunken rage—who exactly am I hurting?”
She smiled softly, leaned over and patted his cheek. “The most important person in the world, Joseph. Yourself.”
* * *
WITHIN HALF AN HOUR Allison had learned the number of breeds of dairy cattle there were (six), how many gallons of milk the average cow produced per day (six to seven), and how to put cow manure to good use. Not only did Ivy sell it as compost to Joe’s friend Parker who owned a greenhouse business, but she also let the manure dry so it could be used as a bedding similar to sawdust. To top it all off, Allison had also heard way too much about artificial insemination. So when her hostess took pity on her and suggested a walk, Allison practically leaped out of her chair.
The sun was bright but friendly, the air fragrant with moist earth and pollen-laden flowers as they tramped across the fields that were as green as sliced kiwi. Ivy introduced Allison to a countless number of horses, goats and chickens, then led her to a special paddock so she could meet the celebrity Holstein herself—Priscilla Mae.
“She does have beautiful eyelashes.” Allison leaned over the fence and patted the cow’s glossy black-and-white hide as the Holstein munched on a pile of hay. The former Lilac Queen didn’t seem so impressed with Allison.
“Ready to tour the barn?”
“You’re going to make me milk a cow, aren’t you?”
“I’d never hear the end of it from Joe if I didn’t.”
Allison lifted her shoulders up and back and drummed her fingers against her thigh as she followed Ivy toward the barn, a structure that looked like it could easily fit Joe’s entire motel inside it. The closer they got, the more the smell of grass and flowers gave way to dung, and the more Allison had to wonder—would it be worse to be hugged by a python, or kicked in the head by a Holstein?
A rhythmic beeping sound put that thought on hold. Ivy stopped, and held up a hand to shield her eyes.
“He’s early.”
Allison squinted across the field and spotted a large panel truck backing slowly toward the barn. When the truck stopped and the driver jumped out, Ivy’s breathing developed a little stutter. The brown-haired man strode to the back of the vehicle, said something to someone in the barn and tugged on the truck’s rear door to slide it up and out of the way.
Allison understood the stark appreciation on Ivy’s face. The man had all kinds of muscle, and moved with a lazy, mesmerizing grace.
“Who’s that?”
“Seth Walker. He owns the feed store.”
“He’s the one who offered to build your bookshelves?”
“Gorgeous, isn’t he? He’s also kind and genuine and the hardest working man I know.”
“But?” It was obvious there was one.
“But he’s looking for something long-term.”
“The bastard.”
Ivy’s laugh sounded forced. “He has kids.” She saw the question in Allison’s eyes and shrugged. “I don’t do kids. Not ones I can’t give back to their parents, anyway. I don’t do long-term, either. So I get to look and not touch, twice a week, every week. Which means I’m more frustrated than a purse snatcher in a men’s locker room.”
Allison knew the feeling. “Should we go help him?”
“I’d rather help myself.” She sent Allison a belated wink. “Let’s go inside. It’s safer in the house.”
They spent the next twenty minutes debating the merits of boxers versus briefs while making sandwiches—chicken salad for them and smoked salmon for Joe—and cutting up fruit for lunch. When someone knocked at the front door they looked at each other. Ivy set down her knife.
“Yours or mine?”
“It’s too early for Joe. And he’s not ‘mine’ anyway.”
Ivy gave her a “yeah, right” look as she wrapped up a sandwich. “Come on. I’ll introduce you.”
The brown-haired man stood on Ivy’s porch, a ball cap in one hand, a clipboard in the other. Bits of straw clung to his shirt, and his face and arms glistened with sweat. He smiled in Allison’s direction, but his eyes were locked on Ivy.
“Seth.” Ivy accepted the clipboard, scrawled on it and handed it back.
“Ivy.” He tucked the clipboard under his arm and nodded at Allison. “You must be Joe’s friend.”
“Allison Kincaid. It’s nice to meet you.”
Ivy tossed her braid over her shoulder. “She’s hanging out with me until the pest control people finish with the motel.”
“Lucky Allison.” A lopsided smile revealed a dimple. “Somehow I need to find the time to stop by Joe’s. See how the reno’s coming along.”
“You’d have plenty of time if you didn’t spend so much of it here,” Ivy teased.
“You’d miss the view.” He slapped his hat against his thigh and backed toward the steps. “Gotta go. Supposed to meet Gil Cooper for a trail ride and I have a bike tire that needs pumping first.” He ambled down the steps, turned and walked backward to his truck.
“Pleasure to meet you, Allison. Hope you decide to stick around. Castle Creek might be small, but it’s got a big heart. Great place to raise a family.”
“Wait.” Ivy jogged down the stairs, handed him the sandwich she’d wrapped in foil and put a hand on her hip. “You know you can call on me if you’re ever looking for something to ride besides that bike.”
“And you can call on me, when you realize you deserve to be treated better than a piece of exercise equipment.”
Allison winced as Seth stalked to his truck, slammed his door and drove away without looking back. Slowly Ivy climbed the porch steps.
“Sorry about that. It’s what we do.”
“If you don’t mind my asking, how long have you been doing it?”
“Too long. I don’t know, over a year now? Ever since he took over the feed store. I guess part of me keeps expecting him to give up, stop coming by.”
“And the other part?”
“He’s right. I really would miss the view.” She sighed, and sank down onto the top step. “Now you know all about me and my dysfunctional love life. Tell me about you and Joe.”
Allison sat beside her, and busied
herself brushing at the dried mud on her jeans. “There is no me and Joe. Like I said, we’re just friends. I came to recruit him for a temporary job back at the agency. He agreed to take the job if I agreed to help him with the motel for two weeks.”
“But why? You have experience with renovations?”
“Hardly. It’s...complicated.”
“Where have I heard that before? And by the way, it usually is.” She stared out at the driveway for several seconds, then huffed out a laugh. “Did he tell you about the bonfire?”
“Bonfire?”
“Right after he moved here. Someone spotted smoke behind the motel and called the fire department. Turned out Joe was burning his suits.” She nodded at Allison’s shock. “I know, right? Anyway, he held one back, for weddings and funerals, but the rest? Gone.”
Allison couldn’t believe it. All that Armani, up in smoke.
Obviously he’d been determined to eliminate reminders of his old life. And here she was, part of a conspiracy to drag him back into it.
“After that day it was as if he’d lived in Castle Creek all his life. Everyone wanted to be his friend.” She nudged Allison with her shoulder. “That crack I made, about Joe being allergic to commitment? He likes to think it’s true but everyone in town knows differently. Not only is he committed to reopening the motel, which means more visitors and more money for the town, but he always steps up to help out. He just doesn’t want to admit it. Like a few months ago, when Parker’s truck broke down and she couldn’t make a delivery, he came to her rescue without even being asked. But you’ll never hear from him that he helped save her business that day.”
Ivy stood, and tucked her fingers in her back pockets. “You’re wondering why I’m telling you all this. Well, it’s just...Joe’s been here a year and as far as I know he’s never been on a date.” She hesitated. “Do you know why he moved to Castle Creek?”
“His brother died, and Joe was looking for a fresh start.”
“Do you know how Braden died?”
“A car accident.” Something about Ivy’s expression... “Wasn’t it?”
“If you don’t know, then maybe there really isn’t anything between you two.”
For some idiotic reason, that hurt. “You’re saying there’s more to it.”
“A lot more.” Ivy sat down again. “Last month I crashed a poker game. Had this crazy idea of seducing Seth into taking me home with him. That didn’t work out, so I decided to stay and hang out with Joe after everyone else left. I could tell he was down and I figured it was because his buddy Reid had deployed.”
“Iraq?”
“Afghanistan. Anyway, it turned out it was the anniversary of his brother’s death.”
Allison propped her elbows on her knees and dropped her face into her hands. “Oh, my God.” She should have realized. Could Tackett’s timing with this assignment have been any worse?
“So he broke out the Glenlivet and we had ourselves a couple of toasts. The story he told... I’m not surprised he fell apart like he said he did. What does surprise me is how quickly he pulled himself together again. On his own, too.”
There was no missing the edge of disapproval in Ivy’s tone. Allison leaned back on her hands and stared out at the road. “You think I should have been there for him.”
“Someone should have been.” Abruptly, Ivy rose and paced the porch. “I...and every other single woman in town...have been coming up with some pretty creative scenarios to explain why he’s not interested in dating. For example, he fell in love with a woman married to a mob boss, the mob put out a hit on him and his lover made him promise to leave town and never come back. Or maybe Joe’s wife fell in love with their neighbor, who convinced her to murder his wife so they could be together, but Joe figured it out and turned her in, and to this day he still visits her in jail. My personal favorite? Joe fell madly in love with an ex-CIA agent who retired to run a motel, and as the agent lay dying she vowed to be reincarnated. Now he’s waiting for the re-embodiment of her soul to grow up and find him so they can be together again.”
Good grief. At least with that last scenario, Joe actually had a reason for saddling himself with that money-pit motel. “That’s...wow.”
“I know, right? We’re talking about collaborating on a book. Point is, now we know the identity of the woman who broke Joe’s heart.”
“Ivy. I didn’t break his heart. He decided to move here, I decided to stay in D.C., end of story. If he was grieving, it wasn’t because of me, it was because of his brother.”
“I’m sure that was part of it. But when he first came to Castle Creek he mentioned someone. A former lover. He never said a name, and now he doesn’t have to. I saw you two at the party last night. So what happened? It was the drinking that broke you up, wasn’t it?” She bit her lip. “Was he violent?”
Allison shot upright. “Never. And our history is not something I’m prepared to talk about, Ivy.”
Ivy leaned over and patted her shoulder. “Good for you. I knew there was a reason I liked you right off. I hope you two can work things out, Allison. But I’ll shut up now, because here comes our tragic hero.”
* * *
JOE KEPT HIS wary gaze on the two blondes flanking the front door. Ivy was tall and slender, eyes mischievous, smile leaning toward haughty. Allison was shorter, curvier, her smile more secretive than confident, and her eyes...
Complicated, vulnerable, “don’t you dare” eyes.
He climbed the porch steps, and somehow resisted the urge to lay claim to Allison with a lip lock.
“Ladies,” he drawled.
Ivy stepped forward and shocked the hell out of him by brushing at his pecs. “You look like you’ve been crawling through cobwebs.”
“Maybe because I have.” He replaced Ivy’s hands with his own and shifted away. He caught her wink then from the corner of his eye spotted Allison’s stern posture. He hid a grin as he wiped his boots on the mat.
Allison crossed her arms. “So what’s the verdict?”
Ivy ushered them inside. “Why don’t we talk in the kitchen? We can put lunch on the table while Joe fills us in.”
He washed up at the sink and Ivy offered drinks. Allison accepted a glass of iced tea while Joe opened a pair of pale ales. He found it interesting that Allison couldn’t seem to meet his gaze. Because he’d accepted a beer? Somehow he resisted the urge to chug the thing.
“What did Pests R Us have to say?” she asked.
“‘Sleep at Joe’s’ is officially snake-free. Mice are another matter.” He grinned. “They also said to tell you their name isn’t copyrighted.”
Funny guy. “What about big scary spiders?”
“Hey.” Joe pointed a menacing finger.
Ivy leaned against the sink. “Snoozy will be disappointed Mitzi doesn’t have any grandchildren after all. So what’d the guy do, use one of those peekaboo cable thingies like the military types use on TV when they want to see into a room?”
“You got it. He drilled holes in the paneling and fed it through. Only he called it a ‘fiber-optic scope.’”
“I like peekaboo thingie better.”
“You would.”
A burst of salsa music. Ivy stretched across the island, scooped up her phone and headed for the doorway. “Sorry, guys. Be right back.”
Joe waited until she turned the corner. “What’s up with you?” He raised the bottle. “Ticked I accepted a beer?”
“You know what, Joe, it’s none of my business whether you drink or not.”
She was right. Still, it stung.
She turned her attention to a dish towel on the counter, one with fringe along the bottom. With slow, deliberate movements, she began to comb the tangles out of the fringe. Yet another compulsion. He’d consider it cute if it didn’t signal she was stressed.
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“Ivy’s very protective of you,” she said. “She scolded me for not being more supportive after your brother died. I have a feeling she’s not the only one who feels that way. I’m guessing Castle Creek will be happy to see the last of me.”
He’d have to make sure Ivy knew the fault was his. “But you’re looking forward to that, too, aren’t you?”
“Do you really have to ask?”
“Yeah. And you really have to answer.” When she bristled, he had his reply. “Humph. You like it here.”
She opened her mouth and he braced himself for a denial. But she hesitated, and her shoulders sagged. “So what? You’re as confused as I am,” she said softly. “You order me around and call me Kincaid and make fun of my high heels and tell people to put me to work shoveling manure—which Ivy didn’t, by the way—yet you also spend the night with me in my car so I’ll feel safe, and take care of me like...”
Like he never had before. Ouch.
She pushed the towel away. “You’re trying to get rid of me, and at the same time you’re trying to show me just how sweet a deal I passed up.”
His blood began to thrum. “Maybe we should concentrate on that sweet deal thing.” Except that was the last thing they should be doing. The last thing he should be doing. Maybe June was right. Maybe Allison was right. His fingers tightened around the bottle in his hand.
She’d been here three days and he’d greeted two of those days with a hangover. Would have had one this morning, too, if he hadn’t worried the alcohol would do more talking for him.
And it wasn’t because Allison was here. It was because that’s what he did. Had been doing, for more than a year now. He drank too much.
He had a drinking problem.
He went still, and waited for the jolt in his chest. For some kind of inner thunderclap. For something to acknowledge the realization he’d been fighting for far too long. Nothing happened.
Because he’d already known. And it didn’t change a thing. Why should it, when he had no chance with Allison, anyway? Yeah, he had a problem. His problem, not hers. Bad enough he had to deal with it. He couldn’t drag her down with him again.