Still fighting the remnants of the desire he generated every time he touched her, she turned away and made unnecessary adjustments to the lamp table beside the sofa.
Spending so much time with Luke, working together to get his house furnished before his parents arrived, had been fun. They'd fallen into a comfortable routine—a comfortable, undemanding relationship—but in spite of working hard and staying busy, the inappropriate attraction seemed always to be lurking just around the corner, ready to leap out at unexpected moments. They were doing a good job of ignoring it, however, and she felt sure it would soon go away. If it didn't, she would be gone in a few days, and that would effectively shut it down.
A knock sounded at the door, and Luke went to answer it.
"Dinner's here!" Papa announced, brandishing a large pizza box.
"Great!" Luke said, taking the box from him. "I'm starved."
Papa came in and looked around, inspecting the room closely. "You kids sure did a good job. I can't believe you got so much done in such a short time."
"Katie did most of it. I just furnished the strong back and the hammer and nails." Luke carried the pizza into his large kitchen.
As they passed the door of the dining room, Papa looked in. "That is purely amazing. That table is almost identical to the one Francine and George had."
Kate cast a quick glance at Luke to see if the reference to his father would upset him, but he showed no sign if it did.
"Katie has a good memory," Luke said. "She got a lot of similar things. Mom's going to be really pleased."
Kate took down plates from the cabinet...plates she'd purchased just that morning...and set them on the smaller café table in the kitchen. "The wire back chairs aren't the same as the originals that were in here when we were kids, but they're really close to the ones that used to be in the drug store before it closed."
They sat around the table and opened the box.
Kate experienced a brief pang of guilt for letting her father have such a high-cholesterol, artery-clogging dinner, but she knew when she returned to Dallas, he'd be eating the same or worse.
For a few moments they ate in companionable silence.
Luke reached for his second piece. "Sheriff, you make a mean pizza."
Papa chuckled. "It's not as good as the meal Katie made Saturday night, but it'll do."
Kate shuddered. "I don't even want to talk about that meal. I've made presentations to major corporations that involved high dollar deals, but I don't think I've ever been so frazzled in my life as trying to cook that meal."
And she still wasn't at all sure about how Papa had decided on the menu or come up with answers to her questions about cooking it.
"Just takes a little practice," he assured her.
"Don't count on me ever getting that practice, Papa. That's why we have restaurants and pizza delivery."
"You're being too modest, Katie," Luke said. "Those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches you made for dinner yesterday were definitely gourmet quality. And that side dish of potato chips? Well, I'd be willing to get you can't get that kind of food in any of those expensive restaurants in Dallas."
Kate tossed a stray bit of black olive at him. "You'd better cool it or I won't make my special Marshmallows Flambeau when your mom gets here."
That occasioned a round of easy laughter from everybody.
Papa shook his head and reached for another piece of pizza. "I'd almost forgotten about the time you tried to burn down the woods."
"Yeah, well, some things are better forgotten."
"That's okay, Katie," Luke said. "You can come over here and cook any time you want to. I've got a fire extinguisher and good insurance."
The familiar voices and laughter floated around the room, and Kate drank it in, feeling the most relaxed she'd been since she'd come down here.
Even though Luke hadn't been able to give her any answers about Papa's peculiar behavior, in sharing it with him, she'd seemed to share the burden, and it lay much lighter when supported by two sets of shoulders.
Perhaps she'd overreacted to Luke's reappearance in her life. Neither she nor Luke bore any resemblance to the children they'd once been. She was no longer the dependent little girl who idolized the little boy she'd grown up with. She was an independent woman, and Luke was a man she didn't know and wouldn't have the time to get to know.
He was also a man who sent her pulse racing and her hormones off the chart, but that was incidental, something she, as an adult in control of her own destiny, could choose not to act on.
When the last piece of pizza had been consumed, Papa pushed back his chair and stood. "That was good. And now if you kids want to give me a quick tour of what you've done upstairs, I'll take it on home and get to bed early."
Kate looked at her watch. "Papa, it's not quite eight o'clock. Are you feeling all right?"
"Is it that late already?" He snapped his fingers. "Darn! My favorite show comes on at eight. We better make that tour really fast."
"Sheriff, you can watch television here. Try out the new set."
"Not the same as watching it at home in bed. When you get to my age..." He shrugged and smiled.
Something wasn't ringing quite true. His voice had an odd quality, almost too sincere or something. Kind of like the day he'd asked her to cook the dinner of foods he claimed were his favorites when he'd never eaten them before.
She suspected, for whatever reason, Papa wasn't telling the complete truth again.
"Papa, what's the name of your favorite show? I don't recall your mentioning something on Thursday nights that you just had to watch."
"You're not usually here on Thursday nights."
She'd give him that, though she had phoned him on Thursday nights before. "So what's the name of the show? Luke and I might like to see it, too."
Papa sighed. "Oh, Katie, when you get to my age, you can't remember little details like the names of all the television shows you enjoy." He checked his watch. "We'd better hurry if I'm going to get to see the bedrooms and still make it home in time to catch that show." He turned and walked away.
Kate and Luke exchanged a puzzled glance then followed him up the stairs.
Contrary to his assertion of a need to hurry, when they got to the door of Luke's room, Papa lingered. "I like it," he said.
Again Kate and Luke exchanged a puzzled glance.
"We didn't do a lot in here, Papa." She'd been reluctant to do much beyond finding a solid color spread for Luke's bed and a small dresser and night stand to get his underwear out of cardboard boxes and his phone off the floor.
Papa walked in, and they followed him. "It's a good room, a real good room."
"It was mine when I was a kid." Luke looked at her and shrugged, apparently as mystified as she at Papa's odd fascination.
"It's a small, square room."
Papa stood near the bed and scanned the place. "Good lighting, too. Windows on two sides. Good vibes, as you kids would say. Come over here by me and see if you can feel it."
Good vibes? Had her father really said that? He must be watching a lot of television reruns to pick up a phrase like that.
Mystified, she and Luke moved over to stand, one on each side of him. The three of them stood quietly for a few seconds.
She supposed if Papa saw ghosts, tuning into good vibes was to be expected.
"Feel anything?" he asked.
"It's, uh, pretty warm up here," Luke ventured. "I knew I should have put in a separate thermostat for upstairs."
"I'll turn on the ceiling fan." Papa moved across the room to the doorway and flipped the switch. "Both of you get closer together. Try to both get in the exact spot where I was standing."
Reluctantly, Kate moved closer to Luke, and he moved closer to her. Their shoulders touched. She held herself rigid, trying not to experience the sensations being near Luke always generated, but it didn't help. No matter how hard she tried, she was exquisitely aware of him beside her.
"Better?" Papa as
ked.
Oh, yeah. Better...and worse.
"It's, uh, cooler," Luke said.
He was lying. It was no cooler for him than for her. The breeze of the ceiling fan couldn't offset the heat of their bodies.
"Definitely cooler." She confirmed his lie.
"Well, stand there for a little while and see if you feel anything." He checked his watch. "Look at the time! I'd better hurry home. I'll see you kids tomorrow." Papa started from the room.
Kate went after him. "Wait for me. I'm staying with you, remember?" She ended on a short laugh that came from tension rather than from humor.
Papa stopped. "I thought you were going to stay here and help Luke finish up with the house."
"It's pretty much finished."
"Katie, you should at least stay and help with the dishes."
"Oh, well, sure, I intend to do that."
She looked more closely at Papa. He was the last person in the world to worry about dirty dishes...especially when those dishes were only three plates. Was he—
A thought occurred to her.
No, surely he wasn't trying to—
He'd arranged for her first meeting with Luke to be just the two of them.
He'd asked her to cook Luke's favorite foods for dinner.
He'd engineered their night together in her condo in Dallas.
He'd managed to keep Luke and her together pretty much constantly since she got in town.
She gave a mental sigh.
Of course. She should have seen it sooner.
Papa was matchmaking. He wanted her to stand beside Luke in his bedroom, alone in the house, in the hopes that a physical attraction would develop.
If he only had any idea how successful he'd been!
For an instant, she was outraged, but she supposed it was only natural he'd want Luke, who'd always been like a son to him, to be his son-in-law. She really couldn't be angry at him for trying. Heck, she couldn't be angry at Papa for anything.
But she would have to set him straight so he wouldn't be disappointed.
This explained a lot of things, like why he'd sounded so unhappy when she told him about her engagement to Spencer and why he'd been so eager to get her to come to Briar Creek right away.
Did it also explain why he'd suddenly started talking to Mama, why he'd put her on the telephone? Had he counted on her concern for his sanity bringing her straight to Briar Creek?
No, Papa might be manipulative and sly as an old fox, but he would never be deceitful. At least, not more than a small fib about his favorite foods or his favorite television show coming on.
She kissed him on the cheek. "I'll help Luke with the dishes and then I'll be home."
Papa smiled. "I'll show myself out."
"We'll walk down with you. The dirty dishes are in the kitchen."
When Luke closed the front door behind Papa, he turned to Kate. "What was that all about?"
Kate hesitated, torn between telling him, inviting him to laugh with her at the absurdity of the idea and being too embarrassed to talk about it.
But there was no real reason to be embarrassed.
"I'm not positive but I think—" She gave a short laugh to show how silly she thought the whole idea was. "I think he may be trying to get you and me, uh, together."
"Together?"
"You know. Matchmaking. Leaving you alone in the office when he knew I was coming to town, the trip to Dallas for papers they could have mailed to him, then conning us into spending the night there." She laughed again, ending on an exaggerated sigh and shaking her head. "He means well. He loves us both."
Luke didn't laugh. He smiled, but it was a sad smile. He rubbed his hand over the back of his neck. "It's not really all that strange. For Sheriff to want that, I mean. Right after my dad died, I used to think that maybe one day Sheriff and my mom would get married and you'd be my sister. That was when I was still a kid, of course."
Kate's discomfort faded. Luke understood. Where Papa was concerned, she could always count on him to understand. "Guess that couldn't happen since it seems that death did not part Papa from Mama."
Luke smiled. "Yeah, that would make it kind of tough."
"Well, let's get those dishes done and I'll go home and check on him."
Luke waved a negligent hand. "Don't worry about the dishes. I think I can handle three plates."
The dishwashing episode at Papa's on Saturday night suddenly flooded Kate's memory…how sensual it had been to stand so close to Luke, to feel his fingers touching hers as she handed him the hot, slick dishes. She was relieved they would forego that delicious torture tonight.
Relieved and disappointed.
But she'd go with relieved.
"Then I'll say good night."
He walked out on the porch with her. Luke's porch was very different from Papa's. For one thing, Luke had trimmed the shrubbery and vines to the point it was possible to see the street. But also it wrapped around one side of his house where a second door led to the mother-in-law room. It had been their play room when Luke was small, and now she'd helped him set it up as a TV room.
She strolled around to the side, admiring the repairs and the exterior paint job that Luke had done.
The lazy summer evening was still light though the sun was low and the shadows long. Kate knew she needed to leave, but somehow she couldn't work up any urgency. A few years ago there had been a popular country song about front porches. Until this trip home, she'd forgotten how peaceful and languid they could make a person feel, especially in the summertime.
"I'd like to turn that room into a library one day." Luke's voice, close behind her, broke into Kate's reverie.
She whirled...and found herself in his arms as he reached reflexively to balance her.
Immediately he released her.
"You startled me," she explained with a nervous laugh.
"Sorry. I thought you heard me come up behind you." He was still much too close for comfort, close enough for those currents to flow between them.
She stepped around him. "No, I didn't hear you. I guess I was woolgathering."
He folded his arms and nodded, looking out over his yard. "Do you remember that book Door into Summer by Robert Heinlein?"
"Sure. Great book."
"I feel like I've found that door, coming back here. I was so busy running around the city, doing all the things I needed to do and wanted to do, every year when summer was over, I always felt like I wasn't through using it. Like I hadn't used it at all."
"I know what you mean." And it scared her, because she did know.
They walked back to the other end of the porch where a new, unfinished wooden glider sat.
"I need to get that stained before winter," he said, then sat down in it and looked at her. "You've been working all day, mostly inside the house or a car or a furniture showroom. Don't leave yet. Sit down and share some summer with me."
If he'd asked her to stay and make love with him or even to stay and talk to him, she could have said no, but she couldn't refuse to share some summer.
She sat beside him. Not touching, of course. The glider was wide enough for both of them.
Except the whole porch wasn't wide enough to keep her from experiencing that damned attraction.
For a few moments they sat without talking, listening to the music of nature...the sweet evening songs of the robins, the strident calls of the blue jays, the liquid trill of purple martins, the crickets, katydids and tree frogs just getting tuned up for the evening, an occasional car passing in the street. The scents of honeysuckle and four o'clocks drifted in on alternating breezes.
"Look," Luke whispered, pointing toward a large four o'clock bush with bright pink flowers.
Kate followed the direction of his finger and saw a vivid green hummingbird darting from blossom to blossom.
Neither of them spoke until the fairy creature darted away.
"I think I'll get a feeder," Luke said.
"What was Cindy like?" Luke was
probably not one bit more surprised than she was at her abrupt, out-of-context, question.
He blinked then laughed. "Talk about a non sequitur."
"Sorry. I have no idea where that came from. You don't have to answer. It's none of my business."
"Cindy was a lot like you in some ways. Slim, red hair, darker than yours and straight. She was fun to be with. A nice person."
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