Heart of the Matter

by Marta Perry

  “And that made you decide to come down here? Because you thought I might be in trouble or because you wanted to take over the interview?”

  Just about any answer would only make the situation more uncomfortable. “I was late at the office. It was no trouble to swing by and make sure you were okay.”

  Which wasn’t really an answer at all. Amanda probably knew he was late at the office every night. Probably thought he was a compulsive workaholic who had no life outside of work. She might just be right.

  Amanda’s brows knitted. “Were you going to come into the building?”

  “Judging from C.J.’s grandmother’s reaction to my call, I didn’t think I’d be welcome. You have any luck?”

  “Not much,” she admitted. “But what were you doing? Waiting for me to come out?”

  She was nothing if not persistent. It was a good quality in a reporter, but at the moment it annoyed the heck out of him.

  “I was just pulling up when I saw you were alone on the curb.” He ground out the words. “Speaking of which, where is your car?”

  “I didn’t want to leave it on the street, so—” She cut that off, consternation filling her face. “Good heavens, I forgot about my brother.” She punched a button on the cell phone. Pressing it to her ear, she effectively ignored him.

  He turned onto King Street and wondered where they were going. He had a vague sense she lived down in the historic district someplace, so he was probably headed in the right direction.

  “Hugh? Listen, I got finished early, so I’ve already left. You don’t need to—”

  A male voice interrupted her, so loudly irate that Ross could hear it. He couldn’t make out the words, but clearly Amanda was getting a much-needed earful from her brother.

  “Yes, I know, but I wasn’t in trouble—”

  Annoyance prickled. She was sounding a lot more apologetic to the brother than she had to him.

  “I’m telling you, I’m fine, so stop yelling. No, you don’t need to get me. A…a friend is taking me home. Love you, okay?”

  The resulting murmur sounded placated, if also a bit exasperated. Being Amanda’s brother must be a full-time job, given her penchant for trouble.

  She dropped the cell phone into her bag and brushed a wing of hair behind her ear. His hand tingled, as if he had touched the silky strand.

  “You didn’t fool him,” he said, distracting himself.

  “You mean about not being in trouble?” She blew out a breath. “It’s tough to con Hugh, him being in law enforcement and all.”

  “To say nothing of knowing you since birth.”

  She grinned, the tension between them popping like a bubble. “That, too.”

  He’d probably be better off without being on the receiving end of too many of those impudent smiles. “One question? Where are we going?”

  “Oh, sorry. I can call a taxi—”

  “Just tell me.” Maybe putting her in a cab was safer, given the level of attraction he felt in the close confines of the car, but…

  She leaned forward, as if just noticing where they were. “It’s not far, if you really don’t mind driving me home. Just take the next left.”

  In a few minutes they were pulling to the curb of one of the narrow residential streets down near the Battery. “That’s it?” He leaned across the front seat to peer through the window at the tiny house tucked between two graceful antebellum mansions.

  “Small, but my very own.” She opened the door, and the dome light showed him a faint embarrassment in her eyes. “Would you like to come in for a cup of coffee or an iced tea?”

  He didn’t want coffee, but he did want to see Amanda in her own setting and to say something to her where they could be face-to-face.

  “I’d like to come in for a moment.” He got out quickly, before she could think of a way to uninvite him, and walked around the car to join her on the curb.

  Amanda pushed open the black wrought-iron gate that led to the tiny front garden of the equally tiny cottage. She hurried up the brick walk, pulling a ring of keys from her bag.

  “My place was originally the gatehouse for that property.”

  She nodded to the house on the left. It loomed over its small neighbor, and he realized that the trim and paint color of the two was the same, despite the difference in their sizes.

  “You were lucky to get something in the historic district.” He’d been here long enough to know that finding an affordable place to live was a major preoccupation in Charleston.

  “It belongs to a friend of a family friend,” she said, opening the door and switching on lights. “Come in.”

  He stepped inside, feeling as if he had walked into a child’s playhouse. At first sight the living room seemed cluttered to him, with chintz upholstered pieces, lacy curtains drawn back from plantation shutters, and photos covering every horizontal space, but after a moment’s study he decided that cozy was a better word. It was a far cry from the sterile furnished apartment he occupied when he wasn’t at the paper.

  “It’s nice,” he said, feeling some comment was called for.

  “All castoffs from the rest of the family. You wouldn’t believe what my folks and my aunts and uncles have in their attics, to say nothing of Miz Callie.” She tossed her handbag on a cherry drop-leaf table. “Now, what about that coffee?”

  He could say yes. They’d sit close together on that chintz love seat…No, that would be a mistake. He might end up doing something he’d regret, like kissing her.

  “No coffee.” He took a step that closed the distance between them, seeing her eyes widen. “I came in to say something to you.”

  “W-what?”

  He was close enough to hear the hitch in her breath, and that set his pulses racing. “You put yourself in danger tonight for a story. You will never do that again, or I will fire you. Understand?”

  She nodded. Her lips trembled, drawing his attention to them.

  He could sense how they’d feel under his—the shape of her mouth, the softness of her lips, the sweetness of her breath. He leaned toward her—

  Back off, he commanded himself. That would be a mistake. Even if he weren’t pursuing a story that might lead directly to her father, he couldn’t get involved with someone who worked for him.

  Amanda, despite her veneer of sophistication, was really a small-town girl at heart, giving up a promising job in Tampa to come home because of her family, from what he’d seen. A woman from a close-knit family like hers would believe in love and fidelity and happily-ever-after. All the things he dismissed as fiction.

  She looked up at him from beneath her lashes, the glance tentative, questioning, as if she wondered what he was thinking. And he couldn’t resist. He covered her lips with his.

  The kiss was sweet…an almost platonic touch in comparison to some of the women he’d dated. But the impact rushed through him and headed straight for his heart, pummeling it unmercifully. He touched her arms, drawing her closer, and she leaned into his embrace with a little sigh that seemed to say she’d come home.

  It was the sigh that brought him back to himself. He couldn’t do this. It was a mistake—a gigantic one.

  It took more willpower than he’d known he possessed to pull away. Amanda’s green eyes held a dazed expression that probably matched his own.

  He had to search for the right words to say. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.” He took a step back, feeling as if he’d left a part of himself behind.

  Amanda shook her head, seeming to shake off the dream that held her dazed. “Don’t apologize. You weren’t the only one involved.”

  “No.” He hadn’t been, and that made things infinitely more complicated. “I’d better go.” Before he made the situation even worse, if that was possible. “Good night, Amanda.”

  He turned and walked quickly away, because if he didn’t, he wasn’t sure how much more foolish he might have been.

  The fact that Amanda was expected for supper at Mamma and Daddy’s the
night after her adventure at C.J.’s apartment was trouble on so many levels she wasn’t sure how to count them. There was the fact of her having been stuck there, to begin with, and then there was that kiss, which she’d been trying all day to forget.

  But the thing that made her chest tight and her palms damp as she went up the walk to the front door was what she had seen when she’d climbed into Ross’s car. She’d looked back, just a quick glance to be sure no one was coming after them.

  The door to the bar had opened, and a man stepped out onto the sidewalk. Not just any man. The last man she’d expect to see in a place like that—her father.

  She paused on the walk, ostensibly to admire her mamma’s dahlias, blooming their hearts out along the veranda. But she wasn’t really seeing them. She was seeing something furtive about that familiar figure in that place. Out of uniform.

  Ask him. The voice of her conscience was blunt. Just come right out and ask him.

  She could, of course. Make it light, as if it meant nothing at all. Which it didn’t, she assured herself quickly.

  That meant revealing her presence in that part of town, and Daddy wasn’t going to be happy about that. But that wasn’t really what held her back, and she knew it.

  That odd interaction between her father and Ross lay at the bottom of her uneasiness. She’d tried again and again to tell herself that she’d imagined it. Unfortunately, she hadn’t been able to make herself believe it.

  Ross was still working on the Coast Guard story, even if he hadn’t asked her for any more introductions. Maybe she’d already served his purpose when she’d introduced him to the family. She just didn’t know what that purpose was.

  She touched the brilliant face of an orange dahlia and straightened, heading for the door. She didn’t know what she was going to do, but she’d best get inside before Mamma sent someone out to fetch her.

  The brass knob was familiar to her hand, and the frosted glass sent back a dim reflection of her face. She turned the knob and walked inside, dropping her bag on the table under the mirror in the center hallway. Her heels clicked on the parquet floor.

  “I’m here,” she called. “Anybody home?”

  “We’re in here, sugar.” Hugh’s voice. If he’d told Mamma and Daddy what she’d got up to last night…

  She walked into the parlor. Hugh’s long legs were stretched out comfortably in front of him as he leaned back, looking practically boneless, on the couch. Annabel, in her usual jeans and T-shirt, perched on the arm next to him, her thick braid swinging across her shoulder.

  Mamma was probably in the kitchen, but Daddy sat bolt upright in his chair, hands planted firmly on his knees, looking as if he wanted to give someone a piece of his mind.

  She exchanged a wordless glance with her twin. Danger, danger… Annabel didn’t need to speak to convey the warning.

  “What’s this I hear about you gettin’ into trouble last night, Amanda?”

  She swung on Hugh. “You told.”

  He spread big hands wide. “I was makin’ a joke of it, honest. I didn’t know Daddy’d get so het up.”

  “Yeah, right. Tattletale.”

  “Right.” Annabel weighed in instantly on her side. She swatted Hugh lightly on the head. “Troublemaker.”

  He grinned. “Daddy, the twins are picking on me.”

  “You ought to know better.” Mamma appeared in the doorway, a wooden spoon in her hand, but it wasn’t immediately clear whether she was talking to Amanda or Hugh. Or both.

  “Do you need some help, Mamma?” She’d be just as glad to get into Mamma’s less volatile company until Daddy forgot about this.

  “No, no.” Mamma waved the spoon. “It’s just about ready, so don’t settle down too much.”

  She vanished again.

  Amanda turned to her sister, ready to change the subject with a question about Annabel’s horses, but Daddy got in first.

  “Amanda, where exactly were you last night?”

  She pressed her lips together for an instant. This would be all right. She’d say where she’d been, and Daddy would comment on being in the same place, say he’d have come to her rescue if only he’d known, and her doubts would be wiped away.

  “Down on Joslyn Street. The three hundred block. It’s where my intern lives.”

  Where you were last night, Daddy. In a bar I’d never have expected you to touch with a ten-foot pole.

  “It’s not as bad as it sounds, I promise.” Hugh sat up straight, bumping his legs on the coffee table. “I dropped her off, and I was coming back to get her.”

  Daddy frowned. “At least you two had that much sense. If I hadn’t been stuck on base last night, I’d have taken her myself, if it was that important.”

  It struck her like a blow to the stomach. Daddy. Lying. She could hardly put the words together. That just didn’t happen.

  “Hugh took care of it,” Annabel said, with the air of someone who didn’t see what all the fuss was about.

  “Actually, I didn’t.” Hugh’s gaze met hers and then slid away. “Manda got done a little early, so a friend drove her home.”

  “Friend?” Daddy’s voice cut like a knife. “What friend?”

  She swallowed. “Not a friend, exactly. My boss. Ross Lockhart.”

  She saw the impact on her father. Saw it, saw him try to hide it. And knew that whatever had taken him to that bar last night, she couldn’t ask him about it. She couldn’t put him in a position where he’d lie to her again.

  Amanda still worried about the situation the next evening when she walked the short two blocks to the home of Cyrus Mayhew. The Bugle’s publisher was having a party, and apparently the whole staff was invited.

  That meant she’d be seeing Ross in a social setting. A business setting was bad enough. He’d been cool and distant at the office, as if to deny that their kiss had ever happened.

  At least Ross had allowed her to do some minor investigating into the landlord situation. She’d discovered the owner was an absentee landlord, living on one of the gated barrier island communities off Beaufort, not here in Charleston at all.

  She crossed the street toward Cyrus’s place, cautious of the cobblestones of the historic district, never easy to navigate when wearing heels, and felt the breeze off the water. The Mayhew house proudly faced the Battery and Charleston harbor. Cyrus was fond of talking about the window glass that had broken during the siege of Fort Sumter, which was visible from his second-floor balcony during the day.

  The wrought-iron gates stood hospitably open. She stepped into the walled garden where tiny white lights glistened in the trees, reflected from the surface of the oval pond and echoed the light summer colors of the women’s dresses.

  She hadn’t gotten two feet when a waiter swept down on her with a tray of drinks, followed by a second with an array of canapés. She took an icy glass of lemonade and a mushroom tart, turned away and narrowly escaped the waving champagne glass of the Bugle’s society editor, Juliet Morrow.

  “Evening, Amanda.” Juliet beamed in her direction. Juliet did enjoy a party. “Be sure you get some of those crab turnovers, y’heah? They are superb.”

  “I’ll do that.” She bit into the flaky pastry of the mushroom tart, feeling the flavors explode in her mouth. Cyrus had been a widower for years and showed no signs of wanting to change his marital status, to the despair of Charleston’s female population, which thought he needed a hostess, at least. Instead, he employed the best caterer in town for his parties.

  “Nice, isn’t it?” Juliet’s glass gestured to take in the garden, the caterer’s people, even the graceful lines of the antebellum house. “Cyrus is lucky it didn’t rain tonight. He wouldn’t want this horde tramping on his Oriental carpets and puttin’ their glasses down on his piecrust table.”

  “The air’s heavy enough for a storm.” Amanda quelled an inward shudder at the thought, never having managed to quite conquer a childish fear of thunderstorms. “I’m sure he’d be welcoming if we had to go inside.�
�� She glanced around, nodding to people she knew. “Where is he?”

  Juliet lifted a perfectly plucked brow. “Our esteemed publisher? Or our hunky new managing editor?”

  “Hunky?” She kept her voice level with an effort. She certainly didn’t want to raise suspicions in Juliet’s fertile imagination. “Really, Juliet, if you use that kind of language in your column, folks will think your beat is gossip, not society.”

  “This is just between you and me, darlin’.” The society editor’s smile held only a trace of malice. “You should know how attractive the man is, as much time as you’ve been spending with him. Tell me, what’s really behind that gruff exterior?”

  The memory of Ross’s kiss flooded through her, and her cheeks heated. She could only hope the light was dim enough to hide it.

  “Ah, I see I’ve hit a nerve.” Juliet sounded as satisfied as a cat in the cream pitcher.

  She should have known the woman could see in the dark, again like a cat. “Don’t be ridiculous.” Her voice was pitched higher than she wanted. “There’s absolutely nothing between me and Ross Lockhart.”

  She turned, hoping to make a graceful exit from the conversation, and found Ross standing behind her. Juliet’s soft laughter faded as the society editor walked away.

  If there was a graceful way out of this situation, Amanda couldn’t see it. “I’m sorry.”

  The words didn’t seem to penetrate the stony mask that was Ross’s face. Not much like the way he’d looked when he’d kissed her, was it?

  “People are talking.” He said the words as if they tasted bad.

  “Just Juliet,” she said quickly. “She’s always imagining relationships that aren’t there.”

  Except that something was there between them. One kiss didn’t make a relationship, but it meant something, if only that he was attracted. As for her feelings—well, she wasn’t going to explore that right now.

  “It has to stop.” That icy glare would make anyone quake.

  A tiny flame of anger spurted up. She wasn’t the one who’d initiated that kiss, after all. “Stopping gossip isn’t in my job description.”