Opal took exception. “I beg your pardon. I ain’t never given a man trouble.” She thought for a moment about Sheriff Roger Lewis. Several years back she could have sworn he had a thing for her, but he’d never acted on it so she’d ignored him. Time had passed and the both of them had become involved with different people. Opal had nobody special in her life at the moment and she wondered if Roger was seeing anyone.
She hadn’t heard any gossip, and surely she would have heard some at the counter of the diner. The early birds slung more loose-lipped talk than she cooked hash specials.
“Present company excluded,” Raul said, sipping a bloody Mary. “I’m talking about that Lucy Carpenters.”
“Carpenter,” Lloyd corrected. “The Carpenters was a musical group.”
“C’hew making fun of the Raul’s accent?”
“Oh, hell, Raul,” Lloyd snorted. “Don’t go acting like you’ve got a couple French fries short of a Happy Meal. Get a grip. I was only making a casual comment.”
Raul’s hair gleamed from pomade, reflections from the slow-moving disco ball glittering across its smooth black surface. He felt as if he was coming down with some sickness. His stomach roiled from the tomato juice he drank. He worried his thumbs.
“That Lucy Carpenters got a client today,” he said aloud, the words souring his already aggravated belly. “Did anyone hear about her sample menu?”
The sparse details annoyed Raul’s stomach even further. He didn’t lack for confidence, but if she got one client, she might get another….
“Why would we know that?” Opal asked.
Furrowing his brow, Raul said, “This town is like a gossip ship. Information lands in all ports—from the hotel bars to the ice cream parlor.”
“I haven’t heard,” Lloyd commented.
Raul pursed his full lips glumly, trying to figure a way out of the creative slump he felt himself slipping into. This was totally unlike him to let a newcomer worry him.
Then a brilliant idea hit! Like an explosion of flavors on his tongue, he tasted victory. “I know what to do! I wan’ you to book a sample menu night with Lucy and tell me what you think of her cooking. Get the recipes and report in to the Raul.”
Grimaces abounded and Opal spoke first. “I don’t need any personal chef, Raul. I cook all day myself and take home plenty from the restaurant.”
Lloyd’s palm rested on his generous stomach. “My doctor’s putting me on a low-fat restricted diet to help me lose a few pounds.”
Raul had never known Lloyd to be weight conscious. “What does that have to do with anyting?”
“All right then,” Lloyd retorted. “I got a bit of a spastic colon issue and I can’t be eating certain foods right now. I’m not about to have that pretty lady come over and me tell her, ‘Sorry there, sis, but I can’t eat that—it’ll give me gas.’”
Raul frowned, but was not defeated. There had to be a way to get a sample of Lucy’s cooking.
“So just who is this client she’s going to be cooking for that has you all riled up?” Opal nibbled on a bowl of buttered and heavily salted popcorn that had been brought to their table. Microwavable with fake flavoring. Raul wouldn’t touch it. Peasant food.
“A Californiano.”
“A what?” Lloyd scrunched his face. “What the hell’s that?”
“The Dickensons from Californias. They moved up here with a big cash flow, but I don’ know what he does for his job. He knows Tolman. Drew Tolman is like that freakin’ E. H. Hutton guy on the commercials. He talks and everyone listens. Damn Californians.”
“Yeah, damn Californians with all their bucks,” Lloyd snipped, then remembered a tidbit. “Hey, Raul. Aren’t you from California?”
“La Puente.”
“Where in the hell is that?”
“C’hew don’ want to know.”
The three of them voiced various opinions on the Californians in Idaho, then tired of that topic and switched gears to discuss whether or not Opal should expand her parking lot.
Raul listened, but only when his name was mentioned did he add to the conversation. These Dickensons could be big trouble for him. If one went over, then another would follow….
And Raul Nunez had had the market on the chef business in Red Duck and Timberline far too long to let any of his clientele slip away. No. He was the best.
This was the Raul’s town.
Seventeen
The Wood River Tigers were playing the Sun Valley Cubs in a doubleheader. Drew sat in the dugout and rallied the boys around for a pep talk. They’d just won the first game three-to-one and, with a break in between, they wolfed down fast food for lunch.
The red-clay floor was dotted with spilled fries, soda pop cups and empty wrappers. Drew’s stomach growled. He hadn’t packed a lunch, and didn’t have someone to bring him in food like the boys did.
The parents were really good about keeping their boys fed, while the coach was on his own. Usually Drew stopped by Opal’s and had her make him a sandwich, but this morning, his mind had been completely elsewhere. Not on Little League baseball, though he’d been doing his damnedest to keep it here.
Mackenzie was coming into town at 5:45 p.m.
Drew was nervous as all hell. He had to drive into Hailey to pick her up at the airport, and he didn’t want to be late. If the second game went as fast as the first, he could be out of the field by 4:00 p.m., head home and shower, then make it on time.
“Nutter, good fielding,” Drew said, clapping with enthusiasm.
Nutter nodded, stuffing a bite of Big Mac into his mouth, then talked around it. “Thanks, Coach.”
“You’ve got mayonnaise on your face, dummy,” Ryan said to Nutter.
Using the back of his stained uniform sleeve, Nutter took care of it.
For the next game, Drew needed two of his players to switch gloves. He was moving their positions in the hopes he could get the game moving and his players motivated…and all done quickly.
Jason Carpenter worked a pine tar rag over his bat handle and disregarded the lunch Lucy had made for him. Drew eyed the thick turkey sandwich and his stomach growled. He’d had her cook for him three times now, and he’d made a referral to some friends of his who lived in the estates. They’d hired her. She’d been grateful.
But not so grateful that she let him kiss her again.
He’d spent some time thinking back on that kiss. Actually, in the moments when he wasn’t planning for Mackenzie’s arrival, he did a lot of thinking about Lucy. He liked her. More than he cared to admit to himself, much less to her. Wanting to be with Lucy wasn’t about his usual chase and catch, love and leave approach that had worked so well in the past. That had gotten him many women, but it had also come with a lot of emptiness the next day.
Lucy was different. He felt different around her. She wasn’t a woman to screw over—not that he would intentionally do so. But if he was with her, it had to be for real and it had to be honest. At this point, he wasn’t even sure what “for real” meant. He’d gotten used to Jacquie, and to the games they’d played with one another.
Timing sucked for him. He liked Lucy. But he was just out of a relationship and his daughter was coming to town. A tough mix to juggle, without adding one more thing.
So Drew told himself that he wasn’t going to think about Lucy. But then he caught his mind drifting to her. Like now. And then he stepped back from the dugout, glanced into the crowd and looked for her.
She sat next to Sue, talking, and wearing a pair of sunglasses that framed her face. Her hair shone reds and browns, the skin on her face slightly more tan than the last game. She’d been out boating with the Lawrences the other day. Drew would have gone, too, but he had too much to do to get ready for Mackenzie’s visit.
Lucy gazed in his direction, and he couldn’t help the tightness he felt in his chest, and the constriction in his lungs. She clearly fought against smiling at him, then gave in with a subtle upturn of her mouth. It seemed to be a struggle for her
to let her guard down around him, but he remembered the taste and texture of her lips. The way her tongue swooped next to his, and the feel of her hands running over his back.
He had to fight the lust that curled deep inside his belly, and the feelings she brought out in him. When she’d come to cook during the days subsequent to her first visit, he hadn’t been home for one reason or another. It had been a busy week, with a committee meeting on the field’s new turf for next year, a luncheon down in Twin for the fall athletics board, and having new linens and a few “girl” things ordered for his spare bedroom.
This week, when he’d pulled into the drive, dead-ass tired, Drew wished he would have found Lucy’s car there. But she’d been gone and the meals were in the refrigerator with the reheating instructions.
Drew ducked back into the dugout and talked to Jason. “Eat your lunch, Carp.”
“Not hungry. I ate all of Nutter’s fries.”
“They sucked. Too salty.” Nutter’s athletic bag was under his rubber-cleated feet, and he didn’t seem to mind that he was dirtying up the canvas with clay, and dripping sauce from his Big Mac. Sipping a soft drink through the cup’s straw, he let out a long belch.
Brownie ripped a fart.
Then it became a free-for-all, and Drew shrugged, went to his clipboard and did some fine-tuning on the lineup.
The second game began and Drew threw his mind into coaching mode, directing players, talking to the umpire once to make sure a fair ball was called.
When they changed innings, he talked to Jason. “You dropped your shoulder too far back when you were hitting last time. Keep your shoulders straight and you’ll nail a line drive.”
“Okay, Coach.”
The boys sat back on the bench, Brownie up to the plate. The greasy smell of fast food permeated the sweat-stale air, giving Drew a second reminder he was hungry. His stomach made a noise.
Jason laughed, shoved his sandwich out. “Here. You eat it.”
Drew snorted. “I guess I will.”
He had to made fast work of the sandwich, getting in only two bites before he had to take to the field and question his other coach on a play decision.
By the time 3:30 p.m. arrived, they were only in the sixth inning. It was going to be tight. He nervously tapped his hands on a spare helmet, the drumming sound ringing through the confined area.
Jason sat next to him, gave him a scowl. “What’s the matter with you? You’ve been a few laces short of a shoe all morning.”
Nostrils flaring, Drew laughed. “Oh, yeah? And what made you the expert?”
“I dunno. I just seen you acting stupid. Like you’re thinking about a girl…or someone.”
Drew was surprised Jason had such a depth of understanding, but he couldn’t exactly admit he was stressed out about picking up his seventeen-year-old daughter who he didn’t know from jack. So all he managed was, “That obvious, huh?”
“Yeah. Who is she?” Jason’s brown eyes regarded him, staring hard. Seconds ticked by, the thwack of a ball and bat on the field breaking the silence. “It’s my mom, isn’t it?”
Not anticipating that one, Drew didn’t remark. His lack of a comment gave Jason free range to come to his own conclusion.
“I’m not stupid. I’ve seen how she is around you even though she tries to hide it. At last week’s game, you and her were talking, I saw how she smiled funny. She doesn’t do that for just anyone.”
Drew didn’t know what to say.
“So are you still hung up on Jacquie? Because if you are, I want you to stay away from my mom.”
“No,” Drew said abruptly. “I’m not seeing Jacquie.”
“I saw her and she was—” Jason’s expression grew markedly indifferent, as if he were contemplating saying something further.
His interest piqued, Drew asked, “Where did you see her?”
A shield went up on the boy’s face. “It doesn’t matter.”
Drew couldn’t get a feel for it, but there was something about Jacquie that Jason knew, and he wasn’t talking. There wasn’t anything Drew could do about it, and frankly, what Jacquie was up to now was none of his business. But clearly, Jason was worried his coach would do wrong by his mother.
“Jason, I like your mom,” Drew said, in the hopes of setting the record straight, but without getting into personal details. “She cooks for me and I think she’s doing a good job with you boys. You’re lucky to have her.”
“I know. You’d be lucky, too. Just don’t hurt her or I’d have to get really pissed off at you,” Jason said, before picking up his glove and running out to the field.
The boys took their positions and a long moment passed before Drew left the bench to stand on the third base line. The sixteen-year-old’s concern was a sobering reality. The last thing Drew wanted to do was play an emotional game with Lucy, but he couldn’t guarantee her, or himself, that he wouldn’t hurt her, however inadvertently.
So maybe it was best if he let his feelings for her die down before he burned them both.
Drew waited, his stomach muscles tight.
Fear of the unknown knotted inside him. It gnawed away at his confidence. He could handle any situation, had been in almost every one imaginable. But this was new territory for him.
A quick and disturbing thought surfaced. What if he messed things up worse than they already were?
He didn’t have an opportunity to consider that. Mackenzie came through the passenger area and walked toward him, a backpack slung over her slender shoulder. He stood far enough away, hidden by security screening, that he could freely assess her without her seeing him.
She was all Southern belle, his little girl.
And for a moment, he felt the pang in his heart ache to his core—a reminder of how he’d done her so wrong. He deserved her hell, her fury and her wrath. The very fact that she was here astounded him, for he had no reason to have been this fortunate. He wouldn’t question that she actually wanted to see him. He just wanted to believe he had a chance.
A memory surfaced, flooding his vision. He saw Mackenzie at twelve wearing a pair of pink capris and barefoot, sitting on the porch with Caroline and sipping cola through a straw. Mackenzie’s golden-hazel eyes had fixated on him while he walked toward her mom, stopping in front of Caroline, his palms damp from the humidity. Mackenzie knew then what he knew now.
She was his.
With his thin shirt clinging to his perspiring skin, his heartbeat pounding in his ears, Drew had come to demand a paternity test—but she had flat out refused. She’d said all he had to do was look at Mackenzie, and that was test enough. Caroline had said she’d go to purgatory before she ever let him put her integrity into question. Paternity had been determined when their baby had been conceived; the truth was still there twelve years later. And if he chose not to believe what was staring at him, that was his own stupidity and he could get off her porch.
At that time, Drew had already checked out of baseball to get help with a substance abuse problem he’d been having for most of his major league career. Through counseling, he’d learned to live life differently, to be a different man, a better person. But it wasn’t until many months later that he’d been able to come to grips with his past.
Caroline had always been a decent woman. Honest, with a good heart. That he’d ever doubted her wrenched his gut. But there was no going back.
The feelings of failure faded as Mackenzie came closer.
Her tall body moved with grace and ease. She walked with a fluid stride, her hips forward and shoulders squared as if she were poised for battle. She didn’t take any sass with that walk. It was all attitude, with just a little sugar mixed in.
A teenage boy walked past her and smiled, and she shot him a sweet curve of her lips that made the kid bounce off the news rack.
Mackenzie laughed softly—a sound he never thought he’d hear from her. Too bad she wasn’t laughing with him, and that it hadn’t been him who’d made her smile.
Her long brown
hair fell over her shoulders and curled at the ends. He wondered if that was natural. He couldn’t remember if it was something she’d inherited from Caroline. The summer color of her skin resembled Opal’s home-jarred honey: smooth and golden. She wore jeans, slung low on her hips, with a belt. Purple flip-flops smacked the linoleum as she walked. She had on a white T-shirt; a pearl bracelet circled her slim wrist.
Heading closer, she spotted him. Her easy stride slowed and she looked wary. So he did his best to put her at ease immediately.
“Hey, Mackenzie, how was your flight?” he said, stepping away from the pole he’d been leaning against.
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