Bedroom Eyes (6 page)

“Oh, nothing,” Mrs. Merlin said, waving a hand as if it were a magic wand. “It’s what I don’t see that tips me off to what’s missing in your life. My fridge, for instance, is cluttered with drawings made by my grandchildren.”

Penelope dumped in the water without bothering to measure. Mrs. Merlin’s words were passing beyond amusing now, perhaps because they hit their target too accurately.

“Oh, never mind,” Mrs. Merlin said. “I’m far too hungry to try to help anyone else. Besides, look what a pickle my last good deed landed me in.”

“As soon as I’ve mixed the pasta I’ll whip up some appetizers. By ‘good deed,’ I suppose you’re referring to trying to help your neighbor with her tax problem.”

“Exactly.”

“Hmmm.” Penelope didn’t like to be impolite, yet she couldn’t help but wonder at the woman’s delusions. The thought made her laugh out loud. Wasn’t she the one suffering delusions? “I’ve got to quit imagining things that don’t exist,” she said under her breath. To Mrs. Merlin she said, “It’s much more sensible for someone with a tax problem to consult an attorney such as myself rather than trying to dream up a make-believe solution.” There, and let that be a lesson to you and your fantasizing, she told herself. Rather than hiding from life with your imaginary lover Raoul, let yourself go. Let David kiss you the next time he tries.

“You’re a tax attorney!” Mrs. Merlin clapped her hands to her forehead.

“I told you I was a lawyer,” Penelope said, forcing her mind back to Mrs. Merlin’s line of discussion, wondering at the woman’s dramatic reaction.

“But a
tax
lawyer! That explains everything!” Mrs. Merlin sat down on a cookbook, chin in hand, and began drawing on her caftan-covered lap with a minute forefinger.

This time Penelope simply waited for an explanation.

“I used verdant and chromium and elixir of violet, but what I must have done wrong was add in the pink. Oh, yes, oh, yes, whatever was I thinking?” She began wringing her hands.

“Whatever are you talking about?” Penelope didn’t like the way the tiny hairs on the back of her neck were rising to attention.

“Candle magick.” Mrs. Merlin looked up at her as if Penelope were a sweet but not too bright child. “An ancient and positive way of calling on the forces of the universe to aid our journey through space and time.”

“Uh-huh.” Penelope crossed her arms over her chest, spattering flour on her already soiled blouse. “And I suppose before you burned your last candle you were really a sweet grandmother from Gentilly about, oh . . . five feet four.”

“Five feet four and a half. And I am a grandmother.” Mrs. Merlin lifted her hands toward the ceiling. “I admit to dabbling in candle magick, but I do have a few things yet to learn.”

“You’re normally five feet four and a half?” Penelope concentrated on the question of height, trying to ignore the reference to magick.

“And I will be again soon. Quite soon.” Mrs. Merlin leaped up. “But I’m afraid that will require some assistance. From you.”

Penelope backed away. “Oh, no. Leave me out of this.” She selected two salad plates and pasta bowls and carried them to the table. In a firm voice she said, “Shoplifting was more than enough for me. Why, my heart stopped in my chest when that sales clerk caught me in the doorway!” She arranged the dishes and crossed back to the counter.

“Oh, phifil! Like I said, no sense of adventure.”

“There’s adventure and then there’s wrongdoing.”

“Granted. But we already decided that I am no more a possession of that store than you are. Ergo—isn’t that what you lawyer-types say?—” She peered upward, a sly grin on her face, “you did not shoplift.”

Oddly comforted by that logic, Penelope turned back to her interrupted dinner preparations, although the last thing she wanted to do right now was entertain a dinner guest. Charming, attentive, and unquestionably handsome, David had captured her attention by his steady yet respectfully restrained pursuit over the past month and a half. But curiously enough, she felt no excitement at the idea of his coming to her apartment, just as she’d experienced no magic at the dinner party he’d hosted at his home.

Now, if it were the man with the bedroom eyes. . .

“Stop,” she said.

“I’m only trying to explain how my spell went awry.”

“Oh, not you,” Penelope said. “I truly do want to hear how it is you came to be sitting in my kitchen.”

“Well, at least you’re curious. That’s a good precursor for developing a sense of adventure.”

Penelope thought of her unchecked fantasies, of how more and more they ran out of control. “I’ll have you know I do have a sense of adventure. I just keep it in check.”

Mrs. Merlin shook her head. “Better to let it out. Why once upon a time, more years ago than I can count, I used to be a little on the fearful side myself. I tried to do the right things, belong to the PTA and cook spaghetti for the church suppers. But, fortunately for me, my grandmother came to live with us.”

“And I suppose your grandmother was a candle magician?”

The small head nodded. “The best there was. My mother lived with us, too, you see, and she strongly objected to my grandmother teaching me anything related to magick.

“There were fourteen of us in a big house off Rampart and Esplanade,” Mrs. Merlin continued. “Now, those were the days! Except I was always doing the work for everyone else. But once my grandmother began teaching me magick, I started making everyone else carry their own load. Why should I be washing dishes when I could be learning the spell to cure a pollen allergy, the colors of the candles needed to heal a broken heart, the rainbow blend for financial success?”

“Why indeed?” The fantasy-loving side of Penelope’s mind took over as she listened to the tiny woman. Who wouldn’t rather heal the sick and weave love spells than do dishes? She pictured the woman life-size, dressed in the flowing caftan, holding court on the broad porch of one of New Orleans’ elegant old homes.

Perhaps it would be that magical time between sunset and dusk when the setting sun kissed the clouds with tongues of fire. And even as the flames leaped in the heavens, the flames of Mrs. Merlin’s candles would catch hold and lift their entreaties to the mysterious powers she invoked.

“Now, that’s an improvement.” Mrs. Merlin’s voice broke through Penelope’s reverie.

She jerked back to the reality of her kitchen.

“Your aura has gone completely blue,” Mrs. Merlin pronounced with a satisfied air. “That suits you far, far better than that muddy-colored armor you wear most of the time.”

“Blue, schmoo.” Penelope turned to finishing the fettucine, then mixed the ingredients for the alfredo sauce she’d decided to serve. She refused to make eye contact with the gremlin magician, refused to acknowledge the woman had observed a difference in Penelope while she’d been off in one of her fantasy trances.

Fantasizing was a bad habit she needed to overcome, a coping technique she’d used during her lonely childhood years and failed to grow out of. She had her feet planted squarely on her kitchen floor and she’d keep them there, thank you.

Mrs. Merlin had taken to muttering again.

Grating fresh Parmesan, Penelope wondered how long her visitor planned to stay and what sort of help she’d require to get her to vacate.

She’d opened her mouth to inquire when the buzzer on the intercom sounded.

“Noodles and napkins!” Penelope shot a glance at the clock. Had she told David seven, not eight?

Mrs. Merlin had stopped talking to herself. “Would that be your man problem?”

“David?” Penelope wiped her hands on a towel. On her way to punch the button to open the building entrance door for David, she said, “No, David’s not my man problem.”

“Oh?”

Penelope pressed the speaker button. “David?”

Passing traffic muddled his response. With a shrug, she pushed the door release. To Mrs. Merlin she said, “There’s this other man. I think of him as the man with bedroom eyes.”

“Ahh-ha.”

Penelope colored slightly. “I know it’s a silly name, but if you could see him, you’d know exactly what inspired the name.”

“And what is his given name?”

“Would you believe I don’t know?”

Mrs. Merlin didn’t look at all surprised.

“Oh, no!” Penelope grabbed the fabric of her slacks in both fists. “Just look at me. I haven’t even changed. My hair’s a mess.” She yanked what hair still remained in the once-tidy French braid loose and her hair spilled over her shoulders.

“If this man cares about you, he won’t give a fig what you look like.”

“Oh, that’s not true,” Penelope said. “Men always care what you look like.” She thought of the boys who’d ignored her in high school, proper Penelope in her hand-me-down clothes from the church basement bazaar. “Now would you. . .”

Penelope’s words dissolved into laughter. “I started to ask you to get the door!”

“I don’t see what’s so funny about that.”

“Oh, I could never explain you to David!” Penelope glanced around, then grasped the cook-book Mrs. Merlin was using as a seat. “I am really sorry about this and I know you’re starving, but you’ll just have to spend a few hours in the bedroom. Hold on.”

Mrs. Merlin clutched her incense stick with one hand, the edge of the cookbook with the other as Penelope carried her from the kitchen. “You clearly have no understanding of southern hospitality. It’s a good thing I’m here to help you learn a thing or two about good manners.”

“Tomorrow,” Penelope said, and set her guest on the bed. She placed the remote control for the bedroom television next to Mrs. Merlin. “I’ve got cable, but please keep it down,” she said, then pulled the door closed behind her.

Chapter 5

The knock on the door sounded before Penelope could prepare herself. The thought of David catching her with her hair a mess, her blouse limp and stained with perspiration and flour, the waistband of her slacks damp, distressed her. Even though he didn’t set her heart to pitter-pattering, she had to admit she enjoyed the solicitous attention he paid her. But a man as impeccable as David would no doubt be repelled by the sight of her in this state.

She sighed, then stiffened as the knock sounded again, this time loud and impatient.

“Coming.” Well, he deserved whatever shape he found her in, arriving almost an hour early. She gave her head a defiant shake, flounced her hair over her shoulders, and flung open the door.

“How nice . . .” the words of greeting died in her throat.

The man with bedroom eyes lounged in her doorway, managing to tower over her, yet at the same time to convey a lazy, laid-back look she found devastatingly sexy.

“. . . you look,” he finished her sentence.

Penelope glared crossly. “Did you come here to humiliate me?”

His eyes widened. “Now, what kind of question is that?”

Penelope rolled her eyes and pointed to herself. “Listen to you—telling me I look nice when I’m completely disheveled. What did you come here for?” Her voice rose. “And how did you get in, anyway? This is a security building.”

He winked and stepped inside her apartment. “Guess you were expecting someone.”

Penelope backed up.

He moved forward. From where he stopped he had a clear view of the dining table, set for two. His eyes darkened. “A man, I’d deduce.”

She held her ground.

He scowled. “And apparently your guest is someone you don’t mind seeing you
au naturel
—or disheveled, as you put it.” He lifted a hand.

Penelope caught her breath. Was he going to touch her? Anticipation warred with indignation. How dare he finagle his way inside her home? How dare he look at her like that? How dare he stop? Then she snapped her mind back on the track of reality. Holding up her hands to block him, she said, “You’re doing it again.”

“It?” His voice remained casual, but he raked her again with those eyes in a way that stirred Penelope’s blood despite her best intentions not to let him get to her.

“Following me,” she said.

“Not guilty on that charge.” He continued to stare at her from beneath his hooded eyes.

She wasn’t sure, but she thought it was her hair that held his attention. Goodness knew it was a mess. Self-conscious of its disarray, she raised her hands to gather her hair behind her neck.

“Don’t,” he said.

It wasn’t a request. His tone carried no please and thank you; it was a command, pure and simple.

Penelope stared back at him, then dropped her hands slowly to her sides. Her heart picked up speed. She could see her chest rising and falling much more rapidly than could be considered proper. Whatever was she thinking?

Not only did her breathing betray her, but her blood stirred and rose to a pulsing that reached out from her veins to thrum in her legs, her arms, and in secret parts of her body she blushed to acknowledge to herself.

Clearly she’d ceased to think, operating solely on feeling. She shook her head as the still-functioning portion of her brain registered that she’d let a strange man into her apartment.

Crossing her arms over her chest, she said in a normal enough voice, “And why is it that you’re not guilty of following me?” As she asked the question she cast a glance toward the bedroom door. If this man proved dangerous, surely Mrs. Merlin would come to her rescue. She might be six inches tall but she could probably punch in 9-1-1 on the bedside phone, which, fortunately for the diminutive Mrs. Merlin, happened to be a speaker phone.

If only she’d fed her! From what she’d seen so far of Mrs. Merlin, Penelope suspected the shrunken magician might be more inclined to help on a full stomach. Penelope knew she herself was always much nicer once fed.

Suddenly she realized he’d followed her look toward the bedroom door. His brows quirked. “Busy day?”

She colored. Well, let him think she had a man stashed in her bedroom. With an attempt at nonchalance, she produced what she hoped passed for a sexy pout and said, “Oh, very.”

“I’m relieved to know you’re feeling yourself again.” He moved toward the door. “And I wasn’t following you. Only stopped by to make sure you’d gotten home okay. Didn’t want to think you’d passed out from heat again on the front steps.” He shrugged a shoulder as if he didn’t really care but had felt compelled out of a sense of social responsibility to check up on her. He turned the doorknob, then paused, almost as if waiting for her to say something to invite him to stay.