Frisco Joe's Fiancee (11 page)

“That’s my girl,” Delilah said. “I always knew you had grit.”

Annabelle glanced up toward the upper story of the house. If she hadn’t known it was impossible, since Frisco couldn’t stand up by himself, she would have thought she saw his shadow in the window, behind the curtain.

Just in case, she waved.

The shadow didn’t move.

Wishful thinking. “Tell Frisco thanks for everything. Funny that none of us ever laid eyes on Mason, since he was the reason we came out here in the first place.”

“Ah, well,” Delilah said. “We never know what the future holds.”

Jerry closed the cab door. Annabelle buckled herself in, with Emmie in a car seat between her and Jerry. Glancing back up at the window, she saw that the shadow was gone. But the sun had moved, as well, and if she’d learned anything on her time at the Union Junction Ranch, it was that she’d never chase shadows again.

Four hours after Annabelle had left, Frisco’s room filled with the rest of the Lonely Hearts ladies.

For his part, Frisco, unused to having women in his room, decided to pull the sheet as high over his waist as he could. There was some appreciative eyeing going on, and while he once upon a time would have eyed appreciatively back, he was feeling a bit more unfriendly than usual.

He missed Emmie in the bed beside him. That little short-term carpet-grabber had been quite a comfort, once she’d stopped griping about her stomach pains. He sure hoped those cramps didn’t return.

He wasn’t happy about Annabelle leaving, but women were known to be notoriously headstrong about whatever they decided to do. A mental shrug and a curse was all he was going to spare on that.

Besides, he had all these women in his room, and he wasn’t sure what they wanted. It felt rather as though a jury had assembled at the foot of his bed,
catching him out when he’d been scrolling the TV channels hoping for a glimpse of a better football game or Pamela Anderson to take his mind off his leg, the missing baby and the woman he’d kissed last night.

No big deal.

“What’s up, ladies?”

“We’re leaving,” Delilah said.

“Any particular reason?” He didn’t think he could handle pounding his brothers if they’d gotten out of line. On a good day, he would enjoy the exercise; today, he just wanted to lie still and debate the world’s existence as it centered in his leg.

“All good things must come to an end,” Delilah said with a grin. “We’ve got to get on to the next leg of our journey.”

Talk of legs at this point only brought a wince. He tried to concentrate on being a good host. “I thought you were on vacation.”

“A vacation should be a journey, if possible, while being a fun trip.”

He squinted at her. “Am I getting a lecture? I should know, so I can pay attention.”

She smiled at him. “You’ve had your mind on other things.”

Oh. Possibly she was pointing out his interest in Annabelle. Could be she meant he was mainly focused on himself. He wasn’t sure where she was heading with this, but he looked at her with alert,
careful eyes. “Good luck on your journey. I take it you’re looking for something. Maybe you’ll find it.”

Her gaze, and seventeen others, focused on him as he lay helpless in the bed. The sensation made his scalp crawl. They were smiling at him.

These women wanted something. And he didn’t think they wanted the biggest ménage-a`-plenty Texas might have ever seen. “Ah, Delilah, why are you smiling at me like you’ve got a secret only recently unclassified by a rogue feminist group?”

“We’d like to give you a parting gift,” Delilah said. “Something to make you feel better.”

“I feel fine—”

“When we get through with you, you’re going to feel better.”

One of the ladies closed the door.

He resisted the unmanly, unexplainable urge to shout for Tex and Laredo. These women looked way too happy about whatever they were going to do.

Four approached the bed. He clutched the sheet.

“Hold still, Frisco,” Delilah practically cooed. And she pulled out the biggest pair of pointy scissors he’d ever seen. On the opposite side of the bed, the buzz of an electric razor punctuated his apprehension.

He was trapped with women whose goal was to whip him into shape.

And there was nothing he could do about it.

T
WO HOURS LATER
, Frisco closed his eyes in relief. They were done, finally satisfied. Every pore of his body was warm with relaxation. He’d been cut, clipped, trimmed, massaged; in short, totally tamed. Hair styled, stubble gone, nails buffed. His cast was signed in colorful pens by all eighteen women. The sheets had been changed. He’d been lifted from them by Tex and Laredo, whom Delilah called to the scene.

Tex and Laredo had left—the traitors!—laughing at him as if he were a prize poodle getting a blue-ribbon grooming.

Even his room was clean, not a speck of dust anywhere. Katy and Delilah had taken down the blue-checked drapes in his room and washed them. Lemon-oil permeated the air, mingling with the smell of clean sheets and body lotion.

“Ah-h-h” was all he could say. At this point, if they’d wanted to put beads in his hair or a tattoo on his back, he probably wouldn’t argue. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Delilah said. “Thank you for having us out.”

“Oh, it was no trouble at all,” Frisco said, feeling less like a prisoner and more like a prince. “You just come on back anytime. Anytime at all.”

His eyelids closed. He couldn’t help himself. Reaching up, he felt where the hair used to brush
his collar. Neck shaved nicely. And his hair no longer fell into his eyes.

Those ladies certainly knew what they were doing.

A sudden itch hit his leg, and he reached down to scratch it without opening his eyes. His fingers contacted something not part of the cast. Opening his eyes, he pulled it out.

It was a business card. Pink, with purple lettering.

Lonely Hearts Beauty Salon.

Let us take care of you.

Well, he wouldn’t be driving that far for a haircut every three weeks.

His eyes snapped open.

But he might for another reason.

M
IMI HEARD THE SOUND
of her father opening the front door. She listened, wondering who would be visiting. Probably the deputy, or some of the other officers, as they knew her father was at home today. The flooding had required his attention around the clock, and he was tired. He seemed to get tired more quickly lately, and it worried her.

He was not the young man he’d once been, and he worked darn hard.

After a few minutes, when she didn’t hear the sound of men’s deep voices, she went downstairs.
To her surprise, all the Lonely Hearts women were talking to her father.

“Hi,” she said to the room at large. “Is there something wrong?”

“We just came to say goodbye,” Delilah told her. “We didn’t want to leave without letting the sheriff know we were going.”

“Oh.” Mimi supposed that was fair enough. She couldn’t say she was sad. Mason was due back soon, and if all this crew was cleared out—particularly the too-cute Annabelle and her precious bundle of joy—Mimi wouldn’t mind. It would make matters less complicated, because Helga was supposed to be here tomorrow. Helga, not Olga.

Mason would be so pleased. Julia said she’d sent the perfect woman to fit Mimi’s description of what Mason needed.

Delilah, her dad and the other women looked at Mimi, obviously waiting for something. She quickly reviewed her manners. Uh-oh, lacking, once again, in her pursuit of Mason’s happiness.

“All of you did so much for Union Junction,” she said sincerely. “I know my father has probably said it, but the shopkeepers said many times that if you ever decided to move your beauty salon here, they’d welcome you with open arms and help you make a success of it. And in this town, that’s saying a lot. They don’t often offer welcome with open arms.”

Particularly to a bunch of pretty women, Mimi thought.

“We were proud to assist. We’ve enjoyed being here. It felt like our own town,” Delilah said.

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out. The housekeeper’s position, I mean.” She tried to look sorry and might have made it, since her father’s gaze was approving.

“Oh, that’s all right. That’s part of the interviewing process. There’s no guarantee of being hired. But we had a great time with the men over there. Sorry we missed Mason, though.”

“Yes, well, he won’t be back for a few more days,” Mimi said hurriedly. “I’ll tell him all about what nice ladies his e-mail advertisement brought to town.” Although when
she
told the story, none of
them
would be man-magnets.

Storytelling license, the discretion of the teller.

“We owe the first wonderful days of our vacation to you, Mimi. In a way, if it hadn’t been for you, we might still be adding up vacation days,” Katy Goodnight said.

“We’d like to do something for you,” Delilah added. “To thank you.”

“No need. We should be thanking you,” Mimi said, her manners now silver-shiny for her father’s sake. “Truly.”

He nodded at Delilah. Delilah turned to look at Mimi. Uh-oh, secret signals.

“Our only way of thanking anyone is to give
them a makeover,” Delilah continued. “And since your father mentioned you have a date tonight—with a lawyer fellow, right?—we’d like to give you the works. If you’d let us.”

Mimi’s jaw sagged a bit. Her father beamed.

“Uh—” she stammered.

“A few highlights, some pretty makeup, a little sparkle on the fingers and toes…what do you say, Mimi? You’re beautiful already, but we’d love to make tonight really special for you.”

Glancing down at her blue jeans and boots, Mimi didn’t have to reach up to feel that her hair had long since grown out of any type of style. It was cowgirl-casual. Her makeup was Maybelline-over-my-dead-body. Her perfume was eau-de-pasture, and her skin was best described as cat-tongue rough.

She didn’t give a flying cow patty about the lawyer coming to see her father tonight. But Mason would be home soon—and if these ladies thought they were miracle-workers, who was she to stand in the way of the great white light?

“You know, Delilah, that sounds wonderful,” she said. “I’d really, really love to take you up on your oh-so-kind offer.”

Wouldn’t Mason be surprised?

T
HE MIRACLE THAT THEY
wrought on her was nothing short of well, glamorous, Mimi decided. “Your shop must stay full of customers,” she told them,
looking at herself in awe. “You must have a waiting list a mile long. Thank you so much! I never dreamed I could look like this.”

Delilah gave her a pleased once-over as she packed away a large cosmetics case, rollers and nail polishes. “We don’t have as many customers as we like.”

“Well, I second the invitation from our community, then. Come here and open up a shop!” She twirled her skirt in front of the cheval mirror. A skirt! Twinkly red sequins adorned the seriously-short skirt, black sequins adorned the heart-shaped bodice, and a long black lace length of fabric with more sequins lay across her shoulders and hung delicately to her hands, keeping the ensemble from looking scandalous. Sexy, but not scandalous. Just right for an evening with someone her father wanted her to entertain.

“We can’t come here,” Katy said. “We’re going to stay and fight.”

“Fight?” Now there was a word Mimi had some passing acquaintance with. “What kind of fight?”

“Oh, metaphorically speaking. Never mind that,” Delilah said, brushing off the question. She smiled at Mimi. “We have to go now, but have a good time.”

Mimi hugged Delilah. “You’re like my fairy godmother.”

“I hope the mystery man is a prince, then.”

“Oh. Him. Yeah, maybe he will be.” Too bad Mason can’t see this dress. It would knock his boots off!

Of course, there was no need for drastic measures. She didn’t even know why she cared about what His Highness the Hard-Headed thought.

“Goodbye,” she said, walking the ladies to the door. “Stop back by some day.” Not too soon, of course, because Helga was due to come tomorrow, and she didn’t want anyone’s feelings hurt. “Bye!”

“Bye!” the group called back. It was like watching a camp retreat, Mimi mused, as the ladies put their suitcases on the porch and went outside.

Thirty minutes later, they loaded up into various trucks, driven by the Jefferson brothers, and headed out. For the bus station, likely.

The phone rang, and she jerked it up, still amazed by the woman staring back at her in the mirror. How did those women get her hair to curl like that? So sexy and feminine! It was almost like not looking at herself, but someone soft and gentle and desirable. “Hello?”

“Mimi, Frisco.”

She frowned at his growl. “So?”

“So you remember when you said you weren’t helping us out while Mason was gone?”

Her lower lip stuck out. “Yeah?”

“Well, you done a fine job of keeping your word, but now you’re going to have to come over.”

Not in these heels, buster. Delilah’s crew had talked her into pantyhose—disgusting!—and high heels. The dress and heels were to be shipped to the Lonely Hearts Salon after tonight. She wasn’t going to risk ruining this get-up just because Frisco had been careless. “I can’t. Can it wait until…tomorrow?” When Cinderella will be wearing jeans and boots again and not borrowed girlie glam?

“There’s a woman here—in my room, I might add—who seems to think she’s applying for a job,” he said tersely.

Mimi blinked. It couldn’t be any of Delilah’s girls—they’d all just left. Annabelle was long gone. “You shouldn’t let strangers in the house, Frisco. Anyway, there’s no position to apply for. I thought we settled that a few days ago.”

“We did. This lady says—in very broken English—that you sent for her. Her name is Helga.”

“Oh! Helga! Why didn’t you say so? I’ll be right there. You be nice to her, Frisco. Just because you’ve got a broken leg is no reason to be a sourpuss.”

She hung up, gave herself one last glance in the mirror—and a fluff under her long, curly hair just for fun. She called to her dad that she was leaving and decided that this once she’d drive next door.

“W
HAT TOOK YOU SO LONG
?”

Mimi glared at Frisco, prone in the bed with a
very large, very old woman sitting next to him on a chair she’d moved quite close to the bed—almost as if she were afraid he might escape.

“Why are you dressed like that? You look like a showgirl,” he complained.

“A showgirl?”

“Yeah, the kind that—”

“Sh! I’m sure you have wide experience in the different varieties of showgirls, Frisco. We need not hear about your downfall.” She pinched the big toe of his bad leg surreptitiously and smiled at the grim-faced woman tucked right up beside Frisco’s bed.

“It’s
so
nice to meet you,” she said with a sugary smile. “Welcome to Union Junction, Helga.”

“Tank you,” Helga said without smiling.

She was
perfect.
As nice as Delilah’s crew had been, this was the housekeeper Mason needed.