Her Minnesota Man (A Christian Romance Novel) (14 page)

She gazed into his compassion-darkened eyes and nodded miserably. It would kill her to let go of her mother's dream, but she might not have a choice.

"I'll determine the dollar amount I can handle," she said dully. "If the estimate's under that, I'll have it fixed and just hope the dumb thing doesn't go out again this winter. Otherwise—" Her eyes were filling with tears, so she looked down at her plate and shook her head.

"Laney." Jeb's smoky voice had dropped to its lowest register. "I know you'd never accept an outright gift, so I'll make any kind of deal you want. A loan? A partnership?"

"Don't tempt me, Jeb." She tugged a paper napkin from the holder and blotted her tears. "I appreciate the offer, but it's crazy to throw money at a dying business."

"You know it would only be pocket change to me."

"That isn't the point." She unfolded the damp napkin and carefully tore an inch-wide strip off one long edge. "If I can't make a go of this on my own, then I've failed, and a cash infusion from you isn't going to change that fact."

"Just sleep on it," he urged. "Maybe—"

"No, Jeb. If the bank thinks I'm such a poor credit risk, I can't in good conscience take money from you." Tearing another neat strip off the napkin, she added, "I have to be practical. That's what Mom would have—" Her voice broke, so she gave up trying to squeeze words past the growing lump in her throat.

Jeb pushed his plate away and folded his arms on the table. "What can I do, then?"

Don't leave me
, Laney's heart cried, but she forced a different set of words from her mouth. "There's nothing you can do, Jeb."

"What about the Graces?" he asked.

"They'll be disappointed. You know they see working at the tearoom as a social outlet more than anything else." Finding no relief in napkin shredding, Laney threw the whole mess onto the table. "Their house is paid for and they have their savings."

"They'll have more time for their charity work," Jeb pointed out.

"Yes. They'll be okay." If she kept reminding herself of that, the rest would be easier to handle.

"You'll be okay, too," Jeb said. "If you sell the building, you'll be able to pay off your debts and start college."

College. Laney had a knack for writing and had always wanted to take journalism classes. She'd love to be able to sell freelance articles. She could write about things like wedding traditions and etiquette, and maybe even do some light travel pieces about Minnesota tearooms and bed-and-breakfasts.

"No," she said on a sigh. "I can't leave here. Not now that Mom's gone." Even if she went no farther than the University of Minnesota, she'd be more than an hour away from the Graces—and at least twice that in snowy weather. What if something awful happened
a
nd she couldn't get home quickly enough?"

"Online courses," Jeb suggested. "You could—"

She stopped him with an upraised hand. "Not now, Jeb."

He smiled in tender amusement. "You always did insist on taking change in small doses."

"That's for sure. I'm a coward."

His dark eyebrows slammed together, forming a harsh vertical line between them. "You're no coward, Laney. And if your mom could see how hard you've
worked, she'd be proud of you." His expression softened as he reached across the table to skim a clutch of curls away from her face. "Just like I am."

Startled by the intensity of his gaze, Laney stopped breathing. There was something different in Jeb's eyes. Something she'd never seen there before.

Something that made her heart begin to pound.

"How about dessert?" their young server cooed at Jeb. "We have four kinds of pie tonight. Apple, peach, lemon meringue, and pecan."

As Jeb ordered pie, Laney inhaled deeply and willed her galloping pulse to slow down. Jeb couldn't possibly have looked at her the way a man looked at a woman he wanted desperately to kiss. In her emotional state, she had just imagined that.

But what she had not imagined, and what troubled her for the rest of the night, was the undeniable thrill that had coursed through her when his warm fingertips, calloused from years of guitar playing, had caressed her cheek.

Why had that simple touch scrambled her wits?

A
rriving home from the tearoom at six o'clock on Saturday, Laney pulled into Jeb's driveway and spotted him in the open garage, a basketball tucked under one long arm as he bent to examine the contents of a row of shelves. She parked near the bottom of the drive
way
, allowing him plenty of access to the basketball hoop mounted below the apex of the garage roof.

He jogged over and opened her car door, his face drawn in an expression of concern. "How bad was the estimate?"

"It was just a burned-out thermostat," Laney said as she unbuckled her seatbelt. "I had enough in my checking account to cover it."

The vertical groove between Jeb's eyebrows deepened. "Then why don't you look happier?"

"Because the guy said he wouldn't trust my furnace to make it through another Minnesota winter."

Jeb turned the basketball between his large hands. "That's
 
not good," he said quietly.

"No," Laney agreed.

He said nothing more; Jeb wasn't one to drop platitudes into uncomfortable silences. They both knew Laney had plenty to worry about, but her workweek was over, and she was desperate to forget her troubles for a while.

She got out of the car and shouldered her bag. "Were you looking for the air pump?"

"Yep." He bounced the ball between his feet.

"Bottom shelf of the workbench. Next to the bag of grass fertilizer."

Watching him walk away, Laney was conscious of a familiar regret that she knew the contents of his house and garage better than he did. It didn't bother Jeb one bit that his place was as full of treasures and as devoid of life as the undiscovered tomb of a forgotten pharaoh.

During his long absences, Laney sometimes treated herself to a late-night soak in his hot tub. As romantic shadows slow-danced on the candlelit ceiling of his screened porch, she imagined living in a house exactly like Jeb's with a husband and children. She liked to picture herself nudging aside a big, shaggy dog with her foot and sliding swollen loaves of yeast bread into the oven as small people at the kitchen table clutched pencils and asked questions about long division or Minnesota history.

Shaking her head to dismiss those thoughts, she followed Jeb into the garage, where he was already sticking a needle attached to a slender rubber tube into the basketball.

"The mail guy left a package for Mrs. Lindstrom on my porch by mistake," he said as he pumped the foot pedal, forcing air into the ball. "Would you
 
.
 
.
 
.
 
?"

Of course she would. The judgmental old lady across the street would have a fit if "that wild Jackson Bell" showed up on her doorstep. Besides, Laney had yet to return the house key she'd used last night when she'd gone over there and scooped stinky gourmet cat food into Snowball's dish.

"Where's the package?" she inquired.

"Kitchen table." Jeb disconnected the pump and gave the ball a couple of experimental bounces. "Thanks."

Laney rummaged through her bag for Mrs. Lindstrom's spare key, and then she plopped the bag on the workbench. Heading toward Jeb's back door, she heard several quick hard thumps followed by a brief silence and then a whispery swoosh—and a masculine grunt of satisfaction.

She couldn't help smiling. She might have troubles by the truckload, but she'd be spending the next few hours with Jeb. And tomorrow morning, he would actually sit beside her in church.

She found the package and carried it across the street.

Sour-faced Mrs. Lindstrom thanked her for bringing it and for looking in on Snowball, the overfed white cat leaning against her spindly legs. Those preliminaries disposed of, she introduced her favorite topic of conversation.

"I see Jackson is home," she said in her high, nasal voice. "And you're spending too much time with him, just like you always did."

For the sake of neighborliness, Laney smiled patiently. "You know Jeb and I have always been close."

"What I know is that Jackson Bell has always been trouble." The skinny old woman pronounced the words with the relish of a small-town busybody, which she emphatically was. "Mark my words, if he doesn't end up a drunkard like his father, he'll be something even worse."

Laney's smile slipped, but she held on to her temper. "Jeb is
nothing
like his father."

"Laney." Mrs. Lindstrom gave her a pitying look. "That boy is a rock musician. Do you honestly think he doesn't take illicit drugs and consort with groupies?"

Laney refused to consider that question. "He's a sweet man," she insisted. Granted, Jeb had made some choices in life that she couldn't applaud. But he was honest and loyal and tenderhearted, and it made her crazy that people didn't know those things about him.

"Sweet!" Hugging the package to her chest as though to shield herself from such wild talk, Mrs. Lindstrom shook her head. "I just hope you know how bad it looks when he's at your house until all hours."

All hours? It was true that after last night's supper at Willie's and the trip to pick up Francine, Laney and Jeb had played Scrabble at her kitchen table. But he'd gone home at ten o'clock, just as he always did, because Laney needed her sleep.

Deciding not to waste her breath explaining that to the nosey neighbor who was obviously still maintaining full-time surveillance on Jeb from her kitchen window, Laney handed over the woman's spare house key.

"I almost forgot to give you this." Forcing a smile that felt as brittle as pond ice after a light freeze, she asked, "Did you enjoy your visit with your sister?"

"What was there to enjoy?" Mrs. Lindstrom demanded in a querulous tone. "Helen's not much of a housekeeper, and how she manages to make an ordinary pork chop so tough, I'll never know. And she brags on her grandchildren all day long, when those kids are the most obnoxious pack of brats you ever did see. And that husband of hers! If he isn't the laziest—"

"I'm sorry to interrupt," Laney said hastily, "but I have to get back." She needed this toxic conversation about as much as she needed a good poke in the eye. "You have a nice evening, okay?" Giving what she hoped would be taken for a jaunty wave, she turned and stomped back across the street to where Jeb stood waiting for her, the basketball cradled against his hip.

"Well?" His mouth curled in wry amusement. "Is she still watching me instead of television?"

"
Yes
," Laney hissed.

All humor drained from his expression. "I shouldn't have made you go. Not after the week you've had."

"I'm okay." Laney sucked in a breath and released it slowly. "She was her usual crotchety self, that's all."

"And you defended me," Jeb guessed. "When are you going to stop rising to her bait?"

"I can't help it," Laney retorted. "She's so unfair. She doesn't understand the first thing about you."

"She might understand more than you think," he said quietly.

"Stop it," Laney commanded. "You're
not
 
.
 
.
 
. what she said. You
don't—
" She thought twice about finishing that sentence.

Jeb had gone very still, his wide-eyed gaze fixed on her with heartbreaking wariness. They had been here before, many times, and Laney had always backed away, afraid to ask questions that might elicit disturbing answers.

"Never mind," she said. "I'm just stressed out. I can't deal with stuff the way Mom did."

"Don't start that again. You're not your mother."

No, she wasn't. She could
all but
kill herself trying,
and she'd
still never be that full of wisdom and faith.

Jeb palmed the basketball and set it to spinning on his raised index finger. "We'll do something fun this weekend," he said as he pushed the ball into the air and caught it, still spinning, on the first finger of his other hand. "Anything you want."