Her Passionate Plan B (10 page)

He spotted her right away, in a huddle with the flashy redhead and the woman who looked like Julia Roberts, only with bigger eyes and a smaller mouth. He started to cut through the crowd but decided it might be smarter to wait until he had a legitimate claim to her company. Meanwhile, he'd just keep an eye on that purple bow.

Kell stood back and watched as the auctioneer held up first one supper box and then another one, reading off a name and fielding the bids.

“Now, come on, George, you know Miss Tilly's crab cakes is worth more'n five dollars. Smells like she stuck in a couple of her homemade grape-leaf pickles, too.”

The bidding had been going on for about ten minutes when the auctioneer held up the box with the purple bow. Recognizing it as one of those Daisy had carried out to her car on top of the stack, Kell raised his hand just as a familiar voice called out a five-dollar bid.

On the far side of the church grounds, Daisy was wailing, “I can't believe I worked this hard for nothing. Didn't I tell you all this was a crazy idea?”

“Hey, it's worked before,” Marty reminded her. The box suppers were one of their favorite venues for getting couples together. Marty and Sasha bought the supplies, Daisy did the cooking, making up an extra box. Then the three women would divvy up the other three boxes, dish a little dirt and look around for their next project.

Sasha checked her shoe heels for mud. “You got the freezer cleaned out, didn't you? Means you're that much closer to moving out of that old mausoleum.”

“I'd be even closer if I'd stayed home and worked instead of wasting a whole evening here,” she grumbled. “Faylene doesn't want a man, all she wants is a pair of legs that don't hurt and a raise.”

“Don't forget hair like Dolly Parton's,” observed Sasha.

“So? She can settle for one out of three and consider herself lucky.”

“Five dollars, do I hear ten?” came the tinny voice from the loudspeaker.

Someone called out a bid of seven in a voice that could barely be heard over the sound of children playing tag around the picnic tables.

“I guess now that Gus is gone, nobody else is going to bid on it,” said Marty. “Raise your hand, Sash.”

“Ten!” called another voice before the redhead could comply.

“Fifteen” came the prompt response.

“That sounds almost like…” Daisy stirred uneasily.

“Now, that's right generous of you, sir. Do I hear twenty?”

He heard twenty-five, followed almost immediately by thirty-five. Not thirty, but thirty-
five.
Daisy tried to peer over the heads of the crowd. Marty, the tallest of the three women, stood on tiptoe. She whistled softly under her breath and said, “Well, what do you know—maybe this wingding's not a complete washout after all.”

“Look, I know y'all were only trying to cheer me up,” said Daisy. She had finally figured it out. “It's not your fault it didn't work, but with Faylene gone, whoever buys her box will have to make do without a partner. I'm going home.”

“So we goofed,” Sasha said airily. “It's not the first time—probably won't be the last time, either. Hey, how else can three smart women of a certain age have fun in a place like Muddy Landing? This doesn't let Gus off the hook, either. Sooner or later we'll use him, we just have to find him someone a few years younger.”

Seeing a football tossed her way, Daisy caught it and threw it back. The preacher's son picked it up and had the good manners to yell, “Thanks, Miss Daisy!”

Miss Daisy. If she'd needed a reminder that she wasn't getting any younger, that did it. If Gus thought Faylene was too old for him, how long before someone said the same thing about her?

“Trouble is, I don't know if he'll ever trust us again.” Sasha tugged at the corset top she'd chosen to wear with her harem trousers. “His exact words when he heard who his supper partner was supposed to be were that he wasn't about to waste time on a prune-faced female old enough to be his mother when he could be watching the Wednesday night Braves game down at the volunteer fire department.”

“But didn't you tell him Faylene's a Braves fan, too?” Marty was hopping around, trying to get a better view of the auctioneer's table.

“Didn't have time, he took off too fast,” Sasha replied. “Who'd have thought his ego would be that touchy?” She shook her head. “Men!”

Daisy was tired to the point of being irritable. “Who'd he think we were fixing him up with, Madonna?”

“Too old. Try Britney Spears.”

It was hardly the first time their plans had failed at the last minute, but all the same, Daisy didn't need any further frustration. She'd had enough of that already. “Look, if y'all don't mind, I'm just going to go home, eat a bowl of cereal, finish up the last of the scuppernong wine and go to bed. Whoever buys Faylene's box, you can either join them or explain that she had to leave. Make up something, you're good at it.”

Gathering her purse and the cardigan she'd brought in case it turned cooler—which it had—Daisy was already on her feet when, in a sudden lull, the auctioneer shouted, “
Sold!
Sold to the gentleman in the black shirt for one hundred dollars! My saints alive!”

Sasha's mouth fell open. “A hundred
dollars?
Who on earth…?” She climbed up on the picnic bench,
grabbed the top of Marty's head for balance and tried to see over the heads of the crowd.

Daisy covered her face with both hands when it dawned on her that she knew “who on earth.” Somewhere under all the layers she'd tried to insulate herself with, she had recognized his voice. Peering out the corners of her eyes, she saw the studly gentleman—her rainy-day cowboy—standing just the way he'd stood the first time she'd ever laid eyes on him at Harvey's funeral. Arms crossed, booted feet spread, he was wearing the look of a man who knew exactly what he wanted and wasn't about to go away empty-handed.

I came, I saw, so what the hell—I conquered.

Only this time, instead of a dreary rain, the setting sun gilded his angular cheekbones, turning his tan to pure gold. As for his eyes, even from this distance they looked incandescent.

“Gracious me, if it's not your cowboy again.” Sasha climbed down and made a show of fanning her ample endowment. “Shall we invite him to eat with us?”

Daisy forced her gaze past Kell, who was making his way to the auctioneer's table, in time to see another familiar figure. It was Egbert, and he was headed out to the parking lot. “Egbert?” she wailed softly. “Oh, for Pete's sake, what else can go wrong?”

“Who'd you think was bidding against him? I guess it's time to add Egbert to the list, now that he's officially out of mourning.” Marty made a show of scratching a name on her palm with her finger.

“It's been almost a year,” Sasha said. “Besides, I heard she was thinking about leaving him when she got sick. Sara down at the bank said—”

“Oh, hush up,” Daisy muttered. Suddenly—or maybe not so suddenly—this game of theirs didn't seem quite so enjoyable.

“Too late, I've already got someone in mind for him.” Marty leaned in closer as she watched Kell dodge through the moving crowd. “You know Carrie Stovall? She's been living with this guy and it turns out he's got a wife up in Suffolk, and they're not even divorced? Carrie needs someone steady.”

“Lord knows Egbert's steady,” Sasha said with a lift of her penciled eyebrows. “Any steadier and he'd have moss growing on his north side.”

“Maybe Daisy knows of a remedy for terminal steadiness. What about it, hon, you want to try your healing arts on Egg-butt?”

Oblivious to the good-natured dishing between her two best friends, Daisy didn't know whether to weep or kick something. To think she could have shared supper with him. It would have been the first step in her campaign.

“Well, hello there,” Sasha purred as Kell sauntered up to join them. When Daisy glared at him, she added, “Don't mind her, she woke up on the wrong side of the bed.”

Daisy had had enough. Ignoring the grinning Kell, who was carrying a big white box full of the food she'd spent the afternoon preparing, she said, “You know what, Sasha? You're the only woman in the world who would dress like that for a church box supper.”

“Honey, let's face it—I'm the only one in town with any fashion sense.”

“Which one of you lovely ladies do I have the privilege of sharing supper with?” Kell asked. He was look
ing straight at Daisy, who was purposefully avoiding his gaze.
As if I didn't know
was implied.

“Oh, God, would you just listen to that. Not only a voice to die for, but manners, too,” Sasha murmured. “You get Daisy, but if she doesn't appreciate you, we'll be right over there at the table by the magnolia tree. Won't we, Marty?” She elbowed her friend in the arm.

“We will? Oh, sure.”

A
t least, Daisy assured herself, she was surrounded by so many chaperones she could hardly do anything too outrageous. All she had to do was behave sensibly for another hour or so; after that he'd be gone and she could try to smooth things over. The good news—the really encouraging news—was that Egbert had bid on her supper box.

“Daisy?” Kell was studying her, a quizzical smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

“All right,” she snapped. A few weeks from now she'd have forgotten all about Kell Magee. By then she should be well on her way to winning Egbert's—well, if not his heart, at least his very good friendship, which, after all, was the best basis for any marriage.

“Look, if I made a mistake and messed up your plans, I'm sorry. I can leave and you can join your friends, just say the word.”

She shook her head. “I'm sorry. It's just—oh, I don't know, everything, I guess. I'm tired from rushing to get things ready so we can close up the house, and on top of that, I think my apartment's going to be sold out from under me. And why am I telling you all this?” She shook her head.

“Maybe because you need to unload and I happen to have broader shoulders than either of your two friends over there?”

She relented. It wasn't like her to be snippy. She'd learned a long time ago never to allow her emotions free reign. It was messy at best, disastrous at worst. “Come on, let's find someplace where we're not apt to be hit in the head with a football.”

“Lead on, MacDuff.”

“Actually, I think that's supposed to be ‘Lay on, MacDuff.'” Daisy rolled her eyes, and seeing her expression, Kell chuckled. She told herself that if she'd managed to resist his charms while sleeping under the same roof, she should be able to manage sharing a meal in a public place.

Taking her arm, he headed for a table down near the creek. And that was another thing—the way he walked. You'd think every moving part in his body had been greased.

One hundred dollars? For plain old fried chicken tied up with a purple bow? She wished now she'd paid attention to the bidding, but she'd been too busy worrying about Faylene and Gus. How hard had Egbert tried to outbid him? Egbert had a reputation for being a good citizen. He always bought Girl Scout cookies and gave them away because he had a wheat sensitivity.

Oh, shoot. She'd forgotten the flour in the corn fritters, not to mention the flour she'd dusted her chicken with. Not to mention the piecrust and the homemade cloverleaf rolls. She'd like to think fate was on her side for once, but that would be too great a stretch.

“After sampling your fried chicken, I'm really looking forward to supper,” Kell said. “This table suit you?”

She wanted to tell him to stop being so damned…decent! How could any man look boyishly innocent and devilishly sexy at the same time? “It's fine with me, as long as you don't mind eating supper next to all those tombstones.”

“Not a problem. I don't believe in ghosts, do you?”

“I don't know what I believe in, not anymore,” she muttered.

They could always try again with Faylene, but she'd missed a wonderful chance to get better acquainted with Egbert on a personal level. Of course, if he bid a bundle and then couldn't eat a single thing she'd prepared, it would've been embarrassing, to say the least.

A picture-postcard setting. Sunset reflected in the creek. Dark fingers of marsh delineated the shoreline, naked cypress trees were silhouetted against the sky. Kell glanced around and murmured, “Nice.”

Stealing a look at his profile, Daisy had to agree. He had a wonderful nose, just the right size, with the slightest arch to give it character. Her gaze moved on to his lips and she quickly looked away. If anyone ever held a kissing Olympics, he'd win gold, hands down.

When he took out a handkerchief and brushed leaves and dried pokeberry deposits from the bench, she told
herself he was just too good to be true. Which meant he probably wasn't.

“What about something to drink?” he asked.

“There's a machine in the church basement. Sorry—I should have thought of it sooner.”

“No problem. Name your preference and I'll fetch.”

“Anything diet.”

He was back in less than five minutes with two bottles of water. “Sorry, this was the best I could do.”

“It's fine. The diet drinks always go first. You do know this was supposed to be Faylene's and Gus's box, don't you?” She nodded to the white cardboard box she'd saved from the last time she'd bought a bakery cake. “It had her name on it, and Gus Mathias was supposed to bid on it.”

“Figured it must be something like that. I saw her drive off just as I was pulling in. She wasn't looking any too happy.”

Daisy shrugged. “I guess you think we were meddling.” Well, they were, but only with the best of intentions. “It's just that when you see someone you like and you think there's a chance to make her happy, you want to try.”

He nodded, then lifted his shoulders in an easy shrug.

She tried unsuccessfully to interpret his mixed signals. “All right, so we have fun matchmaking. There's not a whole lot to do for entertainment in a place like Muddy Landing unless you like hunting, fishing or bingo.”

“And you don't, I take it. Man, are those what I think they are?” He took out a cloverleaf roll and sniffed it, closing his eyes.

“They're just plain old yeast rolls.”

“Hey, there's nothing plain old about these things,” he said, somehow making ordinary bread sound like hot buttered sex.

“Store-bought ones are just as good. I'm just trying to use up all the staples. I hate to throw out good yeast and flour.”

Kell pinched off a bit of roll, then searched in the box to see what else it held. “Ah, geez, is that chocolate cake wrapped up in the napkins? So this thing you planned with Faylene and what's his name—it didn't work out, huh? I guess his loss is my gain.”

“It's pie. Not cake. Kell, I'm really embarrassed you had to bid so much for the same old fried chicken you've had before.”

He bit off a bit of corn fritter, chewed with his eyes closed, then said, “Man, oh, man. Didn't have to. I'd planned on having a sub from that place down the road, but then I passed the church on my way through town.”

“Yes, but a hundred dollars?”

“Blalock ran it up to fifty-five. I got tired of playing his game.”

When it came to playing games Kell was obviously no slouch, but Egbert? She'd never have pegged him as the competitive type. But then, he was a man. With some men it was a survival tactic, a holdover from the Stone Age when the man with the biggest club won.

“Where'd you learn to cook like this?” He broke off a crumb of chocolate-rum pie, tasted it and closed his eyes. “Don't tell me you learned to bake like this in nursing school.”

“I had courses in nutrition, but before that I worked my way through school by helping out in the cafeteria. The women there were wonderful cooks. How about you?”

“You mean where'd I learn to cook?” He shot her a smile that managed to be both teasing and tempting. It occurred to her that she wasn't feeling nearly as tired as she'd been when the evening started.

“Faye said you were a baseball player. Who do you play for? Would I have heard of them?”

“Played. Past tense. I used to play for Houston. Why? Are you a fan?” He had a way of speaking volumes with the lift of a single eyebrow.

“Not really. I never went in for sports—never had time.” At age twelve she'd just been getting into track, but then things had started coming apart at her adoptive home. Next thing she knew, she was back in the system again. And while the system might try, it was under-staffed and underfunded. “So how'd you get interested?” she asked. “Aren't you a little young to have retired? And now you own a sporting goods shop?” As long as they kept talking, she reasoned, she'd be in no danger of falling under his spell again.

They discussed sports and growing up in a small town and then moved on to choosing a profession versus having one chosen for them. By the time she handed out slices of the sinfully rich chocolate-rum pie with coconut and walnuts, Daisy felt so comfortable she nearly forgot to be disappointed about the way the evening had turned out.

She'd been telling him about one of her cases, an elderly woman who had served in the Coast Guard during the Second World War—back then the women were
called SPARS—when she noticed he was staring past her toward the creek. The sun was already down, the afterglow laying long lavender shadows across the mossy old graveyard.

Twisting around on the bench seat, Daisy looked to see what had caught his attention. So far as she could tell there was nothing out there but an old two-plank landing used only by a few trappers and hunters.

Suddenly he rose, stepped over the bench and strode down toward the creek. After only a moment's hesitation, Daisy followed. “Kell? What is it?” Oh, God, she thought, not a child! Kids loved messing around the water, but surely if a child had fallen in they'd have heard the splash. “Kell?”

“Gotcha!” He bent over and came up holding something dark and round in both hands.

“A
turtle?
”

“Slider, if I'm not mistaken. She's been circling around out there ever since we've been here. I don't know much about these critters, but it didn't look like she could see where she was going. She kept running into things.”

 

Much later Daisy would look back on it as the moment she had fallen in love. A muddy little slider, of all things. And Kell had willingly spent the rest of the evening trying to help the poor creature. She couldn't help but wonder if Egbert would have done as much. Or would he even have noticed the poor, blind thing?

It was nearly three hours later when they headed back to Muddy Landing, having left one yellow slider with an eye infection and a serious case of malnutrition at the home of a retired veterinarian in Elizabeth City.

“Kind of makes you feel good, doesn't it?” Kell said quietly as they turned off on Highway 34 at Belcross.

It did, but by that time Daisy was half-asleep, the stress of the past few days having finally caught up with her. “Mmm.”

“Good thing you knew that vet. He said you used to pet-sit for some of his clients.”

“Mmm-hmm.” Dr. Van had retired years ago, but he'd taken one look and confirmed Daisy's suspicions. Too blind to find food, the poor creature would have starved, that is if it didn't blunder out onto the street and get run over.

“You cold?” He turned on the heater, and a current of warm air flowed over her. Once the sun went down, the air had chilled down quickly.

He drove fast, probably above the speed limit, but Daisy was too comfortable to complain, especially after he turned on a CD, lulling her with Vince Gill's dulcet tenor. Why fight it? Feeling warm and safe and—well, comfortable hardly began to describe it, but it would do for now—she gave up and let her eyes drift shut again.

The next thing she knew Kell was lifting her from the car. Coming instantly awake, she started to protest. He said, “Shh, you're in no condition to make it up those steps.”

“Wha's hap'nin'? Where are we? Kell, put me down.”

“Now, why would I do that?”

Twisting around, she looked to see the familiar turreted silhouette of the old mansion that had been her home for nearly a year. “Lemme get the key out,” she mumbled, struggling to find her shoulder bag.

“Already got it.”

“How? It's in my purse.” Her car. Good Lord, she'd left her car in the church parking lot.

“Daisy—hush up, honey, it's not worth fighting over. I didn't mess with any of your other stuff, just the keys.”

“But my car—you should have taken me back—”

“Shh, your car's probably safe enough in a church parking lot. We'll collect it tomorrow.”

Evidently somewhere between Elizabeth City and Muddy Landing she had lost her free will, her backbone and her last shred of common sense. She didn't even argue.

“You're bushed, aren't you? You want to turn in now, or do you want a nightcap?”

“Turn in,” she mumbled. And then “No, maybe something…” She tried to cut off the thought, but before she could stop it, a picture of a naked couple sharing a bottle of wine and then falling into bed together appeared like a DVD, full of color, detail and animation.

She shut her eyes. It didn't help, so she opened them again. In the dim light of the freshly dusted overhead fixture, his features looked as if they'd been carved from some exotic wood and polished to a satin sheen. “Maybe milk,” she said desperately.

“Milk it is. Warm or cold?”

She was wide-awake now. Emotionally confused, physically exhausted, but wide-awake. Shaking her head, she said, “You decide, I can't think straight.”

“Cocoa, then. Why don't you get ready for bed while I make it.”

She stood there like a stump wanting to say, Forget the cocoa, just come to bed with me. Instead, she said, “We don't have any more mix.”

“I'll improvise. You go wash, brush and put on something comfortable and I'll see you in a few minutes.”

Kell watched her stumble toward the end of the hall where her quarters were located, then headed for the kitchen. She'd been asleep in the car for the past twenty-five minutes, making soft, puffy little sounds with her lips. He'd been tempted to pull over and try a little mouth-to-mouth, but knowing how exhausted she was, he'd resisted the temptation. She'd been going flat out ever since he'd been there, trying to wind things up so she could move back to town. He'd been torn between trying to stay out of her way and wanting to spend as much time with her as possible before he had to leave. And not just because he liked being in the house where his father had grown up. And then, on top of everything else, she had taken on this box supper thing. Didn't those two friends of hers have any idea how pushed she was?