Instructions for Love (8 page)

His honey-brown eyes smiled at her. “Our hub? I guess that would be T-Fred’s Diner.”

She shook her head. Dane seemed to try to keep a straight face, but could not. He chuckled. She grinned with him.

Just the two of them together on the porch after Mom Bea left had felt strange at first, causing Erin to have antsy misgivings. But now with them sharing a lighter moment, her tension relaxed, so much so that she made a quiet yawn.

“I never take a nap,” she said, “but I’ve gotten so sleepy. I might lie down a few minutes. How do all of you get used to this heat?”

He gazed at her. “Some days are hotter than others.” He descended the stairs, taking them by twos. “Enjoy your nap. I’m going to work.”

“I won’t sleep,” she said, but he had climbed into the truck and slammed the door. Dane drove back toward the fields. Erin made another stretch, watching his truck until it took the curve past the banana trees and disappeared from sight.

Inside, the house felt empty, as if no one had lived in the rooms. Erin decided to peruse some of them, to see how her lively aunt lived, to see if she’d stopped living once she moved into this old large shell.

How could anyone clean spider webs off the ceilings, all at least ten feet high, she wondered. On a small screened porch off the hall near the kitchen, she located the answer. In one corner stood the longest broom she had ever seen, its handle worn, its bristles frayed. She touched the rough handle and decided not to try to lift it to touch the porch ceiling. She’d probably fall down trying to balance it. Her petite aunt surely had not been the person who used this broom. A strong man must have done that.

Long spider webs clung to this porch’s ceiling corners. No man had been coming in here lately to clean them out. The only things on the porch besides the broom were three ceramic planters, each filled with potting soil and brown shriveled flowers. The view outside offered nothing much, only a sign that flowerbeds had once grown there. Border trim marked off spaces now filled with scraggly bushes.

“Aunt Tilly, what happened to you?” Erin asked. She stared out, recalling how her little aunt fluttered around her well-kept flowerbeds and shiny house. Had this temperate climate tempered her aunt’s spirit?

Erin discovered still no other signs of what could have occurred to her once-lively elder when she studied what must be the office. Right off the short hall from the kitchen, that room held dark furnishing, including a pendulum clock and huge desk, the wine-colored leather chair in front of it turned at an angle, the seat indenture too large to have been her aunt’s. The area gave off the scent of a male, or maybe it only seemed that way.

Erin sat in the chair. She looked over the desktop holding a computer, pens and scattered papers, making it appear the most used space in this house. She lifted the pen that had been set down beside a leather-bound ledger. Fingering that ledger, she imagined Dane sitting here writing in it. Maybe if she looked inside, she could learn why he held the impression that this plantation now belonged to him.

The idea of reading other people’s personal papers seemed too much like cheating, and she discarded the idea. Her aunt had left her papers with whatever she’d wanted her to know. If Erin was to learn of her aunt’s other private matters, she would learn them from her aunt’s attorney or other family members.

The banister behind the desk led the way up the stairwell. A sharp bend in the way lent shadows to the stairs that ran farther up into darkness. Only storage rooms were locked up there, Dane had told her. She wondered.

Weariness sank in, making Erin give up her search. She spied a washer and drier through a partially-open door in a hall and reached the master bedroom, stretching sideways on the bed to close her eyes for just a few minutes.

When they opened again, the lowered sunrays filtering through slats on the green louvered door told her she had slept quite awhile. Unusual for her. Back in Manhattan, she normally had trouble sleeping. So many sounds, so much activity, so much of it all in her head.

She rose and stood beside the bed, listening.

The central air conditioner droned. Chirping birds had to be resting now, taking respite from the heat on the wide porch. No footsteps sounded on boards that creaked. No evidence that Dane had returned.

But he might have. The man, admittedly overseer of the place, could be inside this building he called his residence, sitting at that desk or in the kitchen drinking his late-afternoon coffee. Aunt Tilly had told Erin that the people living down here drank lots of it, even until they went to bed. Erin’s couldn’t imagine spiking her nerves even more with caffeine overdoses.

She crept out of the bedroom, anticipating that in the next room, she might run smack into Dane Cancienne.

Erin Westlake
was what Dane hoped he would find after rounding that final curve in the road to his house. He wanted to see that signature at the bottom of a note stuck to the back door or on the kitchen table. And on that note she would have thanked him for the hospitality and told him she had gone home.

He had been hoping that the whole time he planted in his fields. He hadn’t been able to concentrate, and even old Jessie, also driving a cane planter that Dane almost ran into, asked what was the matter. He said Dane didn’t seem himself today.

Of course he wasn’t. He had that Yankee to contend with.

A grin sneaked up to Dane’s face. He recalled a few of the elder men who’d long since passed away. When each of them mentioned
Yankee
, they’d said it as though they had sworn.
How times changed
, Dane considered when he rounded the bend near the deserted chicken coop. Many of his relatives he admired lived up north now, although most of them remained in the Deep South. Dane stretched his head forward, anticipating spotting a piece of paper stuck near his back door.

A curse sprang to his lips when he spotted Erin.

He’d already passed the flower garden behind the house, and only her motion in his side vision let him notice her. He braked, threw his door open, and strode across the grass.

She snipped a fragrant Tea Rose and bent, placing its stem in a basket near her feet that held two others. She cut another pastel yellow one and stood with a smile when she saw him coming.

“What are you doing?” he snapped.

Her smile faded. “I found these gorgeous flowers and thought I’d cut some for the house. It could use some life.” Creases crossed her forehead. “Was I doing something wrong?”

He stared at the cut stems, what they meant to him not allowing him to speak.

Erin pointed to the rows of others. “This is such a lovely area, but I almost missed it with all those tall shrubs surrounding it. Who tended this garden, Aunt Tilly?”

His fiery gaze met hers. “Me.”

“Oh. Then no wonder you’re so--” She thrust the stem she held into the basket and headed back to the house, calling over her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I had no idea this was your garden.”

He stared at the cut flowers. Dane stepped through rows of the many colored rose bushes, the acute sense of loss tormenting him. Anna’s sanctuary.

He had cleaned out the grass and trash bushes and then tilled up rows for her to plant. The reds, pinks, yellows and multicolored buds now filled in all six rows. Anna had rimmed the rose garden with azaleas and bridal wreath bushes. She’d added banana magnolias to give the secluded area more sweet fragrance in the spring.

After she was gone, the roses quickly fell into disarray. Dane hadn’t bothered about other flowers around the house, but took a crash course in learning to care for these. He tended to them often. Heat sprang to his eyes.

Stomping out the garden, he glanced around, satisfied that he didn’t see Erin.

At the edge of the garden, he retrieved her basket. The flowers she’d cut would die a quick death in this sun.

He found his unwanted guest in the kitchen. “Here are the flowers you cut,” he said harshly.

Her back was to him. She stood near the stove, staring at the drip coffee pot. Dane’s fury had subsided from encountering her in the garden, but new anger swelled when he found her around the small pot that only Anna had used. This woman was helping herself to more of his deceased wife’s things.

Erin still didn’t turn.

Dane slammed the flower basket on the table, making her look at it.

Tears stained her cheeks. Erin glanced from the roses to him. “I didn’t know they were yours.” Her voice sounded small, quiet. “Or so important. It’s just that… I’ve been searching for signs that Aunt Tilly was around here. I thought I’d found those signs in that garden.”

Beyond her, Dane could see no fire burning beneath the teakettle. No dripping sound suggested she’d poured water in the pot. And he’d made her cry. He hadn’t meant to do that.

“It’s all right,” he said. “We can put these flowers in a vase. One’s right up there.”

He pointed to the cabinet behind her, but Erin didn’t turn. She swiped a hand across her eyes and sniffled.

Uncomfortable seeing anyone with tears, he said, “Here, I’ll do it.”

She moved aside for him to grab the vase. He poured water in, took the roses from the basket and set them in the vase, centering it on the table. “Now.”

Erin stared at the arrangement. She peered at him with misty doe eyes. Signs that Tilly had been in this house was what she wanted.

What could he show her? Tilly had done a great job of making the floor shine and keeping dust off the furniture, but not lately. Not since she’d taken ill. Before that, she had cooked some great meals.

“Look here.” He yanked open the refrigerator’s freezer door. Shoving aside the pail of Rocky Road ice cream, he moved thin packs of okra and grabbed the package that revealed rice. “Jambalaya. Tilly made too much a few weeks back, so she froze some.”

Taking the swollen freezer bag from him, Erin held it in both hands. The way she gazed at the package made Dane feel as if he was in a sacred space.

“Thank you,” Erin said. She replaced the pack in the freezer. “Maybe we can eat it tonight.”

He hadn’t planned to have her around by this evening. But she’d gotten so sad and needed something that might wipe away her unhappiness. A dish prepared by her aunt might give her great satisfaction. It would probably be too much trouble for her to fly the package of jambalaya home.

And back home, she might share it with that guy Trevor.

No, a dish Tilly cooked on his stove should remain here.

“We’ll have that jambalaya for supper,” he said, making a smile brighten Erin’s face.

He really should just give her keys to Tilly’s cottage and send her on her way there. But she didn’t seem so unpleasant to be around today. With her not talking as much as she’d done yesterday, even her movements had slowed. He liked seeing her body’s moves in slower motion.

He wrenched his eyes away from her. His interest, he determined with a jolt ramming through his belly, stemmed from not entertaining company in some time.

“I looked through some of the rooms,” she said.

“You didn’t check out the whole house?” This place had become only that, a big wooden shell filled with rooms. Two years ago, when the heart defect they hadn’t known existed took Anna, the building they stood in abruptly lost its feel of being a home. Still, a small piece of him felt proud of it. Of course not as proud as he was of his fields. And Erin had already gone into Anna’s garments in their bedroom. No problem now with her seeing everything else. “C’mon, let’s see what you missed.”

He only went with her through the house because he had hurt her with his fierce reaction to her cutting the roses. And the woman walking beside him had all kinds of sadness to carry already while she discovered for certain, after a time, that she would no longer see Tilly.

What a heart-wrenching lesson, having the truth sink in. You’d never again be near your loved one.

Feeling as if a hand tightened around his throat, Dane forced away former thoughts and stepped through the doorway ahead of her. “This was a dining room.”

Erin had crossed through this room before, and she’d sat at that small table to use the telephone, which she’d been hoping would ring. Trevor should have called back by now. He’d been so unreasonable. If he really cared for her work as much as he said he did, why wouldn’t he understand that she had to follow her aunt’s instructions, even if they seemed strange? She needed to stay down here.

“That’s the table.” Dane shoved one of the six chairs against the magnificent mahogany piece that now collected unopened packages, stacks of mail, and a tarnished silver tea set. “And other stuff,” he said, giving his head a toss toward other fine furniture like the cupboard with wavy glass doors. The diamond-shaped window above it was the largest yet in the house. Amber panes outlined the clear ones within, all thick wavy glass that silhouetted the branches and leaves of the trees outside. Framed photographs of single roses, probably taken in the garden, enhanced the feel that this space had once held more life.

Erin imagined eating in this room. Lots of guests would gather around the table when it sparkled. Airy curtains might replace the worn blinds on the door to the veranda. Joyous laughter might fill this room.

Dane strode ahead, guiding her to another one, this space darker. “The living room.” He stopped in front of a walnut-trimmed parlor set. A newspaper lay open on its coffee table. An antique loveseat, small television, recliner, and tasseled lamps filled in the furnishings. Pale green wallpaper coated the walls. Bottoms of the heavy drapes that closed over the windows lay pooled on the floor.

“It’s dark in here.” Erin’s voice sounded like it broke into a hollow silence.

He flicked on a standing lamp. “There.”

Erin noticed the wall she stood near. “What a beautiful fireplace.” She ran her hand over the mantle’s smooth dark finish. Empty vases stood on both ends. The trim surrounding the area for the charred wood appeared to be made of porcelain, white with traces of deep blue, providing the instinct that this room could feel cozy.