She Drives Me Crazy (23 page)

Jimbo's office door was partially closed. From within the other room, she heard him speaking in what sounded like a one-sided conversation, and knew he was on the phone. "No, no, this isn't a problem. She can say that all she wants, it doesn't make it so," she heard him say. "If she goes out to the club one more time, we'll have a restraining order filed against her. I promise, nothing's going to interfere with your on-time opening this September."

The club. He was talking about Joyful Interludes. Talking to the mystery owner, who, everyone in town had heard over the weekend, was
not
Emmajean Frasier's granddaughter.

"It doesn't matter if she shouts to the world that she never sold the land, because she didn't." He laughed, the dirty kind of laugh little boys made when they'd done something nasty like breaking wind in church. Then he added, "Her grandmother did, before she died, you have my word on it."

Cora stiffened. Emmajean? Sell her family place? The place she'd crowed about every single time she won another blue ribbon at the fair for her pecan pies?

Never. Not in a million years would Cora believe it. Em-majean's family had farmed that land in the last century, and the old woman had held onto it with every bit of Southern stubbornness she'd possessed. Just as Cora would have done.

Something smelled stinky. As stinky as a pair of Bob's old work socks. She suddenly had to wonder if Mayor Jimbo Boyd hadn't been up to more nasty tricks than doing the desk mambo with his secretary. For some reason, the image of the jumble of papers she'd found in Emmajean Frasier's rolltop desk a couple of weeks back popped into her mind. Papers…deeds…things with signatures. All locked up in a house to which Jimbo held the key.

Seemed worth thinking about some more. Maybe even worth a trip to the county records building to do some nosing around in the land transfer files. It might even be worth mentioning to someone official.

Maybe even the
real
power in this town—first lady Hannah Boyd.

Pecan pie was now officially the most heavenly food on earth. Ambrosia. The only bad thing about it was that the stuff turned into glue when it dried.

"Oh, God," she said with a moan as she buried her face in her pillow, only to smear a glob of dried sticky filling on her nose, "I'm going to have to throw these sheets away."

Johnny, who was busy nibbling the vulnerable skin on the back of her knee, mumbled, "Do you really care?"

"No."

She didn't. How could she when he kept doing these insanely wonderful things to her? Like now, smoothing that delicious stuff up the back of her thigh with one fingertip. He tortured her, his touch light and deliberate, laying the path of pie filling. He teased her to the point of begging, but wouldn't touch her where she most wanted to be touched until he was good and ready.

"Oh,
please
…"

She tried to roll over, but he wouldn't let her. "Ah, ah, I already ate my way across the entire top of your body," he whispered as he drew nearer and nearer to the apex of her thighs. "Now I want to finish the bottom."

He returned to his mission, nuzzling, licking, tasting his way up her legs, always taking delicious detours on the way. Like when he'd nipped at the tiny birthmark on her right thigh. Or now when he…oh, when he followed the curve where her thigh met her bottom with the tip of his hot, sweet tongue. Or, oh, heavens, when he slipped that tongue deeper, lifting her hips up to gain better access.

"Johnny," she wailed. Then she couldn't say anything because her world exploded with color and intensity as his mouth went lower, deeper, to eat and drink his fill from her. Until he finally taunted her into another climax that had her practically screeching into the pillow.

"I'll get you for this," she whispered when she was somewhat sane again. "I will get even if I have to bake another pie."

Rolling her over, he gave her a lazy grin, then lay on his side next to her. "There's plenty left, sugar."

And Emma made very good use of every bit of it.

Claire had figured Tim would show up at her mother's house yesterday, for Sunday dinner, but he hadn't. Part of her was glad. Another part missed him like mad. She missed sitting with him at church, exchanging amused glances when the choir started to sing "joyful, Joyful, We Adore Ye," considering how unholy this town was. She'd missed hearing he and Eve laugh together as he pushed her on the old tire swing in the backyard.

Her mother and father hadn't asked many questions. She had the feeling they knew what was going on. When she'd left, Mama had given her a big plate of food and told her to bring it home to Emma jean, to thank her for getting Claire to dress in something that wasn't shaped like a sack.

She was still worrying over Tim's unexpected absence when she left the newspaper office Monday morning during her break.

"Hey, babe."

She immediately stiffened.

Tim looked tired. His hair was uncombed and he wore a pair of jeans, unthinkable on a weekday given the dress code at the engineering firm where he worked.

"Hi," she replied. "You look bad."

"I feel bad."

"I'm sorry about that," she admitted, meaning it. She was sorry, truly sorry her husband was going through this pain. His world had shifted, as had hers. But she'd been the one to cause the shift, and he hadn't quite caught up. At least not yet.

The sad look on his face, and the bunch of daffodils he held out to her, made her realize it might be time to bring him up to speed. On a lot of things. "Want to grab a cup of coffee?"

"I'd rather grab you and hug you and never let you go."

"Well, gee, imagine, you hugging me without being
ordered
by Eve to give us both a family hug. Don't hurt yourself."

His jaw dropped. Then he stared searchingly at her, his fine hazel eyes not hiding a thing. "You're not serious."

Breathing deeply, she replied, "Yeah, I am."

Tim didn't hesitate. He put his arms around her shoulders and pulled her close, holding her, rocking her a little, rubbing his hand up and down her back. "God, I love you so much, Claire, I'd never want you to think I don't love holding you."

She sniffled a little, sucking up his warmth, wondering how long it had been since her husband had taken her into his arms in broad daylight on a public street.

"Let's go talk," she murmured against his chest.

Claire didn't trust the open ears of the diner or the Denny's by the highway, so she suggested they grab some coffee and take a walk in the park. In spite of the stifling heat, it was a beautiful day, with a bright blue sky and a few puffy white clouds floating here and there. And yet she still felt like crying.

She didn't want to hurt her husband. She loved him. Loved him so much she never wanted to think about living without him.

You have to do this
, she reminded herself. For their future, she had to get everything out in the open so they could work together to try to make things right.

"Your friend sure made a speech the other night."

She tensed, wondering if Tim was going to bash Emma Jean.

"Sounds like she had good reason, though. I heard those stories and never thought for a minute they weren't true."

"I told you they weren't."

Tim grinned. "As I recall, that was right after I came and bailed you out of jail. I wasn't much in the mood to be charitable after she got you arrested."

"I don't need anybody's help to get into trouble." Lowering her voice, she added, "At least, I didn't used to need any help."

Tim took her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. "I remember. You were hell on wheels."

"You used to like me that way."

"I like you
any
way." Then he clarified. "
Love
you any way. And I'm sorry I reacted so badly Friday. I know we agreed you'd go back to work sometime. I just hadn't figured you'd want to until Eve started school."

"I was going crazy," she admitted. "I love being with Eve, but sometimes I think if I don't have another adult to talk to, I'm going to lose my mind."

Tim led her to a park bench and sat down with her. "I guess I was mainly upset that you didn't even talk to me about it."

"I've tried to several times over the past year."

He shrugged in a typical "guy" way. "I didn't think you were serious. You always dropped it after bringing it up once."

"Because
you
seemed so against it."

"Because I thought you didn't really want it."

"Well, we were obviously both wrong."

He fell silent for a moment, probably thinking the same thing she was:
when did we stop being able to communicate
?

"Okay," he finally said, "so you're back at work part-time. And Eve seems to really like it at the day care."

Claire raised a brow. "She does?"

Tim nodded.

"She hasn't said anything to me, except that it's fine."

With a snicker, her husband said, "Because she knew you'd tease her. Turns out Courtney Foster goes there and she called Eve 'Angelica' the first day. Since then Eve has been working very hard to make Courtney her best friend."

Claire smiled, suddenly wanting to hug her baby.

"There's more to say isn't there?" Tim asked quietly.

"Well," she admitted, drawing on some inner strength she wasn't sure she'd find, "there is the fact that I feel invisible to the rest of the world…and ignored by you."

"What?"

Wow, she'd stepped into it. She might as well take the leap. "Sorry if it hurts to hear, but it's the truth. I can't remember the last time you walked in the door after work and laid a real kiss on me that wasn't just like the one you give Eve on the cheek or the forehead."

"What? I'm supposed to grab you and kiss the daylights out of you in front of Eve?" He sounded shocked.

"Why not? My parents always had a very loving relationship and I didn't grow up to be an ax-murderer or anything."

"Eew, can we please not talk about your parents' sex life?"

"Are we ready to talk about
our
sex life?"

"What sex life?" he muttered under his breath.

That made her gasp. "Oh, so you noticed?"

"Well of course I noticed, Claire. You think I'm a eu-nuch or something?" He leaned back on the bench, swiping a hand through his thick blond hair, then covering his eyes.

"So why haven't you done anything about it?"

Straightening, he admitted, "I kinda figured when you were ready for something normal again, you'd let me know. You're the one who made it very clear you were too tired or too unhappy with how you looked or too worried about the baby waking up in the middle for us to do anything."

"That was when she was a baby! Eve's four years old."

"Exactly," he shot back, his eyes dark and stormy. "So where's my Claire? Where's the woman I used to find naked and on top of me during the night? The one who'd climb into the shower with me in the morning or grab me under the table when we were in a public restaurant until I was tempted to toss you onto the table and dive on you right there in front of everyone?" He shook his head, looking weary and confused. "I thought she'd been replaced by someone who decided she was now a mother and that certain things weren't…proper. And weren't going to happen anymore. You sure didn't seem interested."

Claire stared at him, unable to believe what she was hearing. God, all the things she'd been feeling and thinking and believing and crying over—he'd been feeling, too.

His words almost angered her at first. He was the one who'd rolled over night after night. But then she thought about it, and had to admit the truth…the times they did have sex he usually initiated it. Unfortunately, she often had such difficulty letting go of her resentment for all the times they
weren't
, that she seldom enjoyed it.

Her feelings had obviously showed.

They sat there for several long moments, thinking things over, their hands still touching. Finally Claire said what was deepest in her heart, knowing it was what she had to say. "I love you so much, Tim. And I want you." She squeezed his hand. "I want the man who can make love to me for two hours straight because he focuses on
our
pleasure, not just his."

He chuckled. "Oh, God, not that
Cosmo
thing again."

She rushed on. "I adore our daughter. I'd die to keep her safe, and I know you would, too."

His smile faded and he looked very serious as he nodded.

"But there will come a time when Eve grows up and leaves, and it's just Tim and Claire." She lifted a hand to his cheek, and he immediately turned his head to press a kiss in her palm. "Before that happens, we have to make sure there's a Tim and Claire who
want
to finish out their lives together."

She stood, ready to go back to work, knowing they'd said enough for now. Enough to get them both thinking.

"Eve's not the only one," Tim murmured as he rose to stand beside her.

She raised a brow.

Running his fingers through her hair, Tim drew her close and whispered, "I'd die to keep you safe and happy too, Claire." Then he kissed her, deeply and passionately, right there in the park in front of the mothers pushing strollers and the old guys playing checkers.

When he drew away to look down at her, Claire said, "I'll come home tonight."

He shocked her by shaking his head. "Stay at your friend's."

Her stomach clenched as she wondered if she'd hurt him too deeply, if it was too late for them to make things right.

"Ask her if she'll baby-sit Eve tonight, okay?" Tim said. "Because I want to take my wife on a date. If she'll have me."

Claire's lips widened into a smile as she began to feel, for the first time in ages, that they were going to be okay. "She'll have you all right," she said. "She can't wait to have you."

With one pie gone, devoured during the most delicious sex of her life, and another one cut into by Eve and Emma Monday night during their baby-sitting adventure—which had left her more exhausted than any four hours she'd spent on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange—Emma was left with only one pecan pie.

That one was spoken for. By the hair salon owner.

Seemed like a rather "flaky" thing to base her short-term future on, but, she figured, it was worth a shot. So she carried it into the Let Your Hair Down salon first thing Tuesday morning. Inside, she immediately looked for the owner, who'd introduced herself as Doris the other day. Doris, a middle-aged woman with blond hair and black roots two weeks past needing a color job, wasn't hard to spot.

Why, she wondered, did hairstylists always let their own hair get so bad? Kinda like the cobbler's kids being shoeless.

"Morning," Emma said brightly as she inhaled the familiar scents of hair products and shampoo and chemicals. She loved that smell. Salons were one of her favorite places—especially after last year. When her hair had started growing back, she'd experimented with different looks at varying lengths and had become addicted to her local salon.

Doris looked up from her station, where she was put-ting something blue and gunky onto the iron-gray hair of an old lady. Another stylist—young and snapping gum like she was trying to chew a wild animal into submission—was snipping away on a large woman. A third busily rolled fat rollers into the thick brassy hair of a buxom, middle-aged redhead. The waiting area was empty but for one customer, who sat there nosing through an old, tattered issue of the
Ladies' Home Journal
.

"Lord a'mighty, you found Emmajean's pecan pie recipe!" Doris cried out when she recognized Emma.

"I did."

"You're hired."

"You were serious?"

"Darn right I was." Doris had stripped off her gloves, leaving the elderly woman's head half-striped with blue colorant. "I didn't think you were seriously interested the other day. Now that I know you're not some rich, bored, porn movie queen, I figure I can give you a shot."

"Glad to see the rumor mill works both ways," Emma murmured.

"It sure does," Doris admitted. Then she snickered. "I wish I'da been there when you went after Melanie For-sythe. She's a pickle. Always claims her hair's not right and wants a discount."

"Yeah, she does," the young gum-snapping stylist said. "We all race for the bathroom when she comes in. Last one in hiding gets stuck with her."

The old lady with half a color job, who now resembled a blue-striped zebra, said, "Doris, my hair!"

"Don't matter, honey," the owner told the old lady. "You have barely enough left to fall out, anyway."

The woman, instead of being insulted, laughed. "Good time for a break, anyway, because I want a piece of that pie. Last September was the first time in forty years I didn't get to have a piece of Emmajean Frasier's pecan pie at the county fair."

Pie, it appeared, was as effective as cash when it came to bribery. Who knew?

Emma had thought to bring not only the pie, but also a knife, server, paper plates and plastic forks. Within three minutes of her entry, every woman in the place was eating a disgustingly fattening breakfast. Everyone except Emma, who didn't think she'd ever be able to eat pecan pie again after yesterday's sex adventures with Johnny.