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She stumbled toward her old bedroom—once her mother’s room, with little cabbage roses on the wallpaper and a canopy bed. She put the lamp on the side table and listlessly scavenged through the bureau drawers. She took her old pillow out, then opened the next one. The plastic covering the one item that lay at the bottom of the cavernous depths seemed to wink at her. She reached in and touched her old waitressing uniform. It seemed so very long ago when she’d worked at Bo and Ruth’s Paradise Diner.
Smiling wistfully, she stripped the cover sheet from the bare mattress. Sleep. That’s what she needed. She was too bushed to think about Rich and all the havoc he’d promised to wreak. Too exhausted to wonder about her meandering visits to the past, and her body-thrumming reaction to Mitch McCoy. Too tired to hunt for something else to wear, to take off her lingerie or to get linens from the hall closet. Tomorrow was soon enough to do all that and to try to make some kind of sense out of the mess that was her life.
2
MITCH HAD NO SOONER closed his eyes than they were wide open again. He rolled over…and nearly injured himself for life. Lying flat on his back, he groaned at his fully aroused state and tried to rid his mind of the images even now clinging to the edges of his consciousness. Provocative lips…tantalizing curves…the flick of a pink tongue. All belonging to one woman: Liz.
So much for getting any sleep.
He got up from the bed and yanked up his shade to find the sun peeking over the mist-shrouded horizon. He grimaced. Despite his exhausted state, he must have squeezed out a few hours of shut-eye, because it was morning already.
He headed for the bathroom, took a bracing, cold shower, dressed, then headed down to the kitchen. He stopped in the empty room. Where the hell was Pops?
He wasn’t sure what he was looking for. A return to normalcy, maybe? A solid sign that his life hadn’t completely gone to hell in a handbasket overnight? Perhaps he wanted to tell his father Liz had returned and get some of that advice Pops had been real good at doling out lately? It occurred to him that he hadn’t heard Sean come in from Maryland last night.
He started the coffee, then headed toward the foot of the stairs. “Pops? Coffee’s on!”
He glanced at his watch. It wasn’t like his father not to be up yet. Sundays he usually beat the sun and had breakfast half fixed by the time Mitch even thought about crawling out of bed. It was the one morning they spent together by mutual, silent agreement, before Mitch headed out to tick off the next item on his list of things-to-be-done around the property and before Sean went off to…
He scratched his head, only then realizing he had no idea what his dad had been doing with his Sundays lately.
“Pops? You want eggs or pancakes for breakfast?”
“Eggs sound good.”
Mitch swung around to face his father coming in from outside. He shrugged out of his suit coat. His suit coat. It suddenly dawned on him that he hadn’t heard his dad come in last night because he never had come in.
“Hey, Mitch, I see you made it home all right.”
Mitch watched him pour a cup of coffee. “Yeah, good thing one of us did.”
Sean took a long sip, his face a little too…cheerful for Mitch’s liking. “Yeah” was all he said, then grinned.
Mitch grimaced.
Okay, chances were that his dad had had one too many at Marc and Mel’s wedding reception and had opted for a motel room rather than making the long ride home. Or…
He groaned. Or else Pops’s sex life was a whole helluva lot more active than his.
He rubbed his forehead. He couldn’t remember a time when he could link the words “Pops” and “sex” together. He wasn’t sure how he felt about his ability to do so now. From what he remembered, and what others had to say in the small, everybody-knows-everybody-else’s-business town, Pops had been blown away by his wife’s unexpected death. While it didn’t completely excuse some of the rougher periods Mitch and his brothers had gone through without a cohesive parental presence in their lives, it explained a lot. And, as Connor sometimes reminded them, Pops didn’t drink and chase women. He merely drank.
Now the opposite was true: Pops no longer drank, he, um, chased women. Or at least one, if Mitch’s suspicions were true.
Mitch tried to stretch the kinks from his neck. He really didn’t need this heaped on top of everything else that had happened since last night.
“On second thought, I’m going to skip breakfast this morning,” Sean said. “I think I’ll go catch a quick shower instead.”
“Yeah,” Mitch said absently. “Why don’t you do that.”
Sean started to step from the room, coffee cup in hand. He halted near the door and eyed Mitch closely. Too closely. “Everything all right? Pardon the expression, but you look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
Mitch turned toward the counter. “The ghost of summers past, maybe,” he said to himself. His intention that morning had been to unload everything and seek out some of Pops’s no-nonsense, use-the-good-sense-God-gave-you advice. Now, he was afraid Pops would be talking as much about his own personal life as advising him on his. He didn’t think he was up to peeking at that particular insight. “I’m fine.” He cleared his throat. “By the way, this…person you stayed with last night. Anybody I know?”
Silence greeted his question. He turned back to see Pops grinning. “Uh-huh.”
“Care to share who?”
“Uh-uh.”
Mitch stood in the middle of the kitchen, watching in amazement as his father left the room, whistling as he went.
Mitch left the coffee on, snatched up his truck keys, then headed for the door. He needed to get out of the house. All this…whistling was making him feel lousier.
AH, THIS WAS more like it. Good, familiar company, a hot cup of coffee, and peace in which to drink it.
One of the many advantages of having traded his P.I. cap in for his new one as a horse breeder was his ability to structure his day however he liked. During the week it was easier to drop in at Bo and Ruth’s Paradise Diner for breakfast and lunch before and between chores than to cook something up for himself. And on those occasions when he traveled into D.C. to work on the few cases he’d held on to or to check in with Mike and Renee, he did so in the afternoon. He glanced at the date on his watch, reminding himself that he’d planned to head into the city tomorrow.
He’d completely forgotten.
Stiffening, he told himself that he was not going to think of the person behind his recent distracted state.
Mitch leaned his elbows against the counter and took a deep breath of his first cup of Joe. Even on his good days he couldn’t come close to imitating Ruth’s unique blend. And today was definitely not one of his good days.
But it was getting better.
Farther down the counter he listened with half an ear as the ever-present Darton brothers argued about whose turn it was to buy breakfast, and behind him he heard Ezra, owner of the town’s only gas station, order his usual pizza, despite that it was nine o’clock in the morning. But it was Sharon, the waitress’s, tight little uniform that got his attention as she reached for a plate of bacon and eggs on the other side of the counter. What a great pair of legs.
She’s too young for you, his conscience taunted.
She’s legal, his libido argued back.
The cash register free of customers, Ruth stepped up to fill a glass of water for him. Mitch dragged his gaze from Sharon’s legs and smiled his greeting.
“Didn’t expect to see you in this morning,” Ruth said. “You and Sean normally eat breakfast at the house on Sundays, don’t you?”
Mitch’s grin waned. “Pops had, um, other things on his agenda today.”
“I see.”
He slowly sipped at his coffee. No doubt Ruth saw a whole lot more than the rest of them did. Born and raised in Manchester, she took great pride in letting everyone know she was never interested in living anywhere else. A good twenty years Mitch’s senior, she had an uncanny ability to figure out what was going on before anyone else did—including those involved in the goings-on.
“By the way, pass on to your brother that Bo and I had a grand ol’ time at the reception last night. It’s been so long since anyone from these parts has gotten married, I’d forgotten what a wedding looked like.”
Mitch put down his cup. “I’ll tell Marc when he and Mel get back. I get the impression calling home isn’t going to be at the top of their list right now.” He waved at Bo through the open kitchen window. Bo raised a meaty hand in response, looking more like a bouncer than a cook. “For a couple that likes to close down the joint, you guys left a little early, didn’t you?”
Ruth busied herself clearing the spot next to him. “Bo was a little tired, that’s all. Things were pretty hectic around here yesterday, and what with the drive into Maryland and all…well, I guess it all caught up with him last night.”
Mitch frowned as he watched Bo flip a few pancakes then drag the back of his hand across his forehead. Bo never got tired.
Ruth sighed. “Nice girl, that Mel. And pretty, too. Who’d have thought Marc would hook someone like her?”
Sharon angled her way back behind the counter to pick up an order. Mitch watched her absently. “Yeah, who’d have thought.”
“Enjoying the view?” Ruth asked as she dragged a rag across the counter in front of him.
Mitch grinned at her. “Yeah.”
Sharon shot him a coy little smile as she squeezed out from behind the counter to take Ezra his breakfast pizza. Ruth put her rag away and leaned closer to him.
He told himself he didn’t care what she was about to say. He lifted the cup to his lips. Nothing was going to stop him from enjoying his first cup of coffee.
Ruth said, “You’ll probably enjoy the view a whole lot more tomorrow morning when Liz comes back to work.”
Mitch spewed the coffee out all over the counter. What precious little peace he’d managed to find scattered to the four winds, and his frustration level surged past the danger point.
Ruth smiled, tossed him the rag to clean up the mess, then walked pleased as could be toward the kitchen.
ADMIT IT, McCoy, you’re thinking with the wrong body part.
Mitch pulled his pickup over a low rise and slowed to a stop on the weed-choked gravel road. He stared at the hulking Victorian some fifty yards away. Not just any hulking Victorian, but Liz’s hulking Victorian. Just knowing she was in it—alone—did interesting things to his body.
He dragged in a deep breath and let loose a line of unmatched curses. Who in the hell had decided to boot him out of his familiar life and into a twisted version of Oz?
Mitch scrubbed his hand over his face. In this particular instance, he could count the bricks that led to the unfamiliar territory in which he now wandered around stupidly. First, Liz had slunk back into town in that shiny new car. Next, Pops had rambled in, looking like he’d come fresh from licking some woman’s neck, his off-tune whistling chasing Mitch straight from the house, bursting with the urge to do some of his own neck-licking. Then Ruth had spilled the beans about Liz’s returning to work at the diner. Soon thereafter he found out word was already all around about her impulsive return. Everyone at the diner was abuzz with the news. Even Josiah—who did little more than rock in his chair on the general store porch—had said something about her still being the tallest drink of water this side of the Appalachians. This when the old guy had barely said anything to anyone for years.
That had been the last straw. Who else but Liz could invade every corner of his life in less than twelve hours without even trying? So he’d abandoned his plans to have breakfast then return to the house to start laying pipe from the house to the new barn, and headed out to the old Braden place.
Mitch took his foot off the brake and steered his truck over the remainder of the potholed, deeply rutted drive. Goliath barked beside him. He looked at the little traitor. How, after living in D.C. with him for several years, could the damn dog remember this ramshackle house and the fact that Liz lived here?
Correction. Had occasionally lived here. She might be visiting, but Mitch had no illusions that Liz was staying, despite her having taken on her old job. She was merely a visitor in a place she, herself, had once described as never really having been home.
He ground the truck to a halt next to a weeping willow and shut off the engine. While Old Man Peabody had managed to keep time from touching the house itself much, the surrounding greenery had been left to run wild. Trees that had been little more than saplings now towered over the truck. The lilac bush was so overgrown, it would take a chainsaw to cut it back. The grass was nearly up to the middle of his shins….
The sight of the grass sent him reeling back to a time when he was seventeen and had decided to make a good impression on Liz’s grandmother by offering to mow the yard. A grand gesture that had turned into a disaster when he found out exactly how much grass he would have to mow. Using Minerva Braden’s old push mower, it had taken him all afternoon.
Ah, but it had been worth it. He smiled. The sun had been setting, the lights inside the house just switching on, and he’d caught a glimpse of Liz—who would have been all of a tender fourteen then and well on her way to being built like Marilyn Monroe—through her bedroom window, exploring her blossoming curves in a full-length mirror. He’d watched her skim her hands lightly over her breasts, pinching her pink nipples. Then she slid her fingers down over her still-boyish hips, then back up over her inner thighs, pausing where her soft curls sprang against the white cotton of her panties….
Sweat caused by a whole different source had soaked him, his own shallow breathing sounded foreign to his ears…much as it sounded now.
Mitch closed his eyes to banish the vivid image and to ease his acute physical reaction to it. It was only natural that being near Liz again would open a door to the past. He only wished that door would reveal as much of the bad as the good.
He couldn’t help wondering if he’d be in the sorry state he was if he and Liz had ever…well, if they had ever had sex. If they hadn’t waited for the wedding night that had never come, and if he had had what he’d been only dreaming about.
He reached for the ignition, then dropped his hand again. For the fifth time that morning, he told himself he’d be better off to lie low and wait for her inevitable departure to happen. But he couldn’t. Not when he knew the only reason she’d have returned to Manchester would be because she had to be in some sort of trouble.
And not when his testosterone level had reached an all-time high, leaving him little more than a quivering sack of lust.
He climbed out of the truck and waited for the aging Goliath to leap down. His stout body appeared to shudder as his paws met the hard earth, then he lumbered in the direction of a stand of trees on the north side of the property. Shaking his head, Mitch shut the door and stepped around the side of the house, noting the weeds pushing through the thin gravel of the drive. Near the one-car garage some twenty feet behind the house, he spotted the Lexus. A large green tarp he suspected was a tent was draped over the roof and hood. Little was visible except for half the Massachusetts license plate.
Interesting….
He might have believed she’d covered the vehicle to protect it from the elements, if it weren’t for the bloodstained wedding dress she’d been wearing when she drove the car into town. And her elusive answers to his questions.
“Hello?” he called through the screen door. He made out the tinny sound of a radio and stared through the screen at wet wading boots in the mudroom…right next to the pair of strappy red shoes she’d been wearing last night.
He called out again—no response. He grasped the tarnished handle and tugged the door open, cringing at the bone-chilling screech of the rusty hinges.
“I’m in the kitchen!”
Mitch stepped ever the boots, knowing it had to be Liz who invited him in. Who else would welcome Lord only knew who into the house? He froze in the open doorway to the roomy, sun-filled kitchen.
“Oh, it’s you. Tell me why I’m not surprised,” she said casually. She stood in front of the sink, yards of white fabric pooled around her feet. She yanked on the material, stuffing a good portion of it under running water.
Mitch tried to come up with a finely honed comeback, but doubted the words would make it past his closed throat anyway. His gaze moved of its own leisurely accord. Up from her slender bare feet and purple-painted toe nails, over the shapely length of her long, tanned legs to where a pair of cutoff jeans barely covered her firmly rounded bottom. He shifted until his gaze rested on the jaggedly cut edge of the Georgetown University T-shirt, an indecent scrap of cotton that came dangerously close to hiking up over her breasts. Breasts he guessed were bare given the way they swayed as she shoved the white material into the sink.
Seven years ago the outfit had been tomboyish on her almost too-slender body. Now it was downright sinful given her fuller, lusher curves.
He pushed a swallow past his dry throat and stared at her golden hair.
“You’re blond,” he said, staring at the way the sunlight made the shoulder-length straight tresses glow. The impact of her looking so much like she had before was like a blow to the stomach.
“Life as a brunette wasn’t as lucky as I thought it would be,” she said, motioning toward an empty box of hair coloring on the cluttered counter. He caught her gaze. There must have been something on his face that gave him away because she bit her bottom lip and touched a hand to her head. “What’s the matter? Did I miss a spot or something?” When she plopped her hand back in the sink, water splashed onto the threadbare front of the T-shirt. Mitch caught sight of the tightening of her nipples beneath the soft cotton, then forcibly wrenched his gaze away.
“No, it’s fine. It’s great. Couldn’t you find anything else to wear?” He plucked a travel brochure from the table and held it strategically in front of himself where his jeans had grown snug. He hadn’t gotten a hard-on so easily since… He cursed. Since he’d last seen Liz in the same outfit.
He stared at the other items on the table. More brochures, maps and travel guides littered the top, some dog-eared, others apparently untouched. He frowned and slid a map of Dallas aside, finding another pamphlet on Miami underneath.
“I don’t know if you noticed, but I didn’t exactly have a suitcase with me when I rolled into town.” Liz drew his attention back to her. She turned off the water and rubbed the shining wet material together.
Oh, no you don’t, he warned himself, as his gaze yearned to watch how her breasts responded to the vigorous movement of her arms.
“It was the only thing in the house I could find that still fit,” she said between determined attacks on the dress.
Fit. She was certainly stretching the definition of that word. Then again, his own jeans had fit just fine until he came into the house.
Agitated, he rustled the brochure he held and focused his gaze on her slender hands. It suddenly struck him what she was doing.
She’s washing the bloodstain from the wedding dress.
Or at least she was trying to. Judging from the puddles of water on the countertop and around her bare feet—were her toenails really painted fluorescent purple?—she had been trying for some time with little luck.
If anything could have cooled him down, her intentions did. He put the brochure back onto the table. “What are you doing, Liz?”
She shrugged off his question as she wiped her damp forehead on her shirtsleeve. “Thought I’d do a little laundry this morning.”
He was frustrated, not only by her evasion of his question, but by the way his libido was so acutely focused on her tight little behind and the delectable curves of her flesh. He stuffed his hands into his jeans pockets, wincing as the coarse denim pulled tighter across certain strategic areas.
“Uh-huh.”
