Irresistible Stranger

Chapter 2

Two nights later, Griff heard the rare sound of fire engine sirens, followed by a rush of cop cars down Main Street. It was just nine, the sun thinking about dropping and the air drowsy with heat.

He was just shutting down the place. Jason had stuck with him, was pretending to do extra clean-up while Griff hunched over a table with the day’s receipts. The day’d been busy. Everybody stopped for ice-cream on a summer day. Even so, the ice cream parlor couldn’t support a cat, so it occasionally amazed Griff that folks actually believed he had no other source of income.

Of course, it had always worked well for him to be seen as a generic lazy scoundrel and a womanizer. Nobody pried any deeper. Why would they?

“You hear the sirens?” Jason asked.

“Yeah. First time all summer.”

Jason squirted more window cleaner on the glass counter, even though he’d cleaned it twice already. “I heard some say they were worried about her coming back. That the fires’d start again.”

“Say what? Who’s this ‘her’?” Griff looked up, only half-listening. He wanted to get out of here, put his feet up, open a dripping-cold long neck and start in on his real work. But the kid had been scrubbing the place until he’d practically worn out his hands; obviously he didn’t want to go home. Bruises hadn’t healed up from the last time his dad had a snootful.

“You know. The pretty lady who came in the other day. The one with the long brown hair. You went right over to her. Don’t tell me you didn’t notice.”

Griff scowled. Sometimes the kid saw way more than he needed to.

Lily had been in twice more for Griff’s Secret-but not for any of his. She’d chatted up Steve the first time; someone had talked to her the other. God knew, he’d raced from the back room to flirt her up, but she’d escaped before he could tackle her both times. Maybe that was accidental-or maybe she didn’t remotely feel the same spark he did.

No sweat, he’d told himself. But somehow she kept pouncing into his mind, lingering there like a sweet taste he couldn’t get out of his head. That he could get hung up on a woman he barely knew was downright worrisome.

It implied a capacity for commitment.

That was fearful.

Still, he couldn’t let Jason’s comment go. “Why would anyone think that Lily Campbell has anything to do with the sirens?”

Jason rolled his eyes. “Come on. Her coming back after all these years just stirred up the story. Everyone knows what happened.”

“Well I don’t, so why don’t you enlighten me?”

“Her daddy was a fire setter. That’s what everybody said. And now she’s back, so people been saying, ‘watch out for fires.’ And now you heard the sirens.”

“That’s pretty darned ridiculous, Jason.”

“Hey, I wasn’t even born when it all happened. I’m just telling you what people are saying, that’s all. Her dad and her mom got burned up in the last fire. The three sisters, they got split up all over the country. People said the three girls, they cried and screamed when folks tried to separate them. That it all was a tragedy. That nobody guessed there was something so broken in Mr. Campbell. That was her daddy. Mr. Campbell. Anyway. The fires stopped after they left. Only now she’s back. And there’s a siren.”

Griff frowned. “Jason, that’s ludicrous. Who’s spreading these rumors?”

“I dunno. Hey, don’t be mad at me. I was just telling you what I heard, that’s all.”

“Well, think about it. If she left town when she was a little girl, there’s no reason to think anyone even recognizes her. And if her father was an arsonist, that has nothing to do with her.”

“I never said he was an ars’nist. I said he started fires.”

“Jason. An arsonist is someone who sets fires.”

“Sheesh. It’s summertime. You’re not supposed to have to learn stuff in the summertime. It’s not fair.”

There were times Griff loved living in a small town. This wasn’t one of them. That young, pretty woman was soft clear through. It was in her eyes, her face, the look of her. That anyone could think she was a criminal-or in town for no good-was beyond absurd.

But Pecan Valley did love its gossip. And good news was boring. The chance of something naughty and meaty was always the ideal, but it was only now that Griff remembered-Lily had mentioned something in that short first conversation. Something about how he might not want to get to know her. He wasn’t sure what it meant at the time. Didn’t matter then. All he’d been concentrating on at the time was the lap of her soft tongue on Griff’s Secret.

He’d imagined her tongue on a few other secret places of his in the days since, making him worry that he was turning into a dirty old man-before he was even in his prime.

“Jason.”

“Yup?”

“You cleaned up enough. I’m locking up. I know you don’t want to go home.”

“Sure I do. You think I want to work all the time?” he said under his breath, “But you’ll keep half my pay still, right?”

“Yup. Got it hidden. Earning interest.” This was old, touchy territory for the boy. “I’m just saying. You find trouble at home, you know where I live.”

“I’m not leaving my mom.”

That voice. So low. So defeated. So old. “I never said you should leave your mom. I said you know where I live. Just like your mom knows there’s a shelter where she’ll be safe, and they’d help her start over.”

“She won’t go.”

“That’s not on you.”

“Right.”

Griff told himself to shut up, because he knew better than to push. He’d pushed before. He had four kids working for him-all troublemakers, school flunk-outs, all of them tattooed and pierced and familiar with the holding cell at the sheriff’s office. You don’t push kids who’ve already given up. And when a kid had already given up by age eleven, you tiptoed, because you might only have one chance to earn some trust-and that’s if you were lucky.

Griff wasn’t a good tiptoer. He wore a size-l4 shoe.

Once Jason finally headed out, Griff thoughtfully packed up a pint-size cold tote and carried it to his car in the alley. Main Street was shutting down.

Shops closed up early on a weekday, but the pharmacy was still open and Deb’s Diner still had a cluster of pickups in front. Although there was no sign of the fire trucks now, all the lights were blazing at the sheriff’s office.

He noticed the lights, but didn’t linger, just turned left two blocks later on Magnolia. The street was an antebellum postcard; the houses were huge and old, built of cool cinder block, most with sweeping verandas and swings hung with chains. Big old oaks shaded the sidewalks, but everybody had flowers, cottage roses under trellises where there was a peek of sun, bosomy peonies in the deep shade…he didn’t know all the flower names. A fat fox squirrel chased right in front of his car-the measure of a safe town, he’d always thought, was that the darned squirrels knew perfectly well they had right of way.

The rich didn’t hang in the neighborhood anymore, mostly because no one was all that rich-but the big old houses still looked loved, porches swept, gardens fussed over. Young couples who wanted a passel of children could afford the mortgages. The elders had already paid off theirs. Those in between had invariably turned their place into the ever-hopeful bed-and-breakfasts.

He parked, climbed out, took his tote. In the way of a small town, he knew Louella’s even if he’d never been inside. It was the last on the block, with a red tile roof and long, long steps leading to the porch…he didn’t initially see her. At least not exactly. What he saw from the rail on the veranda, were a pair of very bare, very dirty, very feminine feet.

Judging from the position of those feet, they were attached to someone who was lying flat on the wood plank veranda floor. A curious position for sure.

He ambled up the sidewalk, up the steps, to peek his head over the rail.

The glow of lights and distant voices murmured from beyond the B and B’s giant screen door, but the only one on the veranda was her.

For a moment, his heart stopped-he wasn’t sure she was alive. She was lying there with her feet up on the rail, eyes closed, arms just lying at her sides, palms up…as if she’d fallen in that kind of heap and couldn’t move. She was wearing shorts and a tee in some pastel color, all wrinkled and tangled.

His heart immediately resumed beating on noting she wasn’t wearing a bra. And that her plump, perfectly shaped breasts were rising and falling, indicating life-not to mention a delectably appealing rack.

By the time he’d finished a complete study-legs were damned good, way, way better than he expected, a little Yankee white, but the calf shape was just that perfect arch of a curve. Anyway. By the time he finished, she had one eye open.

“Please,” she said. “Go on in. Leave me for dead. There are all kinds of people in the house. If you want someone, just pound on the door.”

“I was looking for you, actually.”

“No point. I’m useless. In a state of complete decline. I can’t move, can’t talk, don’t even care anymore.”

“Are we…” he tried to think of a delicate way to phrase it “…having a little trouble adjusting to the heat?”

She closed the eye. “There’s air-conditioning. That’s what the ad said. It didn’t lie. I bought a thermometer yesterday. My room’s cooled off to eighty-seven degrees. Now go away. I can’t stand anyone watching me while I sweat.”

“I brought ice cream.”

“Beg your pardon?” One eye slid open, then the other.

“Griff’s Secret. A pint. Two spoons. Cold.”

“Say it again.”

“Ice cream.”

Silence. Then… “I don’t know why you went to the trouble of tracking me down, but I absolutely don’t care. You can have whatever you want. Just show me the ice cream.”

He lifted the pint container.

She swung around to a sitting position faster than a jet takeoff. “Spoon,” she said.

He produced two from his polo shirt pocket-as well as a hunk of napkins.

“Do not watch me eat this,” she instructed. “I intend to inhale. And I may drool. You need to understand. Thomas Wolff had it right: ‘You can’t go home again.’ I’m hot. I’m miserable. No one likes me. If I were you, I’d hide behind the veranda rail. Protect yourself from being seen with me.”

If she made love with half the enthusiasm that she ate ice cream, bless her heart, Griff might just have to propose. Of course, he’d have to test that theory. And at the moment, she definitely didn’t look in the mood.

When he didn’t interrupt her ice cream inhaling to intrude with conversation, she piped up. “Did you hear the fire truck siren a couple hours ago?”

“Yup.”

“I set that fire.”

“Did you now?” He didn’t lean over to clean up the dab of Griff’s Secret on her cheek, but man, he wanted to.

“I’m not sure what street it was on. Or where it was. In fact, I didn’t have any idea I’d set the fire until an old busybody four doors down came storming into Louella’s kitchen to track me down. So, if that’s why you stopped by-to hear it from the horse’s mouth, so to speak-now you’ve got it direct from me. The fire was all my fault. I did it. Fire setting’s in my blood. I’m nothing but trouble. The only reason I came back to town was to cause trouble.”

“Thanks for sharing.” Okay. He couldn’t stop himself. That bit of ice cream on her chin was too tempting to ignore. Her eyes shot to his when she felt the touch of his finger. His eyes shot clear-cut communication right back.

So. He didn’t have to worry anymore that she didn’t feel the same electric click that he did. Both of them knew-speaking of fire-that there were potentially explosive sparks.

“I took one look at you,” he said, “and before I had a clue about all that history, I just knew, right off that bat, that you were a wicked, wicked woman.”

“Watch it. A compliment like that could bring tears to my eyes. Most men who first meet me seem to immediately figure out I’m a pretty plain old ordinary schoolteacher.”

“Plain old ordinary? That never crossed my mind. I took one look and thought there’s a breath of fresh air in this town. A gorgeous, sexy woman, who can make a T-shirt look like designer clothes, has eyes a man could drown in, with character and mystery surrounding her like magic.”

She almost choked on the last spoonful of ice cream. “All right, all right. You know I’ve been here a couple days, so as you might have guessed, I already know your story. You charm every female that’s ever crossed your path-whether they’re two or ninety, married or single. You’ve gotten a marriage proposal from every single woman in a three-county radius-”

“Not every single one,” he corrected.

“Just most. And I can see why. You’re adorable and all.”

“Thanks.”

“You started out in Savannah. Hard to imagine why you’d settle in this itsy-bitsy town. But lots of people have been happy to fill me in on why they think you came here-even if I never asked. And I really don’t need to pry into your life or anyone else’s.”

“I understand. Once you’re inside the town limits, it hits like a wave. The hot air from people talking about each other. There’s no escaping it.”

“Who knew? Anyway…let’s see what else I was told. You can, of course, correct or deny any of this. You come from a good family-that means, a Southern family, a family that was established here long enough to fight in the War of Northern Aggression. You went to a good school, North Carolina, I think I was told. Played B-ball. Everybody remembers that you graduated, but not what field you graduated in. No one’s sure if you ever had a real job. Somehow, you didn’t feel like making anything special of yourself.”

“That’s me. Just lazy as can be.”

“Yup. That’s how I heard it. Thankfully, you invented and patented your own ice cream. Maybe moved here because the cost of living was extra-reasonable. You can sit around all day and just make a little ice cream, hire kids to help you, and spend the rest of your time romancing all the pretty Southern Belles. Why should everyone need to be ambitious? Why should you do hard work if you don’t have to? Only…none of the girls have caught you. In bed, maybe. In affairs, maybe. But nobody’s caught you anywhere near the altar, or that’s the story I heard.”

“Anything else?”

“Anything you want to deny so far?”

“Oh, no,” he assured her. “Gossips have the story absolutely straight.”

“They usually do,” she said without missing a beat, and finally turned her head to face him. “So I might ask you what your real story is. Sometime. If it’s something you’re interested in sharing.”

“I was going to make the same offer. To listen if you needed an ear.”

She turned quiet, the devilment in her eyes fading. A moment ticked by, then another. The bustling noises inside the house had faded into the single noise from a television. Lamplights had turned on throughout the neighborhood.

The sun had taken its lazy Southern time going down, but it finally ebbed out of sight, nothing left but a deep violet haze beyond the trees and rooftops.

He didn’t realize how much time had passed, how late it had become…but it seemed as if she suddenly did. “You know what?” she said.

“What?”

“I’m glad you stopped. You didn’t need to. It was beyond kind-particularly for a man who seems to have a mighty reputation in this town for not caring much about others. You keep that kind streak really well hidden, I gather.”

“I’m not kind.” Sheesh. It was like being accused of larceny or something. No guy liked to think of himself as kind.

“It’s okay,” she said. “I won’t tell. I just brought it up because I didn’t want you to think I needed looking after. I knew coming back here would be tough. I’m all right.” Rather than leave it on a heavy note, she came through with a grin and added, “Except, of course, for dying of the heat.”

She uncurled her legs and started to clean up the spoons and ice-cream container. Griff didn’t need a bat over the head. It was time for him to go.

Heaven knew what sparked the impulse to visit to begin with. The buzz of gossip coming from Jason had just nagged on him. The sound of the fire truck siren had annoyed him further. He just kept getting some stupid, uneasy feeling that Lily was alone in town and in trouble.

So-fine. He’d come and brought her ice cream and they’d made each other laugh. Everything was great. Time to pack it up. Hell, he’d lost a couple hours of the real work he did at night as it was.

Yet they both stood up at the same time. He reached for the container at the same time she extended a hand to offer it. She was still smiling at him, friendly fashion. She’d absolved him of any responsibility. She was tough, she’d implied. Prepared for trouble, she’d implied. No one needed to worry about her, she’d implied.

This close, for that millisecond, he saw a pearl of perspiration on her neck. Saw the tilt of her head, proud, stubborn. Saw the sunset in her hair.

He had to bend down almost a foot to kiss her. Didn’t know he was going to do it. He didn’t plan it, and didn’t intend to. He was holding the sticky spoons and container, so it was a no-hands kind of kiss, couldn’t be any more, couldn’t turn into more.

Yet her face tilted to accommodate the landing of his mouth, not as if she was inviting him, but as if she just instinctively moved to make a meeting of lips more natural, more easy. He tasted ice cream. He tasted the vulnerable satin of her lips.

He lifted his head almost immediately, saw the startled flush on her cheeks, thought…oh yeah, she’s tough, all right.

Tough as a rose petal.

“I’ll give you a discount on ice cream if you show up regular while you’re here.”

“As if that was an offer I could refuse.” But her eyes shied from his now. The sass was still there, the ready teasing…but she didn’t know what to make of that kiss.

As he ambled down the walk, headed home, he thought, hell times ten, neither did he.