“I’m Susan Pettiford, and I’ll be moving into my aunt’s house next door. There’s a huge pecan tree there, and I’d be happy if you’d like to have some of these pecans. I just gathered them.”
“Come in. I’m Cassandra Hairston-Shepherd, and I’ll bet my husband would love to have them. He owns the restaurant Gourmet Corner, and serves as its head chef.”
“I’m glad to meet you, Cassandra. I hope we’ll be good neighbors. If you have a bag, I’ll be glad to leave these with you. Hairston, did you say? Are you related to the newspaper family?”
“Indeed, I am. My parents made that paper what it is, but my sister owns it now. Thanks for the pecans. Maybe we can have coffee after you get settled in,” Cassandra said, giving Susan the feeling she’d been dismissed.
“Thanks. I’m having the kitchen gutted and modernized. I’ll move in as soon as it’s ready. I’d better be going.”
“Nice meeting you, Susan, and thanks for the pecans.”
“Mmm.” Susan strolled back to her house, unsure as to whether her visit had been welcome. Cassandra Hairston-Shepherd’s reception was barely tepid, and Susan doubted that she would make the effort again. Too bad. The woman seemed to be about her age, and she would have appreciated a friend nearby. “Oh well, I can always make other friends.”
She went into the kitchen, made notes on what she wanted in it and the approximate arrangement. If Lucas’s idea didn’t complement her own, she figured she would have to give in. He spoke gently, but she had already detected in him a core of steel. Besides, the less she saw of him the better. Deceptively discerning, he had practically accused her of inviting him to make love with her. But to her mind, she hadn’t done any such thing. She set the scene, and he responded accordingly.
She ran to answer her cell phone. “Hello.”
“Hello, Susan. Lucas Hamilton here. If you’re not busy, Willis and I need your opinion on what we’ve done about your kitchen.”
“You mean you already started on the plans for it.”
“Unless you have different ideas, we’ve finished. How about it?”
She looked at her watch. “I need an hour.”
“Try to make it in forty-five minutes. Willis has to leave soon.”
She told him she’d do her best. “There goes the rest of my day,” she fumed, but she walked into his office forty-five minutes later looking her best. She liked their ideas, said as much and focused her gaze on Willis.
“How much?”
He looked her in the eye. “Seven thousand, which means we buy everything from a wholesaler and lug it over there ourselves.”
Her gasp didn’t escape either of them, and she followed it with, “Should I get on my knees and thank you, or will it suffice merely to genuflect? I need my kitchen remodeled, but I definitely do not need your attitude.” She turned to Lucas. “Seems to me you could find a more agreeable partner.”
“He’s usually milder than this,” Lucas said. “Right now, he’s mad because I wouldn’t let him charge you fifteen thousand. Seven thousand provides seventeen percent profit above costs and labor. It’s enough.”
“Sure,” Willis said, “because I’m going to collect the stuff and truck it over there. I want to be invited to the first dinner you cook in this state-of-the-art kitchen.” She whirled around and stared at Lucas, her eyes wide and jaw dropped.
“Easy,” he murmured. “I haven’t told him a thing.”
“What?” Willis asked.
“I was talking to Susan.”
Her breathing returned to normal, but if she didn’t get out of there, she would begin to hyperventilate, for her undergarments were already damp. “Send me a contract,” she said to Willis in a voice unlike her own, grabbed her jacket, and headed for the door.
“You didn’t need to do that,” she heard Lucas say to Willis. “No matter what you think, she’s a client.”
The sound of Lucas’s steps thudded on the stairs behind her, but she wouldn’t look back.
“Wait, Susan.” She didn’t stop. “You either wait or I’ll follow you home or wherever it is you’re going.” She waited.
“Get this straight, Susan. Unless you tell someone what happened between you and me on October the eighth, it stays between you and me. I don’t kiss and tell. I apologize for Willis’s childish behavior. He’s just begun to make money with this business, and it’s been a long, hard pull for him. He’s a good guy in every respect, or I wouldn’t partner with him.”
“He has decided that he doesn’t like me.”
“That isn’t true. He has decided that there’s something between the two of us and that we both lied to him when he asked us what we meant to each other. He’d rather we had told him that it was none of his business. Willis and I have different parents, but otherwise, we’re brothers.”
“All right. May I leave now?”
He held both hands up, palms out. “Ok, Susan. You’re the queen of denial. See you tomorrow evening at Wade School.”
Susan didn’t answer. If he wanted to bend her, he had a lesson coming. She got into her car, ignited the engine and, although she headed home, a wrong turn took her to the underpass beneath the Salem River, and she emerged on Fifth Street at the town’s center. She glimpsed an upholstery-fabric store, parked, and went in to introduce herself and examine the merchandise.
“Well, I was wondering when we’d run into each other.”
She looked up to see Jay Weeks standing beside her. “Hi. Do you shop here?”
“If I get in a rut. Otherwise, I shop in Baltimore. How’s your shop coming along?”
“It should be ready in a couple of weeks. Willis Carter is doing the work.” She noticed that his eyebrows shot up and quickly returned to their normal position.
“When are we going to have lunch or something?”
“What about now?” she asked him. “It’s one-thirty, and I haven’t eaten.”
They walked across the street to a mom-and-pop barbecue specialty café. “I hear you’re living in the Greer place. How’d that happen? A lot of people would have liked to buy that house. It won a national award.” They ordered barbecued pork sandwiches and coffee.
“I know. I inherited it from my aunt. I’m having the kitchen completely renovated before I move in.”
“I wish I could have gotten that house. Bon appétit.” He bit into the sandwich. “Lined up any work yet?”
“I’ve just begun to work on my ad material. I hope to get started sometime in January.”
“Mmm. Going anywhere for Christmas? If you aren’t, you’re welcome to come with me to Vermont. I’m going skiing.”
She was careful not to show her surprise at the suggestion or to behave as if it implied anything untoward. “Thanks, but I hope my mother will come for Christmas.”
“It’s hard to find any real fun here in Woodmore. Sometimes I get bored as hell. You’ll see.”
They spoke of mundane things, passing the time and, after an hour, said good-bye and went their separate ways. She couldn’t make up her mind about Jay. She wasn’t looking for a man, but if she was, she doubted that she would consider him. Still, he could be a friend, provided he didn’t become too competitive. She wanted to stop by her shop, but didn’t for fear that Willis would think she was checking on him. Instead, she stopped in a curio store, bought a tiny dancing figure that she saw in the window and went on to her house by the lake.
That afternoon, at the end of the tutoring session and after she left the classroom, Susan gave the little dancing monkey to Rudy. The child hugged her leg.
“Thanks, Miss Pettiford. I’m going to hide this so nobody can get it, and I’ll just play with it after I go to bed.”
She took Rudy’s hand and walked with the child to her car. “It’s beginning to rain. I’ll drop you home. Why can’t you play with the monkey whenever you like?”
“’Cause one of the other children will take it, and my mom won’t make them give it back.”
“How many child
ren does your mom have?”
“Five, but I’m the only one who isn’t hers. I don’t have a real mom anymore. A policeman killed her and a man over drugs.”
She stopped walking, turned Rudy to face her and asked the child, “Who told you that?”
“My foster sister. I don’t like her ’cause she’s mean.”
What could she say other than a meaningless, “Try not to think that way, Rudy.”
She stopped at 316 Salem Court, three blocks from the railroad and let the little girl out of the car. “See you next Tuesday, Rudy.”
Rudy slid over and hugged Susan. “I can’t wait, Ms. Pettiford. Bye.”
Half an hour after she got into her apartment, the telephone rang. “Susan, this is Lucas Hamilton. I need to speak with you urgently. Can we meet somewhere, or may I come to your place?”
Taken aback, she said, “This is a surprise, Lucas. What’s so urgent that you need to see me right now?”
“If it wasn’t important, I wouldn’t deign to take up your time.”
Deciding that tangling with him wouldn’t be prudent, but feeling nonetheless flippant, she said, “Pick the place.”
“Thanks. I’ll be over there in twenty minutes.”
Gaping at the soundless telephone receiver, Susan felt trapped. She had expected him to refuse her offer and to ask her to choose their meeting place. For a few minutes, she debated whether to look stunning in a red jumpsuit or to greet him in the jeans and cowl neck sweater that she had put on minutes earlier. “I’m not primping for him,” she said aloud and busied herself packing belongings that she would take to her house. Her last thought before answering the door was that the evening would not end as it did the one time he’d been in her apartment.
“Hi, Lucas. Come on in and have a seat in the living room. I’ll bring us some tea.”
“Thanks. You couldn’t make that coffee, could you?”
Susan made coffee, glad for the few additional minutes in which to collect her thoughts and emotions before facing him. She put a pot of coffee, cups, saucers, spoons, sugar and milk on a tray, along with some gingersnaps and went back to him. He stood, took the tray from her, put it on the coffee table and sat down.
“It seems that I interrupted your packing.”
“There isn’t much to pack,” she said, rubbing her hands together. “Only a few personal things and linens. Everything else is in New York, packed and waiting to be shipped. What did you want to see me about?”
He ate two gingersnaps. “I like these. Always have.” If it were pleasant, she decided, he’d get on with it. She leaned back against the sofa and waited. “It’s about Rudy Baxter. You’re taking a big risk. The child will become dependent upon you, and that’s not a good thing.”
“Just because I gave her that little monkey and drove her home so that she wouldn’t get soaking wet, I’m making her dependent on me. Don’t make jokes.” She had a feeling that if he pursued it, she would explode.
He put the coffee cup down and glared at her. “You did what? I didn’t know about that. You are not supposed to develop a relationship with these children, because most of them are either from troubled homes and are having a problem with at least one parent. A relationship with you can only compound the problem.”
She rested her right knee on her left one and let her right foot swing with vigor. The man knew exactly how to trigger her temper. “I didn’t realize that they taught psychology in schools of architecture. That little monkey is not going to hurt Rudy. Besides, she said she’d play with him when she was in bed, so that one of her foster sisters or brothers wouldn’t take him away from her. What do you think of that? And as for taking her home, I suppose you would have watched her walk out into that downpour without an umbrella and then gotten into your Lincoln Town Car and driven home dry as a tunnel rat. Well, not me.”
“Of course psychology is taught in schools of architecture. And you’ve got a smart mouth. I don’t care how you rationalize it, you’re out of line. You have the program’s guidelines, and I’d appreciate it if you would read them and abide by them. Otherwise—”
“Otherwise I’m fired? You’ve got a lot to learn, Mr. Hamilton. Nobody pushes me around. My pupils are learning to read, and they are enjoying it. Parents want their children to learn to read and read well. Hold my record up against your stupid rules, and which do you think will win?”
“Otherwise, you may explain it to the school board.”
She sat forward. “You wouldn’t dare do that.” The two hours weekly that she spent with the children had become the most gratifying, happiest moments of her life. She couldn’t have children of her own, but she could enjoy nurturing other children who needed her. “You wouldn’t be that cruel.” She didn’t realize that her personality had practically shriveled as she contemplated the prospect of not being with the children.
He drained the coffee cup and stood. “I signed a form agreeing to abide by the rules, just as you did. That means I gave my word, and if I turn my head and pretend I don’t know what you’re doing, I’m as guilty of infractions as you are. I’m sorry, because I wouldn’t like to hurt you, but—”
“But if I’m nice to that lonely little girl, who goes there in spite of the fact that the other children jeer at her and tease her about her clothes and her living conditions, you’ll do your damned duty and drop me from the program.”
Realizing that tears had begun to cascade down her cheeks, she jumped up and ran to the kitchen.
“What’s wrong? Why are you crying?”
She turned her back to him, walked to the window and pressed her face to the glass. Her flesh remembered the feel of his hard, but gentle fingers and responded to him. Slowly, he turned her to face him, but she wouldn’t look at him. Her tears were no longer for the children she might not see again, but for the children she would never have, for the trauma of losing her maternal rights to an ailment that had eventually afflicted her mother and grandmother. His arms went around her, and she clung to him.
Susan knew when his breathing changed; and when he stepped back in order to see her face, but didn’t release her, shivers raced through her. The fire in his eyes burned with an unmistakable message and, on the brink of becoming victimized by her vivid recollection of their one-night tryst, she stepped away from him.
“Forgive me for taking advantage of your generosity, Lucas. I rarely cry, but back there, a lot of things crowded in on me. I’m sorry.”
Until she made herself look at him, he said nothing. Then, his voice came in something akin to a growl. “That night, you told me that you felt good in my arms. You still do.” Before she could respond, he strode to the door and left.
You could have told her that over the phone. Lucas didn’t try to justify having gone to Susan’s house. He knew she had lunch with Jay Weeks, because he saw them leave the café together. He wasn’t jealous, but if she wanted the company of a man, why not him? He admitted to himself that he wanted evidence that she hadn’t been able to dismiss making love with him as an insignificant moment in her life. In fact, he told himself, “I’ll show her a thing or two.”
The next morning, he phoned a butcher and had a turkey sent to his mother for their Christmas dinner. It had been that way all of his life. He shared his life with his mother and his friends and always wondered what home life was like when both mother and father were present. He looked at his latest draft for Hamilton Village, the retirement complex that he envisioned for Woodmore. If he could get the backing for it, both his status as an architect and his financial position would surpass his dreams. Satisfied that he had enough of a plan to attract his targeted investor, he rolled up the draft and went to keep his appointment with the CEO of Muller Furniture, Inc.
“My board and I have considered this carefully,” Jack Muller told Lucas, “and I think we can do business. Of course, I’m hoping the people will buy their new furniture from me. We’re one of the largest, oldest and finest furniture makers in the state.”
&
nbsp; “If you give them an attractive deal, you should do well.” It hadn’t been easy. He’d been dickering with Muller for at least a year before the man encouraged him to draft a basic plan.
“Who’s your contractor?”
“Carter. He puts up all of my houses and buildings. We’ve been working together for a long time.”
“All right. Let’s meet at the bank tomorrow at ten.”
Lucas left Muller’s office satisfied that he was one big step closer to meeting Calvin Jackson face to face. He had to go over the blueprints once more with Willis, but didn’t expect that his friend would find much to question.
He had the title to the land, the blueprints and the promise of funding. God willing, they could break ground for Phase I in March.
Having finished redecorating the master bedroom in her house, Susan was anxious to leave the apartment that she rented. “Imagine how this living room would look with a big, beautifully decorated spruce tree beside the fireplace,” she said to Willis and the two men who were working with him in the kitchen of her house. “Too bad I won’t be able to move in before Christmas.”
“That doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a Christmas tree here,” one of them said. “The plumbing will be in order, and we’ll have the tiled floor, the stove and refrigerator in place. You can get water from the bathroom.”
She phoned her landlord, gave notice and settled into her house three days later. She bought a tree, decorated it, and prepared to have Christmas Eve dinner alone for the first time in her life. On an impulse, she phoned Jay Weeks and invited him to dinner. To her amazement, he accepted, telling her that bad weather was forecast for Vermont, and he’d decided not to go skiing.
On Christmas Eve, she built a fire in the fireplace, scattered pecans in the ashes to roast, and put a goose in the oven. Jay Weeks proved to be the perfect guest, as she had suspected he would be, and she served a near perfect dinner.
Getting Some Of Her Own Page 6
