“In New York, my friends and I would go to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine for midnight service on Christmas Eve,” she told him. “Is that a custom here?”
“At the Catholic churches, but I’m not Catholic. You want to go?”
“Sure. Come on.”
Leaving the church after service, she encountered her neighbor, Cassandra Hairston-Shepherd and her husband.
“Susan Pettiford, is it?” Cassandra said. “This is my husband, Kix Shepherd.”
“I’m so glad to see you again, Cassandra. Hello, Kix. I moved in a few days ago. This is Jay Weeks.”
They exchanged greetings, but Cassandra did not suggest that they get together. Nor did she linger for a brief chat.
Kix glanced at his wife, frowned and then spoke to Susan. “The Greer house is a celebrated house. I was fond of your aunt, and I regretted her passing. I hope we’ll be good neighbors, Susan.”
“Thank you,” Susan said. She noticed that while Kix spoke with them, Cassandra walked on.
“Cassie,” Kix called to his wife, “would you please wait.” Cassandra stopped, but she did not turn around.
Kix shook hands with Jay. “I hope to see you both again.”
Although she couldn’t quite put her finger on the reason, it seemed to Susan that Cassandra’s marriage needed bolstering.
She liked Kix Shepherd at once, for he seemed more down to earth and was certainly friendlier than his wife. Jay had his own ideas about Cassandra. “That dame’s got a helluva estimation of herself.”
“You’ve met her before?”
“Of course I have. She designed my logo and stationery.”
“You’re not serious.”
“Oh, but I am. She’s a real piece of work. You’ll see.”
As she had done for most of her life, Susan went to church Christmas morning, and it pleased her to see there at least one person who she knew: Nathan. The boy came up to her holding the hand of an older woman.
“Miss Pettiford, this is my grandmother.”
“How do you do, ma’am?”
The woman, who Susan judged to be about sixty or sixty-five, extended her hand. “I’m glad to meet you, Ms. Pettiford. My name is Ann Price. Nathan talks about you all the time. He thinks you’re a saint.”
“He’s a wonderful boy,” Susan said. “Does he live with you?”
“Lord, yes. I have three children of my own. Two of them have gone about their business and left their children with me, and I have custody of my younger son’s child. Altogether, I’m raising five kids. This one’s the youngest, and he’s a blessing. Never gives me a bit of trouble.”
Susan spoke with the woman for a few minutes, wished her and Nathan a merry Christmas and left them. Some people were blessed to have children, but didn’t appreciate their good fortune. If she had . . .
“Don’t start that, girl,” she admonished herself.
Shortly after she arrived home, the phone rang and she rushed to answer it, wondering who her caller might be. “Merry Christmas, Susan. This is Lucas Hamilton. I hope you’re enjoying your home and that you’re feeling more chipper than when we were last together.”
“Merry Christmas, Lucas. I am indeed in better spirits.”
“Glad to hear it. All good things for the new year.”
“Thanks. Same to you.”
“Bye for now.”
She hung up. Surely he hadn’t called only to tell her merry Christmas! She lifted her shoulder in a shrug. It seemed that he had.
The next time the phone rang, Susan answered it and heard the voice of her mother, Betty Lou Pettiford. “Honey, I’m so sorry I couldn’t get there for Christmas, but so many people here need me, I just couldn’t make myself leave. I hope you’ve found someone to share the holiday with. I do miss you.”
“I’m so glad you called, Mom. It’s just as well you didn’t come. I moved into Aunt Edith’s house, and I’m remodeling the kitchen, so it’s torn up. I know you can’t stand chaos.”
“Don’t joke. That was then. Over here, there’s nothing but chaos. I think I’ll go back to the States after this tour is over. It’s time I started living in reality. Your father’s been gone for five years now, and escaping over here hasn’t helped. I have to deal with it there.”
“You know I’ll be here for you, Mom, whenever you get back.”
“I know, child, and it means everything to me.”
Later, as Susan mused over their conversation, it occurred to her that she’d heard that decision from her mother several times in the last four years—whenever her mother had a fit of depression about her father’s death.
School resumed after the first of the year, and Susan could hardly wait to see her pupils. When she saw that all of them had returned, a wide grin spread over her face, and she could hardly contain her joy. Rudy and Nathan sat beside each other, the only children to sit in the front row, and she suddenly understood Nathan. He was not a foster child, but he lived separately from his mother, and he sympathized with Rudy.
The children’s apparent delight in returning to her class made her giddy with happiness and, when the tutoring session ended, she stood in the corridor beside the door of the classroom surrounded by them as they laughed and chatted. However, she had a sudden twinge of discomfort when Lucas Hamilton walked past her accompanied by an attractive woman who was not one of the volunteers. And it angered her that he didn’t speak, but half smiled and winked at her instead. That is, if you could call squeezing both eyes tight a wink.
“I don’t care what he does or who he does it with,” she reminded herself as she drove home.
But that proved to be only the beginning. One of Lucas’s girlfriends dropped by Wade School on Tuesdays and Thursdays and left along with him with such regularity that one would have thought he feared leaving alone. “The devil with him,” Susan murmured one Thursday evening.
Chapter Four
Lucas left the Woodmore Bank in high spirits, his steps quick and his purpose sure. During the past two weeks, he had hired a secretary, a junior architect and an accountant. Most importantly, he had the financial backing of Jack Muller and Muller Furniture, Inc. and the right to break ground for Hamilton Village. He slid into the driver’s seat and knocked his right fist into his left palm. “I’m on my way.” And he’d managed it without investing a dime of his own money.
Using his cell phone, Lucas phoned Willis. “It’s all set. The money’s in the bank, and the papers are in my briefcase. Get busy.” This was his chance to ensure that Woodmore, North Carolina, registered his name for posterity, and when he finished, Hamilton Village would do for him what Fallingwater did for Frank Lloyd Wright.
“We’ve just put the floor in Susan’s kitchen,” Willis said, “and I have to tell you, we ought to photograph this place for Architectural Design. It’s exquisite. I’ve never been so proud of anything I’ve done. Man, it’s perfect.”
“I’m on my way home. I think I’ll drop by and see it. Is she home?”
“I don’t know. She gives me a wide berth.”
“I hope you haven’t done anything else to upset her.”
“Aw, come on. I pull her leg a little bit sometimes, but—”
“You’d better say what you mean.” The sound of Willis’s laughter did not amuse Lucas.
“Weren’t you trying to upset her when you decided Wade School was the place to interview women for the secretary’s post?” Willis prodded. “Huh? Man, I’m not stupid.”
“I’ll see you in a few minutes.” Lucas had not bothered to examine his motive in interviewing the women in his office at Wade School half an hour before the tutoring sessions terminated. On those days, he scheduled his own class half an hour early. If seeing him with four different, attractive young women had impressed Susan in any way, she’d kept it to herself. He’d like to know why she cried when he was last in her apartment. Certainly the possibility of losing her appointment as a volunteer hadn’t triggered that level of misery. And miserable w
as the only way he could describe Susan’s tortured demeanor. Then, when he opened his arms to her, she went to him with the eagerness of a bride to her wedding. Yet, the minute they became aware of their feelings, she gathered that iron will of hers and moved. But he was not willing to give up just yet.
“I haven’t been inside of you for the last time, girl. You liked what I did to you, and as sure as salmon go back to the place of their spawning, I’ll be back there.”
He parked in front of her house, got out and would have gone inside if he hadn’t seen her in the garden trimming boxwood.
“Hello, Susan.” He could see that he’d startled her, for her head jerked up as if he’d frightened her. “Sorry if I’m intruding, but Willis wants me to look at the kitchen.”
“Hi. Go on in. They’re working on the floor.”
“He said they’ve finished the job, and I’m anxious to see it.”
When she struggled to get up from her squat position, he jumped over the fence, grasped her shoulders and lifted her to her feet. His fingers caressed her softness, but she didn’t look at him. Neither did she move away.
“Why can’t you look at me, Susan? I’m here, and I am not going to disappear like a ghost.” And the more she tried to behave as if he were just another man, the more determined he was to make her admit that he was special to her because she wanted him.
As if his words triggered her consciousness, she stepped away from him. “Thanks for the lift up. If I gain any more weight, you’d need a crane to lift me.”
He didn’t allow her to derail his thoughts. “You haven’t gained one ounce since I lifted you and put you on your bed.”
“Please, I—”
“You want to forget it, but I don’t and I can’t, so don’t expect me to cooperate.”
She leaned down, picked up her pruning shears and started toward the back door. “If you told Willis you were on your way, I’m sure he thinks you got lost,” she said over her shoulder.
“Listen here, woman. All you’re doing is making me more determined to find out if what went on between us could happen again and why the hell it occurred in the first place. You said you didn’t regret it. Were you lying?”
She stopped walking, turned around and stared at him. “I’m a free woman, thirty-four years old. Until now, I’ve made an enviable living for myself that has given me a measure of independence. I don’t have to lie to the president.” With those words, she strutted into the house and did not hold the door open for him. Nor did she lock it.
A cool way of telling him she still didn’t regret it. He didn’t want her to see him laugh, so he coughed instead. “I’ll bet she fanned my tail,” he muttered to himself. No one knew that house better than he, so he opened the back door and headed for the kitchen. The house remained one of his stellar achievements, an award winner, and pride suffused him as he strode through it.
“Say, man, what took you so long? How do you like it?” Willis asked him.
“Fantastic. You’ve done a superb job. I think I’ll use this model for kitchens this size. It really is great. What did she say about it?”
Willis began cleaning his hands with a brush that he kept for the purpose. “She hasn’t seen it with the floor installed.”
“When will you finish her shop?”
“In a couple of days. They’re working on the storage room. I’ll be glad to make some real money. These peanut jobs are a pain in the ass. Say, my dad wants to visit me next week. Do you think Aunt Noreen would invite us to dinner? I’m still tasting that food she cooked for Christmas. I always said you were lucky, Lucas. My mother couldn’t cook worth a cent.”
“And neither can you. I’ll ask Mama, or you can. Let me know the dates.”
He wanted to see Susan again before he left there, but he couldn’t stroll around in her house as if he belonged there, even if he did design it. “I’ve got to get out of here,” he told Willis. To the men working with him, he said “Great job.”
He whirled around and knocked Susan against the dining room table. “Good Lord!” he said, grabbing her shoulders. “Did I hurt you?”
“Uh . . .” One of his arms eased around her, and the fingers of his other hand stroked her bare arm. “I don’t think so,” she said so softly that he almost missed the words.
“I’m sorry, Susan. Stand up, and let’s see if you’re all right.” He kept his arm tight around her and eased her into a standing position.
“I’m all right. Honest.” But she didn’t move from the curve of his arm.
“What’s the matter? What happened?” Willis asked.
He cared a lot for Willis Carter, but at the moment, he wanted to strangle him. “It’s okay, Willis. I ran into Susan and knocked her against the table. She says she’s fine.”
“Yeah, man. That’s a sneaky way to get next to a gal.” He wondered at Willis’s lack of sensitivity. Couldn’t he see Susan’s embarrassment, and wouldn’t a savvy man have guessed that they remained locked together for a reason and left them alone?
“You’d know,” Lucas said, not bothering to hide his irritation. “Back off, man.”
“I hope you don’t get any bruises from this,” Lucas said to Susan. She stared at his mouth and then shook herself as if bringing herself out of a trance. He had to get out of there. “I’ll be in touch,” he said and brushed past Willis on his way to the back door.
“What’s wrong? You two can’t get together?” Willis asked Susan.
“We don’t want to, Mr. Carter. It’s as simple as that. We do not want to become involved.”
Lucas didn’t stop. A minute earlier, he could have demonstrated her error to anyone who cared to know it.
Susan did not believe the words she’d uttered to Willis, but she wanted them to be true. His renovation of her kitchen so pleased her that her attitude toward him softened. When she arrived at her shop the next morning to ask when she could occupy it, she found him having strong words with Jay Weeks.
“Man, no one comes in here but my workers and me. You’re snooping around, and it’s illegal. You’re trespassing. How do I know you won’t cause some damage?”
“Susan and I are friends,” Jay said.
“Yeah? You’re also the only other interior decorator in Woodmore. You stay out of here, or I get a warrant that says you do.”
What was Jay doing there? She turned around and went across the street to the barbecue café, where she bought a container of coffee and a scone, killing time until the two men settled their disagreement. She didn’t want to takes sides with Jay because he was wrong, yet she didn’t want to embarrass him by agreeing with Willis. She would remain friends with Jay, but she would keep a careful eye on him.
When she returned to the shop, Jay had left. “How long was Jay Weeks here?” she asked Willis.
“Maybe twenty minutes. I went out to get some coffee, and when I returned, he was walking around as if you’d hired him to inspect the place. What do you think so far?”
“It’s wonderful. I had no idea it would be so elegant, though I hoped for the best. If I put a couch in my office, it can be my second home.”
“That’s what I thought you had in mind. For instance, it’s supposed to snow tonight. If you were here, you wouldn’t have to go home.”
“When I get it all dressed up, I’ll call you, and you can see how great it will look. I realize you didn’t make any money on this, and I’m grateful. The kitchen in my house is out of sight, too. You’re the best, Mr. Carter.”
“Since I’m such a great guy, Susan, you may call me Willis. And if you happen to bake some buttermilk biscuits sometime in that oven back there, give me a call. The only time I get any is when I drop in on Lucas’s mother. He really is a nice guy, Susan.”
She threw up her hands. “I know that. End of topic.”
She went home, bent over her catalogues, and selected fabrics, trimmings and accessories that she would order from the dealer she used in New York. A pain in her neck alerted her to the fa
ct that she had worked for several hours, through lunchtime and into the late afternoon. She got up, stretched her arms, walked over to the dining room window, looked out and gaped at the solid mass of snow. After checking her refrigerator for food supplies and discovering that she needed nothing, she went back to work.
Suddenly, darkness enveloped her. Tests of the lights confirmed her worst fears: the blizzard had caused a power outage. Her cell phone rang.
“Susan, this is Lucas. Electricity is off in your house, but in case you aren’t aware of it, you have a generator. Just inside the door leading to the basement is a switch that glows red in the darkness. Push it to the right, and the generator will kick in. I’ll hang on while you do it.”
After fumbling her way to the basement door, she found the switch and did as he directed. “I found it, and the lights are on. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your calling to tell me that.”
“My pleasure. Have a good evening.”
Silence followed the click on the other end of the wire, and she stopped herself as she was about to throw the cell phone across the dining room. “I’d give a lot to know what goes on in that man’s mind,” she said. “He can make me madder than anybody else on God’s green earth.”
The next morning, awakened by a loud banging on her front door, Susan pulled on a robe, slipped her feet into her house slippers and ran down the stairs. The banging was of such urgency that she expected the worst. She opened the door to find Cassandra standing there with a shopping bag in her hand.
“Hi, Susan. I noticed that you have electricity, and I was wondering if I could put these eggs, milk and butter in your refrigerator until I get some electricity.”
She had expected anything but a visit from Cassandra Hairston-Shepherd. “Of course. Come in. Do you have time for some hot coffee?”
“I sure do. I can’t get started without my coffee. Hope I didn’t wake you up. I thought that since you work—”
“Oh, that’s all right. I worked here until after two this morning, and with all this snow, I figured sleeping in was the most productive thing I could do.” She led Cassandra to the living room. “ Have a seat. I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”
Getting Some Of Her Own Page 7
