Kiss Me Hello (Sweetest Kisses)

by Grace Burrowes

  Luis snorted and preceded Mac into the kitchen.

  Mac tried to picture his own late mother in jail. A criminal defense attorney saw people go to jail almost daily. Bad people, good people, some of them even innocent good people.

  But his own mother?

  He followed Luis into the house and wondered what would make a woman like Sidonie Lindstrom—a pretty, unmarried city girl who probably read more magazines than books and loved the smell of car exhaust—take on the challenge of a kid like Luis.

  Chapter 3

  Sid was dreaming of an expedition to White Flint Mall down in the thriving suburb of Rockville. To the bargain rack at Lord and Taylor, where the slickest Little Black Dress hung in just her size. Finished silk, a plunging neckline, the hemline at exactly mid-thigh, with floral aubergine embroidery on the hem and neckline. Modest, but with the potential to tease, particularly when matched with onyx and gold jewelry, and three-inch spikes. The dress would feel lovely against her skin, and make her want to move around in it simply for the caress of the fabric on her bare—

  Something—the cat’s tail?—brushed her nose.

  “Wakey, wakey, princess.”

  That gravelly baritone had no place in either Sid’s dreams or her realities. She opened her eyes.

  MacKenzie Knightley sat on the white frothy duvet covering her bed, perfectly at ease for all his size and dark coloring.

  “I was resting my eyes.”

  “Right.” He dropped her braid and stood, without cracking a smile—without needing to crack a smile; his amusement was that evident. “You’ve been resting your eyes for a while now, I’m guessing.”

  “Why would you guess that?” Sid bounced and slogged her way to the edge of the bed. Big beds were for sleeping in, not for making dignified exits from.

  “I’d guess that, because you’ve got a crease on your cheek from the pillows, and because I stood in that doorway there”—he pointed ten feet across the room—“and for about five straight minutes, I politely suggested you wake up.”

  Sid made it to the edge of the bed, but her brain was having trouble waking up along with her body.

  “Where’s Luis?” she asked.

  “Braiding some baling twine halters to use until we can scare up the real deal. I suggested he and I make an excursion to the feed store and pick up the pizza so you could sleep, but he was reluctant to leave you here alone.”

  “Pizza.” Sid’s mind latched onto the image of a big, piping hot, loaded deep-dish with a mug of cold root beer to go with it. “I suppose we can’t get anything delivered here?”

  “You suppose right,” Mac said. “I’ll leave you to get yourself in order while I round up Luis.”

  He headed for the stairs, giving Sid a chance to appreciate his departing side. Lithe, like a big cat, and quiet, but not as incongruous in her bedroom as he should have been. The high ceilings, the solid stone construction of the house, the old oaks in the yard, and the open fields beyond suited him.

  Maybe she could sell the place to him, except a horseshoer—she forgot the other word he’d used—probably couldn’t afford this much land.

  Sid stopped dead in front of her cheval mirror.

  “God in heaven.” She had a crease on her cheek, her hair was a wreck, and her clothes looked like they’d never gotten acquainted with the dryer’s wrinkle-guard feature.

  MacKenzie Knightley had seen her like this.

  Apparently, country boys didn’t scare easily. Sid set to work with her brush, changed into fresh jeans that fit a little more snugly, and a green silk blouse that complemented her eyes. Brown suede half boots and a denim jacket with green and brown beading on the hems completed the picture.

  “You’ll do,” she informed her image. When she sauntered into the kitchen, Luis and MacKenzie were sitting at the table, working lengths of some hairy-looking twine.

  “You’ve taken up macramé, Luis?” She tousled his hair, because they had company, and Luis wouldn’t give her sass for it.

  “Making halters for the horses. I’m supposed to bring them in at night and turn them out in the morning until the hot weather comes.”

  “They might be gone by hot weather,” Sid said, going to the fridge.

  Luis set the twine on the table and stood. “Gone where?”

  “I’m not sure, but we know next to nothing about caring for livestock, Luis. You know this place isn’t long-term for us.”

  “But you told Social Services—”

  “Luis Martineau, what I tell that bunch of officious bi—biddies, or your good-for-nothing lawyer, has nothing to do with reality, any more than they’re really concerned with your best interests. Now what do you want on your pizza?”

  She felt MacKenzie Knightley watching them, but what did a horseshoer know about the red tape, posturing, and endless regulations that went along with being a foster parent? What did he know about Luis’s family, much less Sid’s own situation?

  And as far as Sid was concerned, “good-for-nothing lawyer” was a redundant term.

  “You know how I like my pizza,” Luis said, “and I don’t see why we have to sell the horses when we just moved here.”

  Sid was about to tell him that wasn’t his decision, but something in his eyes promised her a knock-down, drag-out, steel cage bout of pouting and sulking if she pulled rank on him in front of their guest.

  “We’ll talk about it later,” Sid said.

  “I’ll be the one taking care of them,” Luis said. “If they’re no inconvenience to you, I don’t see why you have to get rid of them.”

  Damnably logical, until one of the mastodons stepped on his foot, and Child Protective Services was out here, sniffing around and muttering about lack of supervision.

  “They’re not foster children, Luis, and playing the guilt card this early in an argument is a low shot, and bad strategy.”

  “They aren’t foster children,” Luis said, his chin coming up. “They don’t have a lawyer. Nobody is required to report when those horses are abandoned or treated badly. Nobody owes them food or shelter. They have nobody and nothing, no rights.”

  “I hate to interrupt,” Knightley said, getting to his feet, “but the feed store isn’t open all night. We can continue this over pizza, can’t we?”

  “Yes,” Sid said, grudgingly grateful to him for intervening. “As long as you’re willing to look after the horses, Luis, we can take our time about finding them another home.”

  “I’d leave it there,” Knightley said to Luis. “You’re too much of a gentleman to fight dirty in front of me, and Sidonie’s too stubborn to back down while I’m here. You’ll make more progress without a peanut gallery.”

  “She is stubborn,” Luis said, the corners of his mouth trying to turn up.

  “And you.” Knightley took Sid’s purse down from a hook near the door and passed it to her. “Don’t needle him over dinner. Let him spend a few days scrubbing water buckets, trudging in and out from the pasture in the pouring-down rain and wind and mud, spooning honey before and after school every day, and see if his position doesn’t shift closer to center.”

  The prospect of Luis seeing reason all on his own cheered Sid, as did the idea that they were only a few miles—only!—from some place that served pizza and Greek fare Knightley swore was worth the drive.

  “You two coming with me, or are we going to caravan?” Knightley asked.

  His face gave away nothing, not eagerness for their company, not distress at having to share his vehicle. Nothing.

  “We’ll follow you,” Sid said.

  “Then we’ll find the pizza place by way of the feed store. You should have a couple bags of senior feed on hand for your ponies, and probably pick up some joint supplement for them as well.”

  He climbed into his truck—a big blue thing that looked like it could pull house trailers—
and fired it up.

  “Diesel,” Luis said, which was proof positive guys had different genes.

  Sid fished in her purse for the car keys. “You can tell that from listening to it?”

  “You can’t?”

  “You want to drive?” Sid asked, rather than admit her ignorance. Knightley’s wheels sounded like a truck. Like a big powerful truck.

  She tossed Luis the keys and buckled in. Fortunately, Knightley drove below the posted speed, no doubt making allowances for the fact that they were following. In the waning light, the countryside was pretty enough, with a few fields already bright green, and others not yet planted.

  “Do you know what the green stuff is?” Sid asked.

  “Winter wheat. There’s fields of it near the high school.”

  Where they’d registered him on Friday, because the Department of Social Services frowned on foster children having any time off from school, even when those children pulled straight A’s in merit classes. Sid had pushed it, giving Luis three days off before enrolling him, hoping social workers out here in the country were a more reasonable breed.

  Maybe pigs could fly in this fresh rural air too.

  “Feed store,” Luis said, dutifully putting on his turn signal and following Knightley into the parking lot of a building sporting a “Damson County Farmers’ Co-op” sign over a front-facing loading dock. “You coming in?”

  “Sure, unless you’re paying for this pony chow?”

  “I would, if that would make a difference.”

  Sid got out and studied Luis over the roof of the car. “You just met these horses, Luis, right?”

  He jammed his hands in his pockets, a young man trying to figure out how not to get in trouble for telling the truth, because he would assuredly get in trouble if he lied.

  “I saw their tracks in the pasture the day we moved in, and I knew the tracks couldn’t have been there from last year. Mac’s waiting for us.”

  Tracks. Oh, right. Little dude from way downtown saw horse tracks. Like she would believe that.

  “You knew the horses were there, and you said nothing. This is not good, Luis.”

  “They were abandoned,” Luis said again. “Left to starve or die. They don’t deserve that, Sid. They were state champions, and nobody cares what happened to them.”

  Spare me from crusading adolescents. “We don’t know what their story is, but we’ll talk more about this later.”

  Knightley started walking toward Sid’s little Mustang convertible as if he’d heard his cue. “You might consider getting something with four-wheel drive,” he said. “Winters can be tricky out here.”

  “This thing’s paid off,” Sid said, patting the candy-apple-red hood. “Car payments can be tricky too. Where’s the horse food aisle?”

  “It doesn’t work like that,” Knightley said. “Come on inside, and I’ll show you the ropes.”

  He held the door for her—for a farm boy, he had polished manners—and explained that they ordered the feed at the counter, and the nice man would put it in Sid’s car for them. This was good, because the feed came in fifty-pound bags, which meant hefting it out of her car’s trunk would be a job she and Luis shared.

  Fifty dollars later, they had two bags of horse feed and some fancy fairy dust with joint supplement in it for horses. Luis was listening raptly as Knightley explained the ins and outs of feeding draft horses, as opposed to the school horses Luis had met thus far.

  “Are we going to stand here all night,” Sid asked, “or take pity on a starving woman?”

  The man and the boy turned to look at her at the same moment, their expressions showing the same consternation.

  “Pizza,” she said, enunciating carefully. “Gyros, cheesecake. Nu-tri-tion, such as it can be found out here in the provinces. Ringing any bells?”

  “Sid gets cranky when her blood sugar’s low,” Luis said. “And she’s tired.”

  “I never would have guessed.” Knightley turned to open his truck door—his unlocked truck door. “The restaurant is right down this road about two miles on the left. You can’t miss it.”

  “We’ll meet you there.” Sid hopped into her car and started the engine, lest Luis get Knightley going on some other No Girls Allowed topic. That had happened occasionally with Tony, but not often. Luis had kept his distance from Tony, and Sid hadn’t really known what to do about it.

  But then, Tony hadn’t been trying to be any kind of role model for Luis. He’d regarded the foster children as Sid’s “little experiment.” They came and went, and if Sid wanted to send them birthday and Christmas cards, or go to their graduations, that was her decision.

  When she’d told him Luis was different, Luis was a keeper, he’d scoffed.

  “They’re all different to you, Sid. You’d keep every one of them if you could get away with it.”

  Damn him, even if he was dead, he’d been right.

  * * *

  Mac had made a horrendous mistake, one evident before the food had been brought to the table. Aspidistra’s was getting crowded, because Saturday night was an eat-out night in the local surrounds, and the options were few unless driving forty minutes to Frederick or Hagerstown held some appeal.

  Mac lived about four miles away, and the folks politely noticing MacKenzie Knightley sitting down to a public meal with a female-who-wore-no-ring were his neighbors. He’d taken the waitress, Marcella Ebersole, to the junior prom almost twenty years and many dress sizes ago, and had his hand as far up her skirts as nature and the backseat of a restored Super Beetle would allow.

  He’d also defended Marcella’s son on shoplifting charges last year and gotten the kid probation before judgment, thus preserving the boy’s shot at some college scholarships.

  Two booths down, Mrs. Fletcher, Mac’s old youth choir director, sat with her husband of five decades, beaming at the man, though in her words, he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.

  At the bar, Mac’s nemesis from middle school wrestling tournaments, Joey Hinlicky Jr., sat nursing a longneck. Joey was referred to as Deuce now, because his son sported the same moniker, as well as his dad’s penchant for mischief.

  And damned if Joe hadn’t winked at Mac before the pizza was even out of the oven.

  Marcella had smirked at him.

  Mrs. Fletcher had smiled.

  What the hell had he been thinking?

  Mac returned the smiles, nods, and winks with as much civility as he was capable of, which only seemed to amuse the idiots and goons around him. Fortunately, he was with a woman and a boy who took their tucker seriously. Luis matched Mac slice for slice, and Sid held her own as well, even finishing Luis’s piece of cheesecake.

  “Never had key lime cheesecake before,” Sid observed. “Is it a local delicacy?”

  “I’ve never had a dessert from Vespa Boon’s kitchen that wasn’t delicious,” Mac said. “Though I admit key lime cheesecake is new to me too. If nobody’s ordering seconds though, I’ll be on my way.”

  He started to get out his wallet, but Sid reached across the table to circle his wrist with her fingers.

  In front of the whole goddamned restaurant, of course.

  “Put that away, Mr. Knightley.”

  He wanted to, if for no other reason than to get her hands off of him, but she held fast, and her gaze bored into his.

  “You came over to help with those horses then spent half your afternoon cleaning up our barn. You said you’d take a couple slices of pizza as your reward, and it’s hardly a reward if you have to pay for it.”

  Mac had said that, so he sat back and stuffed his wallet in his pocket. Convicted by his own testimony.

  “May I at least get the tip?”

  “No, you may not.”

  He sat there feeling about two feet tall while Sid rummaged in a paisley green bag and came up with some sort of
tie-dyed cloth billfold.

  “Then you have my thanks,” Mac said, because his mama had raised him right. “I enjoyed the food and the company.”

  Sid tossed a twenty and a ten onto the table. This wasn’t an expensive place to eat—far from it—but letting a woman pay for his meal was…

  “You’re too much of a gentleman to argue with her in public,” Luis said, getting to his feet, and now the kid was smirking too.

  “I am.” Mac rose and reached for Sid’s jacket, which hung on the coat rack at the corner of their booth. He went on in French, though it was arguably rude. “See that you continue to set a good example for me, lest I forget my upbringing and embarrass us both.”

  “I don’t embarrass easily,” Luis said.

  Sid watched this exchange but made no comment while Mac held out her jacket for her. She looked like she wanted to argue, or to snatch it from him, but Luis was grinning at them like one of the porpoises at the National Aquarium over in Baltimore. Sid turned her back and slipped her arms into the jacket, then flipped her braid out and draped it over her shoulder.

  “Take me home, Luis.” She tossed him the keys. “Maybe in the morning, those equine asteroids will have ridden their bicycles back to whatever planet they came from. Mr. Knightley, thank you for all your help.”

  She was dismissing him, and Mac felt more relief than was polite to be parting from her. People would talk, that was inevitable, but Mac had spent most of his adult life making sure they weren’t talking about him.

  But then—oh, ye gods and little fishes—Sidonie Lindstrom made sure Mac was all that folks would talk about for at least the next three weeks.

  She went up on her toes, put a hand on the back of his neck, and brushed a kiss to his cheek. To make matters infinitely worse, she hesitated for a moment, lingering near, her hand at his nape. She hovered long enough that Mac got a whiff of something fresh and flowery, a hint of lily of the valley over the clean scent of her shampoo. His hand was at her waist to steady her, though he’d not a clue how it ended up there.

  “You’re welcome,” he managed.

  Sid settled back down on her heels, her fingers brushing at the back of his neck before she withdrew her hand.