by Webb, Peggy
“Do you know where my car keys are?”
“I think they’re in your pocket where you always put them. Are you going out again?”
“I hate to dash your hopes, Hines, but my late- night foray into town has nothing to do with a woman.”
“Perish the thought, sir.”
“Sarcasm doesn’t become you.”
“I rather enjoyed it. I might even take it up permanently.”
“Not you, too. I’d say I was being punished for my sins, if I believed in such nonsense. Fortunately, I know better. Pious poppycock, all of it”
When Ben got in the car, he discovered he had forgotten his jacket, but he wasn’t about to go back and get it. Call it stiff-necked pride, call it principle, call it anything you wanted. Just once today Ben wanted to be right, even if it was over a small matter such as driving off into the winter night without a coat.
How cold could it get in Mississippi, anyhow? Besides, he didn’t plan to roam the streets; he just wanted to find a late-night show where he could hole up at the back of the theater and forget about a redheaded she-devil who tried to pass herself off as an angel.
o0o
“Holly, is that you?”
Her grandmother knew perfectly well it was Holly. Who else would be standing in the middle of the den in a bedraggled sheet that made her look like a snowman left in the sun too long? Who else would come in juggling an armload of table decorations and a basket of leftovers? Who else would put up with a parrot who never said a word except help... and who said it every time Holly came through the front door?
All of a sudden Holly didn’t have one more kind and decent thought left in her, couldn’t muster one more false smile.
“Who do I look like, Grandma? The Good Humor man?”
“Your brother would never talk to me that way. He’s a perfect gentleman.”
Her brother was everything she was not—tall, skinny, successful, and married with kids. But if James was so wonderful, why was he never around, not even on holidays? Why wasn’t he the one who took Grandma to the doctor or to visit friends? Why was he never the one to go on a midnight search for blankets because Grandma yelled that her feet were cold or her head was freezing, or she was going to die of pneumonia... and that it was all Holly’s fault?
Holly was tempted to blurt out her frustration, but she held herself in check. James had been six and Holly one when their parents were killed in a car crash. Grandma had been both mother and father to them.
Just because she’d had a hard day didn’t mean Holly had to take it out on the woman who had changed her diapers.
“I’m sorry, Grandma. It’s been a rough day.”
“Hmmph. You should be in my shoes. Nothing but John Wayne on the TV all the live-long day, and him dead and gone. And the music they play on the radio... sounds like cats out in the alley wailing.” Although Grandma Lily could drive a car when she wanted to and was perfectly capable of walking without assistance, she leaned heavily on a hand-carved cane when she stood up. “Are you going to turn on my blanket so I can go to bed, or do I have to stand here all night with my bad back?”
“Let me get rid of this costume first.”
“Well, hurry up. I’m sleepy. That old parrot of yours kept me from getting my nap.”
“Popeye was talking?”
“Talking, my hind foot. He was glaring at me with his mean yellow eyes. I don’t trust that old bird. If I’ve told you once I’ve told you a hundred times, you ought to get rid of him.”
Popeye turned a beady eye Grandma Lily’s way, then hopped around on his perch so he could face the wall and pout. Holly wanted to wring both their necks.
“Oh, Lordy, I need a break.”
She jerked off her sheet and tinsel, then pulled on a pair of yellow sweats with matching shirt that asked the burning question have you hugged a friend today?
“Hurry up, Holly.” Grandma Lily called from her bedroom. “If I have to keep standing, I think I’m going to faint.”
Holly sighed. All she wanted to do was put her feet up and forget about her day. Instead she raced down the hall, for although Grandma was in good health, you never knew what would happen at her age—as she so often reminded Holly.
After she tucked Lily into bed, Holly settled into her favorite chair to escape with a good book. Unfortunately Popeye came out of his sulk and started yelling for help.
There was a magnet on Holly’s refrigerator that read Lord, give me patience... and give it now! Usually it made her smile, but tonight nothing was going to help except total escape.
She scrawled a note for Grandma, just in case Lily woke up: Gone to the movies.
Holly glanced at her watch. She was going to be late, even for the late show. As she pulled out of her driveway she began to see the humor of her situation.
“Late for the late show. The story of my life.”
Six dramas and a comedy were playing, a Steve Martin remake of an old Spencer Tracy film. That was exactly what she needed, laughter and a jumbo box of popcorn.
“Extra butter, please,” she said. Nothing soothed frayed nerves like food.
The movie was already playing to an audience of one, a man who sat in the center of the center row, the best seat in the house, a seat Holly always chose. Should she sit across the aisle just to be polite or sit in the center and leave a discreet seat or two between them?
She stood in the aisle weighing her problem as if world peace depended on the answer. Meanwhile Steve Martin was hamming it up onscreen, and already Holly felt better. Her laughter was full and uninhibited.
What the heck? She’d sit in the center the way she always did. Laughing and digging into her popcorn at the same time, she made her way down the dark aisle. She was nearly halfway down the center row when the man turned toward her.
“Ben Sullivan,” she whispered.
His eyebrow quirked upward. “If you’ve come to play Welcome Wagon, I’m leaving.”
“Put your mind at ease. I don’t plan to play anything with you.”
“That’s a relief.” His smile was like quicksilver. “I’m wearing a clean shirt.”
“I noticed.” She couldn’t help but smile back at him. Who could resist? “Is this seat taken?”
“Yes. I have a harem of six women out in the lobby, all fetching popcorn and candy.” He flashed that smile again, the one that made her forget about her buttered popcorn. “You don’t have to sit so far away. I won’t bite.”
Vivid images of Ben Sullivan biting her neck and other erogenous zones made Holly suck in a sharp breath. She was grateful for the darkness that hid her blush.
“Is that a promise?” she said.
His eyes glowed in the faint light from the movie screen as they raked over the front of her shirt, taking in the slogan and everything that lay underneath.
“Only for tonight,” he said.
In the daylight he was sexy; in the darkness he was pure dynamite. She sat one seat down from him and tried to concentrate on the movie, but all she could think of was the large dark shadow that loomed beside her, stealing her breath.
“Have you, Holly?”
His voice came out of the darkness, soft and sexy. How could she hate a man who sounded like that?
“Have I what?”
“Hugged a friend today?
“Yes. Lots of them.”
He turned back to the screen, and Holly dug into her popcorn. Somehow it had lost its savor.
“How many?” he said.
“How many, what?”
“Friends.”
She took a swift mental count before answering.
“At least ten.”
“You have ten people you like well enough to hug?”
“Well... yes. More, actually. I like people.”
“Present company not included, of course.”
There was a subtle tingling somewhere inside Holly as all her notions of good versus bad, love versus hate shattered.
“I don’t dislik
e you... I just don’t like what you did.”
He turned the full force of a sardonic smile on her. “On Capitol Hill we call that doublespeak. Some call it worse.”
“Oh, dear.” In the course of one short day Holly had come to see herself as hypocrite and now as a liar. Instead of asking for grace, she was going to have to pray for a complete overhaul. To atone, she held her box toward Ben.
“Would you like some popcorn?”
“Is that a trick question? I say yes, and you dump it into my lap?”
She looked so aggrieved that he laughed.
“I was just trying to be nice.” She jerked the box back.
“Wait...” He caught her wrist. “Does it have butter?”
“Lots... I always ask for extra.”
If he’d said I can see that you do, she would have slapped him.
“I’ll lick your fingers if you’ll lick mine,” he said.
“Oh...” Her face was so hot that he would surely see. “You... you’re...”
“An ass, I think is the word you’re looking for.” He clipped the box out of her hand and dug into the popcorn. When he handed it back, his hand lingered over hers. “That is an intriguing idea, though, isn’t it?”
The box hovering between them suddenly seemed to grow until it took up all the space, all the air. And wafting from it was not the smell of popcorn but a fragrance more exotic, more tempting, a scent so sweet it stole Holly’s breath. She struggled for air and composure, fought her way back toward sanity, forced herself into the proper protective mode.
“I don’t know what to say to you... some fast-talking sophisticate from Washington. You must be a politician.”
“No. Worse. A lobbyist.”
He stared at her in the half-light from the movie screen, his face full of fierce challenge. She wasn’t about to comment on his profession. All she knew about lobbyists was what she had heard—none of it good.
That was just her luck—falling for the wrong kind of man. Not that she was falling, of course, maybe just slipping and sliding a little. Nothing serious. Nothing that couldn’t be corrected if she put her mind to it. Wishing she had sat anywhere except in the center row, she pulled back into the corner of her seat as far away from him as she could get.
Suddenly he was out of his seat and into the one next to her, his broad shoulders and his left leg brushing against hers.
“This makes more sense if we’re going to share the same box of popcorn.”
Oh, Lordy, she couldn’t breathe, let alone reply. Her hand shook as she passed him the corn.
“Are you afraid of me, Holly?”
If he had spoken the question with arrogance, she’d have marched out of the theater and never looked back. But there was an underlying wistfulness that gave her pause.
“No,” she said, not at all sure.
He stared at the screen, full of a dark brooding. She’d never known a man as complex, and if she were smart, she wouldn’t try to know him. She was a small town girl through and through, while he was a powerful man who knew how to make deals with some of the most hated people in the country.
Ben Sullivan was way out of her league.
“You should be,” he said softly. “Sometimes I even scare the heck out of myself.”
In one of his quicksilver mood changes, he captured her face between his hands, his eyes full of merry devilment.
“You have butter,” he said.
What if he licked it off? Worse yet, what if she let him?
“Where?” she whispered.
She held her breath as he leaned in close. If he kissed her, she would kiss him back. It was that simple. And that scary.
Suddenly he drew back.
“You may be the Welcome Wagon lady from Hades, but when you stretch those innocent blue eyes like that, you’re all angel. But then, I guess you know that, don’t you, Holly Jones?”
“That’s what it says on my driver’s license. Blue eyes.”
That eyebrow arched upward, and the mercurial Ben Sullivan changed to the cynic she loved to hate.
“You ought to take your act on the road. You’d make a million.” He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and handed it to her.
“Here. The butter is on the left side of your mouth,” he said, then withdrew into a brooding silence with his face turned toward the screen.
Grateful for the darkness that hid her flushed face, she wiped her mouth. Now what? Give the handkerchief back and hope he didn’t grab her hand?
Hope that he did?
What would Miss Size Two do in a situation like this? Holly knew, for she’d seen the act at church—simper and play the helpless wounded female.
You couldn’t pay Holly to play such a role, much as she needed the money. She’d worked too hard for her independence.
On the other hand, there was the Body. All she had to do was stand around looking curvaceous, and men fell at her feet. The only men likely to fall at Holly’s feet were the ones she tripped.
Ben’s handkerchief smelled faintly of the aftershave he wore. The smell was both comforting and disturbing. Images came to Holly—lazy Saturday mornings in the bathroom, steam covering the mirror, towels wrapped around their waists, the smell of his aftershave and her perfume mingling in a fragrance as intoxicating as love. Christmas mornings before the sun came up, feeling under the warm covers until she found a solid chest, then pressing her face against his naked skin, the scent of his aftershave reminding her of the tree they had decorated together. Summer mornings with the breeze coming through the open window, sheet tangled around their legs, their hands locked. His scent on her skin. Hers on him. Glorious smells of intimacy, of security, of love.
“You’re crying.” Softly, Ben touched a tear that glistened on her cheek.
“Yes.” She felt the tears now, wet and salty, running into the edges of her mouth. And then because she was afraid of showing him this weakness, she lied. “I always cry at sad movies.”
Too late she realized the movie was a comedy. She waited for one of his biting remarks or that sardonic lifting of his eyebrow, or worse yet, a derisive laugh. But Ben Sullivan did none of those things. Instead he took the handkerchief, cupped her face, and tenderly wiped away her tears.
She held herself perfectly still, not daring to move, hardly daring to breathe. The gesture was as sweet as it was unexpected. Just when she thought she had Ben figured out, he did something that forced her to change her mind. Who was this man, anyhow?
In the faint glow from the screen, he looked like a movie star from the early days of film when all the heroes were darkly handsome and dangerously appealing, the days of romance and happily-ever-after when the hero always got the girl then rode off with her into the sunset while some sappy sentimental song played in the background.
Their eyes met, lingered, locked. A tremor went through him, and she felt the aftershocks.
Images flickered on the screen and music filled the theater. On the screen the credits rolled by.
“It’s over,” she whispered.
He held her a heartbeat longer... then two... then three. She wet dry lips, and his eyes followed the course of her pink tongue.
“Yes,” he said, releasing her abruptly. “It’s over.”
He was out of his seat and striding down the aisle so fast, she didn’t even realize she still had his handkerchief until he was already out the door. And then it was too late to call him back.
“You’re always a day late and a dollar short,” Grandma Lily often told her.
Sitting in the dark by herself, Holly held Ben’s handkerchief to her face, just for a moment, just to be certain the doorman wouldn’t see tearstains when she went to her car. Suddenly she was caught unaware by the distinct scent of orange blossoms.
When she finally left the theater, the doorman said, “Did you like the movie?”
There was an enormous decorated tree in the corner of the theater lobby, and flashing silver lights were strung across the exit doors. H
olly managed a bright smile by thinking about Christmas.
“It was great,” she said, “simply great.” And then she stepped outside the theater to find that faint, sweet scent lingering in the air.
Chapter 5
Hines was already unpacking boxes when Ben got up.
“Did you enjoy your outing last night, sir?”
“You need to improve your technique, Hines. Any fool can see through that question.”
“Oh?”
“You might as well come out and ask where I went and who I saw.”
“That’s none of my business, sir.”
“Precisely.” Ben poured two glasses of orange juice and handed one to Hines. “Here. You probably didn’t even have breakfast before you started unpacking.”
“I thought you might enjoy company for breakfast, sir.”
Ben took a long swig of his juice. It was cold and refreshing, and while he drank he thought about what a total jerk he was sometimes. It was not a pretty thought, especially during the season of peace and goodwill.
“By a cruel twist of fate I ended up in the same movie theater as Holly Jones.”
“Miss Jones?”
“The hate wagon.”
Hines grinned. “Oh, that Miss Jones.”
“Yeah, that Miss Jones.”
Ben split English muffins then left them to toast while he got jelly and butter from the refrigerator. A memory assaulted him—a tiny smear of butter on the side of a ripe lush mouth. It scared him how close he had come to kissing her, really kissing her.
But the thing that scared him even more was that he hadn’t kissed her. He was accustomed to taking what he wanted from a woman when he wanted it. Why hadn’t he done that with Holly Jones?
“Are you interviewing the butter or do you plan to put it on the muffins, sir?”
Ben looked at the butter in his hand. He was standing with the refrigerator door open like a man besotted. He plopped the butter onto the table and pulled out a chair.
“I don’t know why I put up with you, Hines.”
“Because you can’t do without me, that’s why. Would you please pass the jelly, sir? Thank you.”
“Oh, it’s please and thank you now, is it?”
“Only because I’m planning to include a substantial Christmas bonus when I write my salary check.”
