Angels on Zebras, (Forever Friends, Book 4 of 4)

by Webb, Peggy

  Joseph had a powerful vision of Maxie, hair like flames across his pillow. Only iron control kept him in his chair. Only a powerful will kept him from howling like a caged animal.

  His laughter was hollow. “Spoken like a true bridegroom. I would expect nothing less from you than a glowing recommendation for the blind and blissful state of holy matrimony.”

  “Great Caesar’s forked tail, when did you get to be such a cynic?” Crash gave him another piercing assessment. “This doesn’t have anything to do with Maxie, does it?”

  “Susan is the woman I was engaged to.”

  “I know that. But you didn’t change one whit when you were seeing her, not even your tired old habit of having spaghetti every Wednesday night.”

  “What you call tired old habits happens to be a sensible routine that worked well for me, something I seem to have forgotten in the last few days.”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “I don’t think it merits an answer.”

  Suddenly Crash began to laugh.

  “What’s so damned funny?”

  “You.” He wiped the mirth from his eyes, then started into fresh gales of laughter. “Maybe there’s hope for you yet, Joe.”

  “I was hoping I could say the same thing about you, but you insist on treating my offer of a partnership as if it were an invitation to a hanging.”

  Crash glanced at his watch, then stood up. “Look, Joe, I appreciate the thought, and if I wanted to grind away the rest of my life in law, I can’t think of a better place to do it than here or a better person to do it with than my brother. But the fact is, I’m happy with my life and I’m secure about my future. I’ll never have as much money as you, but I’m far richer. Think about that, bro.”

  Joseph put his hand on his brother’s shoulder as they walked toward the door.

  “Don’t say no to my offer yet. Talk it over with your wife. B.J. probably wants to concentrate on you and baby Joe instead of law. Give it some thought. Promise me that much.”

  “I’ll do that if you’ll promise me something in return.”

  “Anything.”

  “Go home, get some rest, and while you’re relaxing think about why you’re hell-bent on avoiding the woman you couldn’t keep your hands off of at my house the other night.”

  If Joe hadn’t been such a good lawyer, he’d have had a hard time keeping his poker face. Crash winked at him.

  “Been there, done that, bro.”

  o0o

  Though it was a warm spring night outside, Joseph had turned on the gas logs in the fireplace. The Wall Street Journal lay in his lap, unread, and a glass of red wine sat on the table beside him, untouched. This was a routine that usually relaxed him, but he was still unnerved by his morning discussion with his brother.

  Any fool should know why he was avoiding Maxie. He was water and she was oil. They simply didn’t mix. Why had he ever thought he could change? Why had he ever dreamed he could cast off his conservative nature and become a man-about-town?

  Besides all that, his bedroom suite made it perfectly clear what she thought of him.

  He sipped his wine, then jerked open his paper, determined to read it from front to back. He gave up on the second page.

  “Dammit.”

  He felt like a person who had been raised by wolves, neither man nor beast. He had failed at being a bohemian, and now he was equally uncomfortable being an archconservative.

  That woman was driving him crazy.

  The clock struck ten, and he marched upstairs. Since he couldn’t do anything else, he might as well go to bed.

  The minute he stepped into his bedroom he knew he wouldn’t sleep again tonight. Maxie was everywhere, in the mirrored ceiling, in the wild-animal spread, in the whip that still lay on the floor. He stretched full length across his bed, fully dressed, shoes and all.

  Her fragrance still lingered on the covers. His arousal was instant.

  What was she doing tonight? Was she remembering?

  She had been magic, pure and simple. The minute he’d entered her he’d known he’d been lying to himself. He knew that what they shared was more than passion, more than their bodies, more than sex. It was love.

  He pressed his fingers into his aching temples. He had to get organized. He had to make plans for getting on with his life. He’d start Monday morning by going to the office early and catching up on some case work he’d let slide in the last few days. But there was something else he had to do.

  Somewhere in Tupelo was a man who had drunk beer from Maxie’s other gold shoe, a man who at this very moment possessed the shoe as if it were some prize in a gladiator’s tournament.

  Joe was going to get that shoe back.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  His search led him to a man called Bruiser McCain, who had his own garage and wrecker service. He stood six feet, five inches, and weighed enough to crush small cars with his bare hands. Joseph knew immediately that he had the wrong man, but how did you tell a man named Bruiser that you were wasting his time? And on a Sunday afternoon, at that?

  Bruiser squinted at Joseph from underneath the visor of a baseball cap that proclaimed “This is not road kill, it’s my face.”

  “What can I do for you, buster?”

  Joseph had never been called buster, not even when he was in third grade, but he wasn’t about to make a point of his name with this man.

  “I was taking a Sunday afternoon drive and thought I heard a knocking under my hood.”

  “You either did or you didn’t. Which is it?”

  “I definitely did.”

  Bruiser rubbed his beard stubble and gazed into the distance. “It being Sunday and all, and me just being here to sorta straighten things up, it’ll cost you.”

  “How much?”

  “That depends.”

  Joe wasn’t about to get into a long recital of why Bruiser was going to charge him an outrageous amount. He merely nodded, then pulled his Lincoln into the garage and watched while the top half of Bruiser disappeared under the hood.

  “Don’t see nothing out of the way under here,” he said. “ ‘Course that don’t always mean nothing.” His head emerged briefly. “What you doin’ in these parts, anyhow, a city feller like you, all slicked up?”

  “I’m looking for a man who might know something about a gold shoe.”

  “You planning on wearin’ it or what?”

  “No. I’m planning to buy it.”

  “It must be mighty important to you, this here gold shoe.”

  “You could say that.”

  Bruiser disappeared under the hood once more, made clicking noises with his tongue, then came out once more.

  “Could be I know somethin’ about that shoe.”

  “I would be most appreciative for any information you could give me.”

  “How appreciative?”

  Joseph held out a folded twenty. Bruiser scratched his belly, his beard, his head, then vanished under the hood.

  “Tell you what,” he said, his voice muffled by the cavernous interior of the Lincoln. “I’m gonna fix that knock for free.” He reached into his tool belt and pulled out a hammer. A couple of taps, and he came out smiling. “I don’t ‘spect you’ll have any more trouble out of that baby.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me yet, I ain’t through with you.” Bruiser slung a beefy arm around Joe’s shoulder, leaving a streak of grease on his sleeve. “I’m fixin’ to give you ‘bout a hunnerd dollars’ worth of advice. Fair enough?”

  “Fair enough.” Joe pulled out a hundred-dollar bill, and Bruiser grabbed it in his big paw.

  “On up the road apiece you’re gonna find a man with that gold shoe you’re so all-fired hot to get your hands on. Don’t let on there’s anything personal about the shoe, don’t even talk about it, just pull out a couple more of these babies, and tell him old Bruiser said you was to buy that shoe.”

  Joseph guessed that word had spread to Pontotoc that he
was interested in the shoe. Clearly, as the old adage said, they had seen him coming. Still, three hundred dollars was a small price to pay for winning back the trophy.

  As he pulled into the driveway of the small red brick house half a mile from Bruiser’s garage, he recognized the man coming out the door, the shoe already in his hand.

  “That will be the last time you’ll ever touch anything that belongs to Maxie,” Joseph said. Then he went to claim what was rightly his.

  o0o

  Maxie sat in the middle of her bed with three romance novels, a six-pack of chocolate bars with almonds, a bowl of buttered popcorn, and a chocolate milkshake. Ever since that fateful night at Joseph’s she had been consoling herself with junk food. If it weren’t for the forty-five minutes a day she spent on her exercise bike, she’d be as big as her house.

  Wallowing in self-pity, that’s what she was doing. She was going to indulge herself another two weeks, and then she was going to snap out of it, as her grandmother always used to say.

  She broke a chocolate bar in half, took a big bite, and turned to chapter twenty of From a Distance—Brett, doomed to love his brother’s wife, trying to find release in the arms of another woman.

  She reached for her box of tissues—Maxie, doomed to love Joseph, trying to find relief in paperback romance and chocolate.

  The telephone interrupted her binge.

  “Hello.” Her voice was muffled by the tissue.

  “Maxie?”

  Books, tissue, and chocolate bars flew every which way as Maxie leaped from the bed. She wasn’t about to be flat on her back when she talked to this man. It was far too dangerous.

  She cleared her throat, then stuffed the tissue into the pocket of her robe. “Yes, Joseph. It’s me.”

  Why was he calling? Why?

  “How are you, Maxie?”

  “Just fine.” That made her sound like some little old lady recovering from the flu. “Great! I’m absolutely great.”

  “What are you doing this evening?”

  Her bed looked as if it had been taken over by a flock of spinsters.

  “Clearing up some paperwork for the business,” she lied. “Tax season, you know.”

  “What are you wearing?”

  His voice was deep, seductive. Time spun backward, and she was lying in her bed, phone cradled against her ear, listening to the secret, erotic instructions of Joseph Patrick Beauregard.

  She felt herself go hot all over, then cold. For a crazy moment she thought her legs would buckle. She sank onto the edge of her bed, knuckles white as she gripped the phone.

  “I won’t be sucked back into that game.”

  “That was certainly not my intent. Let me rephrase the question: Are you still dressed?”

  Her pink terry cloth robe hung unbelted, and her purple baby doll pajamas had a tear in the hem where she’d caught it on the corner of a kitchen cabinet while she was making her chocolate milkshake.

  “Yes. I’m dressed.” She shucked her robe and the bottoms of her baby dolls, even as she spoke.

  “Good...”

  What did he mean? Good? Her purple baby doll top billowed around her like the petals of a flower as she studied her chipped toenail polish and pondered his motives.

  “Maxie? Are you still there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can I come over?”

  In one fell swoop she raked the books off the sheets and shoved them under the bed. Then she tossed the chocolate into the popcorn bowl and shoved it next to the books. Three minutes to dress, one to race to the kitchen and dump her milkshake, two to make the bed. How long was the drive from his house to hers? She was so agitated, she’d forgotten.

  “Why?” she asked, recovering her sanity.

  “I have something you want.”

  She had to bite her lower lip to keep from groaning. Did he ever have something she wanted. Her fingers closed over the pillow, and she hugged it to her chest. She pictured the two of them tangled in her small bed, Joe’s feet hanging over the end, her hands gripping the iron railings, sweat dripping off his brow and onto hers, the little bed rocking and swaying.

  But just how many good-byes could she stand?

  “You can come, but only for a few minutes.”

  “That’s time enough.”

  Paralyzed, Maxie stared at the dead receiver. Time enough for what?

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Her skirt was black and short, her sweater red and fuzzy, her earrings purple and dangly. She was barefoot, her hair in a ponytail tied with a purple ribbon. There was something that looked like gold dust caught up in her red toenail polish.

  Joseph couldn’t take his eyes off Maxie’s feet. They were tiny with delicate blue veins crisscrossing a very high instep. He wanted to kneel and kiss each blue vein. Then he wanted to suckle her toes.

  “That was quick,” she said, referring of course to his hell-bent-for-leather rush across town.

  “Do you always work at home barefoot?”

  She wiggled her toes, and he realized he was still standing in her doorway staring at her feet. Quickly he moved his gaze up to her face. Mistake. Her lips were rounded in a perfect O of surprise. He pictured them pressed against a telephone receiver, and worse, circled around him.

  “Sometimes.” She made a sweeping gesture around her room. “Won’t you sit down? I made hot tea.”

  She escaped to the kitchen. Was it because she couldn’t bear to look at him for the same reasons he couldn’t bear to look at her, or was it because she despised him?

  Joseph chose the sofa, hoping she would, too, hoping she would sit close enough for him to smell her fragrance, to feel her leg brushing against his. For a man bent on burying himself in his work, he was acting irrationally.

  “Fool. Just give her the shoe and leave,” he muttered.

  “Did you say something?” She appeared in the doorway with a tray.

  “I said this cool snap is giving us a reprieve.”

  She set the tray on the coffee table, then bent over to serve him. Her skirt hitched upward, and he wondered what she was wearing underneath.

  He took the cup from her, and watched as she went to the chair farthest from him, the purple one with the gold shoes. What was there to say?

  “You like gold shoes, don’t you?”

  “Yes. I like frivolous, gaudy, happy shoes.”

  Once, not too long ago, he had imagined her happy shoes lined up in his closet beside his own. Of course, that was before the bedroom fiasco.

  The tea was strong and hot, just the way he liked it. Out of the corner of his eye he watched Maxie sip hers. The way she wrapped her lips around the china cup was enticing. Every move she made enticed him.

  Loss ripped through him, and for the first time since Crash’s visit to his office he thought about what his brother had said. Suddenly his entire life seemed empty, and he envied his brother, envied his carefree spirit, his cocky self-confidence, his adoring wife, his fat, healthy child.

  Joseph felt like a toad. What woman in her right mind would want to kiss him and turn him into a prince?

  “The tea is good,” he said.

  “Thank you. My grandmother taught me how to make it. She said you could always tell a lady by the way she dressed and the way she made her tea. I got it only halfway right.”

  She sparkled when she laughed. Joseph had never noticed that about her.

  “I like the way you dress.” Maxie set her cup carefully on the table beside her chair and folded her hands in her lap, watching him. “You have an unconventional flair that’s very appealing, Maxie.”

  A lovely blush colored her cheeks, and she captured him with a single glance. Mesmerized, they stared at each other. If he walked across the room and took her hand, would she lead him into her bedroom? Would she take him on that wild, frenzied ride to the stars?

  His cup clattered against the tray as he set it down. Sweat trickled down the side of his face.

  “Why did you come, Joe?”

&n
bsp; Why, indeed? He wasn’t sure he knew the answer.

  “That’s a very straightforward question. Would your grandmother approve?”

  “Definitely not. But then she wouldn’t approve of a lot of the things I do. I’m like my granddaddy in that way. A maverick.”

  If he had Crash’s cocky self-assurance, he would walk across the room, lift her out of the chair, and press her against the wall. Then he’d lift that tiny skirt and bury himself in her sweet, slick folds.

  “That’s why I’m here,” he would say.

  If he were his brother.

  “I don’t like to leave unfinished business,” he said.

  “We have no unfinished business. Everything we started is over... except the christening party, and I can take care of that. All you have to do is show up and give your speech.”

  “This is not about the christening party.” He pulled her gold shoe from a suede pouch. “I’m returning this.”

  “I left that in the office. Where did you get it? Did Claude give it to you?”

  “This is the mate.”

  “How? Why?”

  “Pairs belong together. How is not important.”

  “I don’t believe this. You came all the way over here just to return my shoe.”

  “Not just return it.” A sudden inspiration seized Joe, and he stood up before he could rationalize and change his mind. “Stay right where you are.”

  She sucked in her breath when he knelt in front of her chair.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Playing Prince Charming to your Cinderella.” His grin was crooked. “I feel like a fool.”

  “Joe...” She leaned toward him, and for a moment he thought she was going to run her hands through his hair. But she pulled her hands back and sank deep into her chair. “You don’t look like a fool,” she whispered.

  His hand trembled as he lifted her foot to his knee. He couldn’t resist caressing her soft skin, tracing the tender blue veins with his fingertips.

  “Please,” she whispered.

  “Please, what?”

  “Stop before I do something we’ll both regret.” ‘