by Mae Nunn
“Oh, that’s perfect! Put it on.” Becky Jo was back with something made of stonewashed denim slung over one shoulder.
“It’s too small now.”
“Baloney! Will you stop whining about what’s wrong with you and start taking advantage of what’s right? For the first time in your life you have a chest that will stop traffic. Enjoy it.”
Jessica had to agree with her friend. During her years of food deprivation there’d never been much up top. This fullness was new to her, too.
She’d changed costumes in theater wings a thousand times. Bodies weren’t important then. Only talent seemed to matter. Now, self-conscious even with her dearest friend, she turned her back. Pulling the T-shirt over her head, she replaced it with the delicate lace garment that was hardly more than a camisole.
“As long as you’re being shy, stay there and put this on. I picked them up for you at a garage sale.”
Pale blue denim landed at Jessica’s feet. She stepped out of worn work shorts into stretch cotton overalls. After the straps were fastened, only a hint of yellow lace showed above the bib and beneath her arms.
The pants were a bit too short. Before she could object, Becky Jo sat on the floor, cross-legged, and rolled the cuffs fashionably to just below the knee.
“I’ve always secretly hated you for tanning so well in the summer,” she griped.
“Secretly?” Jessica laughed. “I’ve heard that from you every year since we were nine.”
“Okay, so it wasn’t a secret. Turn around and see how great these colors look on you, Jess.”
How long had it been since she’d really noticed the full-length cheval mirror? Gazing at her reflection, Jessica couldn’t disagree with the results.
“Wear your hair down for a change. Your blue sandals are perfect. I have some nail polish that will look fabulous! After dinner I’ll do your toenails, but you have to do mine, too. What are we having for dinner, anyway?”
Becky Jo was gone, the last words trailing down the stairs. End of discussion. The fashion crisis had passed.
Jessica had a date.
The doorbell chimed the next morning, followed by the usual excited barking and then an abnormal silence. Halfway down the stairs, Jessica noticed that Frasier calmly sat at attention, patiently waiting for whoever was beyond the door.
She took her time. No need to appear anxious. As she reached the foyer, two more rapid chimes caused her to jump.
“All right! I heard you the first time!” She yanked open the door.
The surprise in Drew’s eyes turned the sugary breath mint in her mouth to a sour ball.
He just stood there staring at her.
“What?”
“Excuse me, miss. I’m looking for my neighbor. A lady about your height, stained clothes, ponytail, no makeup. Have you seen her around here anywhere?”
“Very funny.” Stepping aside, she inclined her head as an invitation to enter.
Before crossing the threshold, he squatted to a catcher’s position and offered the patient Frasier a peanut candy. The dog carried the treat behind the couch, where he munched it loudly.
“How’d you get him to sit still like that?”
“I gave him a command through the door. He’s obviously been trained.” He paused, eyes challenging. “He’s just not sure who’s in charge.”
She glared right back. “We’ll have to work on that.”
Assuming they’d take his big truck, Jessica was pleasantly surprised when he proudly escorted her to his car. When she reached for the handle, he hurried to open her door. She slid into the seat, her cane across her lap.
Knowing next to nothing about racing, even she recognized the importance of cables that locked the hood in place and a fire extinguisher mounted in the back. He knelt and showed her how to secure the elaborate harness.
“Are you going to drive it or fly it?” she asked nervously.
“That’s really up to you.” His mustache twitched above a small smile.
The old engine roared even louder from inside the car. Wind whipped hair into her face, making conversation almost impossible. She said little, pointing directions and gesturing at mile markers along the way. They rode in silence, if you could call it that, for the first ten miles.
At her loud instruction, he took the Tara Boulevard exit and downshifted as they fed into the slower traffic. The car seemed to struggle physically against being restrained. Jessica regarded Drew to see if she imagined the sensation.
“You feel it, don’t you?” He seemed pleased.
“Yes! Rambo wants back on the interstate.”
They both laughed at the not-so-private joke.
“Tell me about yourself, Jessica.”
“Why should I?” she teased.
“My family still lives in the same house where I grew up, so I’ve known our neighbors all my life,” he began. “I’d like to know the residents at Sacred Arms, too. This seems like a good time to get started. Do you mind?”
“No, it’s just been a while since anybody was interested in my life story. Where would you like me to start?”
“How about telling me how you got into gardening?”
She smiled at the memory.
“I think I was genetically predisposed to grow things. Mom always had a vegetable garden because money was so tight. It was just the two of us, so I helped out a lot. We planted flowers in the same beds with the vegetables to help keep the bugs away. I guess I picked up her love for it.”
“So you always wanted to do landscaping?”
“Not exactly. We decided it was a good backup to my dance career. As it turned out, it was a smart decision.”
“Dance career?” he asked.
“Didn’t Valentine tell you?” Jessica was amazed her cagey friend had left some mystery for him to discover on his own.
“Ms. Chandler has more inside information than CNN, but she never mentioned anything about you and dancing. I’d remember.”
The last was said so sincerely that Jessica was encouraged to reminisce.
“For the past four years I was with the Atlanta Dance Theater.”
“Are you serious?” He glanced away from the road to read her expression.
“I know it’s kind of hard to believe, looking at me now.” And because he was, she casually drew her feet closer to the seat and balanced on her toes. Thinking her thighs looked a little thinner, she met his eyes and continued. “That was six months and about sixty pounds ago, before the car accident that tore up my knee.”
Considerately he ignored the reference to her weight. “I wondered about your injury. I went through some serious recovery myself a while back. I know how devastating it can be to your life.”
“What kind of recovery?” She stared at him. He was the picture of robust health. This man couldn’t possibly know how it felt to be broken, in body or spirit.
“Not so fast. We were talking about you. I want to hear more about this dance career.”
“You really want to know?”
“I really want to know.”
So she told him.
Drew smiled warmly at the image she spun of the little girl who loved to dance. Her voice held unmistakable pride when she told him about the college production of Cats that won her an audition with a cruise line’s entertainment director.
“How long did that last?”
“Almost two years. It was great fun and there was a lot of creative freedom. But after a while the repetitiveness of the cruise routine got old. I wanted the challenge of a professional company and the chance to sink roots somewhere for a while.”
She pointed to a rural route sign as she spoke and Drew made the sharp turn onto a small shaded road. There was no traffic, so he let the machine roar back to life for a couple of minutes.
She watched the muscles work in his right arm as he shifted smoothly through the five gears. Pretending to admire the restoration of the polished chrome console, she allowed herself to appreciate the contrast of
his tanned arm against a navy polo shirt. She noted the fine layer of smooth dark hair that ended at his wrist and then reappeared lightly atop his fingers. His neatly trimmed nails were immaculate.
“So how’d you end up in Atlanta?”
The question startled her almost as much as the stirring she began to feel at admiring his very masculine arm.
“What?” She caught him grinning at her.
“I said how did you end up in Atlanta?”
“A-A-Atlanta?” She stammered the word, busted over a biceps. “Well, I wanted to stay in the South to be near my mom.”
“Sounds like you two are very close.”
“My father, who’s ex-military by the way, left us when I was nine. He never helped with the bills or showed up when he said he would. Family life just wasn’t his thing, and the more he let me down, the more my mom stepped up. So yeah, we’re very close.”
“Please don’t blame your father’s behavior on the military. There are men who have trouble settling down afterward, but we’re not all like that.”
“That’s what everybody tries to tell me.”
Drew motioned for her to continue.
“Anyway,” she went on, “I started flying to auditions every time we docked for maintenance in Miami. When the ADT offered me a contract, I jumped at it.”
“What about New York? Broadway? I thought that was every dancer’s dream.”
“Maybe for some. But living there never appealed to me. I love visiting, but after a few days I’m ready to get out of that sea of people. Besides, I’m a Southern girl through and through. Mild winters and friendly strangers, you know?”
“I sure do. I’ve seen some of the biggest cities in the world, but none were places I wanted to call home. I’m thankful the good Lord gave me this opportunity to move back to Georgia.”
“You lived here before? I thought you and your family had always been in Virginia. After all, your dad is the Marcus Keegan, right?” She was almost reluctant to mention the famous name, since Drew hadn’t so far.
“The one and only,” he said with admiration. “I grew up in Great Falls, and my sister, Faith, still lives there with my dad.”
“So when were you in Georgia?”
“I was stationed at Fort Benning during Ranger school. After nine of the toughest weeks of my life, I spent some R and R at a buddy’s home in Blue Ridge. It was a beautiful drive up from the base into the mountains. Another time I traveled a few hours into Florida and discovered one of the cleanest beaches in the world. That’s when I decided that if the choice of settling down ever became mine, Georgia would be high on the list of favorite spots.”
“What do you mean, if the choice were yours?” She studied the rugged profile accented by the trim mustache. She willed her hand not to reach across to touch the perfectly trimmed line of dark whiskers.
“I’ve been committed to a military career for as long as I can remember. When I made that commitment, I agreed to go wherever they sent me for as long as I was needed, no questions asked.”
She struggled to imagine devotion of that magnitude. Certainly something her father hadn’t possessed. Dance required discipline and dedication, but those things were born out of love for the art. It couldn’t compare to what he’d been through.
“Did you always know you wanted to be a soldier?”
“I never got the chance to know what I wanted.” He laughed to himself, but there was little humor in his voice when he spoke. “I always knew what my country and my father wanted. And now I know what God wants of me, so I’m focused on that.”
“And what about what you want?”
Drew’s somber eyes met Jessica’s. “What I want has never been at the top of the list,” he confessed. “As a soldier, God, country and family were my priorities. I think that’s true for most servicemen. But it took me a long time to learn the value of truly putting God first on that list.”
“Maybe those things were important to you, but never to my father,” she scoffed.
Drew must have sensed her discomfort over the subject. When they both spied the marquee of the local ice-cream shop, he raised his eyebrows and inclined his head in invitation. A brief detour might be a nice way to break this serious spell. Pulling into the gravel parking lot, he asked, “Do you mind if we stop for a dipped cone? My treat.”
“Captain Keegan, you are a man after my own heart.”
Chapter Five
The temptation of sizzling burgers and crisp Vidalia onion rings beckoned Jessica from the drive-through window.
“You ready for some lunch?” Drew reached for his wallet.
“It’s still a little early and I had a big breakfast,” she lied, her sense of smell miserably tantalized. She’d love to indulge, but had promised herself a healthy diet for once. “But I will take that dipped cone you offered.” Calcium would be good for a mending knee, she rationalized.
Two of the chocolate-coated temptations were passed through the window along with a stack of napkins. He handed her both cones and steered to a deserted spot on the far side of the parking lot. A carload of teenage boys pulled alongside his car almost immediately.
“Hey, mister, mind if we take a look under the hood?” Three young men climbed out of a parent’s sensible sedan and headed their way.
Drew’s door was already open, one clean sneaker crunching the gravel. “I’ll just be a minute,” he called.
“Are you serious? What about your ice cream?” she shouted through the window.
He reached down to release the hood. “Hold it for me, please. This won’t take long.”
At least, that’s what she thought he said. The four heads were already buried behind the raised hood, a wall of brilliant blue and wide white stripes blocking her view. She heard a young male voice crack as he exclaimed over whatever they found so fascinating.
Dribbling ice cream, creeping down her fingers, demanded her full attention. A warm breeze stirred the air inside the car, hastening the melting process. With nowhere to set one cone while she cleaned up, the only option was to eat. And eat fast! Jessica alternately worked the edges of both cones. There was no time to worry about sanitary issues.
Twisting and twirling, she lapped up the melting ice cream that oozed beneath the thin crust of chocolate. Unable to resist, she bit the swirled tip from one of the glistening crowns and sucked a fragment into her mouth. Bad move. The fragile shell began to break apart and threatened to drop into her lap. The lap that was, for once, clean.
With a cry of dismay she struggled to consume the avalanche of chocolate. A muscular arm shot through the window to relieve her of the second cone, freeing her hand for damage control.
Youths abruptly dismissed, Drew once again sat next to her, evidently amazed by her ability to attract stains to her clothing. She continued to struggle with her disintegrating dessert as tiny bits of chocolate fell and melted on her secondhand denim overalls. If it hadn’t been so absurd, she’d have cried over the picture she surely made.
So much for her “date.”
Quickly depositing his own mutilated treat into a handy disposal bag in the back seat, Drew grabbed a handful of napkins and turned to assist.
“Here, let me,” he offered.
She sat like a helpless child, both hands a sticky mess, as he worked his way from her elbows to her chin. The immediate catastrophe under control, he slowed his pace. Their eyes met. Without hesitation, both burst into wide smiles that quickly became uncontrollable laughter.
Since she didn’t dare touch her own face with gooey hands, tears of mirth streamed unchecked down her cheeks.
Unexpectedly he gently dabbed at them with a fresh napkin.
Jessica sobered. Her smile faded. She couldn’t recall ever being touched by a man with such kind intent.
Drew quieted, too. His smile relaxed, but his eyes remained intense.
She felt the need to say something. “You didn’t get any ice cream.”
“It’s not too late,” he said
softly as he bent his head toward hers, stopping just before their lips met.
She held her breath. He was so close. Her eyelids drooped in anticipation of what would surely be a kiss. She was afraid to breathe. Afraid to move. Afraid to open her eyes again for fear she’d been mistaken.
Then there was the smallest tickling sensation at the corner of her mouth. She remained still, transfixed, barely exhaling. Hot breath mingled with her own as he tasted the dried sugar on her lips. Not touching anywhere but their mouths, the two melted into one another.
“Hey, Drew, thanks a lot,” the young driver of the sedan shouted. “We’ll check your Web site.”
The kiss interrupted, Drew waved away the boys without glancing their way. Her heart danced against her ribs as his chestnut gaze wandered over her face.
“I think there’s only one way to finish what I’ve started,” he said as he reached into his back pocket and fished out a small foil packet.
Jessica’s eyes widened in shock, horrified that this man would arrogantly misread an innocent kiss!
She prepared to give him the sticky slap of his life when he turned and offered it to her.
“Wet nap?” he asked innocently.
“What?” She couldn’t have heard him correctly.
“Do you want a wet nap to clean your hands? I always carry one with me,” he offered.
“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me,” she snapped.
Metro Muscle sat on four acres of land in Jonesboro, not too far from where Margaret Mitchell had imagined Tara, the fabled home of Scarlett O’Hara. Whether a client’s collectible was a classic sixties pony car or a brand-new model, Metro carried the reputation as the only place for connoisseur repair.
Drew pulled through the security gate and parked up front. Jessica had hardly spoken a word since she’d snatched the towelette from his hand and used it to scrub her hands and face clean. She’d made such a production of using it around her mouth that he was beginning to think she’d wanted to clean away his kiss.
Before he could open her door, she’d unfastened the harness and struggled to her feet. Even relying on her cane, she almost beat him to the front entrance.
