Mistletoe Bay

by Marcia Evanick

  Dorothy could have been lying somewhere seriously hurt. When their grandmother told them to do something, the boys had to listen. There were to be no if, ands, or buts about it. Tucker and Corey’s punishment had been swift and severe, to their way of thinking.

  They were both sitting on the couch with nothing to occupy their little minds but books. No television, no toys, and no talking for the rest of the night. And absolutely no dessert or leftover Halloween candy.

  She wished someone would hand out that punishment to her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d read a book or had a quiet moment to herself. Mopping up two inches of water from the basement floor didn’t count as peace and quiet. She was too worried that water had worked its way to the oil burner and had damaged some part or another. Underneath the hulking beast had been dried, but she still didn’t trust it. Excessive moisture in the air would probably send the burner into temperamental fits—fits that contained a lot of zeros in the repair bill.

  She couldn’t afford to replace the ancient hunk of iron, and winter hadn’t even arrived yet. The real estate agent had assured her that if she babied it, she could get a couple more years out of the burner. Vince Carter, the first handyman she’d hired, had taken one look at it, laughed, and claimed the burner was older than he was. Vince was seventy-eight, so she didn’t take that as a good sign.

  Thankfully, Coop Armstrong had come along and rescued her mother-in-law. Even though Dorothy claimed he took his sweet time finding the shutoff valve. Being stuck on top of the washer with both hands wrapped around the split hose had distorted Dorothy’s sense of time. Five minutes to Dorothy had seemed like two hours under the water torture.

  Jenni wrung out the mop for what had to be the thousandth time and was pleased to see most of the floor, although damp, contained no puddles. By the time dinner was ready she just might be done.

  Dorothy had been simmering those meatballs in her homemade sauce all day long. The aroma was driving her nuts. Nothing beat her mother-in-law’s spaghetti dinner, except possibly a trip to Italy. Since she’d never been to Italy, she had her doubts on that one.

  Above her head she heard the boys jump off the couch and run to the front door. Sam must be here for Felicity and a free meal. He usually stopped by at night even though Dorothy wasn’t too keen on the idea of them going out on school nights. Most nights they hung around the house cranking the boys up, watching television, and emptying the refrigerator or cookie jar.

  Sam seemed to take perverse pleasure in egging Tucker on—like her middle son needed more encouragement to find trouble. Tucker was like Velcro when it came to trouble.

  A moment later their footsteps ran for the kitchen, and the basement door was yanked opened with enough force to put the life expectancy of the hinges into question. “Mom!” shouted Tucker. “Mr. Brown is here!”

  “I hear you, Tucker. You don’t have to shout that loud.” The late-season tourists over in Bar Harbor probably had heard him. What in the world was Coop doing here now? He’d taken all the packages with him a couple of hours ago, along with a pair of very wet shoes and damp pants. He was probably here to sue her. She had no idea if her homeowner’s insurance covered pneumonia in the UPS delivery man.

  She glanced down at her stylish boots and tried not to cringe. Dorothy’s spring boots were bright green with hot-pink flowers and were two sizes too big for Jenni. Since her snow boots weren’t exactly made for wading, she’d had to borrow Dorothy’s plastic gardening boots. Her worn, stained jeans were tucked into the boots and a baggy sweatshirt hung to midthigh. It was the perfect outfit to wear when one was mopping up a basement. She was pretty sure Cinderella had worn a similar outfit to sweep out the fireplace.

  “You guys had better listen to your grandmother and get back on the couch before your mom catches you off it.” Coop’s deep voice held a note of amusement.

  He had a right to be entertained; Coop had witnessed her very unmotherly frustration at the boys earlier. Banshees were not known to scream that loud. Maybe he wasn’t here to sue her after all. Maybe he was bringing the head of social services to see the abuse for himself.

  Coop started down the basement steps. “How safe is it down there?”

  “You won’t drown, but there’s a school of trout underneath the oil burner.” She watched as brown construction boots, worn jeans, and then a shiny red toolbox came into her line of sight.

  The toolbox made her heart flutter.

  The rest of Coop followed the toolbox. “Are they big enough to catch, or do we have to throw them back in?”

  “They might feed Dumb and Dumber, but not the rest of this family.” Now that the mopping was done, she could see a small sliver of humor in the situation. Now if her feet would defrost somewhat, she might even manage to crack a smile.

  Coop glanced at her feet. “Nice boots.”

  “I have the coat and umbrella to match.”

  Coop looked at her as if he wasn’t sure whether to believe her. “I see you have most of the water cleaned up.” Coop glanced around the basement with approval. “Good thing you’re not one of those people who cram everything into their basement. A lot of it would have been ruined.”

  “Nope, I cram it all in the attic storage room.” She shuddered at the idea of the upcoming holiday season and all those boxes of decorations up there gathering dust. Not only were her decorations up there, but so were Dorothy’s. “I’ll be in trouble if the roof leaks.”

  “It doesn’t?” Coop looked amazed.

  “So far it’s the only thing that doesn’t need to be repaired or replaced.” She quickly tapped the wooden table they used to fold the laundry. “Knock on wood.”

  Coop chuckled. “That reminds me”—he reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a slip of paper—“I have the name and number of two local guys that might be interested in doing some of that construction work for you.”

  “Are you serious?” She yanked the paper from his fingers. There on the crinkled white paper were two neatly printed names and phone numbers. Before she could think, she opened her mouth and teased, “I could kiss you.”

  A fiery blush swept up her cheeks as Coop raised a brow at that suggestion. “I didn’t mean that the way it came out.” The poor guy probably thought she was hitting on him. “I just wanted to say thank you. I really appreciate it.”

  She didn’t want him running from the house in fear for his life. The way her luck with handymen was going, she’d be needing more names and numbers by Christmas.

  “You’re welcome.” Coop put his toolbox down on the wooden table and opened it. “I picked up a new washer hose for you on the way home from work.” He pulled a length of black hose from the box. “I can have it on in just a couple of minutes.”

  “You don’t have to do that.” She was thrilled to death; he was standing there with a new length of hose in one hand and a wrench in the other. A flush of genuine pleasure swept up her body. “I put a call in to a plumber in Ellsworth.”

  “Coastal?” Coop started to take off the old busted hose, barely paying her any attention.

  “How did you know?” So much for that stupid kiss remark. He had barely given it a thought, while she was getting turned on by a shiny toolboxes and a Craftsman wrench. She was either pathetic or seriously disturbed.

  “Ellsworth only has two plumbers: Coastal and Harvey Jenkins. Harvey doesn’t own an answering machine. He’s either there, or he’s not.” Coop handed her the old, brittle hose. “Coastal would take a good week to ten days to get out here for a busted washer hose.”

  Jenni could see why Dorothy had such a hard time holding the thing together. There was a ten-inch split down the length of the hose. She now understood why there had been so much water. “Oh.” There was no way they could have waited that long to do laundry. With everything on her schedule, she couldn’t imagine sitting in a laundromat for hours with three boys—especially Tucker. She’d rather have her eyelashes plucked out by chickens.

  She w
atched as Coop expertly attached the new hose. Problem was, her gaze wasn’t on the hose, or what he was doing with his hands. She was intrigued by the way his shirt stretched across his broad shoulders and the way his jeans outlined the tight curve of his rear.

  The man was perfection in a pair of Wolverine boots, and she had been living out here in the woods a mite too long. One would think she didn’t know what a man looked like.

  “There,” said Coop as he gave the hose one last tightening. “That should hold you for a while. You really should have replaced the hose when you moved in.” He packed up his tools and snapped the box shut.

  “No one told me that.” There was a lot of stuff in life no one had bothered to inform her about, like which side of the battery jumper cables get attached to, or that dogs can heave up twice their body weight after drinking motor oil, and that little boys held peeing competitions out in the woods by seeing who could knock off the most ants from a tree’s bark.

  “I slipped one of the moving guys a twenty just to get the washer and dryer up and running.”

  “He should have told you.”

  “He was eighteen, at the most. He probably didn’t know.” She remembered coming home from the hospital with a two-day-old baby and being scared to death. Although the nurses had loaded her down with free formula, diapers, and more samples and coupons than she could use in three lifetimes, no one had handed her an instruction booklet on how to raise and take care of Chase. At least she’d had Ken to struggle along with her, and Dorothy had been a phone call away.

  When Ken passed away she’d gotten plenty of condolences and cards, but still no instruction booklet on how to be the “man” of the house.

  When she started her own business, tons of brochures, pamphlets, and Web sites were dedicated to helping her get her business up and running. The other night she had spent a sleepless night worrying about the stupidest thing: her sons’ private parts. If she had daughters, she would know what to tell them and would know the answers to all their questions. With boys she was clueless. She was an only child, and Ken had been her first and only lover. Was there something she was supposed to explain to the boys when they reached puberty? Before puberty?

  She couldn’t very well search for the information on the Internet. With her luck she would be caught in some child pornography ring and arrested. She’d spent a good hour of her time ordering a couple books from Amazon.com on raising boys, praying they would have a chapter or two on that particular area. If they didn’t, she would have to muster up enough courage to ask their new family doctor, Dr. Sydney.

  Books were a godsend. When her old college roommate had learned she was moving to the wilds of Maine and into a rundown old house, she had sent her a box containing six rolls of duct tape and a book about a thousand uses for the sticky silver tape. Although the book was meant to be humorous, the duct tape had proved invaluable. It had been the most useful gift she had ever received. Half of her house was being held together by the wonder tape.

  “Hey, you two,” yelled Dorothy from the top of the steps, “dinner’s ready, and, Coop, you’re staying.” Dorothy’s tone didn’t leave room for any argument.

  “I am?” Coop looked amused.

  Dorothy came down a couple of steps and looked at the man who probably had saved her from drowning earlier in the afternoon. “Yes, you are. We’re having spaghetti and meatballs.”

  Jenni softly chuckled and whispered, “They actually taste even better than they smell.” Since the house was filled with the heavenly aroma of simmering sauce, that was saying something.

  “I’d be delighted to join you and your family, Dorothy. It smells too good to resist.”

  “Then get your buns up here. You too, Jenni.” Dorothy turned around to march back up the steps. “Don’t forget to wash up.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Coop and his shiny red toolbox followed Dorothy up the stairs.

  So much for her scrubwoman’s sex appeal. Coop was following his stomach straight to Dorothy’s meatballs and hadn’t so much as given her a second glance. Considering what Jenni looked like, she didn’t blame him one bit.

  What really fried her keister was why she even cared what Coop felt toward her. She wasn’t interested in a personal relationship with the Good Samaritan or any other man. As far as she was concerned, Christmas had come early this year, and Santa had a new name: Cooper Armstrong.

  Coop enthusiastically helped himself to a second serving. “Dorothy, I must admit these are the best meatballs I have ever tasted.” He wasn’t paying a false compliment; they were. “You have to have Italian blood in you somewhere.”

  “Not a drop.” Dorothy flushed with pleasure.

  “Where’s the blood?” Tucker looked at his grandmother. “I don’t see any blood.”

  Corey looked under the table. “What blood? Where? Who’s bleeding?”

  Felicity rolled her eyes. “Jenni, tell them to stop talking about blood at the dinner table. It’s gross, and I’m trying to eat.”

  “Boys, there is no blood. It’s just a saying.” Jenni frowned at Chase’s nearly full plate. “Aren’t you hungry, hon?”

  “Yeah,” Chase wound some spaghetti around his fork, but anyone could see his heart wasn’t in it.

  Coop didn’t see what Felicity was complaining about. The girl had barely touched her dinner. The teenager was too busy making eyes at her boyfriend, Sam. Ah, young love.

  He turned his attention to Chase. The six-year-old wasn’t quite acting like himself. Maybe the kid was coming down with something. “Hey, buddy, you feeling okay?” Chase was definitely the quiet one, but he usually managed to ask about a thousand questions.

  “Yeah.” Chase gave a half-hearted smile and shoved half a meatball into his mouth.

  Coop refused to look at the boy’s mother. Jennifer Wright was trouble with a capital T. So why hadn’t he realized that particular fact before joining her in the basement and almost kissing her? As it was, he had nearly beaten Dorothy to the top of the steps as he raced to get out of there.

  He didn’t kiss single mothers, especially if they had three boys. No way. No how.

  The look of pure dismay that had been on Jenni’s face earlier as she had raced down the steps only to find a soaking-wet Dorothy sitting on top of the washer, and him surveying the damage, was enough to tug at his conscience for the rest of his afternoon run. Since the only thing he had waiting for him back at his apartment was a mediocre book and leftovers his mother had given him from Sunday dinner, he had decided to stop at the hardware store in Sullivan on his way home. The new hose had set him back a whole nine dollars.

  It had been worth every penny just to see the look on Jenni’s face when he had first shown up carrying that piece of hose. The one thing his apartment didn’t have was a washer and dryer. He hated going to Sullivan’s one and only laundromat. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like sitting there doing laundry for six people, instead of just himself. He would rather take ballet lessons.

  Usually he would show up a couple hours early for his mother’s Sunday dinner, and while his clothes turned and spinned, he would do a couple chores around the place that his father no longer could do. It seemed like a reasonable trade-off, one his father didn’t fight too hard against.

  His father, Fred Armstrong, at one time had been the most stubborn man alive. Now it seemed his mother held that honor. Fred had suffered a heart attack eight months ago, and it had given everyone, especially his mother, a real scare. Lucille Armstrong had immediately put her husband on a low-fat, low-carb, low-calorie, low-everything diet. As his father so eloquently put it, if it smelled like a horse’s behind, tasted like crabgrass, and had the consistency of a shoebox, he was now allowed to eat it.

  Sunday-night dinners at his parents tasted nothing like they used to.

  Dorothy’s dinner invitation was a godsend. If he hadn’t been fighting his sudden attraction to a certain dark-haired, mop-wielding witchy woman, he might have thought twice about accepting the
invite. He didn’t want to give Jenni or any other member of the Wright family the wrong impression.

  He had already made the decision that he was not interested in Jenni.

  The blasted woman was making his decision hard to keep. How she looked cute and adorable while cleaning up the basement in her ridiculous boots and baggy, ratty sweatshirt was beyond him. But as soon as she made that ridiculously innocent comment about kissing him, his mind had shut down and his hormones had gone into overdrive. Jenni had meant nothing by that remark, besides being extremely thankful that he had given her the names of two handymen.

  So why in the hell couldn’t he stop looking at her lips?

  “Hey, Coop,” Sam said. “Coach told the team that you would be stopping by Thursday after practice to talk to us.”

  “That’s right.” It wasn’t something he was looking forward to doing, but it was a talk that needed to be had. The sad truth was, he was the perfect guy to give that particular speech. He had done it half a dozen times or so out in California. He just had never had the opportunity to give it at his old high school. He wasn’t looking forward to Thursday.

  “Are you going to give us some pointers?” Sam was sitting next to Felicity, but he obviously wasn’t paying her enough attention. Felicity was pouting.

  “What’s pointers?” asked Tucker. The boy pointed at Sam, and then at his brother Chase.

  Coop tried not to laugh. The boy obviously didn’t get the connection.

  “Not pointing, Tucker—pointers. Pointers are helpful hints.” Jenni teasingly pointed back at Tucker.

  “Like when we play hide-and-seek and someone says ‘You’re getting warmer, or colder.’”

  “Something like that.” Jenni smiled. “But in this case Coop will be giving the football team helpful hints about playing the game.”

  Tucker looked at him. “Why can’t you give me pointers?”