“I’m not starting. I’m just being nice.”
“Will you stop being so damn nice?”
“What are my other choices?’
“God, I don’t know.”
“Okay, I’ll sing.”
“You wouldn’t, would you?”
Sam proceeded to sing “Bicycle Built for Two” very loudly in his deep baritone voice.
“You are the Corn King. King Corn.” Kelly laughed until she thought she would pee, then she joined in.
They reached a small pond with benches and tables scattered around the edges. The moon gave everything a soft look. Sam zeroed in on one bench and as soon as she got close enough, pulled her into his lap. It was cold, and Kelly snuggled close. Because of the cold. Yes, that’s it, the cold, she told herself.
“So. Do we talk about this thing?” Sam asked.
“Let’s just not. Let’s watch the lake and bask in the glow of the Presbyterians’ harvest moon.”
She leaned close and her fragrance drifted into him. For someone who was cold, she felt like a wildfire against him. She leaned her head back and relaxed. He could feel her body in his arms, all warm and inviting.
“There’s only one problem with this idea,” he said softly in her ear.
“What, you feel compelled to verbally dissect something?”
“No, that’s not it.”
“What, then?” Kelly was getting slightly annoyed. She squirmed out of his grasp and twisted around to look in his face.
“I seem to be unable to resist kissing you.”
“Well, damn you, Grayson, just do it.”
Sam did. He pulled her to him and kissed her hard, right on the lips first off. A smoldering, knock-your-good-sense-to-the-wall kiss that made her forget any hint of chill she’d felt before. He ran his fingers gently over her temple, across her cheek, and down her neck. Then his mouth followed every inch of the fingertip trail. Kelly slowly melted into his arms.
When his mouth moved back up and found hers full on, she knew she was in trouble. It was like someone had turned the heat up on the back burner way high. His kiss burned into her and made her ache—her breasts ached to be the next victim of that mouth of his, and so did the rest of her.
He kissed like a sensuous, hypnotic magician. Her pulse had reached her temples, and she could feel her body come alive in every hungry spot she had. The ache became intense. He kissed light, then deep, in a lingering way. Kelly made a tiny sound, a taste-of-heaven sound.
She touched his face, then looked into his dark blue eyes. The moon was reflected there. Kelly kissed him with all the emotion the night had given her. He responded to her with a tender, strong passion Kelly had never experienced before.
Kelly let the blanket drop as his mouth moved down her neck, kissed her shoulders, exploring the curve of her collarbone. His kisses drove her wilder than anything she’d ever experienced before.
She wanted him to take her right there in Paradise Park. She pushed him back against the bench and straddled his lap. Her arms wove around him. He took a gasping breath as she tilted her head and kissed him.
She felt the heat from his body; felt him throbbing through his jeans. His hand brushed lightly against her breasts, just across her nipples. She arched her back and made some animal noise she had never heard herself make before.
He slowly untied the string of her blouse and let it fall off her shoulders. The strapless pushed out of the way, he leaned down and took her breast, his tongue like magic, like stars inside her. The stars were all around her then. She pressed herself against him and felt the heat shoot through her. She shuddered and cried out his name, aching with the desire he had released, letting herself throb against his hardness.
The distant headlights of a car passed over them for a second, bringing Kelly out of her dream.
“Wait a minute, wait a minute. Oh my God!” She squealed, sitting up suddenly. She climbed off of him, dizzy and hot and…still throbbing.
“It is a damn good thing there are no street-lights here. What are we, nuts? We have known each other like, what, one week? And we’re in the middle of a public park getting crazy?”
She tried for serious but felt too giddy to carry it off. She was necking in the park, for pity’s sake. She started laughing, and he laughed along with her. She flopped back down on the bench, pulling the blanket over her again.
Sam gathered her back into his arms and turned her toward him. “You have a point there, but hey, we still have our clothes on,” he pulled up her blouse and retied its little drawstring, a pretty sexy act in itself. “Almost on anyway.”
“Obviously we are sexually attracted to each other.” Kelly tried to sound serious, but Sam kept grinning.
“Obviously.”
“You must think…” She pulled the blanket closer around her.
“I think you are a fantastic, sexy woman with normal needs. I’m glad you feel free with me.” Sam toyed with her disheveled hair. “So how long can we decently go without…you think? I’m just assuming we’re on the same page here?”
“Yep, same page.” She pulled him into a kiss. Same page, all right. She wanted him bad.
Then she shoved him away. She’d better get herself together. Where would a night of hot sex with the town’s favorite guy get her? Maybe tarred and feathered if they all thought she’d used him and thrown him away, because the chances of Sam’s going forward into an actual relationship with her were extremely slim. She’d better do something about that right now.
“Five dates, I think. That would be a reasonably proper amount of time, wouldn’t it? Now that the initial edge is off,” Kelly offered, backing away from his tempting kiss an inch at a time on the bench. Brr, her end of the seat was cold.
“Whose edge is off?” He pulled her back, his mouth hot on her mouth, his tongue dancing with hers, until she agreed. The edge was definitely still there.
“Five dates. We have to do this right, because…”
“Because…” Sam said.
She kissed him back, mercilessly, then continued.
“Five dates, because we both live in this town now, and just because we’re both starved for sex doesn’t mean we should necessarily indulge ourselves. We should take some time to get to know each other, and we should get me a divorce.”
“We’ll look into that Monday. What are you doing for the next five days?” He asked.
“Very clever. I should say four weeks, then, because there’s a chance I’ll be completely free of…former stuff by then.”
“So, what you are looking for is an old-fashioned courtship ritual?” Sam asked.
“Yes, I think that’s it. Something befitting Paradise. Something in keeping with my delusions of small-town life. Are you up for that?”
“Oh, I’m up for it, all right. Four weeks it is, then,” Sam agreed, and she sealed it with another kiss.
“I’ll pick you up tomorrow morning,” he mumbled into her mouth.
Kelly sat at her Hawaiian dressing table wrapped in a towel. She pictured herself going wild with Sam in the middle of Paradise Park and slapped her hand against her forehead.
What in the hell was she doing? She was still a married woman, for pity’s sake. Of course, she’d given him a pretty good argument on that point. Three hours does not a marriage make. Its legality was a technicality she needed to repair.
Kelly thought about Raymond. One make-out session with Sexy Sam was hotter than her and Ray’s entire two-year sex life. She’d thought that a few times on the ride home, but felt guilty and had put it aside. It was true, though. She realized her reasons for marrying Raymond had very little to do with passion and more to do with the stability she thought he gave her.
She was too tired to sort it all out tonight. Kelly brushed her hair with the brush from a pretty set Myrtle had dug up for her. It looked like old ivory but was really Bakelite. Smooth edges. It made her feel elegant.
She slipped her silkiest nightgown over her head and slid between the
cool sheets. Kelly sank into the wonderful sensations of remembering Sam’s touches. How hungry she was for loving touches.
Her head was filled with Sam Grayson, and she drifted into dreams of waltzing with Sam. Waltzing naked.
Sam sat outside Myrtle’s in his Chevy for a very long time, his arms folded against the steering wheel, his head leaning on them. What the hell was he doing? He’d had it all worked out in his head to just leave things with Kelly, enjoy her company, then move on. Then his more basic instincts got in the way.
He saw how the Paradise ladies had worked hard to get them together tonight. I mean who sings “I’m in the Mood for Love” at a church social? So the town thought she was his match. So he’d have to tell every single one of them they were wrong. They didn’t know what he knew about her.
Sure, she was soft and smooth and wild, and it made his blood boil just thinking about the string on her blouse. So what? Damn, he was one confused man, and that was highly compounded by the fact he’d never had any woman turn him on like that before. The way she threw herself over him and let him take her all the way to throbbing all over him was just too damn sexy even to think about right now.
On the other hand, she didn’t seem to scare off tonight. If she were on the edge of running, she wouldn’t have agreed to a month of dating. Would she? Was she actually looking for a home? Sam’s head told him she was an incredible flight risk. She was hiding out, not settling down.
But he did sense her strong desire to create some artificially perfect place. Paradise had that effect on lots of people. Maybe on him as well.
Sam whacked his head against his folded arms. She’d really put a wrench in his plans. He knew it wasn’t macho, but he had a powerful longing to march down the aisle in a tuxedo, to carry his bride over the threshold, and to have a couple of kids climb all over him when he got home. He wanted to show up at a family Thanksgiving with a wife. His parents would love that.
And how would his parents feel about Kelly at the holiday table? Hi, Mom and Dad, here’s my recently divorced, car-thief, tattooed, runaway wife.
Maybe Kelly was just a detour on his road to the altar. A test of his resolve. Attractions were one thing. Life mates were another. He had to hang on to his visions of what he wanted in a marriage.
Men were supposed to run screaming from that kind of commitment, and here he was aching for it. He had enjoyed his single time, but at thirty-two, his biological clock must be ticking. Shit, did men even have those?
Before he let his heart get wrenched out by letting Kelly get under his skin, maybe he’d test her resolve. If she wanted a courtship, he’d give her one hell of a cornball Paradise-driven courtship. If she stuck around for the end of it, he’d be surprised. If she bolted, he’d have learned something.
He’d know for sure that whatever part of him wanted to take home stray cats, fix them up, feed them, and give them a warm place to sleep was the part that needed to be locked up for good. It led him nowhere but Troubleville.
Most likely he was going to scare this stray cat right out of town, and he’d never see her again.
That would be real unfortunate if she ran, because he had never wanted a woman in his arms, in his bed, the way he wanted this one.
Sam started up the Chevy and drove a few blocks before he heard a car come up behind him. In his rearview mirror he caught the familiar look of Lynnette Stivers’s black Trans Am.
What the hell was she up to now? His glimpses of her had become more frequent. Either Paradise really was a very small town or she was following him. Considering it was one o’clock in the morning, chances were she was up to her old tricks.
He hated to call Tom Blackwell again, the poor guy. It had to be totally humiliating for him, being in love with her and all.
The Trans Am turned down a side street. Heck, she wasn’t hurting anyone. It could wait.
Chapter 7
At nine o’clock on Sunday morning, Sam Grayson came through the door of the Hen House Beauty Parlor. Kelly was having her second cup of tea and she half dropped her cup into the saucer, causing it to clatter noisily.
“Sam! I wasn’t expecting you so soon!”
“Uh-oh,” Myrtle said loudly. “Did I forget to tell you Sam called to say he was coming over? It’s Eastern Star Mother-Daughter Day, and my mind is in the clouds. You know we’re only open two Sundays a year, and this is one of ’em.” Myrtle said all that without breaking her stride. She was doing Rhonda Pierson’s hair in a foil, and Rhonda looked like an alien.
Sam was staring. Myrtle had on leopard leggings and a black turtleneck top—Kelly could see Sam was a little startled by both Rhonda and Myrtle.
“I’ll be right out,” Kelly called from across the room. If ever a man needed an escape route, Sam was in need.
“Great, I’ll…er…wait outside.” Sam backed out the door. The screen made its sprongy noise as he opened and shut it behind him.
As soon as he stepped back outside, Myrtle and her crew, Opal and Rhonda, and a few of the customers ran over to the window.
“Rayanne, come over here and check this out! Sam’s such a kid at heart.”
“Geez, you guys, has it been that long since you saw a man around here?” Kelly grabbed her leather jacket and headed to the door. Then she stopped dead and stood holding the screen open wide, like her mouth.
There he stood on the sidewalk with a tandem bike and a large bouquet of daisies. He had on an old-fashioned tweed bicycle hat.
“Date number one!” Sam called.
Myrtle came over and put her arm around Kelly. “He’s smart, just not too subtle,” Myrtle said under her breath.
Kelly agreed. “We might as well take an ad out in the Paradise Pioneer: Local nutcase lawyer dates new girl in town.”
She grabbed the strap of her shoulder bag and marched out the door, ready for anything.
“I thought you’d look sweet on a bicycle built for two,” Sam said as he handed her the daisies and kissed her cheek.
“Hold on, let me get my Brownie camera,” Myrtle hollered through the screen.
“Do Brownie cameras still exist?” Kelly asked. She and Sam posed for Myrtle, then waved goodbye and tried to get their act together. After some wobbly starts and flat-out falls, peppered by laughter coming from the Hen House audience, they made a synchronized attempt.
“One, two, three, go,” Sam directed from the back. They jumped together, started pedaling madly, and were up! She heard clapping behind them.
“Hey, we work pretty well with each other, Miss Applebee.”
“That remains to be seen, Mr. Grayson. We haven’t had our first fight yet.”
“Call me Sam, honey.”
Kelly craned around to give him a look, almost steering them into a tree. She straightened out abruptly as Sam started singing “Bicycle Built for Two” again.
“What are you, nuts?” Kelly called over her shoulder.
They rolled along past neighbors and white picket fences until there were more hay fields than houses, and the road got bumpier. It took a really long time. Her butt was getting sore.
“Turn right here, Kelly.”
He directed her to a field with rolling grass hills surrounding a small lake. Willow trees bowed graceful branches into the calm water, the breeze lifting them like skirts.
They walked the bike to a picnic table. Sam proceeded to lay out a tablecloth, linen napkins, then china. Out came still-warm croissants wrapped in foil, fresh-squeezed orange juice, Brie, smoked honey ham, some kind of papaya chutney stuff, a very colorful melon and grape salad, and a wonderful-looking quiche.
“Quite the magician, Sam. Where did all this food come from?” Kelly asked suspiciously.
“Leftovers,” Sam replied. He slathered an open croissant with Brie and laid a piece of the fragrant ham across it with a smidgen of chutney, then offered Kelly a bite.
“From what, the social? This stuff comes from deeply gourmet roots, Sam.” Kelly shook her head.
“I confess. My mother’s cook packed it for me.”
“Your mother’s cook. I’m going to try and not think about that right now, okay?”
“Don’t hold it against me.”
“We’ll get to that part later.”
They spent the morning sitting side by side, talking and feeding each other the delights of the picnic basket. The sun warmed her back, and she fell into timelessness with him. It was the magical place couples go when they are falling in love with each other. A place she’d never been with Raymond.
Kelly was cautious as to how much she revealed about herself: her unhappy childhood, running away at sixteen, even working in L.A., she skimmed over most of it. She listened very carefully to Sam’s family stories. No alcoholic parent, no abuse, no divorce, just Sam and his two younger sisters and two parents who actually cared. A tear slid down Kelly’s cheek. Sam caught it with his fingertip.
“Where does this come from?”
“You, describing the family I will never have.” Two more tears rolled down. She put her head against his shoulder and breathed deeply to calm herself. The pain twisted way down deep within her.
“You could start your own, you know, be the first part of a new family; give your kids what you never had.”
“That sounds grand, but I would have to learn how. My only pictures of normal family life come from Leave It To Beaver reruns.”
“That’s not a bad start,” Sam said. “June and Ward were pretty tight. She just needed to get out of the kitchen more.”
“Yeah, and what was Ward doing in the garage all the time, anyway? Working out? I liked Ozzie and Harriet. They laughed it off more, and the sex was better,” Kelly said. She reached for a piece of melon and smiled a goofy smile at Sam.
“Oh so that’s what all those fade-out scenes were in Ozzie and Harriet’s TV scripts—sex?
“Of course, didn’t you know?”
“You have a wonderful sense of humor, Kelly, and a very loving heart. That’s unusual for someone who’s been through what you have. It could have made you very bitter.”
Talk of the Town Page 8
