Small Town Girl

by Rice, Patricia

  Amy’s lips tightened and her normally pleasant expression turned grim. “He hasn’t seen the letter. I opened it by mistake, thinking it was a bill.”

  Flint set two mugs of coffee in front of them and appropriated the letter before Jo could crush it into mashed paper. He scanned it and threw it back at Amy. “You should have asked me for a good divorce lawyer. I’d have called the one my wife hired.”

  Amy burst into tears. “I don’t want a divorce.”

  Seventeen

  The bell over the door tinkled, and the most glamorous woman Amy had ever seen outside a television show peered through the semi-darkness brought on by the shattered light bulb. “Anyone home?”

  “Over here, Elise.” With rangy grace, Flint rose from his seat.

  Amy figured Flint for a good-looking scoundrel who would break Jo’s heart, but Jo was old enough to know what she was doing. Right now, Amy had to look out for herself. And her kids. She wasn’t used to that. She’d gone straight from college to marriage. She didn’t think she could stand on her own. She didn’t want to.

  Elise DuBois had the glossy, dark hair of a shampoo model, but she wore it all bundled on top of her head with diamond-encrusted combs in it. Amy assumed they were really zirconia, but the effect was dramatic, especially against the fire-engine red suit and Hawaiian print silk blouse. Amy recognized them from the Saks catalog and suspected Elise was slumming by wearing off-the-rack attire for her mountain sojourn.

  She didn’t care. The lawyer looked like someone who would chew Evan up, spit him out, and smile while doing it. Elise DuBois was everything that Amy wasn’t—smart, spirited, and ruthless beyond her wildest dreams. They’d already had a long, informative conversation on the phone.

  “Is this the notorious letter?” Elise picked up the epistle from the local legal firm and held it between two manicured, red-lacquered fingernails. She scanned the legalese in a flick of her long eyelashes, then dropped it back to the table. “They stole this from an old book on divorce written by a shark who’s been dead for two years. I could notify his estate and have the firm sued for plagiarism.”

  She took the seat Flint had vacated. “I have a license to practice in North Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia, but I’m a contract lawyer, not a divorce lawyer, and I can’t claim to know the judges in all three states. You may wish to consider my legal advice, then hire someone locally to handle the case.”

  She turned to Joella without waiting for a reply. “I’m sorry to return for this purpose. I’d hoped only to see you again when I had the lawsuit filed, but I’ve brought the papers for you to sign.” She opened her briefcase and produced a large manila envelope. “I listened to your demo tape. Your talent is quite amazing. Are you writing anything new?”

  Stunned by the force of Elise’s personality, Amy took a moment to assimilate the various impressions striking her. Flint had sauntered off to fetch another coffee. Jo was gripping the manila envelope and looking as stunned as Amy felt. Although everyone in town knew Jo wrote clever little poems, no one had ever told her she was talented. They all thought of her as a zany waitress. A good-hearted, generous waitress, maybe, but not someone with the brains to write real songs. That this impressive lawyer thought Jo was talented shed new light on her younger sister and gave Amy a respect for Elise’s perceptiveness.

  As Jo stuttered out an admission that she was playing with something a little different, Amy made up her mind. By the time Elise turned to her, she was ready.

  “I don’t want a divorce,” she said more steadily than she had earlier. “I don’t know what’s wrong with Evan, but we have two small children who adore their daddy.” When Elise merely raised her professionally shaped eyebrows and waited, Amy took courage and hurried on. “I just want to show Evan that I’m not a doormat. I want to be strong. I want to stand up to him and force him to look at what he’s doing. He’s so used to having everything his way, it’s time he got his comeuppance.”

  Elise broke into applause, and Jo hastily followed. Flint set a mug down in front of the lawyer and backed off with a frown, crossing his arms over his chest in disapproval.

  “You’d better go away, Flint,” Jo teased. “We’re on the warpath and you don’t want to get in our way if you’re feeling loyal to the male gender.”

  “I like your sister, and I’m not feeling loyal to any bastard who would desert her or his kids, but I’m feeling like a newt in a witch’s cauldron, so I’m outta here. If I’m going to be in at the crack of dawn, I’ll need a place to crash tonight. Your offer still stand?”

  Amy watched with interest as Jo tried to suppress her surprise and delight, and the big tough man in the cowboy boots wiggled like a fish on a hook. She’d be fascinated by the looks they exchanged if she weren’t so terrified.

  “Make yourself at home,” Jo replied. “Door’s not locked.”

  Flint opened his mouth, apparently to object to that carelessness, took another look at the three of them, and closed it again. With a nod of farewell, he stalked off.

  “Jeans look good on tight asses,” Elise reflected, watching Flint walk away.

  Jo snickered at the double entendre but didn’t disagree.

  Disregarding her coffee, Elise sat back in the booth and studied Amy until she wanted to squirm. Suddenly aware of her disheveled hair and lack of make-up in the face of Elise’s perfection, she wanted to crawl under the table and disappear.

  “If you’re willing to play hardball, I’m the one to teach you, but it won’t be pleasant. There will be a lot of shouting when he learns what you’ve done. Are you prepared for that?”

  No, of course not. She loved Evan. She’d first learned to make muffins to give him something to nibble while he studied for finals his senior year. She’d worked bakery jobs to keep them in food while he got his MBA. They’d lived over his parents’ garage while he trained at the textile mills in South Carolina, and she’d been pregnant with Josh. They’d both worked hard to get where they were today. She had a degree in textile design that she’d used to help Evan with new ideas for the mills where he worked. They’d been partners. Their tenth anniversary was in December.

  “I don’t want it to be like this,” she whispered, staring at the horrible letter that had ruined her life.

  “Is there another woman?” Jo demanded.

  Amy flinched. “Maybe. I’ve been trying to find out. The mill is in some financial trouble and the board of directors has been down here a lot.”

  “Lurid Linda!” Jo exclaimed without need of further explanation. “I’ve heard all about her. She’s the treasurer, isn’t she? Owns a mess of stock?”

  Amy ducked her head in agreement.

  “Your husband’s place of employment is in trouble?” Elise asked, focusing on the matter of importance to her. “Could he lose his job?”

  “He’ll just take one in another mill if they close this one. He gets offers all the time. I think some members of the board own stock in lots of mills. Maybe he’s trying to stay on their good side so they’ll hire him elsewhere.”

  “Well, your case is a lot more clean cut and simple than suing record companies, and it sounds as if we better act quickly,” Elise declared. “First, you have to transfer all your cash into your name only. Can you do that?”

  Amy blinked in surprise. “Evan will be furious if he finds out.”

  “How soon is he likely to find out?”

  She thought about it. “I pay the bills, so as long as he can use his debit card, he wouldn’t. But if I change the accounts, the card will fail.”

  “Keep enough in the account so his card isn’t likely to fail. If his paycheck is deposited in that account, you’ll have to keep it open anyway. Just make certain you regularly transfer all you need into your account. Do you own stocks? CDs? Cash them in.” Elise started ticking off commands on her fingers. “Take your name off all the credit cards. Have him sign the back of the car title. Tell him you’re getting a new license plate or whatever. Busy men don’t care h
ow these things work.”

  Amy rummaged in her purse for notebook and pen. Her hand was shaking, but she could handle practical things like this if it would get her husband back.

  “Run a credit check. See if your husband has opened any accounts or bought anything that you don’t know about.”

  She started to protest that he wouldn’t do anything like that without consulting her, but then she remembered he’d consulted a lawyer about a divorce without mentioning it to her. She’d seen Fritz in church on Sunday, and the lawyer had looked her in the face, knowing Evan was thinking of leaving her. She wished she could take Fritz down too. The plagiarist.

  “Send me copies of your house deed, mortgage papers, and tax returns for the last three years, along with a copy of the credit report.”

  Amy carefully wrote each instruction on a separate line so she could check them off as she accomplished them. Why had she never realized that she’d let Evan control her life because he earned a paycheck and she didn’t? He only had that job because she was there to help him every step of the way. They were supposed to be partners, equals, but he’d always been the one to tell her what to do and when and how to do it. That could change.

  “And I’d suggest you hire someone to document how your husband spends his time. Should it come to a showdown, a paper trail is much stronger than accusations.”

  The pen fell out of Amy’s hand and bounced under the table.

  Hire someone to find out how Evan spent all those hours in “meetings”? Did she really want to know for certain that he was sleeping with Lurid Linda?

  With a cry of pain and grief, Amy leaped from the booth and ran for the restroom before anyone could see her break down and weep like a baby.

  ***

  “Well, that went well. Not.”

  Flint looked up from the cookbook he’d bought in Asheville as Jo stormed in, slamming the door behind her. He couldn’t concentrate on the damned book when his mind kept drifting to Jo and that bed hidden up in the loft and what they could do there.

  He’d spent these last days trying to get her out of his system. Instead, he’d ended up in Asheville ordering that apron, buying cookbooks to please her, and wondering if he needed to hire a new shrink. She was suing him for christsake. If that didn’t call for getting his head examined, he didn’t know what did.

  But watching her now, he saw all the kazillion reasons why she’d infiltrated his brain and seeped into his blood. Jo was not only talented and sexy, but passionate and determined and concerned about others far more than herself. And damned independent, he had to remind himself, before he got any other ideas.

  “Divorce is a nasty business,” he agreed mildly, although he felt anything but mild watching Jo pace the loft with electricity all but arcing from every hair tip.

  She held the papers suing him for everything he owned. His badass side longed to kiss her into insensibility before she threw the papers at him. But he admired Jo too damned much to hurt her. Hands off was the best policy, even if he had to tie his wrists behind his back.

  “Your shark of a lawyer is making it nastier,” she declared, throwing the envelope on the chair. “Did you know Elise has a daughter? That she’s divorced from the man who was once her partner and had all his custodial rights terminated? I’ve never seen a woman so stone cold. How can anyone like that marry and produce offspring?”

  Flint would laugh at her naïve outrage, but he figured the subject was a volatile one, and he ought to tread softly. “Life happens. You either learn to roll with the punches or end up battered and broken.”

  All the spark seeped right out of her. Her shoulders slumped, and she shoved wisps of curls from her forehead. He had the urge to get up and hug her, but she didn’t look at him. He figured that was a bad sign.

  “You’re right. Amy has to learn to roll. I don’t want her battered. But those poor kids—” She shook her head and proceeded to the galley kitchen. “Want anything to drink?”

  He remembered what she’d said about wanting to show her daddy how well she’d turned out and figured she was dealing with some issues here. He sure understood the pain of divorce anyway.

  Flint swung his legs off her couch. “I’m fine, thanks. Are you sure you’re okay with me staying here? I can probably set something up in the office if I need to.”

  Jo spun around and finally looked at him. In the afternoon light from the high loft windows, she gleamed like a crystal lamp. Her hair tumbled over her long gold earrings to her nearly bare brown shoulders. She wore some kind of sparkly gold off-the shoulder shirt over pleated white linen shorts, and Flint would almost bet she had shimmery gold heels to match when she went anywhere but work. She’d kicked off her Nikes when she’d come in and stood there now barefoot, looking rumpled and more desirable than riches.

  “You’re fine. The couch is more comfortable than a sleeping bag.”

  Well, so much for hoping they’d share a bed. He knew she had the right of it. That didn’t mean logic applied to lust.

  Quelling a clamor of testosterone, Flint rose and threw the cookbook on the counter beside her. “I have to pay for that fancy stove somehow. I think we better open for dinner once the road is cleared.”

  She glanced at the book’s title. “You bought a stove to sell fancy hamburgers?”

  “It’s what I can cook,” he said defensively. “I make a mean meat loaf.”

  “Because it’s easier than pressing out hamburgers. Got it.”

  Flint knew she was being sarcastic, but he wasn’t listening. His brain had switched off the instant he’d stepped in reach of all those supple curves he’d only begun to explore. He studied the way naturally rose lips parted to reveal that cute overlapping tooth. If he thought about what she had done with that mouth, he’d spontaneously combust.

  “Dave hired Randy as the headliner for the MusicFest,” those plush lips were saying.

  Flint jerked back from his little head trip. “RJ? Here? Is he crazy?”

  Jo stepped out of his reach and leaned against her miniature stove. Apparently gathering the path of his straying thoughts, she crossed her arms to hide her splendid assets. “Randy is an arrogant ass, always has been. He thinks everyone will forgive him because he’s so charming and good-looking.”

  “He knows better than to think I’ll do anything but smash his pretty nose,” Flint growled.

  “I doubt he knows about the lawsuit yet. Does he know you’re living here?”

  That stopped him in his tracks. “He knows I’m from here, but I haven’t spoke to him since he and Melinda…” He winced. He hadn’t meant to say that. Telling a woman that her ex-boyfriend slept around was asking for dish hurling.

  Jo shrugged. “Randy was never celibate. I assume you were divorced at the time?”

  Flint nodded, oddly relieved that she harbored no jealous feelings for the bastard. “I didn’t buy the café until after she died, so he probably has no idea where I’m at.”

  “You and Elise would make a good pair.”

  He heard her sarcasm but didn’t grasp its origin. Instantly on the defensive after all the years of fighting with Melinda, he asked, “You think I’m cold?”

  “You were married to Melinda for what—ten years? And all you can say about her is that she fell in bed with Randy?” She reached for a tumbler in the cabinet and slammed it onto the tiny counter. “Marriage sure is a piece of shit, isn’t it?”

  “Where in hell did this come from?” he demanded angrily, caught off guard by her unexpected attack. “You think because I asked to sleep on your couch that I’m a fair target? Or do women just figure they get to cut a man’s balls off and use them as keepsakes once they’ve slept together?”

  To his astonishment, a big smile crossed Jo’s expressive features, turning her cat eyes up in the corners. “That’s a good one. You could put it to music and make another fortune.” She tilted her head, narrowed her eyes, then warbled to no tune at all—“I’m ruined for all time, because she kept what was m
ine, and all we did was roll in the hay.”

  Flint cracked up. Leaning against the counter, he hooted with laughter, then held his sides and laughed harder when she joined in and the dam of tension broke. Maybe it was relief that he didn’t have to fight with Jo that let him breathe easy enough to laugh. It had been a damned long time since he’d been able to let go and be himself.

  “You’re not doing this to me again, Joella,” he gasped between waning chuckles. “Your singing is inspirational in more ways than one, and I’m under the impression you’re not willing to go there anymore.”

  She heaved a sigh that lifted her gold-draped breasts and inspired him even more than her voice. Flint trained his gaze on the glittering reflection balls dangling over his head rather than admire the more enticing view down here.

  “I don’t need my heart broke anymore, don’t want to end up like Amy, and there isn’t much future with a man who has more troubles than I have. So, yeah, I guess we’d better not make beautiful music together.” Jo poked him in the chest so he had to look at her. “Besides, I have to go to Mama’s tonight. Friends, okay?”

  He sucked in a deep breath of her powdery scent and realized right then and there that it wasn’t okay. Jo wasn’t Melinda. She might be an emotional roller coaster, but she didn’t rocket senseless arguments into knock-down, drag-outs. She laughed at herself and calmed stormy waters.

  It was all wrong that he had to give up this perfect woman because the world was ass-backward. So, maybe he had to figure out how to set his small corner of the world spinning in the right direction again.

  He had to be Atlas instead of Job. Yeah, he could see that happening in the next millennium or two.

  Eighteen

  Like the chicken she was, Jo waited for Flint to leave the apartment the next morning before she stirred from her pillows. He’d been sound asleep on the couch when she’d come home last night.

  It had been a long, long time since she’d had a man in her house. He’d looked scrumptious stretched out there with only one of her old sheets pulled over his hips. She’d just stood there for a bit admiring his muscular brown chest decorated with dark curls, and the mink hair falling over a wide forehead hiding way too many brains. In sleep, his mouth softened to almost approachable, and she’d debated shucking her clothes and doing what came naturally. She didn’t think he’d fight her off.