For a split second she considered asking him in for a taste test. Instead, she extended her hand. He gave it a perfunctory shake. Then AJ reached for the door and held it open. “Have a nice stay in Celebration. It’s a lovely town.”
He offered a brisk nod and turned to leave. As she watched him walk away, she had a sinking feeling this wouldn’t be the last time she saw Sergeant Shane Harrison.
Her heart betrayed her and leaped at the thought.
Chapter Two
When an assignment landed Shane in a new town, one of his first orders of personal business on his first day off was to familiarize himself with the lay of the land.
Even though he didn’t particularly want to be in Celebration, Texas, he’d decided to make the best of it and explore. Earlier in the week, when he’d delivered the chocolates to AJ, he’d noticed a poster in her shop’s window advertising “A Taste of Celebration,” a fundraiser to benefit a new pediatric wing at Celebration Memorial Hospital. The sampling of fare from local restaurants and caterers was happening today in the town square. Despite his lack of appetite for small-town living and all the ghosts it conjured, he was always up for a good burger and a beer. Getting to know Celebration through its local cuisine was the best way to face down this assignment. Well, that and possibly the best chance to raise a glass with AJ Sherwood-Antonelli.
A pretty face and a good meal.
What more did a man need?
Shane parked on a side street of a residential neighborhood about a quarter of a mile away from downtown. He unfolded all six foot four of himself out of his shiny black Ford F-150. The truck was his baby. Since his living expenses were negligible and his life was signed over to the U.S. Army, it was the one indulgence he afforded himself. The truck had been in military storage during his tour of the Middle East. It felt good to be back in the driver’s seat.
As he hit the remote, locking the truck, a loud whistle split the air. “Hey, man, nice ride.”
Shane turned toward the direction of the words that weren’t so much a compliment as they were a mocking challenge.
Four teenage boys loitered on the corner opposite from where he’d parked. Shane hadn’t noticed them until now.
“Thanks,” he returned.
Something in the group’s collective posture and body language made him pause, then glance in his car’s window to make sure he’d put away the GPS and anything else of value.
He had.
He looked back at the group wanting them to know he was taking a mental snapshot of them. All four were Caucasian, probably sixteen or seventeen, all medium height, but one was taller and bigger. Three had dark hair; one was blond. They all wore sloppy T-shirts. Two sported holey jeans. One boy—the tallest kid with long, dark messy hair that hung past his shoulders—wore his pants so low they rode down his butt and his boxers were visible. Another kid was wearing long denim shorts and had a tattoo of what looked like a dragon or some sort of serpent winding around his left calf.
They certainly didn’t blend in, but they were probably harmless—this was Celebration, after all. Since he’d been in town, he hadn’t seen such a rough-looking gang hanging out. Maybe they’d come for the food festival. He wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt, but a voice of reason made him wary. But what was he supposed to say to the sheriff? I didn’t like the way the boys were whistling at my truck?
Punks.
Putting an end to the staring standoff, Shane turned and began walking toward the square, knowing he shouldn’t judge. He was new in town and hated feeling conspicuous. So, he put them out of his mind.
It had been a long week on the new assignment, highlighted by meetings with construction crew chiefs and engineers who were working on the new training facility. Shane was exhausted—not from the work itself, as it wasn’t very demanding physically or mentally. It was more like babysitting.
He hadn’t gotten a decent night’s sleep since he’d arrived. In the army, he moved around so much he usually didn’t have a problem adjusting to a new place. But he wasn’t adjusting well to Celebration. The desk job gave him way too much time for clock watching and restlessness. Because work wasn’t occupying his mind, his thoughts had been running an endless loop of nonsense he couldn’t seem to shut off.
Even as he walked away, his mind replayed the way the teenagers had stopped their horseplay and called out to him; the way his guard had gone on instant alert; the way he’d turned back to face them down and how the short, stocky kid who seemed to be their ringleader—or at least the loudest one of the bunch—had hollered across the street, “Hey, man, nice ride.”
Shane bristled again and glanced back, but the kids were gone.
Training in counter terrorism—and life’s hard knocks—had taught him to be fearless in the face of danger. In fact, he liked to joke that there was nothing like a brush with death to make a man feel truly alive. But tying a man like Shane to a desk gave him too much time to think. That’s when he fell apart.
He smirked at the absurdity of his thought. They were just a bunch of smart alecks and he shouldn’t give them the satisfaction of responding. His reaction proved he was bone tired. This outing would clear his head, reset his mind.
With temperatures in the mid-seventies, fall was already making its presence known. Even though it was still technically summer—the equinox was two weeks away—the punishing heat of summer had given way to mild days and nights that were downright cool.
Shane drew in a breath through his nose, expecting to smell a loamy scent, autumn’s calling card—it was a reflex whenever he thought of his favorite time of year—but instead, he was tantalized by the aroma of A Taste of Celebration.
His stomach growled in response. The distraction—or reminder that perhaps he and this place might reach common ground through the food—helped him reframe and redirect his thinking.
So what if the job was boring? His objective was to serve out his MOUT duty and get the hell out of Dodge...or Celebration, as the case may be. What lay on the other side of construction hell was a plum European tour where he intended to exorcise the demons that had haunted him far too long.
In the meantime, he needed to get a hold of himself and calm the monkey mind that was wearing him down. “Monkey mind” was what his mother had called it way back when he’d been prone to similar restlessness as a boy, when his mind jumped from notion to notion as a monkey swings from tree branch to tree branch.
He swiped a hand over his eyes as if the gesture could scrub away the recollection. But his mother’s sweet smiling face was freshly imprinted on his mind. Memories like this were landmines that he preferred to avoid. He blew out a breath and looked around for something to refocus on.
The possibility of running into AJ again. That should be enough to grab the attention of any red-blooded man, he thought as he walked. And thinking of her did make him feel marginally better.
So, with seeing her to anticipate, what the hell was wrong with him? Feeling of loss like this hadn’t hit him this hard in twenty years. Maybe it was the impending anniversary.
Twenty years. Wow. It seems like yesterday.
After the explosion that had killed his family, he’d learned to shut down his thoughts when the mind apes got restless. He knew from experience if you loved too deeply you got hurt; if you dwelled on the hurt it ended up eating you alive. So, he’d become a specialist at isolating the enemy emotion, neutralizing it so that he didn’t have to give it another thought.
Shane had become an expert at feeling nothing. It made him a damn good soldier. Wasn’t that all that mattered, since he had nothing else to live for?
He’d been eighteen years old when he’d lost his family—his mother, father, sister and brother. Gone. In the snap of a finger, they were gone and his world was shattered beyond repair.
Why am I alive? Why did they have to die? Maybe if I hadn’t stayed behind in Italy?
In the first few years, he’d asked himself these questions nearly every day,
until it had gotten to the point where the what-ifs had threatened to bury him. That’s when he’d to lock it all away.
Why, all of a sudden, were the ghosts he’d so carefully sequestered haunting him again?
As he continued his journey up the tree-shaded sidewalk toward the square, he glanced at the small clapboard houses that lined the walk. His mood darkened with each well-manicured lawn he passed. After several tours of the Middle East and living in government bachelor digs when he was in the States, it was no wonder this homey little town was bringing up issues. It reminded him so much of his childhood.
Fort Hood was just far enough away that it was more practical for him to stay in a rent-by-the-week efficiency. It wasn’t much, but at least it was closer to the construction site than commuting from the base.
This assignment was only temporary, he reminded himself. He’d be out of here soon enough. Then came Europe. And after that...he’d wait and see what life and the U.S. Army dictated.
In the meantime, distant strains of country music and aromas of delicious food beckoned him. His stomach growled again. Starving, he inhaled deeply, trying to discern among the mélange of inviting scents if there was a grilled burger in his near future.
It smelled promising.
As Shane closed the distance between his appetite and the town’s offerings, the sound of a bouncing basketball grabbed his attention. In the driveway of a two-story brick house, two boys were engaged in a game of Horse. The sound of a blaring car horn made one of them miss the basket. A mangy looking mixed-breed dog darted across the sidewalk, having narrowly dodged the honking car. Shane watched as the mutt, who seemed unfazed by his near brush with death, loped up to the boys, barking and dancing around them, licking their faces and wiggling in delight.
“Hey! You’d better put a leash on your furry friend,” Shane called to the boys. They froze, ceasing their whoops and giggles, staring at him warily as if they’d just noticed him. “He almost got hit by that car.”
The boys said nothing. They just stood there, the dog in between them and the stranger.
Shane didn’t mean to scare them. See, that was one of the things he hated most about small towns like Celebration. Everyone knew everyone. Everyone was accounted for...part of a family or at least the fabric of the community. It was just like where he grew up.
The boys didn’t answer, so he kept walking, hoping they would heed his suggestion to curb their pet. Loss hit hard when you lived in a sheltered world that fostered a false sense of immortality. By the time he reached the next driveway, the whoops of laughter and barking began again.
In the distance, he saw the town square, a park dotted with white tents. The source of the delicious aromas, he suspected. He waited for a couple of cars to pass before making his way across Main Street.
Closer to the square, the street had been blocked off with large traffic barriers to allow for free-flowing pedestrian traffic. It appeared that the entire town of 1,288 had turned out for the food fest and that everyone was here milling about.
Did the square have room for 1,289?
Shane bought his ticket and entered the fray. The first booth he came to was a restaurant called Quiche Me Quick. They offered a sampling of quiches.
Quiche?
He hesitated. But since the samples were cut into small pieces and he could take it and eat while he kept walking, he grabbed a plate and did just that.
In fact, he walked right past the next booth. Petite Four, was offering an array of bite-size cakes that were covered in shiny, pastel-colored icing and decorated to look like little presents. Too sweet for an empty stomach. The sight of them made his teeth hurt.
The third booth was even less promising. It was Deloris’s Delicacies, offering what looked like fluffy pink icing that smelled like fish. As if the appearance wasn’t unappealing enough, the smell nearly did him in.
Judging by the first few booths, it looked like the festival was about froufrou food; he craved something substantial. He inhaled again to make sure the delicious smell of something cooking on the grill hadn’t been a sensory mirage. It was still there. It made his mouth water.
“Hi! I’m Deloris. Care to try my salmon mousse?” A petite, middle-age woman, who looked like she would be more at home in a Junior League meeting than hawking fishy fluff, held out a white plastic spoon heaped with the unappetizing stuff. “I made it myself. When I bring it to parties everyone just goes wild over it and asks me for the recipe. They always say, ‘Deloris, you should go into business and sell that mousse of yours.’ So I did. Here, hon, have some.”
She seemed so proud. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt her feelings. He wasn’t picky, but the fact that he could smell the goo from a distance made him hesitate, despite how a steady stream of people drifted by and grabbed spoons.
“You know what? I just got here and I’m making my rounds to see what looks good. I don’t want to get too full too fast.”
She smiled. “Well, I understand. But you come back and see me. I’ll save you a bite, okay?”
He tilted his chin in what he hoped was a noncommittal gesture. “By the way, would you happen to know where I could find the Celebrations, Inc., Catering booth?”
“I don’t know right off the top of my head, hon, but I’ll look at the festival map and find out for you.”
She placed the mousse spoon on an iced silver tray, walked to a table at the back of the tent and returned with a map of vendor locations.
“Let’s see...” She traced the page with a nail that was painted the same color as her mousse. “Ah! Here we go. We’re here.” She tapped the paper. “You’ll want to scoot right across there.” She traced a path away from her booth, around the large gazebo in the center of the square—where a Country-Western band was playing and people were line dancing—to the other side of the square. “Celebrations, Inc. is in tent number 78. Right under that big old oak tree, across from where everyone’s dancing. Would you like to take this with you?” She offered him the map.
“You might need it later. But thanks for your help.”
She rolled the map into a cylinder. “It was my pleasure. But hey, before you go, are you looking to secure a catering company for an upcoming event? Because I know AJ and if you told her you wanted her to use my mousse, I know she’d do it.”
“Actually, I’m just stopping by her booth to say hello.”
“Oh. Ooh!” Her eyes sparkled as if Shane had confided that he was there to propose to AJ. “How long have you known our AJ?”
Another thing he hated about small towns was how good news tended to travel fast. He needed to nip this in the bud before Deloris told the entire town he and AJ were engaged.
“Actually, I don’t really know her. We have a mutual friend, and I was just stopping by for a second to say hello.”
“Oh.” Deloris looked decidedly disappointed.
As luck would have it, three women walked up to the booth, all hugs and squeals, apparently delighted to have found Deloris and her delicacies. Shane took that opportunity to wave goodbye and make his exit.
He meandered in the general direction Deloris had outlined, past the gazebo, toward the stately oak tree, counting down the booths until he came to number 78. That’s when he realized that the heavenly scent of burgers on the grill was coming from the Celebrations, Inc. tent.
Like a petite, blonde angel, AJ was setting down a tray of small burgers. Exactly what he was craving.
Maybe I should ask her to marry me right now.
Chapter Three
Fluffy clouds like white cotton candy stood out against the brilliant blue sky. What a glorious day to be outside, giving away food. All morning, AJ kept thinking she saw—of all people—that soldier who’d brought her the chocolate. Out of the corner of her eye, she’d catch a glimpse of a tall, broad-shouldered blond guy and immediately her thoughts would skitter to Shane Harrison. Each time it turned out not to be him, a vague sense of disappointment would press down on her.
/> It was peculiar that she kept thinking she saw him. Usually when that happened, she would end up seeing the person who’d been on her mind.
She didn’t claim to be psychic or think that the false sightings were some sort of precognition; it was just uncanny how often it happened that she thought about someone and later they’d turn up. With the number of false soldier sightings she’d had today, AJ shouldn’t have been surprised when she turned around to set out her ninth tray of samples and found him standing at her tent. Nonetheless her stomach did a triple gainer.
“There you are,” she said.
He narrowed his eyes and cocked his head slightly to the right. “You were expecting me?”
Ugh. “Did I say that out loud?”
“You did.”
She set down the tray on the table and adjusted her latex gloves and smiled at the other people who came up and grabbed the small plates of food she was offering. The festival was so busy and she’d been working at such a brisk clip her thought must have slipped out. Out loud.
Great.
Note to self. Check internal filter. Make sure it is firmly in place.
“Actually, I was speaking in generic terms,” she hedged. Oh, peachy. If she kept this up she’d end up digging herself into a deeper hole. Heat began to creep up her neck. “I knew someone was behind me—lots of people have visited my tent today—and I—I meant to say, ‘There you are.’ You know...as in ‘look what we have here.’ This is for you.”
She nudged the tray toward him. “Have some.” But he continued to squint at her for a few more beats before shifting his gaze to the proffered platter.
“Okay. So, what do we have here?”
“Sliders. Three kinds. I call this one the Tailgater. It’s a beef patty with bacon, cheddar and caramelized onions with barbecue sauce on the side. This one’s the Parisian. It has Brie, ham and sautéed mushrooms. Then there’s the Antipasto. It’s topped with roasted red peppers, spicy salami, provolone and a garlic-basil aioli.”
Texas Wedding Page 2
