Dixie Rebel (The Carolina Magnolia Series, Book 1)

by Patricia Rice

  Anyone could walk in downstairs. She forgot her objections as he slid his hand down the scooped neck of her summer dress. "Ummm, Axell, don't..." Her voice trailed off as his lips found a more interesting place to play and she arched upward for more.

  "Don't what?" he murmured, trailing kisses up her throat. "Don't kiss my wife in the middle of the day? We're perfectly respectable, you know."

  No, they weren't. He had his big hand up her dress and she was frantically loosening his tie and looking for his buttons. There was nothing respectable about this. But it was wonderful, just the same.

  "We're an old married couple," she whispered. "We should have grown out of this by now."

  Axell snorted as he nibbled her ear. "We've been married all of five months and two don't count. I figure we've got another five good years at least." His fingers found her panties and stroked. "Maybe ten. Then I'll be over the hill and what will you do?"

  She laughed with a trill blending with the ebb tides on the sound system. "Follow you over to see what's on the other side. You'll never be old, Axell Holm, you have too much curiosity in you."

  A hank of golden hair fell across his brow as his smile gleamed down at her, and Maya's heart pounded as it always did when he looked at her like that. Nordic gods weren't meant to be possessed, but she thought maybe she owned just a little piece of him, or maybe more. She cried out in delight as he finally unsnarled their hampering clothing and sank into her.

  Afterward, they lay in disarray upon the thick carpet, listening to the sounds of bird song emanating from the speakers.

  "I forgot to take my pill again last night," Maya worried out loud.

  "You always forget to take it," Axell replied calmly, pulling her tighter against him. "One of these days, you're going to get caught." He tickled her breast as he adjusted her head more comfortably against his shoulder.

  "You wouldn't mind?" she asked.

  Axell propped himself up on one elbow. "Are you trying to tell me something?"

  She shook her head until her hair tumbled around her ears, but she smiled. "No, I just wanted to know you wouldn't mind. Alexa is a handful already."

  He gazed speculatively at her still unbuttoned dress. "Maybe breast-feeding makes them quieter?" he suggested with a gleam of hope.

  Hot waves of desire crashed through her at his words and look and implication. She wanted more babies, Axell's babies, and he seemed equally interested. She breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn't certain, after that last episode...

  "Shall I deliver them for you?" he inquired with a mischievous curve to his smile as he followed the path of her thoughts.

  Maya smacked his arm and struggled to sit up. "I want sedation next time. Now, we've got to get up from here. Selene and Cleo will be here any minute, then half the town will arrive."

  "You're missing Matty," he declared as he helped her button her dress.

  "He belongs with Cleo. She needs him." Maya shooed Axell's hand away when it did more stroking than buttoning. "But Constance misses him. There's a boy in our summer class, one of the scholarship kids who's in a foster home..."

  Axell sat up and straightened his tie while watching her warily. "Maya..."

  She hastened on. "He's up for adoption but his foster parents can't afford another kid. He and Constance play well together. He's only six, Axell..."

  He sighed with resignation and fastened his belt as the door chimes rang below. "What's one more?" he agreed.

  Maya flung her arms around his neck and buried his cheek in kisses. "I knew you'd say that. Thank you, thank you..." She was so blessed. She only wished everyone could have a man like Axell in their lives.

  "Maya? Axell? You up there?"

  "We're coming, we're coming!" Maya called joyfully as she brushed down her skirt and raced toward the hall.

  That was an understatement, Axell reflected as he watched his wife flit from view. He shouldn't still be thinking about sex after just having it, but Maya did that to his mind. He wanted to pull her back down on the rug and put babies in her. He was deranged. In a wild spurt of caveman hunger to see his wife carrying his child, he'd agreed to take on another six-year old. Given a chance, she'd populate his house with strangers.

  And why not? They had room for them, and Maya had enough love in her heart for entire schools of children. With her help, he could learn to love them all too. Tightening the knot in his tie, Axell wandered out to greet Maya's sister and partner. Hell, with Maya around, he wouldn't just accumulate kids, he'd have relatives and friends crawling all over the damned place. The house would never be empty again.

  Spirits decidedly high, he stood at the top of the stairs and watched as Maya gesticulated wildly over whatever topic had popped into her head now. Selene caught sight of him and blew him a kiss. Cleo frowned, but Cleo always frowned.

  "Cool dress," Axell called down to his sister-in-law, and she brightened perceptibly. Like a kid, Cleo just needed attention.

  As he sauntered down the stairs and all three women turned to welcome him, Axell realized something else: for the first time in his life, he was a participant and not an observer. He belonged in the world Maya created around them. Reaching Maya and hugging her shoulders, he savored the moment.

  "The psychiatrist has declared Katherine competent to stand trial," Selene declared without prelude. "The lawyer will probably plead temporary insanity."

  Axell was aware of Maya watching him with sympathy. Him. Katherine was a distant cousin of Maya's, had hired an arsonist and tried to destroy Maya's school, and Maya was looking at him with sympathy.

  He shook his head in disbelief and chucked her chin. "Don't look at me that way, honey. I didn't encourage her obsession any more than Ralph did. The lawyer's right, she was delusional." He didn't mention that the Pfeiffer side of the family seemed to have more than its fair share of quirks.

  He chuckled as he looked down at the currently crimson streak in Maya's hair. It contrasted nicely with turquoise eyes and a pink flowered dress that only Maya could make sexy. And he'd thought Maya was delusional. He shook his head all over again.

  "She was your friend," Maya reminded him. "She probably thought she was saving you from my clutches."

  "Or making Ralph so happy he'd marry her," Selene replied dryly. "Which makes her truly delusional. Ralph will never marry anyone his mama doesn't approve of, and so long as he's taking care of her, his mama will never approve."

  "Want me to put a contract out on his mama?" Cleo asked cynically. "Where are the twin disasters today anyway? I thought they'd be leading a protest march down Main Street against allowing riffraff into their community."

  Axell grinned. "Mrs. Arnold and Sandra have gone up to Cherokee to break the bank at the casino. I think they're planning on buying the town back with Indian money."

  Beside him, Maya snorted. "They're looking for men," she countered. "I wish them well of any they find up there."

  Axell raised his eyebrows at the idea of his former mother-in-law picking up strangers, but the speculative look on Selene's face caught his eye. He'd wager Selene's father would be introducing a wealthy, unattached banker to Mayor Arnold's mother before week's end.

  The high-pitched whine of an electric guitar screamed through an amplifier, rattling the windows. For a minute, Axell thought the sound system had gone berserk. Then he remembered, and groaned. Stephen.

  "Don't look that way," Maya reprimanded, hurrying toward the front door. "The advance sales on his School-Aid concert have brought in twice the scholarship money we'd hoped to have. We may not even have to mortgage the property to rebuild the school. So come outside and be polite."

  The mayor had closed off all the streets around the school for the concert and ribbon-cutting ceremony. Crowds already poured through the early-September morning, carrying lawn chairs and coolers, elbowing for the shady seats beneath the spreading oaks, greeting friends and neighbors, seeing and being seen. It was the next best thing to a three-ring circus, Axell decided, and grinned.
Maya had finally succeeded in turning the town into a circus.

  His restaurant and Cleo's shop would be doing a booming business. He wasn't about to complain.

  "Hey, Cuz!" Ralph Arnold emerged from the business-suited knot of men near the stage to wrap an arm around Maya's shoulders. "Gonna save a dance for me?"

  Grabbing the mayor's necktie, Selene hauled him sideways and branded his cheek with her lipstick. Ralph flushed, hurriedly removed his arm from Maya, and with an embarrassed grin, wrapped it around Selene's waist and kissed her cheek. Ralph would damned well ruin his career in politics with Selene at his side, but he'd be one wealthy former mayor. Who was he to stand in the way of true love and improbable matches? Maybe Maya ought to hand Ralph her granddaddy's journal for a lesson in life and love.

  Proudly, Axell watched as Maya swam through the crowd, hugging all and sundry, mother and child alike. She was practically walking on air, and her happiness bubbled through him with a joy he'd never quite known. She'd unlocked something inside him that allowed the sun to shine in and the music to ring as it never had before. The entire street had become one of her kaleidoscopes, swirling with colors and shapes, but this kaleidoscope had sound too—the sound of laughter and love and music.

  "Got you by the balls, doesn't she?" Headley asked dryly, coming up behind him.

  "Among other things." Axell didn't take offense. Headley was a lonely old man. He wouldn't understand.

  He watched as Stephen helped Constance onto the stage. Constance had been bubbling with excitement for weeks. She was becoming the outgoing child he'd never been.

  "I hear the shopping center project is back on."

  Axell shrugged, brought back to the moment. "Maya and Cleo sold the developer a right of way through the field down the road in exchange for an access road through the back of the property so they don't have to worry about floods anymore. The Garden Club is overseeing the removal of any plants in the way of construction. Maya has a way of working things out."

  Maya had a way of making impossible dreams happen. If only more people would ignore the word "impossible," mankind could visit Mars and Jupiter, abolish prejudice and poverty, and create Utopia. He'd settle for the sunshine of her love.

  "Yeah." Headley sighed in contentment as Maya swam back in their direction, her smile a brilliant sunbeam as she spotted them. "Maybe she should run for mayor."

  "Over my dead body," Axell declared boldly, reaching for his flashy wife and dragging her close.

  Tipping her head back, she gazed at him through dangerously long lashes. "Is Cleo putting out a contract on your body?" she asked laughingly, wrapping her arms around his waist without an ounce of shyness. "I'll take care of her."

  And Axell realized with the freedom of love, that she would, that she would take care of him and his daughter and everyone around her, and would make a damned good mayor should she ever put her scattered mind to it. He didn't have to do it all himself any longer.

  He hugged her tight against him and whispered against her hair. "You take care of everyone else. I'll take care of you. Fair enough?"

  "Yeah." She snuggled blissfully against him as Stephen's band, with Constance in accompaniment, roared into a rousing rendition of an electronic "Carolina On My Mind," and the crowd cheered wildly.

  The End

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  IMPERFECT REBEL

  The Carolina Magnolia Series

  Book Two

  Excerpt from

  Imperfect Rebel

  The Carolina Magnolia Series

  Book Two

  by

  Patricia Rice

  New York Times Bestselling Author

  IMPERFECT REBEL

  Awards & Accolades

  4 1/2 Stars

  ~Romantic Times Top Pick

  ~

  "...both a love story and a story of personal growth."

  ~Jill M. Smith, Romantic Times

  "Superb, superb, superb!...You must read this excellent, excellent book."

  ~Heather Heath, The Old Book Barn Gazette

  "I highly recommend this book... a true high five!"

  ~Deborah Barber, Escape to Romance Reviews

  "Captivating, well-written, and almost impossible to put down"

  ~Susan Lantz, Romance Reviews Today, "A Perfect 10"

  "Brilliant and riveting, edgy and funny,"

  ~Mary Jo Putney, author of Never Less Than A Lady

  Cleo sighed as the driver shut off the car engine instead of turning around at her warning sign. Determined suckers. She couldn't wait to see how her intrepid guest reacted to her burglar alert system.

  A pair of long-legged, crisply ironed khakis appeared beneath the porch overhang. A man. She should have known. Men had to prove themselves by showing no fear. It didn't seem to matter if they showed no intelligence while they were at it.

  The lean torso decked in a tight black polo appeared next. My, my. She stopped chewing her fingernail to relish the loose-limbed swing of wide shoulders and a corded throat topped by a long, angular face with more character than prettiness. Tousled sable hair fell across a tanned brow, and she was almost sorry she'd left the security system on.

  The aviator sunglasses were a downright sexy trim for this parcel.

  "You are under alert!" The loudspeaker blared as soon as the intruder hit the porch step. She'd used an army drill sergeant for that recording. It would scare the pants off any normal person. This one halted and removed his sunglasses to trace the bellowing voice with curiosity.

  "Turn back now. This is your only warning!"

  Cleo bit back a sigh of exasperation as the jerk bent over to examine the step for wires. Did he think her an idiot to put wires where someone could cut them?

  "Your location has been verified, and you are now under surveillance. Put up your hands, or we'll shoot."

  The man straightened and seemed to be whistling as he craned his neck and surveyed the underside of the covered porch from the step.

  Shaking her head, Cleo reached for the "off" switch, but she waited for his reaction to the final performance. Sure enough, her visitor disregarded the warning and fearlessly breached the porch gate. Sirens screamed, strobe lights flared, and a fedora-hatted skeleton dropped down between him and the front door.

  * * *

  Jared McCloud came eyeball to eye socket with a six-foot bag of bones baring a smirk through a cigar clamped between its teeth. He'd been given enough warning to expect it, but he couldn't help grinning in appreciation of the coup de grace. At night, with the shrieking siren and strobes, it would have any potential thief shitting his pants.

  "Pleased to meecha, Burt," he murmured, inspecting the wires which must have held the freak to the porch roof. "Guess this means the old witch isn't at home."

  "Guess it means the old witch is on her way out."

  Jared blinked at the apparition in the doorway. He hadn't heard the door open. Shouldn't the hinges of a place like this creak eerily?

  He smiled in satisfaction at the full impact of the skeleton's creator as she emerged from shadows. Far from being an old witch, she was his newest dream of perfection. Not too tall or too short but sturdy, she packed a lot of punch into a compact, sexy bundle.

  Generally, women didn't appreciate being ogled, so he respectfully raised his gaze to absorb the rest of the glorious sight. Rumpled short hair revealed roots of auburn beneath a mousy brown dye job. Tinted half glasses attempted to hide eyes of a spectacular green—not contacts, either.

  He thought he was in love.

  Of course, he'd been in love last week and the week before, and mostly it was a major distraction. "Name's Jared McCloud." He smiled with as much charm as he could summon. "I'm looking for Cleo Alyssum."

  "She's not here."

  She said that so promptly, Jared figured this had to be her. Well, well. Curiouser and curiouser.

  He produced a business card from his pocket with his
hotel phone number scratched on the back. "I've been told Miss Alyssum is owner of the beach property back of here, and I'm interested in leasing it. I'm prepared to make a generous offer."

  She took the card and dropped it into her shirt pocket. "She doesn't like neighbors." She stepped onto the porch, shut and locked the peeling white door, and did something that reeled the skeleton upward like a collapsing party favor.

  "Your car's blocking my drive," she said curtly as he moved aside to let her pass.

  Not a smile, not a dimple, not a look of interest crossed her stoic features. Jared shrugged and ambled back toward his Jag. Women usually liked him, and he couldn't see that he'd done anything to tick this one off.

  "Do you have some idea when Miss Alyssum might return?" He played along with her gag and cast her a sideways look. She had a short, finely honed aquiline nose with a sprinkle of freckles across it, and a mouth drawn too tight to reveal any trace of humor.

  "She won't be interested. You're trespassing. I'd advise you to turn around before the police arrive." She headed for a beat-up black Chevy pickup, opened the door, then waited for him to move his car.

  She didn't even show an interest in his antique Jag. Damn. That car drew more comments than honeysuckle drew bees. Was she blind?

  He'd never accepted no as an answer. He wasn't an unreasonable man. She had a rundown beach shack going to waste. He wanted to put it to good use. He couldn't see the problem.

  "I can afford whatever price Miss Alyssum thinks the property is worth. I'll buy it if she'd rather not lease it. Just pass the message along, will you?" He leaned against his car door and watched her climb into her truck without replying. Well, damn.

  Maybe she was a witch, but she had all his incorrigible pheromones humming. He sighed as she cranked the truck to life without looking back. He got the message. He'd better move the Jag or she'd drive over it.

  Imperfect Rebel

  The Carolina Magnolia Series