“Haul... You mean you’ve been driving somewhere to get water by the bucket just to clean brushes and things?” She bit her lip. “You could have asked to use my kitchen.”
“You could have offered,” he pointed out. “Since you didn’t, I assumed you didn’t want to be bothered.”
“I didn’t think about it. Look, I’m not completely unreasonable, Rowan. Help yourself to water — to whatever you need. Just use the back door, all right?”
His face didn’t change expression. “You’re certain you don’t mind the mess?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she snapped. “Of course I mind. But you can use the kitchen anyway.”
It wasn’t until later that she realized she might well find her kitchen in ruins, and that she couldn’t say much about it because she’d technically given permission for any sort of chaos he might create.
By the time the shop closed, it was dark and the painting clew was gone. Eileen finished vacuuming the parlor and said, “I’ll come in early tomorrow if you like and help restock the shelves before we open. But I’m going out for dinner tonight with a man, so...”
Clancey looked up from the cash register where she was tallying the day’s receipts. “You’re kidding. I thought you said you were finished with all that nonsense.”
“I said I wasn’t going to look for a man anymore. And that’s absolutely true.”
“Then how do you account for a dinner date?”
“He ran over my foot with a grocery cart in the frozen-foods aisle at the supermarket.”
Clancey shook her head in confusion. “And that means he doesn’t count as a date?”
“Of course not,” Eileen said airily. “If I’d been looking for a date, I’d have seen him coming and I wouldn’t have been injured.”
Only after Eileen blew her a kiss and left did Clancey allow herself to chuckle. When the inevitable time came, Eileen would probably poke her head up out of her casket just to see whether the undertaker was worth going after.
She finished up the receipts and wearily headed for the kitchen, braced for whatever she might find. Blue and mauve paint spattered on the walls? Water sprayed all over? Buckets and brushes on every flat surface?
But the only evidence that her kitchen had been used was a neat pile of brushes drying in an out-of-the-way corner on the back porch.
Clancey decided that she’d actually have been less annoyed if they had left the place in a shambles. As it was, she was furious at Rowan. Did he really think her so rigid that she’d put others to extra work just for the principle of the thing?
But that was probably exactly what he thought. Because, in his view, if she didn’t think that way she wouldn’t still be in the house, keeping him from enjoying his property.
*****
On Sundays, Small World didn’t open till noon, but the painters were out in force as soon as the sun had climbed high enough to banish the frost that had accumulated overnight. Some of them were there even before Rowan was, and when he arrived and saw a group of them with doughnuts in hand, and Clancey with her coffeepot refilling mugs, his eyebrows rose so high they almost disappeared under the brim of his cap. “What brought this on?”
His surprise annoyed her. “It was the least I could do to thank everybody for not dropping loaded paintbrushes on my customers yesterday,” she said tartly. She pushed a coffee mug into his hand, wishing she dared pour the hot brew over his fingers instead of into the cup.
He stayed behind for a moment after the others had all gone off to the ladders. “Look, I’m sorry I put it that way. I’ll be happy to pay you back for the coffee and doughnuts. It’s my crew, and it’s my responsibility to feed them.”
She shrugged. She didn’t look at him, but her tone was a little softer. “That’s not necessary. They’re doing me a favor, too. My customers seem to like the new color scheme.”
There was a short pause. “Then I’ll just say thanks. It was very thoughtful of you, Clancey.”
The note of approval in his voice made Clancey nervous, and she turned her back and began to gather up the empty mugs. “Where did you find all these people, anyway?”
“I help out my friends when they need something, so now they’re helping me.”
She looked at him appraisingly. “You’ve got lots of friends.”
He shrugged it off. “I’ve always been sort of handy with tools. It all balances out in the end.” He reached for a doughnut and smiled at her across its chocolate-coated surface. “I was too tired last night even to stick around and thank you for letting us use the water. I should have. I’m sorry I didn’t.”
His smile was a slow, steady stream of charm, and there was no teasing emerald glint in his eyes, either — only pure, deep blue sincerity. The combination was just short of deadly; it made Clancey feel as if ordinary air wouldn’t quite fit the shape of her lungs anymore, and so there was no sense in trying to breathe.
The man is dangerous, Clancey thought. His wife ought to know better than to let him loose on an unsuspecting world full of women.
Fortunately he went off to paint a moment later, before she could pass out from lack of oxygen.
The traffic through Small World was slower today, with fewer but larger sales. Off and on all through the afternoon the customers commented about the new look of the house. Clancey had learned to listen with half her attention, smiling and nodding a lot, which took care of most of the remarks.
But about mid-afternoon a tall woman wearing a designer suit brought a fashion doll up to the cash register and said, “You will agree to be part of the neighborhood Christmas tour of houses this year, won’t you, Miss Kincade?” Her tone implied there was no doubt about the answer, because no one had the bad taste to refuse such a rare invitation.
Another thing to do before Christmas, Clancey thought automatically before she realized that even if it had sounded like a royal decree, she could still turn down the honor. So she made the first excuse that came into her head. “Isn’t that only for the actual historic district? I’m a couple of blocks outside the edge of that, so I’m afraid no matter how much I wanted to join in, it wouldn’t be quite—”
The woman waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, that’s nothing. We’re always politicking to get the area expanded. But I’ll talk to our chairman and make certain there won’t be a problem. You know her, I imagine? Everybody who cares about old houses knows Kaye McKenna.” She smiled. “We’re so glad to have you join us, Miss Kincade.”
I can manage to get myself into trouble, Clancey thought, without even trying.
If she only hadn’t made it sound as if she was longing for the opportunity...
She thought about it quite a lot through the rest of the afternoon. As a matter of fact, the idea of a Christmas open house appealed to her a great deal. She’d have the store decorated anyway, and she would make it a point to stay open for whatever hours the tour involved, whether she was part of it or not. The exposure and publicity would be good for Small World; anyone who walked in the door, even if it was to admire woodwork or architectural detail, was a potential customer.
But the attraction for Clancey was a great deal more than that. After all, it had been the summer neighborhood tour that had drawn her here in the first place and fixed her attention on the idea of converting an old house. It was only natural to want to show off her own place.
Except that it wasn’t her own place, and she wouldn’t be able even to pretend that it was for much longer. In December, when her neighbors were enjoying the Christmas tour, Clancey would be preparing to close the shop and looking frantically for somewhere else to go.
It almost made her cry, to have to admit how much she would have loved being a part of the Christmas tour, if only circumstances had been different. This house could be perfect at Christmas time, garlanded in pine and ribbon, sprinkled with antique toys, lighted with candles and tiny twinkling bulbs.
She swallowed the lump in her throat and reminded herself that no doubt next year
the house would be open for tours. If Kaye McKenna was already in charge of the whole event, her own house would certainly be a part of it just as soon as she could manage.
Maybe I’ll come back and look at it, Clancey thought. And then she laughed a little at her own idiocy, and retreated to the stockroom for a moment to dry her eyes and try to get herself under control.
*****
The painters worked late, but the house was almost done when the crew left that night. When Clancey completed the week’s bookwork and wandered into the kitchen to find herself something to eat, the only one left was Rowan, still cleaning brushes in the sink.
“It’s getting late,” she pointed out, digging the raw materials for a sandwich out of the refrigerator.
“Sorry,” he said. “I’ll be out of your way as soon as I can, but if these things aren’t cleaned tonight they’ll be ruined.”
Clancey shrugged. “So clean them. Want a sandwich?”
He looked surprised. “Sure.”
She couldn’t keep herself from yawning now and then as she ate her sandwich and watched as he snatched bites between brushes. There were a dozen of them yet to be cleaned, in all sizes, and the paint swirled down the drain in rainbows of blue and mauve and cream as he patiently worked water through the bristles.
“You look as if you’ve done that a lot,” she said. It wasn’t that she cared, actually, she told herself, but the silence was wearing on her.
He looked up as if surprised by the half-question. “I earned my spending money all the way through college by painting houses during the summer.”
“I should think you’d have your fill of it by now.”
He grinned. “Oh, now it’s purely a hobby. I do it just often enough so that whenever I’m auditing a set of books and start to see double, I can remind myself of the way my muscles ache after a day on an extension ladder with a scraper.” He demonstrated the arm movement, and winced a little. “It makes the auditing a whole lot easier to bear.”
“I’ll bet.” He had plenty of muscles to ache, Clancey thought half-consciously, and then asked herself in surprise just when she’d had time to notice. It was true, though; she could see the ripple of strength through his shoulders and arms.
He was watching her with interest. “I’ve been wondering, Clancey. What got you into toys, anyway?”
She answered with the same kind of lightness. “I’ve been accused of having a juvenile fixation which only intensive psychotherapy could fix. I’ve also been told that I’m caught in a mental war between wanting children and not wanting them, so this is my way of soothing the desire while ensuring I’m left no time to act on it. But in fact—”
He shook his head. “Don’t tell me. The truth is that you like to play with toys yourself.”
Clancey smiled. “Yeah. I started buying wooden puzzles and mechanical toys at flea markets years ago, and this is where I ended up. I’ll probably be the only parent in history who owns more playthings than my kids ever will.”
“So you do want children?”
“I suppose so, some day. There are a few other things I’d need first, you know.”
He smiled at that.
The tenderness of the expression reminded her of the tiny baby boy he must be thinking of. It made her feel a little awkward, wanting to mention the baby, to tell him what a precious child he had. But she couldn’t seem to find a natural way to do it, and so she faked another yawn instead, in the hope that he’d take the hint. “Excuse me, but it’s been an awfully long week.”
“I’ll be done here in a few minutes. Go on to bed if you like. I’ll finish up and lock the door.”
“Goodness, doesn’t that sound domestic?” She managed a laugh, to make it clear she hadn’t intended a double meaning, and retreated up the back stairs. She could at least brush her teeth while she waited for him to leave, before going back down to lock the dead bolts.
She took more time with her nightly ritual than usual. Her moisturizing cream had never been so carefully applied, or her dental floss so conscientiously used. By the time she was finished, the house was going through its regular ritual of creaks and moans. She was getting used to all that noise, finally. The first couple of nights it had scared her silly, but now she knew it was only the structure adjusting itself as daytime heat gave way to night’s cooler temperatures.
She started into her bedroom to turn the blankets down. It was the prettiest of the rooms, with hand-grained wood trim and a curved alcove lined with lead glass windows. It was big and airy and pleasant, and her grandmother’s brass bed fit perfectly at an angle opposite the alcove. The walls should be papered in a sunny yellow print, she thought, with white eyelet curtains—but of course that was out of the question now.
She was in the doorway when the house gave one more convulsive groan. In what seemed to Clancey like slow motion, most of the plaster ceiling broke loose from its supports and dropped, to shatter and splinter and well up into a choking cloud of dust.
Much of it landed on top of the bed, where — if not for Rowan McKenna and his pesky paintbrushes — Clancey would have been sleeping, blissfully unconscious of the danger hovering above her.
At this moment, she realized in horror, she would have been buried under a half ton of plaster. And she might very well have been dead.
CHAPTER FIVE
The dust was thick and blinding. Clancey managed to retreat a couple of feet and stood helplessly on the landing, choking and coughing. She heard Rowan running up the back stairs, and she turned and flung herself against him so hard that his breath was driven out in a sudden whoosh. Clancey didn’t notice that; the only sensation she had was of warm, strong arms closing around her, promising to keep her safe.
“Are you all right?” he demanded finally.
Clancey nodded, her head buried against Rowan’s shoulder as if she was an ostrich and he a convenient sand dune. His flannel shirt was soft and warm against her face, and the scents that clung to it — of crisp fall air and paint and smoke from someone’s burning leaves — filled her nose. His hand gently touched the back of her head and then slipped down the length of her hair. It was almost an absentminded stroking, but it was no less sensual for that. It would have sent shudders through Clancey’s bones if she hadn’t had her mind fixed on other things at the moment.
Rowan looked over her shoulder into the bedroom, where the dust had begun to settle and the gaping cavity in the ceiling was now apparent through the thinning haze.
“Aren’t you glad you agreed to let me fix the roof?” he said. He sounded a little breathless.
She turned her head. “That wasn’t the roof.” Her voice held a small quaver. “Was it?”
“No, but the ceiling’s probably been waterlogged somewhere along the line. And now that the boiler’s been turned on again, after two years without heat — well, it would be a wonder if something hadn’t cracked somewhere.”
His hands began to move up and down her back again in a soothing massage. The touch felt good against her tense muscles, and it was a full minute before Clancey realized that it wasn’t the wisest place to rest — snuggled against him like a lover, right outside her bedroom door. What if he thought her calm acceptance was some kind of invitation?
Though, she reminded herself, only a nut could find anything sexually appealing about that bedroom just now. And as for Clancey herself, she could still smell the dust and feel the grit on her face. In fact, she could almost taste it. No, there was nothing sexually appealing about her at the moment, either.
Still, for safety’s sake, she planted both hands against his chest and pushed herself away.
Rowan didn’t make any move to hold her. He folded his arms across his chest. “Feeling better?”
“A little, yes. It was a closer call than I would have chosen.” She stepped over to the bedroom, peering in.
Rowan caught at her arm. “Don’t go in there. The rest might fall at any minute.”
“I wasn’t planning to, exactly. It
’s just that my nightshirt is in there, and my pillow—”
“And that’s where you’d better leave them until someone’s taken a crowbar to the rest of the loose plaster. Look, why don’t you just come home with me? Let the dust settle and worry about it tomorrow.”
She glared at him.
Rowan winced and said defensively, “Well, at least you’d have a clean place to sleep. Don’t look at me that way, Clancey. I’m certainly not making a pass.”
“Of course you’re not,” Clancey said coolly, unwilling to admit the idea had even crossed her mind. There wasn’t a lot of comfort in the knowledge that he agreed with her less-than-flattering assessment of herself at the moment. Then she remembered that he did, after all, have someone waiting for him at home, and she wasted a few moments imagining what Kaye’s reaction was likely to be if he turned up at this hour with a bedraggled female in tow. How would he explain that one she wondered. Like a child with a stray animal? Hi, honey. She followed me home—can I keep her?
The Unexpected Landlord Page 6
