Good Guy Heroes Boxed Set

by Julie Ortolon

  She’d lost track of time. They’d left the area of cornfields and woods interspersed with stables, and the houses had closed ranks. The street was trafficked, but peaceful. A straight, orderly artery going …w here?

  “This isn’t the way to Elmhurst. Where are we going?”

  “I thought we’d off-load some of these guys before we went to your place.”

  “I wondered why you bought so many. But then I thought it was probably a whim.” She meant to tease him, but she also believed him totally capable of such an impulse.

  “It was.”

  “And now you’ve decided to set up your own stand somewhere else?”

  “That’s an idea.” He seemed to consider, then discard it. “Nah. I like my idea better.”

  “Which is?”

  She saw the sign for the town they were entering at the same time she heard his words. “We’ll take some to my folks. They can use some jack-o’-lanterns, too.”

  “Lake Forest.” She read the sign aloud, heard dread in her voice and, knowing the tone would have carried over, was grateful she hadn’t said the other two words in her mind at the moment: your parents.

  Chapter Four

  *

  SHE’D SAID THE name of his hometown as if it were a toxic waste dump site.

  He was used to the other reaction, the one that said that anyone from Lake Forest was a rich kid, and probably a bratty rich kid. Bette had made it sound as if he were taking her into one of the less stable portions of the Middle East.

  “This is the downtown area,” he informed her as they rolled between lines of neat red-brick buildings whose sharply angled roofs ended in green awnings or, for more adventurous establishments, green-and-white-striped awnings. He made a couple turns and brought her through the heart of the area, then completed their circuit.

  “It’s very nice.”

  He looked around at the shops, both familiar and trendy. “Yeah, it is.” If he sounded a bit defensive, too bad.

  From the corner of his eye, he caught her looking at him. “Really, it is, Paul. It’s rather amazing. Everything’s so neat. Even the gas stations and train station.”

  He said nothing as they passed the train station and drove next to the tracks for a while. When he turned, it was into a neighborhood of older, modest homes that had produced bumper crops of bicycles and skateboards. He slowed nearly to a stop in the middle of a block.

  “There, the light blue one, that’s where we lived until I was twelve.”

  “Oh.”

  Bette Wharton could infuse a lot of meaning into one syllable. He just wished he could interpret it. Glancing to his right as he pulled away from the curb, he caught her eyes on him and thought perhaps he saw someone truly looking at him - at him, beyond images, expectations.

  He shifted position to ease a tightening in his shoulders, steering with his right hand at the top of the wheel and his left elbow propped out the window. If that left less of his face open to his passenger’s scrutiny, well, that was a coincidence. He turned into a narrowly twisting street, and headed toward his parents’ house.

  What was the big deal? So he’d had this impulse to show her where he grew up, to have her meet his parents. That was how he did things. By impulse.

  A curse muttered across his mind.

  Who was he kidding? He’d fully intended to introduce Bette to his old house, his hometown, his parents ever since he’d first had the idea Friday.

  He’d been planning this afternoon’s stops for two days.

  And he didn’t like that fact.

  Even when he’d done it for a woman whose navy-blue eyes lit at the sight of him, then shuttered themselves faster than a blink. For a woman who talked about plans and arrangements so stiltedly, then laughed with abandon over a pumpkin.

  Worse, he couldn’t find it in himself to regret any part of it, not the thinking about her for every waking hour, not the pumpkin ploy, not the hometown tour. None of it, because it all meant she was sitting here next to him.

  “There are my folks,” he said as he pulled into the circular portion of the driveway. Spotting the car, his parents waved and started toward them. Since they’d been contemplating a flower bed on the far side of the considerable front lawn, he had a moment to cover Bette’s hand where it rested on the front seat between them. “They’re nice people, Bette. Honest.”

  She met his look and gave a forced smile.

  “Much easier to get along with than me. I promise.”

  To his relief and pleasure, the teasing light flickered into her eyes. “Thank heavens!” she said with soft vehemence.

  He was still chuckling when he opened her door and they walked out to meet his parents.

  “Paul! Why didn’t you tell us you were coming?”

  His mother’s affectionate scolding as she hugged him harmonized with his father’s dry interjection, “Because he never does.”

  “I would have made something special for dinner,” his mother concluded, then barely paused as she smiled warmly at Bette and extended a hand. “Hello, I’m Nancy Monroe.”

  Paul knew he’d have to hurry or his mother’s sociability would outstrip his manners, and for some reason he wanted to be the one to make this introduction.

  “Mom, Dad, this is Bette Wharton.” He placed a hand at the small of Bette’s back, with some idea of encouraging her and reminding her of his support, though he knew his parents could be counted on to welcome her. But the feel of her soft sweater and the firm, smooth curve of her back gave him something, too, something indefinably pleasing. “Bette, these are my parents, James and Nancy Monroe.”

  “How do you do, Mrs. Monroe. Mr. Monroe.”

  She shook hands with them, and he glimpsed the poise she must bring to business dealings, at least ones that didn’t involve him. He suspected he threw her off her usual stride.

  He liked that.

  “Bette’s in the market to buy a house, and I thought she should see some of the other neighborhoods around, so we swung by here.”

  He caught her dagger look of surprise and dismay. She probably wanted to tell him she certainly wasn’t looking in this kind of neighborhood, because it was way out of her price bracket, but was constrained by his parents’ presence.

  He’d remembered her comment Thursday about looking for a house and he’d spotted the real estate listings on her coffee table, but he hadn’t known he’d make use of the observations until he’d spoken the spur-of-the-moment words.

  “A house is an excellent investment,” said James Monroe with an approving nod. “I wish Paul would make that move so he’d build some equity in a property.”

  Paul shrugged at the familiar refrain. He should have seen it coming. “I don’t mind paying rent.”

  “You must not, since you’ve been doing it so long, and now you have rent on your office as well as the apartment.”

  “Property just ties you down.” He worked to keep the words light. It was an old skirmish line between his father and him.

  “Perhaps it’s time you were tied down. We had owned our first home for six years by the time I was your age.”

  “You owned it?”

  Only the blink of his father’s eyes showed that the arrow had gone home. They both knew Walter Mulholland had held the title on the Monroes’ first house, as he had on this house until the day he died.

  “Well, I’m just glad you both came,” smoothed Nancy Monroe. “I have a lovely roast in for dinner, and now we’ll be saved from a week’s worth of leftovers.”

  “Oh, no, really. Thank you, but we can’t drop in like this for dinner.” Bette stopped abruptly, turning wide blue eyes on Paul, and for a moment he forgot everything else. “I mean, I … I really should …”

  He saw her floundering between not wanting to impose and not wanting to deprive his parents of having their son home for Sunday dinner. “We didn’t mean to stay for dinner, Mom. We just thought we’d drop off some pumpkins and I’d show Bette around a little, then we’d be on o
ur way.”

  “Oh, but you must stay for dinner. There’s plenty of time for you to show Bette, maybe take her to Beach Park, then we can have a nice meal and get to know each other. This is such a wonderful surprise, Bette. We don’t get Paul home often enough as it is, and we always enjoy meeting his friends.”

  Paul tried one more time against the force of his mother’s beaming smile. “But we don’t want to interrupt, and -”

  “Nonsense. We were just discussing the arrangement of our spring bulb garden. It’s so hard to remember where things were the spring before by the time you get around to planting in the fall.”

  He knew staying for dinner was all but a certainty. Maybe he’d known it when he pulled into the driveway. He refused to consider whether he’d known it when he’d first thought about stopping by.

  He cocked an eyebrow at Bette and gave an infinitesimal shrug, indicating that if she didn’t want to stay, he’d do his best, but …

  A smile edged into her eyes and he felt an easing of the muscles in her back where he was only half-surprised to realize his hand still rested. She’d come to the same conclusion and she didn’t mind, at least not terribly.

  Paul’s father took a direct approach in trying to make the unexpected guest feel less awkward. “Bette, how long have you known our son?”

  Paul rubbed his free hand across his mouth to mask a smile.

  Ever the lawyer, his father had asked the question to set up some point he wanted to make. The flaming color he brought to Bette’s cheeks was inadvertent, and the surprise her answer was about to administer to his parents came as a pure, unanticipated bonus from his point of view.

  “Four days.” Ah, another bonus. She’d been counting. Otherwise, she would have hesitated to total them or said “since Wednesday.”

  Paul saw his mother blink, then take a closer look at Bette. When her gaze came to him, he looked away, suddenly not so enthralled with surprising his parents.

  James Monroe, however, nodded, as if he’d half expected the response to his question to be “four days,” then took Bette by the elbow and started her toward the house.

  “I don’t imagine in that time he’s introduced you to any other relatives, has he? No? I didn’t think so. So we can understand your being a bit taken aback by all this. We just hope you’ll commiserate with us, since we’ve known him for thirty-two years last March, and he’s never brought a young lady home to meet us before.”

  *

  “IS THAT TRUE? You’ve never taken a woman home to meet your parents?”

  Paul gave Bette an extra beat to add the word before, but she didn’t, and he felt a frown growing. She made it sound as if bringing her to the Lake Forest house today didn’t count.

  “There really wasn’t much need to,” he finally said.

  He looked down the stretch of pebbly sand, then out beyond the huge, jumbled boulders that created shallow pools for summertime beach-goers at the municipal park. This late in the year, with the sun rapidly fading, the beach and the boat ramp farther down the lake were deserted. Two distant fishermen on the pier beyond the ramp were their only companions.

  He narrowed his eyes as he considered the darkening eastern sky. The breeze had picked up, and if he didn’t miss his guess, Indian summer’s spell would soon be broken.

  After a soft drink at his parents’ house, he’d brought Bette here by a roundabout route through town. He’d been telling her about youthful summers he’d spent divided between this beach and his home.

  “I think half my high school graduating class spent three days a week at our house, so everyone I dated was there all the time anyhow. Then in college we were too busy proving we were grownup by going into Chicago to bother coming home.”

  “And since college?”

  His head jerked around, then he had to bite off a grin. He hadn’t mistaken that note in her voice - she was more than mildly curious. But her eyes, darkening with storm warnings just like the lake behind her, told him the consequences if he dared to make anything of it.

  He knew a few people who’d be surprised to hear it, but he could be cautious.

  “Since college, there hasn’t been anyone I thought my parents would enjoy meeting.”

  Pleased - he’d told the truth and paid her a compliment without tying himself to anything - he took her arm and headed toward the pier. They could walk the length of the beach before taking another path to where they’d left her car overlooking the water.

  He easily slipped into more tales of growing up, including one of a sailboat race when he’d had his younger sister as his crew, and had nearly thrown her overboard.

  “Do you sail, Bette?”

  “Not the kind you’re talking about. Just Sunfish on small lakes.”

  “You’d like it. I’ll take you next -” He broke off.

  He’d been out to say “next spring.” He’d always believed in keeping promises, which was why he didn’t make them. But he’d been about to commit himself to something six months in the future. What had gotten into him?

  Bette didn’t seem to notice anything amiss. She walked beside him, watching waves slip into shore.

  “Anyway, it was a great neighborhood to grow up in,” he finished lamely.

  “I’m sure it was.” She sounded as if her mind might be on another track. “It certainly doesn’t look anything like the house you described.”

  Contemplating the upward curve of her top lip and remembering how it had felt against his own, he almost missed what she said.

  “Oh, the house. Mom made a lot of changes. Actually, the same fall after I ran away. I started thinking some of the workmen were going to live with us permanently.”

  Work had kept his father so occupied those months that James Monroe probably wouldn’t have noticed if they’d blown up the house. His mother hadn’t gone quite that far, but close. By the time her father had visited at Christmastime, light and color had replaced somber bulk.

  “It must have been quite a job.”

  “Yeah. Turning a mausoleum into a home kicks up a lot of dust.”

  Walter Mulholland had raged, but there was nothing he could do. Even at twelve, Paul had recognized the lesson. Walter Mulholland was beatable. All it took was determination and unbending resistance.

  “It really is a wonderful place now. This whole area …” Bette made an all-encompassing gesture, then seemed to remember a complaint. “But what possessed you to say I was looking at a house in this neighborhood? I can’t afford this area. And even if I could - what are you smiling about?”

  “Nothing. Let’s get going. I’m hungry and we have pumpkins to unload. I wonder if the neighbors need jack-o’-lanterns this year?”

  *

  “WOULD YOU LIKE more, Bette?”

  “No, thank you, Mrs. Monroe. This was wonderful, but I couldn’t eat another bite.”

  “Are you sure? I don’t think you young people who live alone get enough to eat. I’d hate to think you’d be hungry later.”

  Paul’s chuckle spluttered into his glass of water. Bette thought she heard something resembling “told you so.”

  Giving him a quelling look, she politely declined once more, then helped Mrs. Monroe clear the table. In the kitchen she put a few things away while her hostess prepared coffee and chatted of cooking, gardens, the symphony and family.

  “… I’ll have to show you a portrait of my father after dinner. Paul looks so much like him at the same age.”

  Bette wondered if Paul had ever heard that comparison. Considering his views on that relative, he wouldn’t like it.

  In Nancy Monroe’s mostly gray hair, Bette could see the vestiges of Paul’s chestnut color. Although he shared a lot of mannerisms with his father, Bette saw that many of his features had come from his mother. Physical features, but also the ability to make people comfortable in an instant.

  Bette could admit to herself now that she’d been a bit awed.

  Not only by meeting Paul’s parents so unexpectedly - so
soon, she almost added, as if it were an occurrence she’d expected eventually, when that wasn’t the case at all - but by the house, with its sweeping, dignified exterior, its views of Lake Michigan through multiple sets of French doors, its casually elegant furnishings.

  But Nancy Monroe melted away the awe. She was a very nice woman. In fact, Bette thought as she prepared to take the cream and sugar in to the dining room, they were a very nice family. Not so unlike her own.

  As she stepped into the dining room, she became aware that the Monroes were not unlike her own in other ways. She felt the tension immediately.

  Between her and her parents, the topic was her living alone. Between Paul and his father, it apparently concerned his business.

  “Contact with a prestigious museum like that can’t help but enhance your reputation and that can only aid your business. It’s the sort of opportunity you should cultivate.” James Monroe took a breath, and Bette could tell he was repeating a question, more to drive home a point than to get an answer. “So, are you going out there to discuss this opportunity with them?”

  “I’m going out there.” The coolness in Paul’s voice surprised her.

  “But are you -”

  Paul caught sight of Bette. Rising to take the sugar and creamer as if they were too heavy for her, he cut off his father. “Ah, good. Now all we need is something to mix them with.”

  Without the usual amusement lighting his face, the words fell flat. He seemed to realize that. As he returned to his chair, he went on immediately. “Did you know my dad was a heck of a shortstop thirty-five years ago? Reached the top of the minor league system. Would have made it to the majors, too, only -”

  Paul looked up as his mother came through the door with the coffee on a tray, and broke off.

  “Are you two talking about baseball again?” she asked with fond exasperation.

  “No,” answered her husband. “I was trying to pin him down to make a decision, with as little success as ever. Or at least to find out if he’s making a trip to D.C.” He faced his son, and his voice seemed to gentle. “And I was a borderline shortstop at best. My making the majors was extremely doubtful.”