by Ginny Baird
David turned his head just in time to see the swish of a floral print skirt disappear behind the newsstand. His pulse shot up and his internal thermostat skyrocketed. The cold Virginia fall couldn't touch the current fire in his veins.
"I'll give you a minute to make up your mind," Cecil said, turning to go.
"No, wait!" David reached out a hand and the waiter recoiled. Not that it necessarily mattered to David. The only person he cared about right now stood about five foot six and had the smile of a vixen.
"Do you know that woman over there?"
Cecil raised an eyebrow. "You know, there's a ladies' night at the bar down the street..."
"Decaf is fine," David said, pushing back in his chair with a scowl.
What was this guy's problem? All David had done was ask one little innocent question. Okay, so maybe it was two.
Cecil returned quickly with a lukewarm cup of sludge that he passed off as coffee.
"Anything else?" he asked, setting down the ceramic mug.
Nothing, apparently, that this guy would help him with.
David studied the neat geometric patterns on the imitation tile floor, as Cecil tore a sheet from his pad and laid the check on the table.
"Listen..." Cecil surprised David by softening his businesslike tone. "Didn't mean to come off hard as nails earlier. It's been kind of a long day, if you know what I mean."
"Don't worry about it," David said, forcing a smile. Waiter-with-an-attitude probably wanted a tip.
Cecil pushed his pencil behind his ear in a professorial fashion and appeared to study his surly customer.
"Is it someone special? Or are you just in here shopping?"
David sighed and sipped from his cup. "I hate to shop."
"Ah, but you love to buy." Cecil folded his arms in front of him and looked smug when David didn't answer. "The direct approach always works well for me."
David gave Cecil's narrow shoulders a second look, wondering what he'd missed. A ladies' man? This guy? Well, he'd heard that some women liked the ultrasensitive, underfed type...
"Of course"—Cecil beamed—"it helps that women love artists."
"You're a painter?"
"Better yet. I write."
Better for this place, David guessed, casting a quick glance around the packed cafe. A few couples here and there. But mainly, plenty of women. Single women, David gauged, from what he knew of Covesville.
"So, then. You're into literary types, too?" David flashed Cecil his best let's-be-buds smile.
Cecil laughed. "Let's just say I've been around enough to know you can't always judge a book by its cover. And when you get between those covers..." He grinned. "You read me?" he asked with a wink. "These brainy girls"—his pale gray eyes scanned the room—"really dig a mind link. Give them an intellectual connection, and they're all yours."
"Mind link?"
"Sure, you know. Talk about Plato, or Voltaire. Meet them on their level."
The between the covers part, David understood, and Plato he'd heard of. But Voltaire sounded more like a fast car than an aphrodisiac. "So, it's books we're talking?"
"Of course, books." Cecil nabbed the bill off the table and scribbled some notes on its back. "Here are a few recommendations. And stick your nose in a Publishers Weekly. See what's hot."
"Cecil," David said, laying down a five-dollar tip, as Marie and an elderly woman walked by. "Thanks very much."
Marie leaned against the wall next to the water fountain in the narrow hallway and shook her head at Joanne.
"It's no use. I just can't pretend any longer."
"You're trying to tell me that all of this has happened in the last two days," Joanne said. "But my guess is, it's been building longer. I mean, look, I know you were disappointed with that puny excuse for an engagement ring."
Marie shoved her left hand deeper in the pocket of her nubby brown cardigan.
"He hasn't got it, Marie. Better you face it now than later. After, say, you've produced two or three kids together and are still waiting on that first advance check from a publisher."
"But what is it, Joanne? I've spent my whole life looking."
"Baby," Joanne said, patting her shoulder. "You weren't even born when I started my exploration of the great male species. The only thing I can tell you is when it's there, you know it. And when it ain't, no amount of wishful thinking will make it so."
Marie stayed still a moment, examining her friend. Though her ivory skin had wrinkled, there was an ageless quality to her features, an impish mischievousness in those coal-black eyes.
"Joanne, how is it that a hot mama like you never married?"
"Too busy being hot to cool down for the aisle, I suppose. Or maybe I just missed my chance and didn't know it."
Marie bit her lip and waited for her to finish.
"The thing is, Marie, my problem was always the opposite of yours."
"Opposite?"
"Yes, sweetie. Too into the physical aspect, that's what I was. Free love and all that. It came with the age. Age of Aquarius. I was an old maid of fifty then, and it was liberating!
"But for a spring chick like you..." Joanne clamped her hands around Marie's shoulders and stepped closer. "Honey, a nice girl like you deserves to have it all."
Marie tilted her chin toward the well-meaning older woman. "But I've had that. Don't you see? I've had all that hot-and-bothered stuff. And I ended up with a broken heart."
"And then you met Cecil, who's about as exciting as a dead fish. And you're finally starting to see that dead fish—like company—stink after three days." She grimaced. "Much less five years."
"Excuse me..."
Marie felt her skin go hot as a deep familiar voice rose over Joanne's shoulder.
"Could you ladies tell me where to find—"
Joanne stepped aside and there he was. A vision in trim white jeans and a navy sweatshirt that did nothing to conceal the raw power that lay beneath it.
"Well, what a surprise." He smiled and sent the whole room spiraling. "Marie, isn't it? Marie McCloud?" Oceans of blue crinkled slightly at their corners as the wave of his stare crashed over her.
"Umm, hmm," was all Marie could manage in the drowning silence.
Joanne whistled between her teeth and walked back into the store without saying a word.
"Friend of yours?" David asked, placing his hand up on the wall near Marie's head and inclining his body in her direction.
Speak, Marie willed herself. Say something. Anything. "You've got quite a memory for names, Mr.—"
"Actually, it's the faces I remember best," he said, dropping his chin a fraction lower. Not to mention that her body was one David couldn't forget. Somewhere beneath that fuzzy, wool sweater and modestly swishy skirt lay a very womanly form. He'd seen it at least a million times since Thursday. In his daydreams, that is.
"David," he offered with a smile. "The name is David. David Lake. The optician, remember?"
As if Marie could forget
"Although I don't think we were ever officially introduced."
She looked up at him with those big brown eyes and blinked. "Well, then, you had me at a disadvantage."
Not as much as he would have liked.
A fine wash of color was working its way across her face, but she stood her ground—burgundy suede boots planted firmly in place, daring him with her damnably intoxicating eyes.
"Sorry about that," he said. "Not many clients are really all that interested in knowing my name."
"I doubt that," she said, stunned at where that courage had come from. Flirting! She was flirting with the most godlike male she'd laid eyes on in a decade and her fiancé was right in the next room!
"Excuse me..." said another familiar voice.
Marie swung her head around and choked. "Cecil!" she said, coughing past the lump in her throat.
"Jeez, Marie," he said, leaning forward and giving her arm a little squeeze. "Just going to the stock room. You look like you've seen a ghost!"
He gave David a curious glance. "You be sure she gives you good service, now! If there's anyone here who can get you what you want, it's Marie." Then he slipped between them and headed for the back of the store.
Marie didn't worry about blushing in front of David anymore. She was sure, by now, that he assumed crimson was her natural color.
In light of what had just transpired, David seemed remarkably nonchalant. He just propped his hand back up on the wall in its pre-warmed spot and smiled sweetly.
"Is he always that friendly?" David asked.
No, she'd been wrong. His hand wasn't propped exactly where it had been before. It was higher now. Off center. In a way that enabled him to stand even closer than the first time. Close enough to leave Marie completely overcome by his delectable aroma. The manly scent that would intoxicate her, if he'd only stay near.
"Pardon?" she asked. Knowing, just knowing, that whatever he'd said had flown right past her. Boy, this was bad. Badder than bad. She had to find a way out of here so she could think!
"Cecil."
"Cecil? You know him?"
A rich, bubbling laughter erupted from his chest. "No, not really." David paused and cocked one eyebrow. "But he sure seemed to know you. Boyfriend?"
"No," Marie said, biting her bottom lip. "I mean, friends, yeah, sure. Good ol' Cecil is friends with the world!" Never once in the past five years had she lied about her relationship with Cecil. But since those feelings were now so unclear, was it really lying at this point?
"Yeah, I know his type," David said in a conspiratorial whisper. "Regular Don Juan."
"What?" Marie ducked her head and inched back a step so David no longer held her prisoner.
David dropped his arm to his side. She'd gone from embarrassed red to positively white. "Did I say something to upset you?"
"No. Not at all." Marie felt the heat well within her like an exploding volcano. "It's just that Cecil..." She gave a noncommittal laugh.
"Oh, I know," David said, his eyes wide with amazement. "Not what you'd expect at all. But I guess it's romantic to look like a starving artist. I've heard some people find that very exciting."
"Well, I guess some—"
"Like you, for instance?"
"Me? Oh, heavens..." Marie stammered. "Well, you know, I don't think I could really say."
"But he is popular with the—literary types, I mean."
Marie wrinkled up her nose. Hey, wait a minute. Wait just one minute! All this talk about Cecil? Oh my God, David wasn't... couldn't possibly be asking because...
"What," he asked, with utmost innocence. "What in the world are you staring at? Did I get coffee on my sweatshirt or something?"
"Are you interested in Cecil?"
David just looked at her for a long moment. A slow grin spread across his face. "Me? Holy cow, me?" He sputtered and began to laugh.
Marie gripped her own face in horror, realizing her terrible mistake.
"I only just met him today. Besides," he said, with a teasing grin, "he's not my type."
Marie arched both eyebrows above her turquoise wire frames.
"Females, Marie. I like females," he said, emphasizing the word by making a curving gesture with his two sturdy hands.
"Oh," she said, exhaling slowly. "I'm sorry. So sorry if I implied—"
"Well, there's a first time for everything, I suppose. Not that I'd ever—ever been accused of..."
She looked positively petrified.
"It was a misunderstanding," David said, steadying her shoulders in his strong grip. "Really. Let's forget all about it."
A jolt of sensation ripped through her and she felt somehow awakened by his touch, all over her body.
"Hey," he said, brushing the back of his hand over her burning cheek. "All's forgiven. Really."
Forgiven, maybe. Forgotten, never. Marie had the feeling she'd always remember this. No matter what, she couldn't erase the memory of his tender touch, of an attraction so real, so physical that Marie's only punishment would be in his letting go.
But this was wrong. Terribly, terribly wrong. Despite the way he looked at her, despite the way he made her feel, she'd made her pledge to another man.
"David," Marie said, her breath catching in her throat. "I'm engaged."
David blanched and crammed his hands into his jeans pockets.
"Engaged! Well, isn't that terrific! Ah, what a great coincidence that is."
"It is?" Marie asked, the blood draining from her face.
"Why, sure. You're the bookstore manager, aren't you?"
Marie nodded.
"Then who better to help me pick out a wedding planner?"
"Wedding planner? You're engaged?"
He gave her a humble smile that sent shivers down her—very committed, she reminded herself—spine. "Not me, my sister."
Well, it was a half truth, David told himself. Debbie had already been engaged three times. The fourth time was sure to follow.
Marie was embarrassed at the rush of relief that came at his words. The image that immediately came to mind of David Lake looking handsome in a tuxedo and a boutonniere was enough to make her hear wedding bells.
"So, you'll help?" he asked, his blue eyes shining.
Marie swallowed hard and directed him to the entertainment and weddings section, her knees trembling ever so slightly with each new step. Really, she thought, giving herself a swift mental kick, the last thing you should have read during your dinner break was the wedding scene from Groom To Be.
When Marie got home later that evening, she was surprised to find a note from Cecil taped to her computer.
Great news, it said, finally got that check from Knopf...
Knopf? Cecil had sold a book to Alfred A. Knopf? If he'd already gotten the advance money, it had to have been weeks ago.
Diane and I...
Diane? The cappuccino girl with the body piercings?
Oh, God. Marie plopped down in her chair and tugged off her boots.
She yanked off her glasses, polished them with a tissue, then set them back on her nose, remembering something. Cecil and the lithe twenty-two-year-old Diane huddled over a back issue of Publishers Weekly sharing some private joke.
Yep. It was Diane, all right.
Diane and I have moved to New York. Please try to understand and please don't call. I'll come back for my stuff in a few months if you'd like to box it up.
Cecil.
Chapter Three
David held the big wedding planner in his hands and flipped through its spiral-bound pages.
"You getting hitched?" Caroline asked, her voice weighted with skepticism.
David spun in his chair to face his blond bombshell boss. Funny how he'd stopped noticing how good-looking she was the moment she'd started barking out orders. She was a tough businesswoman, but fair. And, not so incidentally, a contented wife and the mother of two children. Definitely off limits. Caroline chided him about settling down, in a tolerant big-sisterly way. Not that she was that much older, but her superior professional status brought out the mother hen in her. David suspected he was about to get pecked on.
"Can't a man do a little leisure reading on his lunch hour?" David asked, with mock defensiveness.
"Sure, read these," she said, dropping a stack of files on his desk.
David leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on his desk, crossing his legs comfortably at the ankles.
"You can work me like a slave driver eight hours a day, but these forty-five minutes," he said, clutching the thick planner to his chest, "are mine!"
"All right, big boy," she said, laying a hand on her hip. "What's in there? Honeymoon lingerie, perhaps?" She made a move toward the book.
"Not so fast," David said, holding her back with an extended hand.
"It's not..." Caroline's slender shoulders sagged. "Tell me it's not your sister Debbie heading down the aisle yet again."
"It's not Debbie," he said with a flawless grin.
"Ok
ay, David," Caroline said with a giant lunge in his direction, "give it here."
She caught one end of the large book in her hand and tugged.
"Hey!" he yelped, dropping his feet to the floor, as a sheaf of papers spilled forth. "Give that back!"
"David, I swear, if there's something pornographic in—"
Caroline yanked and the planner tumbled to the floor, pages fanning out in wild disarray.
"What's this?" she asked, nabbing an unfolded brochure off the floor. "A Books & Bistro events calendar?"
"Oh my God, David," she said, furiously fanning her face with the flyer. "This is worse than I thought! You're actually reading!"
Marie crumpled up another tear-stained tissue and added it to the heap on the floor. In the three years since she'd been promoted to manager, she could count the times she'd called in sick on one hand. And today was one of them.
Cecil and Diane? How could she have been so blind? And right under her nose!
And what—if anything—did the mysterious heartthrob David Lake know about all this? A regular Don Juan, he'd said in reference to Cecil. Marie clutched her stomach, fearing she would throw up. How many? Just how many other women had there been, then? Five? Fifteen, twenty? Oh, God.
Marie stood and rushed to the bathroom where she vomited violently.
Thank God she wasn't pregnant, she thought, as her bare knees hit the cold tile floor. She rested her head in her hands over the porcelain john, recalling Cecil's recent suggestion that they make a baby.
"Don't you think it'd be better if we got married first?" was all she had asked.
He'd stormed out the door, and not come back for five hours—at which time he'd produced a bouquet of limp daisies and a half-hearted apology. "One commitment at a time," was what he'd said.
It had been a cruel thing to say, knowing how badly Marie wanted a child. For a while, she thought she'd never want to have her own. But, as time moved on and that old biological clock started ticking, she'd begun to change her mind.
After her parents' car accident, she'd practically raised her four younger brothers and sisters. Her mother had died instantly, and her father had become permanently disabled. At age sixteen, Marie had been thrust into the role of running the household, scrounging together nutritious meals on the meager checks from her dad's disability payments.
