“Ow!” Jed dropped the knife and grabbed at a dish towel to stem the blood suddenly gushing from his finger. “Damn it.”
“What did you do?” Karin said, rushing over. “Let me see that.”
“No, I’m all right.”
He tried to spin away from Karin but he found himself in the corner the cabinets formed with the stove.
“Stop acting so macho,” Karin said. “Mother keeps her knives very sharp and I want to make sure that you’re not going to lose a finger.”
“I didn’t cut it that bad,” he grumbled.
Actually, if he was going to chop anything off, it’d be another part of his body. His fingers never caused him any problems so major.
“Jed, quit fooling around. I want to see your hand.”
The tone was sharp and no nonsense. It was the voice of an experienced physician. Someone who expected to be obeyed. Jed held out his hand to her. Karin took off the towel and looked critically at his finger.
“It’s a long cut,” she said. “But fortunately it’s not too deep.”
“I told you it was nothing.”
Karin gave him a dismissive look. “Wash your hand,” she said, pushing him toward the sink. “And I’ll get some gauze and tape.”
He wanted to tell her again that he was all right but he knew a stone wall when he saw one.
“And don’t even think of picking up that knife again,” she called over her shoulder. “I’ll take care of breakfast after I get you fixed up.”
Shoulders slumping, Jed turned on the water and soaped his hands. He really was all right. And once his finger was taped up, he’d be able to handle fixing breakfast without any problem. Certainly more easily than he could return things to normal between him and Karin. He watched the water roll off his hand and wished he was anywhere but here.
It was all right for him to comfort Karin. To hold her. To tell her what a fine woman she was. That’s what a man did. What she didn’t deserve was for him to use her for satisfying his own lust. He should have controlled his urges. There was no excuse for what he’d done.
“Okay,” she said, suddenly appearing at his side. “Let’s get that finger bandaged. Then I think I’d better make breakfast. But tell me, are you always this accident-prone?”
“What do you mean?” he asked. “I just cut myself a little.”
“And banged your shoulder and your head, and sprained your knee,” she pointed out as she applied gauze to his wound. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think Chesterton was dangerous.”
It was turning out to be much more so than he’d ever expected. “Maybe I’m allergic to the place,” he suggested.
“Good thing you’re leaving in a few days then.”
“Yeah. Good thing.”
They both fell silent as she taped up his finger. It was a good job, as good as any bandage job he’d had over his career, but it did nothing for the major ache in his heart.
Chapter Nine
“Okay,” the photographer said, holding his camera in one hand and gesturing at the people gathered in the church basement with the other. “Let’s sit Glinda and the Wizard in the middle and then the rest of you form a half circle behind them.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Gil,” Aunty Em exclaimed. “Enough is enough.”
“Dam tootin’,” an elderly lady named Martha added. “Elmer here’s probably getting a thrill from posing for pictures with us, but Karin’s got better things to do with her day than smiling through another roll of film.”
“No, really. I’m fine,” Karin assured them and smiled at Elmer Brinkley, her co-grand marshal. The circuit-court judge was dressed as the Wizard of Oz. “Though Elmer might have other plans for the morning.”
“I can’t think of a better way to spend my time than surrounded by the town’s most beautiful women,” the old man said.
The older women snorted, but Karin kept her smile in place. Just the slightest change in it might send it crashing altogether. She wasn’t sure why, but then she wasn’t sure of much these days.
She wasn’t certain how it happened that she and Jed made love last night. It had been incredible, but she wasn’t sure how she felt about it. And she certainly wasn’t sure what that strange fluttery feeling in her throat was, except that it wasn’t the baby this time.
She was sure, however, that posing for festival PR pictures for the local newspaper was much better than being at home, where her heart would race each time he spoke to her, where her body would flush if she looked at him, and her breath would stop for wanting his touch.
“That’s it, folks,” the photographer said. “Thanks a lot.”
The women sighed and moved away from the pose, Elmer moved along with them. Karin followed the photographer.
“Where to now, Gil?” she asked.
In the last three hours, they’d posed with the town council, the festival committees and even a few of the town’s service organizations. The last thing she wanted to do was stop now.
“That’s it,” the photographer said. “You’re free until the Oz show at the grade school this afternoon.”
“But that’s hours from now,” Karin said, glancing at the clock.
The photographer shrugged. “I’ve got to get pictures of the construction at the tollway interchange, and of the town’s new garbage truck.”
“I could come along,” she offered.
He gave her a questioning look. “What for? Glinda in a backhoe? Glinda and the garbage truck?”
Okay, so her coming along didn’t make much sense. It was still better than facing Jed when her stomach was square-dancing in big heavy boots at just the thought of his name. If only she knew how he felt about last night, it would help her decide how she felt.
“You and your honey have words?” Aunty Em asked.
Karin turned, wondering if she was so easy to read or if the older woman was just perceptive. “No, of course not,” Karin said with a laugh. “I want to make sure I’m fulfilling my grand-marshal duties.”
“Uh-huh. I’d almost believe it if Elmer was offering to have his picture taken with a bulldozer, too.”
Karin leaned down closer to the old woman. “Maybe Elmer doesn’t have the same civic pride as I do.”
Aunty Em gave her a look. “Well, for sure he doesn’t have a good-looking cowboy at home to distract him.” She nodded at Karin’s costume. “If you’re looking for ways to waste time, you can change out of that frilly dress and we’ll let you help us paint our ornaments.”
“I’m not looking for ways to waste time,” Karin felt duty-bound to protest. “But I’d be happy to help you paint.”
“Call it what you want,” Aunty Em said.
She was calling it like it was, Karin told herself as she changed out of her costume and back into stretch pants and a loose shirt. She wasn’t avoiding Jed, she just wasn’t seeking him out until she understood her reaction to last night.
She hung up her costume and went back out into the church basement where the informal women’s group met. Every year for as long as Karin could remember, they sold Wizard of Oz ornaments at the festival to raise money for holiday baskets for the area’s needy. Helping them paint their ornaments was not a way to waste time but to do some good for the community. Karin sat down at an empty place at the table.
“You want to paint the Tinman silver?” Aunty Em asked.
“Sure. I can do that.”
Karin picked up a brush and began to dab silver paint on a wooden Tinman. Looks like you didn’t have to be made of tin to not have a heart.
She wondered if her lovemaking had been lacking. Of course, it really had not been making love, but still, she wondered if that was why Jed had been moody this morning. Had he been comparing last night to nights he’d spent with his wife and found the memories painful?
Not that she had been trying to compete in any way. Heavens no. But the idea that she had been lacking was oddly bothersome. Especially since the night had been so disquieting for her.
“So how is that young man of yours?” Aunty Em asked. “Has he recovered from his square-dancing incident yet?”
Karin started slightly, jolted from her thoughts. “He’s fine,” she said. “Still has a slight limp but he claims he always limps a little.”
“So what’s the trouble?” Mary asked.
“There’s no trouble,” Karin insisted.
“Maybe he’s limping in other ways,” Aunty Em said.
“That could get a girl down,” someone else agreed.
Karin wasn’t sure what they were talking about at first, then she suddenly got their meaning and blushed a bright red. “No, it’s not that,” she said quickly. The room fell silent and all eyes were on her. She tried to smile. “Really. We’re fine. Happy as clams.”
The silence lasted a long moment, as did the frowning stares aimed at her. She began to feel a little nervous.
Suddenly Aunty Em nodded. “It’s his wife, isn’t it? Dang, we should have thought of that.”
“You feeling like you’re fighting a memory, are you?”
“That’s a tough one, all right.”
Karin had no idea how they jumped to this topic, but she’d really prefer they jumped to another. “You’re all so kind,” she said. “But I’m not competing with Wendy.”
“Best not to try,” Mary agreed. “Just be patient.”
“And Lissa loves you. That’s important.”
“You got time on your side,” Aunty Em said.
Karin stopped breathing. She didn’t have time on her side at all. It was Thursday and they’d be leaving on Sunday. But then her breath came, along with a jolt of sanity. What was she thinking? Time didn’t matter. Last night didn’t matter. This was all pretend.
Jed and his memories would go back to Los Angeles and she’d go back to Chicago. Just the way they planned.
Jed followed Marge into the school auditorium. He would have been satisfied to take a seat in the far back, but she wanted to be right up front.
“We have to make sure Lissa knows we’re here,” Marge pointed out. “I wouldn’t want her to think her grandma didn’t care.”
Jed felt another knife plunge into his heart. Was he hurting too many good people with this charade?
“How about these?” Marge asked. The second row had two empty seats at the end. “I can get good pictures from here.”
“Pictures?” Jed sank into his chair.
She pulled a camera from her purse. “I bought it yesterday. I wanted to get a video camera but I had no idea what to get so I settled for this. Do you know much about video cameras? I really should get one before the festival starts tomorrow.”
The knives weren’t just plunging in anymore, they were plunging and twisting and turning.
“Maybe that wouldn’t be such a good idea,” he said slowly.
She turned to take a stack of programs from a little boy in a scarecrow costume. “Thanks, sweetie.” She helped herself to a program and passed the others to Jed. “Why not?”
Jed extracted a copy and passed the stack to the woman sitting next to him. How could he stop all this hurt, short of betraying Karin’s secret? “It’s just that—” he took a deep breath and watched a couple of older kids setting up the microphone on the stage “—you have lots of time to look for the best deal before the baby’s born.”
She gave him a piercing look. “And you don’t think Lissa will feel slighted if I don’t get it in time to get pictures of her at the festival?”
There was something in her eyes that made him uneasy. “She’s just having too good a time here to think about something like that,” he said.
“And, of course, there’s always lots of time later to get pictures of her,” Marge pointed out. There was an odd tone in her voice now, too. “Speaking of which, when are you two getting married? I never could get an answer out of Karin.”
“Uh...” Damn. Hadn’t they discussed this? He glanced at the stage, wishing the show would suddenly start, but the kids were still fiddling with the mike. “Actually, we aren’t sure.”
“You should do it this weekend,” Marge said. “Wouldn’t that be fun?”
“This weekend?” He stared at her, the horror building. “But we don’t have the license or anything.”
“I bet Elmer could get you through the red tape.”
He didn’t even bother to ask who Elmer was. “And there’s lots of things we haven’t decided yet,” he went on. “Where to live. What to do about our jobs. Where Lissa should go to school.”
“Minor stuff,” Marge said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “When you’re in love, those things work out.”
“Well, yes.”
He took another deep breath but it appeared to contain no oxygen at all. Worse yet was the sudden image of him and Karin together. Of the two of them, along with Lissa and the baby, being a family. And how right it felt, even though he knew it couldn’t be.
He tried again. “We don’t want to rush into things.”
Marge sighed. “It’s Karin, isn’t it? She’s being cautious. I had so hoped she would have the courage to follow her heart.”
Jed didn’t know what to say, but for once in this whole doomed vacation, luck was with him and the show started. He hadn’t known what to expect, but it turned out to be all sorts of skits about L. Frank Baum, what was happening in the country when he wrote The Wizard of Oz, and what life in Kansas was like then.
It would have been fairly interesting, except that Karin and some older man were guests of honor and Jed was having trouble keeping his eyes on the kids. Jed had known Karin was going to be Glinda the Good Witch, but he hadn’t seen her in her costume yet. And hadn’t expected her to look so magically beautiful.
She was wearing a frilly dress in a shade of pink that made her skin glow and her hair seem even darker. She did seem nervous, though, as if she didn’t like being the center of attention, and he wished he could tell her to relax. That she was part of the magic of the festival and not to worry.
“She’s always been so afraid of emotions,” Marge whispered, leaning close to him so she wouldn’t disturb the first-graders reciting a poem about Munchkinland.
“Lots of people are,” Jed pointed out.
“Not to the extent she is.”
The first-graders finished their poem and the audience clapped as parents scrambled to take pictures of the little ones dressed like Munchkins. Then the children trooped off the stage, one little girl lingering near Karin to stare at her in awe.
“She used to believe in magic, too,” Marge said softly. “When she was little, she thought the whole world was magic.”
Jed kept silent as an older group of students came onstage. They were presenting information about life in Kansas around the turn of the century. Hard, bleak and at the mercy of the elements. But wasn’t much of life like that? You had to find happiness where you could.
His eyes strayed to Karin. She wasn’t part of his happiness and he wasn’t part of hers, but he sure hoped she found some soon. She deserved it. Maybe when the baby came, she would see that she could love. Then maybe she would let herself be loved in return. As for him, his chance at happiness had passed and he wasn’t about to try again.
“It was my fault,” Marge leaned close again to whisper as the older kids left the stage. “It was all those jerks I married.”
Jed looked at her. “What?”
“Karin wanted a father who would be a father to her,” Marge said. “So every time I married, she dreamed that this one would be the one to read her stories at bedtime, and check for monsters under her bed. He would teach her to ride her bike and tell her she was beautiful.”
Jed nodded as the next class came on. “But they didn’t?”
“They didn’t know how to be husbands, let alone fathers,” she said, bitterness coming through in her voice. “Neither of us got what we needed, but she was the one more hurt in the long run. Once I saw that, I stopped falling for every twinkling pair of blue eyes.
”
He looked up at Karin, greeting a new class on the stage. “But she never bounced back, did she?”
“The monsters are still under her bed, though she pretends they aren’t.”
“We all have monsters we’re fighting.”
“But they are easier to fight when you’ve got someone with you.” Marge grabbed his hand and held it tightly. “Don’t let her push you away, Jed. She loves you and you love her. I can tell. Fight for that love.”
He couldn’t have spoken to save his life. He wanted to tell her that she was wrong on all counts, but his heart knew better.
Dorothy hadn’t ever really realized how special the festival was until she had moved away. Now each little moment was one to treasure. She saw Heather leading her kindergarten class from the auditorium and waved to her.
Heather paused. “Wasn’t that fun? Karin did a great job.”
“She was perfect,” Dorothy agreed. “And the costume you made her looked wonderful.”
Heather nodded away the praise. “She made it come alive.”
With a slight wave, Heather led her class toward her classroom and Dorothy went around to the locker room where Karin was changing out of her costume. Karin had been wonderful with the kids, so animated, so into the role. Loving Jed and Lissa had changed Karin. Made her softer, more gentle.
Maybe it was just that Dorothy was feeling so glum herself. Only three more days and she was leaving again.
Karin came out of the locker room, her costume over her arm. “Hey,” she said, stopping when she saw Dorothy. “I didn’t know you were here.”
Dorothy forced her moodiness away. “Are you kidding? This is the unofficial beginning of the festival. I couldn’t miss it.”
Karin made a face. “Come on, this is pretty tame compared to what you can see in Paris.”
“That doesn’t make it less enjoyable. In fact, I liked it better than a lot of stuff I’ve seen in Paris.”
Pregnant & Practically Married (The Bridal Circle #3) Page 15
