by Nora Roberts
Her turf. Despite the short span of time since she’d moved in, the house was her turf.
“Then I’m going over there tomorrow,” she told the dog. “It’s work, yes, but that’s still three days running.” She topped the leggings with a tunic in a ripe peach color she liked, then belted it so it didn’t look as if she wore a bag.
She grabbed what she needed—wallet, keys—and started downstairs with the dog prancing beside her.
She stopped. “You can’t go. You have to stay here.”
Until that moment she hadn’t known a dog could actually look shocked.
“I’m sorry, but you’d just have to sit in the car the whole time, and that’s not fair, right? Besides, you’re my excuse for coming back in case he suggests, I don’t know, a movie, or going to his place. You’re my ace in the hole. I’m only going to be an hour or two. Tops two hours, then I’ll be back. You have to stay.”
He trudged back upstairs—actually trudged, she thought, while sending her forlorn looks over his shoulder.
“You’d think I was locking him in a closet and going out dancing,” she muttered. And felt guilty all the way into town.
—
As he pulled on a fresh shirt, Xander figured he was running right on time. Hitting her up for the pizza had been inspired—especially since she’d been hot and wet and limp in the shower when he’d come up with it.
He also figured it was past time they had an actual date. Pizza always served up a good starter. He’d be on call, but those calls—if any—would go to his cell phone. If luck stuck, he’d get her back to her place and into bed without being called back to tow anything or anyone.
He opened the door, pulled up short. Chip stood, his big, raw-knuckled hand poised to knock. Or punch.
“Hey, Chip.”
“Hey, Xander. You’re heading out?”
“Yeah, but I got a minute. Do you want to come in?”
“That’s okay, I’ll walk down with you.”
Chip started down the steps on his slightly bowed legs. A big guy—football star in high school—he tended to lumber unless he stood on the deck of a boat, as he did daily for his family business. There, Xander knew, the man had the grace of a Baryshnikov, and his shy, self-effacing nature worked well for the tourists who wanted to do some fishing or sailing.
He’d mooned over Marla as long as Xander had known him, and had finally won her when she’d come back to the Cove after two years of college.
He’d won her by punching the guy she’d taken up with who liked punching her.
It wasn’t the first or the last guy Chip had punched over Marla. Xander really didn’t want to be the next guy.
But he didn’t sense anger, didn’t see that hard light in Chip’s eyes as they reached the base of the stairs.
“I wanted to, you know, say I was sorry about how Marla acted last night. I heard about it.”
“It’s no big.”
“She’s still got that thing for you.”
Xander kept a close watch, in case that hard light came calling. “Chip, you know there’s nothing there, and hasn’t been since high school.”
“I know it. I wanted to say how I know it, so you know. Patti, she’s making noises like there was something, but I know better. Plenty of other people know better, too.”
“Okay then. We’re cool?”
“Sure. I want to apologize to the lady—the new lady? It’s Naomi, right? But she doesn’t know me, so I didn’t want to go up there and scare her or anything.”
“You don’t have to worry about it, Chip. You don’t have to apologize to anybody.”
“I feel bad about it, all of it. Anyway.” He put those ham-hock hands in his pockets, gazed out at nothing special. “You don’t know where she is, do you?”
“Naomi?”
“No, not her, not Naomi. Marla.”
“Sorry, no.”
“She’s not at her place, the place she has now, and doesn’t answer the phone. Patti said she got mad at her last night, because Patti said she was embarrassed and all. She just took off—and she’d been drinking.”
“Was she driving?”
“Seems Patti was, but it’s not a far walk back to the place she has now. She didn’t go to work today at the market either. They’re that pissed at her now.”
Hungover, mortified, mad, probably in bed with the covers over her head.
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“If you see her, maybe you can give me a call, so I know she’s okay and just in one of her moods.”
“I can do that.”
“I’ll let you go. Maybe if you see the lady—Naomi . . . If you see her, you could tell her I’m sorry about the trouble.”
“I’ll do that. You take it easy.”
“It’s the best way to take it.” Chip smiled a little, then climbed into his truck.
Since it was close, and he was running a bit late now, Xander got into his own truck and drove to Rinaldo’s.
She was already there, sitting in a booth, looking over the menu. He slid in across from her. “Sorry. I got into a thing just as I was leaving.”
“That’s all right. I was just trying to decide if I’d have room for this calamari starter.”
“I’ll split it with you, then you would.”
“Then I would.” She set the menu aside. “Busy place on Saturday night.”
“Always has been. You look good.”
“Better than I did a few hours ago?”
“You always look good. Hi, Maxie.”
The waitress, young and fresh with doe eyes and sunny blonde hair streaked with a pretty shade of lavender, pulled out a pad. “Hi, Xander. Hi,” she said to Naomi. “Can I get you some drinks?”
“A glass of chianti, thanks, and some ice water on the side.”
“You got it. Xan?”
“Yuengling. How’s that hatchback running?”
“It gets me where I’m going and back, thanks to you. I’ll be right back with your drinks.”
“I guess you get a lot of people where they’re going and back.”
“It’s what I do. Listen, if a big, lumbering sort of guy comes up to your place—”
“What? What guy?”
Xander waved a hand. “Harmless guy. Chip. He’s Marla’s ex. He came by just as I was leaving.”
As she straightened, Naomi’s shoulder blades went to iron. “If he’s mad about last night, he should be mad at who started it.”
“It’s not that. He’s a nice guy—too nice most of the time. He wanted to apologize for her. He said he wanted to apologize to you, too, but he was afraid he’d scare you if he just showed up.”
“Oh. It’s not his fault. What’s a nice guy who’d apologize for something that’s not his fault doing with someone like her?”
“It’s impossible to love and be wise.”
“Who said that?”
“Francis Bacon. Anyway, I told him I’d tell you he was sorry.”
Maxie brought their drinks and took their order.
Maybe it wasn’t so bad, coming out, Naomi thought. The place was noisy, but in a good, happy way. And the calamari would’ve met with Harry’s approval.
“I hear you met Loo.”
“I did?”
“At the bar last night. The bartender.”
“Is that Loo?” Sharp-looking brunette with sexy magenta streaks. “I expected her to be older, sort of businesslike, sitting in some back office with ledgers.”
“Loo likes to keep her hand in. She liked you.”
She caught a bright peal of laughter, noted that the comfortably built brunette behind the counter let out another as she rang up an order.
“That’s flattering, since we talked over the bar for about two minutes.”
“She knows what she knows, as she likes to say.”
“She mentioned her ex-husband used to be the groundskeeper when my house was a B-and-B.”
“Right, the stoner. He’s long gone. But it reminds
me I could give you a hand with some of the heavy yard work. Kevin said you didn’t want to hire a landscaper, at least not yet, but if you decide otherwise, you might talk to Lelo.”
“From the band?”
“His family runs the local nursery. He’s actually pretty good at the whole lawn-and-garden thing.”
“And having a stoner is tradition up there?”
After a gesture with his beer, he took a drink. “A former stoner in Lelo’s case. You can size him up tomorrow for yourself.”
“Maybe I will.” More, maybe she’d just have to. “I wanted to deal with it myself, but so far I’ve managed to hack away the worst, plant a couple of pots and some kitchen herbs.”
“No landscaping in New York?”
“Not like this. We’ve got a pretty back courtyard garden, simple and easy to maintain. And that’s mostly Seth anyway. So maybe I’ll think about getting some help with it.”
“We could barter some labor for the photo shoot.”
“Hmm. Let’s see how the shoot goes. That could work all around.”
“Why don’t you come by, take a look at the garage?”
“I’ve got to get back for the dog.” Ace in the hole, she reminded herself.
“Ten minutes won’t matter. It’s basically on the way. You take a look tonight, get that sense you wanted.”
It would help, she thought. And she still had the dog for her ace in the hole. No matter how tempting, she couldn’t end up in Xander’s bed—not with a dog pining away at home.
“All right. Let’s do that.”
Of course, night had fallen so she couldn’t judge the light, but she could get a sense of the space, a feel for what she’d have to work with if she shot in their practice area.
Floodlights popped on as she pulled around back behind Xander.
She saw now he had the bays locked and secured with some sort of keypad alarm as well as the motion lights.
“I hadn’t thought about the security you’d need.”
“A lot of tools, cars, car parts, and sometimes the band equipment.”
He opened the bay door and hit the lights.
A good-sized space, she mused, stepping in. The place smelled of oil, and the concrete floor was stained with it. It held a lift, bright orange. She scanned tools: compressors, grease guns, hydraulic jacks, rolly boards, a couple of enormous tool chests—one black, one red.
Yes, she could make this work.
“Where do you set up?”
“Pretty much like we do onstage. If the weather’s good, and we start early enough, we set up outside on the pad. It’s nice.”
Maybe, but she wanted them inside, with those clashing colors, those big, bulky tools.
“I’m going to want your motorcycle in here.”
“For the shoot?”
“Yeah, maybe. I want to try that.”
And parts, she thought. An old engine would be great, maybe a broken windshield—all those spiderwebs. A steering wheel. Tires.
Yes, she could make this work.
She stepped back out, looked at the space, walked back in, studied it.
“Okay, I want some wardrobe choices—things you’re all comfortable in, but like I said, not just black. Get some ball caps, bandannas. Cowboy hat, maybe a duster. Leather. Definitely leather.”
“Okay.”
She heard the doubt in his voice and smiled. “Trust me. You’re going to like what I do here.”
But it was a big garage, and maybe there were other possibilities.
“What’s in the next bay?”
“The love of my life.”
“Is that so?”
“It is. Do you want to see her?”
“Absolutely.”
He went out, left the first bay open in case she wasn’t done, opened the next. Hit the light.
He’d heard her gasp like that before, he realized. When he’d been inside her.
“This is yours?”
“It is now.”
“You have a sixty-seven GTO convertible, in factory red.”
He stood in reverent silence for ten full seconds. “I think you have to marry me now. You’re the first woman besides Loo who’s seen her and known what she is. I’m pretty sure we’re engaged.”
“It’s beautiful.” She moved closer, skimmed her fingertips lightly over the hood. “Absolutely pristine. Did you restore it?”
“Maintain’s more like it. My grandfather bought her right off the showroom floor, treated her like a baby. The mechanic gene skipped my father, so Grandpa showed me the ropes, and when I turned twenty-one, he gave her to me.”
She reached for the door, glanced at him. “Can I?”
“Sure.”
She opened it, brushed her hand over the seat. “It still smells new. That’s some detailing. Oh, it has the push-button radio.”
“My dad talked about getting an eight-track put in, in his day. My grandfather nearly disinherited him.”
“Well, it’s blasphemy, isn’t it? Your grandfather would be pleased at how well you’ve kept it.”
“He is.”
“Oh, he’s alive?”
“And well, and living with my grandmother—well, stepgrandmother technically, but they’ve been married close to forty years—in Florida. Sanibel Island.”
“Gorgeous place.”
“How do you know about classic cars?”
“I only know some. I did a shoot—one of my first on my own. A friend of a friend of Harry’s and Seth’s.”
She circled the car as she spoke. It really was absolutely perfect. And if Xander maintained it, she imagined it ran just as beautifully.
“He had classic cars and wanted photos of them,” she continued, “inside and out. I was so nervous about the shoot, especially since I didn’t know anything about cars, especially classic cars. I got a list of the cars he had, studied them—actually had Mason quiz me. And one of them was a sixty-seven GTO—not the convertible—but factory red, like this. A beauty.”
“Want to take a ride?”
“Oh. I would.” She sighed it. “I really would, but I have to get back for the dog.”
He recognized lust, and knew how to use it.
