Читать книгу Her Fifth Husband? - Dixie Browning, Dixie Browning - Страница 8

Distracted enough without trying to drive and eat at the same time, Jake ordered a barbecue plate to go and drove the rest of the way to Manteo, a distance of some forty miles, listening to a Molasses Creek CD and thinking about the unusual woman he’d just met.

Sasha Lasiter. It had a ring to it. He wondered if it was her real name. The first thing he’d noticed about her back at the Jamison cottage was her shape. That thing she’d been wearing when he’d tracked her down might have covered her curves, but he’d already seen ’em firsthand. The short skirt and that wispy thing she’d been wearing on top, while it was a lot more than most women wore at the beach, barely covered the essentials. His imagination had filled in the rest.

A guy didn’t see curves like that every day. Jake had heard about hourglass figures. Hers fit the description, with maybe twenty-minutes more sand in the bottom than in the top. The fact that those same generous curves extended all the way down to her ankles meant it was probably genetic and not silicon.

Damned fine genes, he mused.

The scent of barbecue drifted up to his nostrils as he crossed the Washington Baum Bridge over Roanoke Sound and headed home. He had a feeling that it might take more than ’cue and fries to satisfy him tonight. His sex life had died of neglect while he was single-handedly raising his son.

Almost as tall as he was, Jake’s wife Rosemary had been a local track star and dreamed of making the Olympic team. They’d gone to school together, K through twelve. In the tenth grade Jake had made up his mind to marry her. They’d eloped the week they’d graduated—by that time she had given up on her Olympic dreams. Neither of them had ever regretted it.

Seven years later Rosemary had been killed by a drunk driver at one of those intersections Mac had mentioned. Because of their son, Timmy, Jake had managed to hold it together—just barely. After a year or so of fighting the memories, he had rented out the house he and his wife had bought cheap, decorated on a shoestring and shared, and moved himself and his son into the other side of the duplex where his office was located.

God, how long ago had it been? Sometimes he had trouble visualizing her face. Looking at the pictures—which he hadn’t done lately—no longer seemed to help. Not that the styles back then had been all that different—blue jeans were blue jeans; shorts were shorts. But the goofy, self-conscious grins on their faces, especially after Timmy had been born seven-and-a-half months after they’d been married, were hard to relate to after all these years. There were pictures of the tree house he’d built when Timmy was six months old and of the rust bucket they’d bought as a second car and been so proud of.

Somewhere over the next dozen or so years, his memories had turned to memories of photographs instead of memories of the real thing.

“You’re getting old, man,” he muttered as he let himself into the empty duplex, dodging around a folded drop cloth and two ladders. Funny thing, though—he didn’t feel old. As tired as he was and as much as his right foot was starting to ache, he felt younger than he had in years.

Sasha woke when early sunlight slanted through the window across her pillow. Without opening her eyes she lay there for several minutes, thinking of yesterday and the color of light and shadow seen through closed eyes. Holding her breath, she waited to see if her headache was going to smite her again.

The word smite reminded her of her father, who had frequently smote with his fists, even after he’d gotten religion. It also reminded her that the church-sponsored box suppers would soon be starting up again, which steered her thoughts directly to the matchmaking game she and her friends had played for the past several years. Daisy had married and moved to Oklahoma. Marty had married, too, but still lived on Sugar Lane. Faylene, the maid they shared, was an invaluable member of the matchmakers, and the weekly box suppers were one of their favorite venues for getting two people together.

They still hadn’t found anyone for Lily, the CPA who had moved to Muddy Landing a few years ago. The yachtsman they’d tried last fall hadn’t worked out. He’d sailed away; she’d stayed put. Faylene, who cleaned for Lily, had mentioned the letters she got weekly from somewhere in California, that she always put away in a bedroom drawer instead of her desk.

Not that that meant anything, especially as Faye said the letters were written in pencil on lined paper. So maybe she had a child by a previous marriage. Or maybe a niece or nephew…

One who wrote once a week?

Sasha thought of her own nieces and nephews. She was lucky to see their signatures on the birthday and Christmas cards her sisters sent.

Rolling over onto her side, she thought about Jake Smith, wondering if he was married or otherwise involved. If not, they might want to add him to their list of candidates. Whatever else he was, he was definitely one studly hunk.

As random thoughts came and went—she was always at her most creative early in the morning—she made a mental note to check with Katie at Southern Dunes Property Management to see if there were any new cottages going up. Might as well get her bid in early.

Satisfied that her headache was gone, her sinuses no longer in rebellion, she sat up, did a few minimal exercises and headed for the shower.

Jake Smith had said he wasn’t finished with whatever it was he’d been doing in the cottage next door. Adjusting the water temperature, she wondered idly what he’d been doing when the deputy she’d called had showed up. She’d seen the two of them together just before she’d made a run for it. Whatever it was, he hadn’t been arrested, so it was probably nothing illegal, after all.

My mercy, that felt good! Hot water beat down on her shoulders, softening the muscles where stress always grabbed her. She could do with a good deep-tissue massage if she could ever find time.

He’d said he was in the security business. He’d probably been either installing a new system or repairing an old one, in which case he was probably one of those technical types who spoke a language she’d never even tried to master. She used a computer only because she had to, but she wouldn’t know a RAM from a nanny goat, a gig from a crab-net. She read instructions only when she was forced to and even then she rarely understood a word. When it came to disarming and re-arming the gizmos people used to protect their property, she usually managed to follow simple written instructions of the do-this-and-then-do-that variety, but occasionally she screwed up and had to call for help. Basically she was a big-picture woman in a small-picture world.

So he was a security man. Big deal. He and Lily would probably find loads of things in common to talk about in intricate detail.

Increasingly relaxed, Sasha worked coconut-scented, color-care shampoo through her thick, wavy hair. She was still toying with questions and answers concerning yesterday’s mini-adventure when she dried off, lotioned generously and dressed for work in a long skirt topped with a yellow T and a gauzy camisole. Her skirts were getting just a wee bit snug in the hips. Not in the waistbands—whenever she gained a pound, it went straight to her hips, never her waist or her boobs. If she’d been born a century earlier she’d have been right in style, complete with a built-in bustle.

Unfortunately, long, lean and selectively silicon-enhanced was today’s style. As she was none of the above, she was forced to make the best of what she had.

Which she did with—she hoped—style, taste and panache.

By the time she had breakfasted on a doughnut—just one, as she was dieting—and a homemade latte and gotten dressed, the temperature had climbed into the low seventies. As there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky, she put down the top on the convertible that had been her thirty-fifth birthday gift to herself. Her foundation was a high SPF, but even so she tied on a wide-brimmed hat, letting the scarf-ends trail out behind her.

Hadn’t some famous actress died that way when her scarf got tangled around a wheel? She might not have a college degree, but she prided herself on having a wealth of trivia at her fingertips.

Just past the bridge over the Currituck Sound, she stopped at her favorite coffee shop and ordered a hammerhead to go. In case her headache threatened again—and even if it didn’t—she could do with the double shot of caffeine.

Several minutes later she pulled into the paved parking area beside the Jamison cottage. A single glance told her that the parking area next door was empty. She refused to admit to being disappointed. Judging from what she knew about men—and she could have written a book on the species—the studly security man was probably still in bed.

A morning person herself, Sasha had practically been forced to pry all four of her ex-husbands out of bed. Frank had been born lazy. Barry had worked nights, which gave him a legitimate reason, she admitted reluctantly. But Rusty had simply preferred to sleep late and play late, gambling and partying till all hours, usually without her.

As for Larry, her first husband, met and married in a mad, mad weekend the month before she’d turned nineteen, she couldn’t even remember what his excuse had been, unless it was because he knew it drove her crazy. Even as a child she’d been up with the sun, bursting with energy.

The truth was that not a single man she’d made the mistake of marrying had possessed anything resembling a work ethic. Even her father, redheaded, stern-faced Addler Parrish, had sold his tobacco farm and taken up preaching.

Not that he was very good at that, either. Everyone said old Ad was mean as a snake, and she could personally vouch for that. But at least the hours suited him better, giving him plenty of time to lay down the law to his family and punish anyone who broke his rules. Which Sasha had consistently done.

She’d been plain Sally June Parrish back then. Her overworked mother had lacked the strength to defend either herself or her children from her husband’s vicious tongue, much less from his belt and his fists. As soon as Sally June could escape she’d left home and found a job stocking and clerking in a furniture dealer’s showroom. Within a few years, she began taking night classes at the community college and attending the International Furniture Market in High Point with her employer.

By that time she’d been married to Larry Combs, a Jude Law lookalike who couldn’t manage to hang on to a job for more than a few months. He’d claimed to be overqualified. What he’d been was under-motivated. Larry had been the first. Her second husband had been even better-looking, and witty, besides.

Unfortunately, he’d also been a crook.

With two brief marriages behind her, she had left the Greensboro area and started her eastward migration, eventually leaving behind two more ex-husbands. None of her marriages had provided her with what she so desperately needed—a close and loving family. And none had lasted much longer than a year. By the time she’d moved to Muddy Landing and set herself up as an interior decorator, Sally June had become Sasha. She had stuck with her fourth husband’s name because it was easier than changing everything again.

Besides, it sounded good with Sasha.

She’d chosen Muddy Landing because at the time, property in Currituck County had been comparatively cheap. That was rapidly changing as more and more of it was developed, but the location was perfect, being little more than an hour from the Norfolk shopping area and less than half that from the Outer Banks where building was booming and decorating jobs were plentiful.

That had been eleven—no, nearly thirteen years ago. Once it gathered momentum, time seemed to fly. At the age of thirty-eight, thirty-five years of which she admitted to, Sasha was single for keeps. Each time she’d married she’d been certain she’d finally found her prince.

Instead she’d found another poor jerk who thought that learning to dress and speak well would alter who he was. Underneath the designer sportswear, the fancy colognes and the rip-off Rolexes, they’d all been every bit as insecure as she had once been, the difference being that they’d lacked her guts, her brutal self-honesty and her relentless drive to succeed.

She might joke with her friends about looking for number five, but before she would ever allow herself to get involved with another man, she would let her hair go natural, dump all her makeup in the North Landing River and turn her jewelry into fishing lures.

Parked in the shade of the Jamison cottage, she sat outside for a few minutes, savoring the perfect spring weather and the last of the double-strength coffee. She should be able to wind things up here in an hour, with some time to spare.

Opening the door, she swung her legs out and sat there for a moment, savoring the relative quiet of the early morning. A week from now, traffic would have doubled and most of the cottages would be filled, but for now the quiet cul-de-sac was almost like a private retreat.

Leaving the top down, she trudged up the first flight of outside stairs, unlocked the main door and disarmed the security system. The place still smelled of stale cigarette smoke, so she left the sliding glass doors open to air it out. Mosquitoes weren’t yet a problem as they’d had a record dry spring. On the next level up, she opened another door, drawing air from below.

At least she didn’t turn the air-conditioning full blast with all the doors and windows open the way too many thoughtless tenants did.

Humming under her breath, she began double-checking the list she’d made yesterday to make sure that everything that had been lost, stolen or damaged had been replaced. The new bar stools had been delivered. She checked that off her list. Climbing to the top level, she took a good look around to confirm that she hadn’t overlooked anything. Once she was done, she slid open the glass doors on the top floor and stepped out onto the sundeck, her favorite place of all. Ignoring the spectacular view of dunes and ocean, she glanced at the cottage next door.

Not that she’d expected to see him—the parking area next door was empty. Not that she even wanted to see him, but he’d said he wasn’t finished with whatever it was he was doing over there—installing, updating or repairing a security system.

She told herself she wasn’t disappointed, and really, she wasn’t. Not for herself. But for months now she and her friends had been looking for a candidate for Lily Sullivan, the beautiful blond CPA with the sad eyes who lived a few streets over from Marty’s house. So far as anyone knew—Faylene could find out more about a person from their garbage alone than any CIA agent—Lily had no social life at all.

The trouble was that there were so few available men around—certainly none who might interest a woman who was both attractive and intelligent. The best had already been taken; the rest were too old, too young, too dull or too dumb.

Ironically, over the past couple of years it had been Daisy and Marty, two of the original matchmakers, who had skimmed the cream off the top, with Daisy marrying Kell Magee when he’d come east to check out a relative, and Marty marrying the yummy carpenter she’d hired to renovate her house.

And she wasn’t envious, she really wasn’t! As she turned to go, one of her heels slipped between two boards. Flailing her arms for balance, she grabbed at the chaise longue, which slid away from her, throwing her even more off balance. Pain shot up her left leg. Trying to catch herself as she went down on her behind, she jammed her fingers on the sun-warped deck.

“Oh, help, oh, shoot, oh, damn, damn, damn!” She rocked back and forth, clutching her ankle with one hand and waving the other hand in the air, her shoe heel still trapped in the crack between boards.

Seeing that the pink suede covering the five-inch heel was ruined, she cried out in frustration as well as pain. She’d paid dearly for these shoes, knowing that nothing flattered a woman’s legs like a good pair of spike heels. Especially a woman who had stopped growing—at least vertically—in the fifth grade. Having been told at an early age that redheads shouldn’t wear pink, she’d gone out of her way to wear something pink on every possible occasion, even if it was only pink tourmaline jewelry.

With trembling fingers, she managed to unbuckle the ankle strap, unwrap it and ease her foot from the arrow-shaped toe that looked so gorgeous she usually didn’t even notice the torture.

Oh, gross! Her ankle was already starting to look like an overstuffed sausage. Not only that, she had popped three fingernails and collected a handful of splinters that would probably give her blood poisoning. Didn’t they use arsenic to treat the lumber for these beach houses? Did that include the sundecks?

At least she managed to unfasten her gold ankle bracelet before it cut off circulation. Oh God, she was going to die right here on the top deck of an empty cottage. The sun would turn her red as a boiled crab. Her nose would blister, seagulls and ospreys would drop disgusting things on her body—

Her cell phone—she’d left it in her purse inside. If she could just get up she could use one of the plastic chairs as a walker and hop inside to call 911. Although after yesterday…

Maybe a different dispatcher would be on in the mornings.

Tears streamed down her cheeks, leaking trails of mascara through her blusher, dripping off her chin onto her Tilly MacIntire blouse. She unfastened her other shoe and tossed it aside. What good was one shoe when its mate was ruined? If it weren’t for the fact that nothing flattered a woman’s legs like putting them on a pedestal—and she was just vain enough to want every advantage she could possibly get—she’d burn the treacherous things the minute she got home.

But first she had to get there.

She was on her knees, trying to grab the leg of a chair and drag it closer when she heard someone step out onto the sundeck behind her.

“What the devil have you done to yourself?” a familiar voice boomed.

Startled, she twisted around and stared up at the voyeur—the man who had scared the wits out of her just yesterday.

Oh, please, her inner woman groaned, not like this!

“Help?” she said weakly.

By the time they were in Jake’s SUV on the way to the hospital in Nags Head, Sasha had set aside her misery to make three firm vows. First, no more five-inch heels—at least not when she was working. Second, starting now she would cut her carb count in half. No more Krispy Kremes, no more double lattes.

In other words, no more anything worth eating.

Jake had insisted on carrying her down the stairs. As her only option was bouncing on her butt all the way down, which would’ve left her rear end in the same shape as her right hand, she’d let him sweep her up into his arms. As if pain alone weren’t bad enough, the feel of being cradled against a hard, warm body had rattled her to the point that she hadn’t even argued.

She’d already forgotten the third vow, but it probably concerned steering clear of any man who could melt her resistance with no more than a growl, a glower and the way he smelled. Like soap, toothpaste and coffee, plus something earthy and essentially male.

Not to mention the fact that his touch alone was like poking her finger into a light socket.

She’d still been quivering inside when he’d settled her onto the passenger seat and arranged something to prop her foot on. He’d reached for the seatbelt and she’d brushed his hands away. “I can do it myself.”

“Then do it,” he’d snapped.

What the devil did he have to be angry about, she wondered, feeling sorry for herself and, oddly excited at the same time. She was the one with a broken ankle, not him. She was the one whose right hand was probably going to get infected and swell up and have to be amputated. Plus, she’d probably end up with blood poisoning. For all she knew she might be allergic to antibiotics. So she’d die of anaphylactic shock or whatever grisly symptoms that sort of allergy caused.

He drove fast, easing off each time he approached the stoplights so that he wouldn’t have to slam on the brakes if a light suddenly changed. Grudgingly, she appreciated it. Her ankle throbbed like a bad toothache, and she hated pain, purely hated it. Always had. A stoic, she was not.

“You all right?” he asked as they passed the Wright Brothers Memorial at Kill Devil Hill. At least he’d quit growling. In fact, he sounded almost concerned.

“No, I’m not all right, I hurt,” she snapped. Childish, but then, what did she have to lose that she hadn’t already lost? Her dignity?

Ha.

“We’ll be there in a few more minutes,” he said. “This time of year, you probably won’t have to wait. They’ll give you something for pain and then do X-rays, my guess.” He had propped her foot up on a plastic carton he’d padded with a folded shirt. She was cradling her splintery hand in her other hand on her lap. “What’s wrong, did you hurt your hand, too?” he asked.

Well, shoot. Now he even sounded sympathetic. She couldn’t handle sympathy. It had been in short supply back when she could have used it—back when she’d spent her lunch money on cheap makeup to conceal bruises inflicted by her father’s fists, only to have him accuse her of painting her face like a hussy. Which often as not earned her a few more bruises.

Jake pulled up in front of the beach hospital and said, “Wait while I go get a wheelchair.”

“Don’t be silly, I don’t need a wheelchair.” She had never even been to a hospital before, except as a visitor.

“Okay then, put your arm over my shoulder.” He leaned into the open door and eased his arm under her knees.

If she’d had a single rational thought in her head before, it was gone by the time he carried her inside. The man was definitely high-voltage.

“You’ll have to do the paper work,” he told her, “but I’ll see if I can’t speed up the process.”

Two women behind glass windows stared. Several people in the waiting room glanced up from their outdated People magazines.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, put me down,” Sasha muttered. At this rate she wouldn’t even need a doctor’s help. Being this close to Jake Smith, whoever he was—whatever he was—was distracting enough that she hardly even noticed her throbbing ankle, much less her stinging hand.

Just under two hours later an orderly wheeled her out to the waiting room. Laying aside the newspaper he’d read without retaining a single word, Jake stood to meet her. “All done?” he asked. No cast, just a wrap job, which meant a bad sprain, not a break. “What’s with the hand?” Her right hand was bandaged, all but two fingers and her thumb.

“Splinters. I lost three fingernails, too.”

His eyes widened. “Good God, that’s awful!” he swallowed hard, fighting back nausea.

“I think another one’s loose and I just had them done last week. Now I’ll have to get the whole right hand done over.” Glancing over her shoulder, she thanked the orderly. “I can make it from here just fine,” she assured him with a smile that was undiminished by chewed-off lipstick and smeared mascara.

“It’s the rules, ma’am,” the orderly said, refusing to dump her out of the wheelchair.

Jake shook his head. He crossed to the double glass doors and held it wide. “Come on, don’t be so stubborn.”

Together, the two men eased her from the wheelchair onto the front seat. Jake slipped the orderly a few bucks—didn’t know if it was proper or not, but the kid was about Timmy’s age. Might even have been a classmate.

They drove several miles in silence except for a few heavy sighs coming from the passenger side. The first time they stopped for a red light, Jake tried to get a handle on how bad she was hurting. “We’ll stop by and get your prescription filled, then we’ll cut over to the beach road and put the top up on your car. It should be all right there for a few days until you can drive.”

“Oh, wait a minute—just hold on, I’m not leaving my car unattended.”

“You feel up to driving?” He looked pointedly at her ankle, which was once again propped on the padded carton.

“It’s not a stick shift.”

“Sasha—Ms. Lasiter—look at it from my perspective. If I dump you out in Kitty Hawk, I won’t sleep a wink wondering if you made it home all right. It’d be criminal negligence at the very least if anything happened to you.” They must’ve given her something for pain. From the way she was blinking her eyes, the lady was floating around in la-la land.

“I can call a taxi.”

“That won’t help you move your car. Look, I got you safely to the hospital, didn’t I? Don’t you trust me to get you home?”

Another milepost zipped past. He turned off onto the street that dead-ended at a row of oceanfront cottages that were identical but for color and the placement of a few exterior details. Driftwinds, where she’d left her car, was the next to last one on the cul-de-sac.

“You shouldn’t have to drive me all the way to Muddy Landing.”

She was softening, he could tell. Truth was, he didn’t know why he was going to all this trouble. He should be working on the Jamison case, especially since so far his stakeout had produced zilch.

“You like barbecue?” he asked, climbing back into the SUV after pulling her car into the paved space underneath the cottage, putting the top up and locking it.

Nice wheels. The lady had good taste. He handed her the keys and backed out onto the street.

“Who doesn’t?” She was picking at the bandage on her hand, and he reached over and covered both of hers with one of his.

“Leave it alone,” he said. “Didn’t your mama ever tell you not to pick at stuff like that?”

That warranted a fleeting smile. He had a feeling she was hurting more than she wanted to let on, even after whatever they’d given her at the hospital. Which was kind of surprising, because judging by her looks alone he’d have figured her for a complainer.

Not until some ten minutes later when he came out with two barbecue plates and climbed back under the wheel did it occur to Jake that either they were going to share a late lunch or he was going to eat his share cold somewhere else. “Should I have gotten some drinks to go with it?” he asked as they rolled onto the bridge over Currituck Sound.

“I’ve got iced tea,” she said, which pretty much answered the question.

“Tea’s good.” Jake pushed in a CD and whistled under his breath, keeping time with the music with his thumb tapping against the steering wheel.

With work piling up, his home and his office in a mess and the Jamison case going nowhere, he had no business being where he was, doing what he was doing. He’d never been the impulsive type.

On the other hand, when he started something, he always liked to carry it through. In his business, following procedure was the only way to get the job done.

Oh, yeah? And what have you started this time?