Читать книгу Zoey Phillips - Judith Bowen - Страница 10

YES, ZOEY THOUGHT, leaning against the closed door after he’d gone. Yes, somehow she knew she could depend on Cameron Donnelly. Boring, steady, reliable. The kind of man you’d like on your side in a difficult situation.

Especially when you have something as difficult—ridiculous!—as rekindling a romance with his brother on your mind. Zoey moved, went to the window in time to see him cross the street and get into his truck. He didn’t glance up.

His proposition to her was probably just one more entry to be crossed off on his list this morning. If she’d said no, he’d just have moved on to his next item of business. It wasn’t as though he really thought she was perfect for Ryan, just that she was on the spot. An opportunity, that was all she was. A happy coincidence.

As she’d told the elder Mr. Donnelly, she was not on the hunt for a man to complete her life. But, on the other hand, she wasn’t averse to it either. Maybe Cameron was right. Maybe something could happen between her and Ryan.

As Elizabeth had told her point-blank a few days ago, she could do worse. She had done worse. Visions of her last boyfriend—hogging the conversation at parties, glancing in the rearview mirror to check his hair before getting out of the car—came instantly to mind. The worst of it was, she’d actually been prepared to put up with his vanity…until the day she’d caught him in flagrante delicto on his office sofa.

What did that say about her?

Ryan had been different, even at eighteen. Warm, loving, friendly. Considerate. And if it hadn’t been real love back then, it had sure felt like real love.

She remembered the agony when she’d first fallen for him, when he didn’t even know she existed. Then the utter delight that he’d chosen her—her!—to make Adele jealous and the overwhelming despair when he stopped calling. Endless tearful sessions with Mary Ellen, the quiet soothing voice of her mother, telling her not to take on so, there were as many men as there were fish in the sea. She remembered screaming that she didn’t want fish in the sea, she wanted Ryan Donnelly!

She’d never thought of looking him up again until that conversation at the Jasper Park Lodge last spring. But Mary Ellen’s invitation to return to Stoney Creek meant their paths were bound to cross. Fate? Maybe. Stranger things had happened.

If there was still a romantic spark that could be fanned to life, as Ryan’s brother seemed to think—who was she to take the high road?

They were all adults now, as Cameron had reminded her. Not teens anymore, wearing their hearts on their sleeves. Pursuing a flirtation with Ryan would be fun, she decided suddenly—fun and not terribly risky at all. Regardless of what came of it, no one would get hurt.

Either way, wouldn’t it be a knock-out story to take back to the Jasper Park Lodge reunion next year?

WITH THE VISIT from Cameron Donnelly, plus her determination to get through the first chapter of the Chinchilla manuscript, Zoey missed lunch entirely. At two o’clock, she decided to take a break and drive out to Edith Owen’s place, three miles outside town along the river. She grabbed a sandwich from a takeout deli and drove with the radio turned up full blast, singing along to Nellie Furtado as she drove.

Edith lived in a double-wide trailer on a big open lot. There used to be a small three-room log house in that location, long since demolished, where Mary Ellen had lived as a child. Widowed twelve years earlier, Edith Owen was remarrying, a surprise romance with her neighbor, a retired army man, according to Mary Ellen, a tireless fisherman and a lifelong bachelor.

Edith wanted a quiet civil ceremony and had no idea that Mary Ellen was planning a big party for the whole town. Zoey was going to help with the planning and, most importantly, bake the wedding cake. Call-a-Girl had catered a number of small weddings, and Zoey had helped Lydia with the cakes many times. She’d never made one entirely on her own, and was a little nervous at the prospect.

Zoey was dying to meet Tom Bennett, Edith’s fiancé. He must be quite a man, Zoey thought, knowing how madly in love Edith had been with Mary Ellen’s father. And what had entered a long-term bachelor’s mind to change his circumstances at this time in life? she wondered. Mary Ellen’s stepmother was in her mid-fifties, and Zoey guessed Tom Bennett must be of a similar age. Plus, Edith was wheelchair-bound most of the time these days, suffering from spinal stenosis, a crippling long-term spinal condition.

True love. Must be. You never knew where it would show up, she thought, signaling for the turnoff that led to the Owens’ place. Tom and Edith or—look at her. Who’d have guessed she’d even contemplate blowing on the embers of her long-ago romance with Ryan Donnelly?

Edith’s yard was tidy but plain, no flower beds or any kind of landscaping that took extra attention. At this time of year, the grass was brown, with occasional patches of snow under the trees and in dips and hollows, all that remained after the last snowfall, a week ago, Elizabeth had told her. The trees were bare.

Because of her condition, Edith relied on her neighbors for help. Tom Bennett, who lived in a small house nearby, had kept her lawns mowed and her table sup plied with trout, as well as vegetables from his small garden. In the fall, Mary Ellen said, he brought her fresh game for her freezer.

“Hi!” Zoey got out of the car and locked it. Mary Ellen was standing by the frame porch, holding an armload of firewood.

“This is a nice surprise!” Mary Ellen called. “Come in. Edith just put on the kettle for a pot of tea. She’ll be delighted to see you.”

Zoey followed her. The porch door opened directly onto the kitchen, a warm and welcoming room, with two cats sleeping in a tumble on an upholstered rocker. The furnishings were simple and the tiled floor was spotlessly clean.

“Zoey!” Edith held up both arms and Zoey hugged her. Zoey thought she’d lost quite a lot of weight since she’d seen her last, which had to be when she and Mary Ellen were still in high school.

“How lovely to see you, Edith!”

“Sit down. Have a cup of tea.”

Zoey sat as Edith busied herself in the kitchen, pouring the tea and getting milk out of the refrigerator. She was very adept at moving her chair around. Zoey noted the collection of framed photographs on the wall—landscapes and family pictures, including the wedding photo of Edith and Morris Owen, Mary Ellen’s father. Edith had always been an avid amateur photographer when finances permitted.

“Congratulations on your engagement, Edith. I’m so pleased for you.”

She blushed prettily. “Oh, some say I’m too old for this. But Tom and I will be very happy, I know. He’s a very fine man.”

Morris Owen had been killed in a logging accident. Zoey remembered the horrifying news as it spread through town, into the high school where a teacher had beckoned Mary Ellen from the cafeteria to the principal’s office so he could break the news privately.

Mary Ellen had been devastated. Her father had raised her on his own until he’d met Edith Lowry, a thin, pale woman a little older than he was and originally from Vancouver, working in the Stoney Creek Rexall Drugs. They’d been happily married for four years, and all the while, Edith’s condition had gradually sapped her strength. After her husband’s death, Edith had eked out a living making and selling handicrafts, working for telemarketers from her home and spending her husband’s Worker’s Compensation settlement, penny by frugal penny. Somehow, she’d managed to finish raising his daughter, to arrange for Mary Ellen’s education and to keep her house and property.

Mary Ellen loved Edith like the mother she couldn’t remember. More than anything, Zoey knew, Mary Ellen wanted to give her stepmother a wonderful wedding.

“You find a place yet, Zoey?” Mary Ellen called from the living room, where she’d dumped her load of firewood by the fireplace. She joined them at the kitchen table.

“Well, sort of. You’ll never guess who made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.” Zoey stirred her tea vigorously.

Mary Ellen shook her head. “No idea.”

“Cameron Donnelly! He says they’ve got an apartment out there built over a garage or something, and I can stay in it while I’m here.”

Mary Ellen had looked a little startled at her announcement. “You’re going to take it?”

Zoey stared at her. “Of course I am!” She reached for a cookie on the plate that Edith had shoved across the table. “It’s perfect. I can work on my book in peace and—” she winked at Mary Ellen “—who knows?” She hummed a few bars of “Young Love.”

Mary Ellen didn’t say anything. After a few seconds, she looked directly at Zoey. “You don’t mean, you know—you and Ryan again?”

“Hey, I’m just joking. What’s past is past and a good thing, too.”

“Amen,” Edith said quietly. “More tea?”

Zoey refused, and half an hour later, said goodbye. She’d wanted to see Edith and let Mary Ellen know where she’d be for the next little while, but she was anxious to return to the hotel and get herself organized for moving out to the Donnelly ranch. It wasn’t as though she and Mary Ellen could toss around any ideas for the wedding, not while Edith was right there.

On the way back to town, Zoey pondered her friend’s response to the news that she was going to be staying on the Donnelly ranch. Mary Ellen hadn’t seemed too thrilled. The more she thought about it, though, the more she realized that Mary Ellen was only thinking of Zoey’s welfare, worried she’d get upset about Ryan again. Zoey had been all primed to confess that she did have an ulterior motive in moving to the ranch. But, no, Elizabeth was the one to tell if Zoey really felt the need to confide. Elizabeth wouldn’t take everything so seriously, the way Mary Ellen might.

Mary Ellen was too sweet and sensitive. Too softhearted. Zoey recalled how horrified she’d been at the story Elizabeth had told about Adele dumping Ryan at the altar and was doubly glad she hadn’t spilled the beans about what she had in mind.

No, Mary Ellen would just worry and she had enough on her hands with Edith’s wedding coming up.

ZOEY WAS PACKED and ready to leave by noon the next day. She went down to check out and retrieve a trolley for her bags. Cameron was in the lobby, reading a newspaper.

As dependable as he’d promised, she thought with a smile. She paid for her room and started back to the elevator with the trolley, assuming he hadn’t seen her, when she heard a man clear his throat behind her. She half turned.

“Here. Let me take that.” Cameron reached for the trolley.

“I’m fine! I can bring down my stuff,” Zoey protested.

“I’ll give you a hand.” He strode down the hall beside her and they got into the elevator with the trolley. It made for close quarters. Frowning, he watched the lights on the ancient elevator as it laboriously ground its way up to the third floor.

Zoey eyed him sideways, wondering if she was making the right decision. Several weeks on a remote ranch with a high-school crush who hadn’t even remembered her at first, a surly brother with matchmaking on his mind, a widowed aunt who was probably going to talk her ear off and a kid she knew nothing about.

She must be insane.

She unlocked the door to her room, relieved that Cameron didn’t try to take the key and open it for her. On the third try, it meshed.

“That’s all you have?” Cameron surveyed the room quickly. She had the distinct impression that he was trying very hard not to glance at the fly-spotted mirror on the ceiling. So was she.

“Yes. I travel light.” She reached for the blue case that held the Chinchilla manuscript and her laptop. She’d carry that herself.

Cameron loaded her three bags onto the trolley, and as soon as they arrived back in the lobby, he strode ahead of her to the hotel doors. He hadn’t said a word in the elevator. Yesterday must have been a real stretch for him, convincing her to cooperate with his plan.

Maybe his talents—like hers, she sometimes thought—ran more to scheming than talking.

Well, how could she help it? Much of her working life was spent trying to figure out plot twists and tangles in Jamie Chinchilla mystery-thrillers. So far, she’d never thought of this as a particular talent that she could apply to life, but this Romancing Ryan plot of Cameron’s had definitely fired her imagination.

“Cameron?” she called when they reached the parking lot.

“Yes?” He was about to toss her bags into the back of his dark green pickup.

“I’ve got my own car,” she reminded him, indicating the white rental Toyota sedan a few spaces away from his truck. “I’ll follow you, okay?”

He nodded and carried her bags to the car and stood patiently while she fiddled with her keys, trying to open the trunk. Eventually it sprang open and he loaded her bags.

She closed the trunk, then turned to him. “Look, is there something I should know?”

He seemed startled. “Like what?”

“Well, you’re awfully quiet today. I get the impression you’re not as happy about this plan today as you were yesterday but you’re too polite to say so. Don’t feel obliged. We can drop the whole thing if you like—”

“Is that what you want to do?”

Did she? She dug in her handbag for her sunglasses, mulling over the difficulties of going to the Nugents for a few days and still having to look for a more suitable place. “No, I’m game. I’ve got quite a bit of work and I need a place to do it in.”

“Let’s go then.”

Cameron started his engine and immediately re versed. Zoey started the Toyota and decided to give it a minute or two to warm up. She never drove in Toronto, although she’d maintained her driver’s license over the years, and couldn’t remember if you were supposed to warm up a car or not. It couldn’t hurt. Plus, it wouldn’t kill Cameron Donnelly to wait.

Which he did. He was waiting for her at the en trance to the parking lot. She rigorously observed the speed limit as they set out in tandem. When she dropped behind, he slowed. Zoey suspected he’d prefer to go faster. But that was okay, too, she told herself, smiling just a little.

It was clear that Cameron Donnelly was used to taking charge. He ran his ranch and organized his own life and his child’s life and probably Marty’s life. Now he was shopping for a romance for his brother. Well, he couldn’t find out any earlier that she wasn’t all that manageable. In fact, she knew she could be ornery as hell at times, something she wasn’t exactly proud of.

But she was her own woman, with her own ideas and her own agenda. If she hadn’t been, she wouldn’t have gotten as far as she had in life.

And that she was proud of.