women who do. Go marry one of them. Heck, marry Susan. Oh, sorry. I forgot she’s already married.” She laid the handset gently back into its cradle.
Seth had heard all of that—at least her side of it—but when she turned to look at him he was bent over Peony with his back to her. Trying to act innocent. Discreet. Pretty silly for a guy his size, but she appreciated his attempt.
She’d managed to sound calm—well, calmish—with Trip, although she felt anything but. Her heart was beating like Carlos Santana’s rhythm section, sweat slid down her back between her shoulder blades, and when she looked at her fingers, her whole hand was shaking. Her face was probably the color of cherry cough drops.
God, she hated confrontations. She wouldn’t recover for a week. Everybody thought she was so tough, when inside she was made of pure marshmallow. By the time Trip got his story straight, the whole breakup would’ve been his idea. Because she’d failed to live up to his exacting specifications. Because she’d abandoned him when he needed her.
She could hear her father’s voice in her head. “I warned you he wasn’t good enough for you.” Actually, he’d mostly been on Trip’s side.
Her father had started denigrating her boyfriends in high school and kept on until she dreaded introducing him to her dates. Her real worry was that she wasn’t good enough for them. They’d catch on. Better be the dumper rather than the dumpee. So she usually dumped first.
How come one woman was never enough for one man? How come she wasn’t enough for Trip?
The answer came roaring back in her head. Because I couldn’t take the chance of letting him know the real me. The one who’s scared to fail.
Trip was supposed to be different. This time she’d planned to marry for all the sensible reasons. On paper she and Trip were perfect for each other. She didn’t have a clue whether love even existed, and lots of doubts that it would ever exist for her. She’d convinced herself she was in love with Trip. Obviously, she didn’t break his heart. He was probably already setting up a date with her successor.
She went back to the pantry floor beside Seth. “You’re a mess.”
“More on me than in them,” he said. “I’m sticky as a bear in a honey tree. I think you can drop the feedings to every six hours with the food we added to the milk.”
“Really? Does that mean I can sleep?”
“Sleep? I’ve heard that word a time or two. Not sure what it means.” He stood up and slipped Peony back into her nest.
Emma didn’t take his proffered hand to stand up this time. “There’s another word I’ve heard, but not recently. Food? You ever hear of that?” She grinned up at him. “I went to the grocery store between feedings this afternoon. I have lots of bacon, plenty of eggs and enough onions for a Western omelet. Plus I bought some artisan bread. And beer. I don’t drink it, but I thought you might.”
He followed her into what passed for a kitchen. “At this point I’d fight Peony for her dog food. Don’t tell me you can cook. Girl like you?”
“What’s that supposed to mean? I grew up with hot and cold running servants? Here.” She tossed him a big Vidalia onion. “Peel and chop this. You do the crying for a change.”
An hour later as he finished his fourth piece of buttered toast, he said, “Okay, so you can cook.”
“Very limited menu. And you can eat.”
“Big engines require a lot of fuel. So, who’s this guy Trip you don’t like?”
She took a deep breath. To tell him or not? Oh, why not? It wasn’t a secret. Not at home, in any case. “A rich, handsome corporate lawyer on the fast track to being named partner. Just not mine. He’s got political aspirations, too. Going to put his name in the race for State senator, maybe eventually governor. Let’s drop it, okay? I cook, you clean.”
“What? No dessert?”
“You’re kidding, right? All you have to do is rinse and load the dishwasher. It may be the world’s smallest and oldest, but it works.”
As she was scrubbing the kitchen table, she said, “I wish you’d known my aunt Martha. I used to spend my summers up here with her. I loved this place.”
“From what I hear, I wish I’d known her, too. Barbara said she was a great gal. After she died, how come you didn’t come up here before now?”
“My stepmother and I came up to deal with the estate and the papers and things right after. She left me everything, but there wasn’t much actual income to fix the place up, and I didn’t have any disposable income myself. Plus I was at a place in my life where I didn’t know what I wanted to do with the house. She already rented it out, so that’s what I did. I hired an agent who handles it all. When the last tenants—the Mulligans—left six months ago, I missed the little bit of income they brought me, but I figured sooner or later I’d get a new tenant. I was looking for somebody who might want to barter upkeep for rent. Karma, I guess. It hit me when I got fired and unengaged practically the same day that I needed a sanctuary. And thanks to Aunt Martha’s kindness, I had one.” She glanced around the shabby room. “This, however, needs help.”
“Not to mention the skunks.”
She leaned back against the table. “I don’t want you to think I’m ungrateful, but aren’t you going to get in trouble over my skunks?”
“You shouldn’t think of them as your skunks, or you’ll hate letting them go even more. Yes, I can get into trouble, but if we return them to the wild before somebody reports them, I can ask forgiveness.”
“As opposed to permission?”
He rinsed out the sink and hung the dish towel on its hook. And yawned. “Sorry.”
“Go home. Go to bed.”
She followed him to the front door.
“Don’t forget. We meet in the morning at the Farmers’ Co-op.”
She nodded.
He turned, took one step, swung back and reached for her.
* * *
JUST A “meet the new neighbor kiss.”
Maybe it started that way, but it got out of hand—fast. She wasn’t used to being lifted off her feet. When he wrapped his arms around her, she felt as if she were being hugged by that bear in the honey tree.
He tasted of the fig preserves they’d used on their toast, and when their tongues met and teased, her head seemed to lift free of her body.
He set her down, let her go, wheeled around and almost ran across the street. Thank God there was no traffic, because he hadn’t checked either direction, just barreled on inside his house.
She leaned against the wall beside her front door and tried to catch her breath. One kiss, and she could feel her nipples harden.
She hoped he didn’t regret it. She didn’t. Or did she?
Talk about your rebound! The last thing she wanted in her life right now was another man—any man. Certainly not this big, powerful, difficult man who would not be manipulated. Even if she was any good at manipulation. Which she wasn’t.
She’d sworn off the entire sex for the foreseeable future. Maybe forever.
So far, she’d done all right convincing him to help keep her skunk babies safe, but that was only because he had a soft spot for small animals. He could always revert to being Mr. Regulation and take them away from her.
She needed to keep him on her side, but there were limits as to how far she’d go to manage that. On a lifestyle compatibility scale of one to ten—ten being the most compatible—the two of them were about minus a thousand. If her father thought Trip was barely good enough for her, he’d flip out