Trouble When You Walked In (Contemporary Romance) Page 15

  “You’re such a gentleman,” she teased him.

  “I am.” Something in him, near his heart, stirred. He was fifteen again, on a first date.

  But it wasn’t a date.

  And they were both in their thirties. Real love—the passionate, soul-wrecking kind—was for people with boundless futures. For dreamers and doers who weren’t tied down by facts, like families who needed them, jobs that were fulfilling but weren’t perfect, and towns that had grabbed hold of them long ago and demanded they never change.

  She looked down at her lap, and he shut the door. He wanted to know more about her. He could ask Nana, but he didn’t want to give her the satisfaction. He got that Nana didn’t come tonight for obvious matchmaking reasons. Older people couldn’t stand seeing two younger single people together but not together.

  He just knew that Cissie’s grandmother was back home chortling right now, and he didn’t begrudge her that—in fact, he was crazy about Nana. But he was going to go about this his own way.

  “What was it like for you, growing up in that house?” he asked Cissie on the way back up the mountain.

  “I always assumed everyone had parents like mine. There were no rules. They almost treated me like a peer.”

  “That must have been weird.”

  “I amused them—they asked me questions and laughed at all my answers. When I was a teen, they liked to engage me in big intellectual debates. They were very affectionate but only up to a certain point. Inevitably, they went back to their research and left Nana in charge of the household. And of me.”

  “Wow.” His parents were all over him, all the time. Still were.

  “Can you imagine having Nana in charge of you?” She chuckled.

  “No. I’ll bet you two got up to all kinds of mischief.”

  “Nana did. Not me. Both my parents and Nana encouraged me to be an independent thinker—but their way was through academia. Hers was all over the place … in the store, on a stage, at school. I didn’t cooperate, however.”

  “You were shy at school. You seemed to love the rules. Forgive me for saying.”

  “It’s okay. You’re right.” She smiled, but he saw some wistfulness there. “The last thing I wanted was to be Miss Independent. It was too scary. I wanted parameters that I never got. I wanted to be fenced in with all the other kids. I didn’t know how to, so I made rules and stuck to them. At least it was something.”

  He was quiet a minute. “You like being a librarian?”

  “Yes.” She sighed. “I admit that part of it is because it’s an orderly profession. There’s cataloguing. Stacks of books. Alphabetical everything.”

  “Are you OCD at all?”

  “Nope. Just neat and organized. I can walk away from a mess if there’s something better to do.”

  “Like what?”

  “Something exciting … like a great movie. Or a good book.”

  “Or a cute guy?”

  “No,” she said. “Stop teasing me.”

  “I’m not teasing. You told me about the boyfriend in college. But surely, since then…”

  “I’ve been out on the rare date. Not locally. It’s always been when I visit my college girlfriends, who sometimes set me up with their guy friends. It’s happened at a couple weddings, baptisms, and thirtieth birthday parties, too.”

  “Ever gone on one of those dating sites?”

  “No.”

  “Me, either.”

  “I have nothing against them. I know sometimes they work. But I’m not good at meeting strangers. It stresses me out.”

  “That makes sense.”

  “I know why you haven’t used those sites.”

  “Why?”

  “You don’t need to.”

  He pulled up into the shed and switched off the key. Turning to her, he placed his arm across the back of the seat. “That’s not why.”

  There was a beat of silence.

  “Will you tell me why?” she asked quietly.

  He reached out, grabbed a lock of her freshly cut hair. “No.”

  She kept her eyes on his. They were deep smoky blue pools of understanding behind those fashionable frames. But how did she know that was what he needed? Someone who understood that he just couldn’t speak about it?

  Most people would have pressed.

  She didn’t.

  The shed was warm and quiet around them. Dust motes kicked up in the beam of red-orange sunlight between two buckled wall boards behind her head. Night would fall very soon.

  He wanted to kiss her. Badly. In the light, on meadow grass, with a blue sky overhead. And in the dark, too, beneath cool sheets, their two bodies hot and melded.

  She was ripe, ready. He saw it in the way her lips were slightly parted.

  “We should go,” he said. And wanted to kick himself.

  “Yes.”

  He didn’t want to go. He only said that because he was afraid. He had no idea why. He’d never been afraid before when it came to women. But something in him said, Forget this. Stop lingering. Move on before it’s too late.

  Still, they sat.

  He pulled a little on that lock of hair framing her face and drew her closer to him until they were a nose apart. “I want to kiss you.”

  “But you’d better not,” she said softly, and pulled back an inch. “We’re political opponents.”

  He took off her glasses and put them on the dashboard. “Someday, we won’t be.”

  “True.” She looked away. “But by then, one of us will have lost. There might be hard feelings.”

  “I didn’t think of that. So we might as well go for it now.”

  She looked back at him, a delicious wrinkle on her brow. “A kiss. Anything more and we can’t be effective candidates. I’ll stay on my side and you stay on yours.”

  “Good plan.”

  She leaned forward. He met her halfway.

  The kiss was long, slow, and deep. He immediately hardened, but he forced himself to stay on his side of the seat. She tasted of sweet mint. Her mouth was a pillow—soft, warm, and inviting. He wanted to caress it with his own mouth and tongue forever.

  She whimpered. Put her hand on his neck, right above his open collar.

  “I want you,” he murmured against her mouth. “I can’t forget seeing all of you, holding you. Touching you.”

  “I can’t forget, either.” She sighed. “But we have to.”

  “I refuse to forget.” He reached out with one hand and caressed her breast. She leaned into his hand. Sighed. The kiss went on, pure erotic torture—

  She gave a little cry and wrenched away. “I can’t. If we keep going like this…” She grabbed her glasses from the dashboard and put them back on.

  He looked down. There was only maybe half a foot of space between them. “Time to go, huh?”

  “Nana will be looking for me. And I have to get these pictures emailed.” She quickly rolled up her window.

  He did the same.

  “We’re being stupid,” she said sheepishly.

  “Stupid is good sometimes.”

  She laughed, and he loved it.

  “I guess you’re forbidden fruit,” she said, “my opponent in the election. It’s all very understandable from a psychological standpoint.”

  “It’s very understandable from a guy standpoint, too,” he said. “You’re pretty. Outright sexy, actually. Of course I want to kiss you.”

  “Really?”

  “If you’d even looked at me once in high school the way you looked at me five minutes ago, I would have been knocking down your door. It’s not the new hair and the glasses. It’s you.”

  She dimpled. “Thank you.” She looked away, then back. “I’m shy except with my family and friends, like Laurie and Mrs. Hattlebury and Sally.”

  “They sure are an interesting group of friends.”

  “I know.” She gave a short laugh, opened her door, and slid out of the truck before he could get to her door and open it himself.

  “It�
��s all right,” she said, when he came around a second too late. “Sometimes a girl has to open her own door. Just to remember how nice it is when a man does it for her.”

  He shut it behind her. Pressed her up against it.

  “Damn this election.” He took off her glasses again and kissed her for all he was worth.

  One more time.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Cissie couldn’t help hoping that the whole world would notice how professional she looked and how confident she felt the day of the television interview. She arrived at the library in brand-new slim black cigarette pants, black flats, and a short zebra-striped trench coat carelessly tied over her jewel-toned turtleneck. She also carried a tote bag filled with changes of clothes.

  But when the redheaded reporter walked into the library with a posse of a cameraman, a lighting guy, and someone with a black backpack—presumably a makeup person—Cissie did a double take. This person wasn’t the redheaded reporter she’d been expecting.

  “Anne Silver?” She worked at Morning Coffee, a Sunday morning news program seen across the country. “What are you doing here?”

  Anne smiled a smile Cissie had seen hundreds of times and introduced herself. “Please call me Anne. May I call you Cissie?”

  “Sure.” Cissie couldn’t cover up her shock. “But—but you’re from a national network show.”

  Anne took her jitters in stride. “I thought they told you we were coming.”

  Cissie tried not to feel nervous, but who wouldn’t? “I assumed it was the affiliate in Asheville.”

  Anne smiled, her peach-tinted lips shining under the library’s old electric chandelier. “The Asheville station contacted us, and we thought it would make a great story for Morning Coffee.” She gazed around the room. “Your story will fit in perfectly. It’s a slice of Americana: two people running for mayor who also live in the same house.”

  Cissie didn’t want to be on national TV. She didn’t want the entire country to hear about her staying at Boone’s house. It was bad enough that their region was going to speculate about what was going on between them.

  “The real issue is so much bigger,” she said, glad she’d found her voice again. “It’s about protecting good things, like this old library, in the face of pressure to modernize all the character right out of a place.”

  “This building is charming.” Anne sounded sincere and her eyes registered genuine concern. It was how she’d gotten to be so famous. “But let’s be blunt: that fight is going on everywhere, and it will always go on. Things get old, Cissie, and we have to decide every day: should we save them—or move on? Your situation is different—quirky—because of the two players involved.”

  Cissie felt the edge of panic. “I could call someone else right now to find a new place to stay. And then your story would be meaningless.”

  “Go ahead.” Anne sounded perfectly friendly. She folded her hands, the epitome of calm. “I’ll wait.” She gave a little chuckle. “Honestly, if the story is that flimsy, we’ll fly back to New York, and we’ll tell our Asheville affiliate to be more careful screening potential stories before they call us.”

  Cissie pulled out her phone, paused, then put it away. She felt so stupid in the face of Anne’s poise. “But my grandmother likes him,” she said softly. “She has a nice, soft bed, and basically her own apartment. I’m not going to uproot her. I just don’t want to.”

  Anne’s large eyes were luminous with sympathy. “It sounds like she should stay there. But what about you? Couldn’t you move?”

  Damn these TV people. They certainly knew how to prod.

  “Of course I could,” Cissie admitted. “But families stick together.” She really meant it, too. No way was she going to leave Nana and Dexter alone in that big house, then go find a couch to sleep on somewhere else. “And—and it would be stupidly obvious why I moved, which might set even more tongues wagging.”

  Yes, it was a bonus that she was staying with an incredibly good-looking guy with amazing skills in the sex department.

  But Boone wasn’t the main thing.

  Yes, he is, an unrelenting voice in her head said. You care about Nana’s comfort, but don’t lie, don’t lie, don’t lie.…

  “I know how small towns work.” Anne shook her head slowly. “I’m from one. So I understand your plight.”

  Cissie’s hand rested on the big maple desk, the one that had been used by librarians in this building for over a hundred years. “I want to focus on the reasons I’m running for mayor,” she said. “Not my living situation. If you can’t do that, I’m sorry, but I can’t participate.”

  Anne finally looked a little worried. “Okay.” A few seconds went by as she appeared to be considering the situation. “Here’s what I propose: I promise we’ll be evenhanded. We’ll concentrate on the issues with an in-depth look at both candidates’ views. We’ll mention that you’re living together, but we’ll explain why. Please. Let’s go forward with this. You’ll be able to tell all of America why your library should be saved. They can’t vote in your election, but they can take your message back to their own communities.”

  That was a really convincing argument. “Okay,” Cissie reluctantly agreed. “I’ll do it. But I mean it, Anne. I’m counting on your promise.”

  “I assure you, I didn’t get to the network by being a shoddy reporter.”

  Cissie did feel better.

  “I want you to get excited now,” Anne said. “This’ll be fun.”

  “It will?” Cissie felt that panic again when she saw the cameraman lifting his camera to his shoulder. The lighting guy had been busy working all along, and now he was ready.

  “We’ll need to do a little touch-up first,” Anne said, and the makeup lady stepped up to do just that. “And after we capture you in your work environment, we’ll meet up with the other crew and Mayor Braddock. That’s when the interviewing will begin.”

  Cissie had this, even when Sally and Hank Davis came in five minutes later and Sally fell to the ground when she saw Anne, and Hank Davis yelled, “NASDAQ,” over and over, as loud as he could.

  Two other patrons came in a few minutes after that, the teenage girls who loved dystopian near-future young-adult fiction, Cissie explained to Anne in one, long breath. The cameraman got a great shot of Cissie stamping old-fashioned cards the girls had signed and tucking the cards into old-fashioned pockets in the backs of their books.

  The camera guy also took tons of shots of the library, both inside and out.

  Cissie felt so proud when he lingered in the archive room, where one particular letter—the one her ancestors had written about Kettle Knob’s role in the battle of King’s Mountain during the Revolutionary War—was framed on the wall.

  “So Boone’s family fought in that battle?” Anne sounded impressed.

  Cissie nodded. “And our family wrote about it and made sure we saved the account. This is it. The original.”

  “Cool.” Anne didn’t sound as impressed by the Rogers family’s feat as she did by the Braddocks’.

  Cissie was used to that. Quiet academic types were used to being overshadowed by the big, messy marauders whose accomplishments they documented. But then she had to wonder …

  “Have you met Boone yet?” she asked Anne.

  The reporter’s eyes lit up. “Oh, yes. What a fine example of a modern mountain man.”

  Cissie wanted to laugh. If Boone heard that description of himself, he would, too.

  Even so, a spark of unwanted jealousy flamed and she shoved it aside, but not before checking to see if Anne wore a wedding ring.

  She didn’t. Damn.

  Maybe it wasn’t too late to back out. “Anne?”

  “Yes?”

  The cameraman was still shooting the library—now he was focusing on the beautiful old molding on the ceiling.

  “Never mind,” Cissie said. This was her chance to show off her library, to celebrate Kettle Knob. On national TV.

  She was lucky.

&n
bsp; Really.

  * * *

  Boone wondered if he ever should have agreed to this interview. His first instinct had been to say no. But his parents had convinced him that it would be great for Kettle Knob.

  And he’d caved.

  “For corn’s sake, you’re the mayor,” his dad had said when he and his mother barged into the house at breakfast time. Every minute or two, Frank held a handkerchief to his nose to ward off the hideous possibility of cat dander. “Turn this opportunity down, and you’ll look like you’re not proud of your town.”

  Cissie was already out of the house—she’d fled before Boone could see her, but he’d heard her little crap car coughing its way down his elegant driveway. Nana was upstairs watching the Today show with Dexter.

  “If they try to make this about you and Cissie Rogers,” his mother said, “that’s your own fault. And you’ll just have to put a stop to it.” She inclined her head. “That TV upstairs sure is loud.”

  “We like Good Morning America,” his dad said.

  Of course, Braddocks and Rogerses would like different morning programs.

  But now they’d both be on the same one.

  * * *

  “We want real North Carolina,” Anne said to Cissie and Boone a little later. They’d met at the town gazebo, a perfectly nice place to conduct an interview. “Which is why we thought we’d chat about your mayor’s race here on the town square and then cut away to you four-wheeling, white-water rafting, and maybe even listening to bluegrass.”

  “You’re pulling our leg,” Boone told the cameraman. “Right?”

  The guy shrugged.

  “No,” said Anne. “There’s a bar in town—”

  “It’s called The Log Cabin.” Cissie’s face had gone white.

  Some people just didn’t like white-water rafting, and Boone figured she must be one of them. Or maybe it was four-wheeling she hated. No one could hate bluegrass. He was tempted to throw an arm over his opponent’s shoulder and pull her in for a hug, but that wouldn’t do, not with the hawk-like Anne waiting for any sign of romance between them.

  Anne stood a little taller. “You both look surprised. But our program prides itself on getting to the heart of a setting. Don’t you remember the time we interviewed the modern-day gold prospector near the rattlesnake nest in Nevada? And how about that wonderful woman in Ohio who built her own hot air balloon? We interviewed her at one thousand feet.”