A Charmed Place (30 page)

"Up, standing, call it what you like," he quipped. "I saw you moving around at the window. How's everything in your neck of the woods?"

"Oh-h-h, you'd be surprised, I think."

"Can't talk?"

"Not about that. Oh, but I can tell you that Detective Bailey called. Why didn't you tell me you'd contacted him?" she asked.

"For one thing, I thought he might just blow off my suggestion," Dan admitted. "But he didn't; he actually ran the plates again and then called me back to thank me. I was impressed. He's a good man."

"Funny, I just heard that expression used about you," she murmured, twisting the phone cord absently around her finger. She wandered back to the window above the sink and gazed out at the lighthouse. So close. So far.

Dan's voice became huskier. "Maddie, I wanted you in my bed when I woke up just now. I wanted you big time. This is crazy. We should be together now. When can I see you? Find an excuse. Use the sugar excuse. That one works."

She laughed, giddy and confident and in love. She wanted to tease him, to talk dirty, to make him climb the walls of the lighthouse with frustration.

And only then show up with the empty sugarbowl in her hand. "That's not a bad idea. I may
do
it," she said cryptically. She glanced over her shoulder. Claire, considerate Claire, was trying to top off her tea and get out of the kitchen as fast as she could.

"Oh, hell!" Dan said suddenly. "I see Norah and Joan driving up to your house. Don't let 'em in, don't let 'em in; you'll never get rid of 'em. Oh, God, I can't believe this," he said with a groan. "I may as well be in love with the old woman who lived in a shoe."

Maddie skipped right over the old woman part of his sentence and homed in on the "in love with" part. "You haven't told me that lately," she murmured.

There was a pause.

"I haven't said I love you? There's something drastically screwed up about this courtship, in that case. If we could just—I love you, dammit—if we could just get past all the friends and worthy causes and wounded creatures and mothers and daughters, not to mention the ex-husbands and dogged detectives and
... Maddie, this is nuts! I love you, for God's sake. I've loved you for twenty years. When do we get to go out on our first freaking date?''

Car horn beeping, doors s
lamming, Norah calling out hel
los all over the place, Joan and Claire in happy talk about babies and big bellies—
Rosedale
had suddenly turned into a noisy madhouse and a perfect example of what Dan meant. And meanwhile Tracey was hiding in the garden, mulling over Maddie's explanation, and Sarah was hiding in
Sudbury
, hoping to avoid Maddie's explanation, and Maddie still didn't have a clue where the godforsaken address book was. Dan was right: Maddie
did
live in a shoe.

Still clutching the phone as Dan tried to nail down a time when they could meet, Maddie took the yellow bag of Domino sugar out of the cupboard above the stove and threw it in back of the one above the fridge, then emptied the sugar bowl into the garbage can and put the empty bowl on the table just in time to wave hi to Norah and Joan.

She turned her back to them and whispered, "Dan? Ten minutes," then swung around, hung up the phone, and smiled radiantly at her impromptu visitors.

Norah, dressed in a black T-shirt and form-fitting pants and decked out in clunky gold jewe
lry, said, ''Joannie wanted to
go out for supper and we decided to shanghai you into coming along. You too, Claire. Come on; it'll be fun to get away from George for a couple of hours."

But Joan lifted her nose and sniffed the air. "We're too late; their dinner's in the oven."

Norah said, "For goodness' sake, Joan, it's a roast, not a soufflé; it'll keep for sandwiches."
"It might be an expensive cut," Joan argued.

"What difference does
it make?" said Norah exasperat
edly. "The point is to go out and have a good time."

"You're welcome to join us," said Claire. "There's plenty of food."

"Oh, but if they want to go out and have a good time.
..." Maddie argued.

"We can have a good time here," Joan said in an oddly poignant voice. "It's cozy. I like Maddie's kitchen."

"No, this is entirely too
... domestic," said Norah, looking around her with a visible shudder. She frowned fiercely at Maddie, apparently trying to send her a signal of some kind. "Besides, George will be here. He's a male. It alters the chemistry."

Claire explained that her husband wouldn't be back until the next day, at which point Tracey came in and was apprehended by Norah, who tried to make her join them too. Tracey seemed horrified by the thought, which prompted her Aunt Claire to begin nudging Maddie out the door with assurances that Tracey would be perfectly fine staying home with her. Tracey said quickly, "That's a good idea, Mom. You go." And Norah said, "Finally! It's all settled. Maddie, put on some lipstick. Are you wearing that dress?"

The plan was
not
going according to plan.

In desperation Maddie blurted, "Wait! We're out of sugar!" and grabbed the bowl from the table. "I'll just go borrow some and then I'll feel better about leaving poor Claire in the lurch. I'll be right back."

"Maddie, don't be silly. I don't need any—"

Too late. Maddie was out the door and in her car, fleeing like an escaped convict, feeling terrified and exhilarated at the same time.

She had to see him, had to. If she didn't see him, hold him, hear him, she would go absolutely mad. She was wild, she was crazy—she was compensating for a lifetime of doing the right thing.

I did it!
she realized as the lighthouse hove into view. She brought the Taurus to a skidding halt and jumped out, leaving the engine running and the car door open.

Dan must have been watching her getaway attempt. He was standing in the open doorway with a look on his face that was half amused, half amazed.

"Inside, inside!" she urged him, waving the sugar bowl as she rushed past him. "I only have two minutes!"

Grinning, he closed the door behind them, then took the bowl out of her hand and slapped it down on the hall table. "Two should do it," he said, taking her in his arms and giving her a kiss that she felt down to her toes.

"Oh, criminy," she whimpered, "oh, I love you, Dan; I can't go without you anymore." She returned kiss for kiss, moan for moan: both of them were breathless, frustrated, hot.

"No need
... no need
... to go without, love," he muttered distractedly. He hiked her dress up over her waist and tore at her underpants. "Two minutes
... y
e
gods
..."

He glanced around and said, "Couch!"

"Yes!" she said, holding her dress up and making a run for it. She pulled off her pants, then lay on the sofa, feeling scratchy polyester under her buns as she waited the few quick seconds it took for Dan to shuck his trousers and shorts.

He dropped on top of her,
slipping
into her at the same time that he kissed her savagely. She lifted herself toward him in a fierce lunge, causing herself pain, reveling in the sheer brute rawness of it. No foreplay here; it was sex on the run, quick, fast, wet—an act of primal mating, over as soon as begun, and it left them both panting and stunned.

In a husky, breathless voice he said in her ear, "Next time
... a bed, by God."

"Yes, next time," she said, wiggling out from under him, still dizzy from her orgasm. He hopped out of her way and she slid her underpants back on, then shimmied her dress back down and raked her hands through her unstyled hair.

"How do I look?" she asked, aware that it couldn't be good.

Dan just stood there, with an odd, strained look on his face.

"That bad?" she asked, embarrassed.

"Oh, my darling," he said, coming close and cradling her face in the palms of his hands. "Like a dream version of my recurring dream. I love you so very much."

He kissed her in a gentle, touching way, sending new shivers all through her, or maybe just keeping the old ones going. The desire to stay with him was so strong that Maddie scarcely heard the blaring horn of Norah's Mercedes, urging her back to
Rosedale
.

"I have to go," she moaned.

"Tell your family about us, then; tell them," he said as they walked to the front door together. He opened it and she stepped outside.

"It turns out I won't have to tell them," she admitted, trying to sound offhand about it. "The lady with the two terriers? She turned out to be Lillian Lebonowicz, a countess, no less, and a friend of my mother's. We've been outed."

She saw the frustration in his eyes turn to something else. Relief? "Oh boy. What did your mother say about that?"

"Not a whole lot. She's in
Sudbury
now, giving me the Amish treatment."

He shook his head and said, "That's too bad. What about the rest of your family?"

"Well, George was more than willing to drive my mother back to
Sudbury
. I'm taking that as a nay vote. As for Claire—Claire's like
Switzerland
. She sympathizes, but would never take a stand one way or the other."

"Tracey?''

Maddie winced and said, "I might be making some progress there, but it doesn't feel quite right. Well, thanks for the—"

"Shit! The sugar!" he said, grabbing the bowl and handing it to her.

Between them, she was the one with the presence of mind to notice that the bowl was still empty.

"Oh, geez," he said, taking it back from her. "Pray no one's watching this fiasco," he said on his way to the kitchen.

"Trust me, they're watching," she yelled after him.

He came back, after a too-long absence, with the bowl only a
quarter
full. "I had to empty some packets of Equal I found in the cupboard. I think my sister left them here, so they shouldn't be too old."

Maddie rolled her eyes and said, "This'd be funny if it weren't so pathetic."

"We're
pathetic, Maddie," he said, his cheeks flushing with the realization. "Maybe I should ju
st have it out once and for all w
ith your family."

"Don't do that," she said quickly. "I'd be so humiliated. I'm not a child, Dan; you have to let me handle this. One way or another, they now understand what you mean to me. And if my mother and brother don't accept that—so be it," she said stoically.

She searched his face for understanding. Except for a sister, he had no family of his own. Did he grasp what she was prepared to give up for him? Christmases and Easters and birthdays and babies, and all the joys and sorrows and history that bound a family together?

"I know," he whispered, answering her thoughts. "I know, and I love you the more for it. Call me when you can. I love you, Maddie. Keep me in your heart this time."

It was a plea, a scolding, a threat—it was all those things, and more. She gave him a sad, sweet smile and said, "This time, I will."

She turned and ran back to her car, its door wide open, its engine still running.

****

For all her reluctance, Maddie was glad she'd followed Norah's signal and let herself be hauled off to the restaurant, because as it turned out, Norah had found Joan in a deep melancholy when she dropped in on her that afternoon. Getting Joan out of the house had been the only solution that Norah could think of, but having her spend the evening in Maddie's cozy, sweet kitchen didn't seem like the right antidote.

So, voila: dinner at the Pink Fancy, a New England restaurant with a funky
Caribbean
decor. You couldn't help but smile at the over-the-top dec
orations, and that had been No
rah's brilliant intention from the start. Fake palms, dried coconuts, fishing nets strung across the ceiling, posters of Bob Marley and Jimmy Cliff, stuffed parrots, tanks of live tropical fish for viewing and live lobsters for eating, and a steel-drum band that insisted on playing "Yellow Bird" every third song, gave the place a charmingly hokey air. Not only that, but the food was supposed to be good.

They had settled in with their drinks when Joan excused herself to go to the ladies' room.

"I don't get it," Maddie said as soon as Joan was out of earshot. "She was in a fine mood when I saw her last."

"She's sick of being alone, that's all," said Norah with a shrug. "Personally, I think she should adopt."

"That's one solution," Maddie said, taken aback.

"Or maybe she just needs more sex."

"And there's another."

"Speaking of which—how was your quickie?"

Yipes!

Maddie said primly, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"It's a sin to tell a lie, darling. When you came back to the house from Dan's, you had a certain glow. I know it when I see it."