Honey and Smoke (4 page)

She’d moved here a month ago, buying the old family home and fifty acres of meadow and woodland along with it. She’d grown up in Atlanta—her father, John Quint, had left Webster Springs as a young man and made a fortune in the Atlanta real estate market.

She was an award-winning barbecue caterer, and she was going to continue that business as well as run her restaurant in town. She was eight years younger than he, definitely single, and she lived alone—except for the stealth cat—in her ramshackle new home.

Max drew his attention away from her as Scarlett and Rhett reached the end of the aisle and stopped, their hands clasped together tightly, their young faces shining with a mixture of anticipation and awkwardness. Norma hit the last notes of the wedding march, then sat with her dark hands folded patiently on the lap of her blue woolen dress, a solemn expression on her face.

Max married the couple with style, embellishing the official wording of the legal language with some quotes from Oriental philosophy he’d picked up during an assignment in Japan. He suppressed a yawn as he talked about blooming together in perfect harmony. He was proud of his wit. By merely changing the lotus-blossom
references to dogwood blossoms, he gave the quotes a southern flavor.

The couple exchanged rings, smiled tearfully at each other, and kissed for about five minutes after he pronounced them husband and wife. Max glanced over their heads at Betty Quint and found a pensive, unguarded expression on her face. She was watching Scarlett and Rhett, her head tilted to one side, her mouth set in a sad bow.

Her sentimental attitude puzzled Max. He wondered if she’d been married once and was musing over unhappy memories. Or that maybe she found it sad to watch two fresh-faced youngsters throw themselves into a partnership that would probably fall apart when they matured.

But when the pair tromped back down the aisle to the accompaniment of Norma’s organ music, Betty Quint bounded up and opened the parlor doors for them, then stood aside and smiled at them as they went into the anteroom.

Max stared a moment, then regained his concentration. “There will be a brief reception,” he told the couple’s friends. “Please follow the bride and groom to the After—To the reception room to the right.”

As the guests hurried out Max continued to watch Betty Quint. His concentration was still muddled—he’d almost called the reception room by his private name for it. The Aftershock Bunker.

“Nice job,” Norma allowed to Max. She turned her stout frame on the organ bench and smiled mischievously at Betty Quint. “Come on in, Betty. You interested in making an appointment?”

Max watched with fascination as Betty blinked tears away, straightened, and became neutral again. She smiled at Norma. “I’m just an innocent spectator. I had to see this for myself. I hope you don’t mind.” Her gaze switched to Max. “I considered the mushroom basket a kind of invitation.”

“Glad to have you.” He nodded and stepped down off
the platform as she walked up the aisle. There was something compelling about the structured man-meeting-woman design of the aisle; he felt as if she were being directed to him, and he found himself unable to look away from her somber gray eyes.

“What did you think?” he asked bluntly. She came to a stop and stood looking up at him with intense scrutiny, as if trying to read his mind.

“I think you don’t take your position very seriously. You’re encouraging people to make fun of a very profound moment in their lives.” She glanced at Norma. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Bishop. Don’t hold this against me when my business license comes up for renewal before the City council.”

Norma, who had served on the town council for two decades, dismissed the worry with a gracious wave of one hand. “This kind of wedding isn’t for everyone. But married is married. Those that are gonna make it will make it no matter what kind of ceremony they have.”

“That’s right,” Max added, feeling a little annoyed. The Hitching Post was a longtime local tradition. The chamber of commerce had
asked
him to reopen it. It drew tourists, who came to snap pictures in front of the tiny old Victorian house with its sweeping water oaks and the aging sign that flashed “Get Hitched” in red neon over the front-porch steps.

“You might be interested to know that I don’t own this place. Norma does,” he told Betty Quint. “My father willed it to her.”

“If you want to see some
real
strange things, stay around tonight and watch a medieval wedding,” Norma added. “Sometimes the groom trips over his armor.”

Max stepped a little closer to Betty, pushing a little, testing the waters. He’d never wanted to test the waters so badly in his life, he realized. “Why don’t you stay and watch? I’m doing three more ceremonies tonight, but I’ll be finished by nine. Then we could go over to the steak house and have a late dinner.”

Betty Quint’s complexion was Irish cream, and exasperation showed in it easily. “No, thank you. I just wanted you to know that the mushroom basket was a nice gesture, your apology is
definitely
accepted, and the incident is closed.”

Max took another step. “Then why not have dinner with me?”

Norma rose from her bench and said diplomatically, “I better go see about keeping Scarlett and Rhett on schedule. You hustle on over to the reception before long, Maximilian, and let’s sign their certificate.”

“Yes, ma’am. I’ll be there in a second.”

“Nice to see you again, Mrs. Bishop,” Betty said politely. “I want to come by when you have more time. I hear you have some pretty queen-size quilts for sale.”

“Always do. And you’re always welcome. I’m always here. Upstairs.” Norma left the parlor with a spry, forceful gate, her heavy arms pumping.

“Nice lady,” Betty noted. She took a step back from Max. “She seems to have a way with you. Remarkable.”

“She’s the heart of this place. She keeps the appointment books, takes care of the costumes, orders me around like a sergeant at boot camp. I grew up being best friends with her son, and we joined the marines together. He was killed in Vietnam. She and I sort of adopted each other after that.” Max leaned toward her. “But enough chitchat. You smell wonderful. Tangy.”

“I’ve been making barbecue sauce.”

“Mmmm. I’m a rib man.” He let his gaze travel down her chest, then back up.

“Mine are hickory smoked.”

“Must have been painful.”

She was breathing a little too fast now, and he liked the way her nostrils flared a bit each time she inhaled. She frowned at him. “My restaurant will open soon. Chicken, pork, and beef barbecue. Chopped or sliced. Sandwiches or plates. Eat-in or carry-out. Stop by on the first day. I’ll be giving away free samples.”

“I like free samples.”

“I bet.”

He grasped his chest woefully. “You don’t approve of me.”

“Not since you invaded my cave and mashed my face into mushrooms and manure.”

“I admit, it’s not the usual way I’d want to meet a woman. But I don’t think you’re my usual kind of woman.”

“Oh? You mean because I don’t wear leather underwear or have skulls tattooed on my forearms?”

He laughed, liking the way her eyes never left him despite her anger. “First of all, because you’re a civilian. Second, because you’re refusing to have dinner with me—women
never
do that. Third, because yesterday you were a helluva lot more angry than frightened. I’ve known some pretty warlike women, but they were trained to be that way. With you, it just comes naturally. Very appealing.”

“I’d like to ask you a personal question.”

“Hmmm. Go ahead.”

“Why are you running loose in the real world? I understand that you retired from the marines with the rank of major. Sounds like an unwise time to leave a career, to me.”

Her face was pink with annoyance. He wanted to touch it and feel the heat of her emotions under his fingertips. He wanted to take her to dinner, then take her to bed. Funny, she was a newcomer here, but suddenly he realized that she was the homecoming he needed.

“I wanted to see if I could do something new with my life. See if I remembered how to be a civilian. Apparently, you had the same need to do something new. Why leave the bright lights of Atlanta and move to a little tourist town in the mountains?”

“I wanted to find something more innocent, and kind, and traditional about life.”

“A honey of a plan. I approve. But my whole career was built on tradition, and I think a person has to be
careful not to let tradition give him a rigid, narrow perspective on life.”

“I think you’re talking about tradition as in
rules
. I’m talking about
values
.”

“Right at the moment I don’t care what we’re talking about. I’m just glad you came by to see me.” He gave in to the compelling desire to touch her, carefully resting one hand on one of her arms, letting his fingertips press just tight enough to feel her arm beneath the sweater. The contact burned him, made him want to draw her forward and whisper before he kissed her,
Let’s start some new traditions
.

She looked down at her captured arm, but didn’t pull away. Her eyes revealed alarm, though she gave him a jaunty, patronizing smile. “You plan to add me to your harem?”

After a moment of surprise he smiled wickedly. “The reports of my harem are greatly exaggerated. In fact, I think if you’ll check around—which you’ve obviously begun doing already—you’ll learn that in the last six months I’ve been rather tame.”

“Breaking your father’s tradition, Mr. Templeton?”

He pulled her into his arms quickly and looked down into her startled eyes. “My father had his faults, but he was a good man.”

She locked her hands on his shoulders and tried to push herself away. “He must have been very good. He made a
lot
of women happy. Some of them were married to other men at the time.”

“Chasing married women isn’t my style. There are plenty of the unattached kind. But, I admit, I did inherit my father’s ability to make women happy. Only I’ve been a little reluctant to take up the torch of the family legend. Pa left quite a reputation.”

“I wouldn’t want to waste your time.”

“You’d never be a waste. How about that free sample?”

He kissed her before she could answer, his mouth skilled against her resistance, coaxing, careful. What he’d meant to be a provocative tease became a searing
discovery. The taste, the feel, and the scent of her shattered his playfulness.

She made a fierce sound in the back of her throat; she clutched his black coat with knotted hands and braced her arms against him. But at the same time her body began to sag toward his, her breasts flattening against his chest, her back arching. He heard her soft cry of dismay as her mouth softened under his and became mobile. When he flicked his tongue forward, she caught it between the edges of her lips, then groaned with defeat and opened her mouth for his quick thrust.

Dazed and reckless, Max bent her backward. To his delight her arms went around his neck. She was grabbing at him instinctively, as her balance now depended on him, but when her hands splayed across his shoulders with an exploring touch, he knew she’d lost her footing in more ways than one.

He slid his arms around her shoulders and waist while he continued to twist his mouth on hers. She shivered against him and returned his intimate exploration, her tongue quick and desperate, like the mood that had overwhelmed them.

The hearty applause from the parlor doorway broke the spell. Max drew his head up, frowning, and saw Scarlett, Rhett, all their friends, and Norma. Norma rolled her eyes as if she’d caught a pair of children playing a naughty game.

Betty Quint, who lay helpless inside his arms with her knees buckled and her body draped over one of his legs, regained her control with a breathless groan of disbelief. Jerking her arms from around his neck, she shoved him hard and twisted violently at the same time.

Max was just starting to lift her. The end result was that she slipped from his arms and plopped on her rump, half-sitting on the toes of his black boots. Her sweater bunched under her arms during the trip down. Max studied her bare midriff and bent over to help her straighten the sweater. She scooted away from him, her eyes flashing, her face as red as a sourwood leaf.

There were cheers from the audience. Max frowned harder and motioned to Norma to close the doors as he extended a hand to Betty. But Betty scrambled to her feet, jerked her sweater into place, and said low enough that only he could hear, “Set one foot in my restaurant and I’ll come after you with a carving knife.”

“You’re overreacting.”

“You aren’t in the marines anymore. I’m not some military objective you have to take at all costs. I’m not interested in a man who thinks he can have what he wants no matter what the consequences. Go play cute with someone else.”

“I wasn’t playing cute. Smooth your feathers and have a seat. Let’s talk. Something is happening between us, and it’s shaking me up too—”

“The Braselton’s are here early,” Norma called from the door. “You have to help me get the suit of armor out.”

Betty laughed wearily and shook her head. “Stay here and talk to you? I’d have to be desperate or crazy. And I’m not either one.”

Max rocked on his heels and eyed her with challenge. “From the way you kissed me, you were desperate for something.”

“Not for you.” She pivoted gracefully and strode from the parlor. Scarlett and Rhett stopped holding hands just long enough for her to pass between them.

She might have to suffer for a while, but eventually the old Quint place was going to be a terrific home. She was certain. If she could only keep the possum from creeping into her bedroom at night.

Betty peeked over the electric blanket. In the dim glow of a night-light the possum scuttled along one wall. It was a funny-ugly animal, and it hurried as if embarrassed to be in her boudoir. From a spot at the foot of the bed, Faux Paw craned her head slightly, fur rising as she watched the intruder.

Having been defanged, declawed, and neutered by her previous owner—the same one who had dumped her on the doorstep of the Atlanta Humane Society with an injured hind foot—Faux Paw was a rather nonchalant predator. After the possum disappeared into the hallway she yawned.