One Magic Night (10 page)

"You're welcome."

He stood looking at her, his brown eyes clear and steady. "Will I be seeing you soon?"

She hesitated.  "It doesn't seem likely, does it?"

He kept his tone carefully expressionless. "I suppose it depends on when Ty gets the car fixed."

She matched his look with a straight one of her own. "I think it would be better if we didn't see each other again, Deke."

“Depends on what you mean by 'better.' Good-night, Eve." He strode to the door and went out, wishing he felt as cool as he sounded.

"Have a good time?" Ty's voice sounded faintly mocking. There was only one light lit in the apartment, an old fashioned floor lamp designed to look like a candelabra and Ty was sitting under it in the lounge chair, his long legs stretched out in front of him, his laptop lying in his lap.

"She's an interesting woman," Deke said easily, thinking he hadn't seen Ty in a mood like this since the distribution of his last film hit a snag in Chicago.

"Yeah. There's a lot of those around."

"What did you do this afternoon?" 

“Shocked corn," Ty said dryly.

Deke's lips curved in a smile. "Didn't sow any wild oats while you were at it, did you?"

Ty gave him a dark look. "Spare me the rural humor.”

Deke nodded toward the laptop in Ty's hand. "How's it going?"

"It isn't." Ty put the laptop on the table, rose, and walked to the window. He was restless with tension.  He’d searched all through the internet and couldn’t find a damn thing about Leigh Carlow that would shed any light on what had happened to her.  He gazed out at the squares of light that showed from Leigh's apartment.

Deke shed his jacket, sat down on the sofa, and eased his feet out of his boots. Ty turned to him, his face hard with decision. "If I can't get the car fixed tomorrow, I'm going to borrow Eve's and take you into the city.  I want you to catch a plane back to L.A. and do some investigating for me."

Deke's stomach kicked in protest. He didn't want to go, not now.

"What's the big hurry?"

"I need some information."

"What's new?" Deke answered blandly. "You couldn’t find it on the internet?”

“If I did, would I be asking you to go?”

“Who do you want me to investigate?"

Ty's voice was cool.  "Leigh Carlow."

Deke cocked an eyebrow and gave Ty a dryly quizzical look.  "I thought you already did the groundwork on her."

“When I was in L.A, I concentrated on the relationship between her and her mother.  Now I want to know about the men in her life. Was there one? If there was, who was he?”

From his comfortable position on the couch Deke gazed at Ty lazily. "Is this for the movie?”

Ty frowned, his dark brows pulling together. "No. She's out of the movie."

"Since when?"

"Since she refused to be interviewed."

"You've never let that stop you before."

Ty's mouth thinned. "There's a first time for everything."

"Looks like there is," Deke said softly. "Are you serious about her?"

Ty stared at him, raked a hand through his hair, pivoted to look out into the darkness. "No."

Deke said irritably, "You mean I'm flying across the country just to satisfy your curiosity?"

Ty whirled around, his face dark.  "That's not what it is."

"Then why won’t you admit you're hooked?"

His face looked almost gray in the soft light. "Be reasonable, man.  I've only known her two days."

"Sometimes it only takes a minute," Deke said implacably.

Ty turned to look out the window again, tension evident in the set of his shoulders. To the taut back, Deke said lazily, "She left Hollywood when she was fourteen to live in the Adirondacks with her stepfather. She went to college in Oswego and got a job teaching here her first year and has been here ever since. Shouldn't you be looking for a man here in New York State?"

Ty faced Deke and thrust his hand through his hair again. "I don't know. It just doesn't feel right. The answer has got to be out there. I keep grasping on the edges of something." He turned again to stare moodily out into the darkness. Deke waited. He knew better than to interrupt Ty's train of thought.

Ty stood silent for another long moment, then suddenly he whipped around and strode over to his sheaf of papers. "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Somewhere in my notes I've got something. Where is that?" His lean hands shuffled through the sheets. He read and discarded rapidly. "Ah." Triumphant, he held up a single sheet. "Here it is. Leigh was in L.A. the summer she was twenty. She went back to see her mother just before Claire died. She stayed on after Claire's death for six weeks, almost too long to register for college that fall. She had to petition for late registration. I remembered thinking that was out of character."

"Did she get back in school?"

"Yes. Her academic record was such that it was granted without question."

Deke rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Six weeks, eh? Did she stay in Mamma's mansion?"

"Yes, she did. There were things to clear up, of course, but not much. Her mother was deeply in debt, and the mansion had to be sold to pay off creditors. Leigh got nothing."

"Which made it more imperative than ever that she finish her education."

"Exactly." He shoved the papers back into their original place in the pile. “What I want to know is, why did she stay out west so long?"

"That's what I'm to find out, I take it."

"Yes. Find out who she saw, who she talked to. There must have been a maid, or a hairdresser, or somebody who was a regular in Claire's house who could tell you something."

"You don't want much, do you? That was seven years ago.”

Ty stared at him.  After a long moment of assessment, his mouth curved upward. "If I wanted something easy, I wouldn't send you."

"One of these days, Rundell," Deke said lazily, "that line isn't going to work."

Ty said, "You really don't want to go." Deke made no answer. Ty's keen blue eyes raked his tall form. "Got a little something going on the side, have you?"

Deke half closed his eyes and drawled softly, "Let's just say that it’s been so long since I've seen something I want, I’m afraid I’ve forgotten how to go after it."

"It'll come back to you," Ty said dryly.

"I can't do much if I'm three thousand miles away."

"There are telephones," Ty reminded him.  “Text her.”

Two days later, Ty was just as unsympathetic. Tuesday morning he drove with Deke in the newly repaired car to the city airport and purchased Deke's ticket. Then, with a firm hand on the older man's elbow, he guided him into the line waiting to board.  Suitcase in hand, Deke tried one last protest.  "Is this really necessary?"

"Call Eve every night or whenever you like," he said shortly. "Maybe absence will make the heart grow fonder.”

“Yeah,” Deke said.  “Fonder of my absence.”

“Have a little faith in yourself, man.  One thing about it.  She’ll still be here when you get back.  And I doubt if she will have found a new suitor in the meantime.  Just get my job done. And call me the minute you find out anything."

"You paying the tab for the hotel and my meals?" Deke asked as he surrendered to inevitability and walked through the metal detector to the final boarding area.

"Don't I always?"  Ty asked dryly.

At the door Deke turned back. "Be careful of that new brake line on the way back into Springwater." His eyes gleamed as he planted the final jab. "Don't get hung up on the curves."

"I'll try not to," Ty said, a slight smile lifting his lips, knowing Deke was really referring to Leigh's shapely form.  “Thanks for the great advice.”

Deke laughed at Ty's dry tone and pivoted to walk through the door that took him out to the plane.

At Springwater Consolidated School, the halls reverberated with the sound of moving feet and chattering voices. Leigh breathed a sigh of relief that it was seventh period, her free hour of the day, and opened the door of the faculty room. She stepped in and pulled it closed, shutting the noise out, making the oval burnt-wood sign that said ‘Decompression Chamber’ rattle. Eve, sitting at the table leafing through the daily newspaper, glanced up. Leigh got her mug, filled it with coffee, sat down across from her friend and asked the question that had been on her mind all day. "Are you seeing Deke again tonight?" At the moment they were the only two occupants of the long, narrow table.  Ben Harris lounged in his usual corner of the worn, yellow plaid couch, well out of earshot.

Eve shook her head, her eyes bright. "He left for L.A."

Leigh felt her stomach give an odd little twist. "You mean they're gone?"

"Not they, just Deke.  He is flying out this morning. Ty isn't going with him. He still has some unfinished business here, Deke said."

An odd jangle of annoyance and relief sang through her. "When will Ty be leaving?"

"I really don't know." Eve glanced up at her through dark lashes. "Want me to ask Deke tonight when he calls?"

"No." The negative came out crisply. Aware of Eve's curious and faintly amused look, Leigh brought the heavy mug, its side initialed with a big L, up to her lips. "I mean, I don't care, really, I was just curious." She sipped the hot liquid and then set the cup down carefully. "Deke is calling you tonight?"

Eve colored slightly and nodded.

Leigh's eyes were bright above her cup. "Do you like him?"

Eve gave an overly casual shrug. "What's not to like?  He's an interesting guy."

"I thought you were off men."

Eve shot her a straight look. "I thought you were, too."

"I've been seeing Hunt…"

"I said men, honey, not males who've never lived any where away from mother dear in all their forty-five years of life.”

"Hunt has to take care of her."

Eve gave a soft little grunt. "Since when does a barracuda need tender loving care? Hunt doesn't count and you know it and I know it. I think even Hunt knows it in his more lucid moments."

"He's good company."

Eve lifted a shoulder under the sleek dark purple sweater she wore. "It's a good thing you think so. He drives me bananas." Eve tilted her head to one side and gave Leigh a long, considering look. "Somehow," Eve said softly, "I can't imagine Ty Rundell jumping when his mother said jump."

Leigh couldn't either, but she retorted, "What has that got to do with anything?"

Leigh's eyes had gone silver, and that was a bad sign, but Eve pressed on. "He's interested in you, isn't he? And you're interested in him, too, at least you should be if you've got a brain in your head. Why don't you give the guy a chance?  At least, get to know him a little."

"It's out of the question," Leigh said coolly. 

"That all depends on what the question is," Eve shot back, getting up to rinse her cup and stash it back on the shelf above the sink. Before Leigh could reply to the gibe, she was gone.

Forty minutes later she walked to her classroom, telling herself that Eve was wrong. She couldn't let Ty Rundell get near her again. And she wouldn't. She would forget that surge of disappointment she had felt when she thought Ty had gone without even saying good-bye.

She went into her room and sat down at her desk, her eyes not focusing on anything. She was ready for her class. Her students would come in soon, stumbling, running, or walking decorously, depending on who was in charge of the legs and what mood their owner was in, and they would demand all her attention. But now the room was quiet, and her eyes drifted to the tall corn shock standing in the corner, just as Ty Rundell's throaty laugh seemed to echo in the silent room. "I'm not your private scarecrow.''  She closed her eyes. She could see him, his white shirt covered with leaf and tassel bits, his face dark and casually mocking. But later, his eyes had gleamed with desire…

Out in the hall a bell rang, and a young girl swooped into the room and circled round Leigh's desk anxiously. "Miss Carlow, I don't have my paper with me. I left it in my locker. Can I go back and get it?"

She focused her eyes with difficulty. "Yes, Michelle, go ahead."

"Miss Carlow, I forgot what the assignment was.  Can I do it and bring it to you in the morning?"

Leigh sighed. "No, Jennifer, the assignment is due today. You can do the extra credit assignment listed on the board to make up your grade, if you like."

Mark Farrish came in and sat down at his desk with a maturity and assurance far beyond his years, and Leigh was reminded once again of Ty. Where had he gone to school? If he lived on a ranch, he had probably ridden on a school bus to get there. What kind of teachers did he have? Had they recognized his quick intelligence, his drive to succeed, his facility with words? Her eyes drifted to the corn shock. She saw a body bent, shoulders pushing against the cotton fabric of a T-shirt, rounded buttocks and lean thighs straining denim.  She blinked and shut out the image.  She still hadn't gone to get the pumpkins.