Sweet Gone South (16 page)

Lanie leaned back and closed her eyes. Was Luke clairvoyant? Had he looked into her head and offered her a chance — however minuscule — for everything she’d ever wanted? Stability, a real relationship, a family. But could what he was proposing lead there? How could it, when she wasn’t like other women? Was it worth taking a chance for everything she’d ever wanted?

“And,” Luke continued, “I desire you.”

Well, except for that — always that.

“You’re insane,” she said. And so was she, to have considered this for even a second.

“We have established that, but I’m a functional crazy. And my particular brand of crazy is situational.” He gave her a coaxing smile. “So, I have arranged for Pam Carson to watch Emma Thursday night. I would like to take you out for dinner at a place where there are no catsup bottles on the table. That gives you four days to break Nathan Scott’s pretend heart.”

“I’ll think about it,” she said, though she had no intention of doing this fool thing. Probably.

“Fair enough. Now, I’m going to kiss you again.” He got to his feet and came toward her.

She rose and held out her arms, not to him, but as barriers. “That is not going to happen.”

He looked her up and down and gave a little nod, smirking the whole time, like he’d won. He didn’t try to kiss her but he did cup her cheek for a moment before he walked out the door.

• • •

Lanie sank into her chair. Dear God in heaven.

He desired her.
Which meant, if she let him take her to dinner, and then a movie, and then another dinner, and lunches, and church together on Sunday, and the rest of it, that he was going to want to have sex. What a joke. His desire would last about ten minutes.

Then again, he might not care. As long as she helped him with Emma and allowed him to have sex with her, he might not even notice if she pretended. Not that it would ever come to that.

She looked across her desk to where he had sat. He’d left his beer and the baby monitor. The beer was nearly half full. She reached for it and took a drink. She’d take the monitor and leave it outside his door when she went upstairs.

She didn’t realize her hands were shaking until she put them on the keyboard. It had never occurred to her to Google Luke before. Unlike some — Tolly, for one — she wasn’t that curious about people peripheral to her life. But Luke wasn’t peripheral anymore. Even if he hadn’t come up with this little surprise, they practically lived in each other’s pockets.

After sifting through all the other Luke Averys in the universe, she settled into the business of her Luke Avery. Well, not hers. Certainly not hers, but the one she was looking for.

There was lots of stuff that didn’t interest her much — his doings in the Mobile DA’s office, the charity events he’d attended, some marathons he’d run.

But this newspaper item looked interesting.
Senator’s Son Marries Heiress.
There was a picture of Luke and Carrie dancing and a short article about the particulars of the ceremony, along with some information about Carrie — Carrolton Louallan Walton. When she was twenty-two, her parents had died when the small plane her father was piloting went down. This left Carrie, an only child, to run the family real estate business. She and Luke had met at a Mardi Gras ball in Mobile shortly after he’d taken the job with the DA’s office. There was a headshot of her wearing a dark jewel-necked sweater, a string of pearls, and pearl earrings. Her blond hair was swept up in a sleek, simple style. Everything about her shouted old money, class, and private school. It was a good bet she hadn’t owned any baggy candy print clothes.

Lanie clicked back and scrolled down until she found what she was looking for. Article after article recounted the accident that had killed Carrie and Jake Hampton, starting linebacker for the New Orleans Saints. It pretty much matched what she’d heard. It had been raining, the road was curvy, and Carrie was driving fast. The Mercedes SUV went off the road and hit a telephone pole. Carrie was killed instantly and Jake lived a few hours.

She took another drink of beer and started another search. This time she typed Jake Hampton’s name. Lots of football stuff and a few items on his messy divorce popped up.

Ah! Here was an article in
Heartbeat
magazine.
Heartbeat
wasn’t going to win any literary prizes but it wasn’t a tabloid, either. Lots of football pictures. Jake and Luke as children, teenagers, and in caps and gowns. Luke wore honor cords; Jake did not. Jake with Luke and Carrie at their wedding. There were more pictures than copy. That was the way of
Heartbeat,
but it concisely told the same story with an additional tidbit. Mallory Hampton purported her marriage broke up because her ex-husband had been having an affair with Carrie, citing as proof that there were packed bags in the SUV belonging to both Jake and Carrie.
Heartbeat
didn’t give any credence to the accusations, but that hadn’t stopped them from printing it. After that, it seemed to have spread like a bonfire through the media.

Finally, Luke’s father’s office had issued a statement, explaining that Jake had been visiting Luke and Carrie. Jake and Carrie were scheduled to fly out for business trips about the same time but to separate destinations, on separate airlines. Spokesmen from the airlines confirmed this. Of course, Carrie and Jake never made those flights. After that, the buzz in the press dwindled but resurfaced seven months later as football season approached. How awful for Luke. Enduring that gossip must have been fire on top of hell.

Then there were two pictures that turned Lanie inside out. Luke standing with his parents and sister at Carrie’s graveside with Emma perched on his hip, a pacifier in her mouth. His face was fuller but his eyes were wild and empty all at the same time. Another picture showed another funeral in another location, but this time Luke stood with only the senator. If possible, he looked even worse.

Tears gathered in Lanie’s eyes and she downed the rest of the beer. She clicked to enlarge the picture of Luke’s family. It was all sad, so sad. She’d fix it for him if she could.

She jumped at the sound of a gasp, which turned to a scream and then to crying all in less than ten seconds. Emma. Lanie jumped to her feet. Without the monitor, Luke might not hear her. But the next sound from the monitor was Luke’s voice.

“Hey, hey, hey.” The bed creaked. “What’s the matter with my honeybee?”

More crying, but it was muffled now and Lanie could imagine Emma’s face cradled against Luke’s chest.

“A big lion was after me!”

“A big lion? I don’t see a lion. Do you think it might have been a bad dream?”

“Dunno.”

“I think it was all just a dream.”

“A real lion might come.”

“That can’t happen, Emma. Lions live a long way away in Africa and they don’t have any money for plane tickets.”

“I saw one at the monkey place.”

“You did, but he was in the zoo. He can’t get out. He has thick glass and big bars on his house.”

“He might break it!”

“He won’t. And even if he did, even if he came here, I would never, ever let him hurt my Emma. I would chase him with a chair. I would growl at him really scary. I would throw a big book at him.”

Emma giggled around a hiccup. “No throwing in the house.”

“That’s a rule. Sure. But I would break any rule to keep my honeybee safe.”

“I need ice cream.”

“Do you? I think I do too.”

“Can I sleep in your bed?”

There was silence and Lanie held her breath.
Tell her yes, Luke! She’s scared.

“You do understand that’s not what we do? Emma sleeps in her bed and Daddy sleeps in his.”

“But a lion got after me!”

More silence.

“Then I think it would be okay this one time.”

“I love you, Daddy.”

“I love you too, baby. But if you’re going to sleep in my bed, you have to go potty. Is that fair?”

And there were more noises of them moving around and voices fading into other rooms.

Lanie looked back at the picture still on her screen. And then she picked up her phone and punched in a speed dial code.

“Nathan. I need to talk to you. Is it too late for me to come over? I’ll bring you some of those rum coconut bonbons that you like.”

• • •

“If you wanted people to know about this,” Lanie said as Luke escorted her into the dining room of the Merritt Country Club, “you certainly picked the right place.” They both smiled and waved their way through the room like politicians on a last ditch jaunt.

“I don’t want people to know or
not
to know,” Luke said as he pulled her chair out. “What I want — ” he settled into his seat and waited for the hostess to supply them with menus and leave, “ — is a rare steak, a Caesar salad, and some chocolate pie.” He smiled and covered her hand with his. “And I want to spend time with you.”

She ignored the last part — like she was trying to ignore his hand on hers. How pitiful was it that, at her age, such a simple gesture made her heart flip flop. “My, my. Steak, salad, and pie. You must be hungry.”

“You’ve no idea.” He winked and squeezed her hand. “I’m planning on a stuffed potato too.”

“So that’s how we’re going to do it.” She withdrew her hand before he could squeeze it again and picked up her menu.

“How is that?”

“Full court press. It’s been a long time but I still recognize it.” Oh, that was good. Cool. Collected. Blasé.

“It’s been a long time for me too, but I still know how to do it.”

“Do you?” She felt a smile pull at her lips. “I don’t think so. If you were very good at it, I wouldn’t have recognized it.”

He propped his elbow on the table and leaned his chin on his hand. He was adorable. Why hadn’t she noticed that right off? Though his clothes were still a bit too big, he’d filled out some since the first time she’d seen him. And his clothes weren’t as loose as hers. The book club girls scolded her for ordering clothes online and were forever trying to bully her into shopping trips. Maybe they were right; she suddenly felt dowdy in her two-year-old pink linen dress. There had been a time when she had loved to shop and loved to wear clothes that made her feel feminine and sexy. But she wasn’t either of those things and she didn’t need any clothes to remind her of it.

But she had a secret under her dowdy old dress. She’d always loved pretty matching under things — silk and lace in red, black, and soft sherbet colors and, though no one ever saw them, she still wore them. After the shop started doing so well, she indulged herself extravagantly and wore only the best — La Perla, Cadolle, Bracali, Nina Ricci — which she ordered online. Even if they had been available in Merritt, she wouldn’t have risked the humiliation of letting someone catch her buying such feminine things. The pretty bras, panties, boy shorts, and garter belts wouldn’t change her, but it seemed that giving them up would be letting her last shred of pride go.

Luke brought her back from fashion hell. Thank goodness. “To the contrary, I’m excellent at the full court press. It’s just that nothing gets past Lanie Heaven.”

“I don’t know about that,” Lanie said, “but I just saw Jerrilyn Chambers come in. That makes at least three members of the casserole brigade.” The food offerings had slowed down but a few diehards kept returning like feral animals sniffing out fresh meat.

“Maybe they can start in on Mr. Touchdown,” Luke said. “But that might be hard. I’ve stopped returning their dishes.”

“Luke! You can’t do that.”

“Sure I can. I figure if they run out of dishes, they won’t be able to cook anymore. Maybe that’s why they’re here tonight. They got hungry.”

“Judge Avery? Ms. Heaven? Something to drink?” The waitress was cute Jolie Calhoun. Word on the street said she was home from Auburn for a semester because she’d partied too hard and was on academic probation.

“Bourbon rocks,” Luke said and raised an eyebrow in her direction. “Lanie?”

She almost asked for a glass of Chablis, but what the heck? “The same,” she said.

Then people started dropping by their table — Lanie’s customers, Luke’s coworkers, people they knew from church, Junior League, and Rotary. Luke had to excuse himself from conversation to order.

It wasn’t until Jolie served their food that they were alone again.

“We’re popular tonight.” Luke liberally peppered his potato.

“Don’t kid yourself,” Lanie said. “This is a small town and we just made the news.”

“Do you care?” Luke looked at her quizzically.

She shrugged her shoulders. “I’m not the interesting one here.”

“You interest me.”

“I Googled you,” she said.

He laughed. “I don’t blame you. I Googled you too.”

“That must have been the most boring fifteen seconds of your life.” She emptied her drink. “Can I have another one of these?”

He signaled across the room. So he was one of those men who could get what he wanted in a restaurant with a raised hand and a head toss. It sometimes seemed she had to stand on a chair, wave pompoms, and set off bottle rockets to get a glass of water.

“Not extensive but not boring,” he said. “You generously donate candy to fundraisers. You’re secretary of the Junior League. You co-chaired the thrift sale at the church last year.” He nodded at Jolie when she set down their fresh drinks. “And you are — let’s see if I can get this right — you are the most promising young master chocolatier the Southeast has seen in a generation. You have set new gourmet trends without turning your back on the old-fashioned mainstays of your family business. They wonder why you don’t take your show on the road to Charleston, New Orleans, or even New York.”

“That would be turning my back on family business, wouldn’t it? Besides, if people want my chocolate, I have a website.”

“Hey!” He put his hands in the air, palms up. “I’m not arguing. I don’t want you to take your show on the road.” He took a sip of his drink. “I like you right here.”

She laughed, more from pleasure than amusement. This was only a date. Maybe the only one they would have because this couldn’t go anywhere. Still, it felt so good to be flattered and flirted with. There was something to be said for the full court press.