When You Dance With The Devil (Dafina Contemporary Romance) (6 page)

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Authors: Gwynne Forster

BOOK: When You Dance With The Devil (Dafina Contemporary Romance)
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Without waiting for a reaction, she went to her room and called Gregory on her new cellular phone. “I’ve decided not to go to church tomorrow,” she said after greeting him. “I’ll explain it when we meet.”
“I see. Well, there isn’t much to do around here on Sundays except see a movie, and we’ve seen the one that’s playing.”
If he was trying to avoid seeing her, he could forget it. “Then let’s drive over to Ocean City or maybe Salisbury.”
His silence lasted too long for her comfort. “I’ll be over right after church,” he finally said, but she detected a change in his tone.
Maybe I should have gone to church, but I didn’t feel like watching those two old biddies shouting and praising. They’re as mean as my mama was.
“We’ve got company for supper tonight,” Fannie announced that evening before saying the grace. “Joe Tucker’s kid brother, Bob, is with us. Welcome, Bob. Let’s bow our heads.”
Bob Tucker, sitting between Jolene and his brother, Joe, fidgeted throughout the prayer. “You seem out of place in this bunch,” he said to Jolene. “What’re you doing here?”
She focused on the plate of soup in front of her. “Telling will take too long.”
“In that case, how about going down to Joe’s Watering Hole with me after we eat?”
“Not tonight, Bob.”
“You got a date?”
“I have something to do.” She wanted to go with him, but couldn’t bring herself to risk it, and she knew he could read the eagerness on her face.
He put his spoon down and let his gaze roam over her face. “All right. How about next weekend and we go over to Baltimore and check out the scene? This place is dullsville.”
Excitement coursed through her. “I’ll let you know.”
“All right. What’s your name?”
“Jolene Tilman. You live around here?”
“Naah. I live just outside of Ocean Pines. We’ll get together next Saturday or Sunday.”
“Bob’s not overloaded with compassion for people,” Joe Tucker told Jolene the next morning at breakfast. “He’s not going to do anything wrong; too much pride for that. But he looks out for himself, and anybody else, male or female, can catch as catch can.” She suspected that he’d rushed to breakfast early in order to warn her about Bob, for he hadn’t buttoned the cuffs of his red shirt.
His stern expression gave her the willies, but only momentarily. If Bob would take her to Baltimore a few times, maybe she could find a job there instead of in Salisbury. She had money from the funds her mother left her and from the sale of the house, but she didn’t intend to spend a penny more of it than was absolutely necessary.
 
 
“So what was your reason for not coming to church this morning?” Gregory asked her as soon as he drove away from the boarding house that Sunday afternoon.
He listened to her tale of Arnetha’s comment and Louvenia’s speculations about her with barely any interest. But when she added, “I couldn’t appreciate a church service with those two women amening and shouting all around me,” his head snapped around, and she thought he braked abruptly.
His stare held anything but the warmth and compassion she had associated with him. Indeed, it seemed hostile. “I hope you’re kidding,” he said.
Realizing that she had dropped a few notches in his estimation, she hastened to redeem herself by playing upon his sympathy. “I hope I’m going to see you on my birthday, since you’re my only good friend.”
He rubbed his chin slowly and, she didn’t doubt, thoughtfully. “Your birthday is when?”
“Wednesday.”
He didn’t respond until after he’d parked in the parking lot of a roadside movie house on the outskirts of Ocean City, got out of the car and opened the door for her. He stood beside the car, inches from her, staring down into her face until her nerves seemed to stand on end. After what seemed like ages, with his fingers raking over his tight curls, he said,” Would you like to go out to dinner?”
She caught herself a split second before she said,
I’m paying for my supper at the boarding house.
“Thanks. I . . . uh . . . I’d like that.”
He didn’t respond. Somewhere, she’d made a mistake, for he had little to say then or on the drive back from Ocean City, and he didn’t suggest that they swim as she had hoped he would.
“I’d like to get home early. PBS is showing a story on Muddy Waters tonight.”
“I wish I could see it,” she said. “I can’t imagine the folks at the boarding house letting me watch that in the lounge.”
He parked, went around to the passenger side and opened the door for her. “They probably won’t. Well, I’ve received several calls requesting references for you, so you’ll soon be working, and you can put a television in your room.”
When she walked into her room, two thoughts plagued her: Gregory hadn’t offered to give her a television for her birthday, and he didn’t kiss her on the cheek as he’d previously done.
 
 
At supper that night, she wanted to ask Joe Tucker, her seat mate, what he thought of Louvenia, but decided against it and was glad she did when the two of them began to carry on a conversation across from her. She wondered if any of the other boarders felt as lonely as she, an outsider who the others ignored. In the far corner, Richard Peterson, who joined the group after she did, carried on what appeared to be an amiable conversation with Fannie. Everybody talked and smiled with someone. Everybody but her. How she wished she could understand the emptiness, the constant ache inside of her! On Wednesday, she’d be thirty-six, and nothing interesting had ever happened to her.
Gazing up at the two white-globed chandeliers that shone bright above the green and white and red and white checkered tablecloths that gave the room its hominess, she saw them as remnants of the gaslight era, anachronisms well suited to Fannie’s house laws and restrictions. Bob didn’t think she belonged there, and he was probably right, but she needed a family, and the boarders were the closest approximation to one that she had.
 
 
Gregory arrived at six-thirty that Wednesday evening, dressed in a business suit much like the one he had worn to church, and she was glad she’d worn her good black dress with the ruffled collar. But if he noticed how she looked, he didn’t comment on it. He didn’t bring flowers, either, but maybe men didn’t do that in Ocean Pines and Pike Hill. She’d have to ask Fannie.
When they walked into the restaurant, she stopped and stared at her surroundings. She had never been in that kind of place. Soft lights, candles on the tables, white tablecloths and napkins and three or four long-stemmed glasses beside each plate. She couldn’t believe what she saw. A man led them to a table, and she gasped when she saw the beautiful vase of tea roses.
“Are they for us? I mean, can we keep them?”
“They’re for you,” Gregory said. “I hope you like them.”
She didn’t think she ought to tell him that no one had ever given her flowers. “They’re beautiful. I definitely like them a lot. Thanks, Gregory.”
“My pleasure.”
She watched him carefully so that she wouldn’t make a mistake. With three forks, two knives and two spoons facing her, she felt lost, almost as if she were the butt of a joke. He didn’t talk much, but she didn’t notice that until they were leaving the restaurant.
“You’ve been awfully quiet tonight. Don’t you feel well?”
“I’m fine.” The man who showed them to their table handed her a small shopping bag into which he or someone else had put the tea roses. Gregory gave the man a bill. “Dinner was delightful. Thank you.”
“Who’s that man? Is he the owner?”
“He’s the maitre d’.”
“Oh.”
He disappointed her when he didn’t ask if she wanted to go anywhere else. It would have been a good time for him to start her on the dance lessons he’d promised to give her, and she said as much.
“Isn’t there any place around here where people dance?”
His right shoulder flexed in a quick shrug. “Probably, but this isn’t the night for it.” He said hardly anything on the way back to Pike Hill, and let the jazz voice of Billie Holiday erase the silence.
“I had a good time,” she told him when they reached the boarding house. “It’s the best birthday I ever had.”
“Is that so? I’m glad you’re happy.”
He walked her to the front door, but didn’t go in. “I’ll see you Saturday afternoon.”
She waited for him to kiss her, but he only half-smiled, winked, and left. She didn’t know what to make of it. She did know that she’d lost some ground, that he could be a useful friend—already had been, in fact—and that she had better find a way to straighten things out.
 
 
“This is the third time I called. I didn’t think there was anything to do in Pike Hill but swim. Where were you? This is Bob.”
She looked around to see whether anyone was in earshot. “A friend took me out for my birthday.”
“Yeah? Congratulations. I’ll be over Saturday morning around eleven, and we’ll go over to Baltimore and see what’s happening. Okay?”
Excitement coursed through her. She had a feeling that Bob Tucker lived by his own rules. “Great. What’ll I wear?”
“What? Uh . . . whatever you want to. We’re not going to a grand ball.”
They were nearly halfway to Baltimore that Saturday when she remembered that she hadn’t called Gregory to tell him that she couldn’t see him that afternoon.
Oh, well. He’s not much interested now anyway. And Bob is a lot more to my taste.
But she would find that she lacked the sophistication to keep up with Bob Tucker, for he was constantly coaching her. Nonetheless, she wanted entrée into his world of beautiful women, bars, and jazz.
“What do you want? Beer or a cocktail?”
“I . . . uh . . . I don’t drink.”
“You don’t . . . is this some kind of joke?”
“No. My mama wouldn’t have it in the house, so I never learned how.”
“Want to learn now?”
She shook her head. “I’d rather not. Maybe next time.”
“You’re all right, babe,” he said, as the evening grew late. “Fannie’s gonna blow a gasket if you walk in there at two o’clock Sunday morning.” He took a few sips of beer, let his gaze travel slowly over her, not hiding his appreciation for what he saw.
“Tell you what. You spend the night with me at my place.”
She nearly choked. “I’d better not do that tonight, Bob. Fannie may put me out, and I need the boarding house.”
“I got a feeling that this is something else you never learned how to do. What a waste! Am I right? You never stayed out all night with a man?”
Feeling as she did when her mama found her diary and read it, she squeezed her eyes tight and prayed that she wouldn’t cry. She found the strength to nod, but in the depth of her shame, she couldn’t utter a word.
He put the beer bottle on the bar and stood. “Stop beating hell out of yourself, babe. It’s no problem. There’s always another woman.”
When she got inside the boarding house, she sneaked up the stairs as quietly as she could, but when she opened her door it creaked as if its hinges had rusted, a sound she hadn’t previously heard. She opened her cell phone, saw that she had four messages and closed it without checking, for she knew Gregory had called her.
“Well, if he had been warmer the last two times we were together, maybe I wouldn’t have forgotten to call him,” she said to herself.
You shouldn’t have made a date with Bob knowing you had one with another man,
her conscience nagged. She shrugged, undressed and crawled into bed as her watch confirmed that it was one-thirty, later than she had ever been out of the house in her life. She set the clock alarm to seven-thirty. If she went to church, maybe Gregory would forgive her.
 
 
It did not surprise Gregory that Jolene went to church that Sunday morning, for he knew she would be seeking ways to make amends. He didn’t care what excuse she gave. If Miss Fannie didn’t know where Jolene went or with whom, that meant Jolene had deliberately stood him up. Lately, he had developed misgivings about her, but he had been willing to trust her until she proved unworthy of it. He’d never cared for women who expected gifts from men, and she had sorely tested him when she hinted that she’d like to have a television. Giving her a cell phone had sent her the wrong signal.
His anger at having been stood up, wasting his Saturday afternoon, had already abated, and he was glad, because he had been furious enough to insult her. His passion for her had tempered, and as far as he was concerned, her behavior the previous afternoon had served as a wakeup call. He’d been traveling too fast. She was still in him, but he didn’t have to do anything about it.
As soon as the service ended, he left church by a side door, walked around to the front and waited. She came out of the front door and he walked directly up to her.

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