Wildly Inappropriate (10 page)

"No, I'm fine," Lila was saying. Blood trickled from her hair down the side of her face. Colton dropped to his knees in the weeds. Dan looked at the flattened truck again, squinting in the blazing sun, in spite of his sunglasses. "I want to talk to Charlie," she sobbed as Colton's arms went around her.

Dan shook his head and turned away. Lila's son was a Marine stationed in Afghanistan. If she hadn't heard from Charlie recently, that might explain why she'd been so emotional. From the looks of her truck, it was just as easy to die right here in the county as it was fighting terrorism, and the proof Lila would be so careless pissed him off more. Colton needed to spank her ass if she wouldn't willingly slow down.

The farmer who'd called him walked over. "She climbed out 'fore it rolled, Dan. Came flyin' down the road like a bat outta Hell. Lost control in that curve and went right down the embankment. It was stuck in the ditch, nose-down. She got out 'fore I could get to her. Just before you got here, it flipped, ass-over-teakettle." The farmer hooked his hands behind the bib of his overalls and gave Dan a sympathetic look. "She asked if I'd call you. Pitched a fit when I called nine-one-one. Don't she have insurance?"

It had to be a hundred and five degrees in the shade but a chill ran down the back of Dan's neck as he stared at the small truck Lila had bought no more than ten weeks earlier.

"You're damn sure gonna get in that ambulance, Delilah," Colton yelled, causing Dan to look over his shoulder at the couple. Predictably, Lila was shaking her head. "If I have to put you in it, I swear to God, you're going to the hospital." The tears Colton had expected back at the garage ran down her cheeks. Colton's eyes were bright too and Dan knew his brother's anger masked his fear.

"She has insurance," Dan assured his elderly neighbor, looking away from the couple.

A sheriff's car pulled up behind the wrecker. Dan was relieved to see Reese Davies step out, jamming his wide-brimmed hat over his close-cropped light hair. "Dan De Marco, how you been?" Reese greeted him, but Dan saw his brows go up at the sight of the dirty undercarriage of Lila's truck. He and Reese had been friends since high school.

"How's Annie?" Dan asked about Reese's wife.

"Expecting again." Reese grinned. "Not too happy at the moment. She's due any day now."

Dan eyed his reflection in Reese's mirrored shades. His envy didn't show. Reese and Annie had gotten married about eight years ago, around the time Dan's last girlfriend walked out. This was the couple's third child, and Reese laughed happily as Dan congratulated him. "This one's finally my little girl," Reese confided. "Randy's gonna play peewee football this fall. Can you believe he's already five?"

Eventually, Reese wrote up his accident report. Lila was lifted forcibly into the ambulance by his brother, and Dan got down to the dirty work of flipping the truck upright with some help from John Carpenter and his tractor. The longer he labored in the broiling sun, the more certain he became that burning the farmhouse was a fine idea.

A dull red Ford Focus passed by slowly. The woman inside threw up a friendly hand. Dan recognized the woman who'd once helped his mother do what she called 'heavy cleaning', but Georgia Mason and Cammie had been more friends than anything. Seeing Georgia's wiry white hair reminded him of how old Cammie would be now. Georgia had looked after the little ones and cleaned house for Dan's family for a few years after his mother had disappeared, but Rafe turned into such a bastard everyone stopped coming, including Georgia. After Rafe died, Georgia began bringing her car to the garage for service. She lived just on the other side of John's house but she used to walk to the farmhouse, cutting across John's fields.

Braking, she lowered her window. "Everything okay, Daniel?"

He hit the button to raise the winch, turning away from the sight of Lila's crushed roof and shouted. "Just fine, Georgia. How about you?" Dan choked on the red dust and his lie.

* * * *

Relieved when the side of the desk stayed put, Cynda was more careful while she finished the rug, sweeping slowly around the edge of the sofa and his bookcases, lost in thoughts about Iris De Marco and Grams.

"You get a choice between a strong man and a weak man, Cynda, you take that strong one,"
Grams had said a hundred times.
"He gonna hurt you, same as any man, and he can be hard to love, but if he lets you love him, you love that one with all you got. Weak man gonna want your praise for every little thing he do, but a strong man, he never gonna think he's done enough, and when he sees you can love him, even when he thinks he done failed, he's never gonna understand why you picked him. Truth is, that strong man gonna need you more than any weak man could, because he beats on himself, and sometimes, he needs to take that out on you. He'll give back tenfold what he takes, but a weak one, all he knows how to do is take."

The problem was that all the strong men Cynda knew had long since been snapped up, or refused to limit themselves to one woman. Daniel's words about lifetime commitments seemed to hang in the silent air.

Stowing the heavy appliance under the stairs once more, she studied the pictures hanging in the downstairs rooms while she wiped the frames, wondering about the baby Iris had mentioned in her diary
.
There were school pictures of Daniel and his brothers and sister at all ages, from those showing gap-toothed smiles to caps and gowns, showing a range of haircuts that spanned decades. She spied several photos of one young boy with green eyes.
He could be Daniel's son
,
she thought
, but he could belong to any of them, they all look so much alike.

Iris must have been wrong about being pregnant. Or had something about being pregnant made her run away?

The buzzing of the dryer startled her out of her musing. Abandoning her thoughts about Daniel's family, she hurried to the laundry room, eager to try on the pretty dress.

Daisy began to bark when Cynda stepped into the wide circle of the net crinoline. Peering through the window to try and see what the dog was fussing about, the tractor blocked her view of the back of the shed. No vehicle sat in the drive. She tied the ribbon at her waist and slipped the yellow dress over her head, deciding to check on the dog.

Running across the crisp grass in her bare feet, Cynda rounded the tractor and skidded to a stop. Panic jammed her heart into her throat, and she longed to turn and run back into the house, but fear that Daisy couldn't see well enough to fight the danger to her baby pinned her in place.

Chapter Eight

Before he opened the door to his truck, Dan knew something was wrong. Daisy's bark sounded hoarse, as though she'd been raising Cain for hours. He ran for the shed.

"Daniel!" Cynda was on her knees on the tractor seat, holding aloft a plastic quart bottle of oil. She shouted to be heard over the barking. "A raccoon! I think it has rabies."

Dan's heart nearly stopped as he rushed toward the shed. "Cynda, raccoons can climb."

She glanced over her shoulder. Her cheeks were wet with tears. "He's trying to bite Daisy or get the pup." Daniel saw the ringed tail when the animal darted out from under the tractor. Cynda hurled the bottle, striking the raccoon in the side. The dark form turned and he saw the foam dripping from its jaws before it darted back under the tractor. Six other bottles of oil were strewn across the dirt.

He kept his tone low and calm, his heart leaping because he had Colton's shotguns in his truck but falling again when he recalled none were loaded. The few feet into the house seemed like miles. "Cynda, I'm going to shoot the 'coon, but I have to have to go inside to get ammo. If it's a choice between you or the dogs—"

"Noooo," she cried. "Not the baby. And Jacques needs his momma. Hurry, Daniel, I only have one more quart of oil. I think he went under the tractor."

He wasn't going inside and leaving Cynda alone. Racing across the yard, Dan turned on the spigot and grabbed the hose. The nozzle had a powerful spray. He used it to wash his truck, but he knew the hose wouldn't quite reach the shed where he'd parked the tractor the day before. Dropping to the ground, he saw the glittering eyes of the raccoon. It huddled beneath the tractor beside one of the large rear tires. If he sprayed it, the sick animal might turn back toward Daisy. Even if one of Colton's rifles had been loaded, the shot might penetrate the 'coon and hit Daisy. The drool combined with the fact the nocturnal animal was out in broad daylight and attacking Daisy lent credence to Cynda's suspicion of rabies and he knew rabies was almost always fatal in humans.
Fuck.

Daniel dropped the hose nozzle into a low spot in the yard closer to the edge of the yard where the miles of orchards began, some distance from the back door. Cynda was clutching the bottle of thirty-weight like it was a lifeline. He thought about a tire iron. He'd never had a flat in this truck. The jack and tire-changing apparatus would be bolted down.
Do I have time to undo all of that?

The sound of running water got the animal's attention. It darted from beneath the tractor, running in a jagged line toward the growing puddle. As soon as it cleared the shed Daniel raced inside. Cynda jumped into his outstretched arms. "We can't leave Daisy out here," she sobbed, dropping the oil to wrap her arms around his neck. Her legs locked around his waist.

"One female rescued at a time," he informed her, hurrying back toward the house. The raccoon still reeled across the yard, away from the dogs.

Once he had Cynda safely inside, he put her down. Running for the gun safe in his office, he looked at the.22 rifle but reached for a handgun instead. The Glock was already loaded. One shot put the infected raccoon out of its misery. Cynda burst from the house as soon as he discharged the gun.

"Daisy! Jacques!" She ran toward the shed. The dress she wore was streaked with dirt and rust from the tractor, but Dan stared at the way the skirt whirled around her legs and the flash of her crinoline.

Jacques?
"Who the hell is Jacques?" he asked, unlatching the door to the barn. He'd need to bury the 'coon deep and put something on top of it to stop the dog from digging up the body. Daisy was a digger, always unearthing or burying something.

"The pup. I named him Jacques." Her voice came from the back of the shed. He pictured her kneeling in the hay.

Daniel snorted as he grabbed a shovel. "Hell no," he yelled through the wall. "I'm gonna keep that pup, and I'm not gonna be out in the woods with my huntin' buddies, calling for a damn birddog named Jacques."

"I saved his life. I get to name him," she insisted. "And here's another good reason to sell. You got crazy-ass raccoons wandering around. Take the money and move to town."

When he stepped out of the barn, she'd come out of the shed and was cuddling the pup to her neck. "Such a pretty baby," she crooned. Daisy trotted at her heels.

"Keep Daisy back till I get this thing buried," he warned. "The saliva can spread the virus. She's been vaccinated, but I don't want to take any chances."

"Let's go smell the flowers," Cynda said, he hoped to the dogs. She seemed calm as could be now that the danger was past. So did Daisy, but he had to blink at the sight of his dog ignoring him in favor of Cynda. Well, she
was
holding Daisy's pup.

Cynda crossed the driveway and stepped into Cammie's garden. By the time he'd buried the raccoon and found a few heavy rocks to place on top, she'd made herself a circlet of purple coneflowers. Daisy wore a necklace made of them, too. Something about the sight of her, with her floral crown and yellow dress while his sightless dog stared up at her took his breath. Dan stood stock-still holding the shovel, just watching her as she crooned to Daisy in the sweet tone women used when talking to babies. "Such a brave mama. You weren't about to run off and leave your baby, were you?"

He suddenly wanted to punch something. Staying at the house felt impossible, but irrationally, looking at Cynda made him lose the urge to burn the place down. "Did you make that salon appointment?"

She stood still, and peeked at him from beneath her curly lashes. "Yes, Daniel. But it's not till six."

"You're beautiful as a barefoot garden goddess, but let's get the hell outta here." He grinned at her. "Shoe shopping will kill the time. I'll call Colton and check on Lila while you change."

"Let me put Jacques back in the shed." She looked up at him imploringly. "I don't suppose we could move Daisy and Jacques into the house where they'll be safe?"

He felt like a fool but after he stowed Colton's shotgun and rifles in his gun safe, he found a box and an old baby gate in the attic, getting Daisy settled into the laundry room while Cynda changed. "You're just about the only female I understand," Dan confided to Daisy as he led her into the house. He raised the pup in his hand to eye level. "And your name is
not
Jacques."

* * * *

"What happened to Iris?" Cynda asked when they pulled out of the driveway. Dan had one hand on the wheel and one eye on the way the dress she'd selected cupped her breasts.

"Who?"

"Iris. Your mother."

"Cammie," he corrected. "I told you, she left. The first Sunday in September of eighty-four she put lunch on the table and walked out the back door. Never came back."

She saw his knuckles whiten as he gripped the wheel with both hands.

"And yes, we looked for her. My dad had the whole county out hunting for her, for months. The police, volunteers, anyone who'd help. He must've walked every inch of this end of the county, looking for her… her body. The police questioned people. Her photo was on the front page of every newspaper in the state for weeks. It was like she just vanished."

"Something must have happened to her," she replied calmly. "She had a man who loved her and four pretty babies. She'd have come back if she could've."