What the Heart Wants

Amazing how one woman could invade his mind. Why, he could almost swear he heard her voice now, floating down the narrow hall that ran the length of the social sciences faculty members’ offices. With a determined sigh, Kyle fixed his focus back where it belonged. He was just bored with grading, that’s all.

But then a sharp rap brought his attention to his open door. He looked up—to see Allison.

She wasn’t in jeans or shorts today. No, today she sported a light summery dress just right for the unseasonably hot temperatures. Her long legs were beautifully punctuated by delicate, strappy sandals that showed off her toned calves.

“Don’t look so blown away.” Her mouth quirked a bit at the corners as she seemed to smother a smile. “I promise, I’m not here to ask for help moving another china cabinet.”

“Good, because I don’t think my muscles will cooperate,” he admitted. “No, I’m zoned out by these absolute hideous exams I’m grading. I think I should have done a better job teaching the course material.”

Allison wrinkled her nose. “It’s not your fault. It’s the topic. History. Lotta dates. Lotta names. No offense, but history’s a dead subject. I never could get interested in people who lived a hundred years ago.”

It wasn’t the first time he’d been told that. He’d heard it so often that it was the kiss of death for any blind date that his ever-hopeful colleagues kept setting up for him.

Usually the comment inspired a guilty feeling of superciliousness, as if he was somehow wiser than whoever it was talking to him—that and the sure knowledge that no serious relationship could really develop between two people who didn’t appreciate the same things.

But Allison...Allison made him think differently. He wanted to drag Allison to the chair by his desk and keep her there until he could convince her that history was interesting. History was a story, and he was addicted to a good story.

She, however, seemed fairly convinced already—of the opposite, unfortunately. Kyle bit back a tart response. “Well, if it’s not a burning need to hear a good history lecture,” he asked, “what does bring you to my corner of the world?”

Allison beamed. “Ah! Thought you’d never ask. Is this a good time?”

“Yes, of course. Have a seat.”

She dropped down into the chair he had for students during conference sessions, and gazed around. “Somehow this is not what I expected,” she commented.

“Oh. You were thinking that it would be the typical history professor’s lair—stacks of papers and books and—”

“Junk,” Allison interjected. “It’s wonderfully bare. Did you just move into this office?”

“No. I’ve been chair here for, mmm, about three years now. I just like things neat. Easier to concentrate.” He followed her gaze.

The office was bare. Yes, he had the requisite diplomas up, and a bookshelf filled with texts and other sources. But he needed the quiet that a Zenlike bareness helped him achieve.

“I was expecting a lot of artifacts. Isn’t that what you history folks call them? The detritus you collect over the years?”

“Oh, I have artifacts. See?” Kyle pointed to some shadow boxes mounted on the wall. “My collection of bullets rescued from battlefields. And that center box has political campaign buttons. And then for the prehistory folks, I’ve got a middling collection of arrowheads.”

“My college history professors’ offices were a nightmare. Really gosh-awful,” Allison said. “But this? This is nice. I like it. Very modern. Very clean. No gewgaws anywhere.”

Kyle regarded her for a long moment, detecting an unintentional insult to his profession, but certain from Allison’s winsome smile that she had meant no malice. “So...”

“Oh! You must think I’m an idiot. Here I am, blabbering away about interior design choices and wasting your time.” Her smile widened. “I stopped by the historical society office. Good thing I went this morning, as it closes at lunch.”

“Yeah, we can only afford a part-time secretary.” Was Allison thinking about taking up his invitation to attend some of the society’s events? Maybe there was hope, after all.

“The very nice lady there...Trish? Yes. Trish. She told me that I would need to see you about some of the paperwork I need,” Allison said.

“Paperwork? You don’t need to fill out any paperwork to attend a meeting.” What had Trish gotten so confused?

“No, no...very nice of you to invite me, and maybe I’ll get around to it, but you know...well, yeah, you do know that I’ve got my hands full, what with working on the house and getting it ready for Gran and all. No, a waiver request. I need a waiver request.”

“A what?” Now he was the one totally confused. What on earth was Allison talking about?

“There’s gotta be a way, right? To request an exemption? From the ordinances? You know, the ones you were telling me about earlier. I looked at the code, and it did say that any exemption was to be made by the city council at the recommendation of the historic preservation committee.”

“Wait.” Kyle had managed to ground himself back in the present, not distracted by the way the sunlight from the window bounced off Allison’s red hair, nor by the way her smile made him want to smile right back at her and say, “Yes, anything, just name it.”

“Trish said she wasn’t familiar with any sort of paperwork like that. But there has to be, right? I mean, come on, you’re a bureaucracy—oh, not you, I mean the committee. No offense.”

“None taken.” That was a tiny fib. But Kyle didn’t think it counted against him too much. “Honestly, I can’t think—oh. Oh. Wait.” He held up a hand. “I know what you mean. Sorry. It took me a minute.”

He turned back to his computer and gave the mouse a nudge. The screen flickered to life, and he typed “historical variance hearing request” into the file search. A few whirs from the printer, and he pulled a thick sheaf of paper from the hopper.

Allison blinked at the pile. “That’s a lot of paper. I think my application to grad school was thinner.”

“Yeah, probably. It’s...it’s an intensive process,” Kyle told her. He decided he’d better not confess that he’d intentionally made the process as hard as possible to discourage people from even applying. It had been one of the suggestions he’d made when the committee had asked him to come up with ways to safeguard the historic section and the tourist dollars the area brought in.

“Okay. So...any pointers?” Allison reached for the application.

He didn’t give it to her. “Are you...sure?”

“Sure?” Now some of yesterday’s determination slipped by the cheery “I’m game” mask that she’d kept plastered on her face for the past few moments. “Yes. If this is how I have to get a waiver approved...”

“I’m just saying...” Kyle cleared his throat. He glanced down at the application. “This is a request for a hearing. And basically we—the historic preservation committee members—ask that you explain the project, describe how it is at variance with existing ordinances and historical integrity, and then tell why you feel the need to depart from that.”

“In five hundred words or less,” she joked.

“Oh, no. The, er, more detailed, the better.” He couldn’t help but glance back at the unfortunate essay response about colonists being ‘tea’d off.’

“So I work through all this, and then I get my variance?”

“Not exactly,” he said. Why did he feel guilty about this?

Belle Paix would look horrid with modern windows. Allison’s zeal for “modernizing” the house reminded him strongly of the man who’d bought his family home. A sour taste rose in the back of Kyle’s mouth as he remembered how the new owner had quickly stripped the venerable old structure of its character.

A perfectly good house. Ruined.

“Then what? Exactly?” Her cheerfulness had a distinct half-life, and it was approaching that point fast.

“Then you get your hearing. If the application is thorough and well thought out.”

“That makes no sense. Why can’t I just go before the committee and explain it? Rather than write it all down?”

Because then we’d have to tell you no. This way, you don’t fill out the paperwork, you don’t get the hearing and you blame yourself. Not us.

But Kyle didn’t say that. He cleared his throat again. “It’s a way to make sure you’ve thought it all through and explored your options.”

She harrumphed. “Busywork.”

“What?” He hoped that note of guilt in his strangled response hadn’t been as evident to her as it had to him.

“Okay. Hand it over. If this is what I’ve got to do, this is what I’ve got to do.” She stood up and reached for the paperwork again.

“Would you...like me to help you with it?”

“You would?” Allison’s face lit up. Her smile was absolutely breathtaking.

That. That is why you offered.

“Sure. On one condition.”

She frowned. “What?” she asked suspiciously.

“That you come to the historical society meeting. You’d find it interesting—this month’s program’s about Victorian homes. And you could share your story about how Belle Paix was built that you were telling me when we first met. That was fun. Entertaining. Our members would love it.”

“I dunno,” she said. She put a hand to her head as though warding off a sudden headache. “I was really never good at history.”

“I promise you won’t have to remember a single date. Or name. Except mine.”

Allison laughed. “I wouldn’t forget the guy who volunteered his elbow grease to help me out.”

“So?” Kyle couldn’t believe that he was holding his breath in hopes she’d say yes.

“I was planning on painting Gran’s room Thursday—I feel fairly confident in tackling the interior paint job on my own, though the exterior, what with three tall stories and all that scraping, well, that’s a horse of a different color. Anyway, you did say when you first mentioned it that the meeting was Thursday, right? I have to work this weekend—I’m a nurse on weekends at the ER at the hospital. So...I really need to get some work done at the house.”

“I love to paint. And I’ve been told I’m very good at it. If I help you tomorrow night, and maybe Friday afternoon when my classes are done...then you’d be free Thursday?”

“You don’t quit, do you?” Allison gave a bemused chuckle. It made his heart skip a beat.

“I just think...” He looked down at the paperwork. The meeting would be a way for history to come alive for her, to help her understand why people in Lombard were so passionate about protecting their architectural treasures. Not only that, the historic section was an economic engine for the community, bringing in tens of thousands of tourist dollars each year. “I think that anyone who grew up in that marvelous house ought to know about the time the house was built.”

“You really don’t mind helping me paint? Or...” Allison pointed at the stack of papers he had clasped in his hand “...working through that monstrosity of an application?”

“I really don’t mind.”

“Okay, then. That’s a deal I can’t refuse. Wow.”

She took the papers from him. He saw her skim through them, frown in puzzlement and then shake her head. “I really am going to need your help. Half of this reads like a foreign language.”

Again, a twinge of guilt assailed him. He’d made the language as opaque as possible to intimidate would-be variance seekers.

And until now, it had worked. Not a single person had ever actually taken an application once he or she had seen it.

But Kyle had a nagging suspicion that Allison wasn’t like anybody else he’d ever met before.

CHAPTER FIVE

ALLISON DUG HER nails into the palms of her hands.

Nope. Not enough pain. Her eyelids were still drooping.

Time for the old bite-your-cheek trick, she thought.

She risked a peek at her watch and saw that she’d been trapped in the historical society’s meeting room for an hour and forty-five minutes. And there was still no end in sight.

When would this meeting end? Didn’t these people have to eat? Go to sleep?

In the front of the room, a petite woman of about seventy with impossibly dark hair pulled tight into a bun fiddled with her bifocals. “No, no, Eunice, we can’t possibly plant that particular variety of flower in the public sections of the district,” she said. “It is a more modern variety—why, it wasn’t around until 1898!”

To Allison’s sleep-deprived brain, the woman’s shrill, nasal accent drilled into her as insistently as the tools of the trade of any dentist.

So why on earth was she still nodding off?

Okay, so it probably hadn’t been the smartest move in the world to soldier on and come to this meeting after she had been called in to work last night at the last minute. She’d managed to snatch three hours of sleep when she’d gotten home this morning, but the lift-chair electrician was supposed to have shown up.

He hadn’t. Of course not. That would have broken her perfect record of repair guys who hadn’t shown up for their appointments. Five of ’em. No shows, all.

But this last guy? The electrician? He’d sworn that he’d come, that he needed the work. And she’d crawled out of bed much too soon and even showered to make sure she was presentable.

It made Allison demented enough to want to call the guy up in the middle of the night and wake him up.

She should have told Kyle that she needed to sleep. But he’d stayed at the house painting until after 9:00 p.m., and he’d been so excited at the prospect of her coming. And then this evening, when he’d stopped by to walk her over to the library, and she’d started to tell him no, he’d been like a kid. Bubbling with enthusiasm about this person he wanted her to meet, and that expert on Victorians and...

And, well, she hadn’t had the heart to let him down. She hadn’t even admitted to working all night at the ER. Allison was sure he’d think she was making an excuse to wiggle out of the meeting.

He’d done his part. She hadn’t thought one historical society meeting was too much to ask for the help he’d given.

Ha. This is worse than any clinical staff meeting I’ve ever endured. No wonder Gran steered clear of these gatherings!

She stole a look at Kyle, who appeared to be riveted by this minutiae. He’d actually been paying attention, because now he was weighing in with his own opinion.

“Ladies, both of you are right,” he said, smiling.

Even in her sleep-deprived condition, the warm tug of his lips and the way his teeth flashed bright in his tanned, lean face sent a zinger through Allison’s body.

What a charmer. Those two old gals are eating him up.

And they were—when they weren’t glaring at each other. They turned their attention back to Kyle, who continued. “While that particular rose was very popular at the turn of the century—strictly speaking, toward the end of the historic district spending spree—it hadn’t been bred when some of our earlier houses were built.”

That drew a smile from the lady with the dye job. Kyle’s next words, though, elicited a told-you-so grin from Eunice, defender of the 1898 rose. “But who’s to say that some of the owners of the older homes might not have added new varieties? After all, none of us are content with the things we started out with. We keep adding new ones, right?”

Just as Dye Job’s smug smile soured, Kyle did something that really amazed Allison. He smoothed over the whole thing and left both ladies nodding thoughtfully. “Still,” he said, “we can always skip the roses and do a nice bougainvillea instead. Properly trained, it would do quite well, and it was popular and widely available during those years.”

I am going to scream. Hot pokers in the eye wouldn’t be this bad. How is he enjoying this? Allison made the mistake of catching Kyle’s attention. He grinned. Winked, even...no. Maybe that wasn’t a wink. Maybe he had something in his eye. Yes. He was rubbing it. Was he was sleepy, too?

Best prescription in the world for insomnia, one Lombard Historical Society meeting. It had been bad enough hearing the featured speaker, who’d droned on and on about trains and the expansion of the Central Railroad.

True, the speaker had mentioned Ambrose Shepherd, and even pointed out Allison at the beginning of his remarks. He’d called on her to stand up as he’d introduced her. She’d gotten quite the golf clap from all these folks in their Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes.

But there was only so much discussion of board feet of lumber and innovations of cold rolled steel and railroad ties that Allison could endure.

And then? When the speaker finished and Kyle opened the floor for new business?

Distinct turn for the worse.

Allison stared with longing at the ice bucket loaded with bottles of soft drinks that awaited the close of the session. The ice had melted, and tiny puddles had formed on the paper tablecloth around the bucket, but even a lukewarm soft drink would still give her a welcome jolt of caffeine.

She barely managed to cover a sneak-attack yawn that caught her unawares. Allison didn’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings. These people really were passionate about all this history; it just wasn’t her cup of tea.

As she lowered her palm, she noticed Kyle gazing quizzically at her. In a rush, he brought the meeting to a rather abrupt end.

“It looks like we’ve gotten so excited about our public gardening spaces that we’ve run over our time. I suggest we adjourn and head for the refreshments.”

“But—but we haven’t even gone over the list of sources for antique plumbing supplies,” one fellow protested.

Now, why didn’t we do that first? Allison thought. Because that would have been useful. And maybe to go along with it a list of plumbers crazy enough to work on old houses. Maybe what I really need is a support group for renovators.

Despite the man’s irritation, Kyle assured him that he had just the list for him. By the time he’d promised to get it to him, Allison saw that the majority of the crowd had stampeded to the refreshments table. They hadn’t had to be told twice.

Kyle started across the room toward her, but got waylaid by first one and then another attendee. As she held on to the back of the chair in front of her to keep from falling over, she felt a tug on her elbow.

A tall gentleman with a luxurious crop of snow-white hair and a suntanned face peered down at her quizzically. “Well, now,” he said, then cleared his throat and began again. “Well, now. Stimulating stuff, no?”

Allison blinked. Lying was not her style, not even teeny-tiny white lies, if she could get away with the truth. “Er, they are very detail-oriented,” she commented.

“Got to be,” he said with a satisfied nod. “Got to watch every jot and tittle. Don’t want any anachronistic details to spoil the effect, you know? And people will try you. They’ll test you. Got to hold the line.”

“You mean...about the flowers?” Allison asked. It was as if the man could peer into her very soul and know that she was conspiring to slap vinyl siding onto Belle Paix.

“About it all. I’m on the preservation committee. I should know. All manner of wild-eyed schemes come before us. People wanting to paint their Victorians white. Put Georgian columns on ’em. Enough to turn my stomach, I tell you.”

Allison’s own stomach sank like a stone at the news that this hard-liner was one she’d face at her variance request hearing. If she ever managed to fill out all that paperwork. Please...don’t have any clones on the board just like you.

“I can see you take this very seriously,” she said.

“And well I should! That young Kyle, he’s turned this place around. You ought to have seen the mess this neighborhood was in...well, you can! Let me show you the before-and-after gallery—it’s right out in the hall. You’ll be astonished!”

“Uh...” She looked down at the man’s hand, which he’d wrapped around her arm. Likely planning to take her to the display whether she wanted to go or not.

“Ease up, Herbert, will you? Don’t want to frighten her off on her very first visit, do we?” Kyle’s welcome voice interrupted them.

“Oh! Kyle! I was waiting for you.”

There, that was true. She was. She wanted to be a polite guest and say her goodbyes, and then totter off to her bed.

Herbert shot her a disappointed glance, but covered it up with a good-natured dip of his head. “I’ll show you next time, how about? It will be something to look forward to.”

“Yes. It will be something,” she said brightly.

As soon as Herbert had drifted off to join the others at the table, Kyle said, “You look all done in. Did you stay up late painting after I left?”

“Uh, actually...about ten minutes after you left, the hospital called and begged me to come in. They were short an RN for the ER last night. What could I say? I’m the new kid in town.”

“You worked all night? With no sleep today?” His eyebrows shot up and he shook his head in disbelief. “If I had only known.”

“No, no. I got some sleep. Would have gotten more if I hadn’t had to wake up to meet the electrician.”

“So you’re rewiring the house?” Kyle asked. “Who’d you get?”

“Nobody yet. The guy was a no-show. Let’s face it. He probably Google-Earthed it, saw what a disaster the place was and didn’t bother coming.”

“How frustrating. Listen, I have a list of good electricians who are willing to work on old houses. Let me go grab it for you from the office—no, no, I insist. I have to get that source list for Paul, anyway.”

“Ahem, can...can I come with you? Because I’m really not up to small talk right now. It’s all I can do to get out guttural cave-woman speech. Even the weather is beyond me, as tired as I am.”

He laughed and jabbed his finger toward her, then back at his chest. “You, Jane, me Tarzan. You come.”

“Sold!”

The two of them made their way to the office, where Kyle deftly picked a few sheaves of paper from two pigeonholes. “Commonly requested items—pays to keep them handy,” he explained.

“You are just too organized. You make me feel like a complete slob. You know, you didn’t spill a single drop of paint last night, and your paintbrush, when you cleaned it, looked brand-new.”

“Didn’t yours?” he asked.

“Er, no. Mine wound up looking more like one of those troll dolls. I’ll probably toss it and buy another.”

“I did happen to notice it wasn’t a very good quality brush,” he said.

“Aren’t brushes brushes?” she asked.

“No. A good brush is something to go to war over to protect. Trust me, after you’ve done all the trim work on your house—outside and inside—you’ll have found the right brush for you. And you’ll threaten to kill anybody who so much as lays a finger on it.”

“Does this violent propensity extend only toward paintbrushes? Or should I be worried about touching other things that belong to you?” she teased.

He blushed. He really, honestly blushed. She hadn’t meant anything risqué with her comment, but now could see the double entendre.

“Mainly paintbrushes,” he muttered. “I’ll give you...fair warning about the other stuff.”

To take her mind off her own flaming face and Kyle’s awkwardness, she stared down at the pages. “Well, I guess I should be—”

“I’ll walk you home. Let me hand this to Paul.”

And in a flash, though she wouldn’t have expected it two minutes earlier, Kyle’s hand was on her back as he ushered her out the society office’s front door and toward her house.

“You didn’t much care for the meeting, did you?” he asked.

“Really...I couldn’t say.” For sure. Because then I’d hurt your feelings, and you seem like a nice guy. Probably you share Herbert’s hard-liner approach about historical accuracy, but even so, you’re a nice guy. “Maybe I was too tired to give it a fair shake?”

He didn’t say anything for a few steps. The silence stretched between them, interrupted by the sporadic rush of a car barreling down the street past them, and crickets and a dog barking when the car had passed.