And The Winner--Weds!

Jasmine laughed. “You know what she means, Frannie. Make small talk. Be pleasant. Show you’re accessible.”

“Let him know you’re interested,” Summer added. “Smile. Flirt.”

“That’s easy for you two to say. I don’t know how to do any of that.”

“Well, then, it’s high time you learned. Jasmine and I can teach you.”

Jasmine nodded vigorously.

“Oh, no.” Frannie held up her hands, palms out. “No way. No, thanks.”

Jasmine’s flawless forehead creased in a frown. “Why not?”

“Because it wouldn’t work. Besides, I’d feel like an idiot.”

“No, you wouldn’t. Not for long, anyway.” Jasmine circled the front desk and stopped in front of Frannie, her hands on her hips. “Think about it, Frannie. Isn’t it better to feel a little silly for a little while than to feel lonely forever?”

Lonely forever—was that what they thought she was destined to be? A sharp little knife of pain sliced into Frannie’s heart. “There are worse things than being lonely,” she mumbled.

Such as being humiliated. And heart broken. And feeling like a pathetic fool.

Summer’s dark eyes filled with sympathy. “Just because you had a bad experience with one guy in college is no reason to shy away from all other men for the rest of your life.”

It wasn’t just a bad experience, Frannie thought, it was an amputation of part of her soul. Joe had not only betrayed her; he’d emotionally maimed her. He’d stripped her of her self-confidence and her ability to trust anyone.

Frannie pushed back her chair and rose, wrapping her arms around herself. “I’m not shying away. I’m just minding my own business, living my own life.”

“Frannie, you’re practically a recluse,” Jasmine said softly.

“I’m not!”

“Yes, you are,” Summer affirmed. “You never go to any parties or social events. You go to work at the bank, then you come home and work here. And if an attractive man happens to come within a mile of you, you duck your head and avoid making eye contact.”

“And then there’s the matter of how you dress,” Jasmine added gently. “You’re hiding all of your best qualities. You have a great figure, but no one would ever know it under the clothes you wear. You have beautiful eyes, but instead of wearing your contact lenses, you hide behind your glasses. I’d love to have thick, curly hair like yours, but instead of making the most of it, you keep it skinned back in a ponytail or a tight little bun.”

Frannie was surprised to find herself blinking back tears. “Sorry I’m such an embarrassment to you.”

“Oh, Frannie, that’s not what we’re saying!” Jasmine stepped forward and embraced her in a hug. “We love you and want you to have all the good things in life, that’s all.”

“That’s right. We want you to be happy.” Summer placed a hand on Frannie’s back and gave her a consoling pat. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I was just trying to jar a little sense into you, that’s all.”

Frannie sniffed and wiped her eyes, then pulled away. Summer gave her another pat on the back, then pulled herself onto one edge of the computer work station. “I don’t think you realize it, Frannie, but when it comes to men, you’re your own worst enemy. You’ll never meet anyone if you don’t stop hiding.”

“I’m not deliberately hiding. I’m just…I don’t know. Being self-protective, maybe.” Frannie turned away and stared at the large stone fireplace in the living room across the foyer. She took a ragged breath. “If I had one-tenth of the good looks you two have, things would be different. But I don’t. I don’t want to set myself up for rejection again, that’s all.”

“You’ve got everything we’ve got,” Summer said.

“And in some places, more.” Jasmine looked down at her own petite chest in such an amusingly wistful way that Frannie had to smile.

“I’m plain as mud,” Frannie said bluntly.

“You’re not!” Summer said. “You just need a little polishing up.”

“That’s right.” Jasmine nodded. “And attitude.”

Frannie gave a tight smile. “Oh, I’ve got plenty of that.”

“Boy, do you ever!” Jasmine grinned. “But that’s not the kind of attitude I mean. You need to project more self-assurance.”

“Jasmine’s right,” Summer said. “Your outlook and expectations become a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you think you’re unattractive and don’t expect anyone to approach you, you’re going to act in ways that will make men keep their distance. But if you act confident and look your best and expect men to be attracted to you, that’s exactly what will happen.”

Frannie wished she could believe them. Some thing about that race car driver had stirred up longings she’d all but forgotten she could feel. She heaved a sigh. “You make it sound so easy. Too bad it isn’t.”

“Well, how about giving us a chance to prove that it is?”

If she had any sense, she’d say no right away. But the memory of Austin’s touch was too fresh on her mind. “What have you got in mind?” Frannie asked.

Summer grinned. “I just thought of the perfect occasion to prove to you that a makeover of your appearance and attitude can make over your love life.”

“And what might that be?” Frannie asked skeptically.

“Yeah, what is it?” Jasmine asked.

Summer paused dramatically. “The Whitehorn Ball. It’s the hospital’s big annual fund-raiser, and all of the staff is expected to be there. There’s this new doctor in radiology. He’s single, he doesn’t know anyone in town and he doesn’t have a date.”

Panic welled up in Frannie’s chest. “Oh, no. Not a blind date.”

Summer raised her hand in a calming gesture. “Just hear me out. The dance is three weeks away. That’s plenty of time for Jasmine and me to make you over and give you some pointers.”

“Oh, Summer, I don’t think this is a good idea….” Frannie began.

“It’s not a good idea. It’s a great one,” Jasmine said excitedly. She clasped her hands together. “We could triple date.”

“But—”

“But what?”

“But it’s a formal dance,” Frannie protested.

“So? That makes it all the more fun. We’ll turn you into Cinderella for the ball.”

“But—” Frannie swallowed around a lump in her throat. “But I was supposed to go to a formal dance with Joe the night after…after…”

“After you found out what a heel he was,” Summer finished for her.

Frannie nodded.

Her gaze was soft and warm. “That was what? Five years ago?”

“Six.”

Summer gently placed her hands on Frannie’s shoulders. “Can you look me straight in the eye and honestly tell me you don’t ever want to go to a formal dance again the rest of your life?”

Did she really want to limit her life in that way? Frannie sighed. “I guess not.”

“Well, then, it’s high time you got back in the saddle.”

“But the idea makes me so—so uncomfortable.”

“Frannie, sometimes we have to move outside our comfort zone in order to move forward. We have to face our fears in order to get over them.” Summer’s tone was calm and authoritative, the tone that Frannie secretly called her doctor’s voice. “This is a great opportunity for you to put the past behind you, once and for all, and start a new chapter in your life.”

Jasmine nodded earnestly.

“Besides,” Summer continued, “what have you got to lose? It’s just one night out of your life. For just one night, try things our way. If you don’t like the results, you can always go back to the way things are now.”

A car pulled up in the drive and killed its engine. The hum of another engine rapidly followed. A wave of relief washed through Frannie. “Sounds like both of your dates are here. Too bad we’ll have to discontinue this fascinating discussion.”

Summer rose and straightened her skirt, her lips curved in a smile. “Don’t worry. We’ll continue it later. In the meantime, will you promise to just think about it?”

It would be a disaster. She was awful at making small talk. She would make a fool of herself. She was nuts to even consider it.

But she was considering it. Heaven help her, she was. Meeting that race car driver had made her realize how much she longed for male companionship. More than anything, she wanted a husband and a family.

Her cousins were right, Frannie thought ruefully. She wasn’t likely to meet any prospective mates sitting at home in front of the computer.

Frannie sighed and reluctantly nodded. “Okay. I’ll think about it.”

Two

Frannie thought of little else for the rest of the evening. She was still thinking about it the next morning when she strode into the large sun-filled kitchen, where Aunt Celeste was fussing over the stove.

Frannie smoothed a wayward strand of hair back into the tight bun she’d coiled at her crown, thinking how different her own drab coloring was from her vivid aunt’s. A natural redhead, Celeste had russet hair that became progressively brighter over the years as she fought off the signs of aging. Her current shade was called Autumn Flame, and she’d evidently taken the theme to heart, because she was dressed in a loose yellow shirt over a filmy orange and yellow gypsy-style skirt.

“Ouch!” Celeste dropped a heavy skillet back onto the stove with a loud clatter, then stuck her index finger into her mouth and dashed to the sink, her bangle bracelets jangling.

Frannie hurried forward. “Are you all right?”

Celeste flipped on the faucet and stuck her right hand under the running water. “Depends on your definition of ‘all right.’ That’s the second time I’ve burned myself this morning, and the third skillet of scrambled eggs I’ve nearly ruined.”

“Where’s Jasmine?” Jasmine normally did all the cooking at the B and B.

“That nice young man she went out with last night came by and wanted to take her fishing this morning,” Celeste said. “I told her to go ahead, that I’d enjoy taking a turn in the kitchen. I didn’t know I was going to be all thumbs this morning.”

Frannie frowned. Aunt Celeste might be less than careful when it came to bookkeeping and paperwork, but she was usually the very picture of efficiency in the kitchen. Celeste’s personality was as warm as her hair color, and she was just as nurturing as she was warm. She loved cooking and baking, and was as comfortable around the stove as Frannie was around the computer.

Frannie stepped closer. Her aunt’s complexion seemed paler than usual this morning, and the delicate skin under her eyes was etched with deep blue shadows.

“Are you feeling ill?”

Celeste brushed a strand of hair away from her forehead with her left hand and sighed. “I’m fine, dear. Just tired. I didn’t sleep well again last night. I kept having those awful dreams.”

Celeste had been plagued by nightmares for the past two weeks. All of them involved members of her family, and most of them centered on her sister, Blanche. In one particularly vivid dream, Blanche had warned that the past was about to rise up and greet her. She’d also cautioned Celeste be careful to make the right choices.

“Have you had any more dreams about Blanche?” Frannie asked.

“All of them seem to involve her.” Celeste stared out the kitchen window at the forest. “A couple of them last night were about my brother, Jeremiah. He was angry—horribly angry—but I don’t know why or at whom or what was going on. Another time I woke up with my heart racing, and I’d been dreaming about Blanche. I could see her in the distance.”

Celeste shut off the faucet and reached for a paper towel. “She was trying to tell me something, but for the life of me, I couldn’t understand what it was. She was too far away. I could see her lips moving, but I couldn’t hear what she was saying.”

Frannie reached for a clean cloth and filled it with ice. She gave it to her aunt. “You’ve been having a lot of bad dreams lately.”

Celeste put the ice pack on her injured finger. “Just about every night. I’m sure it’s a sign.”

“Of what?”

“I don’t know. Blanche keeps trying to tell me something. I keep thinking back to the dream where she told me the past was about to rise up. Something’s about to happen. And whatever it is, it’s important.”

Celeste was a deeply spiritual person, but she harbored some odd notions about dreams and ghosts and the afterlife. She’d lived in Louisiana for a year with her late husband, and she’d brought back some strange beliefs from the bayou.

“Sometimes a dream is just a dream,” Frannie commented.

“And sometimes it’s not.” Celeste shook her head. “You know, dreams are nothing to dismiss lightly. Sometimes they contain messages from the other side. The problem is, the messages are often hard to read.” Celeste inspected her finger. “They’re like smoke signals—they can drift away before you get a chance to understand them.”

An acrid odor reached Frannie’s nose. She sniffed, then looked at Celeste in alarm. “Speaking of smoke, is something burning?”

“Oh, dear!” Celeste dashed across the kitchen, grabbed an oven mitt and yanked open the oven door, then reached inside. “Ouch!” she exclaimed, waving her hand.

“Did you burn yourself again?”

“Yes, dadblast it! Frannie, come and take these cinnamon rolls out of the oven before they burn to a crisp.”

Frannie patted her aunt’s back. “Why don’t you go sit down and relax? I’ll get breakfast for our guests this morning. We only have three, don’t we? Mr. Deshaw and that nice couple from Washington?”

“Four. Mr. Deshaw’s friend came by to pick him up, and I invited him to stay for breakfast. I believe Mr. Deshaw said he’s a race car driver, of all things.”

Frannie’s heart unaccountably picked up speed. She pulled on the oven mitt her aunt had abandoned and retrieved the burned rolls from the oven.

“The couple ate an hour ago. They’re out on the lake in the rowboat, fishing.”

“Well, then, I’ll get breakfast for the gentlemen.”

“Why, thank you, dear.” Celeste smiled at her niece. “I believe I’ll take you up on that offer.”

“Are you serving breakfast on the back porch?”

Celeste nodded. “It was too beautiful a morning to stay inside. Since the rolls are burned, why don’t you make some toast? You can serve it with the scrambled eggs. I made enough to serve an army.”

Celeste made her way upstairs and Frannie bustled around the kitchen. In a matter of minutes she’d prepared two attractive plates garnished with sliced cantaloupe and fresh strawberries. She loaded them onto an antique silver tray, her stomach fluttering nervously. Taking a deep breath, she headed out of the kitchen, through the den and onto the screened-in back porch.

The porch overlooked Blue Mirror Lake and Frannie usually found the view breathtaking, but she was too distracted by the sight of the tall, handsome man to notice the scenery this morning. Austin was settled in a rustic twig chair at a wooden table, deep in conversation with Tommy, and he looked even more handsome than she remembered. Her pulse fluttered wildly when he looked up at her and smiled.

He rose as she approached the table. “Good mornin’. May I help you with that?” He gestured toward the tray.

Frannie hesitated, completely flustered. She wasn’t accustomed to guests standing and offering to help when she tried to serve them. “Oh, no. Please take your seat.” She lifted a hand from the tray and gestured toward his chair.

She immediately knew she’d made a mistake. The tray tipped and the plates slid. She watched in horror as they headed toward him, as if in slow motion. Trying to correct the slant of the tray, she jerked it upward, but overcompensated.

“Oh, no!” Frannie gasped. A plate of scram bled eggs hit Austin full in the face, then landed back on the tray with a loud clatter.

Frannie stared, too aghast to move. Scram bled eggs dripped from his forehead, from his eyebrows, from his nose. “Oh, I’m so sorry!”

Austin ran his fingers across his eyes, clearing a path through the yellow blobs. Setting the tray quickly on the table, Frannie grabbed a blue cloth napkin and handed it to him. He used it like a washcloth, completely covering his face and wiping the egg away.

Frannie watched helplessly, dying a thousand deaths. “I’m so very, very sorry! Are you all right?”

He pulled the napkin away and opened his eyes. “Fine.” Turning the napkin, he took another swab at his forehead. The corners of his mouth turned up in a wry grin.

“It’s not the first time I’ve had egg on my face, is it, Tommy?”

The large man across the table slapped his knee and chortled. “No, sirree. But usually you’re the one that put it there.”

“I’m so sorry,” Frannie repeated. She grabbed another napkin and began dabbing at his shirt. His chest beneath the blue cotton knit was disconcertingly hard and warm. “Oh, dear, you’ve got it on your jeans, too.” She lifted the napkin, ready to attack his crotch, then froze as she realized what she was about to do.

His hand closed over hers, stopping her. The heat from his hand radiated up her arm, through her shoulder and straight through her chest. She stared up into blue, blue eyes.

His grin was blinding. “I think I’d better take over the clean-up operation.”

“I’m so sorry,” she repeated, her voice a low, mortified whisper.

“It’s all right. It’s no big deal.” Releasing her hand, he took the napkin from her and brushed off his lap. “Looks like you took a bit of a hit yourself.” He reached out and brushed a blob of egg from her cheek.

The intimacy of the touch sent a shock wave curling through her. She jumped away as if he’d gigged her with a cattle prod, only to immediately realize the absurdity of her reaction.

“I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“You didn’t,” she lied.

“Well, there’s a little more egg right…” He reached out his hand again. Once more she reflexively jumped back.

Something about this man’s touch made her feel hot and bothered and breathless.

“I’m, uh, ticklish,” she lamely explained, vigorously rubbing her cheeks. “Is my face clean now?”

He seemed to be looking at something over her head. He pulled his eyes down to meet her gaze. “Your face? Uh, yeah.”

“Good. Well, I’ll…I’ll go fix you another plate, then come back and clean all this up.”

She fled to the kitchen, feeling as awkward as a three-legged chair. Quickly she made more toast, sliced more melon and plated up two more servings of eggs.

“Here you go,” she said a few minutes later as she hurried back to the porch. She set down his breakfast and backed away from the table, unreasonably worried about getting too close to Austin. “I’ll just go get a broom and dustpan and—” She stopped short and stared at the spotless wooden floor. “You cleaned it all up!”

Austin shrugged. “We found a roll of paper towels by the serving bar in the corner.”

Frannie frowned in dismay. “But you’re guests, and I’m the one who made the mess, and—”

Austin waved away her objections. “We’re used to cleanin’ up crank cases and oil pan spills. This was nothing.”

“That’s right.” Tommy smiled, his widely spaced teeth giving his round face the appearance of a friendly jack-o’-lantern.

But it was Austin’s amused expression that held her gaze. He was looking at her in such a strange way, as if he found her intensely interesting.

Frannie felt her pulse race. She was used to being ignored by men, not treated as an object of endless fascination—especially not by the likes of Austin Parker. She was drab and colorless and average. She certainly wasn’t dressed to rate any undue attention; she was just wearing a faded brown sweatshirt and loose-fitting khakis. She wasn’t wearing any makeup, her hair was wound in a bun at her crown, and her glasses were firmly in place on top of her nose. Austin’s intense scrutiny rattled her down to her toenails.

“Well, uh, thanks for the help. Can I get you anything else?”

“I think we’re all set.”

She beat a hasty retreat to the kitchen, where she tried to drown out her clamoring thoughts by loading the dishwasher and vigorously mopping the floor. She was nearly finished when Austin stuck his head inside the door fifteen minutes later. “Breakfast was delicious. Thanks. And give my thanks to your aunt.”

She heard the men’s footsteps retreat down the hall, then heard the front door close behind them. She leaned against the kitchen wall and inhaled a deep breath, her hand on her stomach.

Thank goodness they were gone. Austin made her feel as if her lungs were too small to draw enough air. And the way he looked at her! His gaze went so…so deep, as if he were seeing things in her that no one else had ever seen.

“You’re being ridiculous,” she muttered to herself. Instead of standing around mooning over an unattainable man, she needed to march herself back to the computer and finish the bookkeeping. She started through the dining room on her way to do just that, then jerked to a halt as she caught sight of her reflection in the mirrored china cabinet.

“Oh, dear,” she murmured.

There in the mirror, staring back at her from between plates of flowered Franciscan china, was the reason Austin had regarded her with such fascination: a giant glob of scrambled egg was perched atop her head like a yellow rubber tiara, supported by the bun she’d pulled her hair into that morning.

“Great. Just great.”

Striding back into the kitchen, she held her head over the sink and dislodged the enormous lump of egg. She pulled a paper towel off the holder and rubbed her hair, heaving a sigh of disgust. Austin was the sexiest man she’d ever set eyes on, and what did she do? She acted like a hopelessly tongue-tied klutz, so skittish that the poor guy didn’t dare tell her that the top of her head looked the inside of an egg salad sandwich.

Summer and Jasmine would never have been behaved so clumsily. They would have known how to talk and behave and flirt. Summer and Jasmine never would have thrown a plate of eggs in a guest’s face in the first place, and they certainly wouldn’t have ended up walking around all morning looking as if an airborne goose had just used them for target practice.

Maybe she should take them up on their offer to make her over. She had no expectations of being as glamorous as her cousins, but maybe, just maybe, she could gain a little of their self-assurance. Maybe Summer was right. Maybe if she quit feeling like such a nerd, she’d stop acting like one.

“What the heck,” she muttered, heading upstairs to wash her hair for the second time that day. It was worth a try. When Jasmine got home, Frannie would tell her she’d agreed to the makeover.

Frannie was still burning with mortification over the egg incident when the bell over the front door jangled thirty minutes later. She looked up from the computer to see a tall man in a tan uniform stroll into the foyer, accompanied by an attractive blond woman dressed in jeans and a white cotton shirt with a large black tote bag over her shoulder.

Frannie rose from her seat and smiled. “Sheriff Rawlings, good morning!”

Rafe Rawlings’s rugged face creased in a friendly smile. “Good mornin’, Frannie. I’d like you to meet my new detective, Gretchen Neal.”

Frannie stepped forward and shook the blonde’s hand. “Nice to meet you.” The woman’s handshake was as sturdy as her tall, athletic build. With her milky skin, light blond hair and blue eyes, she reminded Frannie of the movie star Gwyneth Paltrow.

“Gretchen just moved here from Elk Springs,” Sheriff Rawlings said. “But before that, she worked on the police force in one of the toughest neighborhoods in Miami. We’re lucky to have someone with her experience join our force.”

“We sure are. Can I offer you two breakfast?”

“No, thanks. I’m afraid we’re here on business today, Frannie.”

Frannie raised her brows in surprise.

Rafe’s dark eyes grew serious. “Gretchen’s heading up the investigation into Raven Hunter’s death. I need someone who can devote one hundred percent of their time to the case, and Gretchen’s got the background to handle it.”

“I…see.” Although she didn’t. Not really. That still didn’t explain why they were here on a Sunday morning. “Do you have any other suspects? Other than Uncle Jeremiah?”