Her Husband-To-Be

“No. In fact, I expect he’s already here, geared up for the evening.”

“That’s good. I could just see you having to go off to the hospital with him and me being stuck trying to figure out which people go with which tables. So why the suitcase? Are you eloping after work?”

“It doesn’t hurt to be prepared,” Danielle countered. “You never know when you might meet the man of your dreams.”

“It’s especially hard to anticipate the moment when you’re not even looking.”

“That is a bit of a difficulty,” Danielle admitted. She pulled open the main door and held it for Pam, who was carrying the bank bag and a box full of receipts. She was barely inside the restaurant when she spotted her father in the main dining room, moving two small tables together to accommodate a larger group, and she forgot all about Pam as she hurried to help. “Harry, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Getting ready for a party of eight,” Harry Evans said. He leaned on one of the tables and smiled at her.

It was a half-theatrical pose that did nothing to fool Danielle. She could hear the tiny wheeze in his chest, and she wondered if his heart condition was getting worse or if he’d simply been exerting himself more than he should this afternoon. “Dammit, Dad, you know better.” She moved the second table into position, bracing it tightly against the one Harry was leaning on, then slid the chairs back into place. “Let the busboys earn their pay.”

“Then why are you doing their work?” Harry asked gently. He rearranged the linen napkins and place settings and strolled toward the office. “If you have a minute, Danielle, we need to talk about increasing our orders for next week, to be ready for the strawberry festival.”

Danielle followed. “And making sure we have some extra help on call wouldn’t hurt, either.” Especially, she thought, since she herself was going to be wearing two hats right then—and both jobs would be demanding ones. She groaned. I think I need my head examined.

She straightened her shoulders. She was doing what needed to be done after all. And it wasn’t as if she was taking on the Merry Widow as a lifetime commitment, just till the Jablonskis had sorted themselves out or another buyer came along. Which might not be long at all if the strawberry festival was a success.

Harry Evans dropped into his office chair with a thud, and Danielle frowned. “I don’t have to go tonight, Dad,” she said. She’d intended to study the bed-and-breakfast’s reservation book tonight and try to plan at least a few days ahead. But perhaps she could just stop by the Merry Widow, pick up the book and take it home. “If you need me—”

Harry grinned “Now that’s the most loaded question I’ve heard in a month.”

Danielle leaned against the door frame and studied him. His color had come back, and he seemed to be breathing more easily. And she knew better than to treat him like a child. The man was well past fifty, for heaven’s sake.

Pam stopped sorting small bills into the cash register drawer. “Where are you going? And does this mean I’ll be shanghaied into acting as hostess for the lunch rush tomorrow? Because I warn you, Danny—”

“Of course not. I’m only going to the Merry Widow.”

“If they’re closed, how can you check in for a rest cure? Besides, supporting the hometown economy is wonderful, but if I were you, I wouldn’t stop within fifty miles. Too many people can find you if you stay in town.”

It wasn’t as if there was any secret involved, Danielle realized. By tomorrow, all of Elmwood would know the basics, the shopkeeper who had passed on Joe Jablonski’s message to Deke had no reason to keep her knowledge to herself “I’m going to be running it for a while. Till we can sell it again.”

Pam dropped a roll of quarters. The paper wrapper split and bright coins spilled across the floor. Danielle stooped to help pick them up

“Excuse me, but is this a time warp?” Pam asked mildly. “I thought the sale was final almost a year ago.”

“We thought so, too. But Joe and Kate didn’t have quite a good enough credit record to get a mortgage, so we decided...” Danielle took a deep breath. “I decided, really, that it was worth some risk to give them a chance. So instead of making payments to a bank, they’ve been paying us, Deke and me, every month.”

“Till now.” Pam sighed. “As your accountant, Danielle—”

“Please don’t start. You can’t say anything Deke didn’t tell me at the time.”

“But he went along with it anyway?”

“I didn’t give him a lot of choice,” Danielle admitted. “The only other serious interest we had was from a group that was going to cut the Merry Widow up into apartments, and I couldn’t stand to see that happen to Miss Fischer’s house.”

“So you planted your feet and fought.”

Not all that hard, Danielle reflected. But he knew I would if I had to—and by that time, Deke would have agreed to almost anything to be rid of me. But she wasn’t going to admit that to Pam; there were some wounds too tender to share even with a best friend “After she’d trusted me with it, how could I do anything else?”

“She trusted you and Deke,” Pam reminded her “You know, I’ve always wondered why she included him—why she didn’t just leave the place to you. She didn’t even know him, did she?”

“They met once. I went to visit her in the care center a couple of weeks before she died, and I took Deke with me.”

Funny, Danielle thought, that the whole mess really stemmed from a casual trip to the lake. They’d been on their way out of town for an afternoon’s swimming when she’d remembered Miss Fischer and told Deke she’d promised to stop by to see her for a moment. And he’d come inside with her rather than wait in the June heat.

Fifteen minutes, that was all. A quarter of an hour in which he hadn’t even been trying to captivate Miss Fischer—which said something about Deke Oliver’s charm. He didn’t have to try.

He’d stepped outside the room to allow Danielle a private goodbye. She hardly remembered what Miss Fischer had said, for the words had been unremarkable. Something about what a nice young man he was, a very special young man, but that obviously Danielle already knew that. And Danielle had hugged her and said, “Oh, yes. A very special man indeed.”

And from that tiny, careless comment, Miss Fischer—who despite all appearances had been a romantic marshmallow deep inside—had constructed the picture of a couple in love, a couple who simply hadn’t yet told anyone else about their feelings. A couple who’d need a place to live and to establish a family. And so, without a word to anyone else of her intentions, she’d called in her lawyer and changed her will....

And the fallout of that decision, Danielle thought wearily, was still drifting over them, with no end in sight.

It was nearly midnight when the last party left the Willows and Danielle could lock up the restaurant and leave. Harry Evans was still in the office, ostensibly ordering the extra supplies they’d need to have on hand when the strawberry festival began. Danielle knew, however, that he was killing time, waiting around as he always did on the nights it was her turn to close.

She stopped in the office doorway to put on her jacket. “Don’t work too late, Dad,” she said with only a faint tinge of irony

Harry shuffled his papers into the desk drawer. “Is it closing time already? I might as well walk out to the lot with you.”

Danielle could almost have recited the words along with him. She didn’t bother to argue with him anymore. If it made him feel better to stay around to keep a protective eye on his baby and then walk her to her car—well, at least staying up late didn’t hurt him the way moving tables did. Harry could sleep well into the morning.

Which was more than Danielle could. She’d have only a few hours to call her own tomorrow, and in that narrow span of time, she’d have to plan the entire weekend How many guests would be coming in on Friday? How long would they stay? What kind of staples had the Jablonskis left in the kitchen and what would she need to buy?

Despite the hour, the downtown square was still washed with light when Danielle drove through. The shop windows lining the streets glowed softly, showing off merchandise even though there was no one just now to see it. In some of the apartments above—remodeled in the past few years from dark, low-rent rooms into larger, more elaborate homes—windows gleamed. And soft floodlight spilled over the courthouse in the center of the square, making it look even more like a daintily iced wedding cake.

Danielle tried not to look up at Deke’s apartment. But it was hard to avoid; it was on the very corner of the square, so rather than just a narrow frontage, his apartment had windows down the entire length, as well.

They were dark, which was no surprise. What had she expected anyway—that he’d be up late pacing the floor and worrying about the Merry Widow? “Maybe fretting because I’ve taken on so much responsibility and he’s doing nothing,” she jeered at herself.

But if the square was full of light, two blocks away the Merry Widow was another story. Danielle had never seen the place so utterly black, its windows emptily reflecting the pale moonlight.

She’d intended to put her car away in the carriage house, but the walkway between the buildings was even darker than the house itself. At the last minute, she left the car under the porte cochere. But the key Deke had passed on to her didn’t fit the side door, so—grumbling under her breath—she walked around toward the back porch.

High above her was one faint gleam from a tiny attic window that the Jablonskis had no doubt overlooked. The feeble light somehow made the rest of the house seem even darker.

She pushed the back door open. Even though she’d braced herself for the squeal of the hinges, a cold prickle ran up her spine at the sound. Deke hadn’t been far wrong when he said the place would make a great haunted house.

“What a comforting thought,” Danielle told herself wryly. “Why don’t we see if we can conjure up a few spirits while we’re at it?”

There was enough moonlight to guide her once her eyes had grown accustomed to the dimness. She’d wait till tomorrow, she decided, to search out the light switches. And she’d run out to the hardware store for some night-lights, too. How had the Jablonskis expected their guests to get around an unfamiliar house in total darkness?

She reached the top of the stairs and paused. She should have looked around earlier; she hadn’t given a thought till just now about which room she should use. The Jablonskis’ quarters, she supposed. She’d never been there, but she’d heard Kate talking about fixing up the attic into a private suite so all the more accessible bedrooms were available to guests.

But it hadn’t occurred to her to reconnoiter this afternoon. She’d only been thinking of getting away from Deke and that half-mocking smile, that slow and lazy voice. You utterly amaze me, Danielle....

She heard a creak from the front of the house, then something that sounded like a long sigh. She froze for an instant and then shook her head and smiled. In a house the size and age of the Merry Widow, creaks would be a dime a dozen And the sigh was easily explained; the wind had picked up throughout the evening and there was probably no shortage of leaky windows.

She turned toward the set of stairs, only a little narrower and plainer than the main ones, that led up to the attic. She’d been there only once before, on her first inspection tour after Miss Fischer’s will was read, and her main impression had been of a single enormous room, full of slanted walls and tiny odd-shaped windows, under the high-peaked roof The room had been lit only by a few bare bulbs, and there were plenty of boxes stacked haphazardly, most of them clustered in the center around the head of the stairs, as if they’d simply been dumped.

But the huge room Danielle climbed into was nothing at all like the attic she remembered. The basics were still the same; the ceiling soared just as high in the center, and the outer walls still sloped sharply except in the corner tower room.

But there the resemblance ended. The boxes were gone and bright rugs were scattered over the scarred floor. Here and there she thought there was a new wall, blocking off part of the enormous room to create at least the illusion of private space.

Not that she could see much. The only source of light, no doubt the cause of the pale glow she’d seen from outside, was a single small bulb above what looked like a built-in bar in a far corner of the room. No wonder the Jablonskis had missed it; it was so dim that in daylight it probably didn’t show up at all.

She was too tired even to walk across the room to turn the light off. She certainly wasn’t going to bother to unpack, she decided, or to look for clean sheets. She’d just collapse atop the Jablonskis’ bed, and in the morning she’d take care of the details.

Or at least she’d get started.

CHAPTER THREE

DANIELLE was used to waking to sunshine streaming through the wide windows of her father’s bungalow. Even on overcast days when there wasn’t enough light to rouse her, her internal alarm clock always kicked in, making sure she didn’t oversleep.

But on her first morning at the Merry Widow, nothing worked right. There was no sunshine, the Jablonskis had not only selected the darkest attic corner for their bedroom, but they’d angled the privacy wall to close out direct light from the tower windows, the only ones near enough to make a difference. And Danielle’s internal clock seemed to be on strike, as well, she felt almost hungover, as if she’d slept far too long—or not nearly long enough.

She must have fallen asleep the moment her head hit the pillow. In fact, Danielle thought wryly as she forced her eyes open, she wasn’t so sure her head had hit the pillow; all she’d been able to see in the dark room was the corner of the bed, and she’d simply flopped across it and closed her eyes. She felt stiff and lethargic as if she hadn’t moved all night Or perhaps it was still the middle of the night and she’d been jolted into consciousness long before she was ready.

Without even raising her head, she squinted hopefully at the clock on the bedside table and groaned. No such luck—it was morning all right She’d meant to be awake a couple of hours ago By now she should have been well on her way to having the Merry Widow organized. Instead.

Something was jabbing at her, poking her in the side. She tugged a book out from under her. It was a hardcover, its jacket wrapped in plastic—no doubt on loan from the local library In the dim light she could hardly make out the title, but from the design of the cover it was apparently some kind of bloody murder mystery. She wondered if it was Joe or Kate who had the interesting taste in bedtime reading.

She pushed herself up to sit on the edge of the bed. The room was the gloomiest she’d ever known. She was no psychologist, but she wouldn’t be a bit surprised if the Jablonskis’ fights had something to do with waking up every morning in the dark.

“The first thing I’d do,” she muttered, “is knock some skylights into the roof.” She tossed the book over her shoulder toward the opposite side of the bed.

It landed with a thump, instantly followed by a growl that sounded to Danielle like a bear with the breath knocked out of him.

The mattress shifted under her, and from the corner of her eye Danielle saw movement to her left, almost behind her. She turned her head so quickly that a muscle in her neck felt as if it had pulled loose completely, and for a moment tears of pain blurred her vision.

“What are you trying to do, knock me unconscious?” Deke asked There was a faint rasp in his voice this morning. He sounded like warm honey on sandpaper. “And you’re on your own with the skylights. Don’t send me half of the bill.”

Shock turned Danielle’s throat as rigid as an icicle. She stared as Deke pushed pillows into a pile against the wall that served as a headboard She’d never seen him before with the shadow of stubble along his jaw, his eyes dark and still heavy with sleep. The sight sent an almost painful jolt through her, and she hastily looked away from his face, only to see that the soft blanket draping his body had slid to his waist as he leaned back against the pile of pillows, stretching his arms above his head.

Danielle watched the easy ripple of muscle in his bare chest and tried not to remember the last time she’d seen so much of Deke Oliver—at the lake that day after their visit to Miss Fischer. The visit that had seemed so innocent, so casual. The visit that had led directly to this moment.

Though she was damned if she could understand why he was here. He had a perfectly good apartment, and she’d have sworn the last thing he’d intended when they parted yesterday was to get further involved with the Merry Widow.

“All the persuasive energy I exerted trying to get you into bed went for nothing,” Deke mused. “And now, with no effort at all, here we are. Ironic, isn’t it?”

Fury melted the icicle in Danielle’s throat. “So that’s it. You saw your chance—”

“And rushed right over so I could experience the dubious pleasure of waking up beside you?” Deke said, frowning. “Hardly.”

Danielle gulped. It did sound pretty stupid, phrased that way.

“And your salacious scenario has another small problem, too,” Deke continued relentlessly. “I could hardly have planned this—exciting though it is to sit here in bed and argue with you—because I had no idea you were actually planning to move in. What are you doing here anyway?”

Danielle tried to think through the conversation they’d had yesterday. Had she said anything then about her intentions of staying at the Merry Widow? She couldn’t remember, so she went on the attack instead. “It looks to me as if you’re the one who’s taken up residence.”

“But you brought a suitcase.” Deke pointed to her luggage, where she’d dumped it at the foot of the bed. “I have only the clothes on my back. Figuratively speaking.”

With all the self-control in her command, Danielle couldn’t stop her gaze from drifting down the length of his body. The soft blanket draped intimately around him, making it obvious that the only thing he was wearing was a wristwatch.

Feeling herself grow warm, she forced her gaze away from him and her attention back to the problem. “So why are you here?”

A voice echoed up the stairwell “Hello up there’ Anybody home?”

Danielle’s eyes widened. “You’re entertaining here instead of in your own apartment? If I’d known I’d walked into a rendezvous—”

“This is not a rendezvous,” Deke said mildly. “And that is Mrs. Winslow. Otherwise known—along with her husband—as my reason for being here.” He glanced at his watch, a gold slash against his tanned skin. “And she’s looking for breakfast.”

“I don’t get it. You mean they’re guests? But there wasn’t anything in the reservations book.”

“Certain of that, are you?” Deke pushed the blanket back.

Danielle averted her eyes and tried to remember what she’d read in the reservations book. Was she certain? She could see the calendar in her mind—but it was open to the strawberry festival, not the current week. “Not absolutely,” she admitted.

“Well, you’re right. Their reservation is for today—but they arrived a full twenty-four hours early, just as I was leaving the house yesterday And since I had no idea how you planned to handle the details—whether, for instance, you intended to pass out keys so guests can come and go as they please or just leave the place standing wide open...”

Danielle flung herself against the pillows and started to chuckle. “So you’ve been held hostage overnight? Poor Deke! Serves you right for laughing at me. If you hadn’t, I’d probably still have been here when they arrived and you could have ducked out.”

The cheerful voice called again, and an instant later a head topped with frizzy gray hair popped around the end of the privacy wall. The woman’s gaze slid from Deke, who was just starting to zip his trousers, to Danielle—still sprawled across the bed—and back.

“Oh, my,” Mrs. Winslow said faintly. “No wonder you weren’t answering earlier. I do beg your pardon.” She disappeared, and footsteps retreated hastily toward the stairs.

All Danielle’s desire to laugh had abruptly evaporated.

Deke put on his shirt. “Well, since you’re here, you can take on the breakfast detail.”

“Nice try.” Danielle pushed herself up from the bed. “You could have warned me last night, you know. So, since you didn’t, make their breakfast yourself.”

“And have them sue over the cooking? Besides, I tried to warn you. I called the Willows twice last night. Once I got cut off, and the other time I was on hold till my ear was black and blue.”

“We had a lot of parties last night,” Danielle admitted. “Nobody had time to answer phones and carry notes.”

“That was apparent. Then I left a message on the machine at your father’s house, but obviously you didn’t get it.”

“I came straight here after work. And since Dad knew where I was going...”

Deke nodded. “He probably thought there was no point in calling since I said I’d wait here for you.”

Danielle pounced. “So you did expect that I’d come and you set up a booby trap for me.”

Deke turned slowly to face her. Very deliberately, he fastened the last button on his shirt, folded the cuffs back halfway to his elbows and tucked the tail neatly into the waistband of his trousers. “If by a booby trap, you mean you think I plotted some sort of seduction scene, Danielle ...”

She’d spoken without thinking, and now an almost painful flush rose from throat to forehead.

“If I’d had any such intention, I’d certainly have stayed awake for the payoff.” His voice was dry. “As it happens, I got tired of waiting and of Joe’s taste in literature, and decided to get some sleep. I didn’t even hear you come in.”

And since she hadn’t turned on a light ...

“Good thing I didn’t choose the other side of the bed,” Danielle said wryly.

“Isn’t it, though?”

Danielle stared at him, eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Look, if you think I saw you here and climbed in just for the sheer joy of sleeping with you... I’ve met some egos in my day, Oliver, but you take the—”

“The possibility never occurred to me.”

She was relieved, though still a bit wary. “That’s something, I suppose.”

“Because if that was what you wanted, you’d have made sure I woke up.” The last of the sandpaper roughness was gone from his voice, it was pure honey now. Warm honey, which seemed to ooze through her skin and trickle into her veins... “Which makes us even, doesn’t it?”

You can’t win, she told herself. And you’re an idiot to keep trying.

She turned on her heel, circled the end of the privacy wall and descended the stairs all the way to the kitchen. She knew perfectly well Deke was right behind her, almost in perfect step, but she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of any further reactions.

At the bottom of the stairs, he murmured, “You wouldn’t like to walk up again, would you? I’ll bet your skirt’s even more attractive from that angle.”

She tried to ignore him; Deke was chuckling as she opened the kitchen door.

The room smelled of coffee and frying ham. At the stove, Mrs. Winslow was carefully forking thick slices of meat from a skillet onto a couple of plates. Nearby, a bald man with thick glasses was buttering toast.

Mrs. Winslow grinned over her shoulder at Danielle and Deke. “I thought—under the circumstances—that you wouldn’t mind us helping ourselves. Want some ham and eggs?”

Danielle, absolutely speechless, shook her head.

Deke said, “Sounds wonderful to me. Can I pour you some coffee, my dear?”

Mrs. Winslow gave him an approving nod. “That’s the style. Take good care of her. Hand me the basket of eggs, Bill.”

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