Home by Morning (5 page)

“Boy, now what are you up to?” Shaw Braddock reined his horse in front of Cole’s building.

Damn it, Cole thought, his hand tightening on a suitcase grip. He’d hoped that Tilly’s and the excitement of the Liberty Bond doings would keep his father busy until Cole had gotten Jessica’s rigging moved into the new office space. Maybe he hadn’t heard that the mayor drafted her to fill in for Pearson, and that she’d be living in the doctor’s quarters. Now, here Cole was, with Jess’s trunks in the Ford, parked in front of the office. On the sidewalk next to him was Winks Lamont, whom he’d hired to help move the box of books. It wouldn’t cost him much more than the price of a couple of beers, since the simpleminded old rummy spent most of his time at the end of Tilly’s bar cadging drinks. On the other hand, he wasn’t worth more. Winks smelled like an overripe cheese left in an outhouse during a heat wave.

“I thought you were hobnobbing down at the saloon.”

“Did that already. I’m on my way home. It’ll be dark soon.” The old man waved in the general direction of the home place. “We put some pressure on those slackers in the crowd, too, the ones who claim they can’t join the army just now. They all have thin, whiny excuses. ‘My ma needs me,’ ‘I can’t see so good,’ ‘I got to tend the stock.’ Your brother didn’t say any of that stuff. He just went, like a
man
should. It ain’t a matter of convenience. This is war.”

Cole clenched his jaw. “Maybe those men aren’t making excuses. They’re probably telling the truth.”

“Bah! Anyway, you still haven’t told me what you’re doing with this junk.”

“Jessica is going to stay here for a month.”

The old man eyed him from Muley’s tall back. “Oh, she is, huh?”

“Yeah,” Cole answered, hefting the case from the truck. “Horace asked her to stay for a while, and the town is paying the rent.” He shrugged. “It’s better than having the place go unused while we wait for the other doc.” He put a hand on the tailgate and vaulted into the truck bed. “Come on, Winks, grab the other end. Let’s get this thing moved and be done with it.”

“That’s the trouble with Horace Cookson,” Pop began, “always letting his mouth get ahead of his brain. We don’t need that doctor gal, always too smart for—”

“Shaw, how good to see you again.” Jessica emerged from the office. She carried a basket with her and crossed the sidewalk. “Would you care for a doughnut? I bought them at the bakery.” She flipped open the napkin covering the pastries and lifted the basket so that he could reach it.

Cole glanced up from the trunk. The old man actually looked sheepish. He’d always been a pushover for sweets. “A doughnut…” Derailed from his complaining, his attention shifted.

“How have you been?” she asked, nodding at the swan-neck deformity of his fingers as he took a treat. “It looks like that arthritis is still giving you trouble.”

“Well, it don’t get better with age, does it?” Pop snapped, taking a big bite.

She smiled, ignoring his cranky behavior. “No, but it can subside—I mean, it can improve sometimes, especially when the weather is good.”

His scowl deepened and he swallowed. “Ditch water, girlie! I already know that.” Then to Cole he added, “What did I tell you? Doctors ain’t no help, and the new ones don’t know any more than the old ones.”

“It’s too bad that you won’t stay active and get out more often,” she went on. “Amy mentioned that you spend a lot of time in the parlor, making Susannah wait on you. The condition gets worse if the patient just sits.” Jess had always been good at that, putting the old man in his place.

“
Sits!
By God—”

Winks’s hoot of laughter gurgled with phlegm.

Cole turned away to hide his grin.

Pop poked the rest of the doughnut into his big, rectangular mouth as color rose in his weathered face. “That’s what I tell ’em at home, that I’m as good as ever. But they try to keep me nailed to my rocker.” Crumbs and powdered sugar flew. “They say I’m too old and stiff to do anything else. Susannah is trying to turn me into an invalid with all her fussing and coddling. Huh! I can still whup ass and I’ll prove it to any man who’s willing to try me. And that goes for you, too, youngster!” he said to Winks, who was not much younger than Pop.

He wheeled Muley around and took off at a trot toward the farm, which was probably joint-jarring for both horse and rider.

Jessica waved as the old man left, amused and relieved to be rid of him. She knew he’d never really approved of her, and after she’d left Powell Springs the first time, he’d been downright rude during her visits home. But she wasn’t going to lurk behind the lace curtains covering the office’s bay window and listen to him criticize her.

She turned and caught Cole actually smiling at her. It was a familiar smile that pulled at her heart. “Pretty good, Jess.”

“He’s still a rough old cob, isn’t he?” She watched the dust stir around Muley’s retreating hooves.

“Yeah, well, he didn’t get better with age, either. He treats us all like ten-year-olds, and tries to run the world.”

“But now I’m worried that I’ve brought down the roof on poor Susannah. Maybe Amy too, for telling on him.”

He took hold of his end of the trunk and lifted it. “Don’t let him fool you,” he said, his shirt clinging to his torso. “He’s a glutton for their attention. And Amy can sweet-talk him into just about anything. She can sweet-talk anyone. It’s part of her charm.”

As she watched Cole and Winks finesse the trunk through the narrow doorway, her gaze landed on the back of Cole’s neck, where his sweat-damp hair curled below his collar. Unwillingly, she let her perusal slide down his lean, broad back, then lower to the seat of his jeans, just before he disappeared into the darkness of the office.

She lifted her chin, refusing to let herself fall into a trap of self-doubt and second-guessing. The past year and a half had been hard enough.

“Do you want to unload these books?” she heard Cole call from the back room.

She walked inside, through the tidy waiting area and into the examination room, where he waited with Winks. His expression was not quite as hostile as it had been earlier in the day, but the brief smile she’d seen outside was gone now. It was as if a cloud had covered the sun, leaving a chill. “There’s no point. I’m not staying, you know.”

His eyes lingered on her before he turned back to the trunk. “Yeah. I know.” Reaching into the front pocket of his tight jeans, he pulled out a silver dollar and handed it to Winks. “Here you go, you old horse thief. Don’t spend it all in one place.”

Winks practically leaped on the money and showed off his foolish, almost toothless grin. “Thanks, Cole.” He nodded at Jessica and left them standing there, alone again and awkward.

“He’s probably on his way to Tilly’s right now to drink up that dollar,” Cole said. His shirt was unbuttoned to the center of his chest, revealing a glimpse of a suntanned
V
which she knew would fade over the winter but never completely disappear.

“Maybe if everyone around him is drinking, it will dull their sense of smell. I attended autopsies on bodies pulled out of the Hudson River that were less…aromatic.”

He actually chuckled again. Then he considered her with a tense, searching look. Why didn’t it feel different now, after everything that had happened? For one brief moment, she expected him to open his arms to her and if he did, she would be sorely tempted to cross the narrow strip of flooring between them and walk into his embrace.

The sound of footsteps echoed somewhere in the back of her consciousness, but she could not break eye contact with him. The very air seemed thick between them.

“Oh, here you are.” Amy appeared in the back office doorway. “I managed to break away from the bandage rolling and—” Eying them, her smile faded. “Is everything all right? Did you get moved over?”

“It—yes. It went just fine,” Jessica said at last. “I should reimburse you, Cole, for the money you paid Winks.”

He took a step back and waved her off. “Forget it.” He looked at both women. “I’ve got to get back to work.” Then he turned and walked out.

“Well, that was odd,” Amy said, watching him go.

Jess turned away, inhaling the commingled blend of her sister’s vanilla fragrance and the equally familiar scent of Cole.

Although her attention was fixed on getting settled, the sound of more music drew Jess to the sidewalk to watch everyone moving toward the park. Standing there, she had the sensation of being watched herself. She shrugged slightly, as if to shake off an invisible hand, but the feeling persisted.

Finally, glancing to her left, she noticed Cole leaning against the door frame of his shop, his arms crossed as he viewed the passing crowd. Her focus shifted. The people seemed to fade into a blur, the music and noise grew muffled—there was nothing and no one except Cole Braddock. He wore no shirt, just the heavy leather apron that covered him from chest to knees. His shoulders and arms were corded with muscle that bespoke years of swinging a hammer and hard physical work. His handsome face was smudged and gleaming with sweat, as if he had just stepped away from his forge for a moment.

He looked at her full on, and she felt as if a lightning bolt had shuddered through her body. She forced herself to turn her eyes from his, but the sensation of being watched persisted. Eyes on her, considering her.

He was Amy’s intended, she reminded herself. He had betrayed Jessica. He had proven to be fickle and faithless—

“—so glad to run into you, Jessica. I was hoping to see you.”

Jessica jumped at the sound of her name being spoken, and turning around, she saw Adam Jacobsen. “What? Oh, Adam! Yes, it’s been a long time.”

He’d grown into a taller man than she’d expected. His wide brow and full face were offset by large, dark-lashed eyes. Still, she could see traces of the child he’d been, especially around the jaw and chin, and his nose had acquired an arrow shape that seemed to point to his mouth. Dressed in his Sunday best, he carried a clipboard under one arm. He leaned a bit closer to be heard over the crowd around them. “I’m glad you decided to accept Mayor Cookson’s offer to stay with us for a while.”

“I understand you had a say in it,” she replied, not completely comfortable with that fact, or with him. Why would he, of all people, have lobbied for her to linger in Powell Springs? Late in their teen years, he’d once caught Jess and Cole in the tall grass by the creek and had run to blab the news to his own father, who in turn had reported her to Ben Layton. The elder Jacobsen had built an entire Sunday sermon around the sin of lust and the dangers of leaving young people unsupervised.

Shortly thereafter, Jessica’s father had shipped her off to college with the intention of giving her something besides Cole Braddock to occupy her mind.

“You were just the right candidate to take care of our folks till Dr. Pearson gets here.”

She lifted a brow and smiled slightly. “I think I was the
only
candidate.”

He flushed and shifted his clipboard. “Well, yes, that’s true. But you know a lot of the people around here. I felt it was a good idea.”

She noticed that the paper on his board held a list of local townspeople. Some of those whom she’d seen along the street to watch the earlier parade had check marks beside their names, as if he was taking roll. Nodding at the page, she asked, “Making notes?”

“Oh—this.” He turned the list toward his jacket. “I’m just keeping track—that is, I want to be sure everything we planned is going well. The committee, including your sister, worked so hard on this.”

Right, she thought. Still the little sneak, but worse now. A self-important sneak for the American Protective League. She wondered if her name was written with the others.

Jessica caught sight of Granny Mae, who glared at her and then walked back inside the café on the other side of Main.

“Ah, well, I’d better get down to the park,” Adam said. “That will keep us busy for the rest of the day.” He turned and gave her a sincere smile. “I’d really like to see you again, Jessica. Maybe even in church. It’s good to have you back.”

He headed off, full of purpose. When she glanced back at the door to the smithy, Cole was gone.