Hooked (16 page)

“Good. Since you have nothing else to discuss with Miss Brooks, good-bye.” Mr. Wilberforce propelled them along with a brisk stride. She with her secret package tucked in her arm; he with a fishing pole case in his hand and her elbow looped through his.

Meg thought it the most romantic thing to ever happen to her.

Not once did she look over her shoulder to see if Harold was following them. From Mr. Wilberforce's tone, he wouldn't be.

Her Bissell salesman had really taken command of the situation and was now ushering her through the door of Durbin's Ice Cream Parlor as if it were an everyday occurrence for him. She wished it was, would be.

Once inside, Mr. Wilberforce showed her to a red-and-white striped oilcloth-covered table. He pulled out a white lacquered wrought-iron chair for her. She sat, but she didn't let go of her package.

“I can take that for you, Miss Brooks, and set it on the floor next to my fishing pole.”

“No thank you.”

With an uneven smile, he teased, “You're guarding it as if it were the crown jewels.”

Meg felt her cheeks heat up hotter than the tin roof on the feed and seed on an August afternoon. Her knees went a little weak. It was a good thing she was sitting down.

“Your cheeks are flushed, Miss Brooks. Are you going to faint?” His voice was low and deep, suggesting something wicked.

Unbidden, Meg raised one hand to her cheek. “That's an excellent idea. But unfortunately, I don't think I am.”

“Well, that's good to hear. Because if you did, you wouldn't be able to have an ice cream.”

Mr. Durbin approached the table and Mr. Wilberforce looked directly at Meg. “What would you like, Miss Brooks?”

Staring at his mouth, she thought:
I'd like for you to kiss me again.
Instead, she said, “I'll have a vanilla fizz.”

“Make that two,” Mr. Wilberforce said, relaxing into his seat.

Meg tucked her feet together at the ankles, held her back straight, and rested her package in her lap—both hands on it for safekeeping. She glanced at Mr. Wilberforce, who occupied a chair more deliciously than any man she knew. His shoulders filled out the back while his elbows rested on the arms. He'd removed his hat and it rested on the tabletop.

Gazing at the soft turn of his mouth, Meg wished she were alone with him instead of in an ice cream parlor. Mr. Wilberforce's attentiveness flattered her, yet perplexed her. Here she hadn't seen him for several days, then he runs into her on the street and asks to be in her company. If she didn't think it was an act of fate . . . she'd think he'd planned it.

“Miss Brooks, you're looking especially nice today.”

Meg looked down at her attire. Just a plain white shirtwaist and a somber black skirt. She'd wanted to be inconspicuous when she went into Plunkett's mercantile and talked to Hildegarde. “I am?”

“Yes, you are.”

Mr. Wilberforce leveled his eyes on her. Why was he looking at her that way? She saw light smoldering in the flecks of his golden green eyes. Was it a gleam of pleasure? Of passion and yearning? Yet, she detected
sadness and regret. Regret over what? The unknown confused her.

The potency of it all, the prolonged anticipation of what he really thought of her, was almost too much for her to bear.

Their ice cream sodas arrived and Meg was forced to place her package on the table so she could daintily grasp the tall glass and straw without being gauche. After all, she couldn't exactly slurp through the straw with no hands.

Mr. Wilberforce hadn't yet touched his ice cream. He let the glass rest in front of him. “I was admiring your handiwork in the lobby, Miss Brooks. I even took one of your Pilsens to smoke.”

“You did?”

“Yes. I'd never tried one before. An excellent choice.”

“Thank you.”

“Do you have other ideas in mind?” He finally brought the straw to his lips and sucked in the fizzy soda. Meg watched, mesmerized, not thinking at all about his question. Only after he stared at her, did she blink out of her light entrancement.

“Ideas?”

“For the lobby.”

“Of course.” Meg stirred her soda with her straw, collecting herself. “If I had the time and funds, I'd refurbish the entire area, giving way to brighter carpets and bolder window curtains. I think it's a little too dark in the lobby. Almost gloomy. Do you find it that way, Mr. Wilberforce?”

“Now that you mention it, yes.” He leaned back in his chair. “Your expertise never ceases to amaze me. You know furnishings, cigars, and fishing.”

Fishing.
Meg held on to a frown. She didn't want to classify fishing with imaginative experience on decorating and knowing how to pick out a fine cigar. “Fishing is the least of my talents.” Then she bit her lip. She didn't want him to think she preferred casting to drinking tea in a tearoom. Surely if he figured that out, he would be put off.

“But a talent nonetheless,” he said with a smile.

Then again, since he'd brought it up . . . he must think it an asset. She had better continue the subject, only slant it toward him. “I noticed you've been out fishing the past several days. How has your luck been?”

“The rainbows are rising to caddis. I've yet to see a brown trout.”

“They like cover,” Meg said, trying to put him at ease for not having hooked a brown. “The large ones typically run to a brush pile or undercut bank so you have to be careful or your leader is apt to tangle.”

“Yes, I found that out.”

Dragging her fingertip over the glass's dewy surface, Meg watched as water droplets rolled downward. “And what about you, Mr. Wilberforce? What are your talents?”

He looked nonplused for a moment, then said, “I'm a good salesman.”

“Truly? It must be difficult.”

“Not if you believe in what you sell.”

“Have you been selling Bissells for a long time?”

“Since I was twenty-one.” Then his expression darkened—as if he'd said something wrong.

“From the age of twenty-one is a long time. You must have a strong knack for selling things.” She sipped on the fizzy soda with its creamy taste of melting
vanilla ice cream. “Do you mind . . . that is to say, would you be offended . . . and you don't have to answer—but,” she looked into his eyes, “how old are you, Mr. Wilberforce?”

When he replied, his tone sounded as if he felt older than he was. “I'm thirty-one. And you, Miss Brooks?”

Heavens, she wasn't keen on speaking her age aloud—knowing that she might as well put “old-maid” after the number. But how could she deny him when he'd told her his?

“I'm twenty.”

He merely smiled as if it didn't mean a thing to him. Relief flooded her; she'd feared he might find her less than desirable if he knew she was an overripe apple on the tree.

They drank their sodas in companionable quiet for a while, Meg barely tasting hers. Her gaze kept drifting to Mr. Wilberforce, taking in the way he sat, the way he drank his soda, the way he looked with the sunlight shining on his black hair. On his shoulder. The way he effortlessly filled the parlor with his strong and masculine presence.

She thought she was the luckiest woman in the world.

“Miss Brooks,” Mr. Wilberforce said at length, “forgive my asking at such a late date, but I was wondering if you have an escort to tomorrow's Fish Festival.”

She had been hoping, wondering if, he'd ask her. She had no plans to go with anyone. Well, that wasn't exactly true. Nobody of the opposite sex—she'd told Ruth and Hildegarde she'd go with them.

“Why, no, Mr. Wilberforce, I don't.” She made the words sound casual as a Sunday afternoon, but in reality, her heartbeat was thumping double-time.

“Then would you be able to accompany me?”

Her breath hitched, but she kept her euphoria dignified when replying. “I'd be delighted to go with you.”

“Splendid. You pack a picnic lunch and I'll bring my fishing pole.” He gave her a disarming grin. “I want to see you cast a line, Miss Brooks.”

“Really?” She could barely give him a return smile, thinking it odd he would want to watch her fish. Then again, some men didn't mind a woman who was the outdoors type. Mr. Wilberforce might very well be one of them. At that thought, she grew anxious. It had been some time since she'd waded out into the water. She enjoyed the sport. “Well . . . all right, then. I'll look forward to it.”

As Mr. Wilberforce walked her home, Meg thought she was the most fortunate woman in Harmony.

Standing at the gate of her house, Mr. Wilberforce tipped his hat to her and said he'd see her in the morning at eleven o'clock. When he was gone, Meg hugged her package and hurried up the walkway and into the house.

Once upstairs in her room, she set the parcel on her desk and sat in the chair. Glancing at her diary, she smiled. Maybe, just maybe,
soon
she'd be picking out wedding invitations like Johannah Treber.

In class, some months ago, Mrs. Wolcott said that a lady almost always found her heart's soulmate when she wasn't looking. That was how she'd found Mr. Wolcott. They were a perfect couple in Meg's eye. He was as handsome a man as they came; and she was awfully pretty and gay.

Meg hadn't been looking for Mr. Wilberforce. She accidentally found him in his room. She wondered if she needed what was in the jar after all. Because Mr.
Wilberforce had asked to escort her to the festival tomorrow. That meant a whole lot. On the other hand, one should never take anything for granted.

Pulling the string on the package, Meg peeled back the wrapping. Inside a nest of brown paper laid a jar of Princess Bust Cream. Guaranteed to make plump, full, rounded a bosom that was before scrawny, flat, or flabby.

Meg unscrewed the lid and put her love life into the hands of the Seroco Chemical Laboratory.

8

G
age and Meg strolled side-by-side and took in the festivities of the annual Fish Festival—the official kick off to the fly-fishing contest.

A band, its members wearing white uniforms with sharp creases, played from the gazebo in the town square while accompanied by a full brass section. Barrels of beer and soda fountain-size freezers of ice cream were disbursed in lines where men jovially patted each other on the back and children ran circles around their parents. A group of boys played leapfrog while a foursome of young girls laughed behind their hands at them.

With Gage carrying the picnic hamper and his fishing pole and tackle, he didn't have a free arm to offer Meg. But maybe that wasn't such a bad thing after all.

He was a reporter and his job was to get information. In this case, any leads from Meg about her brother. Gage had to find out what he could about a rigged contest. That's why he'd asked her to come
with him. The part he was playing was that of a staid Bissell salesman, Vernon Wilberforce.

Why then, was Gage thinking of today as more than an assignment?

Maybe because the woman by his side was more than just any woman. She was the most refreshingly different woman he'd ever met. From one moment to the next, she kept him guessing. What would be her thoughts? Her gestures? How would her laughter sound? Her smile look?

Tried and true and quite ladylike?

Or whimsical and without restrain?

He preferred the latter. He suspected she did, too. Why she felt the need for pretense, he couldn't fathom.

“Oh, look,” Meg said, pointing. “How very clever of them. I like that.”

Gage followed her gaze to the hardware store.

The local businesses competed against one another for the best fish display in their town square storefronts.

Kennison's hardware store suspended a seven foot long, crepe rainbow trout in the display case using fishing line. The farm implement store touted a papiermâché fish of drab brown. The notary was decorated with paper chains in fish shapes. And the secondhand shop sported a giant speckled cutthroat in their roof.