Seaspun Magic (9 page)

"This one's a foreigner. He's stayed three weeks now, and do you know what she's charging for services rendered?"

"Half a pound of those!" Doom shouted at Arianne, who was still in the back, tapping her finger against the glass to indicate her choice.

Returning to the counter, Arianne weighed out half a pound of banana chips, while Gloom, the one with the mustache, sighed, shook her head and mournfully intoned what sounded to Arianne like, "What's the world coming to...."

"And I want a quarter pound of this and half a pound of the Turkish Delight!"

Arianne filled a small bag with party mints and then had to return to the back room for the Turkish Delight. She dished out the small squares of pink sweets. Doom went on, in a louder stage whisper, "Without a word of a lie, I hear she's charging him three hundred dollars a day—"

Arianne was certain everyone in the shop was stretching his ears to the utmost, just as she was. "Yes, three hundred, cash. So you can imagine what must be going on in that house. Imagine the poor little boy! The historical society ought not to allow such goings-on in our national treasures!''

Gloom nodded sadly. "It's come to that. The bed and breakfast should read bed and booze!"

"Or bed, booze and brothel!"

Arianne gritted her teeth so as not to lose her temper. Back she went to the front of the shop with a determinedly bland smile. She smiled sweetly at the sour-faced couple and ignored some of the sympathetic glances she was getting from the other customers.

"I admire your good nature," Orly murmured, coming up beside her to help take orders.

"If either of them opens her mouth again she's going to get twenty pounds of candy stuffed down her throat!" she hissed back.

Of course she knew the women were just gossips, and mean besides. Nevertheless, trudging homeward, Arianne felt her high spirits of the day dissolving. Of course she didn't take their silly whispering seriously, but all the same, it served to remind her that Leo was, after all, only a paying guest. She should remember to treat him as such. The two days' absence from each other was supposed to cool things down. She wanted none of this make-the-heart-grow-fonder nonsense.

Perhaps she was upset by what the two old women had said because it was so close to the truth. Not all the trimmings, of course, not the booze or the charge.. .but the crux of the matter, the lovemaking. She really was glad now she hadn't succumbed that night. She groaned to herself, bending her head against the wind as she strode a relatively straight but completely unprotected strip of beach home. Suddenly she felt wretched.

Her loneliness was worse having known Leo. When he left, how empty the house would be, how cold her evenings beside the fire. Leo could go away tomorrow and never come back. It was a fact she couldn't lose sight of, and it made her miserable. She stopped, letting the wind bluster against her and swirl around her small shape. It tugged at her hair, blowing the black curls across her face and into her eyes.

With the toe of her boot she scuffed at a sand dollar but made no move to carry on homeward. Huddling into herself, she stared out over the strait, a wide-open expanse of dark-gray water underneath a similarly dark-gray sky, relieved only by the foaming curl of white-caps. There was nothing on the horizon; no friendly lights, no freighter, no ferry, no dark smudge of a fishing boat. The view was like her life ahead: vast and empty.

For the past two years she'd lived for Rae. Was she going to continue that way, living only for him—only to stand him on his own two feet and then be even more alone than now? Was this kind of existence safe or insane? Arianne shuddered in the cold and darkness. The nippy sea wind stung her face.

On the other hand, she could risk everything and get married again to some likely candidate such as Larry and four years down the road have to endure another divorce. Where was the sense?

Between her thoughts and the crash of waves she didn't notice she was sharing the strip of beach until Leo said hello practically in her ear. She jumped, and his arm instinctively reached out to steady her.

"Hi!" He looked his usual happy self, making her feel even more miserable. "I stopped in at your shop, but Orly told me you'd already gone. How was your Thanksgiving?"

"Um-oh..." Her eyes drank him in, the wind blown hair, the lovely dancing green eyes. "It was great." She was breathless.

"Mine was boring. I couldn't wait to get back."

Looking at him askance, she kicked at the sand dollar once more and turned homeward. When he went to take her arm she pulled away before she realized what she was doing.

"Arianne, what's wrong?" he inquired, firmly grasping her hand.

"Oh, it's nothing, it's just..."

"What?" He stepped closer, forcing her to tip her head back to look up at him.

"It's so silly..." She shook her head.

"Tell me so that I can laugh, too."

She turned away from the beguiling warmth in his smile. "Well, it is funny—now." She described Doom and Gloom's shopping spree. "And isn't it ironic," she added, "in my situation! There isn't a guy in sight, and I'm supposed to be running a brothel!"

"You're beautiful, Arianne, and in a small town you're going to be a constant topic no matter what you do."

"As far as Doom and Gloom are concerned, if you're a single mother you must be loose. They view Jill and I as a danger to the community."

"But surely the men around here must think differently?"

"What men? Most are married. And those that aren't—well, one of Jill's sayings is that the guys always want to sample the cooking, but none will stay for breakfast. If you catch the drift."

"I see. There has been no man who wanted to stay for breakfast, so there's been no man? But that gossip today, that shouldn't have hurt your feelings!"

"But a brothel, dammit!" she protested vehemently. "When I haven't even been kissed in two years!"

He stopped her so abruptly that she swung against him. With a hand on either shoulder he held her there, and the next thing she knew his mouth was covering hers, hot, sizzling with hunger. Hot enough to ignite the union and fuse their lips together in sweet abandonment.

While the wind battered them and the crashing waves gnawed at the shore, the kiss held, sweet, hot and profound.

And then all of a sudden it was over and cold wind was between them again, and Arianne remembered that it shouldn't have happened. She stared at Leo in wide-eyed utter dismay, still clutching his sleeve, tasting heaven on her lips.

"Arianne," he began, his look of wonderment changing to concern. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that. It won't happen again. Around you I always seem to be touching things I shouldn't...'' The wind snatched at his words.

Her memory of the sweet heat couldn't be denied, not entirely. She tried to calm her beating heart, but still her lips felt the imprint of his. "It's not your fault," she said, letting him off the hook, her voice trembling slightly. "I'm sorry, too."

He bent his head to catch her reply, and it began to look as if he meant to kiss her all over again. But Arianne slid out of reach, elusive, and suddenly laughed softly as she looked back at him. Inexplicably her good mood had returned.

But she didn't do anything crazy, such as running away along the sand, daring the waves and teasing Leo to chase her. Instead, she waited, staid and polite, for him to fall into step beside her and then, in this calm and sober fashion, they continued homeward. The rest of the hike home they were exquisitely polite. It was only when their eyes met that manners tended to dissolve....

She stopped at Jill's house to collect Rae. After Leo left, the women were alone in her kitchen for a few minutes, laughing over Jill's story of one of her guests.

"Well, now that you've got your feet wet, what do you think about a B and B? Are you going to give it a try next summer?"

"Oh, no." Arianne shook her head. "Leo's different. I kind of like him, but I wouldn't want to do it again!"

"Can you be stubborn! Oh, well, it's your loss. But listen, I forgot to mention it before —B and B Rule Number One is, Don't Fall For The Guests!"

"Wh-what do you mean?"

Jill snorted disbelievingly. "As if you don't know! And you told your mother he wasn't attractive! How could you! Today is the first time I've clapped eyes on him briefly, and now I know why. You've been keeping him for yourself!"

Arianne chuckled. "You gave him to me!"

"Listen, I'm serious. Don't fall for the guests. They go away. But what about... well, Larry Barnes? He's attractive, too. Gorgeous, I'd say, and fun and smart. He even has money. And the cherry on top is that he ain't goin' nowhere. He lives here!"

Jill's words gave Arianne much food for thought as she trudged home. Her dinner with Leo that evening was politeness itself, the subjects of conversation not even vaguely sensual. Birdseed was one subject discussed. How much of it she went through in the winter and what birds could be expected to come.

"A lot—at least fifty I can think of!"

"A lot of birds, but what else? Who else? Do you sit here all winter long with only your birds? Arianne, why have you buried yourself in the country?''

Her mouth dropped. Hastily she stopped herself from gaping at him. "I—I... ah..." He was the second man in two days to practically accuse her of hibernating. Was she really doing that in Port Townsend? She let the subject of birdseed go and searched for something less dramatic. Mikey's famous secret cookie recipe offered hope of entertainment. She broached it, saying she had a bag of his best waiting to be opened.

After several minutes of conversation concerning Mikey's enterprise, Leo interrupted her with a faintly puzzled frown, "Are you going to marry your cousin?"

"No." Arianne stared at him in surprise. "Whatever gave you that idea?"

"You're fond of him, aren't you?"

"He's my favorite teddy bear, but I've never wanted to marry him."

"Then what's this interesting proposition of his?"

"Oh!" she said with a laugh. "That's to help him go big. His next plan is to take over the cookie market. What McDonald's did for burgers, he wants to do for cookies. And he needs help. I'm pretty handy around an office, too, you know. I do more than make fabulous tacos." She lifted the taco in her hand to administer a dollop of creamy guacamole. "I used to run my mother's shop and my—own business, as well." She quickly glossed over that, hoping he wouldn't ask what sort of business she had been involved in. "I organize Orly all the time, although he doesn't know it."

"You're wrong. He knows. As far as Orly is concerned, you invented sunshine."

Arianne had just been about to take a bite. Instead she wondered how a mere dinner discussion could be so fraught with pitfalls. "Yes, well, I don't know what I'd do without Orly. He's helped so many times… Anyway, I'm supposed to think about Mikey's proposition. Heavens, he's too young for a wife and children. He's not ready to settle down."

"But is anybody ever ready? Even at seventy? I know I'm not."

Arianne had been about to take that bite again. She was stalled again. Was that a hint? It had to be a hint, a signal that one day soon he would be gone. Now she didn't want the taco at all anymore. And if it wasn't a hint it was simply an honest answer, and that was just as bad. It meant there wasn't the slightest, smallest, most infinitesimal chance for them.. .there was no reason to even start a tiny flirtation....

She felt the same way next morning, and her appetite hadn't improved any. She sat staring gloomily at the piece of toast growing cold on her plate. Rae was chortling to himself, oblivious to her mood, and doing his best to shampoo his hair with his breakfast cereal.

Starting to scold him, she gave way to helpless giggles, then began the wipedown. Finally she filled his bowl with more of the hot cereal and placed a fresh spoon in his chubby little hand. And that's when the kitchen door opened and her guest came in, with his plate, to sit down at the kitchen table with them. He made himself right at home.

"I feel like a leper in there by myself," he said, nodding toward the dining room. "But, Leo—"

"Think of my feelings, Arianne! I'm easily wounded."

"If you can stand Rae's table manners, you're welcome!" she returned tartly, not trusting the blandness of his tone. Why was he here if he didn't want to get involved with her.

A spoonful of cereal actually made it into Rae's mouth. Most of it found its way onto his chin or the floor or places in between. But Leo didn't make the mistake of trying to take the spoon from Rae's determined fist. She wished he didn't have to look so good in the early-morning light. She wished she could put the kiss out of her mind.

The breakfast was uneventful, except that the kitchen seemed a lot smaller with Leo in it and they always seemed to be bumping into each other. There was something the matter with its traffic pattern, she deduced. It only accommodated one. Finally she had him help her move the table to a new position. Then, when she lifted the garbage bag and he went to take it from her, she stepped back, clutching the bag.

"No. No, please don't take the garbage out," she breathed, not realizing how illogical she sounded. That he not perform the simple action was important to her, though.

"Give me the bag, Arianne." He smiled at her.

"No."

"Give me the bag or go put on some decent footwear." She glanced down at her pink slippers with the little high heels and the bow over the toes. "I don't want to have to scrape you off the stairs."

She considered for a second, then handed over the bag. "They're safer than they look," she said mildly.

"They never have been and never will be safe. They weren't designed to be safe. They were designed to make you trip and fall right into the arms of whoever gave them to you. Who gave them to you?''

"Mikey."

"Little Mikey? I knew those cookies were an innocent front!"

Arianne laughed. "We try to... um... guess what the other wants for Christmas. Finally last Christmas we hit it right on!"

Leo paused on his way out the back door. "What did Mikey want?"