warning you, Joe Santori. My grandmother is going to be mad at you. She doesn’t like people interfering.”
“I can take it,” he replied with a laugh.
He hung up without another word, leaving Susannah to stare, smiling, at the humming receiver. For a friend of her grandmother, he sounded very young indeed. Maybe he was one of those little old fellows who hung around Tyler’s retirement home. She frowned again, trying to place his name. Was Joe Santori one of the old coots who played gin rummy every day at the hardware store? Or one of the gentlemen who sang in the church choir?
He didn’t sound like an old man. Far from it. With that low, sexy voice, he could be—
“Well?” asked Josie, interrupting Susannah’s runaway thoughts. “Who was he?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea,” Susannah replied, cradling the phone. “But I’m going to find out.”
* * *
THE DEPARTMENT STORE was mobbed with Christmas shoppers, but Susannah and Josie managed to slip into the resort-wear section for a swimsuit before making Susannah’s quick appearance in the kitchen appliances, where she had promised to demonstrate a new brand of food processor. She apologized to the store manager for cutting her stay short, but the woman was completely understanding.
“I look after my grandparents, too,” she said sympathetically. “Sometimes I have to drop everything to take them to the doctor’s office or to the grocery store. It’s exasperating, but I wouldn’t trade them for any promotion in the world.”
“Thanks,” Susannah said, relieved that she’d found a human being to deal with. “I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”
The manager smiled. “I’ll hold you to that! Our customers love ‘Oh, Susannah!”’
Josie took the manager aside to schedule another appearance, and Susannah began her presentation. It was fun and lighthearted, and she even managed to sell a few food processors to people who had gathered around the demonstration table to watch her chop, grind and puree.
Then Josie stepped in and broke up the event, making apologies on Susannah’s behalf and hurrying her out of the store.
“You know how to get home to Tyler, right?” Josie asked, bundling her into her car in the parking lot. “You want me to follow you as far as the interstate?”
“I may be an organizational cripple,” Susannah shot back cheerfully, “but I can find my way home.”
“Okay. Then you’ll come back early tomorrow, right? You need time to finish packing for your trip. I’ll phone Roger to tell him what’s happening.”
“Thanks. What would I do without you, Josie?”
“You’d be a dismal failure, I’m sure,” Josie said with a grin, kissing Susannah’s cheek as they hugged. “Either that, or you’d be a network star making millions. Maybe I’m just holding you back.”
“You’re holding me together. Someday it will be your turn, you know.”
“I can’t wait. One more thing. You’ll need this.” Josie handed over the small suitcase she insisted Susannah always keep ready in her office, packed with a few essentials and a change of clothes. “Don’t go off to Tyler unprepared.”
“Oh, Josie, you’re a lifesaver. And I appreciate it more than you can imagine. Give Marlon a smooch for me.”
Marlon was Josie’s temperamental cat. Josie laughed. They parted then, with Josie turning her car back to the city and Susannah heading west.
The drive to Tyler normally took more than an hour, but Susannah lost track of time and was surprised to find the sunlight slanting over the horizon when she finally pulled her station wagon into the town limits of Tyler, Wisconsin.
Tyler looked as pretty as a Christmas card, covered with snow that sparkled in the last flicker of afternoon light. Picturesque trails of smoke wisped from the chimneys of the neatly kept houses on Elm Street. The steeple of the Methodist Church pointed heavenward from a thatch of spruce trees, with snowflakes settling gently on the fluffy green branches.
Susannah’s chest felt tight as she drew up to the curb in front of the tall Victorian house on the corner of Elm and Third streets. No matter how many years had passed since she’d left her hometown for college, she always got a pang of pleasure when she returned.
Pleasure mixed with regret. Susannah often thought of Tyler as the life she’d left behind. The lovely town was quiet, yet full of good people who lived rich, full lives. Tyler had a lot to offer. But, even though she visited occasionally, Susannah had turned her back on it somewhere along the line. She had never meant to abandon her roots so completely. Sometimes a hot career in the big city paled by comparison.
Her grandmother’s house, with its gracefully curving front porch, its scalloped trim and its twin turrets, looked as welcoming as ever. Susannah knew every nook and cranny in the house, having lived with her grandmother after the deaths of her parents. Nothing had changed, as far as Susannah could see. It was comforting to know that life stayed the same in Tyler.
When she opened the car door, she could hear the soft croon of Bing Crosby singing Christmas carols from the loudspeakers in front of Gates Department Store, just a few blocks away. Across the street, Mr. Connelly was stringing colored lights in his shrubbery while his two small children watched, bundled in identical yellow snowsuits with pompoms on their hats. The children looked away from their father long enough to give Susannah happy waves of greeting.
“There’s certainly a feeling of Christmas in the air,” Susannah murmured, reaching into the back seat for her overnight case and a gaily wrapped jar of peach chutney she’d brought along to give to her grandmother. It was an old family custom to bring little gifts when visiting. Then she straightened and inhaled the fragrant scent of wood smoke that hung in the air. “That’s the way life is in Tyler—it’s always like Christmas. Oh, I almost wish I wasn’t going to spend the holidays in the Caribbean!”
“Maybe you can get a refund,” said the same wonderfully masculine voice Susannah had heard on the telephone.
She spun around, fully expecting to come face-to-face with one of her grandmother’s friends—an old man with a cane, perhaps, or loose dentures. A lot of men came to visit Rose Atkins, because she was so lively for her age. Her vigor seemed contagious. But standing in front of Susannah on the snow-encrusted sidewalk was no withered senior citizen with a gleam in his eye. Far from it.
He was tall and lanky, with amazing shoulders, coal-black mischievous eyes full of improper suggestions, plus curly dark hair that tickled his ears and the back of his strong neck. His clothes were rough—a rumpled old parka over jeans, a faded flannel work shirt and heavy boots suitable for hiking the Klondike. The parka was unzipped, revealing a low-slung tool belt worn with the panache of a gunslinger.
“Let me guess,” said Susannah when she could control her vocal cords. “Mr. Busybody Santori?”
His wide mouth quirked into a wry grin. He had a strong Italian face with prominent cheekbones, expressive brows and velvety black eyes that communicated volumes. “Am I going to get a lecture from you, too, Miss Atkins?”
“That would be cruel,” Susannah shot back, smiling. “I bet my grandmother
