yet. She had matters to settle with her own family first.
“Where are you going?” Thurston demanded. “Why wasn’t I informed that she—” he cut Eddi an annoyed look “—was here?”
Doug held up a hand to quiet him. Thank God, Eddi thought disparagingly. No doubt Ms. Ada was at the bottom of the stairs straining her ears to hear every single word.
“This is not the time or place,” Doug said firmly. “We’ll be back in a few hours and perhaps Miss Harper will be ready to speak with you then.”
“I beg your pardon,” Thurston protested, incensed. “As the authorized representative of your employer—”
Doug leaned slightly toward him, which forced him to look down at the man since he was a good two inches taller. “Not…now.” He stepped back and motioned for Eddi to precede him to the staircase. “I’ll call you as soon as she’s ready for a meeting.”
Eddi didn’t have to look back to know that the lawyer was not a happy camper. A smile lifted the corners of her lips. One prayer answered, she mused. Now, if the good Lord would just help her get through the rest.
“Well, that didn’t take very long,” Ada said triumphantly as the two descended the stairs. She gifted Mr. Cooper with a suspicious look. “I certainly hope all was in order.”
Before Eddi could respond, Mr. Cooper said in a voice silky with charm, “Everything is perfect, Ms. Garrett.” He paused at the door where Eddi waited. “Especially since Miss Harper has agreed to have dinner with me.”
Ada’s eyes immediately bulged and Eddi was sure she saw her ears perk. “Dinner? Oh, my. Well.” Her right hand flew to her cheek. “You two have a nice time.”
This time Eddi’s prayer went unanswered. She’d asked God to let the floor crack open and swallow her up. But it didn’t. Instead, Mr. Cooper opened the front door for her like the gentleman he was. She couldn’t stop staring at him as they strolled down the sidewalk toward the curb. He looked pleased with himself, as if he’d just managed some coup. She imagined that he believed he’d headed off any gossip related to why he was really here.
The sad thing was he’d done something far worse. He’d just set Meadowbrook’s infamous matchmakers in motion. Eddi could almost hear Ada on the telephone now putting a call through to Ella or Irene or maybe Minnie and Mattie. Eddi looked up at the overhead power and telephone lines strung along the street. News that she had a dinner “date” with the stranger in town was no doubt buzzing along that very line right this moment.
Mr. Cooper paused where the boardinghouse sidewalk intersected the one along the street. “I hope you don’t mind my taking that liberty. I felt sure you wanted to keep the real story under wraps for the moment. Feeding Ms. Garrett that misleading information should provide an acceptable cover for our real business here. A distraction, so to speak.”
It took every ounce of willpower Eddi possessed not to laugh out loud. She just wagged her head back and forth. “You have no idea.”
Doug was still a little confused by Eddi’s remark as he pulled up behind her truck in front of the Harper residence. Maybe she didn’t approve of his methods. She had called him a spy. It was possible she didn’t fully grasp why he was here. Right now she wanted to check on her mother before going to the hardware to speak to her father.
Going to the hardware store wouldn’t be necessary, it seemed. Her father sat on the front steps of his home, his head hung between hunched shoulders.
Doug blocked the memory of the hurt he’d seen in Millicent Harper’s eyes. Though Doug felt sympathetic toward his employer, this whole affair was going to change so many lives, perhaps do irreversible damage. It was almost heartless, ruthless even.
But the decision had not been his. He watched Eddi take a seat next to her dad on the top stone step. Already Doug had lost his objectivity. Empathized with her far too much…respected her more than he’d anticipated. He couldn’t say for sure what he’d expected when he read her profile, but this earnest young woman was not it.
And she was a plumber. A smile tugged the corners of his mouth upward. She wore overalls, for Pete’s sake. Overalls and sneakers and a plain old white T-shirt. The long braid of strawberry-blond hair mixed with the blue eyes and scattering of freckles across her pert little nose personified the all-American-girl look. The getup she wore lent a tom-boyish quality to the package. But the streak of white hair that blazed a narrow trail from her forehead to the tip of her braid spoke of breeding and elegance. Though Solange D’Martine didn’t wear her hair in a braid, she had the same strawberry blond tresses with that shock of sophistication. The perfect balance between the set of her eyes and the tilt of her nose, and those high-boned cheeks were exactly the same.
The father, Edouard, had had the same coloring, only his hair had been slightly darker, redder. The case file contained a picture of the father as well as the grandmother for showing to Eddi when the time was right. There were documents, all of which the attorney kept safely tucked in his leather briefcase.
Doug sighed, tired. He made no move to get out of his vehicle, but watched his principal from there. This carefree young woman had no idea how very much her life was about to change. Nothing would ever be the same again. With the kind of wealth possessed by the D’Martines came a certain level of public scrutiny. There would be no escaping it. Eddi needed to enjoy her final few days of true privacy, because as soon as the media got wind of her existence any real privacy would be a thing of the past.
“ISN’T YOUR FRIEND getting out?” her dad asked.
Eddi shook her head and refrained from correcting her father as to the friend remark. “He said he’d give me some space.”
She was really glad Mr. Cooper had stuck by his word. She needed these few moments with her father. Needed to reassure him and herself.
“So Mom’s taking this okay,” she ventured. When she’d first arrived home and found her father sitting on the front steps she’d almost panicked. The thought that something could have happened to her mother while she was selfishly demanding answers from Mr. Cooper hadn’t occurred to her. And it should have. Usually Eddi wasn’t as thoughtless as that. But today had been a little extreme all the way around.
“She’s okay,” her father said quietly. “She’s lying down now.”
Eddi nodded. “That’s good.” She bent her knees and clasped her arms around them, then braced her chin there. “You know this is all just absolutely bizarre, don’t you?”
Her father nodded. “But it’s true. Your mother and I wanted to protect you, but maybe we should have told you a long time ago.”
“I don’t want to know now,” Eddi argued. “Why would I have wanted to know before?”
Her father smiled and her heavy heart lifted just a little. “Well, now, I don’t think I could have put it any better myself. It’s a bit of a thorny patch, that’s a fact.” He rested his gaze on hers. “But we love you. We’ve always loved you. If we made a mistake, it was in the name of love.”
She hugged her father then. Hugged him with all her might. “You didn’t make a mistake.” She drew back and blinked away the confounded mist that clouded her vision. She didn’t want him to see her cry. “Don’t ever think it, not for a second. Okay?”
He nodded
