why was she even answering? Who she liked was none of his business.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going out?” She assumed her mama-hen voice she often used with Calvin.
“I didn’t want to bother you.”
“Trust me, Sean. Being courteous is no bother. Next time, just let me know, OK? I don’t want to think you’re safe upstairs, then find out something’s happened to you.”
He smiled at that. “I’m glad you still care.”
“I’ve always cared, Sean. You know that.”
“Sometimes I did. Other times…I got the feeling that it was better I wasn’t around. Like you thought I might be a bad influence on Cal.”
She was a little startled at how well he had read her those years ago. “If I’d really thought you were a bad influence, I wouldn’t have let you near Calvin.” Again the lying.
He lost the smile. “Not that it would have stopped Cal. He always found a way to do what he wanted to do.”
She stiffened. “You got something to say to me about Cal, Sean?”
That struck him dumb. After a long moment, he simply shook his head.
She didn’t like half-assed allusions; they made her angry. No one—least of all, Sean—would tell her about her son. She hadn’t worn blinders these many years. Calvin had had his faults, but he hadn’t been a bad kid. If anyone had been on a slippery slope downward, it was Sean. And he had the nerve to come in this house and make snide remarks about her son?
Instinctively, she wanted to kick him out. To tell him to go back to the hotel, back to Indiana.
Instead, she took a deep breath. “I’m going to make lunch soon. And my mother’s coming over. If you have other plans, let me know. Otherwise, you can join us.”
She saw him hesitate. “What’re you making?”
“I’m frying up some catfish. My mother usually eats her heavier meals at lunch.”
“Yeah, my mom tried that a few times, too. Didn’t work, though…with her weight, I mean.”
Back on safer territory, she let her resentment ebb away. “So, are you staying?”
“Do you want me to stay?” He seemed to now have a habit of capturing her eyes, not letting go.
She knew he was asking about more than lunch. “Yes, I want you to stay.”
His smile was back, wider this time. “I guess I’ll stay, then.”
The smile made his lips come into focus. They were perfectly shaped over a firm chin with just the slightest dimple. A matching dimple marked his right cheek.
The memory of his mouth so near her own came unbidden. She pushed it away.
“OK, then make yourself useful. You can do the salad while I fry up the fish.”
“Wouldn’t baked fish be healthier?” he asked with a laugh as they walked to the kitchen.
“Smart-ass,” she said. Then smiled.
Chapter 8
“Lacey! What happened to your lovely roses?” Of course, her mother would come to the back door today of all days. Which meant she had seen the debris that Lacey meant to rake up in the yard. Her mother stood on the back porch, looking at the mess, her face in shock.
“Come in, Mom. Don’t worry about that.”
As the older woman entered the kitchen, she immediately took in Sean standing at the cutting island. He had been slicing tomatoes for the salad, but at her mother’s question, he stopped and looked at Lacey with a puzzled stare.
“What do you mean ‘don’t worry about it?’ All those beautiful roses, the whole bushes, have been torn down. The porch looks absolutely naked. What happened?” Her mother’s eyes were still focused on Sean, as though he were somehow responsible. And Sean was still staring at Lacey.
“I’ve decided to make some changes around here. Anyway, those bushes were way too overgrown. It’s time I planted something new, something different. I’m also thinking about painting the porch, too.”
Her mother looked at her as though she had sprouted appendages from the head. Still, the older woman said nothing. She peered at Sean again.
Lacey wiped her hand on the dish towel she had been about to pitch to the side for the laundry. “Mom, this is Sean Logan. He and Cal practically grew up together. I think you met him a few times when he was younger. Sean, this is my mother, Mrs. Coleman.”
Lacey’s mother took a seat at the kitchen table, laid her purse to the side. “You’re the young man from the cemetery.”
“Uh, yeh…nice to meet you.” He looked uncomfortable, as though slicing tomatoes in Lacey’s kitchen was akin to committing some felony…or a misdemeanor, at least.
“I see you’re making salad,” her mother said to him, then turned to her. “Nice of him.”
After forty-odd years, Lacey knew the subtext of her mother’s benign comments. Just as Ray had done earlier, she was questioning the situation. Lacey couldn’t understand what the fuss was about. Sean had been in this house nearly a thousand times, had almost grown up in it along with Cal. There was nothing unusual about his being here.
“Yes, it’s very nice of him to help make your lunch. You want endives in your salad?”
Her mother cut her a look, the same look she used to give the teenaged Lacey when she’d said something smart-alecky. It used to make Lacey want to slink away, although the stubbornness she’d inherited from her father often countered her fear. She still had that stubbornness, and she held a conversation of eyes with her mother.
“Well?” Lacey pressed for an answer.
From the corner of her eye, Lacey saw that Sean had gone back to cutting the tomatoes. She also knew he was listening intently, waiting for a cue from either mother or daughter to make himself scarce.
“Endives would be fine.”
Lacey smiled. “Good. Sean, endives, please. Mom, you can sit here and relax while I get the fish going.”
She had the skillet on the range, the fish floured and seasoned. Like her mother used to do, and her grandmother before her, she had also doused the fish in cornmeal for added texture. She poured the canola oil in the skillet, laid the fish in, and immediately the familiar briny, spicy smell began to fill the kitchen. She pointedly ignored her mother, whom she had no doubt was staring from Sean to her.
Why was it everyone’s immediate assumption that a male and female staying under the same roof must be sleeping together? And the thought of her and Sean together was ridiculous. She was twice his age, which made him just a kid. Well, not exactly a kid; still, the idea wasn’t even to be entertained.
She was simply doing him…and
