remarkably straight legs, to a pair of khaki cutoffs and a white shirt with some sort of logo on it.
Too tiny to make out, even with the field glasses.
Maddy took a breath, moved the binoculars another fraction. Forgot about the itch on her chin.
“Joe.”
She said his name calmly, as if she had been expecting to see what she now saw. Why, she didn’t know. It had to be something about the knees, or something like that. Joe had great knees, not knobby at all. Her mind must have recognized them even before she saw his face. And now that mind had gone on Stun.
She didn’t itch anymore. She could safely say that. Because she was suddenly numb, all over.
“Who, Maddy?”
“I think that’s whom, Jessie, dear,” Almira said, moving closer to Maddy. “Did you say Joe? I thought you said Joe. But you couldn’t have said Joe, could you? I mean, what would that mean?”
Maddy was still staring through the binoculars, watching as Joe moved, pointed to a stack of boxes, said something to one of the workers. Smiled. Showed that single dimple in his left cheek. Made her heart flip over, land again with a sickening thud.
“I’m going to kill him,” she announced quietly, matter-of-factly.
By now, Jessie understood what was happening. Not all of it, of course. But enough to know that trouble was coming—with a capital T. She grabbed the binoculars from her sister. “Joe? Joe O’Malley? Your Joe O’Malley? Ohmigod, Maddy! Where? Which one?”
“It doesn’t matter, Jessie. He’ll be dead before you can meet him.”
Jessie squinted as she ran the binoculars over the figure of Joe O’Malley, at last getting a glimpse of the guy who had broken her sister’s heart. “Wow, cute. No wonder you—well, never mind.” Sorry she’d said what she said, she quickly passed the binoculars to Allie as she took hold of her sister’s arm. “Now, Maddy…”
“I’m having a nightmare, aren’t I?” Maddy said, shaking off Jessie’s hand. “First Great-Aunt Harriet, and now Joe O’Malley. It has to be a nightmare. But, if I shoot him, I’ll wake up. Why, the bang alone would wake me, right? That should work.”
Almira hadn’t used the binoculars, just placed them on a small table and walked toward the closed door leading to the hallway. She stood there, silently, her expression blank, and laid a hand on the doorknob.
“This way, darling,” she said, opening the door as Maddy stomped around the room in circles, her fists clenched, her mind going in sixteen directions at once. “May I suggest the front door? It’s the fastest way.”
“Allie, for God’s sake, don’t help her,” Jessie said in mingled exasperation and…could it be relief? No, that couldn’t be it. She felt sorry for her baby sister. Truly she did.
“Why not, Jessie?” Maddy said as, at last, everything fell into place. Every little bit of what was happening to her at this moment. “She brought him here, didn’t she?”
Almira Chandler put one fluttering, newly manicured hand to her chest. “I brought him here? Why, Madeline Chandler, shame on you. What are you saying?”
Maddy growled low in her throat, like an animal about to pounce, then straightened her shoulders and headed past her grandmother. “No, I don’t have time for this. You I can kill any time. Joe first!”
Mrs. Ballantine slipped into the room, her head turned to watch as Maddy stomped down the hallway on the way to the front door. She waited until she could hear the door slam, wincing only slightly as the chandelier in the foyer tinkled a bit in the passing breeze.
“Shame on you, Mrs. Chandler,” she said, shaking her head. “Bringing an old heartache into Miss Maddy’s life just a week before her wedding to that nice Mr. Garvey. How could you have done such a thing to that poor little girl?”
“I don’t know, Mrs. Ballantine, I really don’t,” Almira replied, sighing. “It must be this old age of mine. I just seem to do the most outlandish things.”
Jessie looked from one woman to the other. Neither smiled. Neither allowed a single emotion to show on her face.
“Why, you two sneaks! You’ve been planning this together, haven’t you?”
“Darling,” Almira said reasonably, “Mrs. Ballantine and I can’t even plan menus together, not without nearly coming to blows.”
Jessie thought about this for a moment, then pointed her finger at her grandmother, then at Mrs. Ballantine. She opened her mouth, wagged her finger a time or two as she searched her brain for something to say, anything to say. And then she let her arm drop to her side and said simply, “Thank you.”
“Whatever for?” Mrs. Ballantine said, looking as innocent as a drill sergeant could, which wasn’t very much.
Jessie rubbed at her forehead, trying to tell herself that nothing had changed, nothing would change. Then her blue eyes widened as another thought struck her. “Allie? Mrs. Ballantine? You aren’t going to say anything to Matt, are you? I mean, Maddy needs your help. Lord knows she’s been a mess, especially since Joe O’Malley’s company went public and his picture was on the cover of Newsweek— but you aren’t going to meddle in my life, right? Right?”
Almira put a hand on Jessie’s arm. “I don’t meddle, Jessica. I never meddle. Why, I’m as surprised as you are that Joseph O’Malley bought the Harris house.”
“Yeah. Right. Sure.” Jessie kissed her grandmother’s cheek. “You just keep on believing that Maddy and I believe that. And then keep your meddling out of my life.”
Chapter Three
J oe O’Malley heard the faint echo of a slamming door coming from the direction of the Chandler house. He stood stock-still, pretended for a moment he could feel the concussion of moving air and then began to count silently in his head. Twenty, nineteen, eighteen…
When he got to twelve, he turned to one of the workmen. “I’m expecting someone shortly, Chad. Please just say I’m inside, okay?”
Chad lifted his Phillies cap and scratched his head. “How will I know who your visitor is?”
Joe shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know, Chad. Smoke coming from her ears. Fire sparks shooting from her eyes. You’ll figure it out.”
“Oh, a woman. Well, that explains it,” Chad said as Joe leisurely jogged toward the open door to his new house, stepping inside just in time to hear a rather angry bellow that had his name in it somewhere, right before the words “you dirty, rotten, miserable…”
He smiled, and headed for the massive kitchen. Food to soothe the savage beast, that was what he needed. He hoped this particular savage beast still liked peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
He was just searching through a pile of cardboard boxes for a loaf of bread when Maddy skidded to a halt inside the kitchen. “You.”
As openings went, that “you” was fairly ominous, and he hoped all his sharp knives were still lost somewhere inside a packing crate.
