a silly voice, she said, “May I help you?” and pushed forward on the pole running up the scarecrow’s back to animate her.
There was no immediate response.
Then Nati looked up, and there, leaning over the counter, was a complete stranger—not Gus Spurgis. Instead it was a man with a staggeringly handsome face and the most beautiful blue eyes she’d ever seen.
He smiled. “I hope you don’t pay your receptionist much—she’s a little stiff. And kind of freaky.”
“She does work cheap, though.” Nati played along as she got to her feet.
And took in the full picture of the man in the business suit standing on the other side of her counter.
Tall, broad-shouldered, with the body of an athlete, he had dark brown hair the color of bittersweet chocolate; a long, slightly hawkish nose; just the right fullness of lips; and a pronounced bone structure that included a finely drawn jawline and chin. It all came together with those incredible cobalt-blue eyes to make him so good-looking that it left Nati a little breathless.
And since he also seemed vaguely familiar on top of it she was lost for a moment in wondering where she might have seen him before.
But she decided she must be imagining things. She was sure that if she had ever—ever—encountered this particular man before, there wouldn’t have been anything vague about the memory.
After a moment, she pulled herself together to stop staring at him, and returned to the subject of her scarecrow.
“Freaky, huh?” she mused, glancing at her handiwork. The scarecrow had a real-looking painted clay face surrounded by hair made of straw, a puffy calico dress with more straw sticking out at the wrists and bloomers that came out from beneath the hem of the dress to form legs. “Since I sculpted and painted the face in my own likeness, I think I’m insulted.”
“It’s interesting—I’ll give you that. But you didn’t do yourself justice.”
Was that a compliment or a comment on her sculpting skills? Nati decided not to take it personally one way or the other. “It’s supposed to be sort of a caricature,” she explained. “I know my nose turns up a little at the end—”
“Just enough to be kind of perky,” the man said, his gaze going from her nose to the scarecrow’s.
“But in order to exaggerate it, I gave her a ski-jump nose,” Nati went on. “And I’m grateful that I don’t have that pointy of a chin—”
“No, your chin is just fine… Delicate. Nice…”
She hadn’t been fishing for compliments but she was flattered.
He went on with his critique. “And you definitely missed on the mouth. Yours is good—you have nice, full lips. But that’s one tight-lipped smile on the scarecrow.”
Her chin was delicate? Her lips were nice and full?
Nati felt some heat come into her face even as she told herself that it was silly. There was nothing flirtatious about what he was saying or the way he was saying it. Was there?
It had been a long time since a man other than her grandfather had noticed much of anything about her, and maybe it was going to her head. Just a little.
It was silly, she told herself again. Silly, silly, silly. They were just making small talk.
Her shop door opened just then and a tiny, frail old woman came in.
“Hi, Mrs. Wong,” Nati greeted, glad for the distraction. Then she said to her male visitor, “If you’ll excuse me for a minute. Feel free to look around…”
Turning her back on the man, who was somehow managing to unnerve her without even trying, Nati grasped a small cheval mirror and brought it around to the front of the counter.
“Oh, that’s just beautiful!” Mrs. Wong said.
She had brought the heirloom to Nati to restore the painted ivy decoration on its frame.
“I’m just amazed,” the older woman said. “There wasn’t much more than a shadow left and you brought it back to life. It’s as pretty as it was the day my father gave it to me—that was seventy-two years ago.”
“I’m glad you like it. Let me carry it out to the car for you.”
“Why don’t you let me do that?” the male customer offered.
“No, that’s okay, it isn’t heavy,” Nati assured him.
But she had an ulterior motive. As she carried the mirror out to the elderly woman’s car parked at the curb, Nati took a peek at her own reflection, making sure her appearance compared favorably to the scarecrow’s.
She’d worn her chin-length, golden-brown hair loose today, just barely turned under at the ends. She would have liked it if she had a comb to run through it to neaten it up a little. As it was, her swept-over bangs were falling a bit in her face.
She had on her usual makeup—a little pinkish powder she’d brushed onto her apple-round cheekbones, a little mascara to bring out her brown eyes, and although she’d applied a light lipstick when she’d left the house this morning, it was four in the afternoon and it was long gone.
She was wearing jeans and a T-shirt that suddenly seemed awfully plain and maybe a size larger than necessary. She was comfortable, but now she would have liked to look more stylish. And maybe show off some of her curves.
But still, as she slid the mirror onto its side into the backseat of Mrs. Wong’s car, she decided that she wasn’t too much the worse for wear.
She was better off than the scarecrow.
Not that it mattered. The guy was only a customer, she reminded herself. At least she thought he was. Whatever his reasons for visiting her shop, they weren’t about her personally.
Once she’d made sure the mirror was secure, she closed the car’s rear door and turned back toward her shop, noticing that while Janice Wong was browsing through the painted and stenciled tole pieces she had for sale, the good-looking guy was watching her through the plate-glass windows. Rather raptly…
At least he was until she caught him at it, and then he glanced away.
Maybe he was a summons server and he felt guilty about what he was really there to do….
There had been a summons server from the Pirfoys’ attorneys at the start of the divorce, who had acted a little like this guy…
But the divorce was final. The settlement had been signed. The almighty Pirfoys couldn’t come back and try to take anything else from her or from her grandfather, and surely Doug wouldn’t be bothered doing anything else six months after the fact, would he? Especially when the divorce had been so much to his advantage.
No, she was just being paranoid.
First she had been silly to think something was clicking with this perfect stranger—even though she wasn’t in the market to have things click—and now she was
