Private Affairs Read online

So much time had passed…

  Yet it amounted to a little more than a drop in a bucket…

  She tried to think of Barnaby. To hold desperately onto all of the reasons why she shouldn’t let Palmer kiss her. But as he leaned even closer to her, all reason fled, leaving only acute awareness in its wake.

  When his lips finally met hers, a moan years in the making wound up and around her throat, exiting softly. She released his hands and snaked her arms over his shoulders. How could he taste the same? How could his hair still be thick and coarse against her fingers? How could that longing that she hadn’t experienced since he’d left emerge as if he had never disappeared?

  Palmer groaned, his freed hands sliding even further up under her dress. When the back of his fingers skimmed the front of her damp panties, she nearly jumped from the seat.

  “God, I’d forgotten how responsive you were.” He kissed her long and hard. “I could always count on knowing exactly how you felt about me, Penelope. That you wanted me as much as I wanted you.”

  She bit her bottom lip, hating the hot tears that flooded her eyes.

  That’s not true, she wanted to say. If you’d wanted me as much as I’d wanted you, you would never have left.

  But before she could truly consider the weight of her words, he was shifting her weight from the other side of the gazebo to across his lap. Penelope gasped and held onto his shoulders for balance, surprised by the move. Before she could regain her balance both physically and emotionally, he cupped the side of her face, holding her still while he launched a fresh assault on her trembling mouth.

  Having him this close, his heat permeating her every cell, his chest against her side, his lap under her bottom, it was impossible to think about anything beyond her growing need. As his breathing grew more ragged, hers did, too. And her hands seemed to have taken on a life of their own. They tunneled into his hair, dove down his back, exploring the long, hard length, then circled to press against the hard wall of his chest. He felt good. Solid. A far sight better than what she’d experienced in her dreams. He was there. Present. And she intended to take every advantage of that fact.

  Shifting around, she straddled him, adjusting her skirt so that the only things separating them were the thin wall of her panties and his slacks.

  She stilled. Not because she knew a moment of hesitancy. But because she cherished the white hot heat flashing through her.

  She’d forgotten what it felt like to think nothing at all. To give herself over to sheer emotion. To surrender to something that was bigger than her.

  “Christ, you’re even more beautiful now than you were then,” Palmer murmured.

  Penelope pressed a finger against his lips. “Shh. Please. Don’t speak…”

  At least not with words. She wanted him to communicate with his body. Wanted him to touch her. Everywhere.

  And he did.

  Penelope gasped when he fanned his hands against her bottom and then budged them ever so slowly downward until his fingers were under the hem of her bunched up dress. Skin met skin, sending shivers down her back, causing her to arch her body, seeking a more intimate meeting.

  And he gave it to her…

  His fingers burrowed under the elastic of her panties and cupped her bottom. Then his fingertips followed the shallow crevice inward until they pressed against her swollen folds.

  Penelope tugged her mouth away from his, breathing heavily against his cheek as his fingers found their target.

  Yes…

  She heard Palmer mumble something then curse.

  “I don’t have protection,” he said into her ear.

  Penelope’s throat refused the swallow she tried to force down it, his words too familiar.

  She went still for long moments, trying to gather her scattered emotions into some sort of order. Then she slowly drew away from him, forcing him to release his hold on her both literally and figuratively. Moments later, she sat with her legs tightly closed, her dress back in place, next to him.

  “I wasn’t expecting…this,” he said quietly.

  Neither had she. Not that she usually traveled with condoms anyway. But it was somewhat reassuring that he hadn’t whipped a ready one out of his back pocket.

  Reassuring and disquieting.

  He skimmed the back of his knuckles along her jaw and kissed her again, long and hard, stretching open the gulf of sensation that she was trying desperately to close.

  He cursed once more.

  She smiled.

  “Tell me we’ll be here again, Penelope.” He stared into her eyes.

  She looked away and bit hard on her bottom lip, unable to answer.

  “I didn’t expect to be here now,” she whispered.

  He drew away and sat back against the cushions. “That sounds a little too much like a no to me.”

  “No,” she said. “It sounds like a maybe.”

  4

  “SHH, YOU’LL WAKE HER.”

  “Shush, yourself. You’re the one making all the noise.”

  Penelope easily identified the two voices coming from her open bedroom door even as she fought to hold onto sleep. She’d gotten so little of it. Hadn’t she just finally dropped off? She pried open one eye and read the clock. After eight a.m. The last time she’d looked, it had been after four. And her mind had still been racing with images from the night before. Her ears still filled with the sounds. Her body still reeling from the shock of emotions.

  “Can you tell whether or not he was in there with her?” Her grandmother’s stage whisper was louder than her regular speaking voice. It was a well-known fact, but no one seemed to have the heart to tell her.

  “How would I know?” her great-aunt asked, just slightly quieter.

  “Come on, let’s go before she wakes up.”

  Penelope rolled over and eyed the two busybodies who were also her roommates. “Too late.”

  Her grandmother made a face even as she sharply elbowed Irene. “I told you you’d wake her.”

  Her aunt gave her a long look and then entered the room fully. “That’s all right. Now that she’s up, we can ask her.”

  Penelope’s right arm was still curled around the guest pillow on the double bed. Her great-aunt tugged it from her grip and gave it a thorough inspection.

  “What are you looking for?” Penelope rose up on her elbows.

  Irene plucked at something and then held up what appeared to be a single hair. She frowned. “What color is his hair?”

  “Blond.”

  “This is dark.”

  Penelope gave an exasperated eye roll. “Probably it’s Thor’s.”

  Her aunt sighed and then dropped the hair, brushing her hands together.

  “Well, whose did you expect it to be?” Penelope asked with a raised brow.

  Her grandmother came up the other side of the bed. “Don’t play coy with me, little girl. You know perfectly well who. I changed the sheets yesterday special for the occasion.” She considered Penelope through narrow eyes. “The question is, did you make good use of them?”

  Penelope swung her legs over the side of the bed and sat up. It was far too early for this. “Of course, I made good use of them. I slept on them.”

  She dragged her robe from where it lay over the wicker chair in the corner and put it on, weaving her way around the two old women planted in her room. Unsurprisingly, they gave chase, following her to the kitchen where she took a cup out of the cabinet and poured a hefty dose of coffee from the maker.

  “So we went to Seattle for nothing, then,” her aunt said with a deep sigh.

  Penelope remembered what had transpired in the gazebo and silently told them they hadn’t wasted a minute. She took a deep sip of coffee, only to nearly spit it out.

  “What is this?” she asked, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

  Her grandmother smiled. “Gourmet stuff we picked up last night. Double chocolate mocha almond amaretto something or other. What, don’t you like it?”

  Penelope
poured the cup’s contents down the drain.

  “Hey, that cost four times what our regular stuff does,” her aunt complained.

  “Yes, well, then you got ripped off.”

  To Penelope, coffee was coffee, straight, no special flavorings or additions or fancy names. Good ole Juan Valdez beans freshly brewed was all she desired and needed.

  Funny that emotionally she went for the complicated stuff.

  She grimaced and put a cup of water in the microwave and nuked it so she could have some green tea instead. Plain. No lemon or honey. Just simple green tea.

  She sat at the table, dipping the bag into the steamy water.

  “Who drinks hot tea in the summer?” her great-aunt asked, putting a plate of muffins on the table.

  “How is it different than drinking hot coffee?” her grandmother wanted to know, sitting down.

  Penelope ignored them as she squeezed the liquid from the bag and put it on the table. She took a long sip. That was more like it.

  Finally, she looked up to find Agatha and Irene staring at her.

  “What?” she asked, and then groaned. “Not that again.”

  “And again and again and again,” her grandmother promised. “Penny, girl, you need to get laid.”

  Her aunt nodded her head several times, barely disturbing her tight gray curls. “Yes, you do.”

  “But how are you going to do that if you keep your thighs glued together?”

  Penelope gasped and quickly raised her hand to ward them off. “Please, don’t. It’s much too early in the morning for me to contemplate talking about sex with my grandmother and great-aunt.”

  “Well, you should have thought about that last night. If you had done what you were supposed to, we wouldn’t have to talk about it at all.”

  Penelope narrowed her eyes. “Hmm. Somehow I doubt that.” She put her cup down on the table. “I get the feeling that you two would want detailed descriptions.”

  “God, girl, why would we want those?”

  Her aunt put a muffin on a napkin and pushed it toward her. “We have sex lives. You don’t.” She waggled a brow. “Now if you should want details…”

  “Oh, God, please. Spare me.”

  “Couldn’t hurt,” her grandmother said. “Maybe it will remind her what she’s missing.”

  “And maybe the images you burn into my brain will scar me for life, and leave me unable to ever have sex again.”

  Both their mouths closed with a snap.

  That was better. Much better.

  Penelope ignored the muffin and enjoyed her tea.

  It was hard to imagine a time when she didn’t have these two feisty, witty women in her life. In fact, very little had changed since she was five and her own mother had taken off for parts unknown with her latest boyfriend, an occasional visit or phone call to let them know she was still alive Penelope’s only contact with the woman who had birthed her.

  Agatha and Irene had raised her, although at times it had been difficult to tell who was the child and who the adults. While there had always been freshly baked and cooked food in the house, so had there been parties and a seemingly never-ending trail of paramours, the reputation of the two sisters in their younger years following them well into the autumn of their lives. More often than not it had been Penelope who had picked up beer bottles from the floor and cigarette butts from the plants after a particularly rowdy night.

  She had hoped that one day they would settle down. That her grandmother and great-aunt would finally mature. But it appeared that might not ever happen.

  “So how was Seattle?” she asked, idly pulling apart the muffin and popping a piece into her mouth.

  The two sisters grinned at each other. And Penelope sat back, readying herself for another example of exactly why neither of them would ever qualify for a spot in a Norman Rockwell painting…

  PALMER STOOD AT THE FRONT DESK at Foss’s B and B and stared at the bell after looking at his watch. The scent of fresh coffee and something baking came from the direction of the kitchen, but seeing as he was the only guest in the seven-room inn, he didn’t feel comfortable just walking around the place as if he owned it. Especially since from the moment he’d checked in, he’d gotten the impression he wasn’t exactly welcome. The second afternoon of his stay, he’d returned to find his suitcase on the front porch, his room locked up.

  “I didn’t realize you were staying for more than one night,” Debra Foss had said when he’d finally tracked her down in the back garden.

  He knew differently. He’d told her when he’d checked in to what basically amounted to the only temporary accommodations in town, that he would be staying indefinitely.

  But he hadn’t bothered to remind her. He could tell by the look on her face that she understood what the score was, and nothing he could say would sway her.

  So he made it a point of stopping by the front desk to reinstate his intention to stay and pay for another night before leaving for the day, lest he return to find his suitcase in a garbage can.

  He rang the bell.

  He wasn’t altogether sure why he’d received the cold shoulder upon his return to his hometown. He certainly hadn’t left on bad terms with anyone. Well, outside of his father, anyway. So why the cold reception?

  Mrs. Foss popped up behind the desk, startling him. She didn’t wish him a good morning or offer him a cup of coffee, she merely accepted his money, showed him where to sign—again—and then disappeared to wherever she’d emerged from.

  Not the best way to start the day.

  Palmer stepped out into the summer morning, blinking against the strong sunlight. He couldn’t remember it being this hot here. Many summers it had barely gotten warm enough to set up the sprinkler in the back yard, yet now his shirt immediately stuck to his back, and he wanted to loosen the tie he’d just tightened.

  He walked across the arched gravel drive and unlocked the door to his leased Mercedes, draping his suit jacket over the back of the driver’s chair before getting in and starting the engine, counting to ten as he waited for the air conditioner to kick in.

  Ah, yes. That was more like it.

  He understood the entire state was experiencing a fluke heat wave unlike any they’d seen before. Up in Seattle, the temperature had broken a hundred for the first time in…well, recorded history. And it hadn’t rained in at least a couple of weeks, which was strange in and of itself.

  The thought brought the image of Penelope in the gazebo last night to mind. She’d smelled of summer and made him hot just looking at her.

  Palmer rubbed the back of his neck. The last thing he’d planned was trying to seduce her in the backyard of her grandmother’s house. But there you had it. Seemed the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. He wanted her even more than he had back then. Then again, perhaps time had dulled the old memories. And now reality had honed them to an aching point.

  He couldn’t help looking around Earnest as he drove through the few blocks that comprised the downtown on his way south to the construction site he’d chosen. It held little more than the trailer that served as his offices for the time being.

  He eased his foot up off the gas, spotting someone walking across Main Street.

  Penelope.

  He stopped altogether.

  She was wearing another dress, this time tan with what appeared to be—were those cherries?—printed all over the light material. A wide-brimmed hat protected her dark head from the morning sun and she reached up to steady it as a breeze threatened to take it from her.

  A car horn beeped behind him. Penelope looked over her shoulder in his direction.

  Palmer grimaced and gave a brief wave. “Hey, how are you doing? Me? I’m pissed my discreet moment of watching you was so rudely interrupted.”

  He glanced in the mirror to see who the perpetrator was. Why wasn’t he surprised to find Barnaby in his sheriff’s car?

  He flashed the red-and-white strobe lights on top of his official county vehicle.r />
  Palmer gave him a wave, as well, rather than the finger he would like to have flashed, and put the car back in gear, the moment broken.

  Within five minutes, he turned into the narrow unpaved road that led to the trailer. A pickup kicked up dust as it raced toward him at high speed.

  What the hell?

  At the last moment, Palmer pulled into the brush and the pickup roared by, momentarily blinding him with the dirt cloud it left behind.

  If he hadn’t felt unwelcome before, that little stunt certainly would have clued him in.

  He continued on to the trailer and got out, walking toward the construction foreman he’d hired the week before.

  “Morning,” he said, shaking John Nelson’s hand. “What was all that about?”

  “You tell me.”

  Palmer squinted at him. “Excuse me?”

  “If you had waited a minute longer, it would have been me coming at you head-on on that road.” John slapped a file he was holding against his chest. “And I wouldn’t have missed.”

  He began stalking toward his own truck.

  “Hey, what’s up, man?” Palmer asked, grabbing his arm to stop him.

  “You might want to try asking the man in there.” John jabbed a thumb toward the trailer. “He just fired us all.”

  5

  “GOOD MORNING, PENELOPE.”

  Penelope looked up from where she was fiddling with the espresso machine and found the sheriff standing in the open doorway, his hat in his hands.

  “Hey, Barnaby,” she said.

  She closed the appliance door and pressed the button for brew, pretending everything was as they’d left it last night at the door to her grandmother’s house.

  Only it wasn’t, was it? Everything had changed.

  She cleared her throat and wiped down the counter although she’d already cleaned it.

  “Everything all right?”

  She glanced up to find Barnaby standing on the other side of the counter, a concerned expression on his handsome face.

  She tried for a smile. “Everything’s fine. Why do you ask?”

  “That Palmer DeVoe character hasn’t been giving you any trouble?”