Along Came a Husband (15 page)

It was the only store along the block, other than Duffy’s, with lights beaming through the windows. It seemed odd Missy had chosen to stay this late, especially after the way she’d been making it a point to no longer avoid him. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.

Jonas opened the door to her store and stepped inside. The other night when he’d charged in here bent on verifying that Reynolds had been right about Missy falling apart at his funeral, he hadn’t paid any attention to the surroundings. Today the place nearly overwhelmed him in its Missy-ness.

A sweet, fruity scent permeated the evening air. Music, if that’s what you could call that new age instrumental sound, came softly from the direction of what he presumed was the front counter. Although there was no way to tell where purchases were to be made from browsing areas. The place was in complete and total disarray.

Merchandise lined the haphazardly arranged shelving units with no discernable rhyme or reason. Several shelves were in various stages of being dismantled and rearranged, stock was piled everywhere, and Missy was nowhere to be found.

“Missy, you here?” he called.

“Go away.” She sounded so pathetically miserable he could barely keep himself from smiling.

Sidestepping a couple of boxes stacked in the middle of an aisle, he headed toward the sound of her voice. He found her sitting on the floor, her elbows resting on her knees, her head in her hands, and something in him softened to mush.

The expression on her face was exactly the one he remembered so many years ago when he’d come home to find her in their kitchen in the midst of making vegetable lasagna. From scratch. Fresh tomatoes were bubbling in too small a pan on the stove. Grated mozzarella was everywhere. Chunks of Romano had landed in her hair.

One look at her back then and he’d forgotten he was hungry. They’d made love on the kitchen floor amidst fresh crushed basil and slices of eggplant. What he wouldn’t give to go back to that moment and start all over again. Maybe this time he could fix it before it all fell apart.

Right. And he was a calm, patient, loving man.

He looked away for a moment, gathered himself, and then asked, “What’s going on?”

“Why would you care?”

He raised his eyebrows at her, and that’s when he noticed she wasn’t wearing the protective crystals around her neck.

“Oh, all right!” Her shoulders sagged. “I wasn’t happy with the flow of energy in here. I was trying to feng shui the space and all I’ve done is messed up everything.” She glanced at him. “Go ahead. Gloat.”

She reached up to run a hand through the curls of her long hair and the tattoo markings on the inside of her left arm became visible, and gloating was the last thing on his mind. Obviously, due to the placement of the tattoos on the underside of her arm, they were important to Missy from a personal standpoint as opposed to trying to send a message to the world. Quickly, he stifled the urge to ask her what they meant.

“What is
feng shui,
anyway?”

She studied him for any crack in his sincerity. “Literally, it means wind-water,” she said. “It’s a way of arranging space and color to create harmony in life by keeping the positive energy flowing.”

Who was he to judge? Whether feng shui worked or not, Missy believed it did, and that’s all that really mattered. “What were you trying to do?”

“Move this aisle over there and that one over here.” She pointed this way and that as she explained her master plan.

“So where’s the problem?”

“I can’t move the shelves, Gaia’s already gone home for the day, and this is a bigger job than I expected.” She shrugged. “I’m all out of energy.”

“You plan on opening in the morning, don’t you?”

“Well, yes, b—”

“Then let’s go. If anyone can do this it’s you.”

Distrust clouded her eyes. “Why do you say that?”

He wasn’t exactly sure why he’d made that statement, but he knew it to be true.

“Jonas?”

“Because you’re not only a dreamer, Miss,” he finally answered. “You make dreams come true.”

“You say that like it’s a good thing.”

“Where would this world be without dreamers? Without people who looked outside the box and took on new challenges?” For all his analytical pragmatism, Missy’s outlook on the world was one of the things that had initially drawn him to her years ago and even now pulled him in.

She hesitated.

In spite of everything between them, he found himself holding his breath for her.
You can do it, Miss.
He held out his hand to help her stand. “You’re stronger than you think. I’ll help. So let’s do this.”

“Why? Why would you help me when you should walk away?”

“I’ve disturbed the feng shui of your life enough. The least I can do is make it up to you by helping feng shui your shop.” Besides, he had nothing better to do while he sat tight waiting for Reynolds to get his files and work some magic with the Bureau. He might as well make himself useful.

She studied him for a moment as if deciding whether or not he was being honest, and then on a heavy sigh, reached up and put her hand in his. She was so light he easily pulled her to her feet.

“Okay, boss lady. Tell me what to do.”

For the next hour, Missy told him where she wanted things moved and he moved them. Some things she’d gotten right the first time and other things had to be shifted around once or twice. When she’d settled on the placement of the main shelves and racks, they spent the next hour or so restocking.

Jonas did his best to stay in any aisle except for the one she was in. Being near Missy, smelling her, listening to her soft, calm voice was doing a number on him. At one point, she sent him into the back room for something. He took one look around at the mayhem in her storage area and knew exactly what he’d be doing the next day.

Even so, it was hard to fault Missy. What she lacked in organizational skills she more than made up for with heart. He hadn’t been able to keep from noticing the origins of her inventory. Missy was helping a damn lot of people.

By the time he’d placed the last item, a set of earth-friendly stationery, on a display case his bullet wound, which had previously been healing quite nicely, was aching. Even so, Jonas stepped back, admired his handiwork and grinned. “I’m done. You have anything else that needs to be shelved?”

“Nope. We’re finished.” Missy popped up from another aisle, stood toward the back of the shop and a big smile spread across her face. “I like it. What do you think?”

What he liked was looking at her, the way her hair bounced, her smile widened, her eyes twinkled. He’d promised to not touch her, but touching her seemed the only thing on his mind. He went back to where she stood to get the same view. “It looks clean to me. Like I could easily move through the aisles without bumping into things.”

“Exactly.” She walked through the store grinning. “This is perfect. Perfect.” She was perfect. She glanced at him, a ray of warm sunshine on a cold, bitter day. “Thanks for your help. I couldn’t have done this without you.”

“Yes, you could’ve. You would’ve.”

“It definitely would’ve taken me all night.”

“Probably.”

“Let’s go home,” she said with a soft smile.

Home. What a damn loaded word.

“Salad? Pasta?”

He hesitated. “I’m pretty hungry. Maybe I’ll go back to town—”

“I have the makings for a homemade potpie.”

He looked at her. “Vegetarian?”

She nodded. “But it’s hearty. I promise you’ll feel satisfied.” At least your stomach will, she almost added and then thought better of it.

“What can I do to help?”

“Open that bottle of merlot and then help me chop some onions.” She flipped on the oven and then gathered the ingredients. Onions and garlic. Peas, carrots and corn. Vegetable broth, bay leaves. Potatoes, barley, pie crusts.

He glanced skeptically at the bottle of merlot.

“You used to like wine.” She started peeling a potato.

“Haven’t had the occasion for it these last several years. The lot I’ve been forced to hang with are more of a tequila shot kind of group.”

“If you’d prefer—”

“No, I wouldn’t.” He took out a corkscrew and opened the bottle. “I’m quite sure I’ll never drink tequila again.”

They stood next to each other at the counter, and Missy felt herself relaxing with Jonas for the first time since he’d reappeared in her life. It hadn’t happened often, but years ago when Jonas had come home early from work they’d have invariably found themselves in the kitchen making a meal together. After all they’d been through it was nice to recapture a hint of the good times.

“Where did you live while you were undercover?” she asked.

“Apartment in Chicago. Wasn’t in too bad a part of town, but it was nothing more than four walls, really. Sterile.” He poured two glasses of wine and then downed the better part of one. “I couldn’t have anything personal around that might give me away.”

Missy couldn’t imagine it. She almost reached out to pat his back. But if he couldn’t touch her, she couldn’t touch him. She sautéed the onions and garlic. “Wasn’t there any part of the life that your were living that resembled your own?”

“No.” He refilled his wineglass.

“Never dated? Went to movies? Checked out restaurants?”

“No. No. And no.” He grabbed a knife and chopped vegetables. “I worked. Put together evidence. Filed reports. Listened to wiretap recordings. Deciphered e-mails.”

She watched his face and remembered that look. “Bad men, huh?”

“Very.” He sliced quickly, hitting the chopping block harder and harder with each thrust.

“Can you tell me about it?”

“I’m not sure you’d want to hear.”

“I’d like to—”

“It was as bad as it gets, Miss.” Pausing, he glanced at her. “We were holding out to nail Delgado. The top man. At least I thought that was the holdup. Anything you can imagine, I saw. Beatings. Murders. Teenage drug dealers and prostitutes. And much worse.” He glanced out the window as if remembering. “No respect for life. Few lives worth respecting.”

Through it all, one thing she’d never lost for Jonas was respect. What she did to help the unfortunate was nothing compared to what Jonas had accomplished as an FBI agent.

She shouldn’t ask, she knew, but a part of her cared deeply about his work. “What’s going to happen to this assignment?”

“I’ve worked too long and hard to let these last four years amount to nothing. I’ll nail them all to the wall, if I can.”

She took a gulp of wine, summoning the courage for a question that had been popping into her mind lately. “What if you couldn’t…nail them? What if you could no longer be an FBI agent?”

“It’s who I am, Missy,” he whispered, going back to chopping vegetables. “I don’t see that changing any time soon.”

“Morning.”

Wanting to get to her shop early to make sure she was satisfied with the rearrangements, she’d left her house before he was awake. “What are you doing here?”

He grinned. “Feng shui-ing your back room.”

“Awesome.” Gaia showed up beside Missy. “This the guy who helped last night?”

“Jonas, this is Gaia. Gaia, this is…my husband, Jonas.” On one level it felt so entirely strange to introduce him as her husband, and yet so normal on another.

“Legit.” Gaia raised her eyebrows and nodded with approval.

“He won’t be around for much longer,” Missy added, trying to distance herself. “So there’s no point in getting to know him.”

“If you say so.” Gaia spun around and went back into the store.

“You don’t need to do this,” Missy said as he pulled out one of the shelving units Ron had purchased months ago and began assembling it.

“I want to.” Sidestepping boxes stacked every which way, Jonas came toward her. “If it makes you feel any better I’m bored out of my mind. I need to do something to pass the time.”

Missy backed up as the overwhelming urge to walk toward him engulfed her. No man had ever made her feel quite this real, this free to be herself. His stable, no-nonsense way of going through life had always calmed her thoughts, her energy. As long as he wasn’t touching her, as long as they didn’t make love, being near Jonas somehow grounded her.

The problem was all she wanted was to touch him.

“Thanks.” She backed up even more. “I’ll be out front if you need anything.” Then she quickly escaped.

Unfortunately, nearly the entire day while Missy occupied herself with customers, her thoughts were actually focused on Jonas. She’d hear the sound of a drill and wonder how many shelves he’d assembled. A box would slide across the cement floor and she couldn’t help but imagine how he may have arranged the shelving. Long moments of complete and total silence made her wonder what he was organizing.

By lunchtime she couldn’t stand it. Needing to get away, she ran to the Bayside, brought back several sandwiches and asked Gaia to deliver a couple to Jonas. The afternoon was no different from the morning. It was early evening when he hesitantly came out front.

“Missy?”

She turned from rearranging the window display. “Need some help?”

“Actually, it’s finished. Do you want to see? You might like to make some changes.”

Missy followed him into the back room with Gaia hot on her trail.

“Owned!” Gaia said, walking around looking at the shelving. “This totally smokes.”

Missy was speechless. She barely recognized the area. All the clothing was shelved on one unit, the home and garden merchandise on two others, and books, calendars, cards and all type of paper products on another. Apparently she had enough jewelry for one entire storage unit. Purses and wallets took up most of another.

“I can’t believe this,” she murmured. “I can actually walk around back here.” There was even enough room for a small table and a couple of chairs for short breaks.

“Ron is going to be so happy,” Gaia added. Then a customer came to the front counter with a purchase. “I’ll get it.”

“What do you think?” Jonas grinned at Missy. “Six weeks before you’re going to need someone to get back in here and organize things?”

Her heart felt as if it stopped. “What if you were still here? Would that be so bad?”

Jonas’s smile disappeared. “That’s not going to happen, Missy.”

Of course not. Missy took a deep breath and did her best to smile. “You know what? Gaia’s closing the shop tonight, so let’s go. I owe you dinner.” She headed toward the front door. “How does Duffy’s sound?”

“All right. You’re on.”