Bea (15 page)

Janet

From: Belinda

To: Molly, Bea, Catherine, Clemmie, Joanna, Janet

Re: Rule Four

Bea, you’ve never carried on over all those Mr. Wrongs the way you’re doing over Russ Hammond! I’m so excited! You’re falling in love! I recognize all the signs! It looks like you won’t have to dress slutty to get his attention, but you might pull in your stinger a little bit. And don’t act like you know everything, even though you do! All of us love and adore you, but men like to think they’re in charge. Why, Reeve thinks I can’t even pour my own coffee! He looks so cute and proud of himself coming up the stairs with my coffee on a silver tray. He even goes into the garden and picks a fresh flower every morning. Of course, I show my gratitude as only a wife in love will, so we’re getting in lots of baby making practice!!! I just hope one of these days it will work! But, oh my, I think this honeymoon is going to last forever!!!

If you love Russ Hammond, make him chase you till you catch him, Bea!

Belinda

From: Clementine

To: Molly, Bea, Joanna, Belinda, Janet, Catherine

Re: Belinda’s email

I went through two tissues reading your email, Belinda. It was as good as reading one of my favorite romance novels! Bea, she’s right about toning yourself down a little bit, at least till you catch him. I mean, you have such a big personality you probably scared the pants off all those cowards who split.

Wear perfume, too. Look how well that worked with Belinda! I mean, I’m not suggesting you roll in his bed. For goodness sake, he sleeps naked and you could get into Trouble with a capital T! Still, you know what to do.

Clemmie

From: Catherine

To: Bea, Molly, Joanna, Janet, Belinda, Clemmie

Re: Boots

Wear boots with killer heels, Bea. A French maid costume wouldn’t hurt, either. I saw the cutest one in a shop on Bourbon. I’ll get it and mail it to you. It was one of THOSE shops, but I don’t care who sees me in there. It might enhance my reputation. Why is it that women who study in a field dominated by men get viewed as genderless? Or worse yet, one of the boys!!!

OMG, I can’t believe you saw Russ Hammond NAKED! Was he really HOT, Bea! He sounds like he had that bad boy edge I simply adore! If you decide to throw him back, send him down to New Orleans!

Cat

Bea started to shoot off an email to Cat saying,
you can have him!
But that was going too far, and besides it wasn’t even the truth - which scared Bea more than she cared to admit.

She grabbed her clothes and stepped into the bathroom so she’d be showered and dressed before Molly arrived. By the time Molly got there, Bea was on her second cup of coffee and halfway through a swashbuckling movie so old she didn’t even know the lead actor’s name. All she knew was that he looked good in tight britches and pirate’s boots.

“Bea!” Molly burst through the door like a one-women parade. “OMG, are you hiding in here because of that
gorgeous man
downstairs!”

Swooping across the room in a cloud of perfume, swirling skirts and bangle bracelets, she grabbed Bea in a tight hug.

“Not so loud, Molly. He’ll
hear
you.”

“You can’t hear yourself think down there. I never will get all these relatives straight.”

“Some of them, you don’t even want to try.” Bea marched around Molly. “I see my brother hasn’t changed you one iota. Good for you!”

“He’s just a big old teddy bear!”

“Sam?”

“Don’t look so shocked, Bea. Why shouldn’t he be as wonderful as you?” Molly plopped in the middle of the bed and patted a spot beside her. “Tell all, and don’t you dare leave out a thing.”

“This could take all morning, and they’re expecting us downstairs.”

“Bea, I’ve got to teach you the value of an entrance. If I didn’t make at least one a day, Sam would be disappointed.”

“Mr. Correct and Punctual?”

“Marriage has mellowed him.”

“Mellowed, my butt. I’d say it worked an outright miracle.”

“Not another word about Sam and me.” Molly leaned over and grabbed her hand. “I want to hear about
you
and that heartthrob downstairs
.
If I read the signs right, he’s as tied in knots over you and you are over him.”

“You really think so?”

“I know so, Bea.”

“I’m in total shock.”

“You’re not in total shock. You’re falling in love.” Molly flopped back on the bed. “OH, this is so DELICIOUS, I’m about to die!”

o0o

Russ was glad he’d decided to stay.

The house on North Wood Avenue was filled with lively people who laughed a lot and hugged a lot and talked a lot. He craned his neck, scanning the room. Where was Bea?

“I thought you might need this. Talking to this crew can make a man thirsty.” A big handsome man thrust a glass of iced tea into Russ’s hands. “I’m Samuel Adams, Bea’s brother, and I really appreciate what you did for my sister.”

“I was glad to lend a hand.”

“It seems you did more than lend a hand. You did an all-out rescue job.” Samuel laughed. “With my sister, that’s not easy.”

“She
is
independent.”

“Bossy
is the word I’d have used.”

“That, too.”

Russ felt himself being inspected. He didn’t mind. If he’d had a sister like Bea, he’d have done the same thing.

“Do I measure up?”

Samuel’s dark eyes crinkled at the corners when he laughed. “You caught me red handed.”

“I don’t blame you. I’m sure that nothing you’ve seen about me inspires confidence.”

“I never judge a man by appearances.”

“Then you are a rarity. A wise man.”

“You might not have said that before I met Molly. Speaking of my angel…” Sam turned toward the staircase with the rapt expression of a man who adored a woman.

Molly was blond and beautiful, the kind of woman who turned heads, but it was not Sam’s wife who held Russ’s attention: it was the tall, dark-headed wildcat at her side. Bea was wearing another of those short, tight little skirts that drove him wild and a pair of black boots hat made her legs look six feet long - and every inch delicious.

“Two years ago when I first met Molly, I made the mistake of judging by appearances.” Sam was talking but Russ paid scant attention, just nodded politely and continued to feast his eyes on Bea. “My wife taught me a lesson I’ll never forget.”

At the bottom of the staircase, that little old woman who had screamed Russ out of bed pulled Bea aside and stood on tiptoe to whisper something. Bea smiled in his direction, then patted the old woman’s hand, and she went tottering back in the direction of the kitchen.

When Molly joined them, Sam lit up like a Christmas tree and slid his arm around his wife. No surprise there. What shook Russ to the core was the way Bea sashayed up and hooked her arm through his.

Even Sam looked shocked. Russ figured Bea’s brother was the kind of man who would dig into his background, his business, his financial security, his habits, his friends.

“Have you girls been enjoying your reunion?” Sam smiled indulgently at his wife and her color heightened.

“Darling, I barely escaped from this little bitty old woman who called me
Bea
and wanted to drag me to the kitchen for a private cooking lesson. ‘Beatrice,’ she said, ‘no Southern woman would be caught dead making sawmill gravy with lumps.’ Who
is
she?”

Samuel and Bea hooted with laughter.

“Aunt Rachel. Thank God you got away.” Bea grinned at Molly. “Russ found out the hard way that it doesn’t do to get her dander up.”

“That story has already made the rounds,” Samuel said. “I understand there is even a movement among the unmarried cousins to have a repeat performance.”

“I think I’ll decline,” Russ said. “I don’t like to be center stage more than once a visit.”

“Aunt Rachel is terribly sorry about what happened, Russ,” Bea told him. “She wants to make it up to you.”

“There was no harm done. In fact, I rather enjoyed it. I haven’t had that much attention since I turned a frog loose in the fourth-grade classroom.”

“Humor her. She doesn’t want to apologize. She just wants you to come into the kitchen and lick the bowl.”

“Lick the bowl?”

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” Samuel told him. “Licking the bowl is a rare privilege, especially if Aunt Rachel is making her famous divinity.”

“Her divinity?”

“Candy,” Bea explained, laughing. “Why don’t you just come with me and find out.”

Aunt Rachel was bustling around the kitchen, wearing two aprons, one a frilly organdy and the other a cotton domestic to protect her
company
apron. A perky red bow—the kind used on Christmas packages—perched in her sparse gray hair. In order to keep her bow from toppling off into the gravy, she had stretched a hairnet over her head, anchoring it with enough bobby pins to keep a drugstore in business for a year of two.

She waved when Russ and Bea entered the kitchen.

“Well... I said to Bea, I said, why don’t you get that nice young man out here and let me show him a thing or two? Didn’t I say that, Bea?” She never stopped talking long enough for Bea to reply, but kept looking up at Russ, craning her neck up so that she could see beyond the full beard that so fascinated her. “I said, I’ll bet that young man would like to lick the bowl. I never saw a man yet who didn’t. ‘The way to a man’s heart,’ and all that, that’s what I’ve always said. You just ask Mack. Mack can tell you. ‘The way to a man’s heart,’ just you wait and see. Mack will tell you. It works every time.”

Bea winked at Russ over the top of Aunt Rachel’s head. He smiled down at the two women. It had been a long, long time since he’d been in a real kitchen. This one was big and cozy with copper pots hanging from the ceiling and coffee perking on the stove and bread baking in the oven and pots of daisies sitting in the sunshine on the windowsill.

“Bea tells me you’re making divinity, Aunt Rachel.”

“That’s just like her, telling all my secrets.” Aunt Rachel plucked a big white apron off a hook. “Bend over,” she told Russ, “I’m going to introduce you to the joys of cooking.”

“I confess that I’m rather ignorant in that field.”

“You don’t need a degree to beat divinity. Just a good strong arm and lots of patience. That’s what I always tell Mack, lots of patience, I say.” She looped the sashes around Russ, then tied them in a tiny knot. “My, you’re a big man. There’s not enough sash to make a bow on you.”

“Bea—” Aunt Rachel turned to her niece who sat on a stool in a patch of sunshine, watching “—I’m so glad you picked out a big man this time. You never used to date anybody except those scrawny bookish types. I’ll bet they couldn’t even hold out to beat the divinity.”

“I’ll bet they couldn’t, either.” Russ gave Bea a wicked smile and followed Aunt Rachel to the kitchen counter.

He was having a wonderful time. Bea could tell by his jaunty walk and the easy way he smiled and joked with Aunt Rachel. Not for all the tea in China would she have spoiled his fun by arguing about the men she had dated. Come to think of it, they
had
been rather anemic looking. She’d bet they couldn’t hold out to beat the divinity, either.

Russ and Aunt Rachel had their heads together, earnestly discussing the process of stirring the candy until it was exactly the right consistency.

“Can I do anything to help, Aunt Rachel?” Bea asked.

“You just sit still over there and watch two pros at work.”

Bea did as she was told. One of the things she loved about coming back every year to her family’s reunion was the everydayness of things. Life in this big old house in Florence was filled with reassuring routines and ordinary pleasures—setting the coffee on to perk first thing in the morning, raising the shades to let the sunshine in, flicking off the night-light in the bathroom, running over to a neighbor’s house for a cup of tea. As she sat on her kitchen stool, a sense of peace stole over her. Life from this angle looked good, and it suddenly seemed full of possibilities.

She propped her hand on her chin and lost herself in observing Russ. He looked
right
in the kitchen, with a white apron straining over his broad chest and a big metal spoon in his hand. He was laughing, and it was a sound of such uninhibited delight that Bea wanted to capture it in a bottle and keep it forever. She could imagine herself uncapping that bottle when that old witch of a boss got her goat, listening once more to the sound of his laughter and letting the problems at work just roll off her back.

“You can lick the bowl now,” Aunt Rachel’s voice brought Bea up short. Since when had she stopped thinking of her work as an opportunity for advancement and started thinking of it as a problem?