Dream a Little Dream (6 page)

Nobody did.

So there she was, pencil poised, paper in hand, only to watch as her story sashayed back to her van, yelled at the kids to buckle up, then sped off.

Okay, so maybe there wasn't a story there. Prudy, obviously not heartbroken or in love, scratched his head
and ambled back into the building without giving the disappearing van a second look.

Molly paused. It left her to wonder whether she was so desperate for a story that she'd begun to imagine leads. What was so unique about what had just happened? Honestly nothing. She was just desperate.

Arrggghhh! She stomped her foot, rammed the pencil back behind her ear and contemplated her situation.

She had to get over this. She had to move on, and she would. Her well wouldn't stay dry without a fight. Serious reporters didn't let a thing like this get in their way. They didn't freeze up because of…because of…because of what? She didn't even know what to call what had happened to her.

Stuffing the notepad back into her pocket, she abandoned the rest of her walk to Prudy's. How hopeless was she, that she was going to try to write a story out of a woman asking for directions? Head wagging, she made it across the street, beelining toward her special rock. But first she needed coffee.

A big cup. The nastier the better to hit the spot. Turning on her toe, she detoured to Sam's. Sam's trademark coffee was dark and caustic, and had on occasions supercharged her brain after a late night of writing. Today she just needed a jolt. She had definitely not been doing any writing!

And besides, after what Norma Sue and Esther Mae had said, she thought she needed to check up on Sam. Maybe something
was
wrong. Maybe he needed a friend. He
had
seemed out of sorts lately.

“How do, Molly,” he greeted her as soon as she pushed open the door. “The usual?”

She plodded to the counter, letting her backpack slide off her shoulder onto the stool, suddenly feeling drained. Glancing around the old-fashioned diner/drugstore, it was an odd thing not to see Applegate and Stanley playing their daily game of checkers by the window. But at the moment she was glad the place was empty. Maybe she could get Sam to talk. She was, after all, a reporter and that was what she did. Right?

“Hi, Sam. Do you have any old coffee this morning? Maybe some that you forgot to take off the burner last night. Some that's as thick as mud and stronger than bootstraps.”

Sam frowned, wiped his hands on his white apron and reached for a cup. “That bad, huh.”

She nodded. “'Fraid so.” She hated to be so glum. Especially since she was here to find out about him. Why had he seemed so moody lately? It hit her that maybe it was because of Applegate and Stanley moving to Pete's.

She watched him pour coffee into a large paper cup for her. He'd ordered the paper cups especially for her so she could take her coffee to the woods and write. “Sam, are you feeling okay? Is something bothering you?” There. She'd sliced right to the root. Sam was, as far as Molly was concerned, the sweetest man on earth, even though he hid it under an endearingly gruff exterior.

“Just peachy,” he said. “Don't you be worrying yer pretty little head about me none. Worry about poor Bob. You need to give one of them cowboys some newsprint time other than Bob. That cowboy's had all the ribbin' he can take, Molly girl.”

The acid in Molly's stomach churned up once more. “Did they tease him terribly?”

“Now Molly, you know how these cowboys are. 'Fraid I did it too.” He looked repentant, but only momentarily.

Molly slapped her hand on the counter. “You should be ashamed of yourselves!”

“Ashamed of what? That's the way men are. You gave 'em ammo and they used it. Don't you go athinking Bob wouldn't do it too—well, now that I think about it, Bob just might be the one guy who wouldn't do it. But that's neither here nor there. They was just havin' a peep of fun and he'll get over it. But you still need to focus on somebody else. Now go get to work. Mule Hollow needs you, so stop lollygagging around here.”

Hiding a smile, Molly shouldered her pack and backed toward the door. “That's why I came by, not for the turpentine you call coffee, but for your abuse. Sets me straight every time. I love you anyway.”

And she did. She and Sam had a connection. They teased each other always and loved every minute of it. It was another one of the things that connected her to Mule Hollow. Sam was like a father figure to her. Of course he didn't know that. No one did. Until Lacy Matlock had introduced her to the Lord, Molly hadn't felt connected to anyone. Because of her own father's indifference to her, she'd stopped seeking personal connections with people early in her life. What she hadn't gotten at home she hadn't sought out elsewhere. She'd wondered sometimes if something in her was broken, but she didn't worry too much about it. Some people just had a bad home life, and she was one of them. Besides, she was a
reporter with an agenda aiming for bigger things. Each story she wrote was a specific notch upward toward achieving her goals. Making her dreams come true.

Dreams she'd been dreaming…for years. Those dreams had held her together when life at home threatened to break her apart. A Houston businessman, her dad had been hard to live with. She could still hear the fights—fights that had driven her to hide in her closet, the way a child attempts to drown out the constant turmoil. It had been her imagination that saved her. Dreaming of the world that lay outside the boundaries of her small tumultuous existence had helped her cope.

Mule Hollow, though she loved it dearly, and though it represented more of a home to her than anything she'd ever known growing up, was still just a stopping point. She would leave it behind when the time was right.

She dreamed of being overseas, writing for one of the five respected magazines or newspapers she'd set her mind on. She knew if she just kept working her plan, she could achieve her dream. Her time was near. She'd garnered some interest and sent out résumés and felt confident her break was about to come.

But she hadn't meant to hurt Bob in the process of making her dreams come true. Sweet, wonderful Bob.

The cowboys at Sam's had probably been horrible.

No wonder he'd been so upset with her. So curt and so unlike himself.

Still. The man had said specifically that he wanted a wife. She hadn't gotten that fact wrong and she hadn't written anything hurtful. Sure, he'd been teased, but would he hold that against her when he found Miss Right?

Molly thought not. Despite her worries, if she helped him find his one true love, Molly felt he would be so happy with her that he'd give her a big ol' kiss for helping him!

Not that the kiss she was thinking he'd be giving her would be anything like the kind he would give Miss Right.

Molly frowned as she stepped off the sidewalk. For a bizarre minute there she'd imagined the other kiss, the one reserved for the woman of his dreams.

The loud roar of an engine interrupted her runaway thoughts. She was grateful for the interruption. Turning around, she watched as a powerful purple-and-chrome motorcycle pulled to a stop in front of the diner. It was an unusually busy day for Mule Hollow. Counting the walk-in at Lacy's, this made three out-of-town visitors today. And it wasn't even the weekend.

That was really peculiar.

But then, what hadn't been strange about the past few days?

B
ob spotted the van before he pulled across the cattle guard on his way into town for more nails. It was parked beside his mailbox. The windows were rolled down and there were little kids hanging out every window. There was a woman standing beside the driver's door waving at him.

Thinking she must be having car trouble, he parked, hopped from the truck and jogged over to offer his assistance.

“Ma'am, can I help you?”

She patted her fluffy orange hair and rubbed her hands down the front of her tight black pants—at least he thought they were pants. They were so snug they could have been skin.

“Hi,
you're
Bob,” she said.

By the way she was blinking, Bob thought maybe something was in one of her eyes. And her voice sounded funny, like maybe she had a cold, all hoarse and deep. And she talked real slow.

“I can
tell
by the dark curls and dimples.” She drawled out the word “tell” with a dramatic Southern accent.

Bob took a step back, wondering how she knew who he was? He hadn't shown her his dimples. They only showed up when he smiled. And he wasn't smiling right now. He couldn't very well deny who he was, even though he had a really bad feeling about what was to come. He tipped his hat to her, it was the mannerly thing to do. “Yes ma'am. I'm Bob. Do I know you?”

She smiled a giant red smile and her eyes went to fluttering like she was about to take flight. He did not know this woman. He'd have remembered something about her if he did. There was plenty to remember, then again maybe he'd forgotten it on purpose.

“Well, you don't know me exactly, but I know you. I've been reading Molly Popp's articles. She
say-ed
you were ready to find a wife. Well, here I am to put my name in the hat.”

Bob felt his toes start tingling. Like a slow boil building in a pan of water, he could feel anger rolling up his body.

“I'm looking for a husband. I know this sounds weird, me showing up like this, but a girl needs to throw caution to the wind when she sees something
spea-cial.
”

He was certain he had misunderstood what the woman was saying. At least, he was hoping he'd misunderstood what the woman had said. But as she leaned toward him, smiling brightly and with what looked like not only a blinking problem, but now a supersonic twitch in her left eye, he bit back a groan. His hearing was perfectly fine and the woman was not afflicted with some bewildering twitching disorder.

She was afflicted with something, though, and it was connected straight to Molly Popp.

Fighting back anger at the bizarre turn his life had taken, he glanced at the kids crammed into the van. They were cute and all looked to be below school age. What was this woman thinking?

“Oh, don't worry about them.” She waved at the kids. “They're not mine. I run a day care over in Ranger. You're our field trip.” She clapped her hands together and gazed up at him as if he was the best thing since the zoo! “Kids,” she hollered shrilly, “say hello to Bob.”

Bob looked from the woman to the kids. What kind of woman was she to bring kids on such a far-fetched quest? At least they were clean and looked happy, waving at him from four different windows.

“Do their parents know—”

“Oh Bob, fun-ny! Certainly they do.” She whacked him on the arm, her eyes doing a jig as she tilted her chin up at him. “Do you think I'd take those babies out without parental consent?” She chuckled and stepped close to him. He stepped back. “It's not like I came here to meet some stranger. I came to meet
you
. And everyone knows what a great guy you are. We've all been following along breathlessly, waiting to see if some lucky girl was gonna come along and capture your heart. And
well,
then Molly wrote that you were really, really wanting a wife. Pining away for one…” She sighed.

One eye was starting to blink faster than the other.

Bob wanted to run, but he wasn't feeling well enough.

She patted his arm again, and he noticed her fingernails were longer than his toes.

“It was actually one of my kid's moms who first suggested that I should just stop all that daydreaming I was doing, since I was the only single gal in the bunch of us, and like Meg Ryan in
Sleepless in Seattle
I should just do it. Go for it—you. She said, and I quote, ‘Jana Diane Cravats, you need to just hop in the van and make that short, little seventy-mile trip out there and see if you and Bob connect.' Of course at first I said no. I couldn't do such a thing. But then everyone started encouragin' me. And so as you can
ver-ify,
here I am.”

She was here all right. Bob took a step back, glancing over his shoulder, estimating the paces between him and his truck. Why had he parked so far away? “I'm sorry, miss. Real sorry. But there's been a terrible mistake.” Spinning, he had taken two strides toward safety when the loopy woman sprang in front of him, thrusting a pink plastic-wrapped package at him.

“Here. I baked you a buttermilk pound cake. I don't want to brag, but I bake the best cakes around.” She forced the cake on him, waving her hand at the purple card taped to the center. “I know this is all kooky. Especially since you're shy and all.” Her eyes started up again. “But, that's my name and phone number inside the card, along with a couple of pictures of me. I wouldn't want you to confuse me with someone else.”

Someone else?
Who else? Bob didn't see that happening in a million years. For Molly's sake, there better not be any others to get this one confused with!

The unmistakable roar of a motorcycle racing down his country road drowned out the rest of Jana Diane's
words. She whirled around to see the motorcycle and almost fell off her shoes.

Stuck holding the pound cake, he gaped as the sparkling machine growled to a halt five feet from him. This did not look good. A woman in leather slowly removed her helmet, loosing a cascade of golden hair to swing free as she slung her fringe-clad leg over the bike and stood up. Watching her stride toward him, Bob got a sick feeling. In her right hand she carried a black paper gift bag with yellow polka dots and yellow fuzzy fur lining the top. With her muscular build and the ominous look of her getup, the bag was about as out of place as it would have been if Arnold Schwarzenegger had been carrying it.

A sinking feeling in his gut, Bob again gauged the distance left between him and his truck.

“Bob baby! I'd recognize you anywhere,” she boomed. And before he could make his move, she launched herself at him—
just took a flying leap straight at him!

 

The buzzer on the oven sounded and not a moment too soon. Molly was starving. Poking her pencil behind her ear, she compared the notes on her yellow legal pad to the copy on her laptop, then pressed the save button, relieved to take a break. She'd forced herself to put words on paper, refusing to give in to the notion that she had writer's block. Determined to prove she could move past worrying about Bob, she'd relaxed her mind with her last-resort nonwriting activity.

Her efforts had paid off and she'd spent the past two hours hunched over the computer typing like a mad-
woman. But, she loved lasagna, and within seconds of the buzzer sounding, she'd slid her mitts on and lifted the spicy dish from the oven. She was about to put the store-bought garlic bread in the oven when someone started pounding on her front door. Glancing at her disaster of a kitchen, she tugged the mitts off and tossed them onto the counter, and hurried to the door. The last time someone had banged on her door like this, Lilly Wells was having her baby downstairs in Miss Adela's living quarters. Molly could still see the sheer terror on Cort Wells's face as he yelled for help. She was at least glad there couldn't be a replay of that night happening—no one she knew of was expecting a baby. Her readers had loved the article she'd written, though. As a matter of fact, she'd freelanced several fun and enlightening magazine pieces from that encounter. It had been a very profitable experience for her.

Swinging the door open now, she was shocked. Bob Jacobs was the last person she expected to see standing there. “Bob,” she gasped, stepping back and reaching for the chain at her neck. The sudden thudding of her heart and the rush of heat to her face was immediate. Willing her nerves to settle back down, she studied him.

He stood with one hand stretched above his head, gripping the doorjamb, his weight leaning heavy on one hip, his other hand in midair about to come down and do more damage to her door. The distraught flash in his eyes wasn't a look she'd ever seen before.

“What's wrong?” she asked, backing up as he stormed inside and kicked the door shut with his boot.

“What's wrong?
What's wrong?!
” he tore his Stetson
off his head, gripping it tightly with both hands. His hair was disheveled and she noticed something red smudged on his cheek. “Do you know that I had people—
women!
—at my house. Kids. Yes kids. She had a van full of them. And cakes. There was cake.”

He was so distraught that he was rambling. His navy eyes were almost black with anger—as they seemed to be a lot lately—and his eyebrows were crinkled together. Even though the man had backed her into a corner, literally, she had the overwhelming urge to smooth the stress right out of those eyebrows.

“What's wrong with you, Molly?”

“Me?” She was afraid to ask.

He halted his pacing and took a step back from her, looking shell-shocked. “You don't even know what you've done, do you?”

His question was quiet, miserable. He blinked and, to her chagrin, she was again caught off guard by how devastatingly good-looking he was. Even distraught. Distraught—the man was upset and she was noticing how handsome he was! What
was
wrong with her?

“Don't smile.”

Was she smiling? How could she be smiling when he was obviously broken up about something?

“There's nothing to smile about,” he growled. “Women are coming to my house bringing me cakes.”

“Excuse me. Say that again please.” All traces of a smile were wiped away with the mention of cakes.

“
Reporters!
You heard me.”

The way he said the word was far from complimentary.

“All reporters care about is getting their stories out.
Who cares about the people who get messed up because of them?”

Molly covered her face with her hand, then rubbed it hard across her eyes. “The woman in the minivan,” she groaned. Looking up, she met his accusing glare. “The one full of kids?”

“Yeah, you saw her?”

She choked on air and dropped her hand back to tug on the chain. “Well, I almost got run over by her. I mean she was obviously in a hurry to see you and she was zooming though town like, well, anyway…she came to your house?”

“Her and her
day care
.”

“You mean those weren't all her kids?”

“Nope.” He rocked back on his boot heels. “I was the field trip. Did you get that? I was the
field trip!
” He glared at her and held up a finger in salute. “
With
parental consent.”

The words were miserable sounding, and he looked angry and befuddled at the same time. And to Molly's shame and surprise she wanted to put her arms around him and comfort him. To push the lock of hair out of his eye…
okay, hold it. You are backed into a corner, he's upset with you and you are thinking about comforting him. Yeah, right. Like he would want you to. Wake up, Molly. The man has a less-than-good attitude when it comes to reporters—especially you!

She snapped out of the daydream, straightening to her full five-eight and squaring her shoulders. “So, she brought you cake.”

His expression shifted to blank disbelief. “And Mo
torcycle Tammy brought me lemon squares, in a fuzzy bag.” He shook his head as if trying to get the picture out of his mind.

The motorcycle! Molly groaned inwardly. “Oh no! I saw her, too. They actually came to your house?” She hadn't ever thought this far in advance. Mule Hollow folks had hosted several functions and invited women to come and participate. As she had, they'd envisioned women moving here and settling. They hadn't envisioned stalkers. Or realized that giving out people's addresses might not be the smartest thing to do. But it was a small town, after all.

“Yeah, they came to my house, or at least my gate. Thankfully they didn't cross the cattle guard like someone I know.”

Nope, in her wildest dreams she hadn't thought the women would come acting crazy. What had she done? So many things ran through Molly's mind. Had she put Bob in jeopardy? Strange women were coming to his house. Cassie was one thing, but Molly had overlooked the seriousness of her actions. “Bob, I promise, I never meant to cause trouble for you.” She laid her palm on his forearm, feeling the sinewy muscles tense beneath her fingers. He inhaled slowly, the cotton of his red shirt stretching across his work-toned chest as he visibly reined in his turmoil.

“Look,” he said at last. “I know you didn't mean anything bad to happen. I've been driving around for the last couple of hours trying to fight off this anger but I couldn't. I even worked on my barn for a while trying not to blow up like this at you. But Molly…”

His troubled gaze dropped to her hand then returned to her face. Silence wedged between them and Molly waited for him to speak again. It was apparent that words were still forthcoming.

“Those women practically got into a fight over me. The motorcycle woman even did a little shaky kind of dance thing so I would remember how well all her fringed parts worked.” His expression was glum. “And
that
was after she launched herself at me like I was an
ice-cream cone
or something. Do you know how hard I had to work to make her turn me loose? The only reason she did was because the day-care lady got jealous and distracted her. I'm telling you, Molly, they're kooks. And the worst part of it is the crazy day-care lady had encouragement from all the mothers of the kids she keeps! Can you believe that?”