Hissy Fit (8 page)

He locked the door and jiggled the knob to make sure it was secure, then took my arm and helped me across the rickety porch floor.

“Change your mind?” he asked.

I sighed. “I never should have agreed to come over here and look at this place. Daddy’s right.”

“About what?”

“Me and old houses. I’m hopeless. A total house voyeur. You know how some people attract stray dogs and cats? I’m that way with old houses. Every old wreck I see, I want to fix up and move into.”

“Including this one?” He was steering me through the meadow, his flashlight fixed on the path we’d previously tromped into the tall grasses.

“It’s going to be wonderful,” I said. “Even if it kills us in the process.”

“Let’s get
one thing straight,” I said, once we were back in the Caddy, tearing down the blacktop toward Daddy’s house. “If we take this job, it won’t be because we’re desperate. Have you got that?”

“Got it,” Will said.

I kept my hands tightly folded in my lap. “Glorious Interiors is one of the top design firms in Georgia,” I continued. “We’ve been published in all the major shelter magazines. Gloria is an adjunct faculty member at the Atlanta Art Institute. Most years we turn away more work than we accept. We’re a small, boutique design firm, and that’s how we like it.”

“Certainly,” Will said, his expression sober. “You don’t have to trot out your credentials for me, you know. I’ve seen your work. You people are the only ones I’ve even considered hiring.”

I waved all that off. “I don’t want you thinking we’ll settle for just any old assignment. And I don’t want you thinking the Jernigans have got me running scared.”

“I think it’s the other way around,” Will said, grinning. “The way I heard it, A.J. left the country rather than face the wrath of Keeley.”

“If we take this job,” I continued, ignoring his reference to A.J., “and that’s a big IF, I have to consult with Gloria. But IF we take this job, I want you to understand how we work.”

He nodded.

“We don’t customarily bill out by the hour. Gloria and I will come up with a proposal for the project at Mulberry Hill. We’ll present a detailed program with schematics and sample boards for each area of the house. If you approve that, we’ll proceed from there.”

More nodding.

I sighed. “A Christmas deadline doesn’t give us any wiggle room.
It severely limits our choices when it comes to any purchases that would be custom ordered. That’s not how we usually work. Not at all. But as long as you understand those limitations, I think there is a possibility that I can change Gloria’s mind, and we can take on Mulberry Hill.”

“Great,” Will said, his face wreathed in smiles. “Perfect. When do we start?”

“Right away,” I said. “Assuming my aunt agrees. Can you meet me back out at the house tomorrow morning? I’ll need a set of the architect’s plans for our files. And then we’ll want to measure everything off, photograph the house for our ‘before’ pictures, and walk the property.”

“Tomorrow? Sorry. There’s no way I can do that tomorrow. I’ve got meetings at the plant all day.”

“What about the day after that? We really have to get started immediately if we’re going to make any headway on this thing.”

“Can’t,” he said. “I’ll be halfway to Sri Lanka by then.”

“Sri Lanka?” I could feel my eyebrows shoot up.

“To look at a place we may contract out to do our stitching.”

“Why wouldn’t you do the stitching right there at the Loving Cup plant? You’ve got sewing machines and all those people there. Half of them aren’t even working full-time.”

He looked away.

“Hey!” I said, alarmed. “You’re not thinking of closing the bra plant, are you? My God, things are bad enough over there. You didn’t buy it up just to close it out, did you? What are you, one of those Wall Street scavengers or something?”

His lips pressed together in a thin white line. “I’m not a Wall Street raider. That’s not the kind of operation I run.”

“What kind of operation do you run?” I asked. “Look. This is a small town. It may look pretty prosperous to you, but there are plenty of people who depend on Loving Cup to make a living. They’ve been hanging on by their toenails, hoping things would get better, that the
assembly line would be geared back up and shifts reinstated. They would hope,” I said, my voice betraying my bitterness, “you were going to do that. They would have thought you were going to save the plant and save their jobs.”

“I am doing my damndest to keep the plant going,” Will said. “But to do that, things have to change radically. We have to make a better product. We have to do it more efficiently, which means some of the manufacturing will have to be done overseas.”

“In sweatshops?” I asked, my voice getting shrill.

“With contract labor,” he said, the pitch of his own voice now barely audible.

“I see.” I opened the passenger door and started to get out.

“You only see what you think you see,” he snapped. “Let’s make a deal, shall we?”

I turned around to face him. “What kind of a deal?”

“You take care of decorating Mulberry Hill, and leave the running of Loving Cup Intimates to me.”

“Fine,” I said. “But remember, this is all subject to my aunt’s approval.”

“Understood. Now. One more thing.”

“Yes?”

“You’ve told me all the reasons you’re not taking this job. You still haven’t told me why.”

The early evening breeze had disappeared without a trace. The air had gotten hot and muggy, and the collar of my shirt was soaked with perspiration. I flipped my hair off my neck and piled it on top of my head, clipping the barrette up high.

“Because it’s impossible,” I said.

“Fair enough.”

“It’s going to cost you,” I warned.

“The best always does. I don’t have a problem with that.”

I looked over at our house and sighed. The front porch light was on, but all the upstairs lights were off. Tomorrow was a workday. I
was fairly sure Daddy was sprawled out in the recliner in his den, asleep in front of the Braves game. It had gotten too dark to ride my bike back to town, and I hated to wake Daddy up to get him to give me a ride.

“There’s something else I need from you,” I said, hating to ask.

“What’s that?”

“A ride back into town.”

He started the Caddy’s engine. “Not a problem.”

The rush of air felt good now. I hung my head back to let the wind whip through my hair.

“You never told me anything about your woman,” I said, suddenly remembering how he’d avoided answering most of my questions about her.

“She’s not really my woman,” he said.

“Yet you want to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars redoing this house for her.”

“For us. And she will be mine. She just doesn’t know it yet.”

I shivered. “That sounds pretty creepy. You’re not stalking her or anything, are you?”

He gave me an annoyed glance.

“Well, what’s her name?”

“Stephanie Scofield.”

“You said she’s a lawyer?”

He nodded.

“How did you meet her?”

“That’s not important.”

I rolled my eyes. “Look. If we’re going to design this house so she’ll fall in love with it—and you—I’ve got to know something about her. Like, what colors does she like? What’s her taste in furniture? Is she a collector, or one of those clutter-buster types? Is she outdoorsy? Does she cook? Like to entertain?”

He scratched his neck. “She’s blond.”

“That’s it? That’s all you can tell me about her? Come on, Will.
You must know more than that. You’re a smart guy. Tell me about her.”

We were on Main Street now, but instead of going straight, toward the studio, Will turned the car into the Minit Mart parking lot.

“I need a beer,” he said abruptly. “You want anything?”

“Right now?” I asked.

“Yeah. It’s hot. I want a beer. Can I get you anything while I’m inside?”

“A bottle of cold water,” I said finally. “No. Make that a beer too. Amstel if they have it.”

He nodded and went inside.

He’d left the motor running, so I turned up the radio and closed my eyes and let my head loll back on the Caddy’s headrest. He’d tuned the radio to a country station, and it was apparently oldies hour because Tammy Wynette was belting out “Stand By Your Man.” It was impossible not to hum along. So there I was, humming with Tammy when a car pulled up in the space next to where we were parked. I glanced over and felt my face start to burn.

A short woman with a blue bandana tied over her hair hopped out of the white Toyota. She had her back turned to me, but even with that scarf I knew the car and I knew that cute little butt in those tight cutoff jeans. I sank down in the seat. I was not in the mood for a confrontation with Paige. Not tonight.

But it was too late. The yellow Caddy was impossible to miss.

She turned to get a closer look. Her blue eyes got very wide. “Keeley?” She started backpedaling, and fast. Guess she wanted to get out of slapping range.

Just then Will came loping out of the Minit Mart with a bottle of beer in each hand. He saw me, he saw Paige. And he didn’t miss a beat. He swung into the driver’s seat, leaned over and kissed me passionately, directly on the lips, forcing his tongue into my mouth.

Startled, I tried briefly to push him away, but he just pulled me closer, almost into his lap.

At last he released his hold. “Miss me, baby?” he asked, giving me a furtive wink. Now I caught on. It was showtime. And Paige was the audience. I nuzzled his neck. “Take me home, lover,” I said loudly.

“Disgusting!” Paige snapped. And she flounced off into the Minit Mart.

He waited until she was inside and then eased me off his lap and the car into reverse.

“Not bad for a small-town girl,” he said, shooting me a glance. “Or did you learn to kiss like that in New York?”

“None of your business,” I said, edging shakily back to my side of the front seat. “Crap! Nobody works the kudzu telegraph like Paige Plummer. It’ll be all over town by the time I get home,” I said. “Keeley Murdock’s got a new man.”

“That bother you?”

I had to think about it. “My reputation’s already shot. I guess this couldn’t make matters any worse. What about you? Won’t it bother you to have people assuming we’re a couple when we’re not?”

“I don’t give a damn,” he said.

“What if your woman hears about me?”

“She won’t.”

“Why not?”

“She doesn’t actually know my name,” he said. “Yet.”

I took a long sip
of beer and considered this new information. “She doesn’t know your name?”

“Not exactly,” he said. “But that’s about to change.”

“This isn’t some Internet dating service thing, is it? Did you meet her on a porn site or something?”

“Get real,” he said, looking annoyed. “There’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for all this.”

“I’d love to hear it,” I said. “How exactly do you know this Stephanie person?”

Will took a swig of his own beer. “About a month ago, I was home watching television. The Braves had a rain delay, and there was nothing else on television. I was channel surfing, and I switched over to APTV—you know, the public television station?”

“This isn’t Hooterville, Will. I know all about public television. I never miss
Antiques Roadshow.
”

“They were having their fund-raising telethon.”

“Lord,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I can’t abide those things.”

“It was that or
The Dukes of Hazzard
,” Will said. “So I started watching. You know, just seeing if they’d reach their fund-raising goal. The program that night was called
BarberShop America!
It was like the Super Bowl of barbershop quartet competitions.”

“Barbershop quartet contests?”

“Live from Indianapolis,” Will said. “Grown men dressed in matching outfits. Women too.”

“And you watched this for how long?”

“I kept switching back to the Braves game, but it was a hell of a storm. The public television folks would show some of the contest, then they’d cut back to the telethon, and they had these deadlines.
You know, we need to raise twenty thousand dollars in the next fifteen minutes, or you’ll never see Masterpiece Theatre again.”

“They can keep Masterpiece Theatre,” I said tartly. “I am so over all that
Upstairs, Downstairs
crap.”

“They had volunteers in the studio, answering the phones and taking people’s pledges,” Will said. “And the cameras would scan the phone banks, and they kept showing this one woman. Her phone never stopped ringing.”

“Let me guess,” I said. “Stephanie.”

“I didn’t know that was her name,” Will said. “At the time.”

“You couldn’t take your eyes off her,” I said, my voice all breathy and girly.

He gave me a look.

“She was wearing some kind of red top,” he said. “Everything around her looked gray and old, and there she was, like a, a…”

“Rose among thorns? Daisy on a pile of cowshit?”

“I called the television station, and when I got through, I told them I wanted to make a hundred-dollar pledge. But the guy who answered was this old guy. So then I called back, and I think I got the woman who was sitting next to her. But I couldn’t just hang up, so I pledged another hundred bucks.”

“Two hundred dollars, and you still couldn’t get her on the line?”

“When I called back the third time, I told the clown who answered the phone that I only wanted to talk to the woman in the red top. He said it was against station policy.

“Then I told him I had a two-thousand-dollar pledge, but I’d only make it to her.”

“So they put you through to Stephanie.”

He nodded his head, smiling at the thought of it.

“That’s when she told me her name. She’s a lawyer. Everybody who was answering the phones that night was a member of some lawyer club or something. And I was watching the television as I was talking
to her, and she smiled when I told her about the two-thousand-dollar pledge. It got to me, you know?”

I took a swig of beer and nodded, trying to look noncommittal, even though this was one of the creepiest stories I’d ever heard.

“She said it was the biggest pledge anybody had gotten all night,” Will said. “And something just came over me. I’m not like this. Not usually.”

I nodded again. I glanced casually over at the door to the shop, and wondered how long it would take me to jump out of the car, run to the door, open it, and lock it behind me. I decided not to make any sudden moves, in case it set him off.

“You think I’m deranged,” Will said.

“Not necessarily,” I lied.

“Don’t you believe in love at first sight?” he asked.

“I fell in love with Jon Bon Jovi when I was thirteen,” I admitted. “But the most I ever did was skip school to go to Atlanta to buy tickets to the concert. And I was thirteen at the time. I mean, don’t you think this is all a little…extreme?”

“I’ve never done anything like this before. Not in my life. Not ever. But sometimes, things just happen. A light goes on in your brain. And it’s flashing ‘She’s the one. She’s the one.’ ”

I laughed. “With Bon Jovi, it was more like my brain was flashing ‘OMIGOD. He is so hot. He is so hot!’ ”

“But you skipped school to buy the concert tickets. That was pretty extreme for a little kid,” he said.

“I guess.”

“What about A.J.?” he asked. “How did your relationship with him evolve?”

“That’s totally different,” I said. “I’d known A.J. forever.”

“And one day you just decided to date?”

“I don’t care to discuss A. J. Jernigan with you,” I said, trying to sound aloof. I was damned if I was going to disclose the drapery seduction scene to Will Mahoney. Not that it was in any
way comparable to this loony crush he had on a woman he’d never met.

“Doesn’t matter,” Will said. He took the last sip of beer and tossed the empty bottle in the backseat. “She is the one. I’m not insane. We have a date next week. And if all goes as planned, there will be an engagement by Thanksgiving.”

I threw my bottle in the backseat alongside his. The two bottles clinked companionably.

“You really are insane,” I told him. “I’d be shirking my professional duty as a licensed interior designer if I didn’t tell you so. But tell me something. How in the hell did you get a date with this woman if she doesn’t know your name?”

“Very simple,” he said. “I called the station’s director of development. Told him I’d already pledged twenty-five hundred dollars for the current fund drive, and that I’d round that amount off to an even five thousand if he’d arrange an introduction to one of his volunteers. And then we talked. We’re having dinner next Wednesday night at Bones.”

“Isn’t that called pimping?”

“It’s called good business,” Will said.

“What if you hate her?” I asked. “What if she has hairy knuckles and thick ankles and halitosis and VPL?”

“She’s perfect,” he insisted. “And what’s VPL?”

“Visible panty line,” I said. “You’d think somebody in the intimate business would know about something like that.”

“I’m new to intimates,” he said. “But I’m a very quick learner.”

“It’s your money,” I said finally. “And it’s a free country. But think about all you’ll be out if this plan of yours bombs. You’ve bought an old house, and already spent like twenty-five hundred bucks. And for what? If she thinks you’re a creep, or if she already has a boyfriend or something, you’re busted. All that effort, and you got nothing.”

“That’s not really true,” Will said. “I’ll still have the house, which I intend to restore. And think about all that other stuff.”

“What other stuff?”

“All the loot I got for supporting public television. A tote bag, the
BarberShop America!
four-CD compilation. The official
BarberShop America Live!
DVD. And don’t forget the stainless steel
BarberShop America!
travel coffee mug.”

“Wow. What a bonanza.”

He turned to face me, and stuck out his hand. “We’ve got a deal, though. Right?”

I shook. “Sure. I guess your money spends as good as anybody else’s. And the house has wonderful potential. It’ll look great in our portfolio.”

He handed me a business card. “You can reach me at the office in the morning. Just tell me what time you want to meet the architect over at the house, and I’ll set it all up. Anything else you need in the meantime?”

“Don’t guess so,” I said, opening the car door.

“I’ll be back in town on Monday,” he said. “Can you have something ready for me by then?”

“A bill,” I said. “For our first consultation.”

“Fine,” he said. “Bring along your proposal too.”

He tooted the horn as he drove off in the yellow Caddy.

My mind was a whirl of details as I unlocked the studio door. It wasn’t until I was inside, with the door locked behind me that I noticed all the lights were on. The air in the room smelled different. Flowery.

A huge bouquet of lilacs sat in the middle of my desk. And sitting in the chair behind my desk was a tall, elegant man dressed in a black and cream paisley satin dressing gown. His bald head shone in the overhead light.

“Austin!” I cried. “You nearly scared me to death. What are you doing in here this time of night?”

“Slumming,” he said lightly. “But let’s get down to details, Keeley Rae. Who was that divine hunk of manhood in the yellow pimpmobile
out there? And what were you doing swapping spit with him in the parking lot at the Minit Mart?”

“Paige called you?”

“Don’t be absurd. Paige knows how thick we are. She called her mama. Her mama called Janice Biggers. Janice called A.J.’s cousin Mookie. And Mookie called me.”

“In the space of ten minutes.”

He gave me a broad wink. “Actually, it was more like five. I had to cut the lilacs and make myself presentable. So here I am. Now dish!”