Impossible Dreams (23 page)

“You’ll need your fighting gear in shape,
though, if you’re planning on running for office with a woman like Maya
as wife. She’ll have every old biddy in town clucking with disapproval.
The Garden Club will probably repossess your front lawn.”

“Maya would just make a duck pond of the
remains.” Axell grabbed a bottle of mineral water, contemplated ripping
the cap off with his teeth, but giving it a vicious twist instead. His father
hadn’t been any better with women and kids than he was. The old man had
worked eighteen-hour days and expected his son to do the same. Axell had once
thought his mother had died of loneliness.

“Women!” he growled in frustration, throwing
back a gulp of water. “Why the devil am I doing this to myself?”

“Because you need a challenge?” Headley asked
dryly.

That could very well be. Axell slumped on a barstool. Some
men climbed the Himalayas. Others sailed around the world in forty-foot boats.
Axell Holm married purple-haired gypsies. It made some kind of crazy sense.
What else would one do in Wadeville, North Carolina for a challenge?

“All right, Headley, if I’m gonna do this,
you’re gonna help me.” Axell slammed the bottle down decisively.
“Dig out the dirt on that new shopping development. Our mealy-mouthed
mayor is up to his ass in it somehow. Two can play at this game.”

“Not if one plays fair and the other
doesn’t,” Headley warned. “Politics is an evil business and
you’re going to get your hands burned before this is all over.”

Axell glared at the reporter. “Who said I’m
playing fair?”

Headley grinned. “That’s right. You’ve got
our own Miss Alyssum on your side. That’s definitely stacking the
deck.”

He walked out, cackling. Axell took another swig of his
water. Maya wasn’t capable of stacking decks. That would take planning.
Maya would simply knock the whole card pile on the floor, kick it under the
counter, and bring out her tarot deck.

For some idiot reason, that turned him on so fiercely, he
had to swing around and face the bar to hide his arousal.

Damn, but he hoped he wasn’t thinking with the part in
his pants instead of his head. He’d been down that road before, and it
was a dead end. He’d damned well better be certain of what he was doing
before he did it this time.

***

“You’re marrying Axell Holm!” Selene
repeated, probably for about the third or fourth time, Maya figured.
“You’re going to live in that brick yuppie house in the middle of
yuppie burbs and tool around in a Beamer? You’re a cop-out, Maya Alyssum,
a real cop-out. I can’t believe you’re doing this!”

Glumly, Maya couldn’t believe she was doing it
either — hadn’t even realized she’d decided to do it — but the news was
all over town. All the parents dropping their kids off at school this afternoon
had made it a point to personally stop by the office and congratulate her.

“Well, I probably won’t be driving the Beamer
after Axell finds out I came back here,” she admitted, leaning over to
check that Alexa was still sleeping quietly in a curled up little ball.
“After we dropped off the kids and went back to town, he gave me the keys
so I could go home and nap.” Home. She couldn’t believe she’d
said that. That mansion in the country, home? No way.

Selene wrapped her fingers in her glossy long braids and
yanked. “Listen to you! You’ll be going to garden parties and PTA
meetings and doing lunch with the mayor’s mother.” She stopped and
thought about that. “Maybe that won’t be half bad...”

“Get your head right down off that cloud now,”
Maya warned. “I don’t do parties and lunches. My place is here with
these kids, and don’t you forget it. This school is my dream. We’re
going to go full time, sell our concept to banks and factories in a few years,
take it nationwide after that. Kids deserve love and attention and can learn a
damned sight more than teachers have time to teach in school, and I’m
going to see they get every opportunity. If I have to marry Axell Holm to get it,
then I’ll marry him.”

Selene collapsed in the desk chair and stared at her
shrewdly. “You’re not marrying him to keep this school. I can keep
this school together. This is my vision too, and I’m not about to let
those kids down. Maybe if I’d had a teacher like you, I’d have
stayed in school.” She narrowed her eyes. “You’re marrying
him because of Alexa, and Matty, and probably Constance. You’ve got shit
for brains, girl.”

“Well, no one ever said I was the brightest bulb in
the chandelier.” Maya tucked the blanket more firmly around Alexa’s
feet. “Old Man Pfeiffer stopped by the shop this morning. He said he knew
my grandmother and Cleo. Do you know anything about that?”

“Why the hell would I know what the old goat knows?
Everyone says he went crazy as a coot after his wife died.” She frowned
at her own thoughts. “If old Mayor Arnold knew what a good deal we got on
this lease, he’d have the heirs claiming Pfeiffer insane. The mayor sure
is pretty, but he’s got more devious brains than I do.”

Maya worried at a loose strand of her hair. “Mr.
Pfeiffer said something about his nephew on the transportation board being part
of our road problem out here.”

Selene jotted a note. “I’ll look into it. I
didn’t know there was a Pfeiffer on the board, but it could be his wife’s
side.”

Satisfied she wouldn’t get any more from Selene, Maya
lifted the infant seat and headed for the door. She could hear the shouts of
the children enjoying story time in the schoolroom. The substitute teacher was
working out just fine. Maybe they could hire her full time for the summer
session.

She felt guilty leaving Constance and Matty in the
substitute’s hands, but despite her brave words, she did need the rest.
And she probably ought to stop by a grocery store. She couldn’t feed the
kids bean soup every night as if they were living on food stamps.

Or maybe she could. She still didn’t have any money.

Maya bounced her forehead off the steering wheel as she
cursed her helplessness. She was driving a damned BMW, living in a mansion, and
she still didn’t have enough money in her pocket to buy beans.

She was very definitely not cut out for this life.

***

Axell entered the house through the garage door carrying
plastic sacks of groceries, and almost smiled at the sonorous chanting of monks
blaring through his expensive sound system. No one had played the damned stereo
in months, maybe years. He wasn’t even certain he remembered how it
worked. Leave it to Maya to figure it out.

His smile slipped as he entered the empty kitchen. He
didn’t expect supper on the table. Maya had called with the grocery list
so he knew she didn’t have anything to prepare. He’d just expected
the kids or the cat or something to be in here to greet him.

All right, so he wasn’t the center of anyone’s
universe. Leaving the groceries on the table, he wandered into the family room,
but they hadn’t even turned the lights on. If Maya wasn’t in the
kitchen or family room, was she still in bed? He’d never seen her so much
as glance in any other room of the house.

With a shiver of trepidation, Axell turned down the hall in
the direction of Maya’s bedroom. Maybe the kids were playing in their
rooms. He didn’t think Matty had slept in the one he’d been
assigned yet, but his toys were beginning to gather in there. The blare of the
speakers prevented Axell from hearing the direction of any voices.

A panicky shriek pierced the monks’ calm intonations,
and Axell broke into a run.

He didn’t have to run far. He skidded to a halt
outside the formal dining room. The once formal dining room.

He counted heads first. The apparent source of the shriek
was Constance, who must have dropped a jar of paint on the plastic sheeting
covering the wall-to-wall carpet. Matty watched her in wide-eyed horror. Even
Baby Alexa appeared to be awake and following the action. Calming his pounding
heart, Axell reluctantly dragged his gaze to Maya — his intended wife.

Garbed in loose blue-jean overalls over a bright orange
T-shirt, she bent to kiss Constance’s head and hug her as she climbed
down from her precarious perch on a stool dragged in from the kitchen. The
green paint had apparently hit the overalls as much as the sheeting, or Maya
had been painting her clothes again.

She was supposed to be resting. Axell’s gaze traveled
over the rest of the explosion of chaos that had once been his elegant dining
room. The heavy formal draperies lay in crumpled heaps across the center of the
polished mahogany table. Sunshine flooded the room through the bay windows and
the French doors leading onto the deck, reflecting off the crystal of the
chandelier and illuminating the cut glass in the display case without need of
electricity. His gaze returned to the window. The once neutral ivory wall was
now grass green, with what appeared to be a white trellis with purple flowering
vines spilling across the green. A lionlike creature crouched in an emerald
jungle in the corner.

“This time, it’s deliberate, isn’t
it?” he asked evenly, finally stepping into the room.

Constance shrieked again. From utter silence to shrieks.
Maybe he should have been grateful for what he had. As Muldoon purred and
wrapped cat hair around his ankles, Axell tried to temper his reaction.
He’d promised the house would be hers. Could he live with the result?

Maya tapped his daughter on the head to hush her, then
turned her brilliant smile in his direction. Axell felt as if she’d swept
his feet out from under him. For a smile like that, he’d
live
in
her damned jungle.

“Well, most of it was deliberate,” she admitted.
“These are the only colors I could find at the school. I’ve got
goop that will take any paint off the carpet, but most of it’s on the
plastic. What do you think?” She gestured at the rampant vine encaging
the lion.

“I’m thinking the draperies will hide it.”
What was he supposed to say? He figured she expected something, but he’d
be damned if he knew what it was. The room had looked fine the way it was. No
one ever used it. He gave dinners at the restaurant, where the staff could
prepare them. Angela had hated cooking.

Maya aimed her paintbrush at his nose but didn’t close
in for the kill. “You’re supposed to say it makes the room a
hundred percent more cheerful. I’ll send the draperies out for cleaning,
but I don’t see any reason to hang them again. It could be a wonderful
room with all this sunlight.”

Grateful she hadn’t chosen enormous red dragons for
ornamentation, Axell eyed the huge windows skeptically. “You won’t
have any privacy.”

Maya dropped her brush in the paint can ,and wiping her
hands off on her overalls, crossed the room and looked up at him. He’d
known she wasn’t large, but without her big belly in front of her, she
was almost delicate. Still, her head reached past his shoulders, and she
wasn’t afraid to tap his jaw with her long fingers. He liked the contact
with those long, slender-paint-splattered-fingers.

“You have an acre of lawn and a field of trees out
there. How much privacy do you need? Lighten up, Holm. You’ve got kids
who will want to play out in that enormous yard. Do you want to watch them
play, or eat by candlelight? Or are we changing our minds?” she asked
tauntingly.

Her voice shivered up and down his spine as much as her
touch. He saw the challenge in her turquoise eyes, and he glared back.
“That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? You’re
pushing the boundaries, seeing how far you can go before I break.”

Axell’s composure snapped as Maya’s long lashes
blinked in disconcertion. The day had been long and frustrating. He deserved a
little compensation for his patience. Digging his hands into the wild tangle of
Maya’s curls, Axell cupped her head and prevented her from looking away.
The power of that touch torched a wildfire in his blood, but for the sake of
the children, he corralled it.

“I’m not breaking, Maya Alyssum,” he
whispered so the kids couldn’t hear. “Paint posies on the ceiling
if you like. Fly kites from the roof. But two months from now, I’ll have
you in my bed. Want to redecorate it first?”

And then he did what he’d been longing do since the
last time. He kissed her.

***

December, 1945

Helen sent me a frightening letter today. I think she must have
been in her cups when she sent it, but I’ve never seen her drink enough
to say such things. I’m worried about her. I need to get her away from
that bar and her evil companions. If we married, I could support her, but not
in the style of the Arnolds, or even in the style in which she lives now. The
old man has promised me a management position, but I’d be lucky to have a
job if I marry Helen. I could look elsewhere, but without the backing of a
wealthy family, I’d be fortunate to earn as much as Helen’s
bartender. She’d hate me for taking her away from the bright lights and
music.

I’ll hate myself if I don’t.

Mind like a steel trap — rusty and illegal in 37 states

The house was dark when Axell drove into the garage. Even
for a Friday night, he was unusually late. Katherine’s resignation
hadn’t helped. He’d had to handle host duties while hastily
training one of the waitresses for the job. He didn’t know what
he’d do for an assistant manager. Hire a man, he figured glumly. Women
were too unpredictable.

He veered toward the family room to turn off the table lamp
and paused at the sight of Maya curled up on the couch, wrapped in the throw as
usual, her hair spilling over the edges like part of the tapestry. Axell
thought her asleep until he entered the room, and she stared up at him with
wide, fathomless eyes. It was those eyes that had held him captive from the
first. Like the ocean, they held mysteries that would take a lifetime to
explore.

“Can’t sleep?” he asked warily. With Maya,
he knew better than to expect a simple explanation.