Impossible Dreams (46 page)

“The psychiatrist has declared Katherine competent to
stand trial,” Selene declared without prelude. “The lawyer will
probably plead temporary insanity.”

Axell was aware of Maya watching him with sympathy. Him.
Katherine was a distant cousin of Maya’s, had hired an arsonist and tried
to destroy Maya’s school, and Maya was looking at
him
with
sympathy.

He shook his head in disbelief and chucked her chin.
“Don’t look at me that way, honey. I didn’t encourage her
obsession any more than Ralph did. The lawyer’s right, she was
delusional.” He didn’t mention that the Pfeiffer side of the family
seemed to have more than its fair share of quirks.

He chuckled as he looked down at the currently crimson
streak in Maya’s hair. It contrasted nicely with turquoise eyes and a
pink flowered dress that only Maya could make sexy. And he’d thought Maya
was delusional. He shook his head all over again.

“She was your
friend
,” Maya reminded him.
“She probably thought she was saving you from my clutches.”

“Or making Ralph so happy he’d marry her,”
Selene replied dryly. “Which makes her truly delusional. Ralph will never
marry anyone his mama doesn’t approve of, and so long as he’s
taking care of her, his mama will never approve.”

“Want me to put a contract out on his mama?”
Cleo asked cynically. “Where are the twin disasters today anyway? I
thought they’d be leading a protest march down Main Street against
allowing riffraff into their community.”

Axell grinned. “Mrs. Arnold and Sandra have gone up to
Cherokee to break the bank at the casino. I think they’re planning on
buying the town back with Indian money.”

Beside him, Maya snorted. “They’re looking for
men,” she countered. “I wish them well of any they find up
there.”

Axell raised his eyebrows at the idea of his former
mother-in-law picking up strangers, but the speculative look on Selene’s
face caught his eye. He’d wager Selene’s father would be
introducing a wealthy, unattached banker to Mayor Arnold’s mother before
week’s end.

The high-pitched whine of an electric guitar screamed
through an amplifier, rattling the windows. For a minute, Axell thought the
sound system had gone berserk. Then he remembered, and groaned. Stephen.

“Don’t look that way,” Maya reprimanded,
hurrying toward the front door. “The advance sales on his School-Aid
concert have brought in twice the scholarship money we’d hoped to have.
We may not even have to mortgage the property to rebuild the school. So come
outside and be polite.”

The mayor had closed off all the streets around the school
for the concert and ribbon-cutting ceremony. Crowds already poured through the
early-September morning, carrying lawn chairs and coolers, elbowing for the
shady seats beneath the spreading oaks, greeting friends and neighbors, seeing
and being seen. It was the next best thing to a three-ring circus, Axell
decided, and grinned. Maya had finally succeeded in turning the town into a
circus.

His restaurant and Cleo’s shop would be doing a
booming business. He wasn’t about to complain.

“Hey, Cuz!” Ralph Arnold emerged from the
business-suited knot of men near the stage to wrap an arm around Maya’s
shoulders. “Gonna save a dance for me?”

Grabbing the mayor’s necktie, Selene hauled him
sideways and branded his cheek with her lipstick. Ralph flushed, hurriedly
removed his arm from Maya, and with an embarrassed grin, wrapped it around
Selene’s waist and kissed her cheek. Ralph would damned well ruin his
career in politics with Selene at his side, but he’d be one wealthy
former mayor. Who was he to stand in the way of true love and improbable
matches? Maybe Maya ought to hand Ralph her granddaddy’s journal for a
lesson in life and love.

Proudly, Axell watched as Maya swam through the crowd,
hugging all and sundry, mother and child alike. She was practically walking on
air, and her happiness bubbled through him with a joy he’d never quite
known. She’d unlocked something inside him that allowed the sun to shine
in and the music to ring as it never had before. The entire street had become
one of her kaleidoscopes, swirling with colors and shapes, but this
kaleidoscope had sound too — the sound of laughter and love and music.

“Got you by the balls, doesn’t she?”
Headley asked dryly, coming up behind him.

“Among other things.” Axell didn’t take
offense. Headley was a lonely old man. He wouldn’t understand.

He watched as Stephen helped Constance onto the stage.
Constance had been bubbling with excitement for weeks. She was becoming the
outgoing child he’d never been.

“I hear the shopping center project is back on.”

Axell shrugged, brought back to the moment. “Maya and
Cleo sold the developer a right of way through the field down the road in
exchange for an access road through the back of the property so they
don’t have to worry about floods anymore. The Garden Club is overseeing
the removal of any plants in the way of construction. Maya has a way of working
things out.”

Maya had a way of making impossible dreams happen. If only
more people would ignore the word “impossible,” mankind could visit
Mars and Jupiter, abolish prejudice and poverty, and create Utopia. He’d
settle for the sunshine of her love.

“Yeah.” Headley sighed in contentment as Maya
swam back in their direction, her smile a brilliant sunbeam as she spotted
them. “Maybe she should run for mayor.”

“Over my dead body,” Axell declared boldly,
reaching for his flashy wife and dragging her close.

Tipping her head back, she gazed at him through dangerously
long lashes. “Is Cleo putting out a contract on your body?” she
asked laughingly, wrapping her arms around his waist without an ounce of
shyness. “I’ll take care of her.”

And Axell realized with the freedom of love, that she would,
that she would take care of him and his daughter and everyone around her, and
would make a damned good mayor should she ever put her scattered mind to it. He
didn’t have to do it all himself any longer.

He hugged her tight against him and whispered against her
hair. “You take care of everyone else. I’ll take care of you. Fair
enough?”

“Yeah.” She snuggled blissfully against him as
Stephen’s band, with Constance in accompaniment, roared into a rousing
rendition of an electronic “
Carolina
On My Mind,”
and
the crowd cheered wildly.

With several million books in print and
New York Times
and
USA Today’s
bestseller lists under her belt, former CPA Patricia Rice is one of
romance’ss hottest authors. Her emotionally-charged contemporary and
historical romances have won numerous awards, including the
RT Book Reviews
Reviewers
Choice and Career Achievement Awards. Her books have been honored as
Romance Writers of America RITA® finalists in the historical, regency
and contemporary categories.

A firm believer in happily-ever-after, Patricia Rice is
married to her high school sweetheart and has two children. A native of
Kentucky and New York, a past resident of North Carolina, she currently
resides in St. Louis, Missouri, and now does accounting only for
herself. She is a member of Romance Writers of America, the Authors
Guild, and Novelists, Inc.

For further information, visit Patricia’s network:

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Book View Café Bookshelf

Impossible Dreams

A Prequel to The Carolina Series

Patricia Rice

Book View Café edition December 2011

ISBN: 978-1-61138-130-6

Copyright © 2000 Patricia Rice

All the characters in this book have no existence
outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone
bearing the same name or names. They are not inspired by any person known or
unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

All Rights Reserved, including the right to reproduce
this book or portions thereof in any form.

Originally published by Ivy Books, The Ballantine
Publishing Group

The Carolina Series

Impossible Dreams
Almost Perfect
McCloud’s Woman
Carolina Girl

v20120518vnm
v20120519vnm

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Almost Perfect

The Carolina Series, Book One

Patricia Rice