Sweet Justice (7 page)

“Well!” The smile in Ma's voice was unmistakable. “Katelyn! How nice to see you again! And you're driving? That's good! Maegan will be so proud of you.”

Mallory spun slowly back toward Ma, then swung to take in Katelyn's grin. The pieces clicked into place.

This was
Ma
. Ma Monroe—Collette? Colleen? Andrew's mother. The woman who had sent her fried chicken and blankets and pillows.

A paranoid thought pulsed through her head: Colleen Monroe had never set foot in this shop before today. And Andrew had “happened” to drop by last night with a pizza.

Were they trying to charm her into dropping the lawsuit?

She scrutinized Ma's face as Katelyn jabbered away. No, the woman looked genuinely surprised to see Katelyn here. It was a small town, and most definitely high fashion wasn't Ma's cup of tea, so maybe it wasn't so unusual that she had never been in here before.

“Wait, is this your sister? Mallory?” Ma turned back to her. “Now, why on earth didn't you tell me that?”

“Well—I—”

“Because,” DeeDee interjected gently. “You didn't properly introduce yourself, Ma. You used that old, ‘Just call me Ma, 'cause everyone else does.'”

“So I did. Now you really know who I am.”

“I—I—” Mallory stumbled over her awkwardness. “That fried chicken you sent, and those blankets—it was a wonderful kindness.”

Ma laid a hand on Mallory's arm. “And you sent such a sweet thank-you note care of the fire department. People don't bother to write thank-you notes anymore. It made my day, it did.”

A pang of guilt coursed through Mallory. She'd written that thank-you note with gritted teeth, carefully packing it up with the cooler, as well as the blankets and pillows that she'd used her not-so-spare change to dry-clean. The shipping cost had been exorbitant in light of her scant funds, but she hadn't wanted to keep a thing of Andrew Monroe's.

“Gracious! Ma!” DeeDee had glanced at her watch. “I've got to go pick up the kids from school!” She shot an apologetic smile toward Mallory. “Can we finish this later? I think Ma's on the right track with this dress, but I have to go, and we're all in the same car.”

“Sure,” Mallory said uncertainly. “I'll be glad to—”

“Why not bring some of those brochures tonight and have supper with us?” Ma suggested. “I'll look over those pictures and DeeDee and Cara can argue all they want about sequins, plus Kimberly's coming in tonight, so we can ask her how fancy I need to be. I believe I'll be able to think better when I'm home and not amidst all this frippery. That's just the ticket, right?” She laid her palm against Katelyn's thin cheek. “You could do with some fattening up, child, especially the way Maegan will work you. Say, about 6:00? Now, it's plain fixin's, nothing fancy.”

“Oh, no—” A feeling of being swallowed up by all things Monroe swept over Mallory. She even found herself taking a step back.

Katelyn interrupted. “Sure! That sounds cool! We can hang out after my therapy session with Maegan, because it will get over about 5:30.”

“You come right on down to the farm when you get finished, and I'll put you to work.” Ma patted Katelyn's cheek again, and the tenderness of it reminded Mallory of how Mom used to touch her own cheek.

No. She would not, out of stubborn pride, deprive Katelyn of any mothering she could get. Not even if it meant possibly bumping into the here-again, gone-again Andrew Monroe.

CHAPTER EIGHT

I
F
M
ALLORY
HAD
thought she'd been swallowed by all things Monroe earlier, she hadn't even been close. The house was full to bursting with dark-haired men and honey-haired women and boisterous children stair-stepping from diapers to teens.

It also smelled divinely of fragrant steak and gravy. These people believed in eating: on the counters, they were preparing mountains of mashed potatoes, rivers of onion gravy, platters of golden biscuits, bowlfuls of green beans. Mallory's stomach, pinched and cranky from the inadequate PB&J, quivered in anticipatory delight at such a feast.

Her appetite convinced her to stay put while her feet wanted to run. She'd never been good in big gatherings of people—large families weren't her forte.

Now Katelyn on the other hand...

Katelyn had settled into the fray as though she belonged with the Monroes. She sat at one end of the kitchen table, chopping vegetables for a salad alongside two girls about five years younger than her. She laughed and joked with them and with every other Monroe that seemed to wander through the house every five minutes. There wasn't a shy bone in her body tonight, no sullen withdrawn quietness, no bashfulness about her wheelchair.

No, it was Mallory who was bashful.

She managed to wedge herself into a relatively quiet corner by the window where she could observe the family from a distance. There was the big tall jokester—Rob—and he seemed to be connected to a blond named Kari, who was decorating a cake. And Daniel—a tad shorter than Rob, despite being older—was kind of serious, but she could see the longer he stayed, the more relaxed he became.

Andrew, though... He was nowhere to be seen.

Admit it
, Mallory said to herself.
You're disappointed.

Kimberly, Daniel's fiancée, wriggled into the corner beside her. “You hiding out?” she asked Mallory.

“Just staying out of the way. We're kind of packed in here, don't you think?” Mallory swept a hand toward the crowded kitchen.

“The Monroes can be a little overwhelming at first. I was sure gob-smacked by them,” Kimberly admitted.

“Are they always...” Mallory trailed off, not sure exactly what she meant to ask.

Kimberly laughed. She nodded. “Yep. Always just like this. Any excuse whatsoever to get together, to make a party out of things. You should have been down here in October—they had a cane grinding and all the homemade cane syrup you could eat.”

Mallory's stomach went from pleasantly hungry to tight and tense at the mention of October. October had found her not at a frolic of cane grinding, whatever that was, but in a burn unit's waiting room, praying that Katelyn would survive.

And all because Andrew had left Katelyn trapped in that fire.

The noise and laughter filling the room must have covered up Mallory's reaction, or maybe something else distracted Kimberly. Thankfully, the woman detached herself and left Mallory alone to watch the rest of the crowd.

As if her thoughts had conjured him up, Andrew came strolling in the back door, along with a wake of cold air from the darkening winter outdoors.

Katelyn looked up from her carrot chopping. “Howdy, stranger! Where have you been?”

“Well, someone had to get the horses all in for the night. I noticed you didn't offer to help. No, you hightailed it up from the therapy center for Ma's toasty kitchen,” Andrew teased. He squeezed past Katelyn's wheelchair at the end of the table to hang up a set of keys on a hook.

“Hey, buddy, I'm a paying customer at this here dude ranch,” Katelyn protested. She reached up and punched him on the arm as he slid by again.

Andrew tweaked Katelyn's hair like he would a kid's. “The old dudette ploy, huh? Hang around here much longer, and you'll turn into an honorary Monroe, and then we'll see if you can get away with that.”

They bantered back and forth a few minutes longer. Mallory was relieved to see that there was nothing remotely romantic about their interaction—Andrew could have been bedeviling a pesky kid sister. Katelyn, who went all breathy and silly and brainless when one of her crushes ever entered her sphere, didn't show any telltale signs of infatuation.

And that's why you're watching for that, right?
Mallory tried to convince herself.

Just then, a toddler, barely steady on her feet, wrapped her arms around Andrew's legs. “Horsey!” she insisted. “Horsey!”

Andrew swung the curly-haired tot up onto his shoulders and galloped around the room, evoking squeals of delight from his rider. His spirited jouncing took him careening into Mallory's hideout by the window. He bumped into her, realized it was her and, his face flaming, pulled up short. He set the toddler down gently on her feet.

“Horsey's all tuckered out, now, sweetie. Go find Uncle Daniel and see if he'll give you a ride.”

Off she went, undeterred by all the people and chairs in her way.

“Well, I guess I've made a pluperfect fool of myself,” Andrew muttered as he settled alongside her on the wide window ledge Mallory had pressed into service as a seat. “I'm not—well, I don't usually gallop around like—”

A part of her couldn't bear to let him wiggle on the hook of embarrassment. “I thought it was sweet,” Mallory told him. “I remember my dad doing that for me and Katelyn.”

Some of the tension went out of him then, and he propped an ankle across the other knee, his denim-covered leg nearly brushing Mallory's thigh. His close proximity fueled a confusing flutter of heartbeats, and she found herself scooting over to give him—and herself—more room. Just as she did, she upended a potted plant that was the rightful possessor of the window ledge.

She grabbed for it, missed. She expected the ceramic pot to crash into smithereens on the floor, but Andrew caught it, his strong forearms brushing across her lap. He had the plant by the tips of his fingers.

“Wow—I thought it was a goner for sure—” Mallory reached to rescue the plant, her fingers intertwining with his.

“Ma's African violet has managed to survive us and a whole new crop of grandkids. Couldn't let it go down for the count.”

“Hey,” Rob hollered, and to her chagrin, Mallory realized the room had fallen silent and everyone was focused on them. “You two lovebirds! If you'll quit playing Twister over there, it's time to eat.”

Daniel seemed especially intent, as if weighing both Mallory's and Andrew's actions. He dipped his chin down, raised a pointed brow at Andrew. Mallory knew a telegraphed message when she saw one—hadn't she done much the same to a recalcitrant Katelyn on more than one occasion?

She felt her face awash with heat and color and tugged at the African violet. “I've got this,” she insisted.

Andrew let go of the plant, stood up. His mouth, formerly smiling and relaxed, now set in a straight, ungiving line, with no trace at all of the dimples she'd seen just two seconds earlier. “Y'all go ahead,” he said to his older brother. “I need to wash up.”

And with that, he peeled off for the hall as though being spotted with her was something shameful. No backward glance, no apologies, not so much as an “excuse me.”

The rest of the crowd still seemed to focus on her with intense interest—unlike Andrew, who'd shot off like a cannon.

To cover her embarrassment, she turned, righted the plant on the ledge and brushed off her hands.

Daniel the fire chief is warning Andrew off
, she thought, disappointed in spite of herself. Now, why did she feel the need to have the Monroes like her?

That—especially with the lawsuit that Chad might be filing—was a weakness she couldn't afford.

* * *

I
N
THE
HALF
bath off the kitchen, Andrew splashed water on his face and rubbed it briskly with a towel. He leaned against the sink, his hands planted on either side of the countertop, and stared into his reflection.

Was he trying to prove he was an idiot? Dutch had told him to keep his distance from Mallory, to not tangle up the Blairs any more than he could help into his affairs.

And here he was...

He'd crashed into her not once, but twice, close enough to kiss her. If he'd wanted.

What red-blooded man wouldn't?

Except for the clear signs that she wanted nothing to do with him—hadn't she looked down her nose at his high jinks with his niece Cassie? Sure, she'd mumbled something about how sweet it had looked, but that was manners.

And manners Mallory Blair had in spades. He still remembered the prim thank-you note she'd sent to Ma along with all the stuff he'd taken to her that night in the hospital—complete with dry-cleaning tags still attached to the blanket and pillow.

Andrew shook his head to clear it. He had a weakness for cover-girl beauties like Mallory, and even if she wasn't contemplating a lawsuit like Dutch feared, he needed to steer clear of her kind.

Although, that was hard, with her joining them for supper. Still...not impossible to keep his distance. He was glad it was a full house tonight, where usually it was only Maegan and Ma, with him coming up to join them from his apartment over the stables.

Back in the dining room, he realized with a sinking heart that the only spot left around the crowded table was by Mallory. No way to switch without attracting more attention, so he squeezed in and began to fill his plate.

“You missed grace,” Ma pointed out. “You did say go ahead.”

“I did,” Andrew agreed, shoveling a little too many mashed potatoes on his plate.

“Ma, this is so good! Wow!” Katelyn said. “We haven't eaten like this in... How long has it been since we've had meat, Mal?”

“You're a vegetarian?” he asked Mallory. That might explain why she was pushing around the food on her plate...but it didn't explain the healthy dent she'd put into her own smothered cube steak and gravy.

The glance she shot Katelyn was pointed and freighted with hidden meaning. “Uh, no. It's just—well, you don't need much meat, now do you? And it's awfully expensive.”

Katelyn bristled under Mallory's subtle telegraphed message. She rolled her eyes. “Oh, yeah. Why buy meat when you can buy shoes, huh, Mal?”

Shoes? A sudden memory of a big box labeled Mallory's Shoes filled Andrew's mind's eye. The kid was bone thin and getting over a horrible accident, and Mallory put more value in buying
shoes
than putting a decent meal on the table?

Mallory ducked her head and mumbled something, then lifted her chin. “This is wonderful. I'd love the recipe, Ma.”

“Oh, me, it's nothing fancy.” She began rattling off the ingredients. Thankfully, this seemed to kick the conversation back to easier territory.

Andrew concentrated on eating his meal as quickly as possible so that he could make his excuses. He allowed the conversation to wash over him, trying hard not to notice the resolute self-containment that radiated from Mallory. Was she simply tolerating their company?

Well, hey, we offered her free food. That's more money to buy shoes and fancy duds with.

Maybe that wasn't fair, but it was the first thought that popped into his mind. And what transpired a few minutes later did nothing but strengthen his conviction that Mallory was after the almighty dollar, however she could get it.

The talk had, big surprise, turned to wedding dresses. With two weddings bearing down on the Monroes, it was all Andrew could do to escape endless discussion about stuff that they'd all wear for fifteen minutes and be hot and miserable while they did.

Kimberly was relating to them yet another failed dress hunt when Katelyn piped up, “Hey, Mal could sew your dress. She can sew anything. She was studying to be a fashion designer.”

Mallory's fork clattered against her plate, dropping into a hillock of mashed potatoes. She picked it up and daintily wiped off the potatoes before studiously going back to her supper.

“Could you, Mallory?” Kimberly leaned forward, hope in her eyes. “I've looked all over Atlanta for a dress I like, and I can't seem to find one. They're all strapless or too low cut.”

“Oh, Katelyn's letting her imagination run away with herself—” Mallory protested.

“I mean, I'd pay—my dress budget is two thousand dollars, but I can't find what I want.”

Andrew couldn't mistake the sudden calculating interest in Mallory's eyes. “Well...what exactly are you looking for? If it's not too elaborate...”

Yeah. Suddenly her sewing skills get a whole lot better when Kimberly waves two grand in front of her.

Disgusted, Andrew shoved back his chair. Enough of this woman who valued fashion over basic needs and didn't show a bit of interest in wedding dresses until someone offered her an obscene amount of money to sew one. Two thousand dollars? For a dress you'd wear once?
Highway robbery.

“Excuse me,” he muttered. “I need to see if I locked the stables.”