The Grand Finale (2 page)

“You’re staring at my mouth again,” he said.

And he kissed her. Nothing serious. Just a single, testing-the-waters kiss.

“Jeez,” Berry said.

“Is that good or bad?”

It was terrific, Berry thought. Not that she would admit it to Mr. Large Pizza.

“It was entirely inappropriate,” she said, wriggling out from under him, getting to her feet. “And that was
my
Jeep. I needed it. I can’t deliver pizzas without it. You had no business jumping on me like that.”

“Are you crazy? You would have killed yourself.”

“Well, fine. Now I’ll slowly die of starvation because I’m deprived of earning a living.”

Good grief, Berry thought, she sounded like an uptight, whining moron. It was so unfair. Why couldn’t she have met this gorgeous guy under more favorable circumstances? Like maybe winning him in the lottery. She turned on her heel and strode off to the birch trees to inspect the damage.

She’d gotten the Jeep two years ago, the day after her divorce had been finalized, and it had
never given her a moment’s trouble. Of course, she had to give it a quart of oil every Friday, she thought. And it did look a little disreputable with all that rust and the coat hanger antenna, but those things were cosmetic.

They stood at the edge of the cliff and gazed down at the Jeep, belly-up and slightly squashed in the moonlight.

Berry sighed in morose resignation. “It’s dead.”

“Doesn’t look good.”

Berry was at a loss for words. After all, what on earth can you say when your entire future has just gone over a cliff? What can you say when faced with certain bankruptcy? And I’m not going to cry, she told herself, frowning. I absolutely am not going to cry.

He studied her face in the moonlight. “You’re not going to cry, are you?”

“Absolutely not.” A large tear oozed over her lower lashes and streaked down her cheek. “Damn.”

She was pretty, he thought. And she was nice to kiss. But she was a little nutty. Not that he would hold that against her. He put an arm
around her shoulders and wiped the tear away with his thumb.

“It’s okay,” Jake said. “The insurance will pay to replace your car.”

Berry slumped and did another sigh.

“You don’t have insurance,” he guessed.

“Not that kind. Only if I run over somebody.” She squared her shoulders and turned on her heel. “Well, good-bye.”

Good-bye? He wasn’t ready for good-bye. He wanted to look at the blond curls some more. He needed to know
why
she didn’t have insurance. And what was her favorite ice cream flavor? And when was her birthday? And was she really okay after falling out of his tree? And in fact, he wouldn’t mind knowing what she thought of him naked, but probably he shouldn’t rush that one.

He walked beside her. “Where are you going?”

“Home.”

“That must be miles from here.”

Berry shrugged. “It’s not so far.”

May as well get used to walking, she thought, I’m going to be doing a lot of it. Anyway, she
could use the exercise to get rid of the nervous stomach caused by Mr. Large Pizza with the Works and his navy briefs.

No way was she walking home, Jake thought. It was dark, and late. She could get mugged or snatched by a maniac serial rapist. And she smelled like pizza. She could get attacked by a pack of hungry dogs.

“If you’ll wait a minute, I’ll give you a ride,” he said to her.

“Thanks, but that’s not necessary. Besides, I’d get your fancy car all dirty.”

“My fancy car has leather seats. They wash. Wait here.”

Berry kept walking. “Really, it’s not necessary.”

He grabbed her firmly by the shoulders and plunked her into a sitting position on the edge of the curb. “Wait here!”

“You’re awfully bossy.”

“So I’ve been told.”

That intrigued her. She watched him jog away and wondered who else thought he was bossy. A girlfriend, maybe? A wife? She was still wondering when the cream-colored car
rolled to a stop in front of her. She removed her vest and carefully placed it on the floor, mozzarella side up.

“This is very nice of you,” Berry said.

“Yup, that’s me. I’m an all-around nice guy.” He cut his eyes to her. “You haven’t told me your name.”

“Berry Knudsen.”

“Berry? Like in holly berry or cranberry?”

“Lingonberry. My mother was inordinately proud of her Scandinavian heritage. So, who else thinks you’re bossy? Your wife?”

Sawyer mumbled something unintelligible.

“Excuse me?”

“My kids,” he said on a sigh.

His kids? He had kids. And a wife. And he’d just kissed her. She was going to go straight home and brush her teeth.

“How many kids do you have?” she asked.

“Twenty-one. This morning they all told me the same thing you did. They think I’m bossy.”

“Twenty-one kids?”

“I teach first grade.”

“So you’re not married?’

“No.”

Berry almost swooned with relief. He wasn’t married. Not that it really mattered to her. She wasn’t interested in men right now. She especially wasn’t interested in this man. Still, it was good to know she hadn’t kissed a philanderer. She hadn’t spied on someone else’s private property. She hadn’t smashed a family pizza. And this tantalizing hunk of manliness, driving a megabucks car, taught first grade. Imagine that!

“You don’t look like a first-grade teacher,” she said.

Jake let out a low groan. “I know. I’m too big. I don’t fit in any of the little chairs. My fingers aren’t good at holding crayons or safety scissors. And I can’t get the hang of barrettes at all.” He slumped in his seat. “I wasn’t cut out for first grade. This is the toughest thing I’ve ever done.”

The image of Jake Sawyer playing mother hen to a group of seven-year-olds brought a smile to Berry’s lips. If she’d had a first-grade teacher that looked like Jake Sawyer, she’d have done anything to stay after school. Her first-grade teacher had been five feet, two inches
tall and weighed close to two hundred pounds. Mrs. Berman. Berry shivered at the memory.

“Earth to Berry.”

“Sorry. I guess I drifted off.”

“I was afraid you might have sustained a head injury when you fell out of the tree.”

“No. The only thing damaged is my pride and your pizza.” She squinted into the darkness. “Turn right at the next light. Then just go straight until you see the sign, pizza place.”

“This isn’t exactly a ritzy part of town.”

Berry shrugged. “It’s an ethnic neighborhood. Italian bakery. Vietnamese laundry. Ethiopian restaurant. Everybody’s struggling to make a start, like me.”

Jake executed a smooth corner at the light and frowned at the dark street lined with grimy stores and intersected by narrow alleyways. “Why have you chosen to work in this pizza place?”

“Why did you choose to teach first grade?”

Jake smiled wryly. “If I tell you, will you tell me?”

“I hope your story’s more interesting than mine.”

“I invented Gunk.”

“Gunk?”

“It creeps. It crawls. It comes in five scents and three flavors. It’s edible. It’s freezable. It’s disgusting.”

“I’ve seen it advertised on television.”

“I invented it. I was working for Bartlow Labs, looking for an inexpensive organic glue, and I discovered Gunk.”

“Are you a chemist?”

“I used to be. I quit the second I sold my Gunk rights. I hated the fluorescent lights and the nine-to-five routine. And it was boring. Glue is boring.” He smiled proudly. “Now I’m an inventor.”

“What about teaching first grade?”

“Guinea pigs. I have twenty-one kids to test my new ideas. Besides, I had a teaching degree and I needed the money. I squandered my Gunk money on this car and that monstrous Victorian house.”

Berry wrinkled her nose. The man had forsaken a respectable profession to invent future Gunk, and thought of seven-year-olds as guinea pigs. Prince Charming had some frog in him.

“How did you ever get the school board to hire you?”

“Luckily, Mrs. Newfarmer had a nervous breakdown and suddenly abandoned her first-grade class. When I applied for a job as substitute teacher, they were desperate enough to consider me.”

“Nervous breakdown? Must be some group of kids.”

“The kids are terrific. Mrs. Newfarmer had marital problems.”

Hmmm, she thought, I can relate to that. Marriage could easily give somebody a nervous breakdown. It could give you hives, and dishpan hands, and paranoia.

Berry knew firsthand. She had tried marriage. Four years of struggling to put her husband through medical school, and then she’d found him playing doctor with Mary Lou Marowski. Yes sir, she knew all about marriage.

“Well? What about you? Why are you working in this neighborhood?” he asked.

“I was married while still in college. We couldn’t both afford to go to school full-time, so I quit and went to work. When my mar
riage fell apart after four years I didn’t think I could manage a job that required much mental concentration or emotional energy. I wanted something to do with my hands. Something that was physically exhausting. And I wanted something that was close to the university so I could return to school part-time. Well, here it is. The Pizza Place. I worked as a pizza maker for a year, and when the owner retired seven months ago, I scraped together every cent I could find, mortgaged my soul, and bought the business.”

Jake parked at the curb and considered the two-story yellow brick building. A gaudy red neon sign flashed out pizza place in the ground-floor picture window. White ruffled curtains hung in the four second-story windows.

“You live upstairs?” he asked.

“Yup.”

“Alone?”

“Not anymore. I adopted three old ladies this week.”

Jake raised his eyebrows.

“It’s a long story.”

Berry eased herself out of the car, relieved to say good-bye to Jake Sawyer. The man was
physically disturbing. He gave her hot flashes. She wasn’t even sure if she liked him. He bought extravagant cars and eccentric houses. He thumbed his nose at security. The man was a risk taker with big dreams.

Berry had small dreams. She wanted a college education. She wanted a window that overlooked a meadow, or a creek, or a green lawn bordered by flower beds. She wanted a nice, boring husband who believed in monogamy, but she didn’t want him now. First the college education, then the husband, then the lawn. That was The Plan. It certainly didn’t include breaking out in a sweat over awesome Jake Sawyer. And the worst part about all this was that she’d acted so dopey! She’d fallen out of his tree onto a pizza. Yeesh.

Berry mumbled an embarrassed thank-you, carefully closed the door of Jake’s expensive car, and beat a hasty retreat to her apartment. Her back ached, her arms were scratched, and her jeans had a large hole in the knee. Not one of her better days. She’d peeked in Jake Sawyer’s bedroom window and ogled his body, and now she was being punished. How else could
you explain the Jeep suicide? Berry trudged up the narrow stairs. At least the score should be even now. Her Jeep for thirty seconds of Jake Sawyer practically nude. It seemed like a fair price, but she didn’t know how she was ever going to replace the stupid Jeep. She didn’t have a dime in the bank, and she had nowhere to go for credit. What a rotten break. Just when she was making some progress. Last week she’d gotten two lunch contracts at local businesses. How was she going to deliver pizzas without the Jeep?

“Damn,” she said, trudging up the narrow stairs. “Double damn.”

Mrs. Dugan stood ramrod-straight with righteous indignation at the head of the stairs. “Hmmm, fine talk for a young lady. I may as well tell you right now, I don’t tolerate cussing.”

A second gray-haired lady appeared in the doorway. “For goodness’ sakes, Sarah, all she said was
damn. Damn
doesn’t hardly count as a cussword. Young people say things like that nowadays.”

A third voice chimed in. “You’re right, Mildred, what should she say? Oh, fudge? Darn?
It’s not the same, not the same at all. Sometimes you need to let loose with a good cuss. In fact, I feel like cussing right now.” The plump old lady uttered an expletive that made double damn sound like polite conversation and raised everyone’s eyebrows, including Berry’s.

“Mrs. Fitz!”

Mrs. Fitz slapped her leg and laughed out loud. “That was a beauty, wasn’t it? See, I feel much better now.”

Berry wearily walked across the room and sank into the Boston rocker.

“Good heavens,” Mrs. Fitz exclaimed. “What happened to you? You’re a mess.”

“I fell out of a tree onto the large pizza with the works. And then the Jeep drove itself over a cliff.”

Mrs. Dugan set a bowl of soapy water at Berry’s feet and began gently dabbing at her scratched cheek. “You aren’t hurt serious, are you? You have anything worse than these scratches and scrapes?”

“Nope, I’m okay.”