Turnabout's Fair Play (22 page)

“I have. Did you enjoy your visit with your son in Alabama?” Maureen listened with interest as Kirby talked about his son, a football coach at a small college in Birmingham, and daughter-in-law, the chief surgeon at one of the major hospitals down there. And she let the gaping and astonished expressions of her friends and acquaintances pass without acknowledgment. But she treasured them up in her heart.

“Um…you do realize that you can’t come to this class.” Flannery blocked the door, barring Zarah and Bobby from entering. “It’s for
single
people. And you no longer qualify.”

Zarah looked up at her husband. “I told you she’d be this way.”

“Some outreach director you are.” Bobby moved forward, and rather than get run over by the former soldier who still had his high school football physique, Flannery moved out of the way and let them enter.

“Okay, but this week only. Then it’s on to the appropriate class full of married people for you two.” She returned to the greeter’s table to make sure everyone was either picking up their existing nametags or making one to wear—the job Zarah used to do. One more reason for her to lament Zarah’s marriage.

About half of the two dozen or so people in the room gathered around the newlyweds, and sure enough, the tablet came out of Zarah’s purse so she could show the pictures everyone clamored for.

“Hey, Flannery, I think we have a visitor.”

She looked up from the roll sheet she was trying to figure out at her helper’s nudge.

No, no, no. He couldn’t be here. Not now. Not if he knew.

“Hadn’t you better go greet him?” the younger woman asked, though her eyes stayed glued to Jamie.

“I…yeah.” She put the attendance record down, pushed her hair over her shoulders, straightened her blouse with a tug on the hem, and prayed all the way over to him that neither of them would say anything they’d regret.

Jamie scanned the room. Flannery stopped a few paces away and waited. A few seconds later, his gaze came to rest on her. Every plane of his face seemed to move infinitesimally as his expression shifted from concentration to pleasure.

“What are you doing here?” Okay, so that wasn’t really the proper way to greet a visitor.

He had the audacity to grin at her. But with the short beard and mustache he now sported, she couldn’t see the dimples in his cheeks or chin. She deplored facial hair. “You invited me, remember? At the airport.”

“I didn’t—” But she had said he should visit Acklen Ave. before she thought better of it. “Okay, so I did. Come with me, and we’ll get your visitor information stuff filled out.”

She watched—but tried to feign disinterest whenever he looked up—as he filled out the form with his personal information. She recognized the home address he listed—she’d considered looking at townhouses there to be closer to work.

“Do you like that neighborhood?” She took the form from him and stuck it in the folder with the rest of the attendance information.

“Yeah. I love it. I bought my townhouse about six years ago. It took me less than ten minutes to get to your office building the other day.”

Flannery cringed.
Let’s not talk about your being in
my
office…ever!
“I understand Shandi was able to put you to work immediately.”

“Yes. Thank you for giving her my name and number. This work is going to help me out a lot when it comes to figuring out what I want to do next.” He chewed the corner of his bottom lip.

“I have to ask…what’s with the beard?” She couldn’t help noticing the curious and admiring gazes of all of the women in the room, directed at Jamie. She took a measure of primal female pleasure in being seen tête-à-tête with arguably the best-looking man in the room, even if he was just the same height as she was in her thin-soled sandals.

He rubbed his hand along the dark growth. “I figured since I never had one, now that I’m unemployed would be the best time to experiment and see if I like it. What do you think?”

Flannery cocked her head as if studying and weighing the merits. She couldn’t very well say she didn’t like it because it hid his dimples. That would just go straight to his head. She leaned forward and pointed right where the facial fur hid the cleft in his chin. “Is that a gray hair?”

Pressing his lips together in a sardonic smile, he nodded his head. “Don’t know what I did to deserve that, but that was a good one.”

The couple who taught the class called it to order for announcements and the opening prayer. Flannery shooed her helper and Jamie off toward the chairs set in rows, filling three-quarters of the room.

Jamie took a few steps and then turned and came back over to the welcome table. “Aren’t you coming?”

“I’ve got to finish taking the roll and get this put out in the hall before the hall monitor comes by to pick it up.” She lifted the black folder.

“Oh.” He looked over his shoulder at the chairs. “Want me to save you a seat?”

Flannery looked that direction, too, and caught Zarah looking at her, her eyes squinted in speculation. “No, that’s okay. I’m going to sit with Zarah and Bobby. You go on over. I’ve got work to do.”

A tinge of something—regret?—caught in her chest, but she dislodged it with the reminder that he had a tendency to say things that irritated her and that he possibly knew her biggest, deepest, darkest secret. Well, not the
deepest, darkest
secret, but still one that she didn’t want anyone to know. Though Caylor and Zarah knew of her interest in the Arthurian legends, even they didn’t know how far that interest was rooted. And if she couldn’t tell them, how could she let someone like Jamie in on the secret?

He’d done it. He’d had another normal conversation with Flannery. Well…normal by their standards.

Jamie wanted to copy his grandmother’s actions from before the worship service had started earlier. He wanted to look over his shoulder to see if Flannery was still at the back of the room. Bobby had insisted on moving over and inviting Jamie to sit with them—so he knew he’d see Flannery when she joined them on the other side of Zarah. But what was taking so long?

Was she back to trying to avoid him? At least he hadn’t lost his cool and babbled inanely at her this morning. What’s more, if that gray hair comment hadn’t been directed at him, he would have found it uproariously funny. She was right, even though she hadn’t said it in so many words. He’d noticed gray hairs growing in the predominantly dark beard, and he feared it would make him look even older. Maybe he needed some of that men’s hair color that worked on both head hair and facial hair. Or was there a separate product for each? He needed to pay more attention to the commercials.

Everyone bowed their heads—no, he needed to pay more attention to Sunday school. He bowed and listened to the prayer for people he didn’t know, requests they’d just spent the last ten minutes listening to.

He prayed his own prayer once again about direction and figuring out what to do next as far as making a decision between working and school. Or between finding a job here, going to school here, or moving to Utah and working for his stepfather while he tried to figure out the rest.

Flannery finally came around and sat on the other side of Zarah. Just two people away, yet it seemed a chasm separated them. And he really wanted to figure out how to bridge the gap. Because the more he saw of her—and the more he stayed in his non-freaked-out-dork state around her—the more he saw glimpses of the Flannery who wasn’t all prickles and attitude. That was the Flannery he wanted to get to know better. The Flannery who gave a funny toast at her best friend’s wedding. The Flannery who had seen his need and done what she could to help him—and taken no credit for it.

After Sunday school, Bobby invited Jamie to sit with them in the church service.

“I went to the early service with my grandmother, and now we’re going out for brunch. Maybe next time.” He met a few other people but wanted to catch Flannery before she left.

Foiled, he promised himself that next week he’d plan to stay for the late service and not let her out of his sight.

He met his grandmother down at his car and opened the door for her.

Before getting in, she laid her hand on top of his on the top of the door. “I hope you don’t mind, but I invited Kirby McNeill to join us for brunch.”

Mind? With the way her eyes sparkled and her smile broadened whenever she mentioned the man’s name? “I don’t mind at all. I’ll enjoy getting to know him better.”

Watching his grandmother and Flannery’s grandfather interact over their pancakes and french toast at Cracker Barrel, Jamie caught a glimpse of what his grandmother had been like as a young woman. Her conversation occasionally slipped into flirtation, and if Jamie had to choose a description for how Kirby acted toward her, it would have to be
courtly
.

For all that they noticed he was with them, he could have stayed at church and gone out to lunch with the singles’ group, as invited. And since he’d picked Cookie up and driven her to church, she would then have needed to ask Kirby for a ride home.

Jamie had been aware for quite some time of his grandmother’s subtle attempts to help him meet eligible young women. From the invitation to her friends’ cookout last year—at which he’d met Zarah, Caylor, and Flannery (and called Flannery Fanny, but he wasn’t going to think about that right now)—to the push for him to get more involved in his church, to this most recent suggestion of visiting the Bible study last Sunday and the singles’ Sunday school this week.

He couldn’t really blame her, he supposed. He was her only remaining blood relative. And she wasn’t getting any younger. She deserved to see her great-grandchildren born while she could still enjoy them.

If he called her out on her attempts to find him a woman, she’d tell him she just wanted to see him happy. Well, she deserved some happiness, too. And since it seemed like she might find it with Kirby McNeill, Jamie would do what he could to throw the two of them together as often as possible—especially if it meant getting Flannery’s help.

After all, when it came to matchmaking, turnabout was fair play.

Chapter 16

From:
TennesseeGawain

To:
LadyNelle

Subject:
Hope You’re Okay

Jamie stared at the computer screen for a long time.
“Hope you’re okay
.” He didn’t even know this person. And being honest with himself, he was sending this message for mostly selfish reasons. The user named LadyNelle hadn’t posted anything new in over two weeks, and he was anxious to read more of her story.

Clicking into the message box in the website’s contact form, he ran words through his head to see which would sound the least stalkerish:

You probably feel as strange receiving this message as I feel sending it. But I noticed you haven’t posted anything in a few weeks, and I just wanted to let you know that I hope everything is okay and

And what? And please post something soon? And I don’t care if you’ve been in the hospital having a kidney transplant—I want more of the story?

He leaned back in his desk chair and rubbed the back of his neck. Why was he even sending this message other than to prompt this writer to post more of her story? Did he really care if this person was okay or not?