Authors: Elaine Raco Chase
"I knew you'd make an excellent
interior decorator." His thumb and forefinger plucked a white thread off
the shoulder of her navy terry romper. "I'm going to need a dresser and
wardrobe in here and some things for the guest room. My folks will be coming
for Thanksgiving." Lucas leaned across Amanda, and his hand searched
inside the night-stand's drawer. "This," he dropped a blue checkbook
on her stomach, "is a special account I opened yesterday. I told the bank
your name would be the signature."
Gray eyes widened at the healthy
balance. "Lucas, you certainly know how to make a lady happy."
He was suddenly serious, and his long
fingers stroked the curve of her jaw. "I do want you to be happy, Mandy.
Take one day at a time. Have fun. You're supposed to…"
"I'm supposed to use this time
for R&R." The pads of her fingers followed the grooves in his cheek,
then bounced lightly against his chin. "Rest and reorganization."
Amanda smiled. "It's funny, Lucas, but I feel exhilarated, happy, excited.
I'm very glad you came up with this idea."
"And being a city girl, you
don't think you're going to go crazy out here in the country?"
"Don't I have that great pickup
to drive into town?" Her lips gave a humorous twist. She observed his
intense manner. "Why is my woman's intuition telling me that your question
has a double edge? Is Kitty a city girl?"
Lucas nodded and dropped back against
his bed pillow. "Believe it or not, it was Kitty who sold me this property
last year. That's how we met, although I didn't really get into a relationship
with her until three months ago."
"Well, if Kitty sold you the
house . . ."
"She tried to talk me out of it.
Kitty saw a rundown ruin in the middle of weeds."
"But surely with all the
remodeling you've done . . ."
"I don't know, Mandy." He
winced and rubbed his face. "Kitty really gets off on the city. She loves
the hustle and confusion, thrives on the pressure and embraces all the glamor.
She does have a few . . . attitudes that annoy me."
"And you are so perfect, Mr.
Crosse." Amanda's tone was light.
"Hardly." He came up on one
elbow. "But as you pointed out with Brian Neuman, it's those little things
that fester and infect a relationship. I keep waiting for Kitty to grow up. But
she's stubborn." His dark eyes slanted toward his companion. "She
does remind me of you in that respect."
"Me!" Amanda rallied with
loud indignation. "Stubborn! You've got some nerve!" She yanked the
pillow from under his head and pummeled him with foam punches. "Take that
back, Lucas Crosse!"
Laughing, he easily struck aside her
weapon. Strong hands pinned her shoulders flat against the mattress.
"Stubborn and opinionated." His faced loomed close, eyes locked in
humorous combat. "Hostile and obstinate."
Amanda's hands splayed against his
muscular torso, her fingers sifted amid the dark curls that were freed by his
partially unbuttoned shirt. "You make me sound like a shrew." Her
pink tongue poked a childish response.
"Never a shrew, Mandy."
Lucas felt his body grow hard with desire, his cheek eagerly sought the soft
mound of her breast. Once again he discovered how easy it was to forget that
Amanda was his very best friend.
"Lucas!" She gave him a
playful tap against his cheek. "You're crushing me! All this remodeling
has turned you into Mr. Muscle!" Amanda found herself released from her
masculine prison. Rolling off the bed, she displayed an exaggerated crooked
swagger toward the door. "I'll take my broken decorator bones to my own
flat, uninteresting bed."
Five
An incessant sequence of high-pitched
beeps punctured Amanda's sleep-engulfed subconscious. She sat bolt upright in bed,
thinking her microwave had gone berserk, the oven ready to self-destruct. Gray
eyes blinked in momentary confusion at the unfamiliar surroundings. This stark,
rough-walled, sun-shadowed room was not the Georgian furnished master bedroom
suite in her New Orleans townhouse.
The sonorous tones continued.
Throwing off the geometric blue sheet, Amanda stumbled across the hall,
following the sounds into Lucas' bedroom. There on the water-ringed nightstand
was the source - a modular brown telephone. "Hello." Her greeting was
accompanied by a prodigious yawn.
"Damn! Did I wake you?"
"Lucas?" She yawned again,
shook her head and wiped the wetness from her eyes. "What time is
it?" Her tongue washed over her teeth.
"Ten."
"I haven't slept this late in
years." She rolled onto his neatly made bed, her free arm and both legs
extended in a wakeful feline stretch. "You should have pounded on my door
before you left for the office."
"Mandy, you're on vacation. I
could kill myself for calling. Go back to bed and sleep till noon." Lucas'
deep voice issued the tender order.
"I think," her hand groped
along the padded headboard, fingers curling around the switch that controlled
the vibrator, "I'll just lie here between your sheets and let your
mattress give me a morning massage."
His throaty laugh caressed her ear.
"I wish I could join you. I'm headed into court in another hour
and…oh-oh…the other phone line is flashing." His parting statements were
delivered in a rapid staccato. "I'll be home around six. I left the truck
keys next to the checkbook on the counter. Have fun. Bye."
Amanda listened to the dial tone's
serenade for a long moment.
I wish I could join you.
Lucas' words echoed
in her mind, making her think of last night.
They had shared this very bed. Laughing
and talking just as they always had. Natural. Easy. Unrestricted. But at some
point, while they were wrestling, Amanda found she was responding to Lucas'
silly play the way a woman reacts to a man. She provoked and flirted. Not just
with words, but with her body as well. And she had enjoyed it.
Her cheek nuzzled the brown linen
pillowcase, her nose inhaling the subtle souvenir left by Lucas' spicy cologne.
Gray eyes closed against Monday morning reality. Amanda's night-shirt clad body
luxuriated in the oscillating delights of the mattress.
Her thoughts drifted and darted in
unrestricted abandon. She found it was very easy to respond to sensual
illusion. The weight of Lucas' flat torso again pressed into her softly rounded
stomach. Her long legs were spread by an invisible pair of firm athletic
thighs. Nipples formed twin peaks beneath their cotton cover in much the way
they had taunted the rugged masculine chest that teasingly sought to conquer.
Her breathing came hard and fast, just as it had last night. She could feel
him. Over her. Inside her. Wrapped around her. And again it had nothing to do
with game-playing energy.
Amanda sat up, rudely interrupting
her erotic fantasy. "Damn, how lame is this! How damn desperate am
I?" Her fingers massaged her forehead.
How long had it been since she'd
had sex?
Teeth snagged her lower lip. Nearly a year, since she broke up
with Brian.
Ahh…well, probably just hormone overload. And this damn bed is
like a vibrator!
"This is silly. We were just
joking. We've done it before." Her voice, loud and sensible, sent a wave
of embarrassed color across her skin. The massage unit was switched off, the
sheet and blanket straightened and one female body was marched into the
bathroom. Halfway through a brisk shower, Amanda found her sensual daydreams
gurgling down the drain.
The silence was total. Not even a
bird. The crisp, astringent air cleansed and energized her soul. Amanda grinned
like a truant kid. Her navy espadrilles kicked the stones off the back patio.
Coffee mug in hand, she wandered down to the stables to check on Buttercup and
Maisy. Both horses were quietly munching their breakfast hay, chestnut tails
and ears twitching away the pesky barn flies.
The
Morning News
was stuffed
in the rural delivery box. Amanda settled at the terrace picnic table, perusing
the front page and reading local stories. A paint sale in nearby McKinney
caught her attention.
She made a call to the hardware store
to make certain they carried stucco paint. A rueful expression twisted her lips
when she found the price was two dollars a gallon cheaper than she had paid
when she did her own home. Directions in hand, Amanda unhesitatingly clambered
into the pickup and headed into town.
Two hours later, the short-bed truck
was the transporter not only of paint, painting tools and borrowed wallpaper
sample books but also potted ferns, hanging baskets, indoor trees, potting soil
and clay pots. Amanda had found a highway nursery going out of business.
Denim wrap skirt and white knit
sweater were exchanged for smooth, soft cut-offs that owed their luster and
pale blue color to innumerable washings, and a khaki T-shirt with a cartoon
character logo. Time was taken to devour a tuna sandwich and check what was
available for dinner. Amanda decided to serve the individual frozen quiches
with antipasto salad. After all, she had a lot of walls to stucco!
The newly acquired foliage was given
a hose shower and left in the courtyard to enjoy the sunlight. By
late-afternoon, four gallons of parchment paint had been sucked up by the
living room walls with a deep textured roller that gave a heavy stippling
stucco effect. Luckily, the ceilings and crown moldings were already freshly
painted.
Amanda was trying to decide whether
to open gallon number five when Lucas came whistling through the front doorway.
"Watch your step," she cautioned, wiping her hands on the seat of her
ragged-edged shorts. "I didn't expect you for another two hours."
"My court case was postponed
until tomorrow, and my calendar was empty, so . . ." His voice trailed off
once his eyes discovered the extent of her labors. Lucas swallowed. "I...I
can't believe you got this much done. It looks great!"
Amanda blew on her paint-crusted
fingernails, polishing the roughness on her cotton shirt. "Thank you, kind
sir." She walked toward him, bare feet pulling free of the plastic drop
cloth. "Hmm…I really do believe this little gadget works!" She
pretended fascination with a small object cupped in her palm.
"What have you got there?"
Lucas pulled off his black and red striped tie, tossing it over his arm on top
of his folded charcoal suit jacket.
"The man at the hardware store
said I couldn't hang plants without toggle bolts, and I couldn't sink a toggle
bolt into a beam unless I had a…" her toes overlapped his shoe tips, her
gray eyes sparkled with coquettish mockery, "stud finder." Her
laughter flirted. "I see it works on non-wooden studs."
His teeth flashed with wolfish
intent. "You got taken, kid. All you have to do is thump to find the
studs."
Amanda's knuckles gave a suggestive
rap against Lucas' shoulder. "I'll let you do the thumping," came her
sassy rejoinder. "Go change and grab that stepladder, there's -"
"I know, I saw the jungle out
front." Lucas held his thumbs up for her inspection. "Do these look
green to you?"
She gently twisted his proffered
digits in the direction of his bedroom and pointedly ignored his grumbled
complaints by heading outside to start transplanting.
The vivid air had been replaced by a
heavy, humid blanket. Brooding clouds banded together, growling and chasing the
afternoon sun from the sky. But the dismal slanting rain had little effect on
the garden that was being created inside the triple arched windows.
"I think we should give each
plant a name." Amanda settled in a comfortable Indian-style position amid
the empty remains of their indoor picnic.
Lucas looked up from refilling their
glasses with icy white wine. "I don't know, Mandy, a name, that's so
personal." He squinted at the windows, the foliage drapes illuminated by a
reading lamp brought in to provide a work light. "I'm going to feel guilty
when they shrivel and end up buried in the mulch pit."
A feminine hand slapped his
denim-covered thigh. "These plants are virtually impossible to kill,
Lucas." Amanda's fingernail scratched off a patch of paint that a soapy
washcloth and a hot shower had failed to dissolve. "I think we'll call the
ficus tree Perry Mason, since he holds court in the center. The coleus will be
Delia Street, because she'll need an occasional pinch. That spider plant is a
perfect, representative for that long arm of the law, Lieutenant Tragg. The
assorted ivy plants will be Paul Drake and his detectives. And that
pompous-looking fern will be the never-winning DA, Hamilton Burger."
Applause and laughter accompanied
each of her suggestions. Lucas wiped his eyes and cleared his throat. "Erle
Stanley Gardner is probably rolling over in his grave. Mandy, how the hell do
you know all those fictional characters?"
Avoiding his inquiring gaze, she
concentrated on the tan top-stitching that decorated the patch pockets on her
olive twill pants. "I read every Perry Mason mystery from the
Case of
the Velvet Claws
to the
Case of the Postponed Murder
while you were
in law school." Amanda bolstered herself with sips of wine as she made her
confession.