Lynn minded greatly. “I had hoped we could have a little time alone."
"I'm sorry,” Lillie apologized. “I had no idea last Tuesday when I invited a friend to come for lunch today that you'd call and say you were coming over."
Now Lynn knew why Minerva had been relegated to the back bedroom. She pulled a chair from the table and sat in it. “Do I know this friend?"
"No dear, you don't. His name is Ralph Randolph.” Lillie sat in a chair across from Lynn. “I've only known him a few weeks myself. He moved to Hatlesville about three months ago from Crystal Falls."
The door bell rang. Lillie jumped to her feet and raced to answer, calling over her shoulder as she went, “That's him now."
Under her breath Lynn whispered, “Oh, shit.” Trace's dad was Lillie's other luncheon guest! What the hell was she supposed to do now? There wasn't much she
could
do except eat her lunch, and then get out of there as soon as possible.
One look at Ralph Randolph and Lynn knew where Trace got his good looks. Ralph—that's what he insisted Lynn call him—was a charmer with a ready smile and a soft southern accent that lent magnetism and appeal to every word he spoke. And the way Ralph and Lillie looked at each other spoke volumes.
Damn, Trace was right; there was something going on between these two.
Lynn ate her food and excused herself as soon as she could politely do so. She thought as she decided to go that she'd never before been so thoroughly ignored. “I have to go now. Ruthie is minding the store alone.” Standing she pushed back her chair. “It's nice to have met you, Ralph."
Ralph momentarily shifted his gaze from Lillie to Lynn. “It's nice to meet you too.” He turned his gaze and his attention back to Lillie. “This cake is delicious."
Lynn sidled toward the door. “I'm going now, Mother."
Lillie didn't bother to look Lynn's way. “Bye, dear, drive carefully."
By the time Lynn reached her car she was feeling the first bite of an emotion she refused to give its proper name—resentment. How could the mother who had always been so judgmental of her lifestyle suddenly become intimate with a complete stranger? By the time she pulled her car into a parking slot in front of her bakery her resentment had escalated to anger. She swore under her breath as she got out of her car and hurried toward the bakery. Once inside, she slammed the door and leaned against it.
Ruthie greeted her from behind the counter. “Hi, Lynn."
Lynn moved across the room and took her apron from a hook. “Hi, Ruthie."
Ruthie asked, “Can I go to lunch now?"
"Sure, run along."
As she reached for the door knob Ruthie turned to say, “A Mr. Randolph called. He said he'd be by with the contract for you to sign around seven this evening.” She turned her head to one side. “What contract?"
No one could accuse Ruthie of being diplomatic. “Mr. Randolph is a building contractor I've hired to do some repair work on the building."
Lynn spent the remainder of the day baking and decorating an elaborate wedding cake, and being torn by dissenting emotions. If she didn't need her building repaired so badly and if Joel wasn't coming to the reunion with a guest, she'd tell Trace where he could stick his contract. But it did and he was, and that left Lynn with little choice. She would have to accept Trace's deal and hope for the best.
By the time Trace knocked on her door that evening, Lynn had convinced herself—sort of—that she was doing the right thing. She asked him in and invited him to sit down; thinking as she did that she had never seen a man with eyes so blue and hair so black.
Trace sat in her old easy chair and drew a long breath. “I noticed as I came up that your stairs need some repair work. Did you know the handrail is loose in a couple of places?"
Lynn knew, but that wasn't on the city's list of items to be replaced or repaired. “Don't worry about the handrail. Just take care of what's on the city's list."
Trace said with an arrogance that set her teeth on edge, “The hand rail will be on my list. A loose rail on an outside stair case is not something to be ignored."
A hint of insolence crept into Lynn's voice. “You don't have a list."
Trace smiled that insidiously sexy smile. “I'd feel terrible if you fell down a flight of stairs and broke your neck."
Lynn was momentarily lost in the blue of those eyes. Before she could find her voice, he asked, “How did things go with your mother?"
Lynn sat on her lumpy old couch. There was no good way to deliver bad news, so she didn't try. “I didn't talk with her, not about your dad anyway."
Trace leaned forward. “Ruthie said you went to her house for lunch. What happened?” Impatience pushed him to his feet. “You don't have some idea of reneging on our deal?” When she didn't answer, he demanded, “Do you?"
Ambivalent emotions slammed around inside Lynn as she waved a weary hand in his direction. “Sit down...” How could a man be so sexy and at the same time, so damned aggravating? “...and give me a chance to explain."
Much to her surprise, he did just that. “Go ahead, but this had better be good."
"Your dad had lunch with Mother and me."
Trace's eyes narrowed. “The hell you say."
Lynn nodded her head. “I swear it's true. Mother didn't tell me when I called to say I was coming over for lunch that she was expecting Ralph, too.” She shrugged one shoulder. “He arrived before I'd been there five minutes and he was still there when I left."
Trace was on his feet again. “You left the two of them there alone?"
Lynn admitted, reluctantly, “Well, yes."
Trace slapped his forehead with the palm of his hand. “Oh, my God! The old fool is going to kill himself.” He took long strides across the room before turning to face Lynn. “A piece of afternoon ass is not worth his life.” He advanced toward her with fire flashing in his eyes. “How could you have been so stupid as to leave those two alone together?"
Lynn's temper caught fire. “Just a damn minute, mister!” She jumped to her feet, moved to stand directly in front of Trace, and stare up into his face. “Don't call me stupid. And don't you dare refer to my mother as a piece of afternoon ass.” With both hands on her hips, she added, “Your dad is a lecherous old man."
For a moment Trace stood looking down at her, dwarfing her with his size, intimidating her with his stare. Then with a sigh, he fell into a chair and put his head in his hands. “My dad is an old fool.” Dropping his hands, he lifted his face. The concern in his eyes was undeniable. “"I'm sorry. I apologize. This problem with Dad is making me crazy."
Lynn could understand that. An hour of watching her mother and Ralph Randolph holding hands and flirting outrageously had been enough to make her slightly insane. “You should have seen them. They're like two love-smitten teenagers.” She sat again, this time in her easy chair. “It was disgusting."
Trace snapped his fingers. “Maybe we've been going at this in the wrong way.” A slow smile spread across his face. “How serious are you about wanting to break up this little love affair?"
Recollections of events from today's lunch played through Lynn's mind. “I'm dead serious."
Once more, Trace was on his feet and pacing across the floor. “I have a plan that just might work.” He stopped suddenly. “It's a little extreme."
Extreme Lynn could live with. “Just as long as it's not illegal, I'm game.” Little did she know then that those hasty words would come back to haunt her later.
Chapter 4
Trace stopped his pacing and sat in an uncomfortable straight-backed chair as a devious plan formed in his head. “What would your mother say if she saw you behaving with some man the way she was behaving with my dad today?"
Lynn snorted, “She'd be fit to be tied, and I'd get the tongue lashing of my life."
Trace nodded. “Exactly. And if my old man saw me carrying on with some...” he almost said floozy but caught himself in time. “...woman, he'd be livid."
Lynn wrinkled her nose. “So?"
"So don't you see? That's the answer.” Trace was on his feet and once more moving restlessly around the room. “We will give our parents a dose of their own medicine."
"How can we do that?"
Trace drew a deep breath. “We pretend to have the hots for each other."
Lynn had the audacity to laugh. “That's ridiculous.” She sobered before adding, “My mother would see right through that little charade. She knows me too well to believe I'd fall for some muscle bound hunk."
That remark had all the trappings of an insult but Trace let it pass. “Would you have believed before today that your mother would ‘fall for’ my dad?"
Lynn admitted, somewhat reluctantly, “No, I wouldn't. Mother is a very practical and pragmatic person.” She tagged her statement with a qualifying, “Well, usually."
Trace lifted the straight back chair and placed it in front of Lynn before sitting in it. Leaning forward, he put his hands on his knees. “It's all in the presentation. If we take our time and lay a foundation of believability, we can make this work."
Lynn's disdain converted to uncertainty. “I don't know. It seems like an underhanded thing to do."
Trace knew he was taking a big chance when he said, “If you're not interested, I'll take my self and my contract and go."
His words had the desired effect. Lynn shook her head quickly from side to side. “No, don't do that."
Trace leaned back and laced his fingers behind his head. His chest expanded and his biceps flexed. “Then can we talk business?"
Lynn swallowed and looked away. “After we sign the contract and set up a schedule for you to work on my building.” She glanced again in his direction. “Then we can discuss how to make our parents think we're an item."
This woman drove a hard bargain. That realization both pleased and angered Trace. He took a folded piece of paper from his shirt pocket. “I have a better idea.” He handed Lynn the folded sheet. “Here's the contract. Read it carefully. I'll be back tomorrow morning. If the terms are agreeable to you, we can both sign on the dotted line and I'll go to work immediately on your building."
He got up and sidled toward the front door. “Then we can discuss our plans to break up this little affair between your mother and my dad. See you tomorrow.” Before she had time to protest or argue, he slipped out the entranceway and hastened down the rickety stairs.
Once inside his pickup, Trace breathed a sigh of relief before starting the motor and heading in the direction of the rented bungalow he shared with his dad.
Ralph had prepared a meal of sorts. An opened can of pork and beans and a pan of well-browned cornbread sat on the kitchen table. “Grab a paper plate Son,” he invited, “And help yourself. I'll get you something to drink. What will it be, beer or water?"
"Water.” Trace washed his hands at the kitchen sink and dried them on a paper towel before grabbing a paper plate from the cabinet and sitting at the table.
Ralph filled a glass with water and put it beside Trace's plate. “You're a little late.” He sat across from his son. “How did it go today?"
Trace crumbled cornbread in his plate and covered it with half the contents of the can. “I got a repair job. I'll be doing some work on an old building over on Commercial Street. The owner of the building is one hot little number.” He wasn't lying, exactly. He was just playing fast and loose with the truth. He decided that in this case, the ends justified the means. “Yes, sir, one really hot little number."
Ralph smiled, “So your boss is a woman? I suppose you already have her wrapped around your little finger."
Trace thought of Lynn Evans with her red curls and fiery temper and chuckled. “Not exactly."
"You will before it's over,” Ralph replied, and then urged, “Take all the beans. I'm not hungry tonight."
Trace's concern was immediate. “Are you sick?"
"Nope, I just had a big lunch."
Trance wanted to ask the old man what else he'd had. Instead he said, “I hope you aren't overdoing it."
Ralph bristled, “Will you stop treating me like an invalid? I'm fit as a fiddle,” He stared across the table at his son, obviously waiting for Trace's terse reply.
Trace kept his mouth shut. If his plan to break up his dad's little affair was to succeed, he'd have to learn to bridle his tongue.
Ralph raised one shaggy eyebrow. “What? No lecture?"
"Maybe I've been a little rough on you.” Trace pushed his half-filled plate aside. “What's for dessert?"
"You've been damn rough on me, and we don't have any dessert.” Ralph picked up his newspaper. “I'm hitting the sack. I've had a hard day."
Trace could believe that.
At the door Ralph paused. “Are you sure
you're
all right?"
"Right as rain,” Trace answered.
Later as Trace prepared for bed he congratulated himself. It wasn't often that he could outfox his old man. As he drifted into a dreamless sleep a nagging possibility surfaced. What if his plan didn't work? His dad was all he had left in this world. Everyone else he had ever loved had been taken from him: his wife, his mother, his baby girl. Whatever the cost, whatever the consequences, he had to save his dad. Trace's last waking thought was,
it will work—it has to.
The next morning Trace arrived at The Upper Crust as Lynn was unlocking the front door. He pushed around her and came inside. “I'm ready to go to work. I'll do the outside repairs first. Nothing I have to do out there will disturb your customers. The inside work is a different story. It will have to be done after store hours. We can talk about that later."
Lynn flipped the sign on her door so that it read
Open
instead of
Closed
. Anxiety sounded in her voice. “We haven't signed the contract yet. You can't start work until we do.” She pointed to a small table in one corner of the room. “Sit down. Would you like a cup of coffee and a donut?"
Trace's breakfast had consisted of a bowl of dry cereal and a burned piece of toast. “That sounds good to me.” He sat and discovered that his long legs wouldn't fit under the table.
Turning to one side, he studied the room. It was clean and inviting. Posters and advertisements decorated the walls, and a showcase counter ran across one end of the room. A long table holding a huge coffee urn, Styrofoam cups, cream and sugar occupied a space near the entrance. Tables and chairs were scattered intermittently around the remaining space.