Sketcher in the Rye: (17 page)

“Why don't you ask
them
?”

“Right now I'm asking you.”

“I know Matthew used to have a thing for Lacey, and it really annoyed her. That's all I've got.”

Time for the bait and switch. It had done a good job of rattling his brother's composure. “What do you think about the sabotage at Harper Farms?” she asked.

Luke didn't miss a beat. “It's not good for the bottom line, and it's added to my workload—you do the math.”

“Your dad seems pretty positive Greenbrier's behind it. Do you agree with him?”

“Sure, why not? My dad and Roger have a lot of history, most of it bad.”

“All right, that is it for now,” Rory said, returning her pen and pad to her handbag and pulling on her jacket. Luke walked her to the front door with more enthusiasm than he'd exhibited up until then. But who could blame him? She had yet to meet anyone who enjoyed a good grilling. She handed him her card before leaving. “Give me a call if you think of anyone who can support your alibi.”

“Yeah,” he said, “as soon as I pull one out of my bag of tricks.”

Rory slid into her car and turned on the engine, expecting the marshal to pop in beside her. Although she'd worried about him losing his temper with Luke, he'd been exceptionally well behaved. But maybe that was because he'd checked out early and gone home. As if in answer to her thoughts, the marshal appeared in the passenger seat. He was wearing the self-satisfied grin of the cat who'd eaten the canary along with its extended family.

“I'm almost afraid to ask,” she said, pulling away from the curb, “what kept you?”

“Some unfinished business. I didn't care much for Luke's attitude, so I left him a little partin' gift.”

“Can you be more specific?” She realized she was cringing in anticipation of his answer.

“I piled all the clothin' that was scattered around the room into the fireplace. And no, I didn't actually start a fire there,” he added, “though it was mighty temptin'.”

Rory started giggling in spite of herself. “We've discussed this before,” she said, trying to sound serious. “You can't keep doing weird things to people when I'm around. One day some sharp reporter is going to connect the dots.”

“I'm aware of your thinkin' on the subject and for the most part I agree. But a few unexplained incidents won't go causin' any problems. Besides, Luke deserved some comeuppance for the way he treated you. I'd be willin' to wager that he'll be a mite less cocky now that he's worried about his sanity.”

“Okay, I suppose he did deserve that,” she conceded. “I'm just sorry I didn't get to see his reaction when he discovered his clothes were bent on self-immolation.”

“There is one other thing,” Zeke added.

Oh no. “What else did you do?”

“I may have found a few thumb tacks and dropped them on the floor—pointy ends up. He really ought to be wearin' shoes when he's entertainin'.”

Chapter 20

It was Thanksgiving morning, and for the first time in her life, Rory wasn't looking forward to the day. In the past it had always been a warm and cozy family time, highlighted by her mom's delicious cooking, but this year was going to be different. Not only was it the last Thanksgiving they'd celebrate in her childhood home, but Aaron and Zeke were also going to be in attendance. Since her impromptu baking date with Aaron, she was more comfortable with the idea of him sharing the day with her family, but the marshal was, as usual, an unknowable quantity.

The second pumpkin pie came out of the oven looking every bit as fine as the first one. After Rory was dressed and ready to go, she placed it in the sturdy pie carrier she'd bought for that purpose. With increasingly distracted and aggressive drivers, it was a miracle anyone reached their destination intact these days. The least she could do for her little masterpiece was to provide it with some form of protection against the vagaries of travel.

She hooked Hobo's leash into his collar and called out to let Zeke know she was leaving.

“You're goin' already?” he asked, his voice a moment ahead of his appearance. “Do you have the turkey for breakfast?”

“No, of course not. I get there early to help my mom. Helene does too. Actually I'm not sure how much help we are, but our intentions are good and we have a lot of fun together. It's a woman thing,” she added in answer to the befuddled expression on his face. “You know, like men bonding over sports.” The comparison didn't seem to make it any clearer to Zeke. “What did men enjoy doing together in your time?” she asked, for want of another example.

“I don't know,” Zeke said. “Playin' poker, drinkin', ridin' with a posse if there was a need. Is that what you're gettin' at?”

“I guess.” When you came right down to it, there wasn't that much difference between betting on a hand of cards or on a sporting event. Or drinking hard liquor instead of beer. But when she tried to come up with the modern equivalent of riding with a posse, she was stumped. Of course teenager boys had loved cruising in their cars from the time of the first horseless carriages, but as far as she knew, they were hunting down girls, not bank robbers and gunslingers.

“So when does the shindig really get started?” Zeke asked her.

“My mom usually tells guests to be there at two.” Rory wasn't sure what a shindig entailed, but she hoped the marshal wasn't expecting anything elaborate. “It's not like there's going to be music and dancing,” she pointed out. “We'll spend most of the afternoon eating way too much, and when we're sure we can't stuff another thing in our mouths, we'll have dessert.” Maybe if she stressed how much food figured into the celebration, Zeke would change his mind and opt to stay home.

“Then I'll pop on over at two,” he said, shattering that hope.

***

Zeke showed up shortly after Cousin George, who'd had to check out of his hotel room at one. He let Rory know he'd arrived with a gentle tap of energy on her shoulder. Before he'd perfected that simple act, she'd had a hard time explaining to people why she was suddenly tumbling off a chair or stumbling across a room as if she'd been propelled by gale force winds.

The gentle pat was much easier on her nerves as well as her body.

Aaron was the last guest to arrive. When Rory opened the door for him, he greeted her with a chaste peck on the cheek, the kind one received from a distant relative. Although she would have liked a kiss more like the one at the end of their baking date, she was glad he was playing it low-key around her family.

She led the way into the kitchen so he could meet her mother and greet his fellow thespian. He seemed perfectly at ease making small talk with them until Arlene asked if he wouldn't prefer hanging out with the men, who were watching football. And off he went to the family room.

A few minutes later, Arlene took the spoon away from Rory, who was stirring the gravy. “I appreciate all your help, but you should go be a hostess to your guest,” she said in her don't-quibble tone of voice. Rory didn't want to shine a spotlight on their relationship with her family in the audience, not to mention the marshal, who already had a lousy track record with regard to Aaron. But her mother didn't seem to share that sentiment, and there was clearly no hope of enlisting her aunt as an ally. Helene had had a goofy-looking smile plastered on her face from the moment Aaron walked through the door. She was positively aglow with her triumphant turn as Cupid after all her years of dismal failure. Suppressing a sigh, Rory marched off to the family room, from which a round of raucous cheering had just erupted. Behind her, she heard Helene remark that someone must have hit a home run. Her aunt had always had trouble sorting out the lingo associated with each sport, and after endless efforts, they'd all given up trying to teach her. Hobo chose to stay in the kitchen, where he could guard the food and beg for the occasional sample.

Since her father and George were installed in the two armchairs, Rory joined Aaron on the couch. She thought she'd left enough room between them not to raise even Zeke's critical eyebrows, but the couch was old, the suspension shot, and Aaron had a good eighty pounds on her. In no time she was sliding downhill to him. Not that he seemed to mind. He put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her more tightly to him. Her father and George were too hooked into the football game to notice. But the marshal, who had surely followed her into the room, had no interest whatsoever in that sport.

“Relax,” Aaron said, massaging her shoulder, “your muscles are tight as a knot.”

“That's because we womenfolk have been slaving over a hot stove for hours to create a lavish spread for you menfolk.” Or possibly, because we're also entertaining a federal marshal straight out of the nineteenth century, complete with that era's moral code. Although Zeke had promised to behave today, this wouldn't be the first time he'd broken such a vow. After several minutes passed without any paranormal hoopla, Rory exhaled a sigh of relief.

At halftime her father and George got up to stretch their legs and wound up following their noses into the kitchen to see how dinner was coming along. “It was great of your mom to include me today,” Aaron said once they were alone.

“I'm glad you're here,” she said, meaning it more than she'd thought she would, in spite of the inherent dangers. With their faces only inches apart, it seemed completely natural when Aaron leaned closer and kissed her. It was a brief kiss that was over in seconds, but as their lips parted, Rory heard a grumble like the groaning of old floorboards or the moaning timbers of a house in high wind. Since the house was barely thirty years old and there was currently no wind, she could only attribute the sound to ghostly displeasure. But when she glanced up at Aaron, he didn't appear to have heard anything out of the ordinary. Maybe she'd imagined it. She really had to stop worrying about Zeke's reaction to everything. Right, talk about easier said than done. It was a good bet he'd considered the kiss a public display of affection and therefore terribly improper. Of course it wouldn't have been public if he hadn't been there, and Aaron certainly had no way of knowing there was an invisible pair of eyes watching his every move. But that was a bit of reasoning that could easily have eluded the marshal. In spite of all the time they'd spent together, she didn't understand how a man of generally sound logic and keen perceptions could have such obvious and irritating blind spots.

Aaron tipped her chin up so that he was looking into her eyes for a moment before he bent his head to kiss her again. “Ow, what the—,” he yelped, jerking his arm back from her shoulder. When he pushed up the sleeve of his sweater, Rory saw a small red welt on his wrist.

“What happened?” she asked, although she already had a pretty good idea.

“I don't know,” he said, rubbing the spot. “It felt like a bee sting, but there aren't any bees around this time of year.”

No, Rory thought, but there are ghosts. And she happened to know one in particular who'd learned how to narrow and concentrate his energy into a fine point that might feel like a sting and leave a bruise like the one Aaron was now examining. “Can I get you a bandage or anything?” she asked.

Aaron shook his head. “No, the skin's not broken. It'll be fine. I wouldn't mind knowing what caused it though.”

Since Rory knew the cause, she was wishing exactly the opposite. She thought about demanding a meeting with the marshal in the privacy of the bathroom, but she decided to postpone such a discussion until they were home. There was always a chance that it might devolve into a heated argument and make matters worse. In the interests of a peaceful holiday, she counted slowly to ten, then twenty and on up to thirty, at which point her anger began to subside.

When her unofficial chaperones returned to their seats, she was both relieved and annoyed with herself for feeling that relief. What twenty-first-century woman in her right mind worries about the consequences of a brief kiss from the man she's dating? Stop it, she scolded herself. If she didn't shut down that train of thought, it was going to plough right through the safety crossing in spite of all the warning lights.

By the time her mother called everyone to dinner, Rory finally had her runaway emotions under control. Now if she could just make it through the rest of Thanksgiving without any more drama, she'd consider the day a success. Her father took his place at the head of the table. Rory sat to his right, with Aaron across the table from her and George on her other side. Helene was seated next to her acting buddy. And after setting the drunken cranberry sauce on the table, Arlene claimed the chair opposite her husband. Hobo took up his usual place at her father's side.

At first everyone was busy passing around all the platters and casseroles. But after a few minutes, the conversation started up again with George's praise of the cranberry sauce.

“Arlene, you've outdone yourself,” he said with a blissful smile. “What's in this cranberry sauce that makes it so irresistible?”

“Probably all the brandy,” Helene replied for her sister. “The first time she made it, I didn't realize how much brandy she used, and I wound up with a hangover.”

“That's probably because you guzzled nearly the whole bowl by yourself,” Dan said. “Moderation has never been your strong suit.”

“Well, I'd rather be known for excess than moderation,” Helene told him indignantly. “No one is ever remembered for their moderation.”

“But excess often leads to an early demise.”

“Moderation can lead to boring yourself to death.”

Rory was enjoying the sharp interchange between them that was as much a part of their get-togethers as the meal itself. But Aaron looked as if he wasn't sure whether to laugh or call for peace talks.

“Welcome to my family,” she said brightly to dispel his concerns. “My dad and my aunt always graciously supply our dining entertainment.”

“They're worse than siblings,” Arlene said, shaking her head. “Very immature siblings.”

Between mouthfuls, George came up for air. “Look who's talking,” he said to Arlene. Then he launched into a story about when he and the sisters were kids and spent summers with their families in upstate New York. “These two siblings,” he said, pointing to the sisters, “were constantly sniping at each other. They'd concoct elaborate practical jokes to play on one another too. Somehow I always got caught in the middle and wound up in more trouble than either of them.”

Rory didn't remember ever hearing about that time in their lives. She was listening so raptly to the tales of their exploits that she didn't immediately notice that Aaron was choking.