Wife for Hire

Chapter 4

The rump roast got boring after a while. It had burned itself into a charred chunk about the size of a baseball. It was black enough to look like a Cajun delicacy and had the density of a meteorite.

“So,” Maggie said, “anyone ready for dessert?”

“I think I’ll pass,” Linda Sue said. “I have to be getting on home now.”

Holly tiptoed around the mashed potatoes on the back porch, following Linda Sue. “Yeah, me too. This has been great, but it’s getting late.”

Harry Mallone clamped a hand on his son’s shoulder. It was a gesture of condolence usually reserved for sickrooms, wakes, and the passing on of a severance check.

Hank chose to ignore the obvious. “About that loan-”

Helen Mallone gave Maggie a hug. “I’m going to take Harry home now, and don’t worry about the roast, dear. Hank never was much of one for leftovers. Maybe it’s all worked out for the best,” she said gently.

Elsie met Maggie in the kitchen. “Do I smell something burning?”

Maggie sniffed the air. “I think that’s the pot roast. Fluffy knocked over a candlestick and the tablecloth caught fire. Hank dragged it all out into the backyard.”

Elsie looked through the screen door at the smoldering rubbish. “It don’t look so bad. You didn’t burn down anything important. Is that black chunk the pot roast?”

“Yup.”

“I’ve eaten worse,” Elsie said.

Half an hour later the remains of the fire had been shoveled into a garbage bag, the floors were fresh scrubbed, and the unbroken dishes had been washed and dried. Mabel and Aunt Marvina, Elsie, Hank, and Maggie sat at the kitchen table, eating pie and ice cream.

“I remember my first party as a new bride,” Mabel Toone said. “I’d only been married for three weeks and I had dinner for fourteen on Christmas Eve.”

“I can see it like it was yesterday,” Marvina said. “I wore that green velvet dress with the rhinestones on the bodice. Everything was perfect, except that Great-aunt Sophie had too much to drink and fell into the pineapple upside-down cake. Her elbow slipped off the table,” Marvina explained, “and Sophie went face first into the whipped cream. It made a terrible mess.”

“We didn’t mean to interfere with your party,” Mabel said to Maggie. “It’s just that we were worried about you, so we came to check up.”

“Mom, I’m twenty-seven years old. I can take care of myself.”

“You left in such a hurry, and all you said was that you were going to live with this man in Vermont. We weren’t even sure you were getting married. There’s something fishy here. Are you…?”

Maggie put her finger on her fluttering eyebrow. “No. I’m not pregnant.”

Mabel Toone looked Hank over. “Did he force you into this? Did he kidnap you? He looks a little shifty to me.”

“I wasn’t kidnapped,” Maggie said. “I needed a quiet place to write my book, and Hank sort of showed up…”

Mabel looked horrified. “You mean you got married so you could write a book?”

“Yes. No!” She didn’t want her mother to worry about her. And she didn’t want her mother to think she was an idiot. “I got married because…I wanted to.”

Hank inched his chair closer to Maggie and slung his arm around her shoulders. “Love at first sight,” he told Mabel. “As soon as we saw each other we knew this was it.” He gave Maggie a big, loud kiss on the top of the head. “Go ahead, buttercup, tell your mother how much you love me.”

“Uh…I love him lots.”

Mabel didn’t look convinced. “I don’t know.”

Hank loosened his hold on Maggie. His chin rested against the mass of orange curls over her ear, and his voice grew softer, more serious.

“I know this must be difficult for you, Mrs. Toone. You’re worried about Maggie, and I don’t blame you. We shouldn’t have been so secretive about our romance, but the truth is, it sort of took us by surprise. I think it would be nice if you and Aunt Marvina could stay with us for a few days. I’d like the opportunity to get to know you better.”

His fingertips lightly combed through the wisps of hair at Maggie’s temple, and a rush of tenderness for the woman he held in his arms almost left him breathless. “I love your daughter,” he told Mabel Toone. “And I intend to take very, very good care of her.”

“I guess a mother couldn’t ask for more than that,” Mabel said. “It’s nice of you to invite us to stay, but we’ve got a room at one of those bed-and-breakfast places, and then we’ve got to get back to Riverside. Marvina has an appointment to get a permanent on Thursday, and nobody will water my plants. Besides,” she said with a broad smile, “I know how it is with newlyweds.”

Hank made a masculine sound of appreciation. It hummed against Maggie’s ear, sending vibrations all the way to the soles of her feet. In spite of all her good resolve, she felt herself relax into him.

It was almost impossible not to like Hank Mallone. He might be a womanizer and a schemer, but he was also sensitive and charming and there was something about Hank Mallone that touched her. He didn’t just heat her blood-he also warmed her soul. It was nice, and it was sad. And it was infuriating that he’d lied so smoothly about loving her. Hank Mallone was a rascal, she thought.

“Well,” Mabel said, “we should be getting on. The pie was delicious,” she said to Elsie. She gave her daughter a kiss and hugged her son-in-law. “You keep in touch.”

“They’re nice people,” Hank said when he and Maggie were left alone on the front porch. “They really care about you.”

He was being generous, Maggie decided. He could have said they were meddlesome. “You think I’m a bad daughter?”

He laughed. “No. I think you’re struggling to find a balance between being a daughter and being an in de pen dent adult. And I think you’re mother’s struggling to relate to an adult child.”

She looked thoughtful for a moment, then asked. “Do you think your father will give you the loan?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t look too happy when he left.” He tugged at an orange curl. “I don’t suppose you’d consider getting pregnant?”

“No. I don’t suppose I would.”

“Just checking.”

Maggie was used to hearing cars leaving the parking lot first thing in the morning. She was used to the sound of the garbagemen emptying the dumpster, and to hearing old Mr. Kucharski’s smoker’s cough, as he shuffled overhead from bedroom to bathroom. They were sounds she’d always hated, and it surprised her to find that she missed them. She dragged herself out of bed, shrugged into a worn navy T-shirt and cutoff gray sweats, and padded barefoot to the kitchen, following the smell of fresh-made coffee.

Hank was already at the table. He looked up and groaned. His worst fears and best fantasies were coming home to roost. Maggie Toone was a vision of morning allure with her mussed hair and sleep-softened face. She poured herself a cup of coffee and immediately took a sip. She’d been about to say something, but the plea sure of that first sip of coffee erased all thought. Instead, she smiled and gave a contented sigh.

Elsie took a tray of homemade cinnamon rolls from the oven and knocked them out into a napkin-lined basket. “Don’t think I’m going to do this every day,” she said. “It’s just that I felt like eating cinnamon buns this morning.”

Maggie sniffed at them. “They smell great.”

“Yeah, they’re pretty good,” Elsie said. “There’s cereal in the cupboard and juice in the refrigerator. You’re supposed to be a wife, so I guess you could help yourself.” She took a bun and broke it up in a bowl for Horatio. “He’s got a sweet tooth,” she said to Hank.

“Yeah,” Hank said, “and you’ve got a soft heart.”

“Well, don’t let it get around,” Elsie said. “People take advantage.”

A huge bear of a man ambled through the back door. “Howdy,” he said. “Smells like cinnamon buns here. Boy, I love cinnamon buns.”

Elsie looked at Hank. “He belong to you?”

“Afraid so. This is my best friend, Bubba.”

Bubba turned his attention to Maggie. “Wow,” he said softly. “I don’t mean to stare, but what happened to the rest of your pants?”

Maggie tugged at the cutoff sweats. “I wasn’t expecting company.”

“I’m not company,” Bubba said. “I’m Bubba.”

“I’m Maggie,” she said, shaking his hand.

Bubba took a cinnamon bun and tore off a huge chunk. “So, why’d you have to go and get married?” he said to Hank. “One day you just disappeared, and we all thought you got run out of town by some husband, or something. Then next thing here you are married.” He leaned across the table and lowered his voice. “Is she pregnant?”

“No. I’m not pregnant,” Maggie said. “Do you want coffee?”

“Do bears crap in the woods?” Bubba said grinning.

Maggie rolled her eyes and poured the coffee. “I’d like to stay and chat, but I have work to do.” She took a roll and her coffee and eased herself out of the kitchen.

“She’s pretty,” Bubba said, “but I still don’t see why you had to marry her.”

“She just begged and begged,” Hank told him. “It was pitiful.”

Maggie paused halfway to the stairs and considered going back into the kitchen to strangle her fake husband. He had a diabolical sense of humor, and he loved provoking her. Strangling would be satisfying, she thought, but it involved touching, and probably it was best to avoid physical contact. Once she got started there was no telling what she might do.

By ten-thirty she was flying through Chapter One. Bubba had left and Hank was working in his orchard with a machine that was going “thunk, thunk, thunk.” The day’s heat was filtering through the open window as Maggie tapped a sentence into her computer. She paused to study what she’d written.

She supposed most people would frown on what Aunt Kitty had done, but she didn’t feel it was her place to judge. Aunt Kitty had lived to be ninety-three years old, and Maggie had known her as an old woman. She’d been kind, intelligent, and in love with life. Her diary had been filled with wonderful trivia, pressed flowers, romantic images, and from time to time the confessions of self-doubt and regret of a woman who’d spent the prime of her life in disrepute.

The bulk of the diary consisted of the day-to-day business of running a bordello, and this is what Maggie found most fascinating: The number of linens purchased, the salary of the piano player, the garters ordered from a specialty shop in New Orleans, the bills from the iceman, coal company, green grocer. Mixed in with all of this were descriptions of customers, hilarious anecdotes, and trade secrets that were for the most part unpublishable.

Two hours later Hank stood in the open door to Maggie’s study and watched her work. She looked completely absorbed in her project. She was typing rapidly, occasionally referring to the pad at her elbow, occasionally stopping to read from the screen. She muttered something and gestured with her hand. She shook her head and began typing again.

Desire slid through him. If he hadn’t been holding her lunch in his hand, he might have locked the door behind him and taken his chances. As it was, he watched her for a moment more, trying to understand her determination.

He found it hard to take this writing business seriously. Maybe if she’d wanted to write science fiction, or a book for kids…but a book about a madam? It seemed more like a hobby or a whim to him. Like looking up your genealogy. And it seemed presumptuous to simply sit down to write a book. He imagined there were skills to be learned, a style to be developed. It probably wasn’t much different from growing apple trees, he thought. First you had to acquire a lot of knowledge, and then you had to make a lot of mistakes.

In the meantime she was going to be the scandal of Skogen, and she was going to ruin his last chance to get a loan. He should be furious. But he wasn’t. He understood about crazy ideas and substituting enthusiasm for expertise. And he was head over heels in love with her.

He rapped on the doorjamb to get her attention. “I brought you some lunch,” he said.

She put her hand to her heart. “You startled me!”

“Mmmm. You look pretty wrapped up in this. How’s it going?”

“Great! I’ve researched and planned this book for two years, and it’s practically writing itself. I’ve had it all in my head, you see-” She bit into the egg salad sandwich. “Probably when I get farther into the book it’ll slow down, but it’s so satisfying to finally see it on the screen.”

“Do I get to read it?”

“When I’m farther along.” She wolfed down her sandwich, drank her iced tea, and wiped her mouth. “That was good. Thanks. I didn’t realize I was so hungry.”

Hank took the plate and the empty glass. “Elsie’s going into town. She wants to know if you need anything.”

“Nope. I’m fine.”

He hated to leave her. He wanted to stay and talk and learn about all the horrible things she did as a kid. He wanted to know if she was ever afraid or lonely or discouraged. He wanted to know about the men in her life and how she felt about babies. He searched for an excuse to prolong lunch.

“Would you like dessert? Elsie made chocolate chip cookies this morning.”

“I’m absolutely stuffed. Maybe later.”

“Okay, ’bye.”

It was six o’clock and Elsie was bustling around the kitchen. “We got chicken soup for supper tonight,” she said, slapping plates and bowls onto the kitchen table. “There’s corn bread in the oven and chocolate pudding in the refrigerator for dessert.”

Hank looked at the two place settings. “Aren’t you eating with us? Is there something good on television again?”

“I got a date. I met this nice young man in town today. He don’t look a day over sixty-five. We’re going to get a burger, and then he said there’s a bingo game in Mount Davie.”

Hank mentally reviewed all the old men in town. “Is this Ed Garber?”

“Yup. That’s him. Said he was the postmaster until he retired, and that his wife had died three years ago.”

“Better watch out,” Hank said. “I hear he only has one thing on his mind.”

“Lord bless him, and he likes to play bingo too. Life don’t get much better than that.”

Elsie took her apron off and put it in a drawer. “I saw that Linda Sue at the supermarket today. She was checking out groceries, and I tell you she could put a newspaper right out of business. Everywhere I went in town people were talking about you getting married to a dirty book writer. I wouldn’t hold my breath for that loan. Your reputation’s about as good as snake spit.”

“She’s not a dirty book writer. She’s writing about her Aunt Kitty.”

Elsie looked skeptical. “Don’t get me wrong. I like Maggie. She’s got something to her. And if I were you and had to make a choice, I’d take Maggie over an apple press any day of the year.”

Hank smiled at her. “You’re a pretty smart lady.”

“You’d better believe it, and I’m in good shape for being so old too.”

She took her purse from the counter when Ed Garber knocked at the front door.

“You’d better go pull Maggie’s nose out of that computer and get her down here while the corn bread’s hot. And it wouldn’t hurt to do something with her after supper. It isn’t natural for a body to sit that long. All her insides will get cramped up. I once knew someone who sat all day like that and nature never could take its course. Before you know it, you’re taking prunes and milk of magnesia when all you ever needed in the first place was to go for a walk once in a while.”

Ed Garber looked in at Hank. “Howdy,” he said. “Nice day.”

“Yup. Good weather for growing apples.”

“You still growing them organic? Don’t you have more than your share of rot?”

“I have to work at it, but so far they look fine,” Hank said.

“I should stop around sometime and see how you do it. I’ve got an apple tree in my backyard that’s plain pitiful.”

Hank closed the screen door on Elsie and Ed, and went upstairs after Maggie.

“Elsie says you have to come down to supper while the corn bread’s hot,” he told her. “And she says your insides will cramp up if you sit here much more. Then nature won’t be able to take its course, and you’ll have to eat prunes.”

Maggie finished typing a sentence and saved her file. “You sound skeptical, but she’s probably right.”

“I’m supposed to make sure you get exercise.”

Maggie shut the computer down. “I could use some exercise. We could go for a walk after supper.”

“That was my second choice.”

She wasn’t going to ask him about choice number one. “Would it hurt the apple trees if we walked through the orchard?”

“Nope. It’s crisscrossed with truck paths.”

In the kitchen Maggie ladled out the soup and took the corn bread from the oven. They sat across from each other in companionable silence while they ate.

“This is nice,” she finally said. “I always hated eating supper alone. Sometimes I’d set the table and fuss with a meal, but most of the time I stuck a frozen burrito in the micro wave and ate standing up.”

He grinned at her. “Does your mother know that?”

She laughed. “My mother is afraid to ask. And if my mother’s neighbor Mrs. Ciak ever found out…” Maggie shook her head. “My mother would be disgraced forever.” She buttered another piece of corn bread.

“At night, in my parents’ neighborhood, no one draws the shades downstairs. It would mean that you didn’t want anyone to see in. People would speculate that your house wasn’t clean. And all the women have dryers, but they still hang sheets outdoors because if you don’t someone might think your sheets weren’t white enough to be seen. I know it sounds silly, but it makes me feel claustrophobic. All those unwritten rules. All those comparisons. And as much as I tried, I could never fit my square peg into Riverside ’s round hole. I guess I was too stubborn.”

“I notice you’re using that in the past tense.”

Maggie chewed her corn bread. “I’m better now.” Hank raised his eyebrows and Maggie laughed. “You’re right, I’m still stubborn. But being stubborn can be good when you’re an adult. Now I like to think of myself as having tenacity, strength of conviction, and character.”

Hank pushed away from the table. He went to the refrigerator, took out two puddings, and gave one to Maggie. “Is that why you wanted to come to Vermont? To get away from the white sheets and open windows?”

“I wanted to make a new beginning. I needed to be anonymous.”

Hank averted his eyes and dipped his spoon into his pudding. It sounded to him like she’d jumped from the frying pan into the fire. Skogen was the gossip capital of the free world. He was sure every person in town knew what Maggie had worn last night, what she’d eaten, and what she’d said. And they were judging her. Riverside wasn’t the only town where sheets were hung out to dry. It wasn’t something he wanted to tell her right now. She’d find out soon enough for herself. And if she gave the town half a chance, she’d find out it had some redeeming qualities too.

They cleaned the kitchen and set out for their walk with Horatio trotting close on their heels. There was still plenty of sunlight so Hank headed south, taking a truck path that crossed the longest stretch of his property. It was July and the trees were thick with immature apples.

“What will happen to these apples if you don’t get the loan?” Maggie wanted to know. “Will they just rot?”

“No. It’s not really that drastic. I belong to a coop. I can put them in controlled atmosphere storage, or I can wholesale them.”

“Oh.” There was a blank look to her face that told him she didn’t know much about the apple market.

“There are three ways you can market an apple,” he told her. “Direct marketing means that you sell your own product at your doorstep. Regional marketing is selling your product locally, like I do at Big Irma’s. And the third alternative is wholesale when you go through an apple broker and sell your apples in bulk. You make the least profit and run the greatest risk when you wholesale. I want to develop my direct and regional marketing. I want to cater to the visiting skiers and the affluent, nutrition-conscious yuppies that migrate here from Boston and New York. I’m not at full production yet. It will take another seven years before all my trees reach maturity, but already I’m producing the apples I need to diversify.”

“So you won’t go broke if you don’t get the loan.”

He picked up a stone and skimmed it across the dusty road. “It’s not entirely a matter of money. If I have a good crop, I won’t go broke, but I won’t make any progress either. I don’t need to be a millionaire, but I need to have something of my own. Some success that I made happen.” He looked over at her to see if she understood.

“I was the kid that almost got an A in school. I almost made it to big-time hockey. I almost graduated from college. It’s important to me to see this through to the end. Just once I need to reach the goal I’ve set for myself. It’s not an unrealistic goal. I should be able to achieve it.”

“How soon do you need the money?”

He looked at the apples hanging on the trees all around him. “Yesterday would have been good. Last week would have been better.” He watched her brows knit together, and he ruffled her hair. They were supposed to be walking to get her intestines uncramped, not to discuss his business.

“Don’t pay any attention to me. I’m too impatient. Sooner or later I’ll get the loan, and everything will work out. There’s always another apple crop. I know exactly what equipment I need. I have the ground set aside and all the utilities are in for a small bottling plant and a bakery.”

“Where are you going to build?”

“At the westernmost tip of my property. I could set the buildings back far enough from the road, behind a stand of Paula Reds, so they wouldn’t be an eyesore. The ground is level, and there’s a good water source.”

“How about labor?”

“To work in the bakery? Skogen is stable, but it isn’t flourishing. It could use the taxes and jobs I’d generate.”

“Hard to believe your father isn’t willing to invest in this.”

“My father never takes chances. He doesn’t even own a paisley tie-only stripes in subdued colors. He orders his shoes through a cata log and has worn the same style for thirty-five years. Every morning he has six ounces of orange juice, oatmeal, and a cup of black coffee. He wouldn’t consider a strip of bacon or a glass of cran-grape.”

“I probably shouldn’t have told him about Aunt Kitty.”

Hank took her hand and kissed a fingertip. “You were right to tell him. It wouldn’t do to start out a marriage with secrets, would it?”

Maggie groaned. She’d groaned partly because it was such a ridiculous thing for him to say, but mostly she’d groaned when his lips touched her skin. She snatched her hand away and stuffed it into the pocket of her shorts for safekeeping. “Were you really the scourge of Skogen?”

“I never thought of myself in exactly those terms, but I suppose I put fear into the hearts of a few mothers.”

Maggie had no trouble believing that.

“Physically I was one of those early maturers,” he told her with a grin. “Emotional maturity took a little longer. About fifteen years longer.”

“So, you think you’ve finally achieved it, huh?”

“Definitely. Look at me; I’m married and everything.”

“I don’t mean to burst your bubble, but you’re not married. You’re pretending to be married. Most people wouldn’t consider that to be a sign of mental health. And there is no everything. There isn’t even something.”

“You’re wrong,” he said nudging against her. “There’s something.”

She raised a haughty eyebrow.

His thumb brushed across the nape of her neck. “Go ahead, admit it. There’s something, isn’t there?”

A delicious shiver traveled the length of her spine. “There might be something.”

“Damn right,” he said, whirling her around, pulling her into the circle of his arms. His hands roamed over her back, pressing her closer, his mouth lowered to hers, and his tongue swept away what little resistance she’d been able to muster. He heard her small gasp of delight, felt her yield to him, and was immediately uncomfortable with the fit of his jeans. It was like being sent back to puberty, he thought. He was out of control. He was in love. And he was hurting. He pushed her away, holding her at arm’s length, and took a deep breath. “We could actually get married, you know.”

If he’d been serious, she would have been furious. As it was, she attributed his proposal to his awful sense of humor and his forced abstinence.

He pressed his lips together, feeling like a fool. “I can see that took you by surprise.”

“I’m getting used to being surprised. Besides, it wasn’t such a surprise. It was testosterone talking.”

He couldn’t deny it. Still, he’d lived with testosterone attacks for a lot of years, and he’d never before asked a woman to marry him. “So, what’s the answer?”

Maggie rolled her eyes.

“I suppose that’s a no.”

“Are you relieved?”

A small smile curved at the corners of his mouth. “Maybe a little.” He slid his hands down to her hips. “But not entirely. I like having you in my house.”

Maggie backed away. Smooth, she thought. He had good moves. Moves that were undoubtedly designed to throw her off guard. Disarming one minute, and then charming the next. He was clever all right, but she was cleverer. She didn’t trust him for a second.

“I think you’re just trying to get out of walking,” she said. “I think you’re lazy.”

The grin widened. “No, you don’t. You think I’m only out for one thing, and I’m sweet-talking you.”

She felt the flush creep into her cheeks. “Well, you are the scourge of Skogen.”

“True. But I’ve changed. All that’s behind me. It’s been years since I’ve been worth anything as a scourge.”

“What about Linda Sue and Holly?”

Linda Sue and Holly felt like part of his extended family. He’d grown up with them. They made girlfriend noises, but it had been a long time since he’d found them exciting. Not since high school, in fact. And anything in a skirt had been exciting when he was in high school. “Linda Sue and Holly are my friends.”

“Have you explained that to them lately?”

“Linda Sue and Holly are good at talking, short on listening.”