“I see you brought her some furniture.”
Well, at least he was observant, Linc thought a little sarcastically.
“I think she’ll be pleased with the sofa,” Mack was saying.
Linc hoped so. Hard to tell with Mary Jo. Or with any woman, he realized. He simply didn’t understand women or know how to communicate with them. Over the years he’d had a number of relationships, all of which had come to an abrupt end. The way he figured it, the fault must lie with him. Mary Jo had often told him he was too domineering, too bullheaded and a chauvinist to boot. He’d honestly tried to change, tried to be more sensitive, but that hadn’t worked, either. As far as he could tell, he was destined to remain unmarried. Until Noelle, the fact that he’d never have kids hadn’t bothered him.
It did now.
He loved his niece more than he ever could have foreseen. With Mary Jo and Noelle living in Cedar Cove, the house was strangely quiet and empty. Mel and Ned led busy lives; they were often out. They didn’t have the problems Linc did with women. They were both in relationships and he assumed they’d be married soon.
When Linc wasn’t at the house, he was at work. He ran the car repair shop his father had opened nearly fifty years earlier. Because he was the oldest, he considered it his duty to hold the family business, as well as the family, together. Ever since their parents’ deaths, he’d done his utmost to manage the shop, keep the peace and make sure everyone was okay.
“How’s Mary Jo doing?” Linc asked.
“Why don’t you ask me directly?” she said. She stood in the doorway of her half of the duplex, arms crossed. “It’s not like I’m living in China, you know.”
“Right.” For fear he might say or do something else to upset her, Linc shoved his hands into his pockets.
“Since you asked, I’m doing very well, thank you.”
“And Noelle?”
“The same.”
Linc cleared his throat and turned to Mack; the return stare told him he was on his own.
Gesturing to his truck, Linc said, “I brought you a housewarming gift.”
“Another one?”
“Ah…it seemed you could use more than one.”
Mary Jo smiled. “That was nice of you.”
Linc felt the tension ease from his shoulders and the back of his neck.
He handed over the stuffed leprechaun, which was added to Noelle’s growing pile of toys. Then, with Mack’s assistance, he hauled the sofa and chair into Mary Jo’s living room. She indicated where she wanted them, then changed her mind not once but twice. He wasn’t annoyed, and neither was Mack.
Noelle had been asleep but woke shortly after Mary Jo was satisfied with the arrangement of the furniture. Sitting down on the new chair, Linc held his niece, who smelled deliciously of baby powder and shampoo, and kissed her forehead. She yawned and arched her back, raising her elbows as she did. Babies fascinated him. At first, when Mary Jo had brought Noelle home, he’d been terrified of hurting her—dropping her or squeezing too tight. Gradually he’d become more relaxed around the infant. It helped that she’d outgrown the colic. As it was now, he could hold this little one for hours and be content.
“Do you want to feed her?” Mary Jo asked Linc, after seeing Mack to the door.
“I thought…you know, breasts…” The words seemed to stumble all over themselves and he knew he was blushing furiously.
“Since I work now, I’m using a breast pump.”
Some subjects were best not discussed between sister and brother. Breast pumps fell into that category. “I…think maybe you should feed her.” He knew he sounded gruff but couldn’t help it.
Noelle smiled up at him and he smiled back. He dared not look at his sister as he muttered, “Are you seeing a lot of that neighbor of yours?”
There was a short hesitation. “What makes you ask?”
Linc shrugged, grateful she hadn’t taken offense. “It’s just that he seems to be around every time I stop by.”
“He lives next door. What do you expect?”
Her reply held an edge that warned him against pursuing this line of questioning further. Difficult though it was, Linc didn’t ask anything else. If his sister did become involved with her neighbor, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. As long as Mack understood that Linc wouldn’t allow another man to take advantage of her.
He was well aware that Mary Jo would never talk to him again if he asked McAfee what his intentions were. Still, Linc wanted to know.
Mary Jo offered him dinner but he declined. He’d stayed too long already. It was time to hit the road.
After thanking him for the living room set, Mary Jo walked Linc to his truck. “Drive carefully, okay?”
“I will,” he promised.
“You know, don’t you, that it’s not necessary to check up on me every day?”
He shrugged in response.
“Or even every other day.”
He grinned.
“You don’t need to hold the family together anymore, Linc. We’re all adults. And we’re all capable of making our own decisions, learning from our own mistakes. You’re sweet to want to protect me, but it really isn’t necessary.”
Then, to his utter amazement, Mary Jo rose up on tiptoe, placed her hands on either side of his face and kissed his cheek.
As he drove away, Linc considered what she’d said. The truth was, he realized his sister was right. Mel and Ned didn’t like him looking over their shoulders, either, any more than Mary Jo did.
Rather than take the ferry home, Linc decided to drive across the Narrows Bridge. He hadn’t driven more than a mile down the freeway when he saw a car parked on the side of the road. The vehicle’s taillights flashed, indicating some kind of mechanical problem. A woman stood helplessly outside, obviously waiting for someone to stop.
Cars zoomed past. Linc didn’t want to stop. He’d had a long day, it was now dark, and he was tired. Besides, he had a ninety-minute drive ahead of him. As he neared the woman in distress, Linc knew that he couldn’t in good conscience drive by.
Parking his truck, he climbed down and walked toward the woman. She was delicate-looking, blond, petite. Smaller even than Mary Jo, who stood five-three.
“What’s the problem?” he asked.
The woman stared up at him as if he’d stepped out of a Friday the 13th movie. Her eyes widened in what appeared to be genuine panic.
Linc supposed he could be intimidating, although what she expected him to do to her on the freeway with cars barreling past, he couldn’t imagine.
“My name’s Linc Wyse and I’m a mechanic,” he explained, hoping an introduction would put her at ease.
“It…just stopped running. I was on my way to Gig Harbor and out of the blue, my car just stopped. I was fortunate to get it off the road before it went completely dead.”
“Did you call Triple A?” he asked.
“Ah, no…Well, yes, I did and learned that my membership had expired. I—I’ve gone through a bit of emotional turmoil lately and it must’ve slipped through the cracks.” She seemed ready to break into tears. “You don’t want to hear any of this. Sorry.”
She was right about that. He wasn’t interested in her personal problems. “Did the car choke before it quit running?”
She shook her head. “I tried to look under the hood, but I couldn’t figure out how to open it.”
Typical. Most women barely had a clue about the fundamentals of operating a vehicle.
He must have given some indication of his thoughts because she added, “I’m not stupid, you know.”
Linc knew better than to respond to that comment. He leaned in and released the hood lever, then walked around to the front of the vehicle. He raised the hood and quickly checked all the easy fixes.
The woman stood next to him and studied the engine. “That’s not quite true,” she said.
“I beg your pardon? What isn’t?”
“The thing I said about being stupid.” She gazed past him to t
he traffic streaming by. “You’ve been very kind, and I’m grateful.”
Praise disconcerted him, so he ignored her remark. “I don’t see anything wrong with your engine.”
“I can’t believe this is happening now, on top of everything else.”
“Everything else?” Linc wondered if he was going to regret asking.
“My fiancé. Geoff. Ex-fiancé, I should say. He’s a thief.” She bit down hard on her lower lip. “I broke off the engagement, and my family’s upset—not because I canceled the wedding but because I didn’t have the sense to know that the man I loved is completely unsuitable as a husband and a failure as a human being.” She expelled a deep sigh. “I apologize. None of this has to do with my car. Frankly I have no idea what I would’ve done if you hadn’t stopped. Calling my father wasn’t an option.”
This was the first time Linc had taken a good look at her…and he saw that she was even lovelier than he’d realized.
“You think you know someone and you think you love him and then you learn the truth and it’s just so…so heart-wrenching to discover that the person you loved isn’t the person you thought he was.”
Linc started to move away from the vehicle. “When’s the last time you gassed up?”
Her brow furrowed. “You think I might be out of gas?”
“Let me get in and see.” The woman seemed incapable of clear thought. Linc slid into the driver’s seat and turned the key. Sure enough, the needle pointed to empty.
Apparently she was going through some sort of emotional breakdown. Lucky him that he’d stumbled onto her path. This was what he got for playing the Good Samaritan. No good deed goes unpunished, and all that.
The woman slipped into the passenger seat next to him and shut the door. She began to tremble with what he assumed was the effort not to weep. “I’m so sorry. You’re being kind and I’m being hysterical. How stupid of me not to know I’d run out of gas.” She closed her eyes and lowered her head.
“It happens to the best of us,” Linc said in what he hoped was a comforting tone.
She turned to him with her nose red and her eyes swimming with tears. “Do you ever feel that nothing you do is right?” she asked him.
Despite the fact that he felt as if he’d stepped into the middle of a soap opera, Linc nodded.
“Me, too.”
This was becoming awkward. “I have a gas can in the back of my truck,” he said, eager now to be on his way. “I’ll drive to a gas station—pick up a couple of gallons. That should be enough to get you wherever you’re going.”
“You’re leaving me here?”
“Uh…Do you want to come with me?”
“Could I?”
Linc’s mind darted in ten different directions at once. He couldn’t believe he’d offered, any more than he could believe she’d asked.
To avoid wearing down her battery, he turned off the ignition and passed her the car keys.
“My name is Lori Bellamy,” she said and held out her hand.
He shook it, almost shocked by the softness of her skin against his calloused fingers. “Linc Wyse.”
“Hi, Linc.”
“Hi.” The awkwardness returned, the same unease he experienced whenever he was around women, especially petite ones. Small women like Lori made him feel clumsy and…too big. Linc moved carefully and spoke quietly, not wanting to overwhelm or frighten her.
He got out of her car, hurried to his truck and cleared off the passenger seat.
Once she’d clambered inside—with his assistance—she snapped the seat belt into place and smiled over at him. “Are you always this kind?”
“I have a sister,” he said. “If her car had broken down I’d want someone like me to stop and help.”
He started the engine and merged with the traffic. They sat in silence as he drove, but it wasn’t uncomfortable anymore, nor did he feel the need to make conversation. After a couple of minutes, she murmured, “You’re very easy to talk to.”
“Me?” he asked, startled.
She nodded. “You listened patiently even though I was saying the most ridiculous things.”
“Like what?”
She grimaced. “About Geoff. You stopped to help with my car—not to hear about the shambles my life’s in.”
“Sometimes it’s good to talk to a stranger.” Linc didn’t know that for a fact, but it made sense.
“Well, I certainly didn’t mean to blurt out the most humiliating details of my life.” She gave a short, embarrassed laugh. “My car running out of gas just seems to confirm that my life’s in a downward spiral.” She shrugged despondently. “I guess Geoff proved that I don’t have very good judgment about men.”
Linc grinned. “Then we’re equal. Because when it comes to male-female relationships I’m at a complete loss.” Feeling emboldened, deciding to take a chance, he took his eyes from the road long enough to look in her direction. “Would you like to have dinner with me?”
“Tonight?”
“Ah…sure.” Actually, any night would be fine with him. It wasn’t as if he had a calendar crammed with social events. “Tonight would work,” he said in an offhand way.
“Okay, but only if you let me treat, seeing all the trouble you’ve gone to on my behalf.”
He hesitated, afraid he was about to ruin the most promising encounter to come along in the past few years. “Sorry, I can’t do that. It’s not how my daddy raised me,” he added, trying to inject a bit of humor. He paused to gauge her reaction. “Call me old-fashioned, call me a male chauvinist, call me whatever you want, but I intend to pay for our dinner. I asked you out, remember?”
“Old-fashioned,” she repeated. “I prefer old-fashioned. Isn’t the term male chauvinist kind of dated, anyway?”
“You mean it’s old-fashioned?” he said, and they both laughed.
Linc found a gas station and asked the attendant for directions to the nearest restaurant. It was a mom-andpop burger joint. They ordered hamburgers and french fries and sodas and talked nonstop for two hours. Lori told him about Geoff, and he told her about his sister moving to Cedar Cove. Then he described his shop and how he’d changed the name to Three Wyse Men when he and his brothers took over. She explained that she worked in a boutique near the mall and had recently moved to Cedar Cove.
They might’ve stayed longer if he hadn’t noticed obvious signs that the place was closing. Linc hated to see the evening end. Unlike most women, Lori made him feel relaxed and comfortable. Their conversation interested him. Apparently neither of them was skilled at small talk, and when he mentioned that, she’d said, “So what? We’ll talk about big things, then.” And they had.
Everything changed once they were in the truck again and he was taking her back to retrieve her car. The silence seemed strained when it hadn’t been before. Linc didn’t understand why and wondered what he might’ve said to upset her. He decided to find out, but didn’t know how to broach the subject, how to ask what was bothering her.
“Linc?” She put her hand on his arm. “Do you mind if we just sit here for a moment?” He’d parked on the roadside, a few yards from her car.
“No…I mean—no, of course I don’t mind.”
She turned and stared at him with the biggest, darkest brown eyes he’d ever seen. “You have trouble with relationships, right?”
He nodded.
“I do, too. But I feel different with you.”
He nodded again, unsure how to explain his feelings in words.
“You’re a good person. You stopped to help me when everyone else drove past.” She gestured at her car. “No one cared except you.”
He wanted to brush aside her gratitude, but she seemed so intent that he didn’t speak for fear of destroying the mood.
“You care about your family, too, and you’ve kept your dad’s business going. I admire that.” She closed her eyes, then opened them. “I’m sick of it all.”
“Sick of what?” he asked, puzzled by the abrupt leap.
r /> “Dating.”
“Does that mean you won’t go out with me again?” He couldn’t keep the disappointment from his voice.
“No…listen, don’t say anything yet, but I’d like to suggest something so far out in left field you’ll probably jump out of your truck and head for the hills.”
“What?”
She chewed on her lip, then shook her head. “No, it’s too crazy. Never mind.”
Linc couldn’t imagine what she was about to suggest and wished she’d blurt it out, damn the consequences.
“I’m an old-fashioned kind of woman.” She paused. “Just like you’re an old-fashioned kind of guy.”
Linc agreed; he liked that about her.
“You seem to have problems with relationships and it’s the same way with me.”
Again, he agreed.
“You’re as sick of the whole dating game as I am, right?”
“Right.”
Lori drew in a deep breath. “You want to skip all that?”
“I…beg your pardon?” He was missing some step in her logic.
She kept her gaze fixed squarely on something ahead, although he couldn’t tell what. “Would you be interested in skipping all the stuff that leads up to…marriage?”
The silence seemed to echo. “Lori,” he said cautiously. “I might be wrong about this, and if I am, if I’m being presumptuous, forgive me.” He swallowed. “Are you asking me to marry you?”
She cleared her throat. “I know this is probably the most bizarre, impulsive thing you’ve ever heard, but I have to ask.”
“You’re serious?”
“Yes,” she said solemnly. “We both want to get married, right?”
That was true. Linc could feel his pulse speed up.
Lori continued. “You’ve been burned. I’ve been burned. Let’s do away with all the nonsense. Let’s just go for broke and do it. Would you be willing?”
“I never expected a woman to propose to me, but seeing that you have…”
“Did I completely throw you?” she asked.
She had, although Linc wouldn’t admit it. “Do you want an answer now?”
“Please.”
He took a quick breath. “Okay. I’m willing to give it a try if you are.”