Lily and the Lawman Read online

  Lily nodded and mouthed, “I’m sure,” knowing that there was no way he could possibly hear her answer amid all the noise.

  “Lily!”

  Lily looked around. She’d heard her name shouted, but hadn’t a clue which direction the voice had come from. Standing beside her, Max placed his hand on top of her head and turned it to the left of the room. “That way,” he told her.

  She saw Jimmy coming toward her. April was nowhere to be seen, but there was a rather distraught-looking older woman plowing through the crowd with him. It looked to Lily as if he was coaxing her along.

  Reaching her, he made the introductions. “Lil, this is Gracie Witherspoon. She has a problem I think you might be able to help her with.”

  Confused, Lily looked at the woman. Now what? “Hello.”

  The woman appeared to be torn between being embarrassed and distraught. The words fairly burst out of her mouth. “Bambi’s wedding is the day after tomorrow.”

  “Bambi?” Lily looked from her brother to Max. Was the woman talking about a pet? Was she marrying off some prized dog or horse? At this point, Lily didn’t think she’d put anything past the citizens of Hades. People did some pretty strange things when they were lonely or bored and generally isolated.

  “Her daughter,” Max whispered in Lily’s ear.

  Despite the warmth in the room and the press of bodies, the feel of his breath along her neck made Lily shiver. Made her remember.

  “And Ilka’s got the flu.”

  Lily raised her brow as she looked at Jimmy. “Another daughter?”

  “The woman who was supposed to help with the cooking,” Jimmy supplied. He’d been the one who had sent Ilka to her bed after examining her. Gracie Witherspoon had descended upon him within the half hour with much gnashing of teeth and wringing of hands.

  The light bulb in Lily’s head went off. Cooking. Of course. That’s all she seemed to be good for around here.

  Well, why not? It was what she was good at, what she enjoyed doing, she reminded herself silently.

  “And you need someone to prepare the food for the reception?”

  Hope entered the sky-blue eyes as Gracie nodded vigorously, her gray hair becoming undone from its bun. “Yes. I can pay,” she added quickly.

  Probably not much and not anywhere near what she was accustomed to charging for catering weddings in Seattle, Lily thought. But then, she hadn’t come here to make money, she’d come to try to revitalize something that felt as if it had died within her. Maybe this would help in the long run.

  Just as making love with Max had in the short run.

  “That’s really not necessary,” Lily told her. “Consider it my wedding present to your new son-in-law and your daughter.” Try as she might, Lily couldn’t get herself to wrap her tongue around the name Bambi and not laugh.

  “I even got cayenne pepper,” Gracie volunteered. “Ike said how you favor that.”

  Lily could only laugh as she looked over the woman’s head at Ike.

  “For spareribs, Ike, not unconditionally.” She looked back at the hopeful, round face in front of her. Even if she’d been so inclined, it wasn’t in her to say no. Not when she was faced with such unabashed hope. It wasn’t every day a person got to play hero. “All right, Mrs. Witherspoon, tell your daughter she’ll have her reception. I’ll need to go over the list with you, find out how many people are coming—”

  “The whole town,” Gracie said quickly.

  Great. I’ll be cooking all day, Lily thought.

  “All right, but I also need to know what you’re planning on serving.” Going full steam ahead, Lily suddenly stopped and looked at Ike. After all, he’d gotten her into this, it was up to him to help her. “I’m going to need someone to fly me to Anchorage and steer me to the grocery stores.”

  Though the request was directed at Ike, it was Max who answered. “I can probably get April to fill in for Sydney and have Sydney fly you to Anchorage. She does a lot of shopping for the people in the area, picking up things the general store doesn’t carry, that kind of thing.”

  Lily nodded. “Sounds good.”

  She couldn’t help noticing that Max hadn’t volunteered to come along. Had her show of temper scared him off? Not that it mattered one way or another, she told herself. She’d be leaving soon and it looked as if she was going to be busy for the next couple of days. That left little time for them.

  Or for her to make another mistake.

  “Can’t tell you how much I appreciate this.”

  Lily looked up from the plate she was preparing. Cooking was only half the battle with a catered affair. The rest of it was in making food look appealing. She placed a sprig of finely cut parsley on top of the scalloped potatoes. A carefully prepared pork chop shared the plate with the potatoes and glazed carrots.

  It had taken her only one look at the previous menu to toss it out. Convincing Gracie to go along with the change had taken less time. The woman had given her carte blanche and stayed out of her way, other than to pay the tab for the food.

  All of her catering jobs should go that smoothly, she thought.

  “You don’t have to,” she told the woman. “I can see it in your face.”

  Impulsively, Gracie took Lily’s hand and squeezed it. “You are a godsend.”

  No, Lily thought, an Allen-send. If she hadn’t caught Allen in bed with that chicklet, she would have never come up here. At least, not any time soon. And Bambi Witherspoon’s guests would have probably had burnt offerings to eat, if what she’d heard about Gracie Witherspoon’s cooking was true.

  “I’m only too happy to help,” Lily assured the woman, taking back possession of her hand. “Dinner is almost ready,” she promised.

  Just as she said it, she heard someone come into the kitchen. Several someones. As she turned to look, she was surprised to see Max. In his wake were his sisters and sister-in-law, as well as their spouses, Luc, Ike and Jimmy.

  The kitchen was already crowded with just Gracie and her standing in it. “Hey, there’s not enough room in this kitchen,” Lily protested.

  “Don’t worry, we’re not staying,” April promised. “We’re here to help you bring all these plates out.”

  “Everyone’s looking forward to this,” Alison assured her.

  “Jimmy told us how he got you into this,” June, Max’s younger sister, said. “The least we can do is help with the routine work—none of us can hold a candle to you when it comes to cooking.”

  “Especially June,” Max quipped. “If it’s not motor oil, she doesn’t know what to do with it.”

  Lily looked at June. It seemed incongruous to her that someone who looked as pretty and delicate as June Yearling did could be the town’s only mechanic, but Max had assured her that June would rather spend her day under the belly of a car, repairing it, than do almost anything else.

  Kevin could use someone like that, she’d mused. His fleet of taxis were always in need of something.

  “What do you want us to do?” Max was asking, presenting himself front and center.

  Lily caught her breath, unaware that anyone else had heard her and missing the way Max’s sisters exchanged looks. Lily knew exactly what she wanted him to do, but it didn’t involve food, or an audience, both of which were here.

  “Start taking them out.” She pointed toward the table. It was crowded with dishes that were covered with lids she’d purchased at a kitchen supply store Sydney had taken her to yesterday. With all this help, she wouldn’t have to bother with the lids. Everyone was going to get a hot meal at the same time.

  She smiled to herself as she watched the crew file by, each taking a dish. Less than modern conditions notwithstanding, it looked as if she was going to pull this off, after all. With a little help from the bride’s mother’s friends. And hers.

  Like a prism that shone with captured sunlight, Lily’s smile captivated Max, fascinated him. He didn’t feel like filling his hands with plates of baby pork chops, julienned carrots and s
calloped potatoes. He wanted to fill them with Lily. With the feel of her skin, the warmth of her body, the silkiness of her hair.

  Coming close to her, he inclined his head and asked, “What?”

  Blinking, she looked up at him, not realizing that she must have let her thoughts show.

  “I feel a little like the sorcerer’s apprentice.” The scene with all the broomsticks carrying out buckets of water came to mind. Except instead of buckets of water, her broomsticks carried plates of food.

  His eyes touched her. “Funny, I would have had you pegged for the sorcerer instead,” Max said just as he filed by.

  His comment lingering in his wake like a seductive melody; it took Lily a long moment to rouse herself and get back to work.

  Rather than come out and mingle once dinner was served, Lily remained in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on the wedding cake. She’d stayed up most of the night preparing it. She figured that if things went well, a woman only had one wedding cake in her life. It might as well be a work of art.

  And Lily’s was. But it had been touch-and-go for a while there.

  Standing back, she allowed herself to drink in the sight and admire it before it was to be taken out to the garden to be claimed by the bridal couple.

  “It’s beautiful.”

  She smiled as she heard Max’s voice behind her. The compliment pleased her. And she was quite in agreement with Max. Lily had never believed in false modesty.

  “Thanks, I’m rather proud of it myself.” Circling it slowly, she regarded the seventier cake critically and found nothing lacking. Thank God. “I haven’t made a wedding cake since I can’t remember when. I kept having this nightmare that it would turn out all lopsided and droopy.”

  He could see her concern, but it really wasn’t warranted. Not with this crowd. “As long as it tastes good, I don’t think anyone would notice if it was sinking in the middle.”

  The men might not, but she would have bet her restaurant that Gracie and her daughter would.

  Lily turned to look at him, an amused smile playing on her lips. “Don’t know very much about women, do you, Lawman?”

  Max took that to be a challenge. One he meant to meet. “No, but I’m willing to learn.”

  Their eyes met for a long moment. She thought of the other night. He’d seemed to anticipate her every need before she was aware of it.

  “Seems to me you’re learning already and a damn fast study at that.”

  He took her into his arms. “Seems to me there’s always room for improvement.” His smile curled into her veins as he brought his mouth down to hers.

  “Isn’t this where I came in two days ago?” Ike asked, coming up behind them.

  Max sighed mightily as he pulled his head back and looked at his friend.

  “You do seem to have a problem with your timing, Ike.” It was apparent that the man was not about to discreetly take his leave. Not that Max would have expected it. “What do you want?”

  Ike was the soul of innocence as he approached the wedding cake. Admiration shone in his eyes as he looked at it and then its creator.

  “Nice work,” he told Lily in an aside, then turned to answer Max’s question. “To help you roll in the cake—before it melts from the heat you two are generating.”

  Getting into the swing of the good-natured teasing, Lily waved the two men on their way. “Just take the cake out.”

  Bringing up the rear, Max paused to look at her. “Aren’t you coming?”

  Lily gestured around at the pots and pans that had accumulated. She wasn’t one of those people who cleaned as she went along. Hence it looked as if an aluminum war had been waged here.

  “I have to clean up here—”

  Nodding to Ike, Max figured the man could handle the cake on his own, at least as far as the edge of the house. He had something else to take care of.

  “That is not part of the arrangement. You volunteered to cook, not to clean,” he reminded her. “Seems to me you more than did your part.”

  Without waiting for an argument, Max threaded his fingers through hers and began to drag her out.

  Lily caught her lip between her teeth, feeling guilty at the mess she left. “I like finishing what I start.”

  He looked at her significantly. “So do I.”

  Suddenly her heart had lodged itself in her throat. Lily half expected him to take her into his arms and kiss her again.

  But instead, he pulled her out to the garden where the reception was being held. Stopping just short of the table where the cake now stood, Max moved behind her and tugged at her apron strings.

  Her hands immediately went behind her to stop him. “What are you doing?”

  She heard him chuckle behind her and felt a wave of heat wash over her. “Don’t worry, the apron’s the only thing coming off. For now,” he added in a whisper against her ear.

  The heat spread. “Oh?”

  He turned her around to face him. “And only if you want it to.” His hands on her hips, he stopped to cock his head, listening. “That’s Jake Marley,” he told her. “Lead guitar,” he added when she looked at him quizzically. “The band’s starting up again.”

  She was only vaguely aware of the outside music. There was a symphony playing in her head. It had started the moment he’d touched her.

  “So?”

  “So,” he presented his hands to her, “I’d like this dance.”

  She realized that her mouth had dropped open and closed it again. “You dance?”

  Dancing with her, he inclined his head. “On occasion. Don’t look so surprised. I’ve been doing it ever since I learned how to walk upright and eat with a knife and fork instead of my hands.”

  She’d gone and done it again, stuck her foot in her mouth. Up to the thigh. “I didn’t mean—”

  “Yes, you did,” he told her good-naturedly. “But that’s okay, I’m getting used to it.”

  She sighed, knowing the fault lay with her, but she couldn’t help it. “It’s just that I don’t have any expectations.”

  He supposed he could live with that. “That’s what makes the surprises so nice,” he told her, tugging her closer as the music played.

  She resisted only for a moment, then let the music and the man take her away.

  Stirred, Max found himself having to fight off the urge to press a kiss to her hair. “That was a very nice thing you did back there, helping out Gracie.”

  She shrugged. Cooking was as natural to her as breathing. The feat hadn’t been all that much, really. “I like coming to the rescue.”

  She felt the soft chuckle rumble in his chest before she heard it on his lips. “Looks like we have something in common.”

  Lily thought of the way he’d materialized out of nowhere, coming to her aid when the bear had chased her up the tree. “Maybe we do at that.”

  Leaning her face against his shoulder, she hid her smile.

  And let it seep into her soul instead.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Until Lily had come into his life, Max wouldn’t have believed that he could be moved by a woman to the point that he was contemplating forsaking everything just to be with her.

  Since he was ten years old, he’d always tried his damnedest to avoid letting something like this overtake him. It was at ten that he’d seen firsthand what loving someone, really loving them, could do to a person. It could rob them of their reason, of their very will to live.

  The way it had with his mother.

  He couldn’t allow that to happen.

  Yet the thought of being without this woman who was sitting beside him in the Jeep as he drove through the darkness was like trying to close his hand over so many jagged shards of glass. The pain of it was beyond description.

  It hurt too much to contemplate.

  Max wasn’t even sure just when or how this feeling had overtaken him, couldn’t point to a single moment when his feelings had changed. He just knew they had.

  But his will to survive
was stronger, far stronger than his mother’s had been and Max was determined not to become a shadow of the man he believed himself to be, the man he had to be, for his own sake as well as the sake of everyone who depended on him in this small town.

  They were almost the last to leave the reception. Sydney had left to fly the happy couple to Anchorage for their honeymoon and the bride’s mother had insisted on thanking Lily over and over again. Several people made it a point to tell her how they wished she would stay, how a restaurant was just the kind of thing that Hades needed.

  She’d answered one and all with the same polite smile, saying that yes, it was, and saying nothing further.

  She was going to leave.

  In a week.

  Seven days.

  The thought lingered in his mind.

  They were coming to a fork in the road. To get to his place, they needed to turn right. Left for hers.

  Max turned toward her. She’d been unusually quiet this evening. “Want me to take you home?”

  The question roused her. She’d been busy looking at the stars. And wrestling with her thoughts. “You mean Alison’s house?”

  Lily refused to refer to her sister’s house as “home,” even though she had actually begun to think of it that way. Had begun to think of Hades that way.

  It was absurd, she chastised herself. Home was in Seattle. Home had always been Seattle. Just because two of her siblings lived here didn’t suddenly make this place home.

  She knew that wasn’t the reason her heart was giving her trouble. Love made a place home. Contentment.

  Damn, she was slipping again. Lily struggled to keep a tight rein on her thoughts, her feelings.

  She realized Max was waiting for an answer. She turned her head toward him. “No.”

  Without a word, Max turned his vehicle to the right. Words didn’t pass between them the rest of the way there. They didn’t have to.

  The moment the door to his cabin was closed behind him, Max took the woman he’d been aching for into his arms. His lips were quick to find hers.

  The kiss, born of need, of desperation, exploded between them. It deepened instantly. Like two leaves cast adrift in a gale, they clung to one another, finding their worlds in each other.