Jodi Thomas - Twisted Creek

“Fair enough.” She stretched up on her toes and kissed him on the mouth. A nice good-night kiss, nothing more.

“I’m not married.” He liked the game. “Never have been. Never even close.”

She stretched again, only this time the kiss lingered and the tip of her tongue sliced against his lips, but didn’t enter.

“I went to college in Austin. Loved college, hated school, but managed to finish.”

She waited.

“I majored in girls the first two years and worked as a dispatcher for the campus police my last two years.”

This time when she moved he met her halfway and the kiss deepened. For a moment, he thought he’d tell her anything if she’d keep up this game. Then she pulled away and waited.

He tried to remember his own name. All he could think about was kissing her. Correction. After that kiss he could think of a great deal more to do with her. “I…”

“Brain damage?”

“Something like that.” Surely he could think of one thing that wouldn’t give too much away. But for Luke his work was his life.

“We’ll continue this game some other time. I have to go up.”

She turned to leave and made it two steps before he caught her and pulled her back against him. When she opened her mouth to protest, he leaned down to her mouth.

The game was over. No more questions, no more talking. His kiss was hungry with need as he crushed her between the wall and his chest. She reacted as he knew she would, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him closer. They might not know all about each other, but he knew Allie Daniels was as attracted to him as he was to her.

He felt himself melting into the softness of her, taking in the feel of her, the smell of her, the taste of her. His hand slid down her back and over her hip as he pulled her close. Her fingers dug into his hair and she moaned as he kissed her like a man dying for the nearness of her.

When they were both out of breath and panting, she lowered her head and rested against his shoulder. “You’re not what you seem, Luke. And knowing your name or where you went to school isn’t knowing you.”

“Maybe not,” he whispered, “but what’s between us is real. This attraction I feel for you, this need to be near, goes all the way to my gut. On some level, I already know you and you are part of me. You believe me, Allie?”

She nodded.

“When the trouble on the lake is over, we’ll sit down and play your damn questions game all night, but right now I want you to know that…” He brushed her mouth with his. “…this is not a game. What is between us is authentic. Maybe the most real thing I’ve ever felt in my life.”

I walked inside with the feel of Luke still on my mouth. Much as I hated to admit it, he was right. Deep down I did already know him. I think I had from the first. But I’d fallen enough times that I’d learned not to trust.

I grabbed the ledger book I’d come down for twenty minutes ago and went back upstairs. I curled up by the window and began to draw the Nesters sitting around the stove. Everyone had slicked back wet hair, except Mary Lynn. Hers, long and curly, tumbled around her face and down her back, tiny ebony rivers of curls.

When I drew Paul, I drew him staring at Mary Lynn.

Dillon didn’t look so tough. I drew him huddled by the fire with one of Nana’s mother’s old quilts wrapped around him. He’d put on a pretty good act when he’d been with his father, but now my sketching reminded me of how young he was.

Timothy, though four years older than Dillon, was smaller in build. He’d fought hard to save the kid. I hadn’t heard Dillon thank him.

I drew Timothy with his legs stretched out toward the stove. He looked as thin as ever, only his eyes didn’t seem as sad. He’d saved someone’s life tonight. Maybe there was no need for Dillon to thank him. The satisfaction on Tim’s face may have been enough for him.

I flipped the page and drew Luke leaning against the side of the store, his arms crossed, his eyes closed. The shadows across him kept me from filling in details and I wondered if it were me or the knowledge of how little I knew about him that kept the drawing from looking finished.

Nana brushed my shoulder.

I looked up and smiled. “I thought you’d already gone to bed.”

“I did, but I got to thinking.” She brushed my hair back over my ear. “Tomorrow would you watch me and write down how I make the cinnamon rolls?”

“Sure.”

She patted my arm three times and turned back to her bed. I wanted to ask her if she wanted to make sure I learned the recipe in case she died. But I knew why she asked. She knew she was forgetting things. Cooking was a part of who she was and Nana knew that memory was slipping away.

Part of me wanted to run and crawl in bed with her like I used to do on cold mornings after I heard my grandfather leave. I wanted to hold her and tell her everything was going to be fine. Everything would stay the same.

But I couldn’t lie. And I couldn’t frighten her more with the truth. If she thought writing down her recipes would hold the memories, then I’d write them all down.

By full light we were in the kitchen. Nana cooked and I wrote down all the ingredients. The morning air seemed to have cleared her mind. She wanted her recipes taped to the inside of her cabinet doors.

“My mother had a big ceramic bowl with a crack in it that she made biscuits in every morning.” Nana talked more to herself than me. “She didn’t have to measure a thing, she just knew how high to fill the bowl. Then as she sprinkled flour over the dough, she’d stir it around with her hand until it made a ball. We never washed the biscuit bowl, just set it up out of the way, still floured and ready for the next morning.”

“What happened to it?” I couldn’t remember ever seeing such a bowl.

Nana smiled. “Carla, your mama, took it with her when she moved to New York to set up housekeeping. Said she just had to have it. I figure it was because she was going to be all those hundreds of miles away and wanted to have something passed down through the generations. Something her mother and grandmother, and maybe even great-grandmother handled.”

I couldn’t imagine Carla Daniels being sentimental about anything, but maybe I was wrong. Most of my memories of her were of her waving good-bye.

About the time Nana pulled the last batch of rolls from the oven, the local fishermen started dropping in for their free morning coffee. They seemed to have learned that Nana never cooked more than the day before, so if they wanted breakfast they needed to show up before nine.

This morning most seemed in no hurry to move on. They sat in the café, munching on rolls while they talked. I didn’t mind. Though they knew nothing about Dillon and the drugs, they talked about the fire and the storm.

Willie came in, but he passed right through the swinging door with his free coffee. When I looked across the pass-through, he and Nana were sitting at the little table in the corner.

The rolls and the fishermen were gone by the time Luke showed up. I didn’t look him in the eyes. I didn’t know if I could take those blue depths this morning. He’d made it plain last night that the few kisses we’d shared weren’t just a flirtation. He might not have said the words exactly, but I thought I heard a promise in his voice.

“Morning,” he said. “I guess I missed breakfast.”

Nana looked up from where she’d been wiping the counter and smiled. “I saved you one. I was guessing you’d be by.”

“I told Dillon I’d be here when he could get away. I thought I’d have him describe the drug dealer to Allie so she could draw.”

I knew he looked at me, but I acted as if I had no part in the conversation. I didn’t look up until I heard the swinging door swish and knew they were in the kitchen. Don’t start dreaming again, I warned myself. Don’t build your hopes on something he almost said. My bad luck would hold, just like it always did, and he’d disappear. He might not be the lake bum I first thought he was, but what were the chances he was my knight in shining armor?

I heard an engine out front and moved toward the door. Most of the weekday fishermen owned their own boats, but now and then a weekender would come out to sneak in a fishing day during the week. When that happened he’d usually use the dock for quick access.

An emerald green Mercury pulled up with no boat behind. Whoever came to call was not planning to fish.

I stood at the door, letting the screen hide me from view as I watched a woman climb out. Long legs in four-inch red heels. An expensive-looking bag with letters on it. A skirt a few inches shorter than I’d seen on most business suits. A jacket that fit her waist tight and emphasized her breasts. The hat that matched hid her face.

I’d bet every fishing pole I had in the store that this shopper wasn’t here to buy bait.

She made it two steps toward the porch before I saw beneath her hat and turned to stone.

Carla Daniels walked right up to the screen door, peeked through at me, and said in a voice dripping with honey, “Aren’t you going to let your poor mother in, girl? I’ve been driving for hours.”

The familiar sound of her voice slid along my spine, thawing every muscle. Over the years I’d gotten so used to her “What do you want?” greeting that anything else sounded out of place.

I slowly opened the door and looked at her without smiling. “I’m surprised you found us.”

She shrugged as though she hadn’t expected a warm greeting from me. She walked past me without a hug. “This place looks like a trash heap from the road.”

I tried to remember when I’d grown so cold toward her. As a kid I couldn’t wait for her visits and letters. Except the visits became more and more infrequent and the letters less personal and never directed toward me. My affection for her must have died on the vine sometime before my teens. After that, I used coldness as a shield.