Allison Leigh - Married To A Stranger

Tris turned sideways and carried her into her living room. The furnishings were as uncomplicated as he’d expected: long lines and soft pillows, all in soft colors that reminded him of deliciously cool ice cream cones. “The only gossip I ever heard about your mother or your sister was that they were beautiful.” He settled her on the couch where an enormous orange cat slept in a ball. “There. You’re down.”

“They were beautiful. Justine is beautiful. She’s the kind of woman you should take out for steak.”

“How is Justine, anyway? I haven’t seen her in years.” What he remembered about Justine was that she’d been, well, popular was the polite term. Before Justine and her mother had left town, she’d been ahead of him in school several years, but that hadn’t meant that Tris hadn’t appreciated her sultry appeal.

“She’s in Washington State, now.”

“Married?”

“Three times. And the people of this town thought she’d never find a husband with her wild, wicked ways,” Hope quipped, but the sarcastic tone failed and she just sounded defensive. “Of course, she’s divorcing number three, so maybe they had a point.”

Tris sat on the couch, too, and Hope popped up like a golden-crisp slice of bread flying out of a toaster. He stretch his legs comfortably. “What does she do there?”

“She works in a bank. We don’t talk much. She’s older than you are.” Hope had walked across the floor to look through the sheer, butter-yellow curtains that covered the big picture window overlooking her front yard. “Oh, nuts.” She abruptly turned away from the window, drawing her eyebrows together.

“What’s wrong?”

She shook her head and turned on the floor lamp that stood near the window. Bright light flooded the room, banishing the lengthening shadows. “Gram is driving up.”

“Ruby? I haven’t seen her in ages.”

Hope glared at his left ear. “You don’t understand at all, do you?”

Whatever was turning Hope’s eyes to panic, he couldn’t guess. But he understood all too well that the light was shining from behind Hope, turning her white sack dress with the tiny purple flowers into a translucent sack, barely veiling the long legs and hourglass curves beneath.

He ordered his heart to start beating again and inhaled slowly.

Hope’s wiry grandmother walked right into the house without knocking. Her sharp eyes focused on Tris, then turned to Hope. But that one look left him feeling like he was fifteen again and had been caught making out with Suzette Lipton in the alley behind Ruby’s Café. He was relieved he was sitting on the couch with the distance of the entire living room between him and Hope.

“I’ve had five calls at the café, young lady,” Ruby said briskly, “all wanting to impart the news that my granddaughter was seen dancing down the middle of the streets with him. Now, I want to know what is going on!”

Tris laughed abruptly, which earned him another stern look from Ruby. He waited for Hope to explain, to defend herself, to tell her grandmother she was a grown woman who could do what she wanted if she chose, but Hope said nothing. She just stood there, looking at her grandmother with dismay emanating from every pore.

He rose and joined Hope, automatically sliding an arm around her shoulders, instinctively trying to support her. To alleviate the expression of dread darkening her eyes. “I carried her from the corner to this house,” he said evenly. “Her feet were hurting her.” He’d never felt strongly about explaining himself, and he didn’t, even now. But he really hated the look on Hope’s face. Really, really hated it.

It wasn’t a comfortable realization. Because Tris never hated anything. He never hated and he never loved. He never felt that strongly one way or the other about anything. Except, maybe, his work. He was certainly a believer of the passion of the body, but he left all that passion of the heart to others.

Ruby’s lips tightened. She propped her aging hands on her hips and ignored Tris. “Hope, you know how people in this town talk. Why would you do such a thing—right out in the street like that?”

“Ruby,” Tris interrupted. He knew good and well that Hope’s feet had been just fine. “Forget about it. There’s no harm done.”

Hope shook her head and turned away from her grandmother, pulling away from the arm that Tristan had tucked disturbingly around her shoulder.

“Young man,” Ruby said sternly, “have you been gone from this town for so long you’ve forgotten how it operates? The only thing my granddaughter has is her reputation, and you come blowing into town for a few minutes of entertainment and destroy it without blinking.”

“Gram!” Hope fastened her hands around her grandmother’s arm and tugged her gently to the door. “Tristan was only being…kind,” she said. “But he’s going home, now. So you can go back to the café and tell everyone that nothing is going on.”

“Hope, you’re so innocent, girl. You wouldn’t know a wolf in sheep’s clothing if he bit you on the nose.”

“Gram!” She couldn’t bring herself to look at Tristan. She pulled her grandmother out the front door. “You are embarrassing me,” she whispered under her breath.

“Everyone knows he lives in the fast lane—has ever since he earned all that money making fancy computer things,” her grandmother said sternly. “If you’re not careful he could take advantage of you just the way Justine and Gerri were.”

“Tristan Clay’s not the least bit interested in me that way.”

“Ha!” Ruby headed down the path. “Open your eyes, girl. That man has got one thing on his mind, and sore feet is not it!”

Hope groaned and turned toward the door. She chewed the inside of her lip and prayed fervently that Tristan hadn’t been able to hear her grandmother’s outlandish worries.

She reached for the screen door and pulled it open, catching her breath when Tristan stepped right in front of her. Her fingers clenched over the door handle.

“Your grandmother is right.” His face was hard, his jaw tight. And there was no trace of amusement in his heavy-lidded blue gaze. None at all. “I’m not interested in sore feet.”

“Tristan, please. My grandmother is being ridiculous, I know that. I know you don’t feel that way about—”

“I didn’t say I didn’t want to have you in my bed, Hope. I do. But no matter how much I want that, sweet pea, I don’t intend to…deflower you. You’re safe from me.”

Nothing was going right today.

Hope’s blow dryer blew a gasket or something, which meant that her hair was wet when she twisted it into a knot at the back of her head. She knew it looked even more unappealing than usual.

Of course, if she’d stuck to her guns the evening before and refused to join Tristan for dinner, Hope’s hair would have been dry by the time she needed to leave for Sunday worship.

Even afterward, if she hadn’t spent half the night swinging on a pendulum, she would have tended to business. But no, she’d paced around her small house, feeling astonishment. She’d rearranged her living room furniture twice, feeling disbelief. She’d yanked weeds under the moonlight in her backyard, feeling a fearful excitement.

So, her house was spotless, her furniture ended up right where it had been when she’d started and her garden was immaculate. But her hair was still a mess until morning.

Now, it was a wet, albeit clean, mess.

After the blow dryer had died, her iron—apparently sympathetic to the dryer—had shorted out, too. Her cotton dress was still presentable. Barely. Having to chase after Simon, her cat, at the last minute hadn’t helped the dress. She’d been hot and frustrated by the time she finally coaxed him out from the bushes where he liked to hide.

At least she’d caught him before he’d prowled down to Brenda Wyatt’s house. Brenda’s husband hated cats, and Hope wasn’t sure if her runaway cat would escape unscathed the next time he was caught eating Brenda’s nasturtiums.

She could have driven her little car to church, but she knew there would be no parking left. And now, by the time she’d cut through the neighborhood and walked up the front steps of the church, she could hear the congregation inside already singing and she quietly slipped into the empty pew in the rear, fumbling a hymnal out of the rack. She dropped it and it thudded loudly on the floor just as the music ended.

It seemed as if half the town turned to look and see who’d made the racket. She smiled weakly and sat, feeling around with her hand for the hymnal, but it seemed to have scooted up under the pew ahead of her.

She still felt eyes watching her, and she wished that she’d just taken the hint when the dryer died and stayed home.

Except if she hadn’t shown up at church the way she had done every Sunday of every month of every year she’d lived in Weaver, she’d have ten people trooping by her house later to find out why.

After she’d come down with the flu last year when Ruby was in Washington visiting Justine, Hope’s visitors had brought homemade soup and fresh flowers and crossword puzzles. She didn’t think having visitors this time would be such a blessing.

The hairs on her neck prickled.

She blinked and saw Jolie staring at her pointedly from her seat on the aisle a few pews ahead. Hope frowned, shaking her head slightly.

Jolie rolled her eyes and subtly jabbed her thumb out. Hope followed the direction and stared, stunned at the sight of Tristan sitting there in church. There was no mistaking the back of his head; she’d never known anyone with hair that brilliantly golden.

She hurriedly closed her mouth and glanced at Jolie. Her friend was smiling, knowingly. Hope frowned at her, hoping Jolie could read her expression that there was no earthly reason to connect Hope with Tristan’s once-in-a-blue-moon appearance at worship.

Feet shuffled and Hope dragged her attention to the service, as she stood with the rest of the congregation and read the gospel lesson. But her mind wasn’t on the words. It was on the man three rows ahead of her.

When the service was winding down nearly an hour later, Hope’s attention still remained on Tristan. He hadn’t turned around once to see her, and she told herself that she was relieved.

But she was sitting in church, and the lie tore at her. When the congregation rose once again to sing the last hymn, Hope quietly backed out of the church. If she ended up with calls from Gram and others that afternoon, it would be better than standing there visiting after the service, pretending that she didn’t care two hoots that Tristan was around.

She pressed her hand to her forehead. She was a blooming fool, that’s what she was. Creating ridiculous fantasies in her head.

Standing just outside the church doors, Tris watched Hope scurry away. It was definitely becoming too familiar a sight, he decided. He stopped and greeted the minister briefly, complimenting the man on his sermon even though he would’ve been pressed to recall the topic. He’d been too preoccupied with the young woman who’d sneaked in late to sit a few rows behind him.

“Guess no good deed goes unpunished,” Sawyer said softly, mockingly, behind him.

Tris slid his sunglasses on and ignored his brother. So what if he’d come to church only in the hopes of catching Hope for a minute or two? What was more above-board than running into each other at church?

“Tristan, you’re welcome to join us for dinner this afternoon,” said Rebecca, repeating the invitation that he’d already declined once. “I know Ryan wants to have a chance to talk your ear off about his new computer.”