Moonlight and Mistletoe

“The girl from the church showed me how to get the meat out of the freezer and thaw it,” Scarlett said. “That was the biggest part of the job.”

They were seated, Scarlett and Farrie and Buck, at the big mahogany table in the dining room. Through the sliding doors the Victorian parlor looked better without the clutter of cardboard boxes. The bright glitter of the huge Christmas tree reached almost to the ceiling.

“I was supposed to put the meat in the microwave thing, but she’d left by that time and I couldn’t get it to work. Anyway,” Scarlett added, looking down at the assortment of food on the table, “ten pounds of hamburger is a lot. When I got it thawed out I knew I was just going to have to keep cooking.”

“No problem.” Sheriff Buck tried awkwardly for a piece of meatloaf with the fork in his left hand. “I can’t get over it. Everything’s so delicious.”

The meatloaf slipped and landed on the table-cloth beside his plate. Scarlett tactfully picked it up and put it on her own. She’d been watching the sheriff closely from the moment they’d sat down, but he seemed sincere. Of course he’d been a little surprised that she’d cooked dinner, even after Scarlett had explained that she’d learned it all from the cookbooks they’d taken from the clothes boxes that afternoon. He’d looked tired when he came in and Scarlett saw at once he was out of sorts: Demon had left her marks all over his uniform, and he’d had some sort of accident as his arm was in a sling. Sheriff Buck went right into the dining room, pulled up a chair, and sat down.

Now, Scarlett saw, he’d certainly been hungry in spite of his hurt arm. He’d had a helping of the Italian spaghetti with meat sauce, two big servings of Spicy Shepherds’ Pie, a slice of House and Garden’s Heirloom Recipe Meatloaf, and a cup of homemade chili. That left only the Swedish meatballs to go.

Farrie, too, hadn’t taken her eyes off him. Scarlett picked up the bowl of meatballs and shook her head at her sister in warning. She knew Farrie wasn’t thinking about whether or not the sheriff liked the food.

Marriage. That was the only thing on Farrie’s mind. It was right there in her face. Sooner or later Sheriff Buck Grissom was going to wonder why her little sister kept staring at him like that.

“Take off your hat,” Scarlett told Farrie, frowning. “People don’t eat dinner with their hats on.”

Without shifting her gaze, Farrie reached up and pulled off the hat with the rhinestone pin and peach satin roses. The sheriff wasn’t watching; he was having trouble with the bowl of meatballs. The brown, glistening globes in what the cookbook described as authentic Swedish gravy kept bouncing away from his probing fork. He wasn’t at all good at using his left hand; the tablecloth around his dinner plate was spattered with food.

Scarlett picked up her own fork. “Here, let me,” she said.

He started to object, then watched as she scooped a serving of meatballs and gravy onto his plate. “The dinner is delicious,” he said with an effort, “I’m not kidding. I can’t believe you taught yourself to cook like this out of a book.” He looked down the table, hesitating. “You don’t have any – ah, vegetables, do you?”

Scarlett was cutting a meatball in half for him, and stopped abruptly. “Vegetables? I just cooked up all the meat, I didn’t think about any vegetables! What kind of vegetables do you want?”

“We have iced tea,” Farrie piped.

The sheriff looked across the table, his eyes resting on the too-big dress that hung drooping around the child’s arms and neck. “Does she have to wear that thing?” he growled.

Scarlett studied her sister. “That’s the first pretty dress Farrie’s ever had. If it bothers you, I can take it away later on when she goes to bed.”

Buck leaned over his plate. “Damned if I can make up my mind, everything is good. But what I had before is, I swear, the best chili I’ve ever tasted.”

Scarlett held out her fork to him with a piece of meatball on it.

“I like to cook,” she said simply. “I already know how, a little. But it was better to find a book with those things in it since I had to use up all that hamburger.”

He studied the fork. “I’m not doing very well, am I?”

“There’s a lot on the table,” she admitted.

Slowly, the sheriff opened his mouth and Scarlett popped a piece of meatball into it.

It was a perfectly ordinary thing to do, to offer to help him eat when he couldn’t use his right hand. But Scarlett was suddenly and strangely aware they were close enough so that she was looking right at the sheriff’s long eyelashes. Which curled up and were a dark red color, like his hair. His eyes were bright blue. Up close Buck Grissom had creamy smooth skin. She was particularly struck by his mouth: wide and full, with something downright attractive about it even as he chewed the meatball.

Across the table she knew Farrie wasn’t missing a thing. But Scarlett couldn’t tear her eyes away.

Never in her life had she been so close to a man and so mindful of how good- looking he was. And how warm, she thought with a sudden gulp, and how big!

Sitting there, Scarlett felt a fascinated rush of excitement from the top of her head down to her feet. She could hardly move.

At that moment the sheriff looked up, expecting another meatball. And their eyes met.

There was a strange silence.

Scarlett sucked in her breath. Good Lord, from the way his eyes widened, and he sort of stiffened, she could tell that he felt it, too!

They just sat staring at each other. Finally Buck said, his eyes never moving, “You don’t have to feed me.”

Scarlett still held up the empty fork, forgotten. “I don’t mind,” she whispered. “I like looking after people.”

“I can see that.” He had a peculiar expression on his face.

“Why,” Farrie said loudly, “don’t you feed him some meatloaf?”

They both jumped.

“Well,” Farrie explained, “he didn’t hardly get to eat any of his own meatloaf. It kept falling on the table.”

A scowl settled on Buck’s face. He looked around, seemed to shake himself, then lurched abruptly to his feet.

“Dinner was fine,” he announced hurriedly. “I enjoyed it very much. Right now I think I’ll go make myself some coffee.”

He crossed the dining room, and at the door he turned.

“I’ve got some paperwork to do, I’ll be in the den.” He looked everywhere but at Scarlett. “You two can just watch television or whatever it is you want to do.”

After Buck had left, Scarlett and Farrie sat for a few minutes in silence.

Finally Scarlett said, “You can help me clean away these plates and take them into the kitchen.”

Farrie got up from the table. “We don’t have to wash them, Scarlett. They got a dishwasher in there.”

Something inside Scarlett snapped. She didn’t know what had brought on her sudden bad mood, but it was certainly there.

“Yes indeed, Miss Smarty, and if you know how to work a dishwasher you can just go right ahead and do it!” She picked up Buck’s plate and scraped what was left of the meatballs and shepherd’s pie onto hers. “Otherwise you can come on with me and I’ll wash, and you wipe, and try not to break any of this good china.”

Farrie had listened with an open mouth. Now she put the big hat with the roses back on. Under it, she pouted.