Lacey caught the devilish twinkle in his eyes and suddenly felt warm all over. In moments like this she felt the deep, abiding pull of her love for Kevin all over again. She knew a lot of women who would regard a kitchen appliance as a sorry excuse for a romantic gift. She also knew that she would always see it as the first concrete evidence that the sensitive, considerate man she’d fallen in love with still existed.
Chapter Nine
Lacey drove into town for a much-needed break from Kevin’s gentle attentiveness. After nearly two weeks, she was finding it more and more difficult to ignore her mounting desires and keep her resolve.
Simply wandering the aisles of the grocery store kept her mind on more mundane matters. It was virtually impossible to feel particularly romantic in the frozen food section of the supermarket. It was also good to see other people, many of whom she recognized from past trips.
She had just turned the corner of the canned goods aisle, when she ran into Mrs. Renfield. Dressed in a blue-flowered cotton blouse, a matching sweater the shade of Texas bluebonnets, gray slacks and sensible black shoes, the seventy-five-year-old widow didn’t look a day over sixty. There was scarcely a wrinkle on her face, a testament to the floppy-brimmed hat she always wore to work in her garden and to walk on the beach. Though her gray hair looked as if it might have been chopped off with hedge clippers, the short style was actually very becoming.
“Lacey, dear, how wonderful to see you. How did your bread turn out?”
“It was edible,” Lacey said ruefully. “But it wasn’t nearly as good as yours.”
The older woman waved off the compliment. “You’ll get the hang of it soon enough. Wouldn’t you and Kevin like to drop by for tea this afternoon? I’ve just made another cherry cobbler. I know how much you both love it. There’s even enough for Jason and that new wife of his. Are you expecting them anytime soon?”
“Maybe this weekend, in fact. Kevin mentioned after he talked to Jason this morning that they hoped to drive out on Saturday morning.”
“Then you must come by and collect the cobbler. Besides, I haven’t seen Kevin once since the two of you came out here.”
“I know,” Lacey said. “He’s been sticking pretty close to home. He’s still trying to get his strength back.”
“Well, there’s nothing better for that than fresh salt air and a brisk walk on the beach. You bring him by for tea and I’ll tell him so myself.”
Lacey grinned at her. “If I were you, I’d keep my advice to myself. Kevin is getting tired of being told what to do.”
“Fiddle-faddle. He can grumble all he wants at me. I can take it. I raised six boys and you’d better believe they all still listen when I have something to say.”
“I’m sure they do. I’ll see how Kevin’s feeling when I get home. I’ll call if we can make it over. If not today, soon. I promise.”
Mrs. Renfield regarded Lacey intently and patted her hand. “My dear, you mustn’t take it to heart when he loses his temper. Men never can deal with being sick. They take it out on whoever’s closest to them.”
With that reassurance given, the elderly woman was on her way, pushing her grocery cart briskly down the aisle without a backward glance. She was stopped twice more by friends before she reached the end of the row.
How had she known? Lacey wondered. How had a woman she knew only slightly guessed that Kevin was scowling impatiently every time Lacey dared to mention that he was pushing himself too hard?
She shrugged finally. Maybe it wasn’t some odd psychic power. Maybe it was simply a matter of understanding the nature of the beast. After all, from the time Jason was old enough to talk, he’d always been a bear, too. He moaned and groaned so pathetically, it might have broken her heart if she hadn’t known that he was dealing with a cold or measles and not something fatal. She thought it was poetic justice that he was suffering from morning sickness right along with Dana.
As for Kevin, the worst of it was probably over. Day by day his strength was clearly coming back. After the first week, she had been able to see it in the energy he found to walk on the beach every morning and afternoon. He’d begun to tackle small chores around the house with some semblance of his old enthusiasm.
Lacey might have worried more about the demands he was placing on his still-healing heart, if he hadn’t balanced it all with quiet hours of reading. Just last night a techno-thriller had kept him up until the wee hours of the morning. She had seen the light under his door each time she’d awakened. Today at breakfast he’d been anxious to discuss every detail of the fast-paced plot with her.
With Kevin’s energy increasing, she wondered how much longer she would be able to keep him idle on the Cape, how much longer before they would have to face making a final decision about their marriage. She knew he’d started making daily phone calls to Brandon and to Jason, though he tried to mask them as nothing more than casual chats. The fact that he felt the need to hide his business calls worried her almost as much as the increasing activity. If he couldn’t confide even that, how could they expect to communicate about the really important issues facing them?
When Lacey came home from the store an hour later to find Kevin atop a ladder, clinging to the roof, she felt her heart climb in her throat. As she watched, he saw her and waved, his expression cheerful, his balance at the top of that ladder more precarious than ever.
“I’ll be down in a minute,” he called as she left the car door open and rushed across the yard to steady
