âYou canât marry that guy.â
Jenna couldnât sit still for this. She shot to her feet. âThis is just like you, Mack,â she said. âYou appear out of nowhere after all these years and you immediately tell me how to live my life. Well, I want those papers you promised me, Mack. And I want them now.â
Mack answered quietly. âYouâll get those papers. But not right this minute.â
âWhat do you mean?â she asked.
âI mean I want a little time with you first.â
Oh, sweet Lord, she did not like the sound of this. She strove mightily for calm. âTime for what?â
Mack studied her before he spoke. âWe had something good once. And I admit it was mostly my fault that we lost it. I want some time to try to understand what went wrong.â He paused and looked her in the eyes. âYouâll have your papers. After you spend two weeks alone with me.â
came to her profession the long way around. Before settling down to write about the magic of romance, sheâd been an actress, a sales clerk, a janitor, a model, a phone sales representative, a teacher, a waitress, a playwright and an office manager. Now that sheâs finally found work that suits her perfectly, she insists she never had a problem keeping a jobâshe was merely gaining âlife experienceâ for her future as a novelist. Those who know her best withhold comment when she makes such claims; they are grateful that sheâs at last found steady work. Christine is grateful, tooânot only for the joy she finds in writing, but for what waits when the dayâs work is through: a man she loves who loves her right back and the privilege of watching their children grow and change day to day. She lives with her family in Oklahoma.
The shop, like the steep, rather narrow street it stood on, had a feel of times past about it. The oyster-white sign over the door read Linen and Lace in flowing script. Vines and morning glories twined and trailed in and out of the lettering.
Mack McGarrity stood beneath a striped awning, his hands fisted in his pockets, staring in the window to the left of the shopâs entrance. Beyond the glass was a brass canopy bed. The bed was draped with lacy white curtains, covered in filmy white linens and piled with embroidered white pillows.
Next to the bed, on the left, stood a white dresser bearing a white pitcher and bowl. On the right, a white nightstand, with a vase of white roses and a white-shaded lamp. White lacy nightgowns, each one a little different from the next, had been tossed in an artful tangle across the pillows and the filmy bedcovers, as if the lady who owned them all couldnât make up her mind which to wear.
Mack smiled to himself. The fists stuck in his pockets relaxed a little.
On their wedding night Jenna had worn a nightgown like one of those thrown across that white bedâan almost transparent gown, with lace at the collar and down the front. And roses, little pink ones, embroidered around the tiny pearly buttons.
Those buttons had given him trouble. They were so damn small. And he had been nervous, though heâd tried not to show it.
But Jenna had known.
And sheâd laughed, that soft, teasing laugh of hers. âItâs not as if itâs our first time,â sheâd whispered.
âIt is the first time. My first timeâ¦with my wife.â His voice had been gruff, he remembered, gruff with emotions heâd never allowed anyone but Jenna to seeâ¦.
Mack turned from the window. He stared across the street, at a store that sold hand-painted furniture. A man and a woman stood at the display window there, admiring a tall bureau decorated with a woodland scene. Mack watched them, not really seeing them, until they disappeared inside.
Then, rather abruptly, he turned back to the shop called Linen and Lace. Two determined steps later, he reached the glass-fronted door. He took the handle and pulled it open.
The scent of the place hit him firstâfloral, sweet but not too sweet. An undertone of tartness. And something spicy, too. Like cinnamon. It didnât smell like Jenna, exactly. But it reminded him of her. Sweet and just a little spicy.
Heâd barely started to smile at the thought when he realized heâd tripped the buzzer that would warn her she had another customer. She turned and saw him just as he spotted her.
When the buzzer rang, Jenna glanced toward the door out of habit, ready to send her new customer a swift, be-right-with-you smile.
The smile died unborn on her lips.
It was Mack.
Mack.
Her ex-husband. Here. In her shop.
After all these years.
It couldnât be.
But it was. Definitely.