Billy knocked on the door of the little lakeside cottage, waited, and then knocked again. She knew someone was home. There was an unfamiliar car parked in the driveway beside Mrs. Streeter’s old Volvo wagon, and she could hear something, a game show on TV inside.
Maybe she’d come at a bad time, she thought, and she was considering leaving her present in the mailbox when a middle-aged woman who, despite the noon hour, already looked weary, opened the door. “Yes?”
“Hi, I’m a friend of Mrs. Streeter’s,” Billy explained. “I brought her a DVD from the library—”
“Billy? Is that you?” Mrs. Streeter called from inside the cottage. Billy had heard that she’d been released from the hospital only the day before—this was after a brief bout with pneumonia—but she sounded surprisingly vigorous now.
“Yes,” Billy called back. “I brought you something, Mrs. Streeter.”
“You can’t come in, dear,” Mrs. Streeter said.
“Oh, that’s fine. I can give—”
The woman at the door, obviously a home health aide, leaned closer and said to Billy in an undertone, “She doesn’t want anyone to see her in her bathrobe and slippers. She says unless she can wear an outfit with a matching hat . . .” The woman rolled her eyes. “She says she has a reputation to maintain.”
“Of course,” Billy said, reaching into her handbag and pulling out the DVD. “Why don’t you just give this to her—”
“Billy! What have you brought me?” shouted Mrs. Streeter.
“Only Angels Have Wings,” Billy called, feeling a little ridiculous about all of this yelling back and forth. “And you can keep it, Mrs. Streeter. You don’t have to return it to the library.” Billy, knowing that the library’s DVD order wouldn’t be in for a couple more weeks, had had Amazon overnight it to her personally.
“I don’t want to pay for it, though,” called Mrs. Streeter.
“You don’t have to. It’s a gift,” Billy assured her.
“Oh, no. I’ll return it to the library. But I don’t know when I can get it back, and I don’t want to be paying a late fee.”
“No. No late fees,” Billy called, giving the DVD to the home health worker. “I hope you feel better, Mrs. Streeter.”
There was a long pause and then Mrs. Streeter yelled back, “Well, you’d better get going, dear.”
Billy smiled wanly at the home health worker and turned away. Rae had been right. Mrs. Streeter would not thank her for this gift. As she started down the steps, a gust of wind caught her skirt, and she shivered in her short-sleeved cotton blouse. After it threatened to storm all day yesterday, there had finally been a torrential downpour last night. Now the day, while mostly sunny, had a crisp feel to it, despite the fact it was only the first week of July. Overhead the wind pushed scraps of clouds hurriedly along, and on the nearby lake, it churned up little waves, their foam white against the dark blue water.
Billy got into her car, glancing over at the two architectural books on the front passenger seat. They’d come in that morning from interlibrary loan, and she’d texted Cal to say she’d be “out his way,” and would he like her to drop them off at his cabin? He would, he’d texted back, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble. He was taking the day off from working on Jack’s cottage, and some “non–Hardy Boys” reading material would be great.
Now, as she drove the several more miles to his cabin, she reflected on the last time she’d seen him, standing in her kitchen a week ago. She’d basically given him a polite but gentle push, not only out the door but also out of her life. Or at least, that’s how she saw it in retrospect. She’d had misgivings ever since. He was the first man she’d been really attracted to in years, maybe even in fourteen years . . . There had been Beige Ted, but she’d never been that attracted to him. He’d just been a really nice, responsible man who lived in Butternut and had expressed an interest in her. And there had been a couple of guys she’d dated in Minneapolis-St. Paul when Luke was young and they were living with her parents. But none of them had stirred her the way Cal had. Her thoughts about him lately would make Jane Austen blush. Surely none of her female characters had such lustful fantasies. So she’d decided, over a recent glass of chardonnay on her back porch, served with a side of fireflies, to take him up on his kiss. She’d reminded herself, though, in the sternest possible terms, to not get too emotionally involved, to keep it light. After all, she had no idea how long he’d even be in Butternut.
Still, she was nervous as she pulled into his driveway. He made it easy for her, though. Even before she’d turned off the engine, he came out onto the front porch. He was wearing a T-shirt and blue jeans and he was barefoot. As Billy came up the steps to the cabin, she found herself staring at his feet. They were just like the rest of him, she thought. Tan. Tan and gorgeous. More gorgeous than feet had any right to be.
“Hey,” he said when she handed the books to him. “Thank you for bringing these over. Is this, uh, a new service the library’s offering? Home delivery?”
Billy blushed. “I thought since I was already going to be in the neighborhood . . . Mrs. Streeter—she’s one of your neighbors—has pneumonia, so I brought her a DVD.”
“Mrs. Streeter and I are neighbors?” Cal asked, surprised.
“If by neighbors you mean you live across the lake from each other, then yes.”
Cal laughed. “Well, I’m glad you came. And I hope Mrs. Streeter is feeling better.”
“I think she is,” Billy said. Now his hazel eyes had her attention.
“Good. Can I offer you an iced tea? Or maybe something . . . hot?” Cal asked. Billy had shivered again.
She hesitated. “I’m on my lunch hour, so I need to be getting back, but . . . why not?”
Cal smiled. “I won’t keep you long. Come on in.”
She followed him into the cabin, the inside of which was as unlike his apartment in Seattle as it was possible for any place to be. There was nothing intimidating about it, Billy thought, glancing around at its knotty pine paneling, stone fireplace, and unintentionally retro decor. Rae could definitely have her glass of red wine here; she could even spill a few drops without someone having a nervous breakdown.
“What do you think?” Cal asked.
“I like it,” Billy said honestly.
“It belongs to a very specific decorating school that hasn’t gotten a lot of attention yet from museums and auctions houses. It’s called midtwentieth-century cabin.”
She smiled. “But you’ve been comfortable here, haven’t you?” she asked as Cal went into the kitchen, a cheerful room where open shelving revealed brightly colored Fiesta dishes.
“Very comfortable,” Cal said, pouring them iced teas. “It’s just an easy place to be. I keep hearing echoes of my childhood, though. My mother spent something like eighteen years telling my sister and me not to let the screen door slam.”
“What about not sitting on the furniture in your wet bathing suit?” Billy asked, taking a glass from him.
“That, too,” he said, and because they looked at each other now—just a beat too long, just long enough for Billy to shiver again—she moved away and went to look at the bookshelves in the living room.
“Wow, you weren’t kidding about the Hardy Boys mysteries,” she said, running her finger along a whole row of them. She pulled one out. The Tower Treasure. She checked the year of publication. 1958.
“My dad was raised on those,” Cal said. “I imagine they’ve updated them by now.”
Billy nodded. “They’ve tried to take out the racism and the sexism.”
“Was there anything left?” Cal asked, standing closer to her.
“Not much. Now, I think, they work for a secret government organization. They battle terrorists and track down assassins. That kind of thing.”
“Wow. Who knew the Hardy boys had it in them?”
Cal took the book from her, opened it, and held it out to her. “Does it have that old book smell?” he asked.
She sniffed. “Definitely.”
“You know what my sister says this cabin smells like?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“Mothballs and maple syrup. She says they’re both just ingrained in this place.”
“And wood smoke,” Billy said. While there was no fire in the fireplace, this smell, too, seemed to have permeated the cabin. She took the book from him and put it back on the bookshelf. Because no matter how appropriate it might have been for him to seduce her over a book, she was the one planning on doing the seducing. Never mind that it meant stepping out of her comfort zone.
“Cal?” she asked, moving closer to him, so close that she could have kissed him.
“Yes?” he said with what she thought was the sexiest smile she’d ever seen.
“I’m glad you were home today,” she said before she leaned in to kiss him.
Five minutes later, they were lying on one of the alcove-style beds in his room. It was a bedroom in keeping with the rest of the cabin’s time capsule decor: checked window curtains, rag rug, and what looked like a paint-by-numbers sailboat scene hanging on the wall.
“Is this okay?” Cal asked. Now that they were on a bed, Billy found that some of her boldness had worn off.
“It’s fine,” Billy said.
“Sorry about the single bed,” Cal said. “There are no double beds here. When my grandmother decorated this place, she was obviously thinking about a different kind of fun. You know, Parcheesi. Crossword puzzles. Gin rummy.”
She smiled.
He kissed her gently and touched her cheek. Was he . . . touching her freckles? She knew he liked them.
“Those don’t come off,” she said.
“I hope not,” he said, leaning down to kiss her. “You know what I just realized? I’ve wanted to do this since the first time I met you. Since we were both standing in line at the buffet at Daisy’s wedding.”
“You mean . . . with the biscuits?” she murmured doubtfully.
But now they started kissing again, this time in a way that precluded any more conversation. Talking was over. And as Cal ran a hand over her thin cotton blouse, Billy felt a tremor in her legs. Now the kiss deepened. He started to unbutton her blouse and it was as if he were unbuttoning all of her. She wanted him. She wanted him so badly it shocked her a little. He murmured her name—she loved the way it sounded—and he moved his lips down to her neck. Yes, kiss me, she thought. Kiss me everywhere.
As if he had heard her, his lips traveled down to the hollow at the bottom of her neck.
She felt her blouse fall open, and she moved her hands hungrily under his T-shirt and over the smooth skin of his back. This was going to be good. How did she know this? She knew it because of the way Cal was proceeding, taking his time, moving at a slow, unhurried pace that suggested there was nothing else he would rather be doing right now than leaving this trail of kisses down her body. His lips were brushing over her navel when she heard something, something that hovered, for a moment, at the edge of her consciousness. The bedroom they were in faced the lake, and through its open window, she could hear little waves breaking against the shore, and the halyard of a moored sailboat clanging against the mast. Now, though, there was a new sound: a motorboat approaching, its engine getting louder and mingling with the sound of voices on board.
“Cal?” she asked softly.
He paused. His lips hovered above her navel. “Yes?”
“Do you hear that?”
“Hear what?” he asked, lowering his lips back to her skin.
“I think . . . I think someone’s here,” she said, rising up on her elbows, because whoever was driving the boat had cut the engine, and the two voices were now more distinct. “I think there’s a boat at your dock.”
Cal held perfectly still, listening. Then he pulled back the curtain a fraction of an inch and looked out the window. “Damn,” he muttered.
“Who is it?”
“Walker and Wyatt. I forgot they were coming over. They just bought a new boat and . . .” He shook his head and smiled ruefully. “Want to go for a boat ride?” he asked her.
“I can’t,” Billy said, sitting up. Her legs were trembling, though.
“You okay?” he asked, watching wistfully as she buttoned her blouse.
“Of course,” she said, smiling.
“Come on. I’ll walk you out to your car.”
As they came down the front steps of the cabin, Cal waved to Walker and Wyatt, who were tying up their boat at the dock. After Billy opened her car door, Cal leaned down and kissed her, chastely, on the cheek. “Thanks for the books,” he said. “Are you free tomorrow?”
“I have work, Cal,” she said teasingly.
“Maybe . . . I could stop by and take you to lunch one day?”
“Maybe,” Billy said with a smile as she got into her car.
Driving back into town, her legs were finally still. But it was hours before she stopped feeling the sensation of Cal’s lips against her skin.