Married by High Noon Read online

  “Most people don’t want their parents that close.”

  “To me it’s a privilege. There’s nobody more concerned for me, more willing to lend a hand if I need it. I can’t always depend upon friends. I can on family.”

  Dana’s life had been entirely different. Even in grade school, her parents had been away from home more often than not. When she went away to boarding school, college, started work, they sent cards, talked on the telephone, kept in touch by e-mail, but they maintained their separate lives. Dana couldn’t think of anything more unlikely than her mother showing up at her apartment before breakfast. Her mother never got out of bed before 10:00 a.m.

  “I like familiar places,” Gabe continued. “I can’t go anywhere without being reminded of something I really like doing, somebody important to me. If I left Iron Springs, I’d lose all that.”

  Dana opened her mouth to argue, then closed it again. Coming back to Iron Springs had brought to the surface many memories she’d forgotten. But stepping into her grandmother’s house had been almost like becoming a different person, someone she used to be but hadn’t been in a long time. She hadn’t expected that, wouldn’t have believed it an hour ago. She had left a great chunk of herself in Iron Springs, and she hadn’t realized it until now.

  “I like the slower pace,” Gabe said. “Everybody’s not after you to do 10 percent more this year than you did last. We don’t have to justify everything to cost accountants or efficiency experts. If I need to take the afternoon off, I just close up my shop. I also like selling things I make to people I know. Every piece of furniture I make is designed with a specific person in mind. I know what they like, what they need, even where it’ll go in the house. It’s nice to be able to see how close I came to finding the perfect solution.”

  Dana could understand that. She’d often wondered where a particularly beautiful antique would be placed, if its setting would complement the piece. Even repeat customers seldom invited her into their homes.

  “Maybe most of all, I like being around people I can trust, people who consider me part of their own family. People buy furniture from me even though they could get it cheaper at a discount store, because they know I’ll work a little harder to give them what they want. That’s a wonderfully warm feeling. It may sound trite in this day and time, but it makes my work more fun because it adds meaning to everything I do.”

  Dana had never looked at things like that. Everyone she knew subscribed to the theory that you ought to do ten percent more this year, fifteen if you could manage it; that you shouldn’t worry about anything but making the sale; that numbers were all that counted; that you weren’t a success unless you were a success in other people’s eyes; that if working fifty hours a week was good, working sixty was better; that everything in life was secondary to being successful. She had to be a huge success to force her parents to recognize her achievements.

  She had done all that and more.

  Before Mattie came to live with her, she’d never once questioned that she was doing exactly what she wanted. But after Danny’s birth, she found her job at odds with being able to spend as much time at home as she wanted. Despite her partner’s objections, she stopped working sixteen-hour days, seven-day weeks. She’d even gotten to the point where, while she was trying to make a sale that might have netted them as much as fifty thousand dollars profit, she’d be thinking of what she meant to do after she left work.

  Then Mattie got sick, and the worry and fear made Dana impossible to live with. Her partner had been relieved when Dana’s doctor ordered her to take some time off. Neither of them considered it anything but a temporary situation. But Gabe’s remarks, coming after her visit to her grandmother’s house, had reshuffled things in her head, had put them together in a way she’d never looked at them before.

  In the world’s eyes—admit it! In hers, too—Gabe was a failure and she was a great success. But even with a failed marriage in his past, Gabe was happy and content while she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Maybe Iron Springs hadn’t failed her. Maybe she hadn’t heard what it tried to tell her.

  “I always thought you wanted a family,” she said.

  “I do.”

  “From what I’ve seen, you’ll have to leave here to find a wife.”

  “I don’t need a wife now. I have Danny.”

  “You won’t have him if you don’t find a wife.”

  “That’s why I think you ought to marry me.”

  Surprise caused her to swerve in the road. “I thought you hated that idea as much as I do.”

  “Marriage is my only option, and you’re my best choice. We can work out an equitable agreement, stay married as long as necessary, then get divorced. The whole thing won’t be messed up by a tangle of emotions. It’ll be pure business.”

  The thought of her marriage being a business deal upset her. Even though nearly all her effort so far had been poured into building her career, a successful marriage had always been her goal. Getting married in this way made her dream seem further away, less real, less attainable. No one would call her relationships with men successful, but accepting Gabe’s offer made it seem like she’d given up.

  On the other hand, he would lose Danny if he didn’t marry someone. What kind of woman could he find to marry him by tomorrow? How would she treat Danny? Or Gabe?

  Everything was up to her.

  Marrying Gabe shouldn’t be so hard. He would agree to her staying at her grandmother’s house, even living in New York. She could come down every weekend to see Danny. She and Gabe would hardly have to see each other.

  “Well, what do you say?” Gabe asked.

  “I’ll let you know tomorrow.”

  She could tell he didn’t like that answer. But after being asked to marry him, in fewer than twenty-four hours, she deserved at least half of those hours to think about it.

  Gabe studied Dana’s profile. It seemed absolutely incredible he should be asking a woman he hadn’t seen in fourteen years to marry him, a woman he barely knew, one who embodied nearly everything he distrusted. He might as well close his eyes, leap over a cliff and hope someone remembered to tie a bungie cord to his ankles. No, it was worse, like jumping out of a plane without a parachute. It could only end in disaster.

  Her resemblance to Ellen frightened him. But Marshall was right. If Dana meant to shaft you, she would warn you first. She was direct, honest. Blunt, even. He hated the prospect of a second divorce. He’d promised himself if he ever remarried, it would be forever. Still, if he couldn’t get Danny any other way, he’d do it. It wasn’t as if he was marrying a stranger.

  He wondered why he’d never realized that before. Though he hadn’t seen her since she was sixteen, she’d continued to be a part of his life. Through Mattie’s letters he knew about their years at that fancy New England college, their vacations in exotic places, Dana’s determination to make a success of her career. Mattie had seemed almost unaware of her own great talent, but she’d chronicled Dana’s success almost week by week. When she’d sent pictures of Danny, half of them included Dana.

  Gabe couldn’t understand Dana’s almost frantic need to succeed, her willingness, like Ellen, to sacrifice nearly everything for her career. He couldn’t understand how she and Mattie had stayed friends. Given the kind of life she wanted, he couldn’t imagine why she concerned herself with Danny. She didn’t seem to need anyone—family or friends—or need to belong anywhere. He couldn’t understand such emotional isolation, her need to be so independent. Maybe she feared letting someone into her life would use up the energy she needed for her career.

  Yet her decision to renovate the farmhouse caused him to wonder if she was as much of an emotional desert as she seemed. He’d seen the emotion in her eyes when she turned her car into the lane, when she saw the house, the swings, the yard. He’d also sensed she didn’t want anybody with her when she entered the house. It wasn’t a fancy apartment or a palatial villa on the Costa del Sol. Just a farmhouse. Still, somethin
g about those long-ago summers retained a very strong hold on her emotions.

  Maybe he’d let his prejudice keep him from seeing a side of Dana that even she didn’t know existed. She had insisted Mattie share her apartment. She’d been at her side through the pregnancy and Danny’s birth. And during Mattie’s illness, according to Mattie’s last letter, Dana had virtually abandoned her job. Now she watched over Danny with the ferocity of a mother bear. Maybe Danny and Mattie had changed Dana more than either of them realized.

  The more he thought about that idea, the more it intrigued him. Maybe finding the answer would help him keep his mind off her body for the few weeks they would be married—if she agreed to marry him.

  He glanced to his left again. No, nothing short of unconsciousness could do that. A woman with Dana’s figure should never be seen in profile. It had the power to send the juices churning through his body in a matter of seconds. And she should certainly, absolutely, positively never wear a short skirt when driving. A good look at those long, slim legs could send any red-blooded male over the edge. He didn’t know a thing about hosiery, but Dana’s made her legs look as smooth as silk. The impulse to reach out and trail his fingertips along their length was nearly impossible to resist.

  Her skirt was too short. It ought to extend half way down her calf. Or, just to be on the safe side, down to her ankles. And it shouldn’t be tight-fitting. The sight of her slim hips so cleanly outlined wasn’t good for his concentration. Maybe one of those things with elastic at the waist and lots of thick, gathered material.

  And that didn’t take into consideration a blouse so filmy he could practically see her breasts. He knew he couldn’t, but the material made him think he could. He wondered how much they paid designers to create that effect. It ought to be millions.

  “Everything looks so green,” Dana said.

  “We’ve had a lot of rain.”

  “It ought to help prevent fires.”

  A hurricane couldn’t have doused the fire building inside him. “We almost never have fires up here.”

  “I was thinking of the hay at my grandmother’s farm.”

  “Get someone to cut it.”

  “I don’t know anyone.”

  “I do.”

  “Will you take care of it for me?”

  She turned toward him for a moment—not long enough to affect her driving, but long enough to endanger his self-control. There ought to be warning labels sown into every piece of her outfit saying Wearer subject to attack by sex-starved males.

  Not that a man needed to be sex starved to want Dana. Even the perfume she wore tugged seductively at his senses. Half the time he couldn’t catch the scent. But when he did, it acted on him like a hypnotic drug, one that a man became aware of only after it had him firmly in its coils.

  Everything about this woman seemed designed to eat away at his self-control. He’d better rectify that. No matter what arrangement they reached, city-bred Dana Marsh wouldn’t want anything to do with a country boy who made furniture and lived in a Podunk mountain town in Virginia.

  “What time would you like to leave for Ma’s house?” Gabe asked, determined to get his mind off Dana’s body. She cast him a quick glance before turning her gaze back to the road. She didn’t look too happy about that idea, but he hadn’t expected she would.

  “I’d been thinking of picking up something and spending the evening letting Danny get used to your house.”

  He turned to look in the back seat. Danny had gone to sleep in his car seat, his head tilted to one side. There was something about the child asleep that reached out and grabbed Gabe like nothing ever had. He couldn’t decide whether it was that he was such an angelic-looking child, his complete trust that they would take care of him, or the sweet innocence of his expression. He just knew he was more determined than ever to be the one who would rear his sister’s child.

  “If you want to continue to be part of Danny’s life, you’re going to have to get to know the people in his life.”

  “Nobody in Iron Springs likes me.”

  “Maybe a few of them haven’t forgotten the things your mother said when she left—she badmouthed just about everybody and everything in Iron Springs—but the rest like you just fine.”

  “No, they don’t. You might not have seen it, but I felt it. I asked my grandmother about it.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She said to pretend it didn’t exist.”

  “Sounds like good advice to me.”

  “It’s not good enough for me now.”

  “Then you’ll have to figure out a way to change their minds.”

  “Would marrying you do that?”

  Until he married Ellen, he’d always taken belonging for granted. She looked down on everybody, and they sensed it right way.

  “I don’t know,” he replied. “I supposed you’d have to like Iron Springs, want to live here, want the people to be your friends.”

  “They’d have to want me, too. I was always that kid from New York.”

  “They probably felt you were just visiting, that you had no more intention than your mother did of having anything to do with Iron Springs after you grew up.”

  “Why should they think that?”

  “You were always telling us about your big plans to become a famous businesswoman and make millions of dollars.”

  Back then he’d never heard of a million dollars. That figure had been a constant reminder of the great distance between their two worlds.

  “Little girls always dream big.”

  “A little too big for people around here.”

  “It shouldn’t be.” She sounded short, a little defensive. “You could have half a dozen millionaires in town if a few people decided to sell off a mountain or two. Even if they couldn’t be used for ski slopes, they could be turned into retirement communities.”

  “We don’t want things to change,” Gabe said.

  Bringing that many people and that kind of business into the area would destroy most of what he loved about Iron Springs. He knew Dana wouldn’t see it that way—she’d probably think it would be the salvation of the place—but she didn’t see the real value, the most precious resource of Iron Springs.

  The people.

  “It won’t matter,” Dana said. “If I agree to marry you, I won’t be here long enough for anybody to notice.”

  Gabe thought Dana was mistaken about many things. But in no instance was she further from the truth than in believing she could be anywhere without being noticed.

  Dana approached Mrs. Purvis’s house with trepidation. She had been the only mother to make Dana welcome when she first visited her grandmother. Even after Mattie decided to defy her father and go to college, Mrs. Purvis had never said an angry or accusing word. Still Dana felt like she was stepping into the enemy camp.

  Maybe it came from her own sense of guilt over not having told Mattie’s family about her illness until after her death. Coming on the heels of her father’s death, Mattie felt her own impending death would be too much for her mother and Gabe. Dana thought the shock of hearing Mattie had died without their having a chance to say goodbye would be worse, but Mattie had been adamant.

  “Will anybody else be here?” Dana asked.

  “I doubt it. Ma wants Danny to herself.”

  Mrs. Purvis opened the door before they got halfway up the sidewalk.

  “I was afraid you’d be late,” she said to Gabe.

  “I made a point of getting here early,” Gabe said as he kissed his mother’s cheek. “I knew you’d be standing at the window.”

  But Mrs. Purvis focused her attention on Danny, who did his best to hide behind Dana.

  “No need to be afraid of your old granny,” she said, stooping down before him. “I intend to spoil you rotten. It’ll be Gabe’s job to keep you straight.”

  “Ma, you’ll scare Dana into taking him right back to New York.”

  Mrs. Purvis’s reaction was immediate. “She can’t take him.
Mattie gave him to you.”

  After losing a husband and a daughter within a month of each other, Dana could understand why Mrs. Purvis’s emotions were brittle and close to the surface. Dana decided to do everything she could to encourage Danny to feel comfortable with his grandmother. Her own grandmother had been one of the most important influences in her life. Clearly Mrs. Purvis wanted to be just as important to Danny.

  When Dana offered to help Mrs. Purvis in the kitchen, Danny followed right behind.

  Mrs. Purvis got Danny’s attention by offering him a bit of chicken breast. Next she gave him a slice of orange from the salad. She followed that with a dab of mashed potatoes so Danny could tell her if she’d gotten enough salt and cream to suit him. She even gave him a tiny bit of cake to make sure he liked chocolate.

  “I wouldn’t think of giving him very much,” she said, a little guiltily Dana thought. “But I want to make sure he likes everything. The first meeting is so important.”

  Dana wanted to tell her this was the second meeting, that she’d fawned over him for at least an hour earlier in the day, that Danny would eat just about anything you gave him as long as it was sweet, but she bit her tongue.

  “I don’t think it’ll hurt him,” she said. “Danny’s a good eater.”

  “All the Purvises are. My husband put away two plates at supper until the day he died.”

  She looked stricken by her own words. Dana couldn’t be sure whether over the loss of her husband or the reminder of his implacable attitude that had caused their separation from Mattie.

  “He’ll have to eat more than those little dabs if he’s going to top six feet by the time he’s thirteen,” Gabe said. He offered Danny another piece of chicken. “It’s a Purvis tradition. You’d better get started. You’ve only got eleven years to go.”

  Dana wondered if intolerance figured as a Purvis tradition, too, but she didn’t say anything. The past couldn’t be changed. Nothing mattered now but Danny’s future.

  Dana might as well not have been at the table during dinner. Mrs. Purvis spoke almost entirely to Danny. She offered him seconds and thirds on everything. It took all of Dana’s diplomatic skills to keep her from feeding him until he got sick.