An Eligible Bachelor

He sucked in his breath at the sight of her and dropped the phone back into its cradle. The trim white pants that ended in a slit just below her knees showed off a flat stomach, enticingly rounded hips and lightly tanned calves and ankles. As for the tailored blue shirt, it caressed her curves in a way his hands itched to mimic. And her hair, as usual, fought to escape the clip that held the riotous waves prisoner. A fragment of oak pollen clung near her temple, giving evidence that she’d been gardening or playing outside with Jacob. If she looked this good while just hanging around the house, he dared not imagine how easily she could outshine all the ladies who would be attending the hospital’s charity ball later this month.

“I’m sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if I might borrow a hammer?”

Jacob crawled between her ankles. “Bam-bambam!” he said, imitating a popular Saturday-morning cartoon character.

“Sure, it’s out in the utility room.” He started to step past her and lead the way. But, preferring instead to savor this unexpected visual treat, he motioned for her to go ahead of him. The view from the back was as good as the front. His body reacted as if he’d just returned from spending several years in a monk’s retreat. His overstimulated hormones had his nerve endings tingling with anticipation, and Wade knew if he didn’t send her away immediately he might do or say something he’d regret later.

Grabbing three different sizes of hammers from his workstation, he shoved them all in her hands and abruptly turned and went back inside. Standing once again in front of the telephone, he tried to wipe the picture of her—eyes wide and lips puckered in an unspoken question—from his mind and return to the task he’d been avoiding for weeks.

Waiting a moment for his heart to stop racing, he once again forced himself to pick up the phone. But this time he couldn’t bring himself to go through the motions of calling Cherise.

When Geneva returned a moment later, he felt rather than heard her enter the kitchen.

“I think I need a screwdriver after all.”

“They’re on the workbench where I got the hammers,” he said, inviting her to help herself and save him the torture of having to refuse her round bottom’s beckoning gesture as she exited the room.

Fortunately, she took his cue and left before a fit of conscience compelled him to change his mind.

Trying to pull his thoughts back to the matter at hand, Wade knew he couldn’t wait any longer to find a date for the charity ball. Although there’d never been a shortage of willing ladies to accompany him to similar fund-raisers in the past, courtesy dictated that he give his guest ample time to book a fitting for a new dress and otherwise prepare for the event. With only two weeks to go, he was already pushing it to the wire.

Despite the urgency, he couldn’t bring himself to focus on what he had to do. He was distracted, partly by the image of Geneva in those casual pants, and partly from wondering what she was up to with his tools. Remembering the shelves he’d promised to install over her sewing table, he wondered if she’d decided to put them up herself.

Happily abandoning his mission, he followed the path she’d taken through the garage to the back of the house.

Having anchored a screw in the wood siding beside her door, Geneva reached to lift the wreath from its current mooring.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

The deep male voice almost made her send the wreath—nest and all—crashing to the deck. “I wish you wouldn’t sneak up on me!”

Ignoring the scolding tone in her words, Wade stated simply, “I talked to Tim, the golf pro, and he says the parents might abandon the nest if you move it.”

Releasing her grip on the grapevine decoration, she also let go a breath of frustration. “Then what am I supposed to do? I have a date tomorrow night, and I want to make a good impression.”

“You will.” Wade stepped uncomfortably close. “How could he not be impressed?”

“You know what I mean. Imagine how odd it looks for me to be coming and going at all hours through your house.”

“What’s the matter?” he whispered. “Are you afraid the good people of Kinnon Falls will think we’re together?”

Of course she was! But, to spare his feelings, she shook her head. “It might make Ellis feel weird.”

“Here, take my key.” This time he pressed the metal into the palm of her hand. His gesture clearly said he would brook no further argument on the subject. “I’ll stay out of the way while you two get to know each other.”

It felt so personal, so intimate, to be holding the key to his house. She’d been putting off accepting it, hoping to come up with a more acceptable solution to her bird-imposed dilemma. But that had only put them in more frequent contact as he let her and Jacob in and out of his house. Closing her fingers around the key, Geneva couldn’t bring herself to meet his eyes, so she used the excuse of glancing toward the yard where Jacob played in a new sandbox Wade had built just for him.

“Your generosity in letting us cut through your home is very much appreciated.” Unfortunately the birds gave her no other choice. She paused, uncertain about the propriety of putting conditions on a favor. But it was either that or be confronted with improprieties herself. When he offered to stay out of the way tomorrow night, her imagination supplied the most likely scenario—that he’d be having company of his own. “However, considering your, uh, bachelor situation, perhaps we could devise a code for when you’re…” Geneva felt her cheeks flush with heat “…indisposed. Perhaps a candle in the window or a string tied around the doorknob?”

Wade ran a thumb over the shallow divot in his cheek. “Or we could wire the porch lamp to my bedsprings, and when the light flashes on and off, you’ll know—”

“I should have known you’d make fun of my concern. This may not be a big deal to you, but it is a big deal where my son is concerned.” Moving away from the nest and out of earshot of Jacob, she added, “The reason I moved to Kinnon Falls in the first place is because I wanted to protect him from being exposed to certain unsavory elements.” The major one being the boy’s father, but she wouldn’t go into that now.

Wade’s countenance suddenly turned serious. He leaned in as if to stress his point. Feeling dwarfed by his size, Geneva retreated a step. It didn’t help much. He still took her breath away.

“It’s foolish to make assumptions before you have all the facts,” he said. “When I want to, I can be quite…savory.”

The tone for her date with the deacon was set when Geneva failed to hear the doorbell from her apartment and Wade met Ellis at the door holding a horsewhip and wearing a devious smile. She had hoped he would be out on his own date tonight, but it looked as though he would be sticking around for the evening.

On first glance at the jeans Wade wore and the too-tight T-shirt that pulled across his chest, he looked like an eternal teenager. A well-built one. Ellis, on the other hand, was dressed for the occasion in tan slacks, a pale blue oxford shirt and a navy tie.

Jacob hid shyly behind her, pressing his face against her skirt. Except, perhaps, for the current situation with her landlord, she knew Kinnon Falls would be a wonderful place to raise her son. Discreetly studying Ellis from the den, she wondered if he might be the man with whom she would someday raise Jacob. Judging from his interaction with parishioners and the respect they held for him, he certainly appeared to be a good possibility. And if he wasn’t the man for them, well, she’d keep trying until she found the right one. Never again would she marry someone who didn’t fully meet her needs. And never again would she believe that she could change someone to fit her criteria of the perfect family man.

She stepped into the room, Jacob clinging like an appliqué to her leg, just as Wade was launching into his explanation about the whip.

“Our riding instructor found this in the old barn beyond the stables.” Wade shook the coil loose and danced the worn leather across the floor. “Louis thinks it could be as much as a hundred years old.”

Ellis pushed his hands into his pockets. “What are you going to do with it?”

Her nemesis flashed her a wicked smile. “At first I considered how I might use it for myself, but eventually I decided to do something a little wild and crazy.”

Fearing the worst, Geneva sought to intercept the conversation and gracefully extricate Ellis to the safety and privacy of her apartment. “I don’t think Wade needs to go into—”

But he was determined to finish…and most likely embarrass her.

“I was thinking I’d hang it in the Fox and Hound room at the restaurant,” he said with utmost innocence. Then, raising his eyebrows at her, he rewound the whip over his hand and elbow. “What did you think I was going to do with it?”

Wade held her gaze a moment longer than necessary, breaking contact only after a flush of pink swept over her cheeks. He told himself he was only encouraging her in her wrong opinion of him because it fell in with his plan. If she thought him a wayward man, she would avoid him even if he should lose his head momentarily and attempt to flirt with her. But the real reason was that he enjoyed teasing her and watching her react with the fresh innocence of a much younger woman. He liked the way her chin dipped, revealing the embarrassment she tried not to show. He liked the way her pale brown eyes glowed with golden flecks when she confronted him about his reputation and how it might affect her child. He liked…way too much about her.

Jerking his gaze from the tight line of her soft pink lips, he addressed the man standing patiently in his living room. The deacon was a good man, and Wade was certain he’d treat Geneva right. But something deep down inside Wade nudged him, asking if that was enough. Would she be happy with this guy?

If this relationship went sour for her, he’d be consumed with guilt for having fixed her up with someone unsuited to her. He had to know without a doubt that they were right for each other, and to gain that certainty, he would need to know more about Deacon Tackett.

“So, what kind of car do you drive?”

Geneva sighed and narrowed her eyes at Wade to signal that she was ready to take over from here. All the while, Tackett enthusiastically filled him in about the collector-model Mustang he was restoring. Although the man’s boss cam fascinated him greatly, he reluctantly acknowledged that bit of information would be of no help to Geneva. He decided a more personal question would give him a better idea of their compatibility.

Geneva turned and lifted a hand toward the den, but before she could lead her date away, Wade intercepted them. “You seem to be a man of high standards, Deacon. Tell me, what do you think is the most important attribute in a woman?”

There. That should tell him volumes about whether he was truly the right one for Geneva.

“Wade?”

The deacon touched a hand to her wrist. “That’s okay, Geneva. It’s a fair question.” He addressed Wade much as a student answers a teacher when called on in a spelling bee. He squared his shoulders and looked him directly in the eye, fully confident in his answer. “It is written that charm is deceptive and beauty fades, but a woman who loves the Lord will be greatly praised.”

“No fair,” Wade said with a grin. “You took the easy way out by quoting Proverbs.” It would take some thought, but Wade knew he’d have to come up with a better test.

Geneva bestowed a blistering frown on him that could have made a small child cry. “Here’s another proverb for you. ‘He who guards his lips guards his life.”’

This time, she hooked Tackett’s elbow and practically dragged him from the room, no easy task considering that Jacob had mooched a ride on her foot. So far Wade had scored a double bogey with his line of questioning, and Geneva was calling it a game before they’d reached the eighteenth hole.

But he refused to let her off that easily. He’d impulsively hooked her up with this man, taking his reputation at face value and failing to check him out thoroughly beforehand. Wade’s conscience would not allow him to stand by idly while innocent, trusting Geneva turned her heart over to someone who might not be worthy of love.

Honesty compelled him to consider that his concern about this pairing was not totally altruistic. There was something about Geneva’s sweet innocence that made him want not only to protect her, but to keep her for himself. He supposed that, in an ideal world, he might have considered her his perfect match.

But this wasn’t an ideal world. And he had no guarantee that Ellis was the ideal mate for Geneva.

Deacon or not, Ellis was subject to flaws just like any other man. Wade would have to find out more about this guy before the evening was out.

Chapter Three

After she’d discouraged Wade from following them into her apartment, she invited Ellis into the kitchen to keep her company while she finished preparing their dinner. She didn’t know what had gotten into her landlord, but she hoped he got over it soon.

“Smells great,” Ellis said as he settled into a chair at the table. “What is it?”

“Roma chicken with rice.” She added the chicken and tomatoes to the sautéed onions and garlic, then covered the skillet. “This needs to simmer a little while. In the meantime, I’d love to hear about your Sunday-school class.”

Just as she’d hoped, the subject was one her date enjoyed talking about, and it made a small headway toward breaking the ice between them. Even so, they were still at that awkwardly polite stage. Perhaps, by evening’s end, once the effects of Wade’s interrogation wore off they’d be more relaxed and better able to enjoy each other’s company. To her dismay, Wade ambled into the kitchen wearing a large grin and carrying a bottle of wine in the crook of his arm. “I noticed you were completely out of wine, so I brought you some to restock.”

Flabbergasted, Geneva could only stammer, “But I don’t…we’re not…”

She didn’t know anything about Ellis’s attitude toward alcohol, but since the communion “wine” at church had actually been grape juice, she thought it safe to assume he didn’t imbibe.

Wade pulled a couple of goblets from her cabinet, filled one, and handed it to Geneva. Then he poured another. “How about you, Elvis? Care for a little conversation lubrication?”

Ellis held his hand palm-out at the proffered glass. “No thanks. I don’t drink.”

Just as she’d thought. She had to get Wade out of here before he managed to offend Ellis further and wind up ruining her chances with this man who seemed to have so much going for him.

“No?” he persisted. Wade reached into his pocket and sidestepped her with a smile full of devious innocence. “Then how about a breath mint?”

Ellis accepted one, and Jacob took three. Great, now he was ruining her son’s appetite, too.

“You have a beautiful home.” Her date was obviously trying to make polite conversation.

“Thank you, Elvis. It’s been in my family for generations.” Geneva could have sworn he stuck out his chest as he launched into a discussion of his family’s farming history. “My father was the first to give up farming for a salaried job.”

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