Wedding at Wildwood

Chapter Three

She refused to feel guilty about what she’d said to Dillon. The man needed to know right off the bat that she wasn’t interested.

But, she reluctantly told herself, Dillon had looked so dejected, so hurt when she’d accused him of taunting her. She’d seen it in his stormy eyes just before he’d shut down on her. Then, he’d warned her away, as surely as he’d tried to draw her near. Now the whole town would probably be talking about the little scene in the bridal shop.

When Isabel went into the back with Stacey to tell Susan that Dillon had left, the bride-to-be was clearly flustered.

“What do you mean, he left?” a frazzled Susan asked poor embarrassed Stacey. “We have to fit him for that tuxedo!”

Stacey shuffled her loafered feet and looked over to Isabel for support. “He…he was talking to Isabel and he—”

“Dillon couldn’t wait,” Isabel explained, shooing Stacey away with the wave of her hand. Turning Susan back around to view herself in the three-way mirror, she commented on the exquisite bridal dress. “This is incredible, Susi.”

Looking over her silk-and-lace reflection, Susan soon forgot all about Dillon’s leaving. “Do you like it?”

“I do,” Isabel said, although she herself would have chosen a more understated wedding gown. All that pearl beading and lace seemed a bit overwhelming. But then, she reminded herself, she wasn’t the one getting married. “I knew you’d make a lovely bride. Now, let me just get a few candid shots of you here, and then we can talk about the formal portrait for the newspaper. You know, I thought about the wildflowers. How would you feel about setting up a shoot there?”

Susan’s excitement changed to worry in the blink of her blue eyes. Looking over at her mother for support, she said, “Oh, I don’t know—Eli hates those flowers. He calls them weeds.”

Mrs. Webster fussed with Susan’s veil, then nodded. “It’s true, Isabel. Eli doesn’t like the wildflower patch. It’s been a bone of contention between him and his mother for some time now.”

Susan lowered her voice to a whisper. “Something about it being Dillon’s favorite spot—”

“What?” Isabel raked a hand through her long hair to keep from saying something she’d regret.

“Couldn’t we do it somewhere else?” Susan questioned, her blue eyes big and round. “How about in the garden behind Eli’s house? He had it especially landscaped—that big nursery from Albany did it. They did such a good job, too.”

The image Isabel had of Susan in her wedding gown amid the wildflowers died on the vine. Eli certainly wouldn’t want his bride centered in a field that only reminded him of his unwelcome brother. Remembering how lonely Dillon had looked the night before, she couldn’t help the little tug of regret in her heart. Maybe she shouldn’t have been so nasty to Dillon earlier.

Reminding herself she was being paid to please the bride and the groom, and that she had to stand firm regarding Dillon Murdock, she nodded. “If that’s what you want, of course, we can do the shoot there. But Eli can’t see you in your dress, remember?”

“Oh, no.” Susan’s big eyes widened. “That’d be bad luck and we don’t need any more of that.”

Curious, Isabel asked, “Have you had some problems?”

Beatrice Webster pursed her lips, then started to speak.

Susan hastily shook her head to stop her mother, then gazed at her reflection in the mirror, her eyes glistening. “No, everything’s fine. It’s just that Eli has this cotton crop to worry about, and well, he works so hard. And now, Dillon’s already started showing himself. I won’t have him ruining my wedding, Isabel, I just won’t. We only invited him back because his poor mama wanted him here for his brother’s wedding, and he doesn’t even have the common decency to try on his tuxedo.”

Isabel stopped snapping pictures to stare up at her friend. “Susan, Dillon left the shop because of me. We…we kind of got into a little argument and I’m afraid I was rude to him. I’ll try to smooth things over with him, I promise.”

Clearly relieved, Susan clapped her hands together, her number one concern right now her wedding. “Would you please try to get him back in here, tomorrow morning if possible? We’ve only got a few days left before the rehearsal supper, then the wedding.”

“I promise,” Isabel said, dreading the whole affair all over again. She must have been crazy to even accept this assignment.

An hour later, she found herself in the wildflower field, amid the honeybees and the butterflies, dreading having to see Dillon again. But she had to apologize and persuade him to do his duty. A promise was a promise, and she had caused him to leave the shop.

Only she didn’t run into Dillon in the field. Instead, she saw his petite mother hurrying across the path, a huge plate covered with a white linen napkin balanced on her wrinkled hands.

“Miss Cynthia,” Isabel called, rushing to help the woman with the heavily laden plate. “My goodness, you’ve got enough food here to feed an army!”

“Isabel! I heard you made it in. Susan’s mother—that woman calls me at least three times a day.” Cynthia stopped to take a long, much needed breath. “How are you, dear?”

Isabel dutifully leaned down to kiss the woman’s rosy powdered cheek, noting that Miss Cynthia was dressed impeccably just to cross the road and tramp through a field. She wore a pink cotton shell, pearls, and dressy gray slacks with matching pumps.

“I’m all right, Miss Cynthia. Do you want me to carry that for you?”

Cynthia shifted the platter, then laughed nervously. “Heavens, no. I’m just in a hurry. Eli will be home soon, and I’ll have to answer to him. He doesn’t want me carting food over here to his brother.”

Isabel hurried along with Miss Cynthia. “Just like you used to do—sneaking Dillon food after he got sent to bed with no supper.”

“I’m just an old softy, aren’t I?” Cynthia said, her sharp eyes moving over Isabel. “My, you’ve changed. You’ve turned out to be quite a lovely young lady, Isabel.”

“Still a little tomboy left, though,” Isabel said, remembering how Cynthia Murdock used to encourage her to wash her face and put on some makeup. Isabel had resented the woman’s heavy-handed suggestions at the time, but now she only smiled. Apparently, Beatrice Webster hadn’t wasted any time updating the whole town on Isabel’s improved grooming habits. Straightening the flowing skirt of her soft linen dress, she told Miss Cynthia, “I did remember some of your fashion tips.”

“I can tell,” Cynthia agreed as they reached the back porch of the old mansion. “That red sundress is mighty fetching with your blond hair.”

Fetching. Only Cynthia Murdock could use an old-fashioned word like that and make it sound classy and completely perfect. But the woman could also cut people into ribbons with a few well-chosen words, Isabel remembered.

“Let me get the door,” Isabel said now without thinking.

The two women were busy laughing and talking as they entered the long central hallway of the cool, shuttered house. Which is why they didn’t see the man standing at the end of the long kitchen, splashing water from an aluminum bucket sitting on the wash drain all over his face and bare chest, until it was too late to back out of the room.

Dillon heard the commotion, then looked up to find his mother and Isabel standing there in the doorway, looking at him as if he were doing something scandalous.

“I didn’t hear a knock,” he said, his lazy gaze moving from his shocked mother’s face to the stunning woman standing beside her. “And I don’t recall inviting two pretty ladies to dinner.”

Cynthia quickly got over her shock and set the heavy platter on the cracked counter. “I found Isabel walking through the wildflowers. And…there’s plenty enough here for two.”

Dillon didn’t bother to hide his bare chest, or the surprise his mother’s bold suggestion brought to his face. “Mama, are you trying to fix me up with our Isabel?”

Cynthia snorted. “I was trying to cover up for your lack of manners, son. Where is your shirt, anyway?”

“Over there.” He pointed to a suitcase tossed carelessly up on one of the many long counters. “Throw me one, will you, Isabel?”

Gritting her teeth, and pulling her eyes back inside her head, Isabel chose a plain white T-shirt to hurl at him, her small grunt of pleasure indicating that she wished it had been something that could do a little more damage.

Dillon caught the shirt, his eyes still on Isabel. With lazy disregard, he pulled it over his damp hair, then tucked it into the equally damp waistband of his jeans. “Sorry, Mama, but I didn’t know I’d have an audience for my bath. Guess it’s a good thing I kept my breeches on.”

Cynthia threw up her hands. “He’s still a charmer, isn’t he, Isabel?”

“Oh, he is indeed.” Isabel turned to leave. “And I really can’t stay. I just wanted to say hello, Miss Cynthia.”

Dillon leaned across the old, planked table standing in the middle of the kitchen. “What’s your hurry?”

Isabel turned to see him reclining there, bathed in a golden shaft of afternoon sunlight, his gray eyes almost black with a teasing, challenging light.

She wanted to take his picture again. But she wouldn’t, because she wasn’t going to stay in this hot room any longer. She’d just have to figure out some other way of getting him to cooperate with Susan about that tuxedo. If she stayed here right now, she couldn’t be sure she’d be in control of her wayward feelings.

Tossing back a long strand of hair, she said, “Actually, I was taking pictures and I ran into your mother. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

Cynthia cleared her throat and shooed Isabel back into the room. “Stay and talk to my son, please. Maybe you can convince him to come over to Eli’s house, where there’s plenty of fresh water and air-conditioning.”

Isabel hesitated, her gaze locking with Dillon’s. “I don’t think it’s my place to argue with your son, Miss Cynthia.”

“And why?” Cynthia questioned with a diamond bejeweled hand on her hip. “You two used to argue all the time. That boy used to send you running, nearly in tears. But only after you’d given him a good piece of your mind.”

Isabel lowered her head to stare at a crack in the pine flooring. “Well, that was then—”

“And this is now,” Dillon finished. “Mama’s right. I’m not minding my manners. Stay and talk to me a while, Isabel. I’ll be on my best behavior, I promise.”

“That’s more like it,” Miss Cynthia said, nodding her approval. “You two can keep each other company until we all get through this wedding.”

Dillon lifted up off the table then to come around and kiss his mother. “Thanks, Mama. Now, you’d better get back. I suspect Eli doesn’t know you’ve been feeding me.”

“I’ll take care of Eli, son.”

“Yep, you always have, haven’t you?”

Cynthia stopped at the wide doorway. “I’d be more than happy to take care of you, if you’d stay here long enough to let me.”

Dillon’s smile was bittersweet. “I’m fine, Mama. Really. Now, scoot.”

Cynthia gave an eloquent shrug, then waved to Isabel. “Bye, now. Tell your grandmama hello for me, honey. Oh, and I might have some alterations to bring down to her next week. A couple of dresses that need taking in. I don’t trust anybody else to do the job.”

“I’ll tell her,” Isabel promised, thinking that as always, Miss Cynthia had reminded her of her place. Her grandmother was still the hired help, no matter how fond Miss Cynthia was of Martha Landry. She waited until she heard the click of Miss Cynthia’s heels on the back steps, then looked up at Dillon. “I’m not staying for supper, and I can see myself out.”

He reached out a long tanned arm, catching her by the hand to hold her in her spot. “Was it something I said?”

She glanced back up to find his eyes centered on her with that questioning, brooding intensity. “No, Dillon. Actually, it was something I said. Susan is upset that you didn’t get your fitting this morning. Will you just go back in tomorrow and get it over with?”

He dropped her arm to move to the red ice chest he had propped in one corner of the room. “Want a soda?”

“Okay,” she said without giving it much thought. Just like she’d come bursting in here without much thought, to find him half-clothed. How she wished she’d knocked, but then, he probably would have come to the door bare-chested anyway. When he came back to hand her the icy cold can, she told herself she’d take a couple of sips then leave gracefully.

Then he pulled the white linen cover off the fried chicken. “Mmm, Mama does know how to fry up a chicken. Doesn’t that smell so good?”

Her stomach growled like the traitor it was. Taking a bit of meat that Dillon tore from a crispy breast, she nibbled it, then tried to put the fat and calorie content out of her mind.

Unrolling the silverware his mother had thoughtfully provided, Dillon dipped a spoon into the white mound beside the chicken, then held it out to Isabel. “Want some mashed potatoes?”

“Stop it!” Isabel said, taking out her frustrations on the pop top on her drink. The sound hissed and sizzled almost as loudly as the tension between them. “Just tell me you’ll go back in and get your tux.”

“I might,” he said after shoveling the potatoes into his own mouth. Then he picked up a drumstick and bit into it. Chewing thoughtfully before he dropped it back on the plate, his eyes on her, he said, “Then again, I might just show up like this.” He shrugged and waved the white napkin over his jeans. “Or, I might not show up at all.”

That comment caused her to set her drink can down with a thud. “Oh, that would be just perfect. Show everyone around here that they’re right about you after all. Make Susan feel even worse and cause your mother even more heartache. Yeah, Dillon, I’d say just blow the whole thing off. Why should you try to do something for someone else, anyway?”

In a blur of motion, he dropped his napkin and stood before her, one hand on her shoulder and one braced on the panelled wall behind her. “Don’t, Isabel. Don’t make me feel any worse than I already do.”

She took a shuddering breath, her face inches from his. “Why do you fight so hard against everything?”

His gaze traveled over her face, then back to her eyes. “Why are you standing in my kitchen telling me what I should or shouldn’t be doing?”

She stared him down, though she knew she’d be a nervous wreck later because of it. “Good question. So, let me go.”

“No.”

Glaring up at him, she said on a breath hot with rage, “You haven’t changed a bit. Still the macho tough guy, still trying to make me feel small and insignificant.”

He moved an inch closer. “Is that what I’m doing? Is that how you feel right now?”

She backed farther into the wall. “Yes, to both questions. I’m right up there on your list along with Eli and all the other people in this town you’re still holding a grudge against, aren’t I?”

“I thought you were the one with the grudge,” he said, his hand lifting off her shoulder to come up and cup her chin. “You told me I’d never get to you again. Did I get to you before?”

“No,” she said, hoping she’d be forgiven for lying. “No.”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes.”

Then he lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her with a tenderness that contradicted everything she believed about him. No man this tough could kiss with such a whispered gentleness that it left a woman’s soul dancing.

No man except Dillon, of course.

When he lifted his head, the kitchen was still and warm, the house silent and waiting. And his eyes were alive with a fire of surprise, of awe, of longing. “I wasn’t teasing just now, Isabel.”

Isabel swallowed hard, then tried to find what little sense of reason she had left. She shouldn’t be here with him. She should run away as fast as she could. Instead, she reached up a hand to stroke away that irresistible spike of hair centered on his forehead. “Are you sure, Dillon? Are you sure that kiss wasn’t just a way to inflict pain on me?”

He ran a hand down the length of her hair, then gave her a wry smile. “Right now, darling, I’m not sure about anything, except that maybe I have a champion in you.”

Surprised, she asked, “Why do you think that?”

He backed away then, letting her hair trail through his fingers to fall in cascading waves back around her shoulders. “Because, you didn’t run away. You came here to fight me, and maybe, to fight for me. And you stayed even after I insulted you.” Tipping his head to one side, his hands on his hips, he added, “And you stayed even after I kissed you.”

Isabel moved away from the wall, and on shaking knees, tried to walk to the counter where she’d put her drink. Taking a long, cool swallow of the amber liquid, she turned to face him again. “I didn’t have much choice. You had me against the wall.”

A smug indifference replaced the gentleness she’d seen in his face. “That’s how I court all of my women.”

Tired and frightened of her own soaring feelings, she snapped at him. “We’re not courting each other.”

He came back strong. “Then what are we doing?”

Sighing, she threw her wavy hair back off her face, holding it tightly against her head with her hand. “I came here to ask you to behave, to show Susan some respect. But since it was my fault you left the shop this morning, I just wanted to make amends.”

“Well, you did,” he said, his voice going soft again. “You did that and a whole lot more.”

Isabel dropped her hair over her shoulder, then crossed her arms over her chest in a defensive manner, still holding her soda with a loose hand. “Will you go back and get yourself a tux for the wedding?”

“Will you sit by me during the ceremony and dance with me at the reception?”

“I asked first.”

“I’m asking now.”

She smiled, then set her nearly empty can down. “You haven’t changed a bit, Dillon.”

He tipped a hand to his head in an acknowledging salute, then leaned back against the creaky table. “Ah, but you have. And for that, dear Isabel, I might be willing to behave—for my brother’s wedding, that is.”

“And wear the tux?” she said, tossing him the challenge.

“And wear the infernal tux,” he added. Then he grabbed her to pull her back into his arms. “Just remember, save the last dance for me, okay?”

“Okay,” she said as she allowed him to hold her close. Battling with Dillon Murdock had always left her drained.

Dillon didn’t try to kiss her again. Instead, he just closed his eyes and held her. Isabel couldn’t help feeling as if she’d come home. But she knew in her heart, that Dillon couldn’t give her a home. Neither of them would linger here at Wildwood for very long. They were both still searching for something, some elusive something to ease the ache in their souls.

And all around them, the waning sun cascaded through the tall kitchen windows in rays of gold, white and muted yellow, revealing dancing fragments of dust that had long lain as dormant and still as the pain buried deep in both their hearts.

Chapter Four

“Don’t open the door!”

Isabel stood in the dark bathroom at the back of the house, watching through the red glow of the safelight as the picture she’d taken of Dillon developed in a chemical bath. If her grandmother opened the door now, the picture would be ruined. “I’ll be out in a minute, Grammy.”

“It’s not your grandma,” a deep masculine voice said through the closed door.

Dillon.

Isabel almost knocked over her whole tray of developer. “Just a minute!” Taking a deep breath, she checked the timer, then stood back to see the emerging picture of the man who’d kissed her not two days ago, and who’d kept her awake thinking about him since then. With quick efficiency in spite of the flutter in her heart, she lifted the picture out of the developer, then dropped it in the stop bath for thirty seconds. Another minute in the fixer, then a good wash for a couple of minutes, and the picture was done.

But the knocking at the door wasn’t.

“Hey, you getting all dolled up or something?”

“Or something,” Isabel retorted as she clipped the finished picture up on the clothesline she had extended across the cracked tub. “I’m working.”

“Sorry, but that excuse won’t wash. It’s a pretty summer day and I have a hankering to take a walk down to the branch—with a pretty woman by my side.”

Isabel stared at the picture of Dillon, her smile bittersweet. She’d captured his spirit as he stood there looking up at Wildwood. And somehow, since then, he was coming very close to capturing her heart. She’d have to be very careful about that. She wasn’t ready to admit that Dillon had always held her heart.

Blinking, she called out, “Couldn’t talk anyone else into it, huh?”

“Right. You seem to be the only woman around these parts willing to put up with me.”

Opening the door just a fraction—she surely didn’t want him to see that picture of himself—Isabel pasted an indulgent smile on her face. “You have such a unique way of asking a woman for a date, Dillon.”

Dillon stood back in the small hallway, his eyes sweeping over her face, his half grin teasing and tempting. “And you, dear Isabel, sure have a way of looking as refreshing as a tall glass of lemonade. How do you do that?”

Ruffled, she lowered her head and crossed her arms around her chest, sure that she looked raggedy and drained from working in her makeshift darkroom all afternoon. Conscious of her faded cotton T-shirt and old shorts, she asked, “Do what?”

“You look different now, you know,” he said instead of explaining himself. “I think it’s the hair. You never wore it long before.”

She left the bathroom and moved up the hall to the front of the rickety old house, running her hands through the swirls of loose curls falling away from her haphazard ponytail. “No, I didn’t. Mama made me keep it cut. Said it was too much of a handful, what with all these waves and curls. I hated wearing it short.”