A Husband of Her Own

“Because he was a friend of Josh Hill’s?”

Unfortunately the conversation was drifting toward Josh and she wasn’t sure she could stop it. “Maybe.”

“So we’re not really talking about Randy. We’re talking about Joshua.”

“No, I’m not talking about Josh. I never talk about Josh,” Rebecca responded.

Her mother found a spatula in the drawer and began stirring the sizzling onions. “Well, perhaps it’s time you did,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to get to the bottom of this feud between you two. We love Josh and his older brother. His parents are good friends of ours.”

Rebecca sighed. “I know. But it’s too late to improve relations between Josh and me, so don’t get it in your head to try. The bad blood between us is old, old news.”

“That might be the case, but I want you to bury whatever grudge you’re holding against him.”

“Are you kidding?” Rebecca paused in her knife attack on the radishes. The sudden absence of her rapid thump, thump, thump made the silence seem loud. “What’s the point? We run into each other a lot, but it’s only in passing. We could go on like this indefinitely. There’s no reason to change anything.”

“Now there is. You’ll soon be seeing each other more than in passing.”

“That sounds pretty specific. When?” And Rebecca had thought Buddy’s news was the worst she could receive.

“Your sisters are planning an anniversary celebration for your father and me. It’s in two weeks.”

The scent of her mother’s grilled onions became almost overpowering. “Somehow I knew you didn’t invite me over to talk about candles.”

“I did find some good candles,” her mother said.

Rebecca retrieved two stalks of celery from the fridge, washed them and started chopping them on the cutting board. She realized she could probably avoid the subject of Josh by using the candles to segue into Buddy’s postponement of the wedding. But the words stuck in her throat when she envisioned what her experience at the anniversary party would be like if she mentioned her latest setback too soon. “Heard you and Buddy are waiting a few weeks longer…You think that boy really knows what he wants?…Musta figured out what he was getting himself into, huh?” (said with a hearty chuckle).

Deciding that it would be much better to wait until after her parents’ anniversary, she plunged back into the subject of Josh Hill. “What does this party have to do with me and Josh? We can attend the same function without causing a scene.”

Her mother looked less than optimistic. “Like you did at Delia’s wedding?”

Rebecca threw the core of the lettuce in the trash compactor. “Is that what this is all about? You blame me for what happened at Delia’s wedding? I’ve told you, it wasn’t my fault.”

“Then whose fault was it?” her mother wanted to know. “You can’t blame Josh, not when you were the one who tripped him.”

“He only thought I was going to trip him. He overreacted.” She’d said so before, but no one seemed to care.

“Regardless, he fell into the cake and took the whole food table down with him.” Her mother winced at the painful memory.

“I told you, it was his mistake.”

“Maybe. But you’re the one who darted away from him at the last second and ran smack into the punch fountain, dousing your poor sister. She was so sticky, she had to miss the end of her own reception to change and shower. By the time she and Brad left on their honeymoon, her eyes were swollen, her nose was red from crying, and her hair and dress were ruined.”

“Okay, the punch part might’ve been my fault,” Rebecca conceded. “Josh grabbed at me when he fell and I was trying to get away so he couldn’t pull me down with him.”

“Better you fall in an undignified heap than the bride gets sprayed with punch. It wasn’t a pleasant thing for Delia to—”

The door banged open as her father strode in from the garage, briefcase in hand, and whatever her mother was about to say was immediately lost in the human power surge. Loud, authoritative and supremely confident, her father commanded respect simply by being. The fact that he’d been the mayor of Dundee since Rebecca was in high school, was well over six feet and resembled Billy Graham certainly didn’t hurt. “Did you tell her?” he demanded the moment he spotted Rebecca.

Her mother gave him one of her famous warning looks and cleared her throat. “Actually, Doyle, we were just getting around to—”

“Tell me what?” Rebecca interrupted, meeting her father’s direct gaze. He might not approve of her, but she wasn’t going to flinch in his presence like everyone else. And she sure as heck wasn’t going to use her mother as a go-between.

“That you’re not invited to the anniversary celebration unless you can behave yourself,” he said point-blank. “I’ve had it with this thing between you and Josh Hill. I won’t have you embarrassing me again.” With that, he stalked from the kitchen, presumably to change out of his suit.

Rebecca put down the knife she’d been rinsing and let her wet hands dangle in the sink. “Not everyone sees Josh Hill through the same rose-colored glasses you do, Dad,” she called after him.

“That would only be you,” he hollered back. “Everyone else in this town knows Josh for what he is—an ambitious young man with a shrewd business mind. That boy’s going to make something of himself someday. You wait and see.”

“And I’m not? Is that what you’re implying?”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. Though Rebecca loved her profession, she knew that in her parents’ opinion, a hairstylist—even an accomplished hairstylist—could never compare to a successful horse breeder like Josh. Josh Hill had somehow been able to win the love and approval she’d always craved, especially from her father. But what bothered her most was that he’d done it so effortlessly and so long ago. How could she compete with someone so well entrenched in her father’s affections?

She hadn’t been able to compete with Josh at seven. She couldn’t compete with him now. She wasn’t even sure why she kept trying.

After finishing the salad, she set it on the table and retrieved her keys.

“Where are you going?” her mother asked, alarmed. “Aren’t you staying for dinner?”

Rebecca pictured the moment her sister and the kids arrived; she pictured sitting across the table from her father. “No, Dad already took care of what you both wanted to say. Consider me warned,” she said and headed for the entry.

“Rebecca?”

She paused.

“He doesn’t mean to sound so harsh, honey,” her mother said softly.

“Oh, he meant it all right,” she said. Rebecca wasn’t sure about a lot of things—why Buddy kept putting off their wedding, why she’d gone home with Josh a year ago last summer (and how she’d even started dancing with him in the first place), why she didn’t really fit into her own family. But she knew her father had meant every word.

REBECCA SAT on her back step as darkness fell, and lit up a cigarette. She’d managed to get through yesterday without smoking, despite Buddy’s call, but one visit to her parents’ house and—POOF—there went her resolve. What difference did it make, anyway? She couldn’t change her stripes. Even if she decided to become a nun, the good folks of Dundee would find something to criticize, her father chief among them.

At least she’d come by her reputation honestly. She’d raised eyebrows in Dundee more times than she could count and had certainly given Josh a run for his money in their younger days. She still remembered filling his locker with pincher bugs, spray-painting “Josh Sucks” on the sidewalk in front of his house and telling everyone that his penis was a mere three inches long (without adding that she was going by information gleaned ten years earlier in a classic “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours”).

Contrary to popular belief, however, he was hardly blameless. He’d retaliated by jamming her locker so she couldn’t open it, which made her fail an English test because she couldn’t turn in the essay she’d written the night before. He and Randy stole a pair of panties from her gym locker and ran them up the flagpole. And Josh had offered to give her a more current measurement of his penis. She’d refused, of course. But plenty of other girls had come forward to vouch for something far more impressive than three inches. Taken with his football prowess, even her accusation of a small penis wasn’t enough to dent Josh’s overwhelming popularity.

Rebecca was the only one, it seemed, who didn’t worship Josh Hill. And that hadn’t changed over the years. No matter what happened, her father remained one of his staunchest supporters.

A staunch supporter of the enemy. She grimaced and took another drag on her cigarette. About Josh, her father always said, “He’s made his parents proud, hasn’t he?” About Rebecca her father always said, “God tries us all.”

Oh well, nothing in Dundee was going to matter when she moved to Nebraska, she told herself. But that line of reasoning didn’t pack the same power it used to because she was no longer sure she’d be moving to Nebraska. Buddy had left several messages on her answering machine today, but she didn’t feel like returning them. She felt like sitting on the steps, smoking one cigarette after another, watching the moths hover about her porch light. Autumn was here. The leaves were turning, the days growing shorter. Rebecca had always loved the crisp mountain air, and she wondered if Nebraska was very different. She’d only visited there once, the past spring….

If she did move, she’d miss autumn in Idaho. And she’d miss Delaney.

Picking up the cordless phone she’d carried outside with her, she dialed her best friend at the ranch where Delaney now lived with her husband, Conner Armstrong.

“You’re smoking again,” Delaney said, almost as soon as she answered.

Rebecca exhaled. “That’s the first thing you’ve got to say to me?”

“You promised me you were going to quit for real this time.”

Rebecca removed her cigarette and watched the smoke curl up into the sky. “Yeah, well, that was before I went over to my parents’ tonight. Be grateful I’m only smoking.”

“Something happen at your folks?”

After another long drag, Rebecca stubbed out her cigarette, then stretched her legs. “Nothing new. How’s the pregnancy?”

“The doctor says everything looks fine.”

“Good. Hard to believe you’re almost ready to pop. The past few months have gone fast.” In fact, considering that Rebecca and Buddy had been engaged before Delaney even met Conner, time had streaked by. Delaney was starting a family; Rebecca was trying to work up the nerve to tell everyone her wedding had just been postponed again.

“I’m big enough that it’s getting a little uncomfortable,” Delaney complained. “I’ve lost my toes.”

Rebecca thought she wouldn’t mind gaining twenty-five pounds and losing sight of her toes if it meant a baby. “Guess that goes with the territory, huh? Did you ever find the dressers you were looking for?”

“Conner told me to buy new ones. But I’m having fun hunting for bargains. It keeps me occupied while he oversees the building of the resort. Maybe I’ll drive to Boise next week and visit a few garage sales, see what I can find. You’re off Monday. Want to go with me?”

Rebecca’s call-waiting beeped before she could answer. “Hang on a sec,” she said and hit the flash button. “Hello?”

“Rebecca?”

It was her father. She sat up and shook another cigarette out of the package, knowing instinctively she’d need one. “Yeah?”

“I just talked to Josh Hill.”

She froze mid-motion. “Why do I get the feeling that comment is somehow related to me?”

“Because it is. I asked him to call a truce between the two of you.”

Rebecca stuck the unlit cigarette in her mouth and found her lighter. “You didn’t,” she said, speaking around it.

“I did.” A brief, unhappy hesitation. “Are you smoking again? I thought you’d quit.”

Dropping her lighter in her lap, she quickly pulled the cigarette from her mouth. “I have.”

“I hope so. That’s such a nasty habit.”

“Why did you call Josh, Dad? There’s no reason to ask for a truce.”

“After what happened at Delia’s wedding?”

“That was an accident. We haven’t done anything to each other on purpose for years.” Barring the night they’d gone to Josh’s place from the Honky Tonk, of course. They’d done a few things to each other then—and would probably have done a lot more if they hadn’t been interrupted. But that night didn’t count. Feverish groping didn’t fall in the same category as their earlier dealings.

“I’m tired of being afraid to have you two in the same room,” her father replied.

“Is that what you told him?”

“That’s what I told him.”

“And he said…” Rebecca toyed nervously with her lighter, flipping the lid open, closed, open, closed. Click, click…click, click.

“He agreed to let the past go.”

“He did?”

“That’s what I just said, isn’t it? Now, what do you say?”

Click, click…click, click.

Words were cheap, Rebecca decided. Why not let her father feel as though his intervention had solved everything? “Okay.”

“Okay, what?”

“Okay, we’re calling a truce.”

“Good.” Her father sounded inordinately pleased. “I told him I could convince you.”

“You’ve done a bang-up job, Dad. Is that all?”

“Not quite.”

Rebecca hesitated, fearing she hadn’t heard the worst of it yet. “What do you mean by that?”

“As a gesture of good faith, he’s stopping by the salon tomorrow for a haircut.”

Rebecca coughed as though she’d just swallowed a bug. When she could speak, she said, “But he always gets his hair cut at the barbershop.”

“Not tomorrow. Tomorrow he’s coming to you. He’ll be there at ten. Good night.”

“Wait,” she cried. “I can’t cut his hair.”

“Why not?” her father asked, his voice now gruff. “You agreed to the truce, remember?”

Collecting her cigarettes and lighter, Rebecca stood and began to pace across the small porch. “Of course I remember, but…but tomorrow’s Saturday. I’m booked solid.”

“Not at ten in the morning you’re not.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I was your first appointment, and I just gave him my slot.”

Her heart sank. “You sure you want to do that, Dad?”

“Positive.”

“But this is crazy. How does my cutting Josh’s hair cement this…little truce of yours?”

“Consider it a trial run for the anniversary party. If you two can get through tomorrow without killing each other, we’ll all breathe a little easier.”

Rebecca propped the phone on one shoulder and shoved a hand through her new Ashley Judd hairstyle, frantically trying to think of some way out. But her father didn’t give her a chance to argue further. He surprised her by saying, “You’re doing the right thing, Beck. And stay away from those damn cigarettes.” Then he hung up.

Shocked, she blinked into the dark yard for several seconds, not knowing what to think.

“Was that Buddy?” Delaney asked as soon as she switched back over.

“It was my father.”

“Everything okay?”

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Why?” Delaney asked. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m supposed to cut Josh Hill’s hair tomorrow.”

Silence met this statement, followed by, “You’re kidding, right? Josh is going to put himself at your mercy when you’ve got a pair of scissors in your hands?”

Rebecca bit her lip and sighed as she headed back inside the house. “I guess we’ll see, huh?”

CHAPTER THREE

REBECCA GLANCED NERVOUSLY through Hair And Now’s large front window as the clock ticked inexorably toward ten. The weather was cool and clear with a slight breeze—another perfect autumn day. Not many people were out and about yet, but Saturdays typically started slow at this end of town. Three blocks away at the bakery, there’d be a crowd wanting coffee, donuts and muffins. Starbucks might be taking over the planet, but the citizens of Dundee still patronized Don and Tami’s Bakery.

Maybe Josh wouldn’t show, Rebecca thought hopefully, noting the dearth of traffic. If he stood her up, she could shrug when she next saw her father and say, “I was perfectly willing to make peace, Dad, but he never arrived.” And then she’d look innocent for a change.

Perfect. She smiled as she began readying her station with rods and tissues for the permanent wave she’d be giving at eleven, imagining the look of disappointment on her father’s face if for once Josh failed him. This whole truce thing could end up working in her favor. She could feign disappointment in his stubborn refusal to put the past behind them and—

The bell rang over the door, causing Rebecca’s daydream to dissipate. She knew without turning that Josh had arrived. The murmur that ran from Katie, the other stylist, to Mona, the manicurist, to Nancy Shepherd, who was having her nails done, would have told Rebecca even if her sixth sense did not.

But her sixth sense was working just fine. Somehow she could always tell when Josh was around. He made her feel clumsy, nervous, unattractive.

No wonder she didn’t like him. Anyway, despite her wishful thinking, she’d known all along that he’d appear. He’d never been one to back down from a challenge.

Rebecca cleaned her combs and scissors before looking up. She needed a moment to gather her nerve. Josh was so much easier to hate when he wasn’t within ten feet of her. Ever since she’d made the mistake of going home with him that one night, something had changed. She wasn’t sure exactly what it was, but it made their relationship—or absence of a relationship—very complex. She supposed kissing a man the way she’d kissed him, as though she longed to climb inside his skin and live there for the rest of her life, tended to confuse the issues.

“Hi, Josh, what brings you in today?” Mona asked. At least fifteen years his senior, Mona had a handful of children at home as well as a husband, but the pitch of her voice suggested she could still appreciate a handsome man when she saw one. And Josh was definitely handsome. He had thick blond hair that fell carelessly across his forehead, skin that tanned so easily he was golden-brown before anyone else even thought of bringing out their summer clothes, and intelligent green eyes that sparkled with more than enough mischief to keep a woman guessing.

Fortunately Rebecca had long ago perfected her immunity to his rugged virility. She couldn’t really explain her brief lapse that fateful August 16th, but she was still Rebecca Wells. Josh Hill was never going to get the best of her.

“I have an appointment this morning,” he told Mona.

“You’re Katie’s first client?”

“He’s not my ten o’clock,” Katie said. “Unless there’s been some mix-up, I’m doing a perm for Mrs. Vanderwall. And Erma’s not coming in today. She’s off visiting her sister in Boise.”

From the corner of her eye, Rebecca saw Josh shove his hands in the pockets of his Wranglers. “Actually, I’m here to see Rebecca.”

“You’re joking, right?” Mona was chuckling as she spoke, as though he had to be joking. Everyone in town knew that putting her and Josh together was like putting a match to gasoline.

Rebecca cleared her throat and faced them fully. If she waited any longer to acknowledge Josh’s presence, he might realize she wasn’t quite up to her usual self.

“Josh, good to see you,” she said, forcing a smile.

He gave her that crooked grin of his, the one that showed his dimples, and immediately called her on the lie. “Are you sure?”

Hell, no. “I’m trying to be positive,” she said, clasping her hands in front of her because she suddenly didn’t know where to put them.

He settled his black felt cowboy hat further back on his head. “So this truce thing is for real.”

“I guess,” she said with a shrug.

“Because I gotta tell ya, that fiasco at your sister’s wedding was…” He shook his head and let his breath go all at once.

“I can’t believe you’d even bring that up,” Rebecca responded, bridling. “You made me take out the punch fountain.”

He cocked an eyebrow at her. “You’re the one who tripped me in the first place.”

“I didn’t even touch you!”

“Wait a second,” Katie said. “That wedding was the most exciting thing this town has seen in the past three years. If you two call a truce, life’s going to get pretty boring around here. Who will Rebecca have to fight with?”

“She doesn’t need me,” Josh said. “She’s always been her own worst enemy.”

Katie started to chuckle, but Rebecca gave her a look that said “shut up or pay later.” Katie covered her mouth with one hand in an effort to hide her amusement. But Rebecca wasn’t fooled. She would’ve said something to the effect that she wouldn’t be around to entertain everyone much longer. Except she felt a little unsure of that right now. And Mrs. Vanderwall entered the salon just then, offering the perfect distraction.

“Your ten o’clock is here,” Rebecca said pointedly to Katie and narrowed her eyes at Mona long enough to remind her that she had a client, too. As Mona finally bent over Nancy Shepherd’s hands, Nancy said, “Don’t look at me, I didn’t say anything,” and Rebecca turned back to Josh. “I should’ve known you’d make this difficult.”

His devil-may-care grin reappeared. “I thought that’s how you like things.”

“I don’t like things difficult.”

“Yes, you do. The harder the better.”

Rebecca was fairly certain he didn’t mean what he’d said as a sexual innuendo, but his words still brought visions of August 16th. He’d been as aroused as she had—which was the only saving grace about the whole experience. She might have embarrassed herself by nearly sleeping with the enemy but, if memory served, the attraction had been very mutual. “I’m not the one who rained on your parade,” she said.

“Excuse me?”

“You moved in across the street from me.”

“That’s what you hold against me?” he cried. “That I moved in across the street from you? How the hell was I supposed to help that? I was eight years old, for crying out loud.”

She hadn’t really meant what she’d said, of course. He hadn’t ruined her life by moving in across the street. He’d ruined her life by being everything her father had ever wanted. But trying to explain that would sound equally ridiculous. She was thirty-one. Her father’s preference for Josh shouldn’t bother her anymore.

“Never mind,” she said. “Are you planning on staying or what? Because you don’t have to, you know. I’ll just tell my father that you chickened out at the last minute. I’m sure he’ll understand.”

“Chickened out?” he repeated.

She smiled sweetly. “Isn’t that what you’d call it?”

“I’d call it an issue of trust. The thought of you standing over me with a sharp instrument strikes fear into my heart.”

“Oh, come on. You’d have to have a heart for that,” she said, and thought she heard Mona snicker.

Josh rubbed his chin as though she’d just delivered a nice left hook. “You certainly haven’t changed much,” he said sulkily.

“You have good reason to worry,” Mona muttered from where she was sitting at her station up front, filing Nancy’s nails.

“I bet five bucks he won’t stay,” Nancy piped up.

“I’ll put ten on that,” Katie said.

“What’s the bet?” Mrs. Vanderwall had been too busy trying to straighten her girdle so she could sit down to pay much attention to what was going on around her. At eighty, her hearing wasn’t what it used to be. Katie started to explain, but she only got partway before Mrs. Vanderwall waved her to silence. “Never mind the rest. It doesn’t matter. No one’s a match for Rebecca. I’ll put twenty on her getting the best of him.”

Rebecca wasn’t flattered by this show of support. She wasn’t that much of an ogre, was she? Sure, she’d lost her temper a few times in the past. Once she’d blackened Gilbert Tripp’s eye when he backed into Delaney’s car, but he’d deserved it. He’d tried to drive away before she and Delaney could get out of the Quick Mart, and when Rebecca finally chased him down, he’d blamed the accident on Delaney’s parking. Their argument had quickly escalated and the next thing Rebecca knew…well, she’d let one fly. But she didn’t doubt Josh would have done the same!