Stranger in Town

“If I can afford it,” she said.

Smiling at Lazarus, as if his dog could share his embarrassment, he shook his head. He had Mike to blame for his false assumption. Maybe his vanity had something to do with it, too, but it wouldn’t have been the first time a woman had asked him out. “You can have it,” he said.

“No…I wouldn’t feel good about that. I’d rather…can you name a price?”

Gabe had no idea what to charge her. He’d never sold any of his furniture before. And he didn’t need the money. He thought giving her the chair was a great idea. It could stand as a token of his goodwill, so she could go on with her life without carrying any baggage from the accident. Then, whatever happened—whether he walked or he didn’t—it would be his problem exclusively.

“It’s no big deal,” he said. “Really. I’ll drop it by tomorrow after practice.”

“Now I’m embarrassed I even asked.”

“Why?” He began scratching Lazarus again.

“Because I can’t take it unless you let me give you something in return. What if we worked out a trade?”

His hand stilled. The suggestion piqued his interest, if only to see what she might offer him. “What kind of trade?”

“I don’t know…Do I have anything you want?”

Gabe waved Lazarus away and straightened in his chair. Was he the only one whose mind was suddenly painting erotic pictures? “Give me some suggestions,” he said. Since the accident, he’d tried very hard to cram his sex drive and anything related to male/female intimacy into a single compartment in his brain, a compartment he no longer used. Yet that innocent question from Hannah had his heart pounding as he imagined her naked beneath him, his lips gliding down her flat stomach….

She seemed to realize that what she’d just said could be misinterpreted and sounded embarrassed when she scrambled to clarify. “I mean, I’m a pretty good photographer. I could do some portraits of you.”

“Of me?”

“Why not? You could use them as Christmas gifts for your folks, or put them inside Christmas cards.”

Now that he had allowed the sexy images in his mind to take shape, he was having difficulty brushing them aside. Certainly, getting his picture taken sounded like a poor substitute for what he’d been thinking. He didn’t send out Christmas cards, and he wasn’t sure he’d be spending the holidays with this folks this year. Even if he changed his mind, a portrait was about the last thing he wanted to give them. “No thanks.”

“I could photograph Lazarus.”

“Uh…” He arched a questioning eyebrow at his dog, who’d returned to his favorite corner and was yawning again, then chuckled softly. “I love Lazarus, but I’m not really the type to hang up a big photograph of my dog.”

She didn’t try to talk him into it. She immediately moved on to something else, which strengthened his suspicion that she was working hard to compensate for the “Do I have anything you want?” blunder. “Then maybe I can cook for you. You’ll be busy now that you’re coaching, right? If you like, you could swing by and pick up your dinner after practice each day, then heat it up when you’re ready to eat.”

Gabe didn’t want to be distracted from the life he’d plotted out for himself—especially by the type of images he’d just entertained. But he knew Hannah’s offer wasn’t really about a chair. Despite the years that had passed, she was still looking for some way to feel better about her part in the accident. “I guess we could try it,” he said. “I could give Kenny a ride at the same time if you like.”

Hannah quickly agreed and seemed eager to discuss the details. But Gabe knew almost instantly that he’d made a mistake. He might have given way to Mike’s pressure to take over the Spartans, but that didn’t mean he had to let other people intrude in his life.

“Gabe?” she said when the conversation began to wind down.

“What?”

“What did you think I was asking for earlier?”

“When?” He already knew the answer—when he’d given her a resounding “no” before she could even finish the question—but he hoped to buy himself some time.

“When I was asking about the chair.”

No good answer presented itself. “Oh, something else,” he said vaguely, then added a quick, “I gotta go.” He hung up before she could press him, but the memory of her voice lingered in his mind as Lazarus followed him into the house. He’d let her cook for a week or so, he decided, as he changed into his T-shirt and shorts so he could work out. Then he’d thank her, insist it was enough and get back to growing his wheatgrass.

CHAPTER FOUR

GENERALLY HANNAH DUCKED her head and tried to go unnoticed whenever anyone mentioned Gabe Holbrook. There were too many folks in town who hadn’t yet forgiven her for destroying their favorite football star. She suspected they were more upset that they could no longer bask in his reflected glory than they were about his loss. But they often shook their heads and tsked when she passed by, especially at the beginning of football season and in the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl.

Today, the mention of Gabe’s name made Hannah as self-conscious as ever. When Trudy Johnson started talking about the new coach at the high school, Hannah cursed silently and raised the cookbook she’d brought into the hair salon. She should’ve expected the town to be buzzing with the latest news. Folks in Dundee took school sports very seriously. Here, the high school coach possessed almost as much clout as the mayor.

“I never dreamed he’d accept the position,” Trudy was saying.

“I know!” Over the top of her book, Hannah saw thirtyish Shirley Erman crane her head around even though Ashleigh Evans was trying to put perm rods in her hair. Saturdays were always busy at the beauty shop. “He’s been living like a hermit for three years,” she said. “Then, suddenly, he’s the new coach of the varsity football team? I mean, I hate that Coach Hill passed away, but I think it’s great Gabe’s willing to take over.”

Hannah agreed. In her opinion, Gabe needed to feel passionate about something again, to regain his zest for life. But she didn’t say anything. She wasn’t sure she wanted to draw attention to herself and suffer through that awkward moment when the others realized that she—the person who’d ended his career—was sitting only a few feet away.

“He’ll do a good job.” Rebecca Hill was giving Trudy a short jagged cut that looked far too Vogue for a little town in Idaho, but that was the beauty of Rebecca. She was artistic and dramatic, and she followed her heart. Since marrying Mike’s brother a few years ago, she’d grown slightly more conservative, especially since the birth of their baby. But she’d never be plain or boring. And her salon reflected that. Gone was the faded candy-cane-striped wallpaper and pale pink vinyl of the beauty parlor Hannah remembered from her childhood. Now the salon was decorated in black and white and chrome, had a checkered floor, sleek, contemporary lighting, and vases filled with exotic flowers. Recently, Rebecca had even changed the name. After she’d remodeled and expanded to include facials, electrolysis, massage and aromatherapy, Hair and Now had become Shear Temptation. Located next to an old-fashioned drugstore on one side, and a redbrick bank on the other, Shear Temptation looked like a spaceship parked between two Model T’s.

“Being a good player doesn’t make someone a good coach,” a voice nearby responded.

A quick peek around her book told Hannah that Deborah Wheeler, one of Coach Blaine’s daughters, had made that comment from a seat in the waiting area closer to the front desk.

Hannah had been so absorbed in trying to go unnoticed that she hadn’t seen Deborah come in. She lowered her cookbook. “Being a good player doesn’t make someone a bad coach,” she said, rushing to Gabe’s defense in spite of herself. Now that he was venturing back into society, she wanted to make sure he received the support he deserved.

Everyone’s gaze momentarily fixed on her. She waited for someone to mention the accident but, thankfully, nobody did.

“I just want what’s good for Gabe,” Shirley said, turning back to Deborah. “If coaching will give him fresh purpose, I’m all for it.”

“Even if he’s not cut out for the job?” Deborah countered.

“Even if he doesn’t win very much,” Shirley said. “My husband might disagree, but I say we can’t expect every season to be as good as the last few. Gabe needs this.”

Deborah had a thin, angular face. Now she pursed her lips as though it tried her patience to deal with folks obviously less educated than herself. She taught Honors English at the high school and acted as if she knew everything. Some of the ladies in town made fun of her, but she had her admirers. “Gabe doesn’t need this job,” she said. “He made millions while he was playing football. And anyway, no one should get a coaching position out of pity.”

Hannah opened her mouth to say that with a record like Gabe’s he’d hardly landed the job on pity, but Rebecca answered before she could. “Pity has nothing to do with it! Gabe’s well-qualified.”

Deborah shook her head. “You don’t understand.”

“What’s not to understand?” Hannah asked.

“Think about it.” She set her magazine on the table. “Making Gabe head coach places him in a position where he has everything to lose and nothing to gain. He doesn’t need the money from the job—”

“This isn’t about money,” Rebecca interrupted.

“—and if the team wins, so what? We’ve won plenty of times in the past without him.” She tilted her head at a jaunty angle. “But let’s look at what happens if the Spartans have a bad season. Now there’s a story. Poor, crippled Gabe Holbrook takes on his old high school team, a team with a winning season nearly twenty years in a row,” she was careful to emphasize, “only to watch them lose again and again. Which could happen. He’s an untried entity. So my question is this—do we really want to risk seeing Gabe fall any farther off his pedestal? The accident nearly destroyed him. What’s he going to do if he fails at this?”

Hannah suspected Deborah was actually more afraid Gabe would succeed. “He won’t fail,” she said.

Deborah folded her arms across her nearly flat chest. “You don’t know that.”

“I, for one, am proud of him for trying,” Shirley said. “People who won’t attempt something for fear of failing, cripple themselves. At least Gabe’s not doing that. His handicap was caused by an outside source.”