Almost Heaven

Merrilee’s gaze fixed on him, waiting.

“Mrs. Parker came here over a year ago,” he began. “She bought the old Patterson place up on Cradle Creek.”

“‘Mrs.’? She’s married?” Merrilee asked in a tone even more horrified than before.

“A widow,” Grant explained. “Moved here from New Jersey when her husband died.”

“What does she look like?” Merrilee said. “Young and pretty, I’ll bet.”

“Bottle pretty,” Sally Mae said with a sniff. “She must spend a small fortune on auburn hair dye. And applies her makeup with a trowel. Amy Lou down at the Hair Apparent has made enough profit off that woman to buy a new car.”

“Mrs. Parker is several years older than your father,” Grant added.

Merrilee’s mouth gaped. “Daddy left Mom for an older woman? I don’t believe it.”

“She may be older, but she keeps herself in shape,” Grant said. “She’s a runner. Jogs for miles every day in tight little spandex outfits that accent her behind and, uh, generous chest size.” Grant glanced at Sally Mae, whose eyes were closed in disgust. “And she chooses her routes carefully.”

“Chooses her routes?” Merrilee frowned.

“Her jogging itinerary makes her highly visible to the male population,” Grant explained. “The woman’s been hot to trot ever since she arrived in Pleasant Valley. She’s cast her net at every man in town.”

“Correction,” Sally Mae interjected, “only at men with money. She’s a gold digger.”

“Unfortunately,” Grant said, “your father’s the first catch she’s landed.”

“The others had more sense,” Sally Mae said with distinct bitterness.

Grant didn’t bother mentioning how Ginger Parker had made a play for him last fall, pretending to sprain her ankle in front of his house. When he’d picked her up off the driveway, she’d twined her arms around his neck, pressed her breasts against his chest, batted her eyelashes and asked him to take her home. She’d filled his ear the whole time with how lonely she’d been since her husband, a retired army colonel, had died, and had shed tears that seemed transparently fake.

Refusing to fall for her ploy, Grant had called 9-1-1, and Brynn Sawyer had driven the woman to the hospital in her patrol car. After a thorough examination and X rays, the ER doctor had found nothing wrong with Ginger’s ankle and sent her home. Jim Stratton may have found the woman sexy, but Grant thought her pathetic.

Guilt gnawed at Grant. Ginger had been as persistent as a burr on a dog. She’d bought a canary after the twisted ankle encounter and showed up at the clinic for a consultation. If Grant hadn’t pawned her off on Jim, believing her no danger to his happily married partner, maybe none of this would have happened.

Merrilee shook her head. “I can’t believe this. Daddy has more sense than to fall for another woman, much less one like that.”

“Your father isn’t thinking with his brain,” Sally Mae said.

“Nana!” Merrilee’s face flushed deep crimson.

Grant wasn’t shocked by the oblique reference, only that a woman as genteel as Sally Mae would utter it. What she’d said was true. Jim Stratton hadn’t been thinking clearly for a long time. Ginger Parker had only one thing to offer a man like Jim.

Sex.

The two had nothing else in common.

“I’ll talk to him,” Merrilee said. “Make him see what a fool he’s making of himself. And how much he’s hurting Mom.”

“No.” Sally Mae shook her head firmly. “I don’t think you should do that.”

The older woman’s response surprised Grant. He’d figured Sally Mae had summoned Merrilee home specifically to talk some sense into Jim. She was the apple of her father’s eye and had always been able to wrap him around her little finger. Grant, too, before she shook the dust of Pleasant Valley off her shoes.

“Then why did you call me home?” Merrilee pushed back from the table, stood and paced the antique Oriental rug that covered the highly polished heart-pine floor.

“Men are stubborn,” Sally Mae said. “The more you tell them they shouldn’t do something, the more dead set they are to do it.”

Grant opened his mouth to protest, but Sally Mae cut him off. “Sorry, Grant, but that’s the truth as I see it, and especially where my son-in-law’s concerned.”

“If Daddy can’t be influenced, what can I do?” Merrilee’s reddened cheeks would have been appealing if not for her distress.

Sally Mae smiled with an almost feline cunning that made Grant glad she was plotting against Jim and not him. “I didn’t say your father can’t be influenced.”

Merrilee took her seat. “I know that look, Nana. You’ve got something up your sleeve.”

“Sit down, Merrilee June.” Sally Mae reached for a platter of sandwiches and passed it to Grant. “You might as well eat while we talk. You’re going to need your strength.”

Grant was so hungry he didn’t object to the dainty tuna salad sandwiches with the crusts removed. He filled his plate, but Merrilee took only half a sandwich and picked at it before taking a small bite.

“I want you to move back home,” Sally Mae announced to her granddaughter.

Merrilee choked.

Grant raised his eyebrows. Merrilee had made her happiness at leaving Pleasant Valley abundantly clear, and nothing, not even Grant’s marriage proposal, had been able to keep her here.

“You’re not serious,” Merrilee insisted once she’d cleared her throat.

“If you want to save your parents’ marriage,” Sally Mae said, “you must stay here. You can’t help them long distance.”

“If I can’t talk to Dad, what good is staying?”

She had a point, Grant conceded, but he also was well aware that Sally Mae McDonough was one sharp cookie. She wouldn’t have summoned Merrilee home without a specific plan.

Sally Mae patted her lips with a damask napkin and laid it beside her plate. “I said you shouldn’t talk to him about that woman.”

Grant winced. On Sally Mae’s lips, those two simple words sounded like the vilest profanity.

Merrilee cast her glance toward the ceiling as if seeking divine intervention. “Then what am I supposed to discuss? Cows and horses?”

Sally Mae’s sly smile returned. “In a manner of speaking.”

“What good would that do? Nana, I have my work in New York. I can’t just move home and abandon it.”

Sally Mae straightened her back, the proverbial steel magnolia. But her granddaughter was no slouch in the intestinal fortitude department, either. Grant waited, curious who would win this battle of wills.

Sally Mae nodded toward the hall, where Merrilee’s bags sat. “You brought your camera. You can work here.”

“There are precious few weddings in Pleasant Valley,” Merrilee protested.

“And no Bar Mitzvahs,” Grant added. Jim had kept him informed on how Merrilee was earning her living in New York.