Garden Of Scandal

“The point is you’re afraid of me. I don’t suit the notions of backward, provincial Hillsboro, Louisiana, about how a man should look. I’m not your average redneck—crew-cut and squeaky clean, with nothing on his mind except fishing, hunting and drinking beer. Or at least, nothing he can share with a woman. I don’t fit.” His voice softened. “But then neither do you, Laurel Bancroft.”

Her lips tightened before she opened them to speak. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t you?”

The smile that accompanied his inquiry lasted only an instant. Yet the brief movement of his mouth altered the hard planes and angles of his face, giving him the devastating attraction of a dark angel. There was piercing sweetness in it, and limitless understanding. It saluted her independence even as it deplored it, applauded her courage in spite of her intransigence. It plumbed her loneliness, offered comfort, promised surcease.

Then it was gone. She fought the chill depression that moved over her in its wake. And lost.

On a deep breath, she said, “That isn’t it—or at least I’d like to think I’m not so petty. But I don’t need any more problems right now.”

“You need help and I need money. We’re a natural.” His words were even, an explanation rather than an appeal.

She flung out a hand in exasperation. “It isn’t that simple!”

“Not quite. My brother has cancer in the final stages. Did you know that? I took unpaid leave from the firm where I work in L.A. to come visit Grannie Callie with him. Now he wants to stay. Good home-cooked food and quiet living may help or may not, but at least it’s worth the chance. Still, I’ll be damned if I’ll live off my grandmother’s charity. I could get a more permanent—not to mention better paying—job, yes. But I’d have to be away all day, and that’s not what I need. Your place is close, the work shouldn’t be too confining. I’m a fast worker, I get the job done and I’m not too proud to follow orders. I know a rose from a rutabaga, and I can lay brick, pipe water, whatever it takes. What more do you want?”

What more, indeed? Nothing, except to listen, endlessly, to the deep, steady timbre of his voice. Which was reason enough to be wary.

“It’s just a small project,” she said. “I might install a little fountain in the middle of the roses after things are cleared away, but it’s not really worth your time, much less your skill.”

His smile came again, warming her, enticing her against her will. “Neither are worth all that much just now. They’ll be worth even less if you turn me down.”

“I don’t think…”

“Tell you what,” he said, easing forward. “I’ll work the first day for free. If you decide I’m no use to you, that’s the end of it. If you like what I’ve done, we’ll take it from there.”

“I can’t let you do that,” she said in protest.

“A fair trial, that’s all I ask. Starting at eight in the morning. What do you say?”

She was definitely crazy, because the whole thing was beginning to sound almost reasonable. What was the difference between hiring him or old man Pender down the road, or even young Randy Nott who did odd jobs for her mother-in-law? This man would be hired help, a strong back and pair of able arms. Probably more than able, but she wouldn’t think about that. A couple of days, maybe a week, and then he would be gone.

In sudden decision, she said, “Make it seven, to get as much done as possible before it gets too hot.”

“You’re the boss.”

Somehow, she didn’t feel like it.

He nodded once, then moved away, melting into the darkness along the overgrown path toward the drive. After a moment, Laurel heard the low rumble of a motorcycle being kicked into life. Then he zoomed off in a blast of power. The noise faded and the night was still again.

A shiver moved over her in spite of the warmth of the evening. She clasped her arms around her, holding tight. Sticks looked up, whining, as he picked up on her disturbance.

“What do you think, boy?” she asked, the words barely above a whisper. “Did I make a mistake?”

The dog gave a halfhearted wag of his tail as he stared in the direction Alec Stanton had gone.

She sighed and closed her eyes. “I thought so.”

Her new hired hand was on time the next morning—Laurel had to give him that much. She had barely pulled on her old jeans and faded yellow T-shirt when she heard his bike turn in at the drive.

Maisie Warfield, her housekeeper, hadn’t arrived yet, since she always had to get her “old man”—as she called her husband who was nearing retirement age—off to work before she could show up. Rather than waiting for Alec Stanton to come to the door and twist the old-fashioned doorbell, Laurel picked up her sneakers and moved in her sock feet toward the side entrance. At least she didn’t have to worry about Sticks. He had spent the night on the screened back veranda and was still shut up out there.

Alec Stanton was not on the drive where his bright red Harley-Davidson leaned, looking as out of place in front of the old, late-Victorian house as a ladybug on the hem of an ancient lace dress. Nor was he in the tangled front garden. However, a ripping, shredding sound led her to the side of the house. He was already at work there, tearing a clinging green curtain of smilax and Virginia creeper away from the overlap siding.

He looked around at her approach. His nod of greeting was brief before he spoke. “The whole place needs painting, though I can see at least a dozen boards that should be replaced first. You’ll lose more if you don’t protect them soon.”

“I know,” she said shortly.

“I could—”

“I can take care of it,” she said, cutting off the offer he was about to make. “You’re here for the garden.”

He yanked down a long streamer of smilax and let it fall, leaving it to be dug up by the roots later. Stripping off his gloves, he tucked them into the waistband of his jeans. He ran a critical eye over the house, which loomed above them, with its balustraded verandas that were rounded on each end in the style of a steamboat, its gingerbread work attached to the slender columns like ice-covered spiderwebs, and the conical tower set into the roofline. “It’s a grand old place,” he said. “It would be a shame to let it fall into ruin.”

“I don’t intend to,” she answered tartly. “Now, if you’ll…”

“Your husband’s old family home, I think Grannie said. How did you wind up with it?”

“Nobody else wanted it.”

That was the exact truth, she thought. The place had been the next thing to abandoned when she first saw it. Her husband’s mother, Sadie Bancroft, had moved out not long after her husband left her back in the sixties. His sister Zelda had no interest in it; she’d had more than enough of the big barn of a place as a child and couldn’t comprehend why Laurel had begged to buy it from the family after she and Howard were married. Even Howard had grumbled about the upkeep and often talked of trading it in for a small, neat ranch-style house during the fifteen years they were married. But that was all it had been—talk.

“It’s mighty big for one person.”

“I like big,” Laurel said and felt a sudden flush sweep over her face for no reason that made any sense. Or she hoped that it didn’t, although that seemed doubtful, considering the ghost of a smile hovering at one corner of Alec Stanton’s mouth.

“Where shall I start?”

“What?”

He tilted his head. “You were going to tell me where to start to work.”

“Yes. Yes, of course,” she said and spun around, leading the way toward the front garden.

She had meant to help him, in part to be on hand to point out what she wanted to keep and what needed to go. She soon saw that it was unnecessary. He knew his plants and shrubs; his time as a yardman had been put to good use. He was also efficient. He didn’t start work until he had checked out the tools in the shed behind the detached garage, then oiled and sharpened them.

“You could use a new pair of hedge shears,” he suggested as he ran a callused thumb along the edge of a wide blade. “It would make your job around here a lot easier.”

He was right, and she knew it. “I’ll tell Maisie to pick them up next time she goes into town.”

“You’re also out of gas for the lawn mower.”

“She can get that, too.”

He studied her for a moment, his eyes as dark and fathomless as obsidian. “You know you have a flat on your car? And the rest of the tires are so dry-rotted you’d be lucky to get out of the driveway on them.”

“I don’t go out much,” she said, avoiding his gaze.