The Ballad of Dixon Bell

She paused on the last step. “I gather from the frown on your handsome face that your dinner plans fell through.”

“Yes, ma’am, they did.” He tried to erase the frown. “That’s okay—there’ll be another night.”

At the mirror beside the front door, his grandmother checked the smooth sweep of her silver hair, always worn in a knot on the crown of her head, dabbed a little powder over her fine skin and checked the set of her lavender suit jacket. Convinced she was perfect—as, indeed, Dixon thought she was—she turned and put a hand on his arm.

“Why don’t you come with us, then? We’d love to have a good-looking male at our table to pass the time with. LuAnne Taylor just loves to flirt with younger men.”

Dixon lifted her hand and kissed the cool fingers, feeling them tremble just a bit in his hold. She smelled like his childhood—lavender water and talc and Dove soap. “You’re sweet, Miss Daisy. But I think I’ll let you go on without me. I might not be the best of company tonight.” He wanted to treat Kate’s refusal lightly, but the disappointment harkened back to the old days, when getting turned down by Kate Bowdrey had changed the course of his life. At seventeen, a boy was permitted to take love so seriously. By the time he’d reached thirty, he really ought to have gained a little perspective.

“If you say so, dear.” Miss Daisy patted his cheek with her free hand. “I’m just grateful to have you home again.” Outside, a car horn beeped. “Don’t wait up—sometimes we go to LuAnne’s and play bridge until the wee hours.”

Dixon opened the front door. “Miss Daisy, you’re a hell-raiser.”

She flashed him the smile that had captivated most of the men in New Skye at one time or another. “Of course. At my age, what else do I have left to do?”

Chuckling, Dixon escorted her down the house steps so she wouldn’t have to depend on the rickety railing, and held her arm as they went toward the twenty-year-old Cadillac waiting at the end of the walk. The crumbling brick pavers made the footing shaky, at best, but the grass on either side was too high and too weed-grown to walk through. He was surprised one of the older ladies who visited his grandmother hadn’t fallen and hurt herself before now.

As Miss Daisy settled herself in the Caddy, Dixon spoke with Miss Taylor. “Don’t y’all get too rowdy tonight. I want to be able to hold my head up in town tomorrow.”

“The very idea.” Miss Taylor pretended to be embarrassed. “Just four old friends having dinner together. What could be more refined?”

Dixon shook his head. “Four wild women is more like it, I’d say.”

“LuAnne, Alice is waiting for us,” Miss Daisy commented. “And you know how she fusses when she has to wait.”

With the ladies inside and the windows rolled up against the humid evening, the Caddy followed the curve of the driveway and headed down the quarter-mile gravel lane toward the street. Dixon turned toward the front porch, hands in his pockets, wondering what he would do for dinner.

But then he caught sight of the house, gleaming white in the twilight, and forgot his train of thought. An antebellum relic built by his many-times great-grandfather, Magnolia Cottage had been a plantation house before a bad economy and an ugly war stripped away most of the land, leaving only a few acres of gardens around the main building. The Crawfords and Bells had never been very lucky with money, so the gardens had eventually fallen into a state of disrepair, followed soon enough by the house itself. Growing up, Dixon hadn’t recognized the problems, but after so long away, he was appalled at the conditions in which his grandmother continued to live.

Not dirty, no…Miss Daisy had a woman in twice a week to keep the place clean. But the plaster walls and ceilings were crumbling as badly as the brick walk. Floorboards were loose all over the house. Miss Daisy had learned to avoid certain steps and particular danger spots, but Dixon had banged a shin with an exploding board in the bedroom floor on his first night at home. In addition to a hell of a bruise, he’d gotten a blistering lecture from his grandmother for his “uncivil” language.

There was no central air-conditioning, of course, only window units in the rooms Miss Daisy used. The kitchen was old, the appliances barely functional, the bathrooms—two of them for the whole house—archaic. Magnolia Cottage needed a serious renovation before it could serve as a home to raise a family in. Which he hoped to do, if only Kate Bowdrey LaRue would cooperate.

While he was pondering the possibilities, enjoying the way the humid air held the scent of leaves and grass and pine, a dark-blue SUV pulled around the curve of the driveway and stopped in front of the house. Dixon didn’t recognize the man who got out and came to join him.

The stranger nodded toward the house. “A wreck, ain’t it?”

Dixon ignored a flare of temper provoked by the insult to his home. The guy was a clod, but that was no reason to get mad. “Needs some work, definitely.”

“You Dixon Bell?” He wore mirrored sunglasses and a pink knit shirt and had “let’s make a deal” written all over him.

“I am.”

“Well, you’re just the man I’m looking for, then.” Turning, he stuck out his hand. “I’m L.T. LaRue. And I’ll pay you three hundred thousand cash to let me take this disaster off your hands.”

CHAPTER TWO

DIXON KEPT HIS FISTS in his pockets. “Thanks, but no thanks.” This was the bastard who had left Kate—and his own kids, for God’s sake—to be with another woman. No way was he going to dignify the man’s existence with a handshake.

LaRue waited a few seconds, then let his arm drop. The grin stayed on his face, considerably stiffer than before. “We can deal on the price. I just wanted you to know I’m interested.”

“No, we won’t deal. I’m not selling.”

“Aw, come on, Dixon. The place is falling down around your ears. Your grandmother needs a decent place to live out her old age. Let me build you a new house and get you out from under this white elephant.”

Dixon imagined the pleasure of planting his knuckles directly under the bridge of those shiny shades, but decided not to start a brawl on his own front lawn, weedy though it might be. “Like I said, Mr. LaRue, I’m not selling. Have a good evening.” He headed up the walk, leaving LaRue behind.

But Kate’s husband did not, apparently, get the message. “I’ll give you four hundred grand,” he called as Dixon climbed the semicircular steps that had been built with bricks made on the property more than one hundred fifty years ago.

“No, thanks.”

“Four-fifty’s my top offer!”

Gritting his teeth, Dixon shut the hand-carved mahogany front door between himself and L.T. LaRue. He would have liked to punch a wall, but there were enough holes in the plaster already. Out in Colorado, he could have saddled up and galloped his horse through the sagebrush until they were both tired enough to sleep.

But he’d left his horses—Brady, the bay gelding, and Cristal, the quarter horse mare he had yet to break to saddle—at the ranch until he could find the right place to board them in North Carolina.

Meanwhile, the evening was wearing on and he hadn’t had his dinner. Maybe some good food would take the edge off his temper, mitigate his urge to murder L.T. LaRue. And since he doubted Miss Daisy’s cats would be willing to cook for him, Dixon grabbed the keys to his truck and headed for the one place in town he could be sure of getting a decent meal and friendly company.

If he couldn’t be with Kate, the folks at Charlie’s Carolina Diner were the next best thing.

KATE FELL ASLEEP at the kitchen table and woke to find Kelsey staring down at her. “What are you doing?”

She sat up, wincing at the stiffness in her back. “I’m not sure. What time is it?”

“Almost eight.”

“It’s not!” But, of course, it was. Kate braced her palms against the table and pushed herself to her feet. “Um…let me see what I can find to make for dinner.” Standing at the door to the pantry, with her mind still fogged by the wisps of a dream, she couldn’t seem to find much inspiration. “We’re down to the bare bones here. Mushroom soup, anyone?” Kelsey stuck her tongue out. “Refried beans?”

“We could have burritos.”

“Except there’s no cheese, no salsa and no tortillas. Just beans.”

Trace came into the kitchen. “Gross.”

Kate agreed. “No eggs, no butter, no pasta or sauce.”

Kelsey crossed her arms. “So let’s go out somewhere.”

For once, Trace agreed with his sister. “Sounds good.”

Kate shook her head. “I don’t have enough cash for fast food.” And she really didn’t like eating out of a paper bag.

“So we can go someplace that takes plastic.”

“Possibly.” She looked at her kids. Trace wore the oversize T-shirt and hugely sagging pants that comprised the required uniform among his friends. Both pieces had been ironed at the beginning of the day, for all the good it had done. Kelsey’s shorts were just that—barely conforming to the dress code that required them to reach her fingertips. Once home, she had changed the relatively modest shirt she’d worn to school for a clinging tank top that left a strip of midriff showing and almost nothing to the imagination.

As for herself…well, she was decent, in shorts and a T-shirt, but not really dressed. “Where could we go at this hour, without changing clothes?”