Authors: Patricia Burroughs
Razzmatazz-DDL (24 page)
She spun toward him, her pale cheeks suffusing with color. “Just drop the dog food where you are. I’ll have the boys take it out later.”
Jeff warily did as she commanded. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” she answered weakly. “I just need to sit down for a minute.” She dropped into a chair at the breakfast table and put her head in her hands.
He needed to leave. He wanted to leave. Jeff slid his hands in his pockets and glanced uncertainly around the large kitchen-den combination. An assortment of trophies decorated the bay windowsill, and a soccer ball fought for space on the cluttered surface of a rolltop desk. Jutting from under the brown leather couch was the rump of a quivering beast, most probably a Great Dane.
“Cecil,” he asked tentatively, “is something wrong with your dog?”
She raised her head. “He’s terrified of strangers. If he hides his head, he thinks you can’t see him.”
“Mmm...” Jeff cast a wary eye at the dog’s angular derriere.
Three sharp knocks shook the back door and another boy entered the the room. Jeff did a double take. Son of a gun, not four!
“Mikey, would you please get me a glass of ice water?” She buried her face in her hands again.
“Sure thing, Mrs. Evans.” The dark-haired boy sauntered confidently across the kitchen and jammed a glass under the dispenser in the refrigerator door.
“Well, since everything seems to be under control...” Jeff began.
“Mom needs her scissors,” the boy said, thrusting the glass at Cecilia. “That’s why I’m here.”
“I don’t know where they are. How soon does she need them?” She took the glass with one hand; the other never left her forehead.
“She needs ’em right now, but don’t worry, I’ll find ’em.” He dashed to the back door and opened it. “Hey, Vincent! Come ’ere and help me find the scissors!” A younger dark-haired boy joined him, and they raced into the living room, shouting for Brad and Peter.
Jeff shifted uneasily. Cecilia seemed to have forgotten him. This whole scene reminded him of Cub Scout day camp. All that was lacking was the chiggers. He cleared his throat.
She stared blankly in his direction. “I’m sorry...”
“Are you sure you’re—” He was no more than halfway finished, when she began to slump. With a startled oath, Jeff dashed across the room and caught her just before she hit the table. Her body slid against his, and he felt her feverish skin. With one arm under her shoulder and the other grasping her free arm, he held her in an impossible position for lifting. He uttered a sharp curse and dragged her toward the sofa.
Halfway there, he was suddenly confronted with what appeared to be at least one hundred forty pounds of snarling Ralph. “Wait a minute, dog,” he pleaded, easing Cecilia’s limp body to the floor and putting himself between her and the dog. Of all times for the mangy cur to discover he had guts.
“What are you doin’ to my mommy?” Anne-Elizabeth leaped at Jeff, and he thought he heard the child growl. Then a set of teeth, obviously not canine, closed on his wrist. Jeff gave a yelp and jerked his hand free. The mop-haired child fell backward, screaming bloody murder. But before Jeff could inspect the damage, the snarling dog and Anne-Elizabeth’s angry wails had summoned the boys out of the woodwork.
“What’d you do to my sister?” Brad demanded.
“Look what he did to your mom!” Mikey shouted.
They all sprang at Jeff at once.
“Oh, hell!” Jeff ducked his head and threw himself across Cecilia’s limp body in an effort to protect her from the onslaught.
A piercing whistle split the air, ceasing all movements. Jeff raised his head and saw Peter standing in the doorway.
“What’s going on here?” Peter’s blue-gray eyes scanned the room with clear disapproval as he twirled a shiny referee’s whistle.
Jeff leaped up. “Help me. Your mom fainted.”
“What did you do to her?” Peter exclaimed, running to his mother’s side. “Look, buddy,” Jeff growled, “I didn’t do anything. She’s sick, can’t you tell? Now shut up and help me get her to the sofa.” Cecilia moaned in his arms, and he felt a strange protective sensation stir within him.
Jeff placed Cecilia gently on the sofa after Peter cleared newspapers and a basket of clean laundry out of the way. Jeff shot his hand out in time to save Cecilia from being doused with ice water. “Mikey, I don’t know who in the heck you are, but if you throw a drop of water on this lady, you’re history!”
Mikey backed off, his eyes wide. “Come on, Vinny, I think we’d better go get Mom!” They disappeared.
“Where’s your dad?” Jeff asked Peter.
The boy’s faced shuttered over.
It was his sister who responded. “With Monica.”
“Monica?” Jeff echoed. “You have another sister?”
“No, dummy,” Brad chimed in. “He married her.”
“He mawwied her,” Anne-Elizabeth repeated.
Peter just stared belligerently at him.
What now? Jeff stared helplessly at Cecilia’s pale face as Peter bustled around in the kitchen, then returned to his mother’s side. Her eyes finally fluttered open, and Jeff felt relief flow through him. She opened her mouth to speak, but Peter thrust an electronic thermometer in. She blinked from Peter to Jeff, to Peter again in apparent confusion, then closed her eyes once more.
When it beeped, Jeff reached for the thermometer, but Peter snatched it away. “Mom, you’ve got a hundred and one. You’re sick.”
Brad whirled toward Jeff. “That means you’ve gotta get outa here, mister. Mom doesn’t allow company when we’ve got fever.”
Jeff started to tell the kid exactly what he thought of him, but was interrupted by a very welcome adult voice.
“What seems to be the problem?” A tall woman with dark almond eyes surveyed the scene from the open back door, flanked by Mikey and Vinny. She cast her appraising look at Jeff. “I don’t believe we’ve met?”
“Jefferson Smith.” He offered his hand awkwardly, feeling uncharacteristically ill at ease under her close scrutiny.
“Carol Bellini,” she responded with a slight smile. “Are you a friend of Cecilia’s?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes. We, er, go back a long way.”
“Mmm-hmm.” She crossed toward Cecilia, patting Ralph’s head as she passed him. The disgusting mutt wiggled with delight.
“Carol…” Cecilia croaked. “What’s happening?”
“That man hurt you, Mommy. But me and Walph stopped him.” Anne-Elizabeth beamed with pride.
“I did not...” Jeff began.
“And he twied to hit me, but I’m too stwong,” Anne-Elizabeth continued.
“I did not!” Jeff said desperately, but the clamoring of the children as each babbled a different version of the fracas drowned out his voice. He closed his eyes in despair. Damn, nothing had changed. Chaos still surrounded Cecilia.
His suit was rumpled and covered with dog hairs, and he’d already missed a meeting. Did he have time to go home and change before his next appointment? First he had to get out of this madhouse. Then maybe the world would shift back to normal.
But when he glanced at Cecilia’s pale face surrounded by the anxious faces of her children, he felt a pang of… of what? What was it about her that grabbed hold of him, made him feel so protective? Those same waifish eyes, that same fiery mop of hair, that same full, pouting lower lip... No doubt about it, she’d turned out better than he had ever suspected a skinny fourteen-year-old possibly could. But what he was responding to was something else.
He couldn’t explain the smile tugging at his lips, the amusement suddenly bubbling up inside him at the sight of her, the thought of her, the reality of Cecilia Greene crashing back into his life again, after all these years. He should be gnashing his teeth with frustration. Instead he was grinning like an idiot.
What the heck had come over him? Whatever it was, he’d better get control of it fast. Without a word, he slipped out of the room.
Ten minutes in this household was enough to convince him he didn’t have the time, energy or fortitude for any further dealings with Cecilia Greene.
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PATRICIA BURROUGHS (Pooks) is a fifth-generation Texan who lives in Dallas with her husband, and near her three sons and their families.
Her earliest memories are of long afternoons spent soaking up the drama and laughter of the silver screen, and of long nights absorbing the magic of the written word—by flashlight. As a teenager, she sang, danced and acted in community theater productions.
These influences, she believes, are the foundation of her lifelong ambition to write, to spin the dreams that ignite imaginations—to repay the debt to those who reached through the klieg lights, flashlights and footlights to touch a young girl’s heart.
Find out more about Pooks, her books and other projects, and where she will be appearing at conferences, classes and readings, on her websites:
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Other Book View Café Books by Patricia Burroughs
The Romances
Coming in 2014 from Story Spring Publishing
The Fantasies
This Crumbling Pageant
[2014]
The Dead Shall Live
[2015]
Untune the Sky
{2016]
~o0o~
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