Really Something (12 page)

“Really?”

She nodded. “Not so much as a Dixie cup flying at my head.”

Relief flooded Duncan's features. “Good. I half expected to come home and find a chalk outline of your body on the hall floor.”

Allie laughed. “I made sure we ate off paper plates, just in case.”

“Smart woman.”

“Thanks.” The intensity of his gaze proved too much and Allie dropped her attention to the threadbare armchair in the corner. “Katie's really had it rough, hasn't she? I mean with all she's gone through since the accident, that explains why she's so…”

“Complicated,” Duncan replied. “To put a nice spin on it.”

“Beneath it all, though, she's a nice girl.” Allie remembered the Katie who'd been a few years behind her in high school. She hadn't known Duncan's sister very well then, but today she'd found a vibrant young woman lurking under the bitterness, pain—and alcohol.

“She used to be so different than she is now.” He sighed. “The accident changed her.”

“And you,” Allie said quietly, knowing now what had put that tension in his shoulders. Why Earl Hickey had been so protective of Duncan.

Could it be that her perception of Duncan was wrong? Could he have changed?

Or could she just be wishing for a change? A big happy ending that she could take with her back to Hollywood? Hadn't she already learned all happy endings were manufactured?

He shrugged. “She's my sister. Of course I had to take care of her.”

Allie looked at Duncan Henry and realized her plan of loving and leaving him wasn't going to go off without a hitch. Because she'd started to care. And that was dangerous. The first rule in her business—never, ever involve your heart. Get into bed with the actor, the producer, the screenwriter. But never fall in love with any of them.

“We've all had a long day. I should go. Let you…get some sleep.” She moved toward the door.

Duncan caught her hand. Warmth skated up her veins. “Thank you.”

“I didn't do much, really. Just—”

“You made her laugh today.” His voice cracked a little on the last word. “And I haven't heard her laugh in…well, in a long time.”

Duncan's blue eyes captured hers. He reached up a hand to cup her jaw, the wide, solid strength of his palm so tender against her cheek. So tempting.

Too tempting.

“I should go.”

“You already said that.”

“Or, I could stay…” She raised a shoulder, let it drop, along with an implication.

What was she doing? She needed to leave, to get away from his touch, his eyes. And most of all the thought that he wasn't the man he used to be. The one who'd fooled her into falling in love, then shattered her heart as easily as a fastball pitched into a plate glass window.

“If I what?”

“If you needed me…for anything else. Anything at all.”

“I can muddle along from here. I'm not the best nursemaid, but Katie survives.” He gave her a smile, but it was one filled with exhaustion, from years of carrying a burden she'd barely tasted today. Sympathy ran through her.

“Katie's sleeping right now. Why don't we walk the gardens? That way, you can hear her if she calls you. And you get some time out of the house.” Allie reached for Duncan's hand before she could think twice, and went outside with him.

Love him, leave him. Break his heart, just as he did yours.

The words sounded, distant and soft, in the back of her head. She pushed them aside. Maybe it was the super-sugary chick flick.

Whatever it was, something she refused to name had softened her stance toward Duncan Henry. At least long enough to get him to enjoy a sunset. As she twisted to the side to circumvent an overgrown vine, the papers in her jeans back pocket rustled.

The agreement. His signature. That's what she needed. Not him.

Yeah, right, her body said, painting her a liar as surely as the setting sun painted the quiet, enclosed yard in hues of orange and red. The lingering warm rays settled on her shoulders, and Allie hesitated to grab the papers. For a moment, she'd enjoy the end of the day. This moment.

She walked with him in silence, the comfortable quiet of two people who had known each other for years. Except she was the only one who knew that.

Then her cell rang, playing the distinctive ringtone of “Take This Job and Shove It.”

Jerry. Damn.

“I'm sorry, Duncan, I have to get this.” She flipped open the phone and stepped to the side. “Hello?”

“Unless you want to find yourself in the unemployment line with your ass getting groped by a newly paroled sex offender, get me my goddamned contract so I can film my movie.”

“But—”

“You know the fax number.” Jerry hung up.

Allie hung up the phone, reclipped it onto her jeans and turned back to Duncan. She reached into her back pocket and pulled out the papers. “I forgot to have you sign that.”

“Ah yes, the contract. Always business with you, isn't it?”

She grinned. “Maybe not always.”

Duncan reached forward and plucked the papers from her grasp. “Do you have a pen?”

“No, not on me.”

“Allie Dean, unprepared? After all the wrangling you did to get me to sign, too. You surprise me.” He reached into the breast pocket of his suit and withdrew a ballpoint. “Good thing I used to be a Boy Scout.”

“You were never—” She cut off the sentence.

“And how would you know?”

“Uh…you don't seem the Boy Scout type. You're far too charming.”

“You think I'm charming?” He took a step closer, the pen dancing a lazy circle in his hand. “And how is that bad in Boy Scouts?”

“All those little old ladies would get too distracted by your blue eyes and your smile.” She moved closer, touching his face. “And they'd forget why they wanted to cross the street in the first place.”

“And you don't?”

“Not at all.” Her breath got caught in her throat, her heart tripled its beat.

“Then I'll sign this and let you be on your way.” His gaze darkened and dropped, slowly, down. Past her lips, to her chest, lingering for one long, hot moment. “If that's what you want.”

“Of course.”

Duncan scribbled his name across the contract, then stepped closer—as close as he could, their torsos meeting, nothing between them now but a flicker of air, a few tendrils of sun rays—and trailed a finger down the skin exposed by the
V
of her shirt. “Do you have what you want now?”

Allie drew in a breath, her breasts rising to meet his touch. “My papers are signed, right?”

“Of course. A promise is a promise.” Gruffness rasped along his words. “Our business is concluded. Isn't it?”

Her belly tightened with want and her blood quickened with desire. This had nothing at all to do with the rental agreement. With her vow to stay away from him. With Jerry or the damned movie.

He pressed the papers into her hand and slid the pen back into his pocket. “Everything you wanted.”

She shook her head. “No, not everything.” Then she reached up and cupped his jaw. Before she could think twice, remember why this was such a bad idea, Allie pressed a kiss to Duncan's lips, then paused a moment to inhale the warm, male scent of Duncan before drawing back.

“God, Allie, what are you doing to me?” he said, his voice still rough as sandpaper.

“Kissing you. Nothing more.”

He shook his head. “You're weaving magic because you've got me looking forward to coming home. Thinking about you when I'm supposed to be working. Dreaming about you every time I close my eyes.”

“What kind of dreams?” Allie asked, breathless, caught up in his spell and in the words she had longed to hear from him for so many years.

A grin quirked across his face. “Well, most of them start with you in my arms.”

She slid into his arms, placing his free hand against her back. She knew those dreams. Heck, she could plot the sequels. “Done.”

“Then there's a lot of kissing,” Duncan added, his grin widening.

“Sounds like a good idea.”

And wasn't that exactly her plan? Rile him up, as he had done to her, scrambling those jets of desire. And then, sometime later, when her brain wasn't some fuzzy thing, she'd drop the bomb.

Assuming, that was, she remembered to push the button.

Allie kissed him again, no longer tentative or sweet, but with a desire that crackled and burned. She slipped her tongue into his mouth, tangoed with his. He tasted of coffee, with the softness that came with the end of a long day.

She could fall into this kiss. Fool herself into thinking it was real and as comfortable as a long marriage.

Her arms stole around his back, pulling his chest to hers, pressing him against the painful, throbbing ends of her nipples. She tilted her pelvis, meeting his, feeling the erection that signaled his want.

Yet, even as enjoyment soared inside her, she pulled her emotions back, told herself to keep above the desire, hold her heart out of the fray. Hadn't she seen actresses do this a hundred times? Pretend to fall in love for a role? A paycheck?

And then, once the contract was signed, the scene was shot, they were on to the next man, the next payday.

She could do that, too.

But as Duncan's lips worked their magic, sweeping over hers, playing a ballad she had long ago sung alone, her heart tangled itself in the mix and refused to let go. Her hands traveled down, farther, over his shoulders, his waist, his hips, then came around to cup him in the front. He groaned against her and tangled one of his hands in her hair, the other reaching down to her buttocks.

“Duncan,” she murmured against his lips, wanting to say a thousand different things, but knowing she couldn't say a one of them. Couldn't tell him the truth. Couldn't open that door to what lay inside her thoughts.

“Allie,” he whispered back, his voice hoarse with desire. “You are…incredible.” And then, he pulled away, laying his forehead against hers, his breath short and ragged. “Too incredible. That's why I can't.”

“Can't what?”

“Can't get involved with you. A relationship doesn't fit into my plans.”

“A relationship in general,” she said, then forced out the next words, “or a relationship with
me
?”

With Allison Gray. Although he didn't know that, did he?

“Both.” He drew back, ran a hand through his hair, looking again like the weight of the world sat on his shoulders. “I need…” He let out a breath. “Hell, I don't know what I need, but it isn't this.”

“What, you don't need sex? Did you become a monk in the last five seconds?”

He laughed. “I'm not a monk, believe me. But I'm not going to just sleep with you. I'd like to get to know you better first. I'm not eighteen anymore. I want more…meat in my life, more substance if I'm going to invest time into a relationship with a woman. And I get the feeling that time isn't something you're interested in giving. You're not exactly a forthcoming woman. I know more about the janitor who works at the station than I do about you.”

Exactly the plan. “I don't think we have to become best buddies in order to go to bed with each other.”

He blinked. “That's all you want, a one-night stand?”

“What's wrong with that?”

He took a step forward, invading her space, confronting her with nothing more than his presence. “You don't strike me as the type. In fact, everything about you is a contradiction. You're hiding something, Allie. In fact, I think you're hiding a lot of things.”

“And you're so upfront, is that it?” Anger flared, replacing the desire, the second fire blazing hotter than the first. “So aboveboard and honest? What you see is what you get?”

He glanced away, and Allie knew she had hit a nerve. “We're not talking about me.”

“Then don't talk about what I'm hiding until you start playing show-and-tell, Duncan Henry.”

The mayor had a rifle leveled at Allie's head.

Earl Hickey closed one eye, squinted the other through the sights of the Remington.

“Mr. Hickey?” Allie stood in his office the next morning, determined to get the movie made and just as sure she was going to get killed in the process.

Earl expended a “pow,” then dropped the rifle. “Getting ready for duck season.”

It didn't sound like a question, so Allie just nodded. “I'd like to talk to you.”

He swiveled away from her and took bullet-free target practice on the stand of
Things to Do in Tempest
brochures. Of which there were exactly three—tour the factory of the Kitty Kleen Litter company, visit Madame Rosy's On-target Tarot readings, or sample Aunt Ruby Mae's homemade rhubarb jam, Tuesdays through Thursdays, at the Jam Crib on State Route 93 (take the right by the bent mailbox shaped like a rhubarb plant).

He let out a gust. “You're still around?”

“I work for a movie production company. I'm scouting out a location for our next film. And Tempest is perfect. We'd like to use it.”

“Ain't interested.” He raised the rifle, this time directing it toward the complimentary wall calendar from Jim's John Deere Sales & Service, and pretended to assassinate the entire week of June tenth.

She would not be dissuaded that easily.

“This will bring in much-needed revenue to the town. Tourist dollars.” She glanced over at the trio of tourist attractions and doubted Aunt Ruby Mae would see a spike in sales with the body-conscious Hollywooders. “As well as exposure for the town, not to mention, jobs for—”

“I said no.” Earl took aim at the duck decoy sitting atop a bookshelf crammed with popular fiction and a few weighty—and dusty—tomes like
Guide to Indiana Municipal Government.

“Mr. Hickey, this could be a great opportunity for everyone involved.”

Another
pow
, and an invisible cranium shot to Daffy. “What kind of film you talking about?”

“It's like a thriller.” Sort of. If she told him it was one of those cheesy horror films with half-naked teens, there was no way he'd agree. She sent the rifle a wary glance.

“I don't like thrillers,” Earl said, feigning a ceiling fan murder. “Had enough of that damned stuff with that Henry thing. Near ruined the town, he did.”

“You don't have to watch it.” Allie ignored the reference to the Henrys. “Just allow Chicken Flicks to use a few town locations for certain scenes.”

“Find another damned town. This one ain't for sale.”

Allie bit back her frustration. Jerry would be here in a matter of days, and if she didn't secure permission to do some location shots in the town, she knew he'd have her head. And her job. The farmhouse was great, but Allie knew the script, and knew there were scenes that needed to be shot in the “ordinary world” of downtown Tempest.

Earl's monkey wrench meant the town could end up being off-limits to the crew, the equipment, and the caterers—raising costs. Raising Jerry's temper.

Never good.

She worried her bottom lip, as Earl ignored her and went on pretending to kill the light fixtures. “Duncan Henry is letting me use his farmhouse. Surely—”

Earl lowered the gun. “He is? You got his signature on your little Hollywood paper and everything?”

She nodded.

“Well, hell. I'd never expect he'd do that, given the history of that place.”

“You mean Katie's accident.”

“That ain't all that's happened out there.” Instead of elaborating, Earl sighted the doorknob.

Allie decided not to ask. “Since Mr. Henry has agreed, surely you can understand—”

“Sorry, no can do. Come back when you're filming a western.” He laid the rifle on the desk, crossed his arms on top of it, then looked at her, expectantly.

Waiting for her to leave.

“You can fill out the paperwork,” he continued, “even drop a check on my desk made out to the town of Tempest. But there ain't no way I'm letting a bunch of uppity Hollywood vultures make a mess of my town. Like those damned TV jerks did when Whiteside Tire went under. I ain't letting anyone make my town look bad ever again.” Then he got to his feet and opened the door, gesturing toward Allie. “Thank you for stopping by, Miss Dean. But you best find another town for your trash.”

“Mr. Hickey—”

He stepped back, and the glass door shut with a whoosh, leaving her on the sidewalk. Allie let out a gust of frustration. Maybe Earl was right. Maybe she should just go back to L.A., admit her failure to Jerry, and put an apron on, because the only job open to her in Hollywood would be one asking “Do you want fries with that?”

Then she paused. Drew in a breath. Regrouped.

Steven Spielberg wouldn't have let one grumpy town manager turn him down. Francis Ford Coppola probably would have wowed Earl with some homemade manicotti.

And Allie Dean sure wasn't going to be beaten back by a Smith & Wesson. She needed a plan. And an ally. Preferably one packing bigger heat.

“No luck with Earl?”

Allie pivoted to find Ira Levine standing behind her, a notepad in one hand, a bag of takeout from Margie's in the other. “He was…pleasant.”

Ira chuckled. “Which means he turned you down flat and probably used his rifle to drive home the point.”

“How'd you guess?”

“Earl fancies himself a hunter but has never hit so much as a squirrel's tail. He takes every opportunity to practice on inanimate objects.” Ira leaned in closer. “Personally, I think he's got trigger-pulling issues.”

“And tourism issues. He refused to see my point about letting the movie crew in.”

“Maybe you should get a local to talk to him. A local like…Duncan Henry?” Ira gestured over his shoulder toward Duncan, who was coming out of the post office, a book of stamps in one hand, car keys in the other.

In the day and a half since she started helping Duncan with his sister seeing him had become an added complication. Every time he was near, the temptation whipped up between them out at the farmhouse erupted again. The
last
thing she should do is entangle herself further with him. Every twist of that connection brought her closer into the very dangerous territory she was trying to avoid—

Where he could break her heart again.

“I don't know if asking Duncan is such a good idea,” Allie said. “I can handle this on my own.”

Ira laughed. “Maybe if you call in the Marines. Besides, I wouldn't worry about anything where Duncan Henry is concerned. You always did have him wrapped around your finger.”

Before Allie could ask Ira what he meant, he had left, strolling down the sidewalk toward the offices of the town paper. At the same time, Duncan turned, saw Allie on the sidewalk, and smiled.

Fireworks exploded in her chest, forcing her to wonder who had who wrapped around a finger.

He strode over to her, pocketing his keys and stamps. “You seem to be everywhere I am.”

“Your very own personal stalker.” She grinned. “Though I do work for you, remember?” This afternoon, a visiting nurse was with Katie, providing some therapy, giving Allie a couple hours to make the run downtown.

If it keeps up, I might just need to call in the law.” He grinned, teasing her.

“In a town like this, I take it that means some guy who volunteers on the weekends, after his shift gets over at Charlie's Do-It-Yourself?”

Duncan grinned. “You sure you didn't grow up in a small town? Because you nailed the life.”

“Speaking of small towns,” Allie said, avoiding the question, “what do you know about convincing the mayor that a movie is in Tempest's best interests?”

“I take it you tangled with Earl?”

“Him
and
his rifle collection.”

Duncan looked her over, the grin still on his face, teasing her. “No visible bullet wounds, which is good.”

Two elderly women who looked vaguely familiar came ambling up the sidewalk, their bright floral housedresses competing for most garish. “I told you, Esther, give up on them tulips. Squirrels eat those things like candy.”

“But MaryAlice Walters gets them to bloom with no problems at all.”

“That's 'cuz Joe shoots every squirrel that comes on their land. Either find yourself a husband with a twenty-two or switch to Trumpet daffodils for your spring fauna.”

The ladies paused in their conversation, noticing Duncan. “Oh my, if it isn't Duncan Henry. You're better than my
Farmers' Almanac
.” Esther reached over and gave his cheek a pat. “Are you married yet?”

“Uh, no, ma'am.”

“I have a niece, you know. She's thirty-five, got three kids by two different men, but she's a real keeper. Hardworking, can change a tire and fix a pot roast—”

“Not at the same time,” Jane interjected.

Allie bit back a laugh.

“I appreciate that, Miss Winters, but I'm currently spoken for.”

Esther leaned back in surprise. “You are? By who?”

Duncan grinned at her, the twinkle in his eye that Allie recognized from the television clearly part of what had gotten him voted Indiana's sexiest forecaster. “Now, if I told you, whatever would you nice ladies have to gossip about?”

Esther gave him a good-natured slap on the shoulder. “We do not gossip, young man. We…” She turned to Jane for help.

“Extrapolate.” With one last smile at Duncan and a curious glance at Allie, the ladies continued on their way.

Duncan chuckled and shook his head, then turned to Allie. “You know you've just become part of the gossip chain.”

She laughed. “I became part of that the minute I showed up in a rental car. Just so long as no one figures out—”

“Figures out what?”

“Figures out why I'm here before I get permission from Earl,” she finished.
Too fast
, Duncan thought, almost as though she were lying. “I'd hate to see him turn me down because the town twisted the whole story around.”

“Yeah. Things do have a habit of getting turned around in Tempest. Everything you think is true…isn't always.” Above them, the sun cast her hair in shades of blonde, but at the very roots, he could see a darker shade.

Not a natural blonde.

That didn't bother him. Hell, virtually every woman he knew did something to color her hair, from the lemon juice highlights he'd seen his sister apply on summer days to the full-out frosting his grandma had done to ward off the elderly gray kiss of death.

“What?” she said. “You're staring at me. Do I have some lunch on my face or something?”

“Oh, no. Sorry. Let's, ah, go in there together and talk to Earl again. I think I can help you change his mind.”

“Thanks. If you do, I'll owe you again. Maybe another dinner or…something else?” Allie smiled at him, and he promptly forgot exactly why the color of her hair bothered him at all.