Spellbound Falls [5] For the Love of Magic (7 page)

Peg went back to smiling, albeit crookedly again. “Wow. When you take off your tiara, you don’t mess around, do you?”

Rana smoothed down her shirt. “It kept getting in the way every time I wanted to do something . . . un-queenly.”

“Yeah, I could see where that might be a problem. But instead of leaving it hanging on your bedpost, couldn’t you have sold it for at least enough money to buy a truck with an automatic transmission?”

Rana looked up in surprise. “You don’t think I can drive a standard shift?”

“Oh, no, of course you can,” Peg said, nodding vigorously. “And I would love to teach you. When do you want to start? I’m free today until the bus brings my tribe back from school. How about I go get Charlie then swing back here and pick you up? You ladies should be done enjoying your tea and fruit by then, shouldn’t you?”

Rana eyed her suspiciously. “Will I see a marina coffee cup in your hand when you pick me up?”

Peg started backing away. “No offense, but Maude is a bit scary.”

“But is that not a quality you would want in a midwife? Oh, and Peg?”

She halted. “Yes?”

“The driving lessons will be our little secret?”

“Not a problem. Um, any particular reason you asked
me
?”

Rana set her hand on the doorknob. “Why, I would think the reason is obvious. I assumed any woman who would willingly marry Duncan MacKeage surely must have nerves of steel,” she said, stepping through the door when Peg burst out laughing.

“
This
is why I want boys,” Peg said as she led Charlie over to a tree on the back side of Rana’s garage. She then positioned the three-year-old in front of her and bent to unfasten his pants. “Potty training them is a breeze, especially if they come in pairs,” she continued as she leaned him forward to brace his hands against the tree. “Because just as soon as they realize they can compete to see who can pee the farthest, they don’t want to waste their precious body fluids on a diaper. Okay, let her rip, big man.”

Rana looked down at the small plastic card Peg had handed her. “You said Duncan . . . made this for me?”

“Yeah.” Peg straightened as she continued holding on to Charlie’s jacket to keep him steady. “Hey, don’t worry; I didn’t mention our lessons. I only told him you bought a truck, but that you didn’t have an actual license. I swear the man pulled one out of thin air faster than I could say abracadabra,” she said, batting her eyelashes, “because he somehow got the notion that seeing him make magic turns me on.”

Rana slipped the license in her purse. “Yes, our men do love to impress us with their tricks,” she said, walking to her pickup when she saw Charlie had finished drowning the tree. “I’m ready to begin if you are.”

“Wait,” Peg said, carrying the boy to her SUV. “I thought about it on my way back from the marina, and I think our first lesson should be in my truck.”

“How is driving your truck going to teach me to drive mine?”

Peg turned from buckling Charlie into his car seat. “I think you should get used to working a gas pedal and brake before we add in a clutch and shifting. All of which,” she added, “you’ll have to do at the same time.”

Rana glanced at her battered and rusted pickup, then looked at Peg’s much newer SUV, which although muddy, was completely devoid of dents. “But what if I hit a tree or drive into a ditch? I would pay to have your truck repaired, of course, but how would you explain the damage to Duncan?” She eyed Charlie in the backseat, just now realizing she might well be putting the child in danger. “Maybe we should do this another time.”

“Pfft,” Peg scoffed as she opened the front passenger door. “You’re not going to hit a tree because you already know how to drive.”

“No, I don’t,” Rana said, rushing around the truck when Peg got in. She opened the driver’s door and climbed in behind the steering wheel. “I’ve never driven a vehicle.”

“Sure you have. I’ve seen you drive snowmobiles and Nicholas’s boat, and you tootle around in the resort carts all the time.”

“But those aren’t automobiles.”

“Same concept, just different applications.” Peg pushed a straw into a juice box and handed it to her son in the backseat, then faced forward and fastened her seat belt. “They all have a throttle, a brake, and a steering wheel. Well, except
water
is the brake on a boat.” She reached over and turned the key to start the engine, making Rana scramble to fasten her own seat belt. “You have to press on the brake to put the truck in gear, which you do by using this lever,” Peg continued, touching the lever jutting from the right side of the steering column. “Pull it toward you and down while watching the letters below those larger dials, and you’ll see the light move from
P
for park,
R
for reverse,
N
for neutral, and
D
for drive. You can ignore the numbers because this is an
automatic
transmission,” she said with a cheeky grin, “meaning the truck knows which gear it should use. Okay, go ahead and put it—no, wait. Before we start, get a feel for the gas pedal by pressing down on it a few times.”

Rana leaned to the side to see her feet. “Which pedal is the gas?”

“Oh, sorry. The tall one on the right is the throttle and the wide one is the brake, just like on the resort carts. The setup is almost always the same on anything with an engine—gas on the right, brake on the left.”

Rana pressed on the right pedal, only to yank her foot away when the engine roared loud enough to shake the truck.

“Gently,” Peg said with a laugh. “A truck is a lot more powerful than a resort cart. Just think of it as squeezing a horse’s sides when you want to move forward. Pressing hard is like kicking it into a gallop.”

Rana pressed softly on the gas pedal. “If we’re not moving, why is that needle moving?” she asked, pointing at one of the larger dials, which resort carts did
not
have. “See, it drops back when I take my foot away.”

“That’s the tachometer. It tells you how fast the engine is turning over. You don’t need to pay attention to it today, but you will in your pickup. It’ll help you decide when to shift to a higher gear. The only dial you should keep an eye on is the one beside it. That’s the speedometer.”

“Then why does your truck have a tachometer?”

“It’s a guy thing,” Peg said with a dismissive shrug. “Okay. Press your right foot on the brake, pull the lever down until the
D
lights up, then transfer your foot to the gas.”

Rana frowned through the bottom of the wheel at the pedals. “I have two feet, so why wouldn’t I use one on each pedal?” She looked over at Peg. “That’s how it works on a snowmobile, only with my hands.”

Peg shook her head. “You’re going to need your left foot to work the clutch in your pickup, so you might as well start training your right foot to work two pedals.”

Rana pressed down the brake with a deep sigh. “This is far more complicated than I was expecting. There are so many dials to watch, how does one pay attention to the road? And all the buttons! The resort carts have a key and a light switch.” She gave Peg a sheepish smile. “I thought it would be relatively simple, since I’ve seen your daughters driving with Duncan on the tote roads, and they’re only twelve and ten.”

“That’s a safety thing,” Peg said. “Out here we teach our kids to drive as soon as they can see over the steering wheel, because they could be our only means of getting help in an emergency. Don’t worry, driving will become second nature just like your smartphone did. That took you what . . . all of two days to learn? So okay,” she said, rubbing her hands together, “let’s go see if we can find some grange ladies to run over.” Her smile turned sinister. “Extra points if you take out their ringleader.”

Rana stilled with her hand on the shifting lever. “You can’t mean for me to drive on the main road for my very first lesson.”

“Well, you’re not going to learn anything idling up and down a camp road. That’s why I got you the license.”

Sending a silent prayer to Athena, goddess of wisdom and courage, Rana moved the shifting lever to the
D
, then slowly let out on the brake. “Nothing’s happening.”

“Because you aren’t giving it any gas. Gently,” Peg said with a laugh when they suddenly shot forward and then jerked to a halt when Rana stomped on the brake.

“Oh, friggin’ mess, Mama.”

Peg closed her eyes on a groan. “Duncan really needs to start watching his language around Charlie,” she muttered, twisting to look at her son. “You’re okay, big man,” she soothed, pulling her coat sleeve over her hand to wipe juice off the poor child’s face. “Let’s give it another go,” she said, facing forward again. “Or we’re gonna miss our chance to flatten those bun-stealing grange ladies.”

Realizing Peg was attempting to calm her with small talk, Rana decided she’d made a wise choice for her driving instructor. She checked for traffic and
gently
eased down on the gas, thankful Peg had circled around the garage when they’d arrived so she didn’t have to back up. “Is there a particular reason you’re not enamored with the grange ladies?” she asked, guiding the large SUV down the narrow camp road.

Peg gave a soft snort. “The spring Mac brought Henry to Inglenook, the grange ladies were raising funds to send Olivia and Sophie to Disneyworld because her dead husband, Keith Baldwin, was the town’s only war hero. But when Olivia said absolutely no way, and Mac suggested they raise money for a
general
widow’s fund instead, those busybodies made me and my kids their new pet cause. Um, you’re doing great, but you might want to go a little faster than a turtle.”

Rana eased down on the gas, pleased to discover that driving a truck was no more difficult than driving one of the resort carts. “But what’s wrong with that, Peg? Surely you could have used help providing for four young children.”

“They were going to put pictures of my kids on all their friggin’ fund-raising jars and stick them in all the stores in Spellbound and Turtleback.”

“Oh, how embarrassing. Please tell me you were able to stop them.”

Peg suddenly laughed. “I didn’t have to. Your son’s mountain-moving earthquake nicely redirected their attention.”

“Yes,” Rana said dryly. “Epic events have a way of doing that.”

“When Bottomless Lake suddenly turned into the Bottomless
Sea
, the grange ladies decided the town needed a fancier park more than I needed their charity.”

Rana glanced over in surprise. “They really just forgot about you?”

“Well, in their defense,” Peg said, “they watched me go from rags to riches when I started selling my gravel to Duncan to build the road up to Nova Mare. Don’t panic,” she calmly added when a small red car came racing in the camp road toward them. “There’s plenty of room for both of us. Just edge to the side and let him drive by you.”

Only instead of continuing past when Rana guided the SUV as close to the trees as she dared, the car stopped beside them and its window lowered to expose Titus frowning up at her.

“The top left button on your door lowers your window,” Peg said.

Rana gently pressed on the gas pedal and drove off, stifling a smile when Peg gasped in surprise. Only they hadn’t gone more than a hundred feet when the engine suddenly shut off. Rana lifted the shifting lever into park with a resigned sigh, which was lost in her passenger’s laugh.

“I’m torn between admiration and pity,” Peg said, “when I think of you being married to him for
thousands
of years. You want me and Charlie to walk up the road to give you a little privacy?”

Rana reached over to stop Peg from unbuckling her seat belt. “That isn’t necessary. But listen closely,” she added, patting Peg’s arm, “and maybe you’ll learn an impressive trick of your own for the next time Duncan starts flexing his muscles at you.” Rana then pressed the button to lower her window when the small red car backed up and stopped beside them again. “If you’re heading to Missy Maher’s,” she said to her glowering husband, “I don’t believe she’s returned from her grange meeting yet.”

“What makes you think I’m going to Ms. Maher’s?”

“I can’t imagine why you would be driving down this road other than to show off your fancy new car to the most eligible spinster in Spellbound Falls,” Rana said, reaching over and squeezing Peg’s arm when the woman started choking.

“I’m down here to see
my wife
.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I must have missed your
phone call
.”

He had the good grace to look contrite. “It appears I left without my phone this morning. Therefore,” he went on when she tried to speak, “I decided to simply ask you in person to have lunch with me today.”

“I’m rather busy today, Titus,” she said as she started raising the window. “Try
calling
me later on in the week.” But she suddenly stopped the window halfway up as she made a point of running her gaze over his newest purchase. “Did the motorcycle turn out to be a little too spirited for you?”

“I purchased this car so you would be comfortable on our
dates
.”

“Oh,” she said with a pronounced pout. “I was looking forward to our zooming through the countryside on that motorcycle together. You remember how I used to wrap my arms around you and hold on for dear life, don’t you, my love?” she said in a husky purr as she slowly started raising the window again, “when I’d sneak away to meet you in the meadow and we would race the wind on your powerful warhorse?” She started the truck, then gave the slack-jawed blackguard a jaunty wave as she headed out the camp road at the speed of a racing turtle.

“I want . . .” Peg cleared her throat. “I want to amend what I said earlier. I don’t know whether to admire or pity
Titus
.”

“I specifically asked him not to drop in unannounced,” Rana explained, only to mutter a curse—in Greek, for Charlie’s sake—when the truck stalled again.

“Are you sure you don’t want me and Charlie to take a hike?” Peg drawled when Rana’s window lowered
without
her touching the button.

“Why are you driving the MacKeages’ vehicle?” Titus asked when he halted beside them again. His eyes suddenly widened. “Zeus’s teeth, you don’t drive!”

“Of course I do. I’ve been driving for nearly four years.”

“Electric carts on resort
paths
.”

“Same concept, different applications,” Rana said. “We’re leaving on our errands now, and I would appreciate it if our vehicle continued running.”

“Wait. You didn’t say why
you
are driving.”

She gave a negligent shrug. “Peg was kind enough to let me try out her truck to see if this is the model I should buy.” She made a production of running her gaze over the small red sports car again, wondering how the man had folded himself inside it. “But maybe I’ll buy myself something more fun. Good-bye, my love. Enjoy this beautiful day.”