Chapter 19
“Yes,” Caleb said, staring at the Ruby parking lot with his hands on his hips. “This is the perfect spot.”
Spencer rubbed his chin as he squinted at the empty lot. “Perfect for what?”
“A cruise-in.”
“You mean one of those old car things?”
Caleb gave his new friend a dubious look. “They aren’t old cars, they’re classics, and the people who own them like to show them off. We’re going to give them that opportunity.”
“Now you sound like Coop,” Spencer said. “I can appreciate an old car”—Caleb increased his glare, and Spencer corrected—“a classic car as much as the next fella, but anything that happens in this parking lot needs to go toward the restoration project. That’s not my rule, that’s according to the owners.”
“It’ll all go toward the restoration project. ”
That announcement caught Spencer’s attention. “You’re talking about a cruise-in to raise money?”
“I am,” Caleb said. “We can hold them all summer long. This lot is large enough for three sections.” He pointed to the row directly adjacent to the back wall of the theater. “Cruisers over there.” Shifting to the middle section, he added, “Muscle cars in the center, and over on the far side will be the sale lot. We’ll charge a higher fee for those spots, of course.”
“Let me get this straight,” Spencer said, stepping forward and surveying the lot as if trying to picture what Caleb described. “People will pay to park their cars here?”
“They will.” He could see it clear as day, as if the cars were already filling the space. “Once the first event is a success, word of mouth will spread, and by the third time around, we’ll have to turn people away.”
Catching Caleb’s enthusiasm, Spencer said, “What about vendors? People will need to eat, right?”
Liking the idea, Caleb nodded. “People will definitely need to eat. It’s the perfect fundraiser because it’s almost no overhead. Provide a couple generators for the vendors, if they don’t supply their own, and maybe set a little of the entry fees aside as prize money. Award a ‘best in show’ or something. The owners love that, and we can let the attendees decide the winners.”
“Buford would cough up the generators with no problem,” Spencer said, referring to the local hardware store owner and official Ruby Restoration committee chair. “I can’t believe we didn’t see this before. Especially after utilizing the space for the festival.”
“The idea came from Cooper. He told me that the mayor wouldn’t let him use the fairgrounds for something like this.” With a conspiratorial smile, Caleb added, “I bet if we team up, we can coax our mechanic friend into coordinating the whole thing.”
“Are you sure folks will come?” Spencer asked as he looked out over the parking lot. “Not the owners, but other people? ”
Recognizing how his position at the paper could benefit the cause, Caleb said, “If we advertise it right.”
That elicited a chuckle from Spencer. “We’ll need to get an advertising budget approved by the committee, but something tells me you won’t have any problem selling them on the idea.”
“Me?” Caleb asked. “You’re the one they all listen to.”
“Oh no,” he said, tipping his hat back. “This one is your baby, and you’re the salesman. I doubt you’ll have any trouble making them listen.”
He appreciated the man’s faith in him. “Fair enough.”
With a check of his watch, Spencer said, “Time to go.” The pair hustled back to the front of the building as Spencer explained, “Carrie’s appointment is in less than thirty minutes, and I still need to pick her up out at the construction office.”
“You’re taking Carrie to an appointment?” Caleb asked, confused once again by the connection between Boyd and the expectant mother.
“Sure,” Spencer answered, pulling his keys from his pocket to unlock his truck. “She can’t fit behind the wheel of Patch’s old truck anymore.”
Caleb hadn’t heard the name before. “Patch?”
“Her good-for-nothing dead husband.” Pausing at his open door, Spencer said, “We’ll wait until we talk to Coop before presenting this idea to the board. You good with putting something together for next Friday?”
“Not a problem,” Caleb answered.
As the gray Dodge drove off down the street, Caleb wondered if Lorelei knew how her fiancé felt about Carrie Farmer’s former husband. Or more importantly, how he felt about the tiny brunette about to be a single mother.
Snow moaned for the third time as she gripped her headboard tighter. “Oh, yes. Right there,” she said, her voice breathy and desperate .
“Right here?” Caleb asked, his voice syrupy as he circled the same delicate spot over and over.
“Uh-huh.” Snow’s entire body melted in pure pleasure. “How did I go without this for so long?” she asked.
Caleb dropped a kiss on her big toe. “I don’t know, darling. How did you?”
She opened one eye and shot her husband a warning look. “Don’t get smug down there, Mr. McGraw. But it’s nice to know that if your job at the paper ever falls through, you have a lucrative career in foot massage to fall back on.”
Increasing the pressure on her arch, Caleb ignored her comment. “What do you know about Spencer Boyd and Carrie Farmer?” he asked.
Snow’s eyes popped open. What was that question about?
“I know Carrie is Spencer’s ex-wife,” she said. “And that they’re good friends.”
The foot massage stopped. “She was his wife?”
“Hey,” Snow said, shaking her foot. “Are we talking or massaging?”
“Relax,” he said, returning to his task. “I can do both. So Lorelei knows about them?”
Snuggling deeper into her pillow, Snow answered, “Sure, she knows.”
“Huh,” Caleb said. “And she’s fine with her fiancé being in love with someone else?”
Snow jerked her foot out of Caleb’s grasp as she sat up. “Her fiancé what?”
“I can’t be the only one who sees it,” Caleb said. “He hovers over her. Drives her to her appointments. If Lorelei is fine with it, then good for them, but I couldn’t handle that.”
Though she appreciated knowing her husband was against either of them falling in love with someone else, she needed to disabuse Caleb of his highly erroneous assumption.
“Spencer Boyd is not in love with his ex-wife. He loves Lorelei, and he always has. ”
“But you said he was married to Carrie.”
“He was,” she explained, “but that was while Lorelei was in LA trying to be an actress and he thought she wasn’t coming back.”
Caleb’s head tilted. “So he married Carrie, even though he loved Lorelei?”
Why did she have to land the only man on the planet who possessed a feminine view on love?
“Of course he didn’t.” Snow struggled for a way to explain her friends’ situation. Though to be honest, she never totally understood the whole story herself. “After Lorelei broke his heart, Spencer moved on with his life. He married Carrie, whom he loved and thought he’d spend the rest of his life with, but life happens, you know? Their marriage ended, she married someone else, and eventually Lorelei came back to him. Happy endings all around.”
“Except for Carrie,” Caleb pointed out. “Her husband died, remember?”
“Yes,” Snow agreed. “But her husband was a wife beater who got himself killed at a bar. So, really, she’s better off without him.” She slid her foot back under his nose and wiggled her toes. “Now, please tell me you haven’t shared your cockamamie theory with anyone else.”
Massaging the back of her heel, Caleb asked, “Who says cockamamie anymore?”
“Tell me you haven’t spread some rumor about Spencer cheating on Lorelei.”
“Of course not,” he said, sounding offended. “I’m not an idiot. But are you sure I’m wrong?”
Snow nodded, closing her eyes and letting the tension leave her shoulders. How Caleb found the exact right spots she did not know. But oh, was she thankful he did.
“I’m positive. The other night, Lorelei referred to Carrie as the little sister she never had. I admit, it appears to be a weird situation from the outside, which Lorelei readily admits, but there’s nothing salacious going on.”
“That’s good,” Caleb said, sliding his hands up her calf. “Because I like Spencer, and I’d hate to lose respect for him.”
She opened her eyes to watch him drop a kiss on her knee. The zing nearly shot out her ears as Snow’s body started to melt. “You really don’t like infidelity, do you?” Snow asked.
Caleb looked up after kissing the inside of her thigh. “No, I don’t. I’ve seen up close what it can do to people.”
“What does that mean?” she asked, struggling to concentrate as he worked his way up her body. With every touch, the need pitched higher.
Shaking his head, Caleb dropped a soft kiss on her lips. “Not tonight,” he said. “It’s time for a different kind of massage.”
She didn’t want to let the question go, especially when she saw the demons the subject let loose in his eyes. Her always lighthearted husband was hiding a wound she knew nothing about. But before she could push the issue, Caleb slid the straps of her tank top off her shoulders and took one pink nipple between his teeth. Her gasp of pleasure echoed around them as her questions drowned in a pool of desire.
Caleb had never seen Snow this nervous. After weeks of watching her step on stages in Nashville, he’d expect selling a painting at auction to be the less daunting task. But his wife had become a frantic ball of energy in the passenger seat. He’d asked her twice if she needed him to stop for a potty break, and the second time she nearly ripped his head off and told him to drive and keep quiet.
Being the rational man that he was, Caleb followed the directive and clamped his piehole shut.
“This is it,” Snow informed him, as he pulled the Jeep into the auction house parking lot. He didn’t bother to tell her he knew where they were going, seeing as he was the one who had mapped the place out. Today was not the day to correct his better half.
“There aren’t a lot of cars here. That’s a bad sign, isn’t it?”
“Not when the show doesn’t start for ninety minutes.” The e-mail she’d showed him said to arrive by nine, but Snow had demanded they leave the house at seven. He’d talked her into leaving at seven thirty, and that still put them here a half hour early. With only two cars in the lot, Caleb wondered if they were the first to arrive.
Snow reached his side of the Jeep before his feet hit the pavement. “Be careful with the painting,” she said, for the tenth time that morning. “Don’t hurt it.”
“I’m not going to hurt it, darling,” he said, looking forward to this sale being over so he could have his mild-mannered wife back. “You’ve wrapped it well enough to survive the Titanic .”
“I wanted to make sure it didn’t get damaged on the way down here,” Snow defended, hovering around him as he drew the delicate cargo from the backseat. “Don’t put it on the ground,” she ordered, seconds before the painting touched the pavement.
“Honey, it’s wrapped in four layers of brown paper. A little asphalt isn’t going to hurt it.”
“Still,” she said, taking her new obsession out of his hands. The thing was nearly as big as she was, making her look like a giant brown rectangle with feet. “I’ll feel better once we’re inside.”
I’ll feel better once this is over, he thought. Not that he’d say as much aloud. Caleb had learned a lot about being a husband in the last couple of weeks. Determination to keep a woman happy and his own hide out of a sling made a man a fast learner.
“I’ll carry it,” he said as she started hobbling toward the large building with the Premier Auctions sign over the door. “You’re going to break your neck and the painting—now give it here. ”
For the first time all day, Snow didn’t argue. She let Caleb take the painting without a fuss and didn’t even remind him to be careful. Maybe she was starting to relax. And then they reached the entrance.
“Be careful,” she murmured, holding the door open for him.
Caleb rolled his eyes, but only because she couldn’t see his face. To his relief, an auction coordinator met them at the small counter not far from the entrance. She introduced herself with a welcoming smile, thanked them for bringing the painting on such short notice, and then explained that she would hand it over to the staff to tag and place with the other items up for bid.
As the treasure passed hands, Snow said, “Be careful,” to the friendly woman, who nodded and maintained her smile. Caleb assumed the employee was used to overprotective owners, but Snow was acting as if she’d given birth to the thing.
“The auction room is the second door on the right,” the woman informed them, nodding toward the back of the room. “Coffee and tea, as well as water, are available on a side table.” To Snow she said, “Don’t worry about a thing. This is the star of our show. We’ll take good care of it.”
As if those simple words were all she needed to hear, Snow visibly relaxed and managed a genuine smile in return. “Thank you. I’m not usually this crazy.”
“No, she isn’t,” Caleb said to back her up, but the woman had disappeared through a doorway behind the counter. “Let’s go sit down,” he said to Snow, dropping a hand to the small of her back.
“She thinks I’m nuts, doesn’t she?”
Caleb shook his head. “I doubt you’re the first person who cared about something of value.”
“But I’m practically twitching, and she gave me that look most people reserve for small children or misbehaving dogs.”
Pressing a kiss against her temple, he said, “You’re more adorable than either of those things. ”
She slid her hand through his arm and said, “I’m going to take that as a compliment.”
“As it was intended.” Together they stepped into the auction room, and both stopped in their tracks. “Holy moly,” he muttered.
“That’s one way to put it,” Snow replied.