He threw her a glance. “When have you ever led a festival? Or owned a red car? Or rented your big house in town, to move out in the sticks?”
“It is not the sticks,” she reproved him. “It is the McIntyre ranch, where I have longed to live ever since first grade when your mom gave that pool party the last day of school. And now I do live there.”
He didn’t laugh this time, but there was humor in his voice when he said, “I get it. Living in my guesthouse is the fulfillment of a lifelong dream.”
“Not exactly. Not quite so permanent as a dream. More temporary. Like a fantasy.”
He grunted. “As your landlord, I’m bound to ask, exactly how temporary do you mean?”
“Oh, Cody. Don’t worry. I’ll give a month’s notice before I leave. And it won’t be for a year or two, at least. What I mean is, it’s just something I always wanted to do, not something that lasts a lifetime. That’s all.”
He was quiet for a time, digesting this. Then he said, “So what gives, Julie?”
His serious tone surprised her. She answered in her old way, with that little frightened catch. “Wh-what do you mean?”
“You’re different. You’ve changed. I didn’t really notice it until today, when you suddenly insisted I let you take on the pageant. But it’s been happening for a while, a few months at least. I can see that now, looking back on things.”
She turned in her seat to face him. He gave her a quick, encouraging smile. Then he looked back at the road, which was climbing now, up into the pines, as they grew nearer the ranch. “I’d really like to know, Julie,” he said, this time not glancing over.
“Y-you would?”
He nodded.
She realized she wanted to tell him. Maybe it was that he’d actually asked; no one had asked before. Or maybe her confidence was finally high enough, that after tonight, she wouldn’t need to keep her resolution secret anymore.
But she supposed it didn’t really matter why. What mattered was he’d asked.
As he drove the twisting road to the ranch, she told him everything. About her vow that her next thirty years were going to amount to more than the past thirty had—and about all the steps she’d taken to make that vow come true.
He listened and nodded, and laughed a little when she told about that first time up in front of the group at Toastmasters International, when she’d been so nervous that she’d gestured wildly, knocking over her water glass into her shoes, which then made embarrassing squishing sounds every time she shifted her weight through the rest of her speech.
The miles flew by. She was just telling him how terrified she’d been for those first seconds up on the stage this evening, when the front entrance to the ranch came into sight. It was a high stone wall broken by two widely spaced stone pillars, with an iron M on a rocker in a cast-iron arch across the top.
Beyond the arch, Juliet saw the sloping lawn of the house grounds and a blue corner of the big pool. Kemo, Cody’s dog, stood between the pillars, wagging his tail in a hopeful manner. Juliet waved at the mutt and caught a brief glimpse of the rambling two-story house before they sped past and turned into the small drive that led to the guesthouse next door.
Juliet finished her tale as he pulled up before the little house she rented from him.
“So that’s that,” she told him. “I’m making myself a whole new kind of life, from now on.”
He gave her his beautiful right-sided smile. “And then what happens?”
“When?”
“After Midsummer Madness is over. After you’ve proved beyond a doubt that you’re the most assertive woman around.”
“Well,” she confessed, “I haven’t thought that far ahead yet.” She scooped up her jacket and her manila folder and leaned on the door latch. It gave, and she jumped down. “But I’ll let you know, as soon as I figure it out. If you’re still interested, that is.”
She turned and practically skipped up the stone walk to the small porch of the guesthouse before she realized that in her excitement over all she’d accomplished, she’d forgotten to thank Cody for the lift home.
Conveniently, he hadn’t driven away yet but was still sitting there staring after her, with his engine idling. She rushed back to the driver’s side and leaned in the window.
“Thanks, Cody. Thanks a bunch.” She kissed his cheek—it was warm and a little rough, very pleasant to the lips, actually. And then she whirled and danced back up the walk.
Cody sat and watched her go, bewildered at the change in her. Why, damned if her blouse hadn’t been open two buttons down. He’d got himself the sweetest glimpse of that little shadow between her small, high breasts when she leaned in the window and put her soft lips on his cheek.
He couldn’t figure it. What in the hell was innocent Julie Huddleston doing showing cleavage, making a man think about her in a whole new way?
He had half a mind to call her back and tell her to button up. But she was already bouncing up the steps of the guesthouse, turning once to wave, and disappearing inside.
Cody sat there a few minutes more, deciding that telling her to button up would have been presumptuous anyway. He was glad he hadn’t done it. It would have sounded nothing short of crude—and besides, then she would have known that Cody McIntyre, who had always looked out for her, had just now been looking down her blouse.
Three
Juliet’s only problem that night was getting to sleep. She was just too keyed up to simply close her eyes and drift off. So she lay with the window open and only a sheet for a cover, staring up at the ceiling and enjoying daydreams of her success.
She planned a little, thinking it would be fun to try to get a real professional auctioneer this year to raffle off the baked goods at the big picnic on closing day. And this year, for the frog jump, she was going to see that there were separate categories for out-of-county frogs. Recently, some tourists had been buying some real long jumpers from Sacramento pet stores and running them against the more short-hocked local frogs. It just wasn’t fair.
Smiling into the darkness, Juliet rolled over and tried to settle down. But ideas kept coming. She thought of a better way to arrange the booth spaces for the Crafts and Industry Fair even as she started planning her own costume for the Gold Rush Ball. Maybe she’d go as Maria Elena Roderica Perez Smith, the doomed laundress from local history. Or as one-eyed Charlie Parkhurst, who’d lived her life pretending to be a man. Or maybe Madame Moustache, the lusty bighearted saloon owner of Nevada City fame….
Juliet rolled over again and looked at the clock; it was past midnight. She really ought to get some sleep. Tomorrow was Friday, a regular workday. She had to finish off the payrolls for Duane’s Coffee Shop and Babe Allen’s Gift and Card Emporium, not to mention get a good start on that unit cost analysis for McMulch’s Lumberyard.
From outside, she heard the crow of a rooster who was up way past his bedtime. Juliet grinned. She knew the rooster. The ranch, which was mostly timberland, didn’t support too many animals. Cody kept three horses, Kemo the dog and a cow called Emeline. There were a few chickens pecking around the stables, and one big mean black rooster that Cody swore was destined to be thrown in the pot one day soon. Cody called him Black Bart, and he was the only one ornery enough to stay up making noise all night.
Black Bart crowed again. And as the sound of his crowing faded off into the night, Juliet heard, drifting in the open window, the sweet, high sound of a harmonica.
It was Cody. Playing that silver mouth organ of his in the way that only he knew how, the notes sliding all over the scale, from so high and sweet your heart ached, to those low, sexy