“Do I have a burglar in my house?” she called out.
“Yes, you do, sweetheart, and he’s stalking you.” Will took her purse from her, set it on the dining room table, and led her to the sofa. “Sit down right here. I’ve got your favorite coffee made, and the snickerdoodles will be out of the oven in two minutes. I’ve missed you today.” He kissed her—long, lingering, and passionate.
The timer dinged in the kitchen, and he stopped the short make-out session to hurry across the living room. Darla slumped down on the sofa and scolded herself for ever even thinking of walking away from a man like Will Jackson. He was always full of surprises, and life would never be dull with him.
But will it be as exciting as it would be with Andy? the devil’s advocate in her head asked.
Will returned with a tray holding two mugs of coffee and a plate of fresh snickerdoodles and set them on the coffee table. “Are we okay, Darla?”
She reached for a cookie and held her breath. What had he heard? Did he know what Andy wanted her to do? “Why would you ask that? Do you think we’re not okay?”
“You’ve seemed so distracted this past week. Mama says that it’s completely normal. Please tell me you aren’t getting cold feet. We can elope tomorrow if you don’t want to go through with all the big stuff.” He took her face in his hands and looked deeply into her blue eyes. “I love you so much that it hurts me to see you worrying.”
“I love you,” Darla whispered and meant it from the depths of her heart. She was speaking the absolute truth.
“Then what’s the problem?” Will dropped his hands and picked up his coffee. He took a sip and then reached for a cookie. “I didn’t make these from scratch. I bought the dough from one of those kids who came by selling stuff for a school fundraiser.”
Honest. Kindhearted. That was her Will.
“They’re delicious”—Darla smiled up at him—“and it was so sweet of you to make them for me.”
“I would do anything for you, Darla Marshall. Cookies. Coffee. Hugs. Shoulders to cry on. Anything you want or need,” Will said.
“Would you curl up with me on this sofa and take a short Sunday afternoon nap?” she asked. “What I need right now is to feel your arms around me until it’s time to go to the movies.”
“I would love to, darlin’,” he said with a smile.
Chapter 4
Wednesday was one of those days that seemed like a Monday. Each second lasted an hour. At eleven o’clock, when it was time for Darla’s kindergarten class to go to the lunchroom, she felt like the day had been a week long. The kids were rowdy during their twenty minutes in the cafeteria and couldn’t wait to get outside to run off some energy. But as luck would have it, a thunderstorm blew up just as the bell was ringing for them to go to the playground, and they had to go back to the classroom.
When she returned, with the kids grumbling the whole way, there was a huge bouquet of yellow daisies on her desk. She opened the card with trembling hands, expecting the usual love note from Will, since he sent her flowers at least once a month.
She opened the envelope and read: See you on Friday. Looking forward to good times and seeing your face on the screen.
She dropped the note, and it fluttered right into the trash can at the end of her desk. “You kids may gather around the puzzle station and see how fast you can put together the one of the United States. I’ll be back in just a couple of minutes.” She picked up the flowers, stomped down the hallway to the janitor’s closet, and tossed them into the trash can. She fumed all the way back to her classroom, alternately cussing herself, for even talking to Andy, and then him, for being so brazen as to think he could waltz back into her life and make her a porn star.
She plopped down in her desk chair and stared out the window.
“Miz Darla, are you okay?” Macy, the tiniest little girl in her class, was suddenly beside her, patting her on the arm.
“I’m fine, sweetheart,” Darla answered.
“What happened to your pretty flowers?” Macy asked.
“I shared them with other people.” That wasn’t a lie since she did share them with the garbage collector.
“I’m sad,” Macy said.
Darla draped her arm around Macy’s shoulders. “About what, darlin’?”
“My sister is going to run away from home, and I’m going to miss her, and she said I can’t tell Mama because it’s our little secret.” Macy’s lower lip began to quiver.
“Mindy is going to college, isn’t she?” Darla asked.
Macy nodded so hard that her little dark braids flipped over her shoulders. “I love my Mindy, and she said she will always love me, but she’s in love with a boy named Andy, and she don’t want me to tell Mama—” Macy stopped for a breath and then went on. “And she’s leaving Friday with that boy, and I don’t even know who he is, but I don’t like him a’cause he is takin’ Mindy all the way to Afornia.”
Darla felt like she needed a long hot shower. Damn that Andy Miller for making her doubt her commitment to Will! Maybe she should tell Mindy’s father. Bobby wouldn’t even think about fancy pistols if he knew what was going on.
You can’t do that without it causing so much gossip and rumors in the little town of Tishomingo that Will hear about it, she thought, seething.
“Maybe she won’t go when it comes right down to it.” Darla managed to keep the anger out of her voice as she hugged Macy tightly. “Sometimes a girl will change her mind.”
“I don’t want her to go away.” Macy’s little chin quivered. “It would make me and Mama sad, but Mindy said that Daddy would shoot him if I told anyone. And then our daddy would go to jail.”
“Well, then we won’t tell, will we?” Darla had heard about Bobby Tisdale’s overprotectiveness toward his seven daughters and had no doubt that Macy was telling the absolute truth.
Macy gave Darla a hug and then ran back to the table where the kids were putting together the puzzle. Darla hated for Andy to ruin Mindy’s life, but she couldn’t figure out how to go about talking to her. Five minutes before the final bell rang, the clouds parted, the sun came out brightly, and the storm was over, but the turmoil in Darla’s heart was still boiling hot and furious.
“I wish the guilt I feel over ever even thinking about leaving Will could be gone like that,” Darla muttered as she gathered up her tote bag and purse and took her children outside to wait on their parents or the bus monitors to pick them up.
Like always, everything was a madhouse for about five minutes, and then, when the last child had been picked up, Darla was free to leave. She made a beeline for her car and drove straight to her grandmother’s house to find Roxie waiting on the porch. She had her big black purse thrown over her arm and was wearing a pair of jeans and a cute little orange sweater set. She waved and made her way down the sidewalk, got into the car, and fastened her seat belt.
“Thank God it stopped raining, or we would have had to take Claud with us. He’s such an old bear in a clothing store, but now that it’s stopped, he’s convinced that the fish will be biting,” Roxie said. “And I’ve got gossip to share with you. Mindy Tisdale was seen with Andy Miller a couple of nights ago.”