Chapter Fourteen
August 5th. 2009Kimberly J. Fish © 2009
Chapter Fourteen
Lacy stood just inside the Kendall County Sheriff’s office, close enough to the door to watch Henry receive his personal belongings, but not so she could hear the Sheriff’s warnings. Henry didn’t look much different than he had earlier. His starched navy shirt was wrinkled, but with the cuffs rolled back and the hem hanging loose over his jeans, he gave the term “disheveled” a nice ring. His hair, all thirty mixed-up shades of brown and blonde, still had that artless curl and wave thing going. And he was standing tall, as if six hours in a jail cell meant so little in the scheme of life.
If the situation had been reversed, she doubted she’d be as peaceful as Henry. He’d locked into a strength that carried him through this ordeal. He’d told her God was in control so why should he worry? Hello, she wanted to knock on his head. Worry was what kept her sharp.
If she hadn’t been agonizing over this for the last six hours would Henry be standing there a free man?
She bit her bottom lip. Probably. In her experience God had a way of working things out that defied her understanding. Still, maybe God had used her penchant for nail-biting as a means to work out His plan.
Staring at the FBI wanted poster on the bulletin board, she said the words over again in her mind. Had she been used by God? Here. . .in Comfort? Or was God doing something else and she just got swept up in the currents?
Henry touched her shoulder. “Hey, Knight in Shining Armor, day dreaming of your next adventure?”
Henry’s voice melted her thoughts. She turned toward him and felt her world tilt into balance. This art and antiques dealer-cum-potential criminal sent an electric charge through her body with little more than a sentence. She was toast.
She might have argued self-reliance in her many disagreements with Henry, but what she realized today, maybe even right this very minute, was that she wanted more than a successful business profile and impressive spread sheet. She wanted a partner. Someone she could trust. Someone who had strengths where she was weak. Someone who made her laugh. Someone who had eyes that saw right into her soul.
“Do I look like a daydreamer?” Unfortunately, she wasn’t ready to tell him her revelation.
Henry scanned Lacy’s floral and striped shirt, designer jeans and the tennis shoes she’d traded for her pointy-toed heels. The scarf that had been tied so chic around her head was now holding her long hair in a ponytail. If there was anything left to her make-up it faded in the fluorescent glare of the Sheriff’s office. “I think you look perfect.”
Lacy glanced at the old corduroy jacket clutched in her hand. It was an even bigger fashion mistake than her running shoes. “Then they must have struck you on the head during the torture session.”
“Apparently this is a torture-free zone. They even offered fresh coffee.” Henry put his hand on her back and guided her toward the door. “But that doesn’t mean I want to linger.”
Lacy stepped away from his touch, as much to put on the old coat as to keep her wits about her. She wasn’t sure she wanted to tell her grandchildren that she confessed her love for Henry on the steps of the Kendall County jail.
Henry opened the door and shivered. “It’s gone from Indian Summer to winter in one afternoon.”
“Welcome to South Texas.” Lacy hadn’t thought to stop by the house for a blanket in her hurry to bust Henry from jail, but at least the heater still worked in her car. “Are we really done here?”
“The Sheriff assured me I never need to visit his office again, unless I want to report poaching on the ranch that I don’t as yet own.”
Henry as a rancher. That was far-fetched as her slipping on Columbo’s trench coat. But. . . she had.
Lacy wasn’t sure how much she was going to tell him about the afternoon’s escapades. Not that she wasn’t proud of her investigative work she was just feeling a bit vulnerable after Inga’s confession. Inga had reacted to infidelity with a ruthless urge to destroy her husband’s past. Lacy had never been in love before, not really anyway. And now that she felt a deep swell under her heart, she wasn’t sure how she could handle a betrayal of those new feelings. Would she be vindictive like Inga? Well, maybe she wouldn’t frame her nephew for kidnapping and theft, but she could understand the scorn. And that scared her.
She hurried down the steps. “Kali and Brad are waiting for you at their place. She kept dinner warm because she knew you’d be around to enjoy it.”
Henry glanced at Lacy. “Kali must have great confidence in the judicial system.”
“Kali may have been involved in some surveillance work so she may have had some inside knowledge that you’d be freed before nine o’clock.”
“Interesting.” Henry reached for Lacy’s car door. “Would this have anything to do with a certain posse that organized instead of going to their aerobics class?”
Lacy stood beside the driver’s door and stared at Henry across the car roof. His teeth clenched against the cold. “You know about that?”
“Theresa called Michael with the scoop. I think she’s just trying to get his attention by acting all CSI-ish, but whose to say, maybe Michael will be impressed.”
Lacy crawled behind the steering wheel. “All this time and I still forget there are no secrets in Comfort.”
“That transparency saved my life tonight, so you won’t hear me knocking the system.” Henry stretched his fingers to feel the heat blowing through the car vents. “And in case you hear about this in the morning, I may have started a few rumors myself.”
Lacy backed out of the parking lot. “If this involves anymore antiques teaching moments you’d better warn me now. I can’t say I’ve enjoyed my mentorship so far and I’d really rather not have to hideout in the warehouse. The heater is on the fritz.”
”This isn’t business, it’s personal.”
“And doesn’t that make me feel so much better.”
Henry’s chuckled bounced off the leather dash. “I might have let it slip that I’m fascinated by a local business woman and I’m extending my vacation so I can wow her with my charm.”
Lacy had suspected, if she’d been in his shoes, he’d climb in his Suburban and put Comfort in his rear view mirror as fast as possible. As it was, maybe she should stop putting herself in everyone else’s shoes and just concentrate on the shoes God had given her.
Henry was staying. At least for a few more days.
Lacy kept the sigh out of her voice. “Would the ‘wow-ing’ process include a real dinner date, something not involving chili fries?”
“But the chili fries were so pivotal to our day, they’re sort of a hallmark-okay I can see by your stern jaw that chili fries are out.”
Lacy smiled. Maybe she didn’t hate Dairy Queen after all. “I know a restaurant where they serve dinner on linen tablecloths. I’d bet you’d like that seeing as how your such a connoisseur of sophistication.”
Henry turned on the seat so he could face Lacy. “As long as you and I are together a fish shack is fine with me.”
She caught his gaze for a quick second, stunned to see how his expression validated his words. “How can you say that? Our worlds are so opposite.”
“Our real worlds are the same. The way we think, our values, our motives, those are all in sync. Just because I live in a town with hour-long commutes and coffees shops on every corner does not mean that is what I need to survive. I like what I see here. The air is clean. The views are long and the people are priceless.”
She thought of her circle of friends and how they’d dropped their plans to help her tonight. “Some things are more important than coffee shops.”
“You seem to be stuck on what you don’t have here instead of seeing what you do.”
“That’s not true.” Lacy braked at the blinking red light in the downtown district. She looked both ways down the barren streets before proceeding to the highway leading to Brad and Kali’s house. “I chose to stay in Comfort for all the same reasons you listed. My friends and family are here and I wouldn’t trade them for any amount of city sparkle.”
Henry put his hand on her knee. “Then can you make room for one more person in your life?”
She already had. “Are you going to keep trying to mentor me in Antiquing 101?”
“You’re a rather head-strong student. I think I’m going to let you gain your own experience and figure out things as they come. But, if I can help you lighten up along the way, show you how to have some fun then that will be a perk for both of us.”
“You do seem to have a remarkable sense of joie de vivre.”
“It’s a gift.” He shrugged in the way a Frenchman might. “But one better appreciated when traveling with others who are hard-headed and stubborn.”
“And when does this charm thing you mentioned come into play?”
”I’m surprised you haven’t recognized it already. I started my agenda the day we met.” Henry laughed. “Maybe you’re just choosing not to see it.”
Despite what she first thought was his under-handed attempts to outmaneuver her professionally, he’d been paving a road a road straight to his heart from their very first conversation. All she had to do was take down the broken bridges, misdirection signs and roadblocks in her own heart so he could have full access to hers.
She pulled onto a grassy shoulder and shifted the car into park. Turning to face Henry, she felt a heat surge through her body that had nothing to do with the car’s thermostat. “I know I choose you. Does that count for anything?”
Henry cupped Lacy’s face between his hands and leaned close enough to kiss her. “It counts for everything.”
THE END