Written on Her Heart (17 page)

Monday came quicker than Andi would have liked. She arrived to work with a lingering anxiety that knotted her insides into a giant mass. She stepped behind her desk just as Ford left his office. Their eyes met from across the room, and Andi wondered, as she had all weekend, whether she should mention the incident at the cove. Should she say something about her impromptu dip in the lake? Should she thank him again for saving her? Should she mention the kiss?

She gnawed at her lip, considering. Too many questions, and too many shoulds for a Monday.

Ford moved toward her and threw a stack of papers with his sloppy scrawl on her desk. “She’s gone for the week, so it’ll just be you,” he said, hooking a thumb toward Ms. Perry’s desk. “These are some informational posts I typed up for this weekly thing my agent asked me to do. They’re articles on improving craft, marketing yourself, that kind of thing. Just save them and send them to my e-mail when you’re done.”

“Sure thing.” She glanced up at him from under her lashes, trying to be inconspicuous, but she needn’t have worried, because he didn’t look at her again or try to catch her gaze. Instead, he simply turned and retreated back into his office.

“Awkward,” Andi muttered under her breath.

She stared at the closed door to his office, wondering once more if she should muster her courage and say something. “No,” she said to the empty room.
Let him come to me. Let him say something first.

She sat down and grabbed the stack of papers. Deciphering Ford’s handwriting was like translating Latin, but two hours later, she hit send and leaned back in her seat. For the first time since her arrival, Ford opened the door to his office and popped his head out. But still, he didn’t meet her eye. “Hey, I just got that. Do you think you could go grab me a Starbucks or something?”

Andi forced a straight face. “And where would you like me to get that? There aren’t any in town. In fact, there isn’t one within a thirty mile radius. Small town, remember?”

“Really? Hmm.” Ford pursed his lips. “One from the local shop is fine.”

“Anything special? Latte? Cappuccino?”  Ford didn’t seem the froufrou coffee type, but she asked anyway, willing him to actually look at her when he answered.

But he didn’t.

Turning, he said, “No. Black coffee’s fine,” then went back in his office and shut the door.

That first day set the precedent for the week. Ford spoke to Andi only when necessary, giving her work, then hiding away in his office. Either that or he would leave and not come back until it was time for her to go home. Tuesday, he sent her on useless errands around town, taking in his dry cleaning, picking up lunch and buying office supplies.

She hauled the heavy shopping bags from the local Office Express to her car. Sweat beaded her brow and rolled down the back of her hair, which seemed to act as an insulator for the eternal damned.

She thought of the blessedly cool water of the cove as she placed the supplies in her trunk, then moved around to the front to get in. She opened her door, lifting her gaze, and spotted Ford across the street. She ducked her head inside, hoping he hadn’t seen her.

Ford hurried toward old Mrs. McGreery, who hobbled along, struggling with her shopping bags as she tried to find a way to use her cane while walking to her car. He reached her as she stumbled and took the bags from her wrinkled, liver spotted hands. She turned to him and smiled, patting her feathery white hair as she spoke. Ford beamed at her, balancing her bags in the crook of his arm while helping her walk with the other. Laughing at something she said, he glanced up to see Andi watching him. His smile fell, and Andi whipped her gaze away from him. Forcing herself not to glance back at him, she started her car and returned to the office.

In the middle of the week, Ford had Andi doing research, wading through what felt like thousands of old newspaper articles at the library. It was as if he couldn’t stand to be in the office alone with her, but she sucked it up and did what he asked of her. Because a part of her couldn’t stand it, either. Every time she saw him, she thought of the cove and wondered about the kiss.

She brought her printouts to the reference desk at the library to pay, but the employee had slipped into the little office just behind the counter and was talking with a coworker. Sighing, Andi glanced at her watch and resigned herself to waiting. She really didn’t mind, anyway. If she took long enough, she could return to the office, drop off the paperwork and head for home.

The muffled voices of the two women leeched out to where she stood, despite their best efforts to talk quietly, and Andi found herself listening, if for no reason other than to occupy herself while she waited.

“I heard they may need to sell everything,” the woman said. “And I heard it’s Mrs. Beaumont who’s responsible.”

Andi’s ears perked, hearing the reference to Rachel’s mother. She angled herself closer to the desk, leaning forward so she could hear better.

The other woman snorted. “Too many lunches at the club?”

“You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.”

“Spill!”

“Gambling,” the woman declared. “From what I’ve heard, it started with trips she and the mayor would take together to the casinos in Cleveland. Well, he wasn’t the mayor then, but once he made office, he became busier and too political to go, so he stopped. And then he hardly had time for her anymore and I heard she wasn’t so quick to put on the brakes.”

“
No
,” the other woman breathed. “How scandalous.”

“Mm-hm.”

Andi’s hand slipped, knocking a stack of books to the ground with a thud. “Oh, I think you have the Callaway girl waiting for you,” the non-employee said.

Andi gathered the books up and shot to her feet as the employee appeared in front of her.  “Can I help you?”

“Uh, yeah. Sorry, I just need to pay for these papers I printed.”

She waited as the woman checked her out, then practically leapt out of the library into the sunshine. She walked swiftly toward the center of town, her legs and arms pumping as quickly as her thoughts.

She stared at the ground as she tried to make sense of what she had just overheard. Rachel’s mother, a gambler? Andi shook her head. Somehow the image of Mrs. Beaumont with her perfectly coiffed hair, designer clothes and manicured fingers playing blackjack didn’t exactly fit, but…

What was the first thing they’d said? Andi bit the inside of her cheek, trying to remember.
I heard they may need to sell everything.
The women had clearly implied that the Beaumonts were in serious financial trouble, and according to them, it was due to Rachel’s mother’s gambling habit.

If that’s true, could it have anything to do with Rachel’s persistence with Ford?

Maybe you don’t know my family as well as you think you do.
Rachel’s words from the day at her house echoed in Andi’s head.

She frowned, halting when she came to a crowd, nearly smacking right into a little boy. She glanced up and noted she was just outside Peach’s, the local ice cream shop.

A huge group of kids were gathered in a giant mass on the sidewalk outside, swarming like bees in a hive. Some held cones, licking them with fervor and abandon only children could, while others were being handed theirs through the takeout window.

Andi smiled at a little girl with a chocolate mustache and was stepping around the children onto the street to get past when she noticed Ford. Stunned, she watched as he took a round of orders from another group of kids dressed in baseball uniforms, then went to the window and rattled off more orders.

“Anyone else?” he asked as he turned around. He caught her eye, glanced away, then turned back to the window and paid.

#

What is wrong with me?

Andi stared at the blank computer screen. The cursor pulsated on the stark white page, mocking her.

She shook her head, knowing exactly what was wrong. Ms. Perry had returned to the office last week, but her new routine with Ford hadn’t changed as she’d thought it would. She had mistakenly assumed Ford had been more distant at least partly due to the absence of a third party as a buffer. But that turned out not to be the case, as the monotonous, time consuming, and menial tasks continued through the following week, with little face-to-face direction from Ford.

Rachel had showed up, more often than not, since Ms. Perry’s return, to have lunch with Ford, only amplifying Andi’s newly acquired anxiety. It had been two weeks since Ford told her his agent wanted to read her manuscript and yet she couldn’t seem to finish the last chapter. What usually came naturally to her seemed a monumental task. The words just wouldn’t come, and she felt more pressure than ever to get it right.

When Ford didn’t have her racing around town, he gave her completed chapters of his new book to type. His writing struck her and pulled her in, just as it always had, except now she found herself scrutinizing every word, every page for truth. She questioned whether the main character’s love interest, a blond socialite, was fashioned after Rachel, or if the famous artist, with his raw passion and charisma, was in some way a part of Ford. Then she would set the pages aside, disgusted with herself that she was doing exactly what every other person who now read Ford’s books did. She didn’t want to be like them. Because she knew the real Ford. She
saw
him that first week. Really saw him, and she noticed things about him when he wasn’t paying attention. As she had last week, when he’d asked Andi to help him with some of the arrangements for a huge charity event dedicated to eradicating illiteracy in adults, or when she’d seen him helping old Mrs. McGreery, or buying half the town’s children ice cream.

Every time her mind drifted, instead of focusing on her story, she wondered about Ford. Whether he had given any thought about talking to the press. She wondered about his mother and whether he had located her yet. She thought about Rachel every time she came around, wishing she knew what exactly was going on between them. And while she had asked Ford for a professional-only relationship, by Friday of the second week, his silence had become excruciating.

But worst of all—worse than him not talking to her about anything other than work in a clipped tone, or his going out with Rachel—she couldn’t stop thinking about that morning at the cove … that kiss.

Had it been real? Had it been a dream? She still had no idea, and despite attempts at reconciling herself to the idea that she’d imagined it, she still wasn’t convinced. Every time she lay down to sleep, the sensation of his mouth—the hint of maple syrup on his breath and the warmth of his touch—struck with the efficiency of a ball-peen hammer.

She growled and pushed away from her computer. She wasn’t getting anywhere. Besides, it was about time to get ready for her date with Peter. She’d just have to finish her scene later.

An hour later, Andi sat across from Peter at The Windy Willow. She picked at her roll, putting tiny pieces into her mouth, one at a time. She wasn’t hungry, and though she should have been completely invested in their date, she couldn’t seem to concentrate. They had gotten along since their last fight and seemed back to normal.

Then why did a soft blanket and a pint of mint chocolate chip ice cream sound like a better idea than being on their date?

“I don’t get it,” she muttered, forgetting herself.

“What?” Peter frowned. “I actually think a study on the habituation of arousal in humans will prove to be a great contribution to not only the psychological community, but to the population at large. If we can figure out why people get tired in relationships, unaroused, uninterested—”

Andi forced a smile and put her hand up. “No, sorry. I was just thinking about … I was distracted.”

She glanced down to the pile of tiny dough balls where her roll used to be, disgusted with herself. “Gah. I’m sorry. Here you are, wanting to talk about your experiment because you’re excited and things are going well for you, and I’m not giving you the attention I should.”