Walls of Jericho. Lynn Bulock
Claire stepped away, where his warm breath wouldn’t confuse her thoughts. “I guess I want to change the partnership a little. Diversify.”
She turned around and leaned against the sink. That could be a mistake, looking into Ben’s warm, dark eyes. If she weren’t careful, this argument would end the way of all their arguments, with him promising plenty, changing nothing and romancing her into complacency.
Except that when she turned around, the look on Ben’s face assured that she wasn’t going to be romanced into anything tonight. “I could just smack you, Ben Jericho. You’ve got that ‘isn’t she cute for using the big business word’ smirk on your face.”
Ben’s grin faded. “I didn’t mean to. But I can’t help thinking you might be a little out of your league with all this. Which is the major reason I can’t explain what I’m discussing with Marcy. And the major reason I’d like you to think about what Kyle calls ‘the closet thing.”’ He reached out toward her, and Claire scooted away.
“I look at you, and I still see the sweet thing I married. And I promised to honor you, protect you, cherish you.”
Now that sounded like a caveman. “Yeah, but you didn’t promise to treat me like a child or an idiot. And we’re both different from those two kids who got married back in the Dark Ages.”
“Not so different,” Ben began, heading toward her with his usual argument-winning tactics.
This time it wasn’t going to work. “Not tonight, Ben.” She planted a hand firmly on his chest. He seemed surprised that she would actually resist his charms. “Tonight I need to make it very clear to you that your sweet young thing is all grown up. And she’s got a lot more sense than you give her credit for.”
His brows pulled together again, and Ben moved half a step back. Her hand stayed on his chest, holding him at bay. It was difficult, but she was determined.
“I’ll give you a lot of credit, Claire. Running the house and raising the boys takes effort. But I still don’t think you’re up to business responsibilities at Jericho Hardware or running a huge mission project at church. Just as I don’t think I could do your job here.”
Now her anger really blazed. Claire drew back, planted one fist on her hip and shook the other at him in anger. “Is that what you see all this as? My job? Well, I’ve got news for you, housework and raising children are a lot more challenging than you think. And I’m more than half tempted to see if you could do ‘my job,’ just to show you how much you don’t know.”
Ben’s eyes sparked. “Is that a dare? Because if it is…”
The back of her neck prickled. “I think it is. Yes, that’s a dare. A double-dog dare like Harley Fox gave you to climb the flagpole during your senior year. I dare you to try my job for a month, Ben. And I bet you anything you like that you’ll be less successful at it than I will be at running The Caring Closet.”
“Anything I like? You’re on.” He moved in on her. Claire found herself no place to go to escape, having backed herself into a corner of the kitchen already. “And there’s only one way to seal this kind of double-dog dare bet.”
He leaned down and captured her lips before she could protest. Opening her mouth to argue would only intensity the kiss that Ben was giving her. Claire found her fingers twined in his rumpled dark hair.
Finally he broke the kiss and looked down at her. It took a moment for her to clear her head and gather enough air to speak. “Double-dog dare or not, I know you didn’t kiss Harley Fox,” she said.
“He wasn’t nearly as cute as you, even when you’re riled up.” With a wink and a grin, Ben walked out of the kitchen, leaving her to fume in silence at the outcome of another argument. Even though she’d gotten what she wanted, it still felt as if he’d won. It always felt like he won. How did he do that?
He was an idiot. A purebred fool. How could he have gotten himself into this much trouble all at once? Ben sat in his recliner, behind the newspaper, not really reading it, not paying any attention to the baseball game on television, either. He was using both as distractions from his problems. Neither was working.
Why didn’t he just go back into the kitchen and confess everything to Claire? That he was a miserable failure and he’d finally gotten to the point where talking to an outside business broker about selling the family business was the only option. That the broker happened to be Marcy McKinnon, whom he barely remembered from high school, struck him as a huge coincidence. That obviously was not the way Claire would see it.
From Claire’s perspective, he seemed to be planning something shady with another woman. That was the last thing on his mind. He couldn’t imagine anything he’d ever done that would give Claire any ideas in that direction.
Still, at this point he’d rather have Claire thinking that he might be flirting with another woman. It beat having her know that her husband was such a loser. Not that everything facing him was his fault. In fact, most of it was totally out of his control, which is what made him so mad.
The big discount and chain stores out on the highway took most of the hardware business these days. There was no way a little mom-and-pop like Jericho could match their prices on everyday stuff like tools or paint. And he couldn’t carry the inventory in his small building that the big boys did, either. If Ben wanted to survive in business, it was time to start from scratch.
But he couldn’t do that. Both his grandfather and his father had managed the hardware store in Friedens. Could he really call his dad in Arizona and tell him he was running the family business into the ground? He couldn’t even face telling Claire that, much less his father.
Maybe if he’d gotten a pro football contract he could have changed his father’s assumption that he’d take over the hardware store. But by marrying Claire and starting a family so young, he’d done in his college career as a ball player. And at that point he wasn’t such a standout that he could have gone pro. Without that option, he’d gone home and drifted into managing the hardware store the way his father had expected. Selling out now felt more like chickening out.
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