Scandal in Copper Lake. Marilyn Pappano
them and forget them.” Somewhat similar to his own policy for women. He didn’t indulge in one-night stands; that would be too much like his father. He preferred pleasant, short-term relationships that ended amicably on both sides. In a town like Copper Lake, with its twenty thousand or so citizens, the “amicable” part was important.
“Not forget,” Anamaria disagreed. “The Duquesne women love well.”
But temporarily. It sounded as if the two of them were a good fit, on that issue, at least. But the Duquesne women, apparently, made little to no effort to avoid pregnancy. Robbie made every effort. Adults might not owe each other anything after an affair ended, but a baby…that changed everything.
“Are you planning to move back to Copper Lake?”
She shook her head.
“Sell the house?”
Another shake.
“Come back in another twenty-three years for a visit?”
She speared a tiny tomato and a chunk of cucumber on her fork and dipped them in dressing before shaking her head. Her earrings, silver chains that cascaded from a diamond-shaped shield, caught the sun, winking as they swung gently against her neck. “Who knows? I can’t tell you what I’ll be doing twenty-three days from now, much less twenty-three years.”
“Not a wise thing to say for a woman who claims to read the future.”
“Not my own future. I rarely see anything about myself or people I’m close to.”
“What else do you do? Do you know who’s on the phone before you look at the caller ID display? Can you pick lottery numbers?” He made his voice Halloween-spooky. “Do you see dead people?”
A stricken look crossed her face, shadowing her eyes, chasing away the easy set of her mouth and making her lower lip tremble just a bit until she caught it between her teeth.
Robbie felt like an ass. He’d forgotten that her mother had died, that seeing her dead in her casket was likely the most traumatic event in Anamaria’s life.
“I’m sorry,” he said awkwardly. “I didn’t mean…”
After a moment, she smiled, a quiet, resigned sort of gesture. “It’s all right. I should have expected…”
What? Tactless questions from him?
“I read emotions. I do numbers and charts. I read palms. I have visions. But people are always fascinated by communication with the dead, even nonbelievers. Everyone’s hoping that Grandma will pass on the location of a fortune no one knew existed or that Grandpa will tell them where the casket of priceless jewels is hidden.”
“Do they ever?”
She shrugged, unaware that the tiny action made his fingers itch to touch her. To stroke over her skin. To smooth the cotton of her shirt. To brush her neck the way the earrings did.
Or maybe she wasn’t so unaware, he thought as something came into her eyes. Heat. Intimacy. Mystery. Though a person didn’t need to be psychic to see he found her damned attractive.
“If any of Mama Odette’s clients ever struck it rich as a result of her communing with the spirits, I’m not aware of it.”
“For a seer, you seem to be unaware of a lot of things.”
If his comment annoyed her, she didn’t let it show. She was cool, serene. He liked cool and serene.
They ate in silence for a few moments, until voices became audible in the hallway that led to the room. One of them was a waitress; the other belonged to Ellie Chase. She and Tommy had had an on-again, off-again thing that started about five minutes after she’d moved to Copper Lake. They seemed pretty good together, except that Tommy wanted to get married and have kids, and Ellie didn’t. Occasionally, Robbie wondered why. Even he wanted kids someday.
Fair-skinned, blue-eyed kids with blond hair, he thought with a glance at Anamaria. He’d always been partial to blondes—icy, well-bred, blue-blood, who could fit into his life as if they’d been born to it.
Conversation finished, Ellie rounded the corner. “Hey, Calloway, who let you in here?”
He shifted in the chair to face her. “Don’t bitch, Ellie. I’m one of your best customers.”
“I’ve noticed. All that expensive schooling, and you can’t even put a sandwich together.”
“Yeah, but I work miracles in the courtroom.”
She crossed the small room, her hand extended. “Hi, I’m Ellie Chase.”
“Anamaria Duquesne.” Anamaria took her hand, a quick shake, a light touch, but more than she’d offered Robbie so far. “This is your restaurant?”
“Every table, every brick and every mortgage payment.”
“The food is great.”
“Anamaria’s in the restaurant business in Savannah,” Robbie said, pulling a chair from the next table so Ellie could join them.
“Really? Are you in the market to expand? I’m giving serious thought to selling this place and running away.”
“She threatens to do that about once a month,” Robbie said.
Anamaria smiled as if she knew the feeling. “So does Auntie Lueena. I work for her, so the headaches are hers. I just show up ready to do what she tells me.”
“I love my job. Really, I do.” Ellie sounded as if she were trying to convince herself, but Robbie knew it was so much bull. She’d worked damn hard to make the deli a success and had only recently begun the expansion into a full-service restaurant. She did love her job. “What kind of place does Auntie Lueena have?”
Anamaria smiled again, soft, affectionate. He wondered if that smile was ever spurred by anyone other than family. Friends—he was sure she had them. Boyfriends—he was sure she had them, too. Plenty of them. All that she could handle. “It’s a small family diner. Soul food. Comfort food. She’s been in the same location for thirty years and has had the same menu for twenty-five.”
“And you do a little bit of everything?”
“Wait tables, run the register, wash dishes, cook, bake.”
Robbie had trouble envisioning her in a hot, busy kitchen, hands in steaming water, prepping vegetables, stirring pots, skin dusted with fine white flour. She was too exotic, too sensual for such mundane activities. She should spend her time lounging on a beach somewhere, wearing beautiful clothes, shopping in expensive stores for diamonds and rubies and emeralds to show off against her luscious skin.
Ellie didn’t seem to notice either her exoticness or her sensuality. He supposed, her being a woman, too, that was a good thing. “You ever want a place of your own?”
“No. Not at all.” But Anamaria didn’t say what she did want. A full-time career telling fortunes? Or did “seeing” people’s futures full time require more ingenuity than she possessed? He imagined that on a regular basis it would drain the creative well pretty dry.
“Do you come from a restaurant background?” Anamaria asked.
“No, I—” Distracted, Ellie looked in the direction of the hall, where, an instant later, Tommy appeared around the corner. Right now, judging by the look he wore, if they weren’t off-again, they would be soon.
“You ought to put the boy out of his misery and marry him,” Robbie murmured.
“Worry about your own love life,” she retorted, rising easily from the chair. “Anamaria, it was nice meeting you. Come back soon. I’d love to talk more.”
She met Tommy in the narrow aisle halfway across the room. She stopped; he stepped aside. Their gazes held for a moment, their expressions equally blank, then she moved on.
Definitely off-again. Great.