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  “Yeah,” Sophie said, drifting toward the door. “Tomorrow’s good.” She closed the door behind her and stood on the porch looking dazedly out at Temptation’s Main Street

  baking in the late-afternoon sun.

  Nice little town, she thought. Pretty.

  The door rattled behind her and Phin came out, holding a white sweater. “Forgot to give this to you.” He handed it to her just as a car went past.

  It slowed down, and Phin waved.

  “Anybody we know?” Sophie said, shaking the sweater out. It had a large red T with a red-and-white basketball in the middle of it.

  “I know them. You don’t,” Phin said, and Sophie thought, Story of my life, town boy.

  “We’ll be very careful with the sweater,” she told him, and he said, “Don’t bother, I have more.”

  “Of course you do,” Sophie said, and started down the steps.

  “Frosty,” Phin said, and went back inside.

  “Satisfied,” Sophie said to nobody, and went back to the farm.

  “I suppose you had to,” Wes said when Phin went back to join him at the table.

  “Pretty much. She seduced me.”

  “Yeah, right,” Wes said. “She said, ‘Please fix the kitchen drain,’ and you interpreted that—”

  “She said, ‘Fuck me.’ ” Phin put two balls on the table and picked up his cue. “I interpreted that to mean she wanted sex.”

  “Oh.” Wes picked up his cue. “That would have been my call, too.” He squinted at the table. “Why would she have said that?”

  “On a guess? Because she wanted sex.” Phin bent to shoot, and Wes did the same. They stroked the balls to the opposite cushion and then watched them roll back. Both balls hit the second cushion, but Wes’s stayed an inch behind Phin’s.

  Phin racked the balls for him and stepped away from the table. “She’s not as uptight as she looks. She wants to be a straight arrow, but she’s bent as hell.”

  Wes slammed the cue ball into the rack and the balls scattered, two finding pockets. “So you’re helping her find the real Sophie.”

  “I’m pretty much doing whatever she tells me to,” Phin said. “That’s working out well for me. She called the therapist last night and broke it off, so you can forget giving me grief on that account.”

  Wes made the next ball and walked around to the other side of the table. “So thanks to you, her relationship is over.”

  “Is this going to be a long conversation?” Phin said.

  “I just want to know why she’s giving up a solid relationship for seven more days of sex with you.” Wes stopped to chalk.

  “I have no idea,” Phin said. “I’m just grateful.”

  “You said that first day she was up to something.” Wes pocketed the second ball. “I think you were right. And Stephen is very hot to find out what and link you to it, and Zane Black thinks he knows.”

  Wes chalked again as Phin said, “Zane Black?”

  Wes nodded. “He came in today. Tracked me down on a Sunday to say I should look into Amy’s background. He said I should close down the movie because he was pretty sure it was something we wouldn’t like, and once I got a look at Amy’s history, I’d know it for sure.”

  Phin felt his old unease about the movie come sneaking back. “Did you check?”

  Wes nodded again. “She’s clean. But I’m still worried about Stephen.” He bent to shoot again, adding, “Especially since you appear to lose your mind every time you get near Sophie.”

  “So, you getting anywhere with Amy?” Phin said, and Wes miscued.

  “You want to play pool or talk?” Wes said.

  “I want to play pool,” Phin said, and began to run the table, trying not to think about what kind of trouble Sophie could be getting into out at the farm with that damn movie. He’d just have to watch her more closely, he decided.

  His civic duty.

  The next morning, Sophie handed Amy the almond-oil scene.

  “This is good,” Amy said when she’d finished reading. “Almond oil, huh?”

  “It wasn’t so much the oil,” Sophie said, “as what he did with it. I think he reads a lot.” She paused and then added, “I met his mother, too.”

  “That bad?”

  “Angela Lansbury in The Manchurian Candidate. I kept waiting for her to say, ‘Why don’t you pass the time by playing a little solitaire?’ and then the last thing I’d see would be Phin’s eyes glazing over.”

  “That would explain a lot about Phin,” Amy said. “There’s a considerable chill factor there.”

  “That would be because his mother is a Frigidaire,” Sophie said.

  “One of the Hill Frigidaires?” Amy said. “These old families sure know how to repel outsiders.”

  “Yeah,” Sophie said, feeling a little depressed. “They sure do.”

  They heard a car come down the lane, and Amy went to look. “Who do we know that drives a blue BMW?” she said, and Sophie said, “Us? Nobody,” but when the car stopped and a champagne blonde got out, she said, “Oh, no.”

  Amy squinted out across the yard. “Who is that?”

  “Phin’s mother,” Sophie said, and pushed past her to go out onto the porch.

  “My son is an important man in this town,” Liz said carefully, when they were sitting on the swing alone, Amy and the dog having taken one look at Liz and retreated into the house. Sophie was melting in the heat —she could feel the sweat trickling between her breasts— but Liz wasn’t even flushed, even in her silk suit. “The Tuckers have always been important here.”

  Sophie nodded. The woman had to be an alien.

  “I’m sure that seems amusing to you, coming as you do from the city—”

  “No,” Sophie said. “I’m not amused at all. He told me about the New Bridge. I understand how important it is.”

  Liz nodded. “Thank you. That makes what I have to say much easier.” She pressed her lips together. “I realize that you and my son are involved in a liaison, and that is none of my business. But the political well-being of this town is my business, has always been the business of the Tuckers, and it’s my duty to make sure that it is not threatened. Your association with him is unfortunate from a political perspective. When are you leaving Temptation?”

  Sophie drew back, stung in spite of herself. Well, what had she expected? Welcome to the family? “Next Sunday,” Sophie said, holding her temper.

  “Will you be seeing him in Cincinnati?”

  Sophie took a deep breath. “We haven’t talked about it.”

  “I see.” Liz stared out across the barren yard, her face like stone. “But if he decided to pursue the relationship once you went back to Cincinnati, you would agree.”

  “I have no idea,” Sophie said. “By this time next week, I may loathe him.” She thought about Phin, and fairness made her add, “Or not.”

  “He doesn’t have any money, you know.”

  Sophie jerked around to look at her, all the anger she’d been repressing breaking through. “What?”

  “He doesn’t have any money.” Liz stared out at the yard. “The Tuckers have never had money. The money comes from my family.”

  I’m not after his money, you ice cube. Sophie shook her head, willing herself to stay calm through her fury. “You know, you’re not thinking this through.”

  “Really, Miss Dempsey—”

  “I realize your view is clouded on this because you’re his mother, but he’s gorgeous and smart and funny and kind and skilled. He’s fixed half the stuff in this house. Do you know how attractive that is?”

  “His father was like that,” Liz said, taken aback a little.

  “Then you know how attractive that is. But mostly, he’s just sexy as hell.” Liz flinched, and Sophie thought, Good. “Trust me, if Phin were standing on a street corner in a barrel, holding a cup with pencils in it, women would still be lying at his feet.” Sophie stopped, caught by the image. “Okay, that’s a little weirder than I meant it to be, but you