Met Her Match Read online

  “I am,” Billy said. “But in return, I will give you my life. You will have it all.”

  She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t go with Billy, knowing what she did, any more than she could make an effort to take Nate away from Stacy.

  She wasn’t so innocent that she didn’t know how much Nate liked her. Whereas she and Billy had been different people, it was as if she and Nate were two halves of a whole. Never had she ever felt so at ease with a person as she did with Nate.

  She’d had to teach Billy things. “No! Pick up that end,” she’d snap at him.

  One time she was so bad-tempered at his not knowing how to do things, that he’d put his arms around her—then fallen sideways into the lake. It had taken him an hour of kisses to calm her anger down over that.

  There was nothing like that with Nate. He’d done so much in his life that there wasn’t much she needed to teach him. And his way with people! She’d never seen anything like it. Billy was likable, but Nate went beyond that. He soothed people, made them feel better. He joined them, matched them up. He—

  Terri took a breath. They didn’t belong to her. Neither man was hers and was never going to be. It should help that each separation was her choice, but it didn’t.

  The truth was that she knew she could have Nate if she went after him. “Accidentally” landed in bed with him. Wore seductive clothing—or a lack of them. It wouldn’t take much to make him forget his promises to Miss Stacy Hartman.

  But Terri wasn’t going to do it. She wasn’t going to be like her mother and leave behind such deep pain that people never recovered.

  She wasn’t going to be that selfish. She knew that if she seduced Nate, forced him to choose her, Brody would say, “I just want you to be happy.” And that was true. But her father’d had more than twenty years of whispers about a wife who’d left him. He didn’t deserve more scandal about a daughter who’d slutted her way between a man and the mayor’s daughter. Dear Stacy Hartman who’d never hurt anyone. A young woman who was universally loved by all.

  If Terri got together with Nate under those circumstances, the town would be rampant with talk of her mother, of Terri injuring a boy who had a promising athletic career, of Terri killing the spirit of Billy Thorndyke, the boy the whole town loved. Add Stacy to that and Terri would have to disappear. Leaving town wouldn’t be enough. The town would probably hire mercenaries to go after her.

  She closed her eyes for a moment, then slowly got out of the chair. That was enough about the past. Enough wallowing in self-pity. She had a lot of work to do and she needed to put her mind to that.

  Chapter 11

  “It was the most romantic thing I ever saw in my life,” the girl said.

  Terri didn’t know the girl well, just that she was rarely without a book in her hand and she stayed with her parents in cabin number eighteen. Behind her were two other girls looking up at Terri as though she was supposed to make some comment. She was on a stepladder, staple gun in hand, electric drill in a holster at her hip. “Hand me that yellow box, would you?”

  The girl picked up the staples, reached up to Terri and gave them to her.

  The big tent Terri was working on had a tear in it the size of an ice crevasse. “You didn’t unroll this thing and check it?” she’d asked the three older women putting up the knitting booth.

  “Were we supposed to do that? We’re very sorry, Terri.”

  She sighed. They were widows and they’d spent the winter knitting really cute things for their stall. Of course they hadn’t looked at the tent for possible rips and tears. “I’ll fix it,” Terri said, “but only if I get one of those blue scarves.”

  Smiling angelically, the three women walked away. “I told you she’d know what to do about it,” one of them whispered.

  So they had seen the big tear. Terri was trying to decide whether or not to call their bluff when the teenage girls came running. They hadn’t stopped talking since Terri began pulling the canvas and stapling the ancient, moldy, falling-apart fabric into place.

  “Soooo romantic,” the second girl said.

  Terri knew they were hinting at something, but she didn’t know what. “All right! I’ll bite. What is so romantic?”

  “The house the mayor gave to Nate and Stacy.”

  Terri stopped stapling. Behind her, the three knitting ladies also halted.

  “The mayor and Mrs. Hartman had just picked up that cute Stacy from the airport and—”

  “She was in Italy.”

  “All the way across the ocean.”

  “Anyway,” the first girl said, “Nate was there and—”

  “That’s the Nate who was here,” the second girl added.

  “Yes, dear,” said one of the knitting ladies, and there was steel in her voice. “We know who Nate is.”

  “And we also know that he is engaged to Stacy Hartman,” said a second knitting lady. There was no steel in her voice, just sadness with a dash of disbelief.

  “The house had a big ribbon on the door.”

  “What house?” a knitting lady asked.

  “That old Stanton place,” a girl said. “I thought it was falling down. Why would Stacy want that? She’s so pretty she could be a model. And she’s—”

  “Too short to be a model,” the first knitting lady snapped. “What was going on at that old house?”

  “The mayor gave it to Stacy and Nate as a wedding gift. He gave them a key in a box.”

  “It had white velvet inside. It was really pretty. And Stacy unlocked the door.”

  “And inside was a picnic on the floor. With a white tablecloth and candles and a basket of food.” The girl sighed loudly.

  “And the mayor gave everyone a glass of champagne. I had a sip. It was wonderful!”

  “Stacy was so happy she was in tears. She was hugging her parents hard.”

  “And what did Nate say?” the first knitting lady asked.

  “He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t look too happy. I thought he liked boats better.”

  “But he carried Stacy over the threshold, then she shut the door so they could be alone.” At that image, the girls giggled in a suggestive way.

  The third girl gave Terri a sly look. “I thought he liked you.”

  The first knitting lady stepped forward. “Does your mother know you’ve been drinking alcoholic beverages?”

  “She’s too busy drinking herself to notice what I do,” the girl said with another giggle, then the three of them turned and ran away.

  “They’re never too young to start being bitches, are they?” the third lady said.

  “Terri...” the first knitting lady began.

  She turned on the ladder to look down at them. “Nate and I are friends. Got it? I’ve always known he was engaged. There’s never been anything between us of a...a romantic nature. Friends. That’s all.” She turned back to the tent and began stapling.

  Behind her, the three ladies looked at each other in sadness, then went back to unloading boxes.

  Good! Terri told herself. She was succeeding at keeping her feelings under cover. Considering how she’d lost it this morning, she was proud of herself. After she’d sat outside and indulged herself in useless memories of the past, she’d given herself a pep talk. Think of the future, not the past! But then, she’d walked into a barren kitchen and realized that Nate was gone. Really and truly gone. Everything had hit her with the weight of an outboard falling onto her and she’d burst into tears. Of course that was when her father and Uncle Frank and Elaine had decided to show up with her favorite cream-filled doughnuts. Elaine had immediately taken Terri into the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face.

  “I knew it was coming so I shouldn’t be upset,” Terri said. “Nate and I are friends, that’s all. I knew that from the beginning.”

  Elaine had been silent, but her face t