The Complete Mackenzie Collection Read online

  “Now, Cicely,” Eli choked as he tried to dodge his hat.

  “Folks, let’s have some order in here,” Harlon Keschel pleaded, though he looked as if he were enjoying the spectacle of Cicely bashing Eli with his own hat. Certainly everyone else in the room was. Almost everyone, Mary thought, as she spotted Dottie Lancaster’s cold face. Suddenly she realized that the other teacher would have been glad to see her fired, and she wondered why. She’d always tried to be friendly with Dottie, but the older woman had rebuffed all overtures. Had Dottie seen Joe’s truck at Mary’s house and started the gossip? Would Dottie have been out driving around at night? There were no other houses on Mary’s road, so no one would have been driving past to visit a neighbor.

  The uproar had died down, though there was still an occasional chuckle heard around the room. Mrs. Karr continued to glare at Eli Baugh, having for some reason made him the focal point of her embarrassed anger rather than turning it on Francie Beecham, who had started it all.

  Even Mr. Is by was still grinning as he raised his voice. “Let’s see if we can get back to business here, folks.”

  Francie Beecham piped up again. “I think we’ve handled enough business for the night. Miss Potter is giving the Mackenzie boy private school lessons so he can go to the Air Force Academy, and that’s that. I’d do the same thing if I were still teaching.”

  Mr. Hearst said, “It still don’t look right—”

  “Then she can use the classroom. Everyone agreed?” Francie looked at the other board members, her wrinkled face triumphant. She winked at Mary.

  “It’s okay by me,” Eli Baugh said as he tried to reshape his hat. “The Air Force Academy—well, that’s something. I don’t reckon anyone from this county has ever been to any of the academies.”

  Mr. Hearst and Mrs. Karr disagreed, but Mr. Is by and Harlon Keschel sided with Francie and Eli. Mary stared hard at the shadowed hallway, but couldn’t see anything now. Had he left? The deputy turned his head to see what she was looking at, but he didn’t see anything, either, because he gave a slight shrug and looked back at her, then winked. Mary was startled. More people had winked at her that night than in the rest of her life total. What was the proper way to handle a wink? Were they ignored? Should she wink back? Aunt Ardith’s lectures on proper behavior hadn’t covered winking.

  The meeting broke up with a good deal of teasing and laughter, and more than a few of the parents took a moment to shake Mary’s hand and tell her she was doing a good job. It was half an hour before she was able to get her coat and make it to the door, and when she did, she found the deputy waiting for her.

  “I’ll walk you to your car,” he said in an easy tone. “I’m Clay Armstrong, the local deputy.”

  “How do you do? Mary Potter,” she replied, holding out her hand.

  He took it, and her small hand disappeared in his big one. He set his hat on top of dark brown curly hair, but his blue eyes still twinkled, even in the shadow of the brim. She liked him on sight. He was one of those strong, quiet men who were rock steady, but who had a good sense of humor. He’d been delighted by the uproar.

  “Everyone in town knows who you are. We don’t often have a stranger move in, especially a young single woman from the South. The first day you were here, the whole county heard about your accent. Haven’t you noticed that all the girls in school are trying to drawl?”

  “Are they?” she asked in surprise.

  “They sure are.” He slowed his walk to keep pace with her as they walked to her car. The cold air rushed at her, chilling her legs, but the night sky was crystal clear, and a thousand stars winked overhead in compensation.

  They reached her car. “Would you tell me something, Mr. Armstrong?”

  “Anything. And call me Clay.”

  “Why did Mrs. Karr get so angry at Mr. Baugh, instead of at Miss Beecham? It was Miss Beecham who started the whole thing.”

  “Cicely and Eli are first cousins. Cicely’s folks died when she was young, and Eli’s parents took her to raise. Well, Cicely and Eli are the same age, so they grew up together and fought like wildcats the whole time. Still do, I guess, but some families are like that. They’re still pretty close.”

  That kind of family was strange to Mary, but it sounded warm and secure, too, to be able to fight with someone and know he still loved you.

  “So she hit him for laughing at her?”

  “And because he was convenient. No one is going to get too angry with Miss Beecham. She taught all the adults in this county, and we all still think a lot of that old lady.”

  “That sounds so nice,” Mary said, smiling. “I hope I’m still here when I’m that old.”

  “Are you planning to raise cain at school board meetings, too?”

  “I hope so,” she repeated.

  He leaned down to open the car door for her. “I hope so, too. Be careful driving home.” After she got in, he closed the door and touched his fingers to his hat brim, then strode away.

  He was a nice man. Most of the people in Ruth were nice. They were blind where Wolf Mackenzie was concerned, but basically they weren’t vicious people.

  Wolf. Where had he gone?

  She hoped Joe wouldn’t decide to stop his lessons because of this. Though she knew it was foolish to count her chickens prematurely, she felt a growing certainty that he would be accepted into the Academy and was inordinately proud that she could be part of getting him there. Aunt Ardith would have said that pride goeth before a fall, but Mary had often thought that a person would never fall if he didn’t first try to stand. On more than one occasion she had countered Aunt Ardith’s cliché of choice with her own “nothing ventured, nothing gained.” It had always made Aunt Ardith huffy when her favorite weapon was turned against her. Mary sighed. She missed her acerbic aunt so much. Her supply of clichés might wither from lack of use without Aunt Ardith to sharpen her wits against.

  When she turned into her driveway, she was tired, hungry and anxious, afraid that Joe would try to be noble and stop his lessons so she wouldn’t have any more trouble because of him. “I’ll teach him,” she muttered aloud as she stepped out of the car, “if I have to follow him around on horseback.”

  “Who are you following around?” Wolf demanded irritably, and she jumped so violently that she banged her knee against the car door.

  “Where did you come from?” she demanded just as irritably. “Darn it, you scared me!”

  “Probably not enough. I parked in the barn, out of sight.”

  She stared up at him, drinking in the sight of his proud, chiseled face and closed expression. The starlight was colorless, revealing his features in stark angles and shadows, but it was enough for her. She hadn’t realized how starved she had been for the sight of him, the heart-pounding nearness of him. She couldn’t even feel the cold now, the way blood was racing through her veins. This was probably what “being in heat” meant. It was breathtaking and a little scary, but she decided she liked it.

  “Let’s go in,” he said when she made no effort to move, and Mary silently led the way to the back door. She’d left it unlocked so she wouldn’t have to fumble with a key in the dark, and Wolf’s black brows drew together when she turned the knob and pushed the door open.

  They entered, and Mary closed the door behind them, then turned on the light. Wolf stared down at her, at the silky brown hair escaping from its knot, and he had to clench his fists to keep from grabbing her. “Don’t leave your door unlocked again,” he ordered.

  “I don’t think I’ll be burgled,” she countered, then admitted honestly, “I don’t have anything a self-respecting burglar would want.”

  He’d sworn he wouldn’t touch her, but even though he’d known it would be difficult to keep his hands to himself, he hadn’t realized quite how difficult. He wanted to grab her and shake some sense into her, but he knew if he touched her in any way at all, he wouldn’t want to stop. Her female scent teased his nostrils, beckoning him closer; she smelled warm and delicate