Her Heart's Desire NH2 Page 8

  “Excuse me, Miss.”

  She looked up from her sewing to see what had to be the most attractive man she’d ever laid eyes on. He wore a nice suit and was tall with blond hair and brown eyes. Clearing her throat, she asked, “Yes?”

  “Are you Ethel Mae Jordan?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I got the right Ethel Mae.” He went over to her and sat next to her on the porch swing.

  She thought to rebuke him for taking such liberties and sitting close to her when she hadn’t invited him to do so, but then he shot her the most charming smile she’d ever seen on a man and all protests flew right out the window.

  “I ran into a friend of yours by the name of Rick Johnson,” the man continued. “He is a friend, right?”

  “Yes, in a way.” She didn’t really consider him to be a friend. He was more of an acquaintance, but she didn’t know if she should explain that to this stranger. After all, she didn’t even know him.

  “Well, he’s under the impression we know each other.”

  “He is?”

  “Yes, and he also suggested that you’re interested in me because I make you pursue me, which is ironic since I’m the type of man who’d rather pursue than be pursued.” He winked at her. “You’re most certainly worth the pursuit.”

  Her face flushed. “B-but I don’t know you.”

  “Sure you do. My name is Samuel Dixon.”

  Her eyes grew wide and she swallowed the lump in her throat. “S-S-Samuel?” Rick met up with a man named Samuel and told him she was interested in him?

  Looking amused, he asked, “Do you have a tendency to stutter?”

  Her face grew warm. “Of course not. It’s just that…” Just that what? She couldn’t tell him she made him up in order to get Rick interested in her friend. Even if Samuel caught her in her lie, she didn’t want to disclose anything else.

  “I know. I caught you off guard.” He leaned back in the swing and draped an arm along the back of the swing.

  Surprised by his friendly demeanor, she scooted away from him and cleared her throat. “I really don’t think Rick meant you. He meant another Samuel.”

  “Is there another Samuel Dixon in town?”

  She considered her options. She could lie and claim there was, but look at how much trouble lying was causing her!

  Vivian opened the storm door and peered around it. “Is Hugh gone?”

  Directing her attention to her sister, she asked, “What?”

  She rolled her eyes but repeated, “Is Hugh gone?”

  Ethel Mae checked the street and saw that it was clear. “Yes, he’s gone.”

  Breathing a sigh of relief, she stepped onto the porch. “I hate it when he sees me walking to my friend’s house.”

  Samuel laughed and crossed his legs, placing a hand on his knee. “Why should it bother you if he sees you?”

  Vivian gave him a pointed look. “Because he’s annoying. He seems to think we’re going to get married someday.”

  “Ah.” He nodded. “Poor lad. He’s going to get his heart broken when he’s older.”

  “I keep telling him I’ll never marry him. It’s not my fault if he doesn’t believe me.”

  “If you hate it so much that he sees you when you go to your friend’s, then why don’t you choose a different way to get to her house? I might not have been in Omaha long, but I can see there’s more than one way to get somewhere.”

  She crossed her arms and stuck her chin out. “I shouldn’t have to.”

  With a knowing grin, he said, “I suspect you enjoy his attention, even if you’re too proud to admit it.”

  Her jaw dropped and then she quickly shut it. Turning her gaze to her sister, she asked, “Who is he?”

  “I’ll do it,” he told Ethel Mae. “I’m Samuel Dixon.”

  This time when Vivian’s jaw dropped, Ethel Mae swore it almost hit the floor. “But I thought I made Dixon up!”

  Bolting to her feet, Ethel Mae strode over to Vivian. “Get in the house. We need to talk.” Glancing at Samuel, she said, “We have something important to discuss.”

  “That’s fine. I’ll wait,” he called out, rocking in the swing and looking as if he had absolutely nowhere to go.

  Sighing, Ethel Mae nodded. “I shouldn’t be but a minute.” So he planned to stay. She made a mental note to bring out something for him to drink when she returned. Even if she didn’t know him and found this whole thing horribly embarrassing, she had to be polite. “Come on, Vivian.”

  Vivian went into the house, and Ethel Mae followed, her hand on her sister’s arm as she directed her to her bedroom. Once they were inside the safety of the room, Ethel Mae shut the door and turned to her sister.

  “You told Rick that Samuel’s last name was Dixon?” she demanded, her hands on her hips.

  Vivian shrugged. “I had to. He wanted to know Samuel’s last name. Dixon was the first one that came to mind. I was under a lot of pressure!”

  She groaned and paced the room. “You must have heard his name from somewhere.”

  “I think so. Probably from Hugh. I’m telling you, he’s no good.”

  “Oh, don’t you dare pin this on Hugh. This was all your doing.” She stopped and tried to decide the best course of action. “So, you told Rick that Samuel’s last name was Dixon. Then Rick happened to run into Samuel Dixon and told him I’m interested in him because he’s pretending to be interested in someone else. And now Samuel’s over here.” She groaned again and rubbed her temples. “How can something so simple become so complicated?”

  “It’s all Sally’s fault. She told Rick you’d be interested in him if he pretended to be interested in her, so we had to make up Samuel Dixon to help her.”

  “No, it’s not her fault either.”

  “Then it’s Rick’s. He shouldn’t be interested in you. What right does a man have in wanting to court you anyway?”

  Ethel Mae gasped. “What?”

  “No, I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant that if he was smart enough to want someone else, none of this would be happening.”

  She stopped pacing the room and glared at her. “I get the point.” Taking a deep breath, she mentally ran through all her options. “Fine. From this point on, no more lies.”

  “Does that mean we tell Rick the truth?”

  “Oh, of course not!” She’d rather die than tell Rick the elaborate lie they all concocted because then she’d have to tell him she was never interested in him and hoped to pawn him off on her friend. “It wouldn’t be good for him to know any of this. Men are fragile. They need to feel good about themselves in order to get up in the morning and go to work.”

  “So we have to keep lying.”

  “Only to him.”

  “But what if he runs into Samuel again?”

  She hated the fact that someone as young as her sister could be so logical in a moment like this. With a sigh, she said, “I’ll talk to Samuel.”

  “So you’ll make him lie, too.”

  “I don’t know what I’m going to do yet. I just need a moment to think, that’s all.” She slowly inhaled and then exhaled. When her heartbeat slowed enough to where she didn’t hear it pounding in her ears, she straightened her back and held her head high. “I’m going to get refreshments and talk to him.”

  “What are you going to talk to him about?”

  “I don’t know yet. I’ll figure it out as the conversation progresses.”

  Crossing her arms, Vivian shook her head. “You should have a better plan than that.”

  Ethel Mae huffed. “Well, never you mind. You keep hiding from Hugh. I’ll take care of Samuel.” She opened the door and shoved her sister into the hallway. “Now, you run along.”

  “Fine. I will.” As she headed out of the house, she called out, “Next time you want to get rid of a suitor, don’t bring me in to lie for you.”

  “It’s a deal.”

  Ethel Mae let out an aggravated sigh and hurried to the kitchen to place a pot
on the cook stove so she could boil water. Out of curiosity, she rushed down the hallway and to the front door. Just her luck. He was still there. That meant he didn’t get bored and head off to wherever it was he came from. At the moment, he was sitting in the porch swing and staring at the street where people rode their horses as they went about their business. She grimaced. What in the world was she supposed to say to him?

  Pushing the storm door open, she forced a smile on her lips and called out, “I’m boiling water for our tea.”

  He looked over in her direction and smiled in return.

  Alright, she had to admit he had a smile that could weaken any woman’s knees, but that didn’t mean she wanted him to stick around!

  “I’m in no hurry,” he said. “I’ve got nothing else to do today.”

  “Oh.” Did that mean he intended to stay until evening? She didn’t know if her parents would be thrilled to know a young man had invited himself to supper. Not that she thought he’d come out and ask to stay, but it’d be rude to send him away on an empty stomach. Trying to figure out the right response, she hesitated before saying, “I’ll add a few cookies with the tea.” Yes, that was good. No one could find fault with tea and cookies.

  As she closed the storm door, she realized they’d need something to set the tea set on. She couldn’t invite him into the house when her parents weren’t around. Deciding on the small table in the parlor, she went over to it and took the vase and removed it from the table. She picked the table up and carried it out the front door.

  He stood up and took the table from her. “You should have let me get that for you,” he kindly admonished before he set it in front of the swing.

  She shrugged. “It wasn’t heavy.”

  “But it’s the principle of the thing. I can’t have a lovely young lady such as yourself carrying big items when I can do it myself.”

  Her cheeks grew warm. “Well…thanks.”

  “It’s my pleasure.” He returned to the swing and sat down.

  When he glanced her way again, her heart fluttered with an unexpected thrill. Oh, this was ridiculous! She didn’t even know this man, and here she was, acting like a silly schoolgirl. Not wanting to look any more foolish than she probably already did, she quickly opened the storm door and went back into the house. She made it to the kitchen in time for the water in the pot to boil. As she took the pot off the cook stove, she realized her hands were trembling. Good grief! Samuel was just a man like Rick. She never had any problems handling a teapot around Rick.

  But Samuel isn’t Rick, she thought as she set the pot on the worktable and went to grab a tray. Samuel was… Well, he was a man, just like Rick was. That much was true. But he wasn’t anything like Rick. Samuel was…better. Much better.

  She shook her head. This was ridiculous! She didn’t even know him. After she set the rest of the items she needed on the tray, she picked it up, relieved her excited trembling wasn’t making the teapot and cups wobble. She managed to carry everything out to the porch and placed the tray on the small table without dropping anything. So far, so good.

  With a nervous smile, she sat beside him and poured the tea into their cups. “How do you know Rick?”

  “I don’t really know him. I happened to run into him when I was talking to my uncle.” He picked up his cup and a cookie. “My uncle is Judge Townsend.”

  “Your uncle is the other judge?” Just what were the chances that a Samuel Dixon would be related to the judge when Rick was the other judge at the courthouse?

  “Yes.” He bit into his cookie and chuckled. After he swallowed, he added, “It’s a small world.”

  Was that ever an understatement! She sipped her tea and nodded. “I can’t argue with that.”

  “I gather Rick is someone you’d rather not be with?”

  She almost spit out her tea at his bluntness.

  “There’s no need to be embarrassed around me,” he assured her before he took a sip of his tea. “I understood the situation when he talked to me. As luck would have it, I actually do know a woman by the name of Ethel Mae. She’s a lovely old lady who lives down the street from the cousin I’m staying with while I’m in town. So when he asked if I knew an Ethel Mae, I said I did, and then he went on about how you were interested in me. I knew he wasn’t talking about the same Ethel Mae I was.”

  She set the cup in her lap and took a deep breath. Alright, now she was going to explain everything and hope he understood. “Oh, well, you see—”

  “You don’t need to say it. I already know. Sometimes you fancy someone and sometimes you don’t. It’s not something you can control.”

  “Well, that’s true.”

  “I figure there’s no harm in letting Rick think you prefer me to him. Besides, he didn’t look all that upset about it.”

  At that, she straightened in the seat. “He didn’t?”

  “No. He seemed to be congratulating me.”

  “He was?”

  “Yes. I don’t think you have anything to worry about.”

  She didn’t know how he could be sure but decided to ask, “Did he mention that he was interested in someone else?”

  “No, but a man can tell when another man is interested in a woman. I suspect he was at one point, but something happened to change his mind. Perhaps he met someone else.”

  Sally! He got a chance to know Sally and now he was interested in her. That meant the plan worked!

  “Besides wanting to meet you, I also wanted to assure you that you don’t have worry. Rick won’t be asking to court you.”

  She cleared her throat and smiled. “That’s very nice of you.” After she took another sip of her tea, she decided she might as well find out more about him, especially since he wasn’t going to run off and tell Rick what she’d been up to. And it certainly didn’t hurt that he was gorgeous. “You’re in town to see your uncle. May I ask where you’re from?”

  “It isn’t where I’ve been that’s as interesting as where I’m going.”

  Curious, she raised her eyebrows. “Oh?”

  “I’m on my way to California to open a hotel.”

  “A hotel?”

  “Yes, but I expect it will be the first of many.”

  “That’s rather ambitious.”

  He shrugged and finished his cookie. After he took a sip of his tea, he leaned back in the swing and gave her one of his heart-melting smiles. “I can’t help it. Ever since I was a child, I wanted to be the best in everything I did. I figure with people heading out west, I can use this to my advantage.”

  “I really would like to know something about your past.”

  “It’s a boring story.”

  Amused, her lips turned up into a smile. “So bore me. I have nothing to do for the next hour.”

  “Alright, but if you fall asleep, it’s your own fault.”

  “I’ll take the chance.”

  “I was born and raised in Virginia. I was the eighth in a family of seventeen children.”

  Her jaw dropped. “Seventeen?”

  “Yes. In a family as large as mine, there was a tendency to get lost in the crowd.”

  “Let me guess. You competed with your brothers and sisters to get noticed.”

  “Yes, but I did it in a way where I learned to excel in everything I did.”

  “Like what?” she asked, realizing she was enjoying this, even if he considered it boring.

  “There are many things I tried in my quest to find what I was best at.”

  “Then it shouldn’t be hard coming up with something to tell me.”

  The edge of his lip turned up. “You’re quick with a comeback.”

  “Well, if you’re looking for a woman who’s afraid to ask questions or voice her opinion, you’ll do better to find someone else.”

  He set the cup on the table and clasped his hands together. “Why do I get the impression you didn’t bother asking Rick about his life?”

  “I had no need to. He came out and told me all about his past.”


  “Ah, then you do like a man who can be harder to get.”

  Her cheeks flushed. That wasn’t what she intended for him to think, but maybe he was right. Maybe part of the reason she wasn’t attracted to Rick was because he was too easy to get. Perhaps a little mystery was what she craved.

  “I’ll tell you what,” Samuel said as he checked his pocket watch and stood up. “I’m due to meet my uncle in a bit. Why don’t you come with me to a play I planned to attend later this week, and I’ll tell you everything about my boring past that you want to know?”

  “You’re a difficult man to deal with, aren’t you?”

  “On the contrary. I am quite agreeable, but I’ve stayed here for as long as I can today. Besides, I don’t want to wear out my welcome. I promise I’ll answer all your questions next time. Shall I pick you up at six? The play starts at seven, and I plan to meet your parents first.”

  “But I didn’t say yes yet.” She stopped herself before she could gasp. Did she really add the word yet? Good heavens. The man had her saying things she shouldn’t! The least she could do was make him wonder if she’d join him for this play.

  “Ah, but why make me wait when I need to leave?” He lifted her hand and kissed it. “I look forward to seeing you at six on Wednesday.”

  Before she could respond, he let go of her hand and headed down the porch steps. He glanced at her once to offer her a smile that made her weak in the knees. Once he was safely out of sight, she released her breath. That man was much too charming for his own good. She wondered if he did that with all women or just her. A man like that surely had a lot of women falling at his feet.

  As charming as he was, it’d be dangerous to fall in love with a man like him. Who knew if he went around inviting a lot of women to plays? She could be one of many—maybe even the one he’d take out this week. Turning her attention to the tray, she decided to collect the refreshments and take them back into the house. Yes, that’s how it was. He invited women to attend plays with him and lost interest in them after going. Wednesday, she’d see the play, ask him her questions, he’d grow bored of her, and he’d move on. There was no reason to invest any more thought in him, even if he was incredibly handsome and fun to talk to. Feeling more in control of her swirling emotions, she took the tray back to the kitchen. Yes, come Thursday morning, Samuel Dixon would be nothing but a memory.