Nora Roberts - High Noon

He did a little gardening, Duncan thought. What Ava did was what Essie did with hook and yarn. She created art. "I don't want a landscaper here, exactly. Nothing against them, not a thing. I want something homey, but a little dramatic. Individual. I like what you've done to the Jones Street place. That's what I'm looking for here. I've got pictures." He pulled a folder from a briefcase on the steps, pushed them at her. "Of the house, the grounds-such as they are, the verandas, so on. And I worked up some of the basic ideas I have in mind. Not set in stone, but ideas. And the budget I was thinking of."

Curiosity got the best of her, so she opened the folder, paged through until she got to the budget. "I'm going to sit down here on these steps."

"Okay." He sat down with her. He did love sitting on a step or a stoop in the city and just watching life go by. So he was content enough to do just that as she was silent for several moments.

"Duncan, I think you must be an awfully sweet man, but you may have a mental problem." When he laughed, she shook her head. "You don't offer a major project like this to someone who isn't proven."

"Well, major's relative. I have a major project elsewhere, which maybe we'll talk about some other time. I want this to look like a home." He wanted the life that went by to see it as one. "That's how I see what you've done. I know something about gardening, and-" She snorted, jabbed a finger. "Tell me half a dozen of the plants you've seen at MacNamara house."

"Well, you've got that one urn thing on the veranda with heliotrope and that dark red phlox, with the lobelia and the sweet alyssum." He moved on to another pot, on to the shrubs and beds in the front.

She studied him now, her eyes narrowed behind shaded lenses. "Did you write all that down?"

"I notice things, especially if they interest me. You could think about it. I've got a couple weeks before I have to lock this in. Maybe you'll come up with some ideas, and we can kick them around. I could…" He glanced at his watch, winced. "But I've gotta get on. Phoebe's coming for dinner in a couple hours so I've got to…"

"Get on," Ava murmured. "I think I'll just sit here a bit longer, if that's all right with you."

"Sure, poke around." He rose, turned and studied the house again. "I'd really like to bring her back. Just give it some thought, all right?"

"I'll give it some thought."

She sat, after he'd gotten into his car and pulled away. She sat, thinking he must be a crazy man. Then she stood, studied the house, walked carefully around the sagging veranda.

She thought of the yard she'd had in that tidy subdivision in West Chatham. How she'd loved turning it into a showpiece. How she'd hauled soil, fertilizer, peat moss. How she'd dug, and planted, and sweated and weeded. Making her home, she remembered. Making it picture perfect, without a clue that there was a snake in her garden. Not a clue that she'd have to walk away from the dreamscape she'd imagined and worked so hard to create.

Wouldn't it be something if she could do this? If she could scrape away all the dead, all the ugly, and make something beautiful here? For no reason other than the beauty.

Yes, she decided. It was something to think about.

She'd nearly talked herself out of going to Duncan's. Which, of course, would be insane. She wanted to go. She really, really wanted to finish what they'd started on his veranda a few nights before.

But Sensible Phoebe elected to debate with Needy Phoebe-and damn her, had made some very valid points on the way home from work, during the change-for-date process and even now on the drive to the island portion of the evening.

They should get to know each other better. He was, no question, an appealing, interesting man. But what was the rush? Wouldn't it be more rational-read: safer-to have a few more dates in public venues before haring off to his house when and where the end result was inevitable? She could argue with that, and did. She liked him, she enjoyed him, she was strongly attracted to him physically. She was thirty-three.

But really, what did she know about him-under the surface of things? For all she knew he might be the type who used that affability of his like a weapon and knocked susceptible females over on a weekly basis. He could be the male version of Celene's mother, busily juggling. Did she want to be one of his balls in the air?

What the hell difference did it make? Couldn't she date a mancouldn't she sleep with a man-without demanding or expecting absolute exclusivity? She deserved some fun and some companionship and some goddamn sex-in her personal life. So shut the hell up.

He meddled. At least it could be construed as meddling by someone with her twin antennae of cynicism and suspicion humming. An outlet for her mother's needlework, a gardening job for Ava. What was next? Would he offer to buy a shoe store for Carly?

Of course that was ridiculous. It was overreacting. It was overprotective. Certainly neither her mother nor Ava considered the opportunities offered meddling. And it wasn't as if they weren't particularly skilled at the arts and crafts he'd provided a channel for.

The problem was she could twist his actions, this relationship, the entire mass of it all into any of several forms. If she were going to be obsessive and picky about it. Instead ofjust taking a chance, enjoying the moment.

Besides, she was too close to his house now to turn back like some nervous idiot and bolt for home.

They'd talk, they'd simply talk about what was going on, about what this business with Ava was really about. They'd eat some pizza, maybe drink some wine, and have a mature, adult conversation about where-if anywhere-they might be going.

If Sensible Phoebe wasn't satisfied with that, she could get the hell out of the car and walk home.

It occurred to her as she turned into Duncan's drive that the first time she'd seen his house she'd been traumatized. The second time it had been after dusk. Seeing it now, in full light, with all her wits about her, was a different experience.

It was gorgeous, all those tall windows with the carved white trim against the pale, beachy blue of the wood. The sweep of terraces and verandas. And, of course, the sturdy elegance of the portico with its white columns. Where they'd very nearly taken an action that would have turned her recent debate to dust.

The charm of that widow's walk where she could easily imagine standing to look out at marsh and salt flat, at garden, at river. And, of course, the gardens. The heaps and flows, the spikes and trails. She had to concede the man knew gardens, or hired a fleet of people who did. Which was one and the same, really. A man didn't have to dig and plant, to prune and weed, to appreciate the power of a lovely landscape.

The result was a gorgeous little slice of island living, sun and shade, bloom and fragrance, green and color all swirling around a house that managed to be grand and homey at the same time.

It took vision, she supposed, to pull that off.

She strolled along the walk, enjoying the dreamy, romantic sensation, and hoped they'd have that wine, that pizza and conversation, out on the veranda with the warm, moist air and those heady fragrances stirred up by the breeze.

He opened the door before she reached it, stood framed by that white trim, watching her walk toward him.

"I feel like I should be wearing a flowing white gown," she called out, "and a wide-brimmed hat-like this dead-ringer-for-Julia-Roberts transvestite I had a nice chat with yesterday. Only my hat should be trimmed with violets, I think-tucked into the band, and ribbons trailing."

"You look pretty perfect just the way you are, even if you aren'tfar as I know-a transvestite."