Mary Wilson - Discovering Duncan

“I know what you thought,” he said, straightening in the cold air. “And it’s my fault.”

“Oh, no, if I hadn’t parked my car there, you never would have—”

“I got distracted,” he said.

“I can’t open the door.” A voice came from the car and the next thing Lauren knew, a woman had slid across the driver’s seat and gotten out.

She was of medium height, slender, almost plain. Certainly not an Adrianna Barr type. The woman pressed a hand to her chest and gasped, “Oh, my goodness, now that was a ride.”

Duncan asked if she was okay then headed to the hood of the SUV. Lauren followed. Together they stared at the damage. The front tire on the passenger side was torn to bits and the rim had dug into the gravel. The SUV was butted up against the guardrail. Deep ruts were embedded in the body thanks to the large metal bolts that held the wooden rails in place.

“Holy cow,” she whispered and Duncan turned, almost hitting her in the chin with his arm. She moved back quickly. This was not how the plan was supposed to go. “You really did wreck your car, didn’t you?”

“That about sums it up,” he said. “That tire’s history and we’re stuck.”

“No, no, we’ll put on your spare, and we’ll be fine.”

“No, the spare’s gone.”

The SUV was so new it didn’t even have its regular plates on yet. Lauren had to crook her neck slightly to look up at him. “You don’t have a spare?”

“I tore up a tire a week ago on a strip of metal in the road, and I haven’t picked up the replacement yet.”

The mystery woman appeared, pressing herself between Duncan and Lauren to take a long look at the damage. Then she drew back and looked up at Duncan. “And you don’t have a spare?”

“Ladies, there is no spare tire,” he said with a touch of exasperation. He glanced back down the road where Lauren had parked. “What’s wrong with your car?”

She stuck with the words she’d rehearsed while she’d been waiting for him to show up, when she’d hoped he’d stop to rescue another damsel in distress. “It stalled and I can’t get it started, and my cell phone has no signal.”

He exhaled, his breath curling into the cold air. “Let’s see if I can’t get your car started.”

But as he made his way toward her vehicle, Lauren followed and blocked his path. “I can’t let you mess with that car. It’s a classic. It’s not just some old car.”

In fact, the car was her brother’s, almost forty years old, completely restored, and recently had a new paint job that Alan called “cherry-apple red.” It had taken real bribery to get him to part with it for a week or so, and let her drive it all the way here. But she knew she’d need a car that wouldn’t be overlooked or forgotten by Duncan. “And it’s really temperamental.” That was true, and it was also true that if he knew anything about old cars, he’d know that the coil wire had been pulled out. “It’s got a mind of its own.”

He almost laughed at her. “It’s a car, lady.”

She stood her ground. “It’s my car,” she said. “I’ll take care of it.”

“You said it stopped, and you couldn’t get it going. Why do you think you can fix it now?”

“No, I said it stalled and I parked here,” she said, quickly elaborating to cover her tracks. “I didn’t get to finish and tell you that sometimes, if you let it rest for a bit, it’ll start.”

Damn it, he was going to laugh, really laugh. She could see it in the failing light. “So, it’s pouting, and won’t go until you make nice-nice to it?”

She didn’t smile. “No, it’s got a problem with the electrical wiring, and sometimes it reconnects and restarts.”

“Let her try,” the woman said as she came up behind Duncan and grabbed his arm. “It’s freezing and we have to get back.”

He pushed his hands into his jacket pockets and nodded to the car. “Go ahead and talk to it nicely and make it understand that we need to have a ride out of here.”

Lauren didn’t wait to be asked twice. She hurried to the car and made a show of tinkering under the hood before reconnecting the wires. Standing, she turned to look at the other two. “That should do it, if we’re lucky.”

“A lady who can fix her own car,” the woman said approvingly. “I love it.”

Lauren reached up to pull the hood closed, then she went around to get behind the wheel. She waited a moment, then turned the key and the strong engine kicked over immediately. Her brother had completely rebuilt the engine and it worked perfectly. She turned on the headlights, drove slowly forward and came even with Duncan as she rolled down the window. “You two need a ride?”

“You’re terrific,” the woman said.

Duncan said, “Annie, get in, and I’ll get our things from the car.” He headed back to the disabled SUV while the woman, Annie, ran around the front of the car and pulled the passenger door open.

She scrambled into the back seat. “Duncan would never fit back here,” she said as she sank onto the white tuck-and-roll upholstery.

“Sorry it’s so small back there,” Lauren said and saw the emergency flashers of the SUV click on. Duncan got back out, closed up the car, then headed back to them with a small bag in one hand and a large envelope in the other. He went around and climbed in, taking the other bucket seat and quickly closing the door after him. He gave Annie the small bag and kept the envelope. “Got everything?” she asked.

He glanced at her and skimmed off his watch cap. His hair spiked slightly around his face, and she could see the beginnings of a beard at his jawline. A rough version of his father, very rough. “I left the luggage. We can get it later,” he said, then asked, “Is it going to keep running?”

“I hope so.” She eased out onto the highway.

“This is a great car,” Annie said, sitting forward to lean between the bucket seats. “And I’m Annie Logan.”

“I’m Lauren,” she said and waited for Duncan to chime in. He didn’t.

Instead, he asked, “Where were you heading, Lauren?”

She started her cover story. “Up the road a ways.”

“Is that a gypsy thing?” he asked.

“Do I look like a gypsy?” she asked.

“I don’t know.”

She pushed back the hood of the lime-green jacket she’d chosen to make an impact, then glanced at him. “I’ve got freckles and red hair. Gypsies don’t usually have either trait.”

He was studying her intently. “I guess not,” he murmured.

“Now, where am I taking the two of you?”

“Up the road.”

Annie jumped in. “Don’t pay any attention to him. Getting information out of him is like pulling teeth. We’re going to Silver Creek.”

The fact that Duncan Bishop was with a woman shouldn’t have surprised Lauren, not after what his father had told her and what she knew from the checks she’d done into his romantic history. But the type of woman surprised her. Annie Logan seemed warm and friendly, and unassuming. Lauren doubted anyone would have called Adrianna Barr unassuming. She shot Annie a glance in the rearview mirror and said, “Silver Creek it is.”

“Have you ever been there?” Duncan asked.

“No,” she lied. “Why?”

“I thought you looked familiar, but I guess not.”

She looked familiar? He couldn’t remember her from that flashing moment in the diner. He’d barely looked at her, and she’d done everything to be invisible, down to wearing dark clothes and that stupid knit hat. “I guess I’ve got that kind of face.”

“What kind?”

“The kind where you think you saw me before, but you couldn’t have, because I was never where you thought I was, so you couldn’t have seen me.”