Cathleen Galitz - Only Skin Deep

“Catch, honey!”

Lauren spun around at the sound of her mother’s voice. She barely had time to shield her face from a projectile hurtling across the room at her. Barbara Aberdeen should have played high school football herself for all the precision and accuracy of her throw. The crowd cheered—and laughed—as a red-faced Lauren displayed her ill-gotten prize: one bridal bouquet compliments of a well-meaning, if not openly desperate, mother.

Later at the punch bowl, Lauren overheard a disappointed and tipsy Sylvia Porter describe the event as “A pity pass if I ever saw one.”

Lauren wouldn’t have thought such a petty remark would have the power to sting at her age. But it did. Maybe even more today than years ago when she and her girlfriends had labored under the misconception that popularity really mattered and dating the right guy was a one-way ticket to happily ever after. The raw wistfulness in Sylvia’s voice kept Lauren from confronting the nasty little witch who was so obviously distraught at the thought of ending up as ancient and alone as the day’s maid of honor.

Lauren took a deep breath and did her best to let it go. She certainly hadn’t made a conscious decision to live her life as the object of anyone’s pity. In fact, it wasn’t all that long ago she had imagined a life for herself that included a husband and children and the simple joys that so many of her own friends took for granted. As much as they assured her that she was the smart one, unfettered by an endless procession of soccer games and the astronomical price of fixing their children’s crooked teeth and having to clean up after chronically lazy husbands, Lauren suspected they were simply being kind. Somewhere between college and tenure in the local public school system, she had turned into the Old Maid in the card game that she so enjoyed playing as a child. If there was any way to reshuffle the deck now without somehow discarding herself in the process, she had yet to find it.

In retrospect, Lauren supposed she’d been too picky back in the days when she’d occasionally accepted a date. The few college guys she’d gone with had been too aggressive for her introverted nature. And after a couple of years of horrible blind dates arranged by well-meaning friends immediately following college, she’d gradually slipped into a routine of work and home and civic duties that distracted her from the fact that everyone else her age was either married—or remarried. Periodically Lauren updated her surroundings with new curtains and bedding so that the passing of years became as familiar to the room in which she’d been sleeping since childhood as the seasons routinely changing outside her window.

Had it not been for her mother’s recent revelation that she had fallen in love again and was actually considering Henry Aberdeen’s proposal of marriage, Lauren supposed she never would have been forced out of her comfy little rut. Above all, she wanted her mother to be happy. So she had put aside her own personal struggle about betraying her father’s memory and encouraged Barbara to follow her heart. After all, if someone as wonderful as her mom was lucky enough to find true love twice in one lifetime, who was her spinster daughter to stand in the way?

That wasn’t to say that Lauren wasn’t struggling internally with this latest turn of events in her life. If catching the bouquet at your mother’s wedding didn’t qualify as a defining moment in one’s life, she didn’t know what did.

Since she doubted there were any books written on reverse empty nests, Lauren poured herself another glass of champagne-laced punch and reconsidered her all too boring life. She wanted to be completely moved out of her mother’s house by the time the newlyweds returned from their Caribbean cruise honeymoon. Then she was going to actively start looking for Mr. Right.

Or even Mr. Close Enough.

The fact that decent rentals in the area were about as easy to find as eligible bachelors under the age of sixty-five was just one obstacle for Lauren to overcome. Another more formidable hurdle was her own innate tentativeness when it came to matters of the heart. She didn’t need a therapist to tell her that her fear of intimacy was rooted in the unexpected heart attack that killed her father when she most needed him. What she really needed was the nerve to overcome her insecurity—and a chance to revive her expired dreams.

As luck would have it, opportunity presented itself in the form of Fenton Marsh who worked up the courage behind a pair of pop bottle lenses to sidle up next to her and ask her to dance. Lauren ignored her first inclination to dismiss him. He was, after all, no Travis Banks. But then again, a girl had to start somewhere, and being standoffish hadn’t gotten her anywhere but miserable so far as she could tell.

“I’d be delighted,” Lauren heard herself say a little too brightly. She feared that all she was missing was the Southern drawl to make her feel as pathetic as poor Blanche DuBois from A Streetcar Named Desire.

Blessedly, her third glass of punch was doing what it was supposed to do: deaden her inhibitions. Heck, if her mother could overlook the groom’s balding pate and obsequious pandering for her affection, the least Lauren could do was close her eyes to Fenton’s obvious shortcomings and focus on his strengths—something he was more than happy to point out the instant they reached the dance floor.

“I’m guessing you already know that since we went to school together, I’ve become quite wealthy,” he said, crunching on her instep.

Lauren winced. She supposed the fact that his father had left him the only grocery store in town might have something to do with that, but instead she simply murmured how wonderful that must be for him.

Apparently giddy with the impression he was making, Fenton twirled her around like a multicolored chiffon top. Lauren hadn’t been expecting the move and consequently caught a heel in the hem of her floor-length gown. Flinging an arm out to steady herself, she connected with a mountain of a man who was doing his best to get his big fingers through the handle of a crystal punch glass. Liquid rained down upon them both.

As Fenton hurried off to get a wet rag, Travis Banks studied the red stain spreading down the front of his expensive white shirt. Looking like a victim of a drive-by shooting, he mumbled, “I’m sorry.”

Lauren was perturbed. After all, apologizing for something that wasn’t her fault was her specialty.

“What for? Being in the wrong place at the wrong time?” she asked, drawing her gaze away from his muscled chest up to his bemused, twinkling gray eyes.

That they reminded her of fog lifting from the top of the Tetons didn’t help matters any. That they belonged to the most sought after—and elusive—bachelor in the county didn’t do a thing to put her at ease, either.

“For getting in Fred and Ginger’s way when they were in the middle of one of their crowd-stopping moves I suppose.”

The fact that his country drawl was thick enough to draw flies only served to underscore his charm. Although the music had stopped, Lauren remained frozen in place by a flash of Travis’s white teeth. Only when Fred Astair, aka Fenton, returned with a handful of dripping wet paper towels did Lauren realize her own hands were planted squarely on a rock-hard set of pectoral muscles. She drew back as if she were touching a wall of flame instead of all too human flesh.

How tempting it was to peek beneath that tailor-made jacket to see if there wasn’t something fake hidden beneath its folds.

Like a heart.

Even sheltered English teachers such as Lauren were privy to the local gossip about how Casanova had nothing on the infamous Travis Banks. How repeated attempts failed to convince him that not all women were like the ex-wife who reputedly had “ruined” him for married life forever. And how he was attempting to pay back the rest of the female race by using up lovers like so many tissues in a box. Not that such bad behavior on his part weakened his standing as the most “ooh-able” match in these sleepy parts. Even married women openly sighed over him.