By the Book Read online

  “I am happy here,” she said, a whole lot happier than she had been. And to try out her newfound power once more, she added, “I’ll be even happier if you give me a chance in Loans.”

  “Well, I can’t think of one good reason not to, now that I know you’re interested. And by coming to me like this today, you’ve certainly demonstrated your confidence and leadership skills. I think you’d be an excellent addition to the Loans Department.”

  Confidence and leadership skills. She almost laughed as she let herself out of Joleen’s office a few minutes later. It amused her to think of the utter waste of breath it was to use those words to describe her—but wouldn’t the look on Vi’s face have been priceless if she’d heard them? Confidence and leadership skills. She wrote the words on a slip of paper at her desk, then wrote Ellen Webster beside them. This time she did chuckle. Incongruous at first, they began to look good together, like polar opposites, like the symbol for yin and yang.

  Nodding with satisfaction, she swiveled her chair toward the window, toward her next experiment. She sighed. Getting the man to smile at her as if she were the only woman on earth wasn’t going to be as easy, or even as justifiable, as getting her pay raise. It wasn’t as if it were her right or as if she’d done something to deserve any special attention from him. But there was a principle here, a point she wanted to make, a central idea she needed to prove to herself.

  It was something she wanted. It would make her happy to know she could have it if she wanted it. And it was her right to be happy.

  And what about the man, she thought, taking her purse from the bottom drawer and scanning her desk for neatness before she left for the day. Would he mind being her unwitting partner in her testing of the little green book? Would he understand a lifetime of giving with little reward? Of helping others across the finish line and inevitably coming in last? Would he understand her need to take control of her life, to place her own hopes and desires first for a change?

  She left the bank by the front door, eyeing the camera shop as she circled around to the parking lot in back. Was it fair of her to involve him at all? Maybe he had problems of his own. What if he ...? No. She was being too nice again. Look at Vi, she consoled herself. She didn’t know any four-letter words like can’t or won’t or don’t or stop or wait or fair. Her life was her own. She took what she wanted. She was happy.

  Ellen stopped at the end of the building before turning the corner and glanced back at the camera shop. All the man had to do was smile at her—just her, in a special way—was that so much to ask of him?

  “Is something wrong?”

  She startled and backed up against the red brick of the bank, watching with wide eyes as the man squinted at his own camera shop in an effort to see whatever it was that had held her attention so long.

  “I don’t see anything. Did you see something over there?” he asked, too delighted that the gods had not given up on him to worry much about a bunch of cameras. Giving her time to recover her wits, he went on, “If it’s a burglar, he’s going to be disappointed. There’s twenty bucks and a roll of antacids in the till, and he’ll have to stay up all night rubbing the serial numbers off the cameras before he can pawn them. Not a very smart burglar. He could do a lot better than a failing camera shop. Not a wise choice.”

  “No,” she said, trying to smile and breathe at the same time, and doing both badly. “I mean, no, I didn’t see anyone in your shop.” She hesitated. She liked his eyes. They would have been plain old hazel green eyes in someone else, but in this man they were alive with light and perception—like a pair of mystical stones from another time and place. “But then, no, you’re right too. Robbing a camera shop wouldn’t be as profitable as robbing ... oh, say ... the bank across the street from it.”

  He grinned.

  There. She’d won her prize, and the butterflies in her stomach were a testament. Or was that simply an impersonal smile of amusement? She could see immediately that further experimentation would be necessary to determine exactly when he was smiling a smile meant specifically for her.

  “But then, robbing isn’t a wise occupation to begin with, so ...” Her voice trailed off as she suddenly realized that she’d painted herself into a corner with a lame topic of conversation. What could she possibly say to him now? She’d never get that smile if she let him walk away once more thinking her completely devoid of intelligent conversation.

  Alter your life by altering your attitudes. Attitude is mind-set. You deserve it. It’s yours.

  “Ah ... but ... I’m glad I ran into you. I ... I didn’t thank you earlier for helping me. I was already late getting back to work. I could have been chasing oranges all over the parking lot if you hadn’t come along.”

  “I’m glad I was there,” he said, patting his pockets, reaching into one without looking away from her. “I was hoping to run into you, too, actually. I found these in the shop and thought you might be able to use them.” He held up a wad of crumpled plastic bags. “You still need to get those groceries out of your car somehow.”

  Smiling, she glanced from the bags to his face. “I do. I ...” The smoldering light in his eyes held her, mesmerized her. Her mind was a blank. “I ... Thank you. It was kind of you to think of me. Thank you very much.” Stunned stupid, she took the bags. “I really appreciate this.”

  There. A stranger being nice to her for no reason at all. And what did he know about her? Only what he’d seen that morning—she’d been ill-tempered and rude. Being too nice never intrigued men like him—anger and frustration had caught his attention. Success is ninety percent attitude. And hadn’t she just seen that in Joleen’s office? And wasn’t the man impressed with it?

  He shrugged. “They were laying around. I stuffed them in my pocket in case I saw you again.” He’d never been good at pussyfooting. “Actually, I could have just tied them to the door handle of your car, but I’ve been pacing the parking lot waiting for you to come out.”

  “You have?” She vacillated between fear and excitement. She hoped neither reaction showed on her face.

  “I was hoping I could talk you into having dinner with me sometime.”

  “Me?” she asked, speaking before she could untangle her thoughts. He was more than impressed by her new attitude, he was attracted to it. Excitement churned in her belly. Endless possibilities were lining up in the back of her mind.

  He nodded, then glanced about uncomfortably. “I’m sorry. I’m not very good at things like this. I’m used to taking the direct approach, which puts me at a distinct disadvantage in the subtle art of pursuing women. But the fact is, I’ve been wanting to meet you for a while, and if I don’t ask you out now, I may not be able to come up with another good excuse to talk to you.”

  Pursuing women? He wanted to pursue her? She stared at him for a second or two, then laughed. “Well, that certainly is a direct approach,” she said, turning and walking slowly toward the parking lot. Be cool. Be blasé, she thought, adjusting her attitude. Men pick you up like this all the time. She added a little extra swing to her walk—it couldn’t hurt. “I, on the other hand, have been wondering if I can afford a fancy camera that’s too complicated for me to work. Not one of the self-doing-everything kind that a monkey could work, mind you—I wouldn’t want you to think I was stupid—but a really, really complicated one I’d have to keep taking back to your shop to figure out.”

  Okay, so it was Vi’s idea, but she’d been invited to tag along. And it could have been her idea if she weren’t afflicted with a lack of confidence, a sexual aggression deficit, and being too darned nice for her own good. The camera tactic would have occurred to her eventually, if she’d had the right attitude at the time.

  A slow, knowing grin spread across his face and sent tingling chills up her spine.

  “Very clever,” he said, smiling his approval. He should have known she would make this easy for him. She was too nice to let him feel awkward and uncomfortable for very long. In mock despair, he added, “And I cou
ld have used that sale. Plus we could have spent days together, because I don’t know one end of a camera from the other.”

  “You don’t?”

  “Nope. My camera is the self-doing-everything kind that a monkey can work.” She laughed. The sound satisfied his soul from one end to the other. “I’m not even a very good photographer. I get a lot of shots of my thumb and headless people; friends with fire in their eyes and overexposed vistas I barely recognize. But I can process film like that,” he said, snapping his fingers in the air. “And that appears to be the moneymaking end of the business anyway, so ...”

  “So, you do know one end of a camera from the other.”

  “No,” he said, chuckling. “Not really. There are a couple of machines over there with A-B-C directions on them that do all the work. I just feed the film into one to be processed, then feed the processed film into the other one for prints, and put the prints in envelopes. It’s a no-brain operation ... until someone comes in for an enlargement or to buy a camera. Then it’s an acting career.”

  Again she laughed and decided then and there that she liked this man. They had arrived at her car when she turned, saying, “My name’s Ellen Webster.” From habit, she held out her hand.

  He glanced down before taking it. “Jonah Blake,” he said, noting her expression as their grasps fit together comfortably like cold feet and thick socks on a midwinter night.

  “Are you Mr. Blake’s son or nephew?” Inquiring minds would want to know tomorrow during coffee break.

  “I’m his son,” he said, a curious aspect to the tone of his voice as he continued to hold her hand. He liked the feel of it. Not frail but not too big or too strong. Not controlling. Capable and soothing perhaps. Gentle and sensitive.

  “And are you an FBI agent or a spy? A mercenary or a national hero?” she asked, smiling as he first frowned and then started to laugh, her hand slipping from his. “You haven’t talked to many people in town, so we’ve had to make up our own stories about you.”

  “I see,” he said, chuckling. “So now I can either make up some fabulous lie and bask in my fifteen minutes of fame, or I can tell you the truth and slip helplessly into the pit of the boring and mundane. What a choice.”

  He was joking, of course. There was nothing about him that said he thought himself boring or mundane. Self-contained maybe, and judicious if the caution in his eyes was any indicator. But boring? No.

  “Or you could dodge all the questions and remain a mystery,” she said, enhancing the last word as she popped the lock on her car door. “I can’t remember the last time a real live, genuine man of mystery wandered into Quincey.”

  “But ... could a real live, genuine mystery man persuade you to have dinner with him tonight?”

  For fun, she bit her bottom lip and studied him with narrowed eyes, taking her time, enjoying the view, elated by the sense of power and danger surging through her veins.

  “Yeah. I think he could,” she said, the little critters in her belly belying the sanguine smile on her lips. It was also a bit Vi-like to be so obvious about her attraction to him but ... in for a penny ... why shy away now? “Does he like Italian food?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does he know where Amherst Street is?”

  “He can find it.”

  “Seven-twenty-one West,” she said, glancing at her watch. “Apartment 2B. At eight?”

  She gave her name, rank, and serial number without making him ask. She set the time so he didn’t have to worry about giving her enough to get ready. Picked the restaurant even. Could anything be simpler than that? He was falling fast and hard for this woman. She was all the good things a woman was supposed to be, with a simple uncomplicated mind like a man’s.

  “I’ll be there,” he said, grinning his satisfaction at his fantastic find. “With or without cloak and dagger?”

  She returned his grin. “Your choice,” she said, sliding into the car and swinging the door closed.

  He’d never known anything like the feeling in his chest as he watched her start up the car, put it in gear, and drive off with a quick wave. Was this love? This I-don’t-care-if-I’m-not-breathing-I’ve-never-felt-better feeling that was making him light-headed and weak—was that it? Or was it the pressure building underneath it? The overwhelming fear of both winning and losing at once.

  He forced himself to breathe deeply as he strode across the lot to the car he’d leased when he’d first arrived in town. A provisional act that now clashed with a strange, isolated desire for some sort of permanence in his life. He frowned and shook his head. Permanence? What was happening to him?

  Ellen couldn’t recall the drive home as anything but a blur of hazy what-if’s and should-I’s. What if she’d been too forward? What if, now that he’d spoken to her, he was rethinking his interest in her? Should she use more or less attitude when he showed up that night? Should she get all dressed up or play it casual? What if she slipped up? What if he really was some sort of mercenary killer? Should she tell him the truth and forget this charade? What if he found out that she was simply too nice, with hardly any attitude at all? What if ...

  “Oh no.” She groaned aloud as she approached the old Victorian house on Amherst Street. She occupied one of the four apartments the elegant old place afforded, with its single turret and scalloped friezes and porch brackets. A dented, paint-chipped, rear-taillight-hanging Mazda was parked out front, one wheel well over the curb and twisted into the lawn.

  A small nagging headache commenced as she pulled into her parking space behind the house. A sort of sad frustration filled her as she rubbed her forehead with the tips of her fingers. Her brother, Felix, was the single greatest drain on her patience and goodwill. As the only son and most beloved youngest sibling in her family, Felix looked like a twenty-three-year-old man but often acted like a spoiled twelve-year-old.

  “Can we help you with those groceries, dear?” came Mrs. Phipps’s weak but still shrill voice from the screened porch that served as the back entrance. “We’ve been watching for you. We feel just awful asking you to pick up so much this time. We were out of everything. You are such a dear, sweet girl.”

  It never mattered if it was a box of frozen broccoli or eight bags of groceries, Mrs. Phipps stood on the porch and said the exact same thing every evening.

  “No, Mrs. Phipps. You stay put. I can handle this. There’s not much here,” she said, as she always did. “How are you today?”

  “Well, we’re better now that we know you’re home safe and sound. We heard on the news about a woman in Lafayette who had her car stolen while she was still in it. Can you imagine? They put a pistol in her face, told her to get out, drove off with her car.”

  “Carjacking, Mrs. Phipps,” she said, her head inside the car, her words muffled, as she gathered up groceries and stuffed them into the bags Jonah Blake had given her. “Welcome to the twentieth century.”

  “We’re sorry, dear. We didn’t hear that.”

  “I said,” she shouted, “the grocery bag split wide open.” Seeing her brother’s car on the front lawn had shortened what little temper she had, and Mrs. Phipps was unfairly feeling the mild heat of it. To make up for her sarcasm, she added, “I sure do miss paper bags.”

  “Oh, yes. Paper bags. And you could use them for so many things. The garbage. Storage. When my son was little, we’d make pirate hats out of them, and I sometimes used them for dear Harold’s lunches, you know, when he forgot his lunch box at work? We used them for book covers and to wrap packages for mailing and—”

  “It’s cooling off a bit, I think,” Ellen said, or the endless uses of good old-fashioned brown paper grocery bags would have gone on endlessly. “Is your air conditioner keeping you cool enough?”

  “Oh my, yes. But it does whir so. We suppose that can’t be helped though, that whirring noise.”

  The we she spoke of was herself and her cat. He was as black as Beelzebub, but overweight and lazy. She called him Bubba.

  “No, I don’
t suppose so,” Ellen said, mounting the shallow steps, her arms laden with groceries. “We had Jim Penny come tinker with it, remember? He said it was supposed to make that noise.”

  “Yes, yes,” Mrs. Phipps said, pushing the screen door open for her. Bubba sat dead center in the doorway. “We remember. That Jim Penny. I had him in my Sunday school class, years and years ago. Had ants in his pants. Just couldn’t sit still.”

  Ellen chuckled at that and stepped over Bubba. These days, Jim Penny was slow as grass growing, taking weeks to finish the handyman jobs he was hired to do.

  “Well, he wouldn’t steer you wrong, Mrs. Phipps. If Jim says your air conditioner is supposed to whir, it should whir.”

  “That’s true. Jim never did lie. I’d ask who put food coloring in the baptismal font, and Jim would step right up.” She hesitated and looked concerned. “Felix is upstairs in your apartment.”

  Ellen nodded, squeezing sideways though the back door. “I saw his car. How is he?”

  “Well, he didn’t stop to talk, so we suspect he’s under the weather a bit,” Mrs. Phipps said, her way of saying he was drunk as an empty teacup. “But we haven’t heard one peep out of him since he went up, so maybe he’s just sleeping.”

  “Most likely,” Ellen muttered, entering the narrow hallway that led toward the front of the building and Mrs. Phipps’s apartment.

  “We’d best leave him sleep and have our tea.”

  Mrs. Phipps was tiny, maybe five feet tall before her shoulders had bowed and her spine had curved with age. Gray haired and thin skinned, she was always impeccably dressed in a floral shirtdress with the belt cinched at the approximate middle of her tiny frame—and she always had hot water on for tea.

  “Umm ... maybe not tonight, Mrs. Phipps,” Ellen said, finding it hard to deny the old lady anything. Her too-nice syndrome was acutely susceptible to anything old, young, sick, or fuzzy. She was aware of this. She would have to be strong. “It’s been sort of a strange day for me.”