“Hi,” Tate said from outside the door. “Want some company, or have you had enough of me today?”
“No, please come in, I’m just frying a couple of peacock legs. Want one?” Casey joked.
“My favorite.” He gave a groan of pain as he sat down on a stool.
“Was your workout bad?”
“Horrible. I have to learn to use a sword.”
She glanced over at him. “You don’t look like you’re suffering. You enjoyed it, didn’t you?”
He laughed. “Caught. But I wish Jack had been there. He texted me that they won’t get back until tomorrow.” He paused. “I know you haven’t lived in Summer Hill long, but how well do you know Gizzy?”
“Actually, not well at all. The first time I went somewhere with her, the siren for the volunteer fire department went off and she drove nearly a hundred miles an hour to get to the fire. She put on a big black coat, and ten minutes later I saw her sliding through a narrow window to search for people to rescue. She scared me.”
“But it didn’t frighten her.” Tate was staring down at his hands. “You don’t believe she thinks of Jack as just a source of…excitement, do you?”
“No, I don’t. I think she genuinely likes him.”
Tate nodded. “I hope so.” He looked at her. “Maybe tonight you and I…”
Casey knew what he was hinting at. Where were they going to spend the night? His place or hers? She knew that if he’d mentioned it while they were still in the well house, she would have said his. Or hers. Or by a campfire under the stars.
But now that she wasn’t pressed skin to skin with him, she could think more clearly—and she remembered things. There were Devlin’s words about Tate and secrecy, and the phone call she’d overheard. He wanted to “play things out” as long as he could.
Smiling, she said, “Would you mind if you and I kept our”—she couldn’t really call it a relationship—“intimacy secret? Until we see how things go?”
For a second his eyes flashed with something that she couldn’t read, but it was quickly gone and he smiled sweetly. “If the peacock doesn’t tell, I won’t. But Jack and Gizzy will guess.”
“I’m sure they will. And Olivia knows. But if possible I’d like to contain it within that group.”
He gave a nod. “You got it. Whatever you’re cooking, it smells great.”
“Quail with apricots from Ottolenghi’s latest cookbook. The man is a genius. Oh! I’m about to forget my news. Pour us some wine and I’ll tell you how close you and I came to being brother and sister.”
“That would have been a tragedy. How could it have happened?”
“Ace grew up to be my father.”
“Yeah? Tell me everything.”
She told him Olivia’s story of Letty and Ace and Uncle Freddy, but she didn’t tell what Olivia had said about her marriage. Nor did she tell him about her suspicions that Olivia and Kit may have known each other quite well in the past.
Maybe it wasn’t fair of her, but she felt that even though Tate owned the old plantation, he was an outsider. Maybe she wasn’t ready to give up the physical pleasures of their friendship, but she needed to do what she could to protect herself from the inevitable pain she was going to feel when he left.
Hours later, Casey had just stepped out of the shower and was drying off when her phone rang. It was Stacy. “Hello, traitor.”
“I knew you’d forgive me, and from what I hear, you did great with the props. And you had some serious excitement. Did the fabulous Tate Landers really hold you as you hung down a roof?”
“He did,” Casey said. “I want to hear every word of what you know about Kit. And tell me about Olivia Trumbull and her husband, and the son, Kevin. What do you know about his wife, Hildy?”
Like Gizzy, Stacy had grown up in Summer Hill. Her father was the mayor, and he prided himself on knowing everything about the private lives of the full-time residents. “I heard that Olivia’s husband had financial troubles and that she pulled him out, but not much more than that. As for Hildy, isn’t she ghastly? She runs half the committees at church. What have you heard?”
“The same thing. So how’s the new boyfriend?”
“Splendid. Divine. I am falling in love. What about you and Tate?”
&nbs