Emily glared at him. “Stupid dog. Despite whatever conclusions you might have drawn during the past few days, I do have a life.”
That statement reminded her of the rather lame excuses she’d made when Wade Davenport had asked her out
She hadn’t exactly been surprised that he’d wanted to spend some time with her. And it hadn’t been easy for her to decline. She liked him. Maybe she could have gone out with him once or twice, as long as they both knew that casual dating was all it would be. After all, she’d made it clear to him that she wouldn’t be around much longer, that she had places to go, things to do. Settling down in her lifelong hometown with a ready-made family was not a part of her plans—even if Wade was thinking along those lines, which he probably was not.
But something had made her turn him down. Maybe it had been instinct, or perhaps just overdeveloped caution, but her responses to Wade Davenport had warned her that it wouldn’t be easy to date him casually. He was a man who could tempt her to forget her lofty plans, and to start indulging in foolish daydreams that were liable to get her hurt.
She wondered if Wade still grieved for his wife. If he’d been deeply, passionately in love with his son’s mother. Did Wade simply want someone to substitute for his first wife and be a mother to Clay?
And then she wondered why she was wondering about things like that—hadn’t she just told herself that Wade’s future was none of her business, since she wouldn’t be around to see it?
She thought of Wade’s interest in her house. He would be the first potential buyer to look at it. Maybe he would buy it. She tried to imagine him living here with Clay. Something about that image felt right. She could so clearly picture little Clay running through the same woods she had played in as a child. She could almost see Wade puttering around in the yard, nailing new boards onto the porch, mowing the grass in the summertime.
That thought intrigued her. She entertained herself for a moment by imagining Wade pushing
a lawnmower on a hot summer afternoon. The bright Georgia sun would bring out the red highlights in his glossy brown hair. Maybe he would take off his shirt. She imagined muscles moving beneath his skin, sweat glistening on his back and biceps.
Expanding the fantasy, she pictured little Clay running across the freshly mowed grass, maybe chasing a puppy. And a woman standing on the porch, just about where she was now sitting. In fact, the woman in the fantasy looked a lot like herself...
Oliver barked again, bringing Emily sharply out of the daydream. Appalled at the direction her thoughts had taken, she scowled and shook her head, driving the lingering mental pictures away. What on earth was she doing? Maybe Wade Davenport would buy this house, and maybe he and little Clay would settle down here with someone—but it certainly wouldn’t be Emily.
She would be off having adventures. She would be meeting people who had never heard of the McBrides, who wouldn’t look at her and see Nadine’s daughter or Lucas’s sister. She would be finding out who she was and what she really wanted out of life. Chasing those dreams she’d written about in the letter she’d once buried in a makeshift time capsule.
For the first time in her life, Emily wanted to be truly selfish. To take care of no one but herself. And she told herself that she couldn’t wait to begin—even if the thought of leaving her home left an oddly hollow feeling inside her.
5
IT WAS EARLY Wednesday evening, two days after her meeting with Wade, when Emily’s phone rang with yet another request for her time.
“Come on, Emily, please. We really need your help,” Tressie Bearden pleaded. “Don’t turn us down.”
Emily swallowed a groan. “Tressie, I really don’t have time for this. Why in the world did you wait until the second week of October to start planning a Halloween haunted house? You should have begun weeks ago.”
“I know, I know. But our club heard that the Jaycees were going to do one, and we’ve just found out that their plans fell through, so no one’s putting one on this year. We thought we could throw one together real quick and maybe make a few dollars for next year’s projects, you know? But none of us on the fund-raising committee have ever done a haunted house before and we know you’ve been involved with them before with other groups, and we knew you’d help if we asked. Say you will, Emily. You know how much our club needs the money for our projects. Think of all the Christmas toys we can buy for the needy children.”
Low blow, Emily thought with a wince. Tressie knew Toys for Toddlers was one of Emily’s pet projects.
“But, Tressie, a haunted house is very difficult to organize. It requires a lot of planning, manpower and expense. You could end up losing money if you don’t pull it all together.”
“We’ve got lots of people who said they would help,” Tressie countered eagerly. “All we need is someone to help us get started. And since you’ve got experienced...”
Emily could have said no. She even opened her mouth to do so. And then she thought of the toddlers who would get a few extra toys because of this project. And she realized that it might be the last time she could help raise money for the needy children of Honoria.
“All right, Tressie,” she said. “I’ll come to your meeting tomorrow night to talk about it But no promises until we see where we stand, all right?”
“Great!” Emily’s old schoolmate sounded exultant—and totally oblivious to Emily’s hesitation. “I told everyone you would do it. I knew you wouldn’t let us down.”
“We’ll talk about it at the meeting.”
“Sure. This is going to be so much fun.”
Tressie hung up before Emily could tell her that running a haunted house fund-raiser was much more work than fun.
“I’m only doing this because I want to,” Emily said out loud as she hung up the phone. “Not because I’m a doormat who can’t say no.”
Her voice sounded oddly skeptical as it echoed through the empty room.
Her phone rang again only a few minutes later. Wondering what they wanted from her now, Emily answered it warily.