The Dating Game. Sandra Field
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phone could be tied up for hours, he thought with total unfairness. He’d better go over there right now. And he’d better hurry.
Danny lived six houses down the street in a stucco bungalow with a painfully tidy garden, which Teal disliked on sight. He parked on the street and marched up the narrow concrete path to the front door. The brass knocker was tarnished; Danny’s mother wasn’t quite the perfectionist that the garden would suggest. He pressed the doorbell and waited.
No one came. Through the open living-room window he could hear music, very loud music that was undoubtedly drowning out the sound of the bell. Feeling his temper rise, he pressed it again.
This time when no one came he pulled the screen door open and was about to pound on the door when the breeze wafted it open. Didn’t she know this was the city, and that she should keep her doors locked? Stupid woman, he fumed. He went inside, wincing at the sheer volume of sound coming from the stereo equipment. Diana Ross, unless he was mistaken, singing something sultry and bluesy accompanied by a muted trumpet. It was not music calculated to improve his mood; he didn’t want to hear a sensual, husky voice or the evocative slide of a trumpet over melancholy notes in a minor key. He had closed off that part of himself a long time ago.
Noises from the kitchen overrode the music. Teal strode down the hall and stopped in the doorway.
The four occupants of the kitchen all had their backs turned to him. Danny was leaning against the counter holding an imaginary trumpet, wailing tunelessly. Scott was perched on a stool licking cookie dough from his fingers. A scruffy gray cat was sitting on the counter next to him, washing its oversized paws much too close to the bowl of dough for Teal’s liking. And, finally, a woman with a sheaf of streaked blonde hair held back by a ragged piece of purple ribbon was standing near the stove. She was singing along with Diana Ross, belting out the words with clear enjoyment.
Teal opened his mouth to say something. But before he could the buzzer on the stove went off, adding to the racket. The woman switched it off, swathed her hands in a pair of large mitts and bent to open the oven door.
She was wearing an old pair of denim shorts with a frayed hem, and a blue top that bared her arms and a wide strip of skin above her waist. The shorts must once have been jeans, which had been cut off. Cut off too high, Teal thought with a dry mouth, his eyes glued to the delectable, lightly tanned curves of her thighs, and the taut pull of the fabric as she leaned over to lift a cookie sheet out of the oven. He was suddenly angry beyond belief, irrationally, ridiculously angry, with no idea why.
‘Perfect,’ she said, and turned round to put the cookies on the rack on the counter.
She saw him instantly, gave a shriek of alarm and dropped the metal pan on the counter with a loud clatter. The cat leaped to the floor, taking a glass of juice with it. The glass, not surprisingly, smashed to pieces. The boys swerved in unison, gaping at him with open mouths. And the woman said furiously, ‘Just who do you think you are, walking into my house without even so much as ringing the doorbell?’
Scott was right, Teal thought blankly. Danny’s mother was beautiful. Quite incredibly beautiful, considering that she had a blob of flour on her nose, no make-up, and clothes that could have been bought at a rummage sale. He searched for something to say, he who was rarely at a loss for words, struggling to keep his gaze above the level of her cleavage.
‘Hi, Dad,’ Scott said. ‘Boy, you sure scared the cat.’
‘His name’s Einstein,’ Danny chimed in. ‘Mum says that’s ‘cause he bends time and space.’
Teal took a deep breath and said with a calmness that would have impressed Mr Chief Justice Mersey, ‘He certainly bent the glass—sorry about that. I’m Scott’s father, Mrs Ferris...Teal Carruthers.’
‘Julie Ferris,’ Julie corrected automatically. Ever since Robert had walked out on her that last time, she had disliked the title Mrs. ‘Did you ring the doorbell?’ she asked, more to give herself time to think than because she was interested in the answer.
‘I did. But it couldn’t compete with Diana Ross.’ He added, wondering if her eyes were gray or blue, ‘You should keep the door locked, you know.’
‘I forget,’ she said shortly. ‘I’m used to living in the country.’
Why hadn’t Danny warned her that Scott’s father was so outrageously attractive? The most attractive man she’d ever met. Teal Carruthers wasn’t as classically handsome as Robert, and looked as though he would be more at home in sports clothes than a pin-striped suit; but his eyes were the clear gray of a rain-washed lake, set under smudged lashes as dark and thick as his hair, and his body, carried with a kind of unconscious grace that made her hackles rise, was beautifully proportioned.
‘Do you always let the cat sit on the counter?’ he added. ‘I thought nurses believed in hygiene.’
‘Are you always so critical?’ she snapped back, and with faint dismay realised that the two boys were, of course, listening to every word.
‘If my son’s to spend time in your house, I’d much prefer you to keep the doors locked,’ he replied with an air of formal restraint that added to her irritation. What was the matter with her? She normally liked meeting new people, and certainly she had no desire to alienate the father of her son’s best friend.
‘That makes sense,’ she said grudgingly, straightening the cookie sheet on the rack. Then she reached for some paper towel and knelt to pick up the shards of glass. Luckily they hadn’t pierced the floor covering; she didn’t think that would fall in the category of apple-pie order.
‘I’ll help,’ Scott said.
As she stooped, Teal was presented with a view of delicate shoulderbones and the shadowed valley between full breasts. Her fingers were long and tapered, and the afternoon sunlight was tangled in her hair. He said flatly, ‘We’re late for your dentist appointment, Scott. I tried to phone you here, but the number was busy.’
‘Darn,’ said Julie. ‘I bet Einstein knocked the phone off the hook again.’
Scott’s face fell. ‘I forgot about the dentist.’
‘We’d better go,’ Teal said, adding punctiliously, ‘Thank you for looking after Scott this afternoon, Mrs Ferris. And for bandaging his knees yesterday—a very professional job.’
‘The bill’s in the mail,’ she said flippantly, getting to her feet. Teal Carruthers didn’t look the slightest bit grateful. And he had yet to crack a smile. ‘I prefer to be called Julie,’ she added, and gave him the dazzling smile she employed only rarely, and which tended to reduce strong men to a stuttering silence.
He didn’t even blink an eyelash. ‘Good afternoon,’ he said, not calling her anything. He then nodded at Danny and left the room, Scott in tow. Julie trailed after him into the living-room, turning down the volume on the stereo as she watched a sleek black BMW pull away from the curb. It would be black, she thought. Black went with the man’s rigidly held mouth, his immaculately tailored suit, his air of cold censure. Amazing that he had such an outgoing son as Scott. Truly amazing.
Her bare feet padding on the hardwood floor, she went to lock the front door.
CHAPTER TWO
THE home and school meeting was between six-thirty and eight on Thursday evening. Julie dressed with care in a plain blue linen tunic over a short matching skirt, her hair loose on her shoulders, and went promptly at six-thirty, partly because she had worked the last of her three overnight shifts the night before and needed to go to bed early, partly with a subconscious hope that she would thereby miss Teal Carruthers. Because of the connection between Danny and Scott it was inevitable that she would meet him sometimes. But there was no need to put herself in his path unnecessarily.
There was no sign of him when she got there. After Danny had shown her all his lively and inaccurate renditions of jet planes and African mammals, she chatted with his homeroom teacher—a pleasant young