LITMIR.BIZ

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neither could the designer, for many stone tables and benches had been grouped among the greenery and beneath the trees. To one side, nearest the house and outside the pool gate in a cool, shady spot, stood an elaborate playground surrounded by several inches of dark pine mulch; a little boy’s paradise. “It’s wonderful,” she said succinctly.

      “The gazebos serve as bathhouse and bar,” Brodie told her. Bringing her cup and saucer to the table, he dropped a thick linen napkin in her lap. “Have a pineapple tart,” he said, placing that plate before her as well. It wasn’t a question or even a suggestion, and she bristled slightly at the tone of command, but when she lifted her gaze to his, she found his lips twitching against a smile, and her indignation immediately wilted. “They’re one of Marcel’s specialties,” Brodie went on, “and you know how temperamental chefs can be. You’ll offend him deeply if you don’t eat.”

      With that, he presented her a fork. She snatched it from his hand, and he walked around her chair and dropped into the one next to her, mouth quirking with that smile he still strove to suppress. He knew how he affected her, blast him, and she didn’t doubt that he was somehow doing it on purpose. Leaning back, he prepared to enjoy his coffee at leisure while watching her steadily over the rim of his cup.

      In pure defensiveness, Chey broke the crust of the tart with her fork, anything to distract her from Brodie Todd’s sultry perusal. Still warm, the tart exuded a piquant, sharp-sweet aroma that made her mouth water. She cut off a bite and shoved her fork beneath it, lifting it toward her mouth even as she blurted, quite without meaning to, “You’re not eating.”

      He chuckled and sipped from his cup before saying with mock severity, “I’m being disciplined.”

      Chey closed her lips around the flaky confection at that moment, and the full flavor of the cooked pineapple burst within her mouth. She widened her eyes, savoring the incredible taste as she chewed and swallowed. “Oh, my,” she said.

      “Which is why Brodie’s already had four of those this morning,” his grandmother revealed with a chortle.

      Chey lifted an eyebrow at his version of “disciplined,” but she could understand why he’d stuffed himself. The thing was pure heaven. She began to eat with genuine gusto.

      Brodie sipped from his cup again and admitted unrepentantly, “I could eat the whole plate of them. And I will, too, unless some kind soul does it for me.”

      “In that case,” Chey said, swallowing another delicious bite, “I just may have another.”

      He laughed at that, sliding down in his chair and putting back his head so the sound could roll up from his throat. “I love a woman with healthy appetites!”

      “If she eats like you,” Viola said, placing the jam pot between her great-grandson’s legs, “she’ll have to work out like you.” She grimaced and confided to Chey, “All that sweating and grunting. I don’t understand why a person doesn’t just eat less.”

      “Grandmama is the queen of self-denial,” Brodie said affectionately. “She won’t even taste one of Marcel’s tarts.”

      “Of course not,” Viola sniffed. “I won’t try crack cocaine, either, or tobacco or any number of harmful things.”

      “Her list of harmful things, however, does not include mint juleps,” Brodie divulged, and Chey laughed around a bite of tart.

      Viola feigned shock. “The mint julep is the most efficacious concoction ever invented by man.”

      Brodie smirked. “The mint julep is nothing more or less than crushed ice, a sprig of mint, some sugar and a glass full of hard liquor.”

      Chey wiped her mouth with her napkin and reached for her coffee, while Viola lifted her chin and primly announced that a little hard liquor never hurt anyone. Brodie winked at Chey and said, “Lest you think that Grandmama overindulges, I should tell you that she strictly confines her alcohol consumption to two mint juleps a day, one at lunch and one as a night cap.”

      “That’s right,” Viola confirmed, “and I’m as healthy at eighty as you are at thirty-six.”

      Chey’s jaw dropped along with her coffee cup, which she barely managed to direct back to its saucer. “You’re eighty?”

      “Eighty-two, to be exact,” Brodie answered for his grandmother, who preened blatantly—until a blob of strawberry jam hit her smack in the chest. All eyes turned to the child, who looked as surprised as everyone else. Having buried his hand in the jam pot up to the thumb joint, he obviously hadn’t foreseen the difficulties of trying to clean it by shaking.

      “Seth!” Viola exclaimed, while Brodie just groaned and put his head in his hands. Wide-eyed, Seth stuck his entire hand in his mouth, while Viola wet a napkin in her water glass and dabbed at the stain on her dress.

      “You’ll have to forgive my son,” Brodie said with a sigh, lifting his head and looking at Chey. “He’s only three.” While speaking, he reached over and removed the jam pot from his son’s lap. “I suppose he really needs a nanny.”

      “What he needs is a mother,” Viola retorted.

      Brodie sent her a direct look and said carefully, “He has a mother.”

      “Humph.” Abandoning the stain, Viola rewet the napkin and reached for the boy, who yelped, scooted out of the chair and ran in a wide loop around his father, right to Chey, reaching for her with both hands. It apparently never even occurred to the little imp that he might not be welcome, and she reacted completely without forethought, as she had done any number of times with her numerous nieces and nephews. Grabbing up her own napkin, she caught that small sticky hand before it caught her. As he was already climbing over the arm of the chair, she quickly guided his feet away from her skirt and, for lack of any better option, settled him in her lap. He laid his head back against her chest, looked up at her and exclaimed loudly, “You pwetty like Mommy!”

      Chey smiled limply. Suddenly she wondered why the newspapers hadn’t mentioned Brodie Todd’s wife. The next instant she pushed the thought away as insignificant and said politely, “Thank you. Now if you’re going to sit in my lap, young man, you have to have that hand washed.”

      He acted as if he didn’t hear her, but when Viola leaned forward and began cleaning his hand with the damp napkin, he sat still—as still as a three-year-old can sit, anyway. Brodie said, entirely too lightly, “You obviously have experience, Mary Chey. Do you have a child of your own perhaps?”

      She lifted her gaze to his and said purposefully, “No. But I do have thirty-one nieces and nephews.”

      His cup rattled in his saucer. “Thirty-one?”

      “It’ll be thirty-two before long.”

      “How many brothers and sisters do you have?”

      “Nine.”

      When he didn’t immediately reply to that, she looked up at him. His mouth was hanging open. “Ten kids?” He sat back in his chair with a plop. “Holy cow. This one runs me absolutely ragged.”

      “I can imagine.”

      “I’m sure you can.” He sat forward again. “Don’t misunderstand me. I love this little terror.” He smoothed a hand over the top of the boy’s bright red head. “I wouldn’t trade what I have with him for anything in this world, but I just couldn’t do it ten times.”

      “Not many people can,” she said. “The most any of my brothers and sisters have is five. That would be Frank, he’s the oldest, and Mary Kay. Bay and Thomas and their wives each have four. Johnny—he’s the baby—Mary May, Matt and Anthony have three apiece, and Mary Fay has one and is expecting one.”

      Brodie was smiling. “Are all the women in your family named Mary?”

      “Each and every one,” she confirmed, “including my mother, who is Mary Louise, and both of my grandmothers. I guess my mother’s something of a poet at heart

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