LITMIR.BIZ

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Once she signed the paperwork and handed Benny the tip Marshall had provided, she made sure he and his men took more refreshments for their return trip to Dallas and waved them off.

      The sound of the big diesel engine rumbling back to life brought Marshall from some remote part of the house and he joined her in the kitchen. With an understanding smile, she pointed to the receipts on the counter. “Mission accomplished—and without too much damage. There’s a table scratch, which can probably be rubbed out, but I made them initial for it here—” she pointed to the appropriate page “—and for a chip out of the bed’s headboard.” She pointed to the second initial.

      “Those are both my fault, not theirs,” Marshall said.

      Genevieve nodded, experience allowing her to read between the lines. She, too, had been grateful for everyone’s kindness and help during her darkest days, but there came a time when she began wishing that she lived in a bigger city that would provide anonymity because she didn’t think she could bear even one more pitying or curious look, or “chin up, life goes on” lecture. At her lowest point, she’d lived to get home and release some of that pressure.

      “I broke a clock against our fireplace mantel,” she confessed. She added a sheepish smile. “Frankly, it was the ugliest wedding gift we’d received, and I wasn’t sorry to see it go. I’ll give the company a call immediately and tell them that the notations are nonissues.”

      “The headboard happened right after we contracted on this place and I caught Cynthia sneaking a cigarette,” Marshall said with equal chagrin. “I was frustrated and angry. I threw a gift, too. A silver picture frame. I’ll handle the call, Genevieve.”

      Wedding photos were often in silver frames, she thought. Hers were. For weeks after Adam’s death, she couldn’t bear to see a photo of him without falling apart and for a while had put them facedown, until seeing them that way would make her feel guilty so she would place them upright again, until she had to hide them behind books and in drawers because it hurt too much to look at his dear face. But she’d never wanted to throw a photo of him. The box containing his flag maybe, because she’d been as angry with the military as she’d been with the radical militants who’d killed him. The thing was that being a soldier had been in his blood and she’d married him knowing that. Wasn’t it the same for Marshall with Cynthia? From what they’d told her, they’d met in college and she’d been a near life-long smoker.

      “Okay, then…” Realizing that she had no more reason to stay, Genevieve tucked her pen into her bag and pulled out something from the bottom of the clipboard that she’d worked up for him. “Well, the good news is that you can take your time from here on. Here’s a sheet with service phone numbers.”

      “I told you that you were incredible. The gift that keeps on giving,” he murmured.

      His admiring gaze had her feeling as if she was one step away from blushing. Determined to keep to her professional script, she focused on the paper she passed to him. “A simple printout of what I already have in the computer. These are people we hire repeatedly at the office and you can feel free to use my name, although by now everyone knows yours, so you probably won’t have any trouble getting quick service. Also your address is a dead giveaway.”

      “Does that mean I should tip them double? Not that I mind if they’re as good as you say,” Marshall added with a shrug, “but I don’t want to immediately become the hated one on the street by the rest of my neighbors.”

      Those neighbors included her mother, a fact that he had been informed of back when he and Cynthia first looked at the house. “If I recommend someone, you can pretty much trust that you won’t be dealing with padded invoices, so tip as you see fit.”

      Placing the paper on top of the receipt, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “How do I thank you? You’ve gone above and beyond what I intended or imagined.”

      “Full disclosure time—fun for me is playing decorator, and I have the best job to feed that because I get to see so many styles and ideas. The muscle boys had the hard work.” Seeing the new potential in the place, she tried to infuse him with a little of her excitement. “Do you like it so far?” What Genevieve really wanted to ask was, “Do you think you could consider staying despite what’s happened?”

      “What’s not to like?” Marshall replied. “It’s a fabulous house and you’ve done the most with what you had to work with. In bad weather, I can even jog using the wrap-around patio. With luck, I can crack open my skull slipping on sweating concrete and quit worrying about what I’m supposed to do with myself here alone.”

      “Marshall.” His last words shook her almost as much as when he took that awful call weeks ago outside of the title company. Genevieve couldn’t keep from fingering the delicate gold cross her paternal grandmother had given her at her christening. Loss that cut soul-deep opened one to so many dangers.

      He held up his hand to entreat her patience. “I’m being a self-pitying jerk. Ignore me, please. I’m used to knowing immediately what to do when and the protocol involved. I could arrange for dinner for a surprise visit by a foreign dignitary or celebrity with barely any notice, but right now just this small talk with you is almost making me break out in a cold sweat.”

      She understood completely. “Then I should leave.”

      “Don’t. I mean, I wish you wouldn’t.”

      Having started to reach for her things, Genevieve hesitated. “But you just said—”

      “What I meant was that I was editing myself mute. It’s been a progressive thing…mostly to avoid conflict with Cynthia, because getting upset was the last thing she needed given her prognosis. Increasingly, I’ve found the tendency is bleeding into the other parts of my life.”

      The admission that Cynthia was so addicted to nicotine that even when on oxygen she would light up was bad enough; Genevieve couldn’t begin to imagine how difficult it was for Marshall—trying to help her when she would not or could not be helped. “I must admit when we first met, I thought you a bit difficult to read, but I soon concluded that was simply your desire for privacy, combined with your first-rate professionalism.”

      Marshall looked away and rubbed his nape. “Bless you. At least now you know how wrong you are.”

      “No, I don’t think so.”

      When he looked back at her, he shook his head and smiled. Although it was a sad smile, it was the first time she saw something close to a natural reaction from him—other than one of pain—and the tenderness of it almost took her breath away. He had a face that made her think of brooding Irish poets and brave Greek gods, nothing like today’s air-brushed cover-model perfect images, but a face full of character and intelligence earned by some life-altering bumps and blows along the way. Suddenly she saw a new layer of the charisma that he was capable of, and Genevieve was grateful to have the counter to hold on to. Combined with his penetrating eyes, she felt almost as weak-kneed as one of her mother’s fictional heroines.

      “Oh, hell,” he muttered and tore his gaze away only to gesture to the refrigerator. “I saw that generous gift of champagne you sneakily tucked in the back of everything. At least stay long enough to join me in a glass?”

      “You weren’t supposed to notice it until I left,” Genevieve replied, trying to figure out all that was going on beneath the surface of the man as fast as he hid it. “As a matter of fact, I debated not putting it there at all. It’s a given that you don’t feel like celebrating—”

      “Well, if you leave without sharing a glass with me, it’s apt to still be in there when you next put the house on the market.”

      He didn’t seem to say that as a threat, just a fact of life, but the fact that it was a possibility triggered a sinking feeling inside her. Against her better judgment, she found herself reaching for her BlackBerry. “Let me take this outside and check my messages and see how things are at the office. One glass,” she added as she backed toward the French doors leading to the patio. “I haven’t eaten enough today to risk more

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