So she’d wait him out, Cilla decided. And if he made another move, she’d be ready.
Meanwhile, Steve had been bumped down to a regular room, and his mother had hopped back on her broomstick to head west.
Dripping sweat from working in the attic, Cilla stood studying the skeleton of the master bath. “It’s looking good, Buddy. It’s looking good for tomorrow’s inspection.”
“I don’t know why in God’s world anybody needs all these shower-heads. ”
“Body jets. It’s not just a shower, it’s an experience. Did you see the fixtures? They came in this morning.”
“I saw. They’re good-looking,” he said, grudgingly enough to make her smile.
“How are you coming with Mister Steam?”
“I’ll get it, I’ll get it. Don’t breathe down my neck.”
She made faces at his back. “Well, speaking of showers, I need one before I go in to see Steve.”
“Water’s turned off. You want this done, water’s got to stay off.”
“Right. Shit. I’ll grab one over at Ford’s.”
She didn’t miss the smirk he shot her, but opted to ignore it. She grabbed clean clothes, stuffed them in her purse. Downstairs, she had a few words with Dobby, answered a hail from the kitchen area, then spent another ten minutes outside discussing foundation plantings.
She dashed across the road before someone could catch her again, and decided to slip into the shower off the gym rather than disturb Ford.
It wasn’t until she was clean, dry and wrapped in a big white towel that she realized she’d left her purse-and the clothes in it-sitting on her front veranda.
“Oh, crap.”
She looked down at the sweaty, grungy clothes she’d stripped off and dragged a hand through her clean hair. “No, I am not crawling back into them.”
She’d have to disturb Ford after all. Bundling her underwear and baggy work shorts in her T-shirt, she tied it off and carried the bundle with her.
She opened the door to the kitchen, to a very surprised Ford.
“Oh, hi. Listen-”
“Ford, you didn’t tell us you had company.”
“I didn’t know I did. Hey, Cilla.”
Her expression went from slightly harried to mildly ill as she looked over and saw Ford’s mother sitting at the kitchen bar with an older man.
While she stood frozen, Spock dashed over to rub against her bare legs. “Oh God. Oh God. Just… God. I’m sorry. Excuse me.”
Ford grabbed her arm. “Back up like that, you’ll pitch right down the steps. You’ve met my mother. This is my grandfather, Charlie Quint.”
“Oh, well, hello. I apologize. I’m, well, what can I say? Ford, I didn’t want to interrupt you. I thought you’d be working. They had to turn the water off at my place for a while, so I ran over to use your shower downstairs-thanks for that. And then realized that when I was being distracted by varieties of spirea, I left my bag and my clothes sitting on the veranda. I came up to ask if you wouldn’t mind running over there and, you know, getting them. My clothes.”
“Sure.” He sniffed at her. “My soap smells better on you than on me.”
“Hah.”
“Cilla, I bet you’d like a nice glass of iced tea.” Penny rose to get a glass.
“Oh, don’t bother, I-”
“No bother. Ford, go on now, get this girl her clothes.”
“All right. But it’s kind of a shame. Isn’t it, Granddad?”
“Pretty legs on a pretty woman are easy on the eyes. Even old eyes. You look more like her in person than you do in pictures I’ve seen of you.”
How much more awkward could it be? Cilla wondered when Ford winked and slipped out. “You knew my grandmother.”
“I did. I fell in love with her the first time I saw her on the movie screen. She was just a little girl, and I was just a boy, and that was the sweetest kind of puppy love. You never forget your first.”
“No, I guess you don’t.”
“Here you go, honey. Why don’t you sit down?”
“I’m fine. Thanks.” She stared at the glass Penny offered and wondered how to take it as she had one hand holding the bundle of filthy clothes, and the other clutched on the towel.
“Oh, are those your dirty clothes? Just give those to me. I’ll toss them in Ford’s machine for you.”
“Oh, no, don’t-”
“It’s no trouble.” Penny pulled them away, pushed the cold glass into Cilla’s hand. “Daddy, why don’t you show Cilla the pictures? We were going to drop by to do just that,” Penny continued from the mudroom. “Just stopped to say hi to Ford first. My goodness! You must’ve worked up a storm today.”
Casting her eyes to the ceiling, Cilla moved closer to the counter as Charlie opened the photo album.
“These are wonderful!”
At the first look, she forgot she was wearing only a towel and edged closer. “I haven’t seen these before.”
“My personal collection,” he told her with a wistful smile. “This one here?” He tapped a finger under a picture. “That’s the first one I ever took of her.”
Janet sat on the steps of the veranda, leaning back, relaxed and smiling in rolled-up dungarees and a plaid shirt.
“She looks so happy. At home.”
“She’d been working with the gardeners-walking around with them, showing them where she wanted her roses and such. She got word I took pictures and asked if I’d come over, take some of the house and grounds as things were going on. And she let me take some of her. Here she is with the kids. That’d be your mother.”
"Yes.” Looking bright and happy, Cilla thought, alongside her doomed brother. “They’re all so beautiful, aren’t they? It almost hurts the eyes.”
“She shone. Yes, she did.”
Cilla paged through. Janet, looking golden and glorious astride a palomino, tumbling on the ground with her children, laughing and kicking her feet in the pond. Janet alone, Janet with others. At parties at the farm. With the famous, and the everyday.
“You never sold any of these?”
“That’s just money.” Charlie shrugged. “If I sold them, they wouldn’t be mine anymore. I gave her copies of ones she wanted, especially.”
“I think I might have seen a couple of these. My mother has boxes and boxes of photos. I’m not sure I’ve seen all of them. The camera loved her. Oh, this! It’s my favorite so far.”
Janet leaned in the open doorway of the farmhouse, head cocked, arms folded. She wore simple dark trousers and a white shirt. Her feet were bare, her hair loose. Flowers spilled out of pots on the veranda, and a puppy curled sleeping at the top of the steps.
“She bought the puppy from the Clintons.” Penny stepped beside her father, rested a hand on his shoulder. “Your stepmama’s people.”
“Yes, she told me.”
“Janet loved that dog,” Charlie murmured.
“You need to make copies for Cilla, Daddy. Family pictures are important.”
“I guess I could.”
“Granddad’s going to make copies for Cilla,” Penny announced as Ford walked in with Cilla’s bag. “He has the negatives.”
“I could scan them. If you’d trust me with them. Here you go.” Ford passed the bag to Cilla.
“Thanks.” Sensing Charlie’s hesitation, Cilla eased back. “They’re wonderful photographs. I’d love to look through the rest, but I have to get to the hospital. I’m just going to…” She held up the bag. “Downstairs.”
“You look more like her than your mother,” Charlie said when Cilla reached the door. “It’s in the eyes.”
And in his lived such sadness. Cilla said nothing, only slipped quickly downstairs.
CILLA DID a mental happy dance as the first tiles were laid in the new master bath. She glugged down water and executed imaginary high kicks through the first run of subway tiles in what would be her most fabulous steam shower.
The black-and-white design, retro cool Deco, added just the right zing. Stan, the tile guy, glanced over his shoulder. “Cilla, you gotta get the AC up.”
“We’re working on it. By the end of the week, I promise.”