Hitched For The Holidays: Hitched For The Holidays / A Groom In Her Stocking

2

“DON’T LOOK AT ME THAT way! I know it’s a lousy idea, but it’s too late to call it off.”

Mindy finished changing earrings for the third time and stared at the little silver-and-turquoise donkeys dangling from her lobes.

“See, told you these are better. It’s not easy dressing for a date who’s only doing me a favor.”

Peaches responded with a big doggie yawn and stretched her short white legs as far as she could on her special end-of-the-bed quilt made from salvaged remnants of blue jeans, a gift from Mindy’s sister-in-law, Carly.

Her father had opted for a nap in the spare bedroom she’d hastily cleared for his use. Now all the paraphernalia of her business was stacked in her own bedroom. To get to the closet she had to maneuver an obstacle course between catalogs, models of storage units and piles of magazines and books. Thank heavens her clients couldn’t see this mess. Her personal space looked like a recycling center.

She picked her way around boxes of junk sure to come in handy someday to the full-length mirror on her bathroom door. Dad would expect her to look spectacular for the doctor-boyfriend, but what kind of signal would that send to the shanghaied vet? She didn’t want him to think this mock date was a ploy to attract his attention.

Hopefully, she’d hit a happy medium. Her silky scooped-necked turquoise dress flared at midcalf and had tiny cap sleeves. She’d added a delicate silver belt and silvery-gray spike heels. Maybe she was overdressed for a casual evening out, but the donkey earrings said she was only kidding.

“Darn, I need a haircut,” she complained to Peaches, who was trying to nap through the ritual of dressing. “Yeah, pretend to sleep, you lazy hairball. I know those big ears of yours are picking up every word I say. You’re sulking because you don’t have a date with Dr. Eric.”

At least Mindy liked the color of her hair—dark sable, cropped short, but the fashionable spikes seemed limp in spite of the salon special wax.

Did the turquoise enhance or clash with the green glints in her eyes? Was she out of her mind fussing over what she wore on a pretend date orchestrated to keep her father from meddling in her love life or lack thereof?

The door chimes startled her, which was ludicrous since she’d spent the past hour anticipating Eric’s arrival. Peaches bounded off the bed with more agility than her short legs suggested and stood impatiently, nose to the door, waiting for Mindy to open it.

“Now don’t slobber, shed or jump on Dr. Eric,” she warned sternly. “I don’t want to look for a new vet because you can’t behave.”

She hadn’t exactly looked for the one she had. When Peaches was a pup, she’d taken her to a busy clinic where the wait was always considerably longer than the appointment. A client had raved about a new vet in Chandler, which wasn’t unreasonably far from Tempe, where Mindy lived. The rest was history. Peaches loved her new doctor and stopped trying to amputate a finger or two during exams.

As soon as the bedroom door opened, Peaches was a streak of brindled tan and white racing to the front door, nails clicking on the red-tiled hallway.

“Now behave!” Mindy whispered sternly before she opened the front door. She might as well tell a dust storm to settle down.

Where was Dad? If he’d overslept, she’d have to make small talk. Wouldn’t that be awkward! What could she say to a man she’d coerced into pretending to be the love of her life?

She grabbed Peaches’s collar with one hand and opened the door with the other.

“Hi. I knew this was the right place when I heard Peaches,” her date for the evening said.

“Dr. Kincaid, I’m glad you found it okay.”

It was a wonder anyone ever found her little patio house in the huge development of similar white-stuccoed bungalows. The streets curved and meandered with a total absence of memorable landmarks. If it weren’t for the black wrought-iron street numbers on the ruddy-orange front doors, she might get confused herself.

“No problem.” He dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Shouldn’t you call me Eric?”

“Oh, right, thanks.” She spoke softly and looked over her shoulder. No sign of her dad. “Please, come in.”

“Nice plants.” He gestured at the big earthenware pots flanking her flagstone walk. “I like natural desert, sand and cacti. Why come to the Southwest and try to grow a lawn?”

He stepped inside and casually walked into her living room on the north side of the house. The big picture window faced west and gave her a great view of sunsets, but it meant the bedrooms at the rear caught the early-morning sun and woke her up before any sane, civilized person should stir.

She’d opted for a simple decor, as much from poverty as design. The windows had pale green slat blinds, but no curtains. The red-tiled floor was bare throughout the front of the house, except for a round braided rug in the living room, one of her few new purchases after buying the house a couple of years ago. The bright greens and yellows made her gray pseudo-suede couch and recliner seem less drab in their new setting. The thrift-shop tables she’d re-painted mustard yellow and emerald green were kitschy but cheerful. She was still in the process of finding art for the walls, a search stymied by lack of time and money. For now, a few castoff flower prints a friend had given her hung over the couch, leaving the rest of the rough-plastered white walls unadorned.

“Nice place,” he said, standing beside the couch which she’d forgotten to vacuum free of doggie hair. Fortunately it wouldn’t show much on his pale yellow short-sleeved dress shirt or tan chinos if he decided to sit down.

He was wearing a tie, bright green with tiny Scottie dogs silhouetted in black. No doubt it was the kind of gift people gave vets, cute but not too cutesy. Trouble was, he’d clearly been in a rush as it was tied wrong with the bottom length hanging longer than the top.

“Can I get you something to drink?” she asked, wondering where the heck her father was. He was so darn eager to meet The Boyfriend. Why wasn’t he ready to go to dinner? “I have diet cola, lite beer, mineral water and a bottle of champagne Dad brought to…”

She nearly said “celebrate.” More specifically, her father hoped to toast her engagement with the bubbly, although she’d never, ever given him reason to believe her nonexistent romance had progressed that far.

“Where is your father?” he asked.

“He took a nap.” Scratch her hope for a short evening. “Guess I should knock on the door to be sure he’s awake.”

“I’m awake and eager to meet your young man,” Wayne Ryder said, coming out of the guest bedroom and into the kitchen.

How could he say something that corny? She tried to cut him some slack because he’d never fully recovered from losing her mother in an auto accident nearly five years ago, but sometimes he talked as though the twentieth century had never come and gone. He’d definitely prefer to live in an age when fathers arranged marriages for their daughters.

“Eric Kincaid, sir.” He offered his hand with a deference that made her want to hug him.

“Eric, it’s a pleasure to meet you. Just call me Wayne.”

“My pleasure, Wayne, sir.”

Mindy wasn’t fooled. Her father was the alpha male locking horns with a young buck. He might approve of her new boyfriend in theory, but he was gearing up to interrogate him in the best—make that worst—CIA tradition. If she ever did find the right man, she was going to elope before her father got wind of him.

When he wasn’t confronted with her male friends, her dad was a sweetheart in spite of being too rigid. He wanted the best for her, but her future husband had to meet his impossibly high standards.

“Well, Mindy, let’s break open that bottle of bubbly before we go,” he said.

Dad had left all twenty or so of his business suits in shades of black, gray and navy at home. He’d gotten into the Southwestern spirit by wearing jeans and a navy knit shirt with a collar. He was even sporting a bolo tie, but his attempt to look casual was spoiled by his black wing tips. It didn’t really matter. Her father looked like an accountant even when he wore a bathing suit. Neither tall nor short, he was lean and slope-shouldered with the bland looks that made him easily forgettable. His face was long and narrow, always clean-shaven with smooth skin. Only the vertical lines on either side of his mouth gave away his age, those and the fact that his gray-brown hair barely covered his scalp, although a side part and a good haircut gave the illusion that he still had a head of hair.

“I’ll pass on that, sir…Wayne,” Eric said. “Mindy and I decided to take both cars tonight in case I’m paged.”

His excuse sounded lame to her, but Dad seemed to like it. A busy doctor had to stay sober and alert.

“Well, what do you say we get going then?” her father said, giving them their marching orders.

They filed out with Peaches dancing around their heels hoping to be included.

Mindy waited until the two men were out of hearing then hissed at her disappointed pet. “You’re the lucky one! You get to stay home.”

Her father went to the carport and got behind the wheel of her second-hand van with Ryder Reorganizing Inc. painted on the sides. He was going to follow the two of them, naturally expecting her to ride there in Eric’s dark red Tracker.

One thing was still bothering her.

“Ah, Eric, would you do me a tremendous favor?” she asked, coming around to the driver’s side of his vehicle before he got in.

His look suggested he already was, but he only shrugged.

“Your tie.”

“My tie?” He looked down at the black Scotties cavorting on green silk. “Too dressy for where we’re going?”

“Oh, no, it’s perfect. I love it. I just have this compulsion—well, maybe compulsion is too strong—but would you mind terribly if I fixed it?”

“Fixed it?” His hand shot up and tested the firm knot at his throat.

“Not fixed exactly, but I don’t want to be distracted by your long end. My dad is so sharp, I’ll have to be on guard every minute.”

“My long end? You’ve lost me,” he said.

“The skinny end is hanging lower than the top. I don’t want to be picky, but it would look so nice if…”

He lifted the two ends of the tie and frowned.

“Here, let me,” she said, wishing she’d never mentioned it.

Her fingers were nimble, at least her mother used to say so. She loosened the knot and pulled gently until the full part of the tie hung the right way. Then she tightened the knot and tucked it between the tips of his collar.

“It’s an adorable—no, make that handsome—tie. I’ve never seen one like it.”

Of course, she never bought men’s ties unless a client sent her shopping. Her brother, Dwight, much preferred a book or a tape as a gift, and her father’s taste was so ultraconservative she’d accused him of buying his ties by the dozen, each identical to all the others he owned.

“My ex-fiancée was into cute,” he said dryly. ‘This is the first time I’ve worn it.”

“Oh.”

Talk about stepping into a pile of doo-doo. He would probably bribe a waiter to ring his pager ten minutes into the meal. At least her father was leaving Monday. She only had to get through two full days of his questions, and there were all kinds of reasons why a busy doctor couldn’t spend time with his “girlfriend” on the weekend.

“Well, it is a cute tie,” she said, hurrying round to the passenger side before he changed his mind about going.

The ride to the restaurant was the longest twenty-three minutes of her life.

What had made her try to reorganize Eric? Fussing with his tie was so intimate, so intrusive, so dumb. But she did like being close to him. He smelled of vanilla with a touch of spice, and she’d never noticed how sexy his lips were. Of course, she could think of a better use for that pucker than signaling his irritation.

“I’m sorry about the tie,” she said as they pulled up to the trendy steakhouse with a great view of the Camelback Mountains. “I fidget when I’m nervous.”

“No problem,” he said, opening his door and walking around the vehicle.

He helped her out of the car and handed his keys to the valet.

“It’s what I do for a living. Organize things. Closets, drawers, parties, you name it.”

“Yes, you told me during Peaches’s last visit.” He looked directly at her and smiled. “Don’t worry. This will go okay. Your father seems like a nice guy, not an ogre anyway.”

“Yeah, not an ogre,” she said hopefully, crossing her fingers where he couldn’t see them.

Mindy had never been to Mountain Monty’s, but it was one of those restaurants that made all the tourists’ guidebooks. She should have read one before making the reservation. The first rule of the steakhouse was no neckties. Her father had to surrender the bolo he imagined made him look like a native, and Eric handed over the doggie tie she’d straightened.

A scantily clad hostess dressed in abbreviated saloon-gal garb with a panty-level denim skirt and a vest covering not much of anything, put the ties in a plastic bag and promised their return.

“Mountain Monty can’t stand the sight of a noose, not even one with cute little doggies,” she said, giving Eric a smile so broad it nearly cracked her cheeks. “It’ll be about thirty minutes if y’all would like to wait in the lounge.”

So much for reservations, Mindy thought glumly as her father took on the job of host and ushered them into an area too dark for the old-west decor to be totally cloying.

“The evening’s on me,” Dad said expansively. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you for a long time, Eric. Mindy’s told me a lot about you, all good.”

She’d told him zilch except for the part about being a doctor, but how could she begrudge her father a little exaggeration after telling him the whopper of her life?

“That’s good to hear.” Eric smiled warmly at her.

They settled down, really far down, on a low semi-circular couch in the corner with a tiny table. A server appeared instantly and took their orders: a beer for Dad, white wine for her and a club soda with lime for Eric. Was he going to play the sober doctor all evening, or didn’t he imbibe? She knew so little about him, this evening was going to be massively stressful.

“Tell me, Eric…” her dad began.

She was going to hate those words before the dinner was over unless, of course, her “date” bailed before the entrée.

“Are you a native of Phoenix?” Wayne asked.

“No, I’m an Iowa boy.” He said it with pride. “I came here a couple of years ago to set up my practice.”

“Guess it’s a good place for health practitioners. Aging population and all. I didn’t want Mindy to go to Arizona State when we visited out here. Plenty of good colleges in Pennsylvania. But she liked it well enough to stay. Now that I’m retired I’ll have time to check it out for myself.”

“If you don’t mind the hot summers, it’s great,” Eric said.

Great conversation, Mindy noted. Weather, the dullest and safest of subjects. She jumped in with a few anecdotes about melting makeup and sun-dried skin. Her stories tanked, but they helped kill time until they finally got called for dinner. What had seemed like two hours in the lounge had really been fourteen minutes. This was going to be one whopping long ordeal.

The Old West really came alive with a vengeance in the huge dining room. Long wooden tables for ten were covered with blue-and-white checked tablecloths. Customers sat on benches with thick log legs and no backs. It reminded Mindy of a family reunion with someone else’s relatives. At least the noisy group of six senior-plus citizens at the other end of their table reduced their conversation to spotty exchanges of menu information.

“How about it, honey,” Eric said, resting his hand on her shoulder. “I’ve heard their mesquite grilled steaks are the best. They have a porterhouse for two if you’re up for sharing.”

He massaged the back of her neck with his fingers, a deliciously intimate gesture that made her father look at the cowhide menu with a disapproving scowl. If Eric had acted too cool toward her, her dad would have criticized that later, too!

Eric dropped his hand when she squirmed but only to hide it under the table where, her father would assume, he could feel her up under cover of the blue-and-white cloth. Actually he kept a decorous inch or so between their thighs, resting his hand on his own, not hers.

Overhead the wooden ceiling looked smoky dark in contrast to the white plaster wall beneath it. A country band filed out to a small stage near the middle of the far wall, and a deep bass voice started moaning about the wicked woman who didn’t know how to love just one man. At least it kept conversation to a minimum.

They gave their orders to a jean-clad male server in a flannel shirt too hot for the room. After an eternity of shouting at each other across the table, their appetizers came and the band took a break.

They had salads topped by the house dressing, in bowls large enough to mix up a cake, and red wine spicy enough to make her hair stand on end. Her father sliced bread from a loaf of homemade sourdough and, when she was full enough to call it a night, the main course arrived.

The porterhouse for two was smothered in mushrooms, onions and a peppery sauce, cooked to a delicate pink and served with a baked potato on steroids. Her father had pork ribs and cowboy beans delivered in a brown ceramic pot large enough to plant a tree in it. The idea was, she supposed, to eat one meal here and take home enough leftovers for three or four more in handy foam cartons. At least she wouldn’t have to cook all weekend.

The seniors sharing their table finally left carrying enough leftovers to feed a football team, and she could sense her father’s relief. Now they could have a real chat and hear each other.

“You don’t know how happy I am to meet you, Eric,” he said in the tone of a magistrate reading a prisoner’s sentence. “I tell you, my little girl’s choice of friends has given me some anxious moments in the past.”

“Please, Dad, let Eric enjoy his dinner.”

“Oh, I’m enjoying it,” he said wickedly.

“Can you believe, when she was sixteen some guy came roaring up to the house on a motorcycle with Mindy on the back?”

“I was wearing a helmet,” she said dryly, giving up on the big slab of cow on her plate.

“They wanted to get matching his and hers tattoos. I was supposed to sign a permission slip because she was under eighteen. I told him he’d be getting his tattoo in the state pen if he didn’t get lost.”

“Pen” was her father’s idea of talking the talk. If she and Eric really were an item, she’d want to crawl under the table.

“It got worse,” Wayne went on. “She brought one idiot home from college her first Christmas break. He was into conspiracy theories. Thought Kennedy had been shot by some baseball player.”

“He was a philosophy major. He enjoyed theoretical problems. Anyway, I was sure I could change some of his radical ideas. He was really nice, if you’d only given him a chance. It was wicked of you to make fun of his ideas.”

“He was a jerk.”

“Daddy! He had great potential. Anyway, Eric knows all about me, and he doesn’t want to hear your prejudiced opinions about a boy you scared away.”

“What is that nut doing now?” her father asked, never one to give up on a subject until he’d fully vented.

“I wouldn’t know.”

This was her year to lie, which made her feel anything but good. There was no way, though, that she was going to tell her father that an old boyfriend had lost everything when his dotcom company went under and was now part owner of a mall taco stand, something she’d accidentally discovered.

“How about you, Eric?” Wayne said. “Have you been married?”

He meant, are you really a married man out to seduce my innocent daughter and ruin her life?

“No, I came close once, but it didn’t work out.”

“Happens sometimes.”

He meant that a good prospect like the doc was better off with his daughter. She could read her father like a supermarket tabloid. Would this evening never end?

Eric looked at his watch, a complicated one with lots of extras, great if you wanted to know what time it was in Siberia. Big mistake. Her father had spent his career working with tiny details like commas. He didn’t miss Eric’s sneak peek.

“Are we keeping you from something?” he asked. He was eating his beans two or three at a time, stretching out the interrogation in spite of hovering busboys eager to clear.

“No, not at all, Wayne, but I may have to help with a delivery later tonight. The bitch has had a hard time of it in the past….”

Whoops! Mindy grabbed his thigh under the tablecloth and squeezed, but it was too late.

“You call your patient a…” Wayne sputtered.

“Dad, you must have misunderstood. Eric isn’t a human doctor,” she tried to explain, her face getting hot.

“I’m human, but my patients aren’t,” he said, trying for humor, but striking out with Dad.

“He’s a vet…a veterinarian.” She said it so emphatically people for tables around stopped eating to eavesdrop.

“Hey, there’s a friend of mine.” Eric stood up and gestured wildly to a man and woman just entering the dining room.

As the couple made their way toward them, Mindy tried to gauge how her father was taking the vet news. He was stone-faced, fussily scraping beans away from the side of the pot.