A Bachelor Falls Read online

  In one second he went from relaxed to aroused.

  Dear Reader

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Copyright

  In one second he went from relaxed to aroused.

  They were in close quarters, waiting out the rain, when he touched her, and awareness assaulted him with sudden surprise. Wait a minute, he told his overeager body. This is Ellie, my best friend. “I’d better go,” he said, and was amazed by the husk of desire he heard in his voice. “I think the rain may be letting up.”

  “You think so?” She tilted her head back to listen and his senses were filled with her scent, and her hair—all that wild, fragrant hair curled riotously, sensuously into his awareness. He had to get out of here. Now.

  “Ross?” Her voice stopped him. “I just wanted to tell you that no matter what, I still love you. As a friend.”

  “As a friend,” he repeated, as if reminding himself.

  He didn’t know she was going to hug him until he felt her arms around his waist, until her hair brushed against his nose and mouth, teasing him with its fragrant summer sweetness. And he was positive she didn’t know he was going to kiss her until his lips closed over hers and the whole world turned upside down....

  Dear Reader,

  The forecast this spring is for SHOWERS! Not the gloomy, wet kind that bring May flowers, but the baby, bachelor and wedding kind that bring happiness and true love.

  And you’re invited to all three! This month Karen Toller Whittenburg hosts a bachelor party—but it’s a most unusual one, since the best man happens to be a woman!

  Join us next month for a raucous bridal shower in Debbi Rawlins’s The Bride To Be...or Not To Be?

  Confetti’s falling all spring at American Romance! Don’t miss out on any of the fun!

  Happy reading!

  Sincerely,

  Debra Matteucci

  Senior Editor & Editorial Coordinator

  Harlequin Books

  300 East 42nd Street

  New York, NY 10017

  A Bachelor Falls

  KAREN TOLLER WHITTENBURG

  TORONTO • NEW YORK • LONDON

  AMSTERDAM • RARIS • SYDNEY • HAMBURG

  STOCKHOLM • ATHENS • TOKYO • MILAN

  MADRID • WARSAW • BUDAPEST • AUCKLAND

  Chapter One

  “Eliot! Eliot Applegate!”

  Stopping short on the corner of Main and Second Streets, Ellie glanced back to see Aunt Ona Mae Hunyacre barreling down the sidewalk toward her.

  “Whoa-ho! You’re in for it now, Ellie.” Overhead, local handyman Henry Boyd grinned down at her from the bucket of a utility truck as he unfurled the Bachelor Daze festival banner he was in the process of stringing across the intersection. “Ona Mae has been having her dreams again. Better think of a good excuse quick or you’ll be stuck on this street corner until Falls Day.”

  “Be a pal, Henry,” Ellie pleaded. “Rescue me.”

  Henry swept off his Cardinals baseball cap and ran a hand over his nearly bald head. “Come on, Ellie, who do you think I am? Rapunzel?”

  Ellie stuck her hands into the hip pockets of her overalls. “You’re Prince Charming, Henry. Please, lower that bucket and sweep me off my feet.”

  “Now, don’t you go tryin’ to sweet-talk me, Miss Eliot. Besides, you know as well as I do, there’s no escaping Auntie Om when she’s on a tear. She’d just climb up after you and this here bucket ain’t big enough for the three of us.”

  Ellie made a face at him before turning in patient greeting as the town’s reigning eccentric bustled up beside her. “Hello, Auntie,” she said. “How are you, today?”

  “I’ve been better, Eliot. The ringing in my ears is getting so loud I can hardly hear myself think.” The older woman fingered the fifties-style flip of her white hair, checking for stray strands or foreign objects...neither of which was any more likely to appear than the other. “I want to talk to you, Eliot. About a personal matter.” She frowned at the utility truck and at Henry, who was leaning over the edge of the bucket, eavesdropping shamelessly. “We must talk privately.”

  “I’d love a chat, Auntie....” Ellie pulled her left hand from her pocket and glanced purposefully at her wrist, although she never wore a watch. “But I’ve got to get back to the garage. I just ran downtown to make yesterday’s deposit and—”

  “You have time for this.” It was a statement, and when Ona Mae Hunyacre made a statement, she brooked no arguments. If she said you had time, then you had time.

  “Why don’t you walk with me?” Ellie suggested, hoping to corral the dialogue into the ten minutes or so it would take to walk to the auto repair shop. “We can talk on the way.”

  “We’ll cross Main Street and sit on that bench in front of Taylor’s Shoe Shop,” Ona Mae stated. And she set out to cross the street then and there, without so much as a glance in either direction, causing Tommie Nell Eubanks to slam on her brakes and tap the horn of her 1976 Plymouth Barracuda. Ellie offered Tommie Nell a glance of apology before she reluctantly followed Auntie Om across the street.

  If she had been slightly less demanding or slightly more normal, Ona Mae might not have been so difficult to contend with. She was a dear person, really, and she meant well. Just because she believed in alien abductions and the prophetic nature of her dreams was no cause to snub her. Although, in truth, snubbing her had no effect whatsoever. Ellie—and practically every other resident of Bachelor Falls—had tried everything except downright rudeness to escape Auntie Om’s clutches, only to discover that the best way to handle the problem was with affectionate tolerance. Ona Mae might be two raisins short of being a fruitcake, but she was a part of their community and, as such, she was treated with courtesy and respect.

  Ellie did wish she hadn’t run into Ona Mae this busy morning, but there was no way to get out of it now. So, with a sigh, she sank onto the old wooden church pew in front of Taylor’s Shoe Shop, stretched out her legs and settled in for a rambling discourse on dreams and their interpretations, à la Ona Mae. Overhead, the festival banner flapped in the breeze as Henry arm-wrestled it into submission.

  “Sit up straight,” Ona Mae instructed, her own back rigid-straight under the beige, polished cotton of her Donna Reed shirtwaist, her skirt tucked protectively over her knees, her snap clasp, cream patina purse propped pertly on her lap. “I don’t know how you can dress like the farmer’s daughter and expect to find a husband, Eliot. I believe you’d wear those godawful overalls to Sunday morning services if you weren’t aware of the ruckus it would raise.”

  Ellie couldn’t keep from smiling. As if a ruckus would have deterred her. “You’ll be happy to know OshKosh has come out with a floral print pattern for Sundays and special occasions. Of course, I’m saving my new hot pink pair to wear in Kelly’s wedding next month.”

  “Hmmph. You’re not fooling me, Eliot. I know you’re not wearing a pair of tacky pink overalls in the wedding because if there’s anyone more stubborn than you, it’s Kelly...and she won’t let you. You’ll wear sea-foam green just like the other maid of honor.”

  “Now that Lana’s married to Blake, I guess, technically, she’ll be the matron of honor and I’ll be the maid.”

  “Old maid, if you don’t change your ways,” Ona Mae said with a disapproving sniff. “If God had meant for women to wear pants, he’d have given them h
airy legs.”

  “Or a dull razor.” Ellie smiled in the face of the older woman’s frown and steered the conversation away from fashion. “I can’t decide what I should do with my hair for the wedding.” She fingered the thick, dark braid looped across her shoulder. “Lana thinks I should wear it loose, but I don’t know. I think it would look better pulled through the back of my ball cap in a ponytail. Don’t you agree, Auntie?”

  Ona Mae’s hazel eyes sparkled with humor—well, truthfully, it was just simple aggravation, but Ellie liked to pretend there was more to Aunt Ona Mae Hunyacre than met the eye.

  “You young girls have no respect for tradition. That’s the problem, Eliot. However, if Kelly wants to let you dress like an automobile mechanic at her wedding, that’s entirely up to her. I’m sure I have nothing to say about it. Right now you and I have more important things to discuss.” Ona Mae adjusted the position of her purse by a centimeter and lowered her voice, as if she thought the whole town might be listening in...which they probably were. “Last night I had a dream,” she whispered dramatically. “And in my dream, Ross Kilgannon was getting married.”

  “Really?” Ellie’s interest picked up. “Was he wearing tacky pink overalls?”

  Ona Mae’s carefully arched eyebrows arched higher in surprise. “I must say I expected some concern from you, Ellie. He is still your friend, isn’t he?”

  Still? Ellie couldn’t imagine life without her friendship with Ross Kilgannon. She only wished he were here now to laugh with her over yet another of Ona Mae’s “I had a dream” forecasts. “Ross is getting married. The day after Falls Day. Remember?”

  The stern, white eyebrows reversed direction and drew together in a frown. “Why wasn’t I told about this?”

  As if it were a secret, as if the whole town hadn’t been talking about Ross’s engagement since the Bachelor Falls Gazette had printed the official announcement nearly a month ago. “Maybe you forgot,” Ellie suggested tactfully.

  Impossibly, the older woman’s back got straighter. “I hardly think I’d forget something as important as the Kilgannon’s only son’s betrothal. Obviously the Bostians have interfered again.”

  Ellie’s heart sank as the mysterious Bostians entered the conversation. It was well-known throughout the county—perhaps the whole state of Missouri, possibly the entire world—that Ona Mae Hunyacre believed her fiancé, her beloved Lowell Murtry, had been abducted by aliens over forty years ago. It was well-known for the simple reason that Ona Mae told the sad story to anyone and everyone, whether they wanted to hear it or not. It was not well-known how she had discovered so much about the planet Bost and its inhabitants, the Bostians, but since the purported abduction they had been blamed for miscellaneous misdeeds and mischief, up to, and including, her own forgetfulness.

  “Ross’s engagement was in the newspaper,” Ellie offered as a distraction.

  “Not in any issue I’ve read. No, Eliot, it’s perfectly obvious what has happened here. Whatever their devious reasoning, though, I have outwitted the sly little creatures from Bost once again through the power of my dreams.”

  At moments like this, it was hard to know what to say, but Ellie gave reality a shot. “So, who was Ross marrying in your dream?”

  “Rest assured it wasn’t that nitwit blonde from over yonder at Mount Eagle.”

  “He’ll be glad to hear that considering he hasn’t dated her since high school.”

  “And he wasn’t marrying that nitwit blonde he brought home from college, either.”

  Ellie could see her morning evaporating into the list of blondes Ross wasn’t marrying. Dearly as she loved him, he had dated a lot of nitwits. “I’ll bet you saw him marrying a beautiful, blond accountant from Chicago,” Ellie said, hoping to skip straight to the bottom line. “And I’ll bet her name is Tori Bledsoe.”

  “Never heard of her.” Ona Mae dismissed Ross’s intended bride with an unimpressed sniff. “But I distinctly remember telling Kelly no good would come from the Kilgannon’s sending Ross to that backwater university. And to think...he could have been a doctor!”

  Ellie looked longingly at the bucket truck and Henry. “Northwestern is hardly a backwater university, Aunt Ona Mae, and Ross is a doctor. He’s doing his surgical residency in Chicago now.”

  “He is? Hmmph. I’m always the last to know everything. A real doctor, you say. Well, that’s good, then. At least, we’ll have someone to take over Doc Spivey’s practice when he retires.”

  As if there were a single resident—with the exception of Ona Mae Hunyacre—who thought Ross should hang out his shingle in his hometown. He was Bachelor Falls’s pride and joy, and the residents took great delight in discussing his success, even going so far as to claim substantial credit for his having turned out so well. To hear the local wisdom, Ross would have been spoiled rotten by his parents if it hadn’t been for the common sense of the townspeople and their influence. To a person, the residents of Bachelor Falls had known Ross was destined for greatness from the moment of his birth. Aunt Ona Mae had prophesied it, due to a particularly vivid dream in which she’d seen Baby Kilgannon conversing with Aristotle, Shakespeare, Picasso, Elvis, and various unknown, but obviously influential, Bostians. So it was decreed from the beginning that nothing was too good for Ross Kilgannon, that no goal was beyond his reach, that he was the town’s gift to the world. And it might as well have been a part of the town’s charter that when he chose a bride, he would choose someone quite extraordinary.

  “Are you certain he’s going to marry this Chicago girl?” Ona Mae asked suspiciously.

  “Ross told me himself,” Ellie confirmed. “He called me before he even popped the question and asked me to be the best man in his wedding.”

  That wrinkled Ona Mae’s brow. “You’re not wearing overalls to his wedding, are you?”

  “No, a tuxedo.”

  “Pants, again.” Aunt Ona Mae made a disapproving click with her tongue. “I certainly hope you aren’t planning to be at the bachelor party, too.”

  Ellie smiled, knowing whatever she said now would be percolating through the Bachelor Falls’s gossip hotline within the hour. “Actually, as the best man, it’s my job to plan the bachelor party for Ross. I was thinking about making it a shower...you know, something like Lana’s baby shower last month. Except I’m not sure if people will know what kind of gifts to give a bachelor.”

  “I expect a bachelor needs a toaster just as much as a bride does.”

  “Hmm, maybe.” Ellie waved to Jasper as he came out of the bank and she silently pledged to shop exclusively at Jasper’s Save-Rite store for the rest of her life if only he’d cross the street and rescue her. He waved back, but walked briskly in the opposite direction...the wily, old rascal. “I don’t know. I think a bachelor shower ought to have more imaginative gifts. No appliances. Fun things, but useful, too. Not the towels or linens or kitchen stuff we took to Kelly’s shower last week.” She pushed to her feet, deciding if no one was going to rescue her, she’d just have to do it herself. As usual. “I really have to get back to the garage, Aunt Ona Mae. It was great talking to you and I’ll let you know what I decide about the shower, so you can—”

  “Sit down, Eliot.” Ona Mae eyed her with ponderous authority. “I’m not through talking to you about Ross Kilgannon. I haven’t even told you the dream yet.”

  Ellie glanced at her wrist again, then at Henry, who waved her back to the bench. He probably hoped she’d keep Ona Mae occupied until he had the banner strung and was safely away from the intersection, saving himself from an earful of Auntie Om’s nonsense. “I can only stay five more minutes,” Ellie said, as she sank onto the old wooden pew again. “Chip is working today and I don’t like to leave him on his own for too long.”

  “I’ll get right to the point then.” Ona Mae unsnapped the clasp of her purse, reached in and pulled out a lavender-scented hankie, which she used to dab the tip of her long nose. She then tucked the hankie back inside the purse, and snapped the clasp, leav
ing an embroidered triangle sticking out of one corner. “In this particular dream, the whole town was gathered in the Methodist Church, which was decorated in purple froo-fras from belfry to basement. Tommie Nell always overdoes the color theme, you know. Thelma Perkins was playing ‘Three Blind Mice’ on the organ and Melva Whiffington was all set to sing ‘I Love You Truly,’ although why Ross would let someone who couldn’t hit middle C with a coat hanger get up to the microphone at his wedding, I cannot explain.”

  “It was just a dream, Aunt Ona Mae,” Ellie pointed out.

  “There’s no such thing as just a dream, Eliot. Did I or did I not have a dream in which you owned Applegate Auto Repair before your uncle Owen even decided to sell it to you?”

  “You did, Auntie,” Ellie said with a sigh. It would have been futile to remind Ona Mae that Uncle Owen had told people for years he wanted Ellie to take over his business when he retired. “You did have a dream about the garage.”

  “Well, then, stop interrupting.” She pulled her shoulders back and raised her chin. “If my dream is accurate—and I’m sure it is, because one way or another, my dreams are never wrong—Ross is going to need your help.”

  “I’ll try to talk him out of asking Melva to sing, if that’s what you’re getting at, but I don’t know if it will do any good.”

  “Melva, Schmelva.” Ona Mae dismissed the details with a jerk of her hand. “I’m trying to tell you, Eliot, that in my dream Ross wasn’t marrying a short little blonde from Chicago.”

  “Well, who was he marrying then?”

  “A zebra!” Ona Mae said in her best theatrical whisper. “In my dream, Ross Kilgannon was marrying a zebra! And you know what that means...”