Any Thursday (Donovans of the Delta) Read Free Page B

the table and held up her hand. “There, see it? If Anna’s going to have the wedding reception here instead of at the country club, where all the Presbyterians and Episcopalians go, then I’m bound and determined to see that she does it right. After all, Hallie is my only brother’s child, and my favorite niece to boot.”
    She narrowed her eyes, obviously calculating the effect of her last statement on Hannah. Hannah laughed.
    “So you’ve always said, Aunt Agnes.”
    “Lord, child, you know I’m just kidding you. I love all of you like you’re my own. But I don’t see how we’re ever going to get you to the altar till you change your ways. Thirty’s mighty old not to be married.”
    “I’m not altar bound, Aunt Agnes. But Hallie is.” She crossed the library and took her aunt’s arm. “Let’s make a pact. Let’s work together to make Mom’s job easier instead of aggravating her with suggestions. You know she’s going to run this wedding exactly as she pleases anyhow.”
    “Well, I guess if we’re not going to the country club, that’s all right. But it does appear to me that since Anna’s insisting on fixing everything herself instead of having it catered, she could serve Italian bowknots. They’re the latest thing in finger foods, you know. Italian bowknots. I read about them in Redbook .”
    “It you want Italian bowknots, Aunt Agnes, I’ll see that they’re served. But Mom doesn’t have time to make them. You have to.”
    “You know I can’t cook worth a flitter.”
    Hannah knew it was true. “I’ll come over to your house and help you, Aunt Agnes.” She’d just made the supreme sacrifice. Her cooking was on a par with Aunt Agnes’s, but she’d do anything to make this wedding run smoothly.
    “That’s fine with me. But don’t you bring that wolfhound of yours. Your uncle Charlie’s allergic to dog hairs.”
    “Pete’s a Siberian husky.”
    “Husky, smushky. It appears to me that’s one of the major reasons you’re an old maid. Keeping company with nothing but dogs and whales.” Agnes gathered up her hat, a dashing straw bowler, and set it on her head at a jaunty angle. Hannah was reminded of the way Hallie wore her Stetson. “I’ll see you this afternoon at four, and don’t you dare be late.” With that final order, Aunt Agnes swept from the library.
    As soon as the door was shut, Hannah picked up the first thing she could get her hands on, a fat book of Eudora Welty’s collected stories, and flung it across the room.
    “Hell’s bells.” The book sailed across the back of the sofa and landed with a satisfying plop on the hearth.
    “Temper, temper, my dear. Is that any way to catch a husband?” Jim Roman’s head appeared over the back of the sofa, then his broad shoulders, then his impressive chest. “You almost beheaded me.”
    “Pity I didn’t. How long have you been back there eavesdropping?”
    “Long enough to know that Aunt Agnes considers you to be doomed to oldmaidhood. That’s a quaint term. I never hear it on the West Coast. It must be a southern expression.”
    “We have a lot of things in the South you’ve never heard of. Manners, for one thing. The very idea, lying on the sofa eavesdropping.”
    “Actually I was napping until you and Aunt Agnes got into that interesting discussion about Italian bowknots and old maids and wedding receptions. Your charming mother told me to make myself at home. I was looking for a book to read, and all this bucolic peace and quiet put me to sleep.” Jim Roman unfolded his long legs and stood up. Picking up the book she’d thrown, he started toward her.
    “Don’t come any closer,” Hannah’s hand closed around a brass candlestick. Jim merely laughed and kept on coming.
    His lazy grin and relaxed manner almost made Hannah forget his transgressions. But they were many, and she was determined to deal with them.
    “Mr. Roman—”
    “Call me Jim,” he interrupted her smoothly. “After all we’ve been to