Call Me Irresistible (Wynette, Texas #5)(86)

But this was no knockoff, and Meg suddenly understood the veiled looks she received whenever she wore any of the garments she'd picked up at Kayla's resale shop. All this time, she'd been wearing Torie O'Connor's castoffs, clothes so immediately identifiable that no one else in town would buy them. And everyone had been in on the joke, including Ted.

Birdie shot Meg a smug look as she handed over her iced tea glass. "The rest of us have too much pride to wear Torie's old clothes."

"Not to mention, we don't have the body for it," Zoey said.

Kayla fluffed her hair. "I keep telling Torie she'd make a lot more money if she sent her things to a consignment shop in Austin, but she says it's too much trouble. Until Meg came along, I could only sell her things to out-of-towners."

The comments would have stung, except for one thing. All of the women, even Birdie, kept their voices low enough so only Meg could hear their barbs. She didn't have time to ponder why they'd done that because Ted was setting down both coffee carafes and heading right toward her.

Although his easy smile was firmly fixed, his determined eyes told a more dangerous story. A car crash was heading toward her, and she couldn't think of a single way to avoid it.

He stopped in front of her, pulled the iced tea pitcher from her hand, and passed it over to Torie. Meg took a step back only to feel his fingers curling around the nape of her neck, anchoring her in place. "Why don't you go help Chef in the kitchen, sweetheart. I'll clear off these dishes."



       
         
       
        

Sweetheart?

The engine roared, the tires squealed, the brakes smoked, and the speeding car slammed into the baby carriage. Right there in front of the biggest gossips in Wynette, Texas, Ted Beaudine lowered his head, sealed his legendary lips over hers, and announced to the whole world that there'd be no more sneaking around. Meg Koranda was the new woman in his life.

A furious Kayla came out of her chair. Shelby groaned. Birdie knocked over her iced tea glass. Emma buried her face in her hands, and Zoey, who looked as befuddled as one of her second graders, cried, "I thought she was making it up to get rid of Spence."

"Ted and Meg ?" Hunter Gray's mother exclaimed.

Francesca sagged back in her chair. "Teddy . . . What have you done?"

With the possible exception of her agent, everyone else in the room understood the import of what had just happened. Kayla watched her boutique slip away. Birdie saw her new tearoom and bookstore go up in smoke. Zoey mourned the school improvements that would never happen. Shelby and Torie envisioned more sleepless, guilt-ridden nights for their husbands. And Francesca saw her only son slipping into the grasp of a scheming, unworthy woman.

Meg wanted to cry from the sheer, exhilarating joy of knowing he'd do something so colossally stupid for her.

He brushed his knuckles down her cheek. "Go on now, sweetheart. Mom appreciates the way you stepped in to help her today, but I'll take over now."

"Yes, Meg," Francesca said quietly. "We can handle it from here."

Meg was more important to him than this town. Her heart surged with a giddy intoxication that made her dizzy, but the woman she'd become didn't let her enjoy the moment for long. She dug her nails into her palms and faced his mother's guests. "I'm . . . I'm . . . sorry you were forced to see that." She cleared her throat. "He's, uh, had a tough time lately. I'm trying to be kind, but . . ." She took a shaky, shallow breath. "He can't accept the fact that I'm . . . just not that into him."

Ted picked up what was left of Torie's soufflé, took a bite, and listened patiently as Meg tried her best to do the right thing and dig him out of the beautiful mess he'd created. "It's me, not you." She turned to him, urging him with her eyes to go along with her. "Everybody else thinks you're fabulous, so it has to be me, right? Nobody else seems to find you just a little bit . . . creepy."

He cocked an eyebrow.

Francesca swelled up in her chair. "Did you just call my son 'creepy'?"

Ted spooned up another bite of chocolate, interested in what else she'd come up with. He wasn't going to help at all. She wanted to kiss him, yell at him. Instead, she returned her attention to the women. "Be honest." Her voice gained strength with the rightness of what she was doing. "You all know what I mean. The way the birds start to sing when he walks outside. That's creepy, right? And those halos that keep popping up around his head?" 

No one moved. No one said a word.

Her mouth had gone dry, but she plowed on. "What about the stigmata ?"