A Plum Orchard novel

Dixie’s eyebrow rose. “We? Won’t that cause trouble for you with Louella and the gang?” Louella was going to have a kitten if she found out Em was helping Dixie Davis—once girlfriend-code breaker extraordinaire, now sworn enemy.

Em flapped her hand, but her eyes wouldn’t meet Dixie’s. “Bah. They pay me little mind unless they need somethin’ legal, so I pay little mind back. It’s the same as it always was—just like high school. I wasn’t born a Mag, so I’ll never be a Mag. And since Clifton left me for that no-good woman in Atlanta, they only tolerate me because I can be of help from time to time in the legal area. I was always an outsider, Dixie. That’s still just as true as it ever was.”

Dixie grinned. Em was bucking the system even though Dixie knew the lack of acceptance from the reigning queens of popularity and prominence stung. “Then we can be outsiders together.” She tugged at her arm.

But Em hesitated. “Wait. Before we go any further, there’s one more thing.”

Dixie stiffened. “Now what? Oh, wait, I know. Landon owned a brothel, too, right? Is this the part where you tell me I have to get rid of my flannel pajamas for crotchless underwear, but you couldn’t tell me before because it was confidential?” She accented the word with a roll of her eyes.

Em’s hand fluttered to her neck. “Why, Dixie, I almost think that would be easier.”

Hackles rose on the back of Dixie’s neck. “Than?”

“Telling you about the court-slash-Landon-appointed mediator. Remember Hank mentioned that?” Em’s feet were suddenly moving down the steps at a rapid pace, the skirt of her dress flying behind her.

Dixie followed suit, pushing the exit door to hold it open. “Vaguely. I was a little caught up in the ‘oh, baby, I like it like that’ at that point.”

Em stepped around her and held her hand out with a grimace. “Meet your court-appointed mediator.”

Four

Dixie stood at the foot of the bed in her appointed room at Landon’s house. The house he’d bought, expanded and renovated from top to bottom. He had instructed she stay in the aptly dubbed Princess room, the room he’d always given her whenever she’d come back home during and after college to visit the big house.

Buttery lemon and pastel green leaves whispered across the wallpaper on the walls, surrounding the centerpiece of the room—a king-size canopy bed handcrafted in Italy of chestnut and ash and lacquered in a soft cream.

This was the bed where she and Caine had spent the nights just before their engagement party, wrapped in each other’s arms, contemplating their future.

Caine would spread her out on the cool sheets while the sky outside grew heavy with stars. He’d rise up above her, running his possessive hands along her skin, paying special detail to the dip where her waist met hip, leaning forward and nipping at it while his hair grazed her shivering, frantic flesh.

Her hands always rose to caress his thighs, loving the response he gave when he’d fall over her, taking her legs up around his neck and moaning the words with a rasp, You, Dixie. I need to lick you or I’ll damned well lose my mind.

Those decadent, raw sounds coming from his lips always made her press her hips upward, begging.

When his head finally dipped between her legs, it was almost a surprise how the wondrous lust filled her up.

Jesus, Dixie, you’re all I can think about day and night, were always the last words he spoke before he parted her cleft with his thumbs and slipped his tongue inside her, drawing long passes around her clit, making her beg him to capture the bud between his lips and suck the hard nub until she was thrashing her way toward insanity.

Rising up on his elbows, his glittering eyes held victory in them when they found hers. His raw power never failed to wrench the breath from her lungs when he demanded, Look at me, Dixie. Look at me when I—

“Dixie?”

The voice from over her shoulder jolted her with a yank from her memories and the indelible mark of Caine. Taking a shaky breath, she turned to find Sanjeev, Landon’s trusted assistant, at the door with Dixie’s lone suitcase.

She quickly took the opportunity to hide her embarrassment by gazing around the room she’d helped to decorate.

Her eyes scanned her surroundings and almost nothing had changed, from the thick carpet beneath her feet to the whimsical tea set on a corner table between the floor-to-ceiling windows, draped in shimmering silk, and overlooking the main house’s pool. Despite the big house’s lavish opulence, it was meant to enthrall those who stayed in it—not impress.

Landon had never cared what people thought about his outrageous spending. He’d only cared that, should they grace his doorstep, they grace it with the utmost comfort at their disposal.

Sanjeev, dressed in a traditional maroon kurta, put down her luggage then smiled at her. His olive-black eyes, set in flawless mahogany skin, gazed at her with warmth. “Landon said this should be your room for the remainder of your stay.” He held out his long, well-defined arms and embraced her. He tightened his grip, as if he knew a hug was in order.

She leaned back in his embrace so their eyes met, ruffling his thick thatch of midnight black hair with her fingers. “Yeah, about that, Sanjeev... Did Landon, that crazy prankster, say anything else about my stay?”

His smile beamed wide. “He said I was to cater to your every whim, keep you well-fed, well-rested, and make sure you didn’t spend wasted time mourning him.”

She gave him a look of admonishment, clucking her tongue. “Aw, come on, Sanjeev, you know what I mean, and it has nothing to do with your out-of-this-world lamb curry or your saffron rice or even your pillow fluffing skills. The phone-sex thing. You must’ve known.”

Sanjeev didn’t miss a beat, though an erratic pulse throbbed at the base of his neck. “Of course I knew. I was his assistant. I knew everything.”

Dixie tapped him on the shoulder with a chastising finger. “So you knew Caine would be here, too.” She didn’t ask.

His nod held no apology. “I did.”

“And a sneaky, late-night phone call, something along the lines of, ‘Hey, Dixie-Cup, that guy who stomped on your dreams of marital bliss like he was stomping out a campfire is going to stay in the big house with you while you call men naughty boys’ was totally out of the question?”

Sanjeev’s eyes twinkled. “First, I believe it was you who stomped first with that dreadful bet. And oh, no, it wasn’t out of the question.”

The bet. She never, ever wanted to talk about the bet. “But it was disloyal to Landon?” She sighed in understanding. “I can’t fault you for that, even if it wasn’t in my favor.”

His smile gleamed playfully. “As per Landon’s reminder, I was bound by the ‘I saved your life’ speech.”

Landon had found Sanjeev in the streets on one of his treks to India, dirty, infested with lice, homeless and alone at seventeen after he’d run away from an orphanage three years earlier. After living with Sanjeev for a year in India, Landon had acquired, via his multitude of connections, a visa for Sanjeev and brought him back to the States to live with him and manage the big house. That was eleven years ago, and never was there a better assistant to someone as whimsical and impulsive as Landon than Sanjeev.

Dixie rolled her eyes, knowing Landon would have cut off his right arm before he’d have sent Sanjeev back to India. “Well then, I hope you gave him the ‘If not for me, the big house would have collapsed by now, and Toe the Camel would have died of malnutrition’ speech,” she teased.

And it was true. Sanjeev ran the big house like a well-oiled machine. Nothing, not even the tiniest of details went unnoticed under Sanjeev’s watchful eyes.

“I will always remain loyal to his memory, but above all else, his last wishes. Though,” he said, cocking a raven eyebrow, “I did warn him, during the hatching of the conditions of this will, a war the likes of which no one in Plum Orchard had ever seen was bound to ensue.”

So Sanjeev knew the thought process behind Landon’s last wishes. Interesting. But it wasn’t the time to press. “And he said?” Dixie prompted, shrugging off her jacket and laying it across the bed.

“He said, and I quote, ‘I hope you videotape it and put it on YouTube because it’ll probably get a lot of hits and become the YT’s newest sensation,’” Sanjeev responded with his comical imitation of Landon’s accent.

Her head fell back on her shoulders as laughter, rich and free, spilled from her throat. It was so good to be where Landon’s presence was strong—where his memory still breathed life into every nook and cranny—even if, in his memory, he’d left her between a rock and a hard place.

“So he really has a phone-sex company?”

Sanjeev’s eyes were amused. “Indeed.”

“These women are in the guesthouse right now?”

“They are. It’s where Landon insisted they work.”

Dixie eyed him. “Did he give any thought to what will happen to these poor women when he decided to drop them in Plum Orchard? You know what they’re like here, Sanjeev. How they all gossip. It can ruin your life if you let it.” She knew. She’d stomped on a life or two in her time.

“He gave it great thought. Surely, you know Landon did nothing without care, Dixie. He consulted all of them, and they made the decision together to come here, knowing how judgmental this town can be. However, when you meet the ladies of Call Girls, you’ll understand why Landon left this earth at peace with his choice.”

“The Mags will find a way to make their lives miserable all while looking for a way to have this shut down, Sanjeev. Did Landon think about the fact they could lose their jobs?”

“Have you thought about the fact that Landon has greased many a wheel in his time here on earth and in Plum Orchard—or that he was as careful about picking his lawyers as he was his locations for phone-sex operations?”

Dixie gave a halfhearted laugh, rubbing her eyes. “Point in Landon’s favor.”

“You look tired, Dixie. And I don’t mean the kind of tired grief brings, or the kind a good night’s sleep will fix. I mean soul weary. This worries me.”

Ah, leave it to Sanjeev to look beyond the concealer under her eyes. “It’s been a long couple of years” was all she was willing to admit.

He tugged on a strand of her hair, his eyes concerned. “And in those long years, you forgot to freshen your roots? Who is this Dixie?”

This was the Dixie who was too focused on her goal to pay everyone back and didn’t have time or money to go to the hairdresser. She shrugged, casting her eyes down at her feet. “This Dixie was just caught up in other things.”

“Then this assistant will fetch you some henna before you become too much more caught up. Pronto,” he added with a wink.

Dixie kicked off her heels, sinking her bare feet into the Persian carpet. She leaned her shoulder against the canopy post to fold her hands in front of her. “I just can’t believe he’s gone,” she choked out. Those words would never sound right. “So what will you do next, Sanjeev? Will you go back to India? I imagine Landon left you plenty of money to return in style.”

Though Sanjeev leaving the big house and going back to his homeland left her heart as empty as a good bottle of wine after a long night of girl-talk, Dixie had always wondered if he yearned for the sights and smells of his native country. Much the way she’d longed for the comfort of her small town even with its irrefutable throwback to a simpler way of life, and its antiquated views on a woman’s place in the world.

Sanjeev’s eyes flashed momentary confusion. “I will do as I’ve always done. Maintain the big house and handle the multitude of charities Landon was involved in.”

She cocked her head, her ears burning hot with new information. “So Landon isn’t selling the big house?” He’d left the big house to Sanjeev and the numerous staff?

His arms went around his back. “No, quite the opposite, in fact.”

Uh-huh. Suspicion pricked her spine just as it had with Emmaline back at the funeral home. “You know something I don’t know, don’t you?”

Sanjeev’s eyes shadowed. “I know only the things I know.”

“As clear as mud as always, Sanjeev,” she said even though his evident secrecy made her grin.

Sanjeev’s chin lifted as it always did when he was disgruntled about the fact that he still didn’t have a full understanding of the subtleties of the English language. “For as long as I’ve been in your country, I will never understand you. Mud isn’t clear, Dixie.”

Dixie tilted her head, squinting one eye. “Know what else isn’t clear?”

He took a solemn stance, his expression serene as he waited.

Dixie began to pace, a revived, caged energy freshly unleashed. Surely Landon had confided his reasons to Sanjeev for putting her and Caine together. “Why Landon would do something like this to me—to both of us? He knew where we stood with each other. Caine and I are in the worst possible place two people who broke up the way we did can be.”

Sanjeev’s eyes shifted downward in subtle recognition before refocusing on Dixie. “A place entirely of your own making.”

Dixie nodded at his more than fair statement. “That’s the absolute truth. You’re right. But he’s pitted us against one another like two children fighting over the last piece of Martha’s peach pie. Why would he want to hurt me like this? He knows—knew—how painful the subject of Caine is for me.”

Sanjeev smiled as though he were recalling a fond memory. “He’s also the man who stood by you even after enduring Louella Palmer’s public accusation that you had a sexually transmitted disease, lest you forget.”

Dixie’s fists clenched at her sides. “The clap to be precise.”

Sanjeev raised his hands and slapped them together, jarring her.

“Still not funny.”

“Oh, Dixie. It was almost a lifetime ago. Surely you can see the humor in it by now?”

“I’m not sure I’ll ever see the humor in Louella Palmer, standing in line behind me at Lucky Judson’s hardware store, randomly clapping while everyone was in on the joke but me.”

The memory of that still stung as freshly as if it had happened just moments ago. A mix-up in her pre-marital test results, tests both she and Caine had agreed to have administered before their marriage, had resulted in the “teetering-on-senility” Dr. Wade Johnson somehow allowing his onetime receptionist, Louella, get her hands on them. Of course, she’d told anyone who’d listen Dixie had the clap.

“What is it your countrymen say about payback?”

“While I see your point, that’s not the point. This phone-sex business isn’t about punishing me for being a mean girl, Sanjeev. Landon loved me when I was horrible, and he loved me after I wasn’t so horrible. Anyway, we’re off track here, friend.”

He pursed his lips, giving his cheekbones a hollowed look. “I’m not off track. There is no track. Landon didn’t always have a rhyme to his reason. As you well know, he did many things on a whim—or because it simply pleased him, but never without the utmost caution. I don’t know what would please him about seeing you suffer when he did nothing but indulge you almost all of your life, even at your worst, but I have no answers, only my orders to keep you safe, well-fed, and comfortable.”

“Nothing concerning Caine Donovan is safe,” she muttered.

Sanjeev acknowledged her words with a nod. “Be that as it may, we’re here in this moment. Now, I have Mona and Lisa to bathe. They’re as unruly as your hair, and I won’t have them laying all over the bed I expressly freshened for you until I’m sure we’re cleared for fleas. You, lovely Dixie,” he said, pointing toward the equally opulent adjoining bathroom, “have an appointment at the guesthouse to meet your fellow employees. Freshening up wouldn’t hurt you either. You’re funeral worn.” He chuckled at his joke, padding out of the room with a wave over his shoulder.

The silence of the bedroom engulfed Dixie in its subtle hues of silk and throw pillows, leaving her a moment to hear the throb of her panicked heart.

Meet your fellow employees, rang in her ears with a hauntingly Vincent Price–like quality. Sanjeev said it as though her new job was something as ho-hum as retail sales or file clerking.

Which brought a thought to mind. What were the women of phone sex like? Did they have office parties or swingers’ parties? Celebrate birthdays with a cake from the local grocery store and attend in pasties and a thong?

Gossip at the water cooler about what a limp dick Dale in Idaho was for calling them from his mother’s basement, and running up her phone bill just so he could get off to the sound of some imagined sex-starved woman who was just waiting for his dulcet tones to lull them into a pretend orgasm? Did they send each other the BDSM joke-of-the-day emails?

Oh, Dixie, reckless and impulsive be thy name.

The jingle of dog collars and heavy breathing startled her from her panic. “You’re overthinking this, Dixie!” Sanjeev called out with a pant as he flew past her bedroom with Mona and Lisa dragging him down the long hallway.

Sure. She, Dixie Davis, was overthinking. Not something often credited to her, but on this rare occasion, certainly applicable. Reaching for her purse, she made her sulky way to the bathroom, paying little attention to her lavish surroundings.

She didn’t notice anything but her purse vibrating the sound of a text message when she threw it on the countertop just under the gorgeous Venetian mirror she didn’t want to look into.

The only person who’d ever texted her was Landon....

Dixie took a hesitant step forward, the tile beneath her feet no longer soothing her with its cool surface. Instead, it magnified the apprehension sweeping along her nerves like an out-of-control firecracker left on the ground to spin haphazardly.

With a trembling hand, she opened her purse on the vanity and snatched her phone out, stifling a shaky breath in order to read the text—from none other than Landon.

My beautiful friend, your journey awaits. Today is the first day of the rest of your life, Dixie-Cup. Carpe phone sex!

After freshening her makeup, brushing her hair into a ponytail, throwing on a cotton skirt and a tank top, impossible text message still on her mind, Dixie strolled along the winding path of arborvitaes and rosebushes to the guesthouse.

Which wasn’t really a guesthouse at all. It was a mini version of the big house with only five bedrooms instead of ten, a pool lined with white travertine along its sloping edges, and an island, complete with palm trees, chaise longues and a bartender in the middle of it all.

As she made her way past the pool area, she noted not a single string bikini or Insanity Workout body to be had. The pool didn’t have a ripple of activity swirling in the crystal-blue waters, dotted with solar lights beneath the surface where she’d expected to see a bevy of beauties playing volleyball on the shoulders of beefy men.

Her images of sex goddesses scantily draped in bikinis, dangling their feet in the pool while they whispered, “I love it when you touch me there” fled and were replaced by the sound of a voice that couldn’t belong to someone more than ten years old.

She followed it toward the wide glass doors leading inside, scooting through the doors, and making her way across the terra-cotta tiled floor to the rounded entryway where the voice grew stronger.

“Ohhhhhh, I’m so wet for you!” an enthusiastic voice cooed. “You’re so big and hard, I just don’t think I can stand it! Doooo me, Enzo,” the little-girl voice—far too youthful for phone sex—purred. “Do me like that, you Italian stallion!”

Dixie stopped all forward movement as if she was playing a game of life-or-death freeze tag, gripping the overstuffed chair in the twilight-filled foyer to keep her legs from collapsing.

She couldn’t do this. The woman’s voice, coming from Landon’s old office, belonged to, at best, a teenager. How could she possibly support anyone who wanted to talk to a child—even if she was a grown woman merely pretending to be a child? How could Landon have supported it? Disgust bloomed in the pit of her stomach, mushrooming until she couldn’t breathe.

This had gone much further than she’d gone in her head. It was one thing for two adults to consensually have make-believe sex with a phone as their barrier. That she could almost handle. But when a man wanted a child he could pretend to have sex with—that was well off her morality chart.

Not to mention—Italians and stallions?

That was her cue. Exit stage left.