Birds of a Feather (Sunday Cove) Read online

  Birds of a Feather

  (Sunday Cove)

  Peggy Webb

  WH

  Westmoreland House

  Birds of a Feather (Sunday Cove) by Peggy Webb

  Published by Westmoreland House

  Smashwords Edition

  All characters and events in this book are fictional. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is coincidental.

  Copyright @2014 by Peggy Webb, author’s cut w/new material

  Cover design 2014 by Vicki Hinze

  Publishing History/Bantam/Loveswept/Copyright © 1984 by Peggy Webb

  This is a work of fiction.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or via any means, including electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or via any information storage and retrieval system without the express written permission of the copyright holder and publisher.

  Published in the United State by Westmoreland House, Moorevillle, Mississippi

  WH

  Dear Reader,

  Welcome back to SUNDAY COVE and more innocent, carefree times. You’ll find the language tame and the bedroom doors closed.

  I hope you fell in love with Holly in NAUGHTY AND NICE, the first book in the series. Rarely do I base characters on real people, but Holly is very much like my dear friend, Alice Virginia, a zany redhead who sings with me in the choir at First United Methodist Church and who used to be the church hostess. The scene in the book with the live nativity actually happened. I was in the corner, doubled over with laughter and taking notes! Alice Virginia said she might just have to kill me over that.

  In this second book, BIRDS OF A FEATHER, travel with Mary Ann from Sunday Cove to the deep woods of Tennessee as she strikes out on a bird watching trip that was her mother’s idea. Mary Ann is very much like me, Southern to the bone and ever mindful that mother knows best. And even if she doesn’t, it’s prudent to take her advice just to keep the peace.

  The original version of this book was considered the first true romantic comedy. When it was first published, it was used by a few colleges on the west coast as an example of how to write comedy. Many years and many books later (dates tend to escape my mind), I received a Romantic Times Pioneer Award for forging the way for the sub genre of romantic comedy.

  It’s so much fun to revise these classics for you! I’m changing the settings in all eight books to Sunday Cove, a small fictional town on the Mississippi Gulf Coast with its own romantic legend. In addition to the legend, I’ve added new scenes and a new cast of regulars. I’ve also deleted and/or revised scenes and added Clara’s Cookbook as a bonus to the back of BIRDS OF A FEATHER. Have fun as you watch the characters get caught up in the love spell woven by an ancient legend.

  Now curl up with a cup of spicy Mayan hot chocolate (recipe in the back) and enjoy a few belly laughs – I did as I created this author’s edition. When you read the last page, I hope you’re still smiling.

  I plan to have eight books in SUNDAY COVE, the first one in December of 2014, and the other seven in 2015. Though each story is connected by a romantic legend, a small Southern town by the sea and the lovable regulars who inhabit it, each book stands alone and can be read out of sequence.

  Look for DISTURBING THE PEACE next…February, 2015! As always, I hope you enjoy every one of the stories in SUNDAY COVE. Thank you for reading!

  Peggy

  Table of Contents

  Letter to Readers

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  What’s next from Peggy

  About the Author

  Book list

  Bonus Holiday Recipes from Clara’s Café

  Prologue

  Sunday Cove, Mississippi

  May, 1985

  In Sunday Cove, you’ll likely see Hoot, the opinionated owner of Hoot Sims Barbershop, enjoying a cup of coffee and his wife Clara’s famous chocolate pecan pie over at Clara’s Café. Don’t be surprised if you also run into Miss Emma Lumpkin, the postmistress, who has a fondness for Clara’s sweet potato casserole and even more interest in the local news, otherwise known as gossip. You can count on Sunday Cove’s regulars to take an avid interest in everything newsworthy in the town, especially if it involves the love legend.

  You can also count on an occasional pod of bottlenose dolphins in the blue waters of Mississippi Gulf, and the tourists that flock southward every summer to enjoy Sunday Cove’s white sand beaches.

  But don’t be fooled if you smell orange blossoms. Sometimes you might find an orange tree growing tame in Miss Emma’s yard, but more likely than not, you might follow the fragrant trail and find nothing more than an empty park bench that leaves you with the nagging feeling you’ve just missed something remarkable.

  The legend of orange blossoms dates back to the Civil War and Sunday Cove’s founder, Colonel Joseph Lancaster. The Colonel was known for his matched team of white horses, his fancy three-story house with the white Corinthian columns, and the uncommon beauty of his wife and daughter. The Colonel, a handsome man in his own right, claimed credit for everything. His hubris was matched only by his wealth.

  But wars respect neither wealth nor position. The Colonel lost everything, including his wife and the sprawling estate he called Camelot by the Sea. The only thing he didn’t lose was his daughter, a fair-haired, ethereal girl whose hopes of a lavish wedding to her beloved Rebel captain were now gone.

  Reduced to poverty, the bride-to-be sat in the charred remains of her father’s gardens and cried. But everywhere her tears fell, an orange tree sprang up, fully grown. And so, the bride married her true love in an orange grove under a shower of fragrant blossoms.

  According to the legend, you’ll know when you find your true love by the scent of orange blossoms. Even if you’re nowhere near an orange tree, the scent will be so strong you’ll lose your breath and feel as if your heart is about to take flight.

  Mary Ann Gilcrest knows the legend all too well. She’d felt its power once. But like the Colonel’s daughter, she’d also discovered how easily love can be ripped away.

  Don’t tell her Sunday Cove’s legend will give her a second chance at love. She won’t believe you.

  Besides, she’s too busy running her dress shop and single-handedly raising impish twin boys to get wrapped up in fantasy. Though to be technical about it, she’s not really alone. She has her mother Judy, who is there to help, but her mom is also slowly and systematically driving Mary Ann crazy. Not that Judy meddles; she’s just opinionated – and a bit daffy and zany, though thoroughly lovable.

  And she has this crazy notion that Mary Ann needs to leave the relative sanity of Sunday Cove and head off on a retreat, which sounds like a wonderful idea if you’re going to a spa in Arizona that features massages with hot rocks and lazy days of pampering around the pool.

  Unfortunately, this particular retreat involves mosquitoes and snakes and birds of every feather. Feathers make Mary Ann sneeze.

  But what’s a lonely widow drowning in the past to do except leap onto every leaky raft that floats her way.

  Chapter 1

  Mary Ann Gilcrest emerged from her motel room carrying a tote bag and a lumpy, overstuffed duffel bag and dragging a raggedy mass of canvas. She stubbed her toe coming out the door, and the lumpy tent banged heavily against her legs.

  “If I ever get back home, I’ll kill you, Mother,” she muttered.

>   Still, in spite of the awful feeling she’s just made the biggest mistake of her life, the brisk mountain air took her breath away. Mary Ann looked toward the blue, mist-covered peak of Mt. Le Conte. The mountain range was a far cry from the familiar and beloved beaches and flat blue Gulf of Sunday Cove. Mary Ann wondered for the hundredth time how she had let herself be talked into this.

  “Premature senility,” she said stoutly as she half-walked, half-stumbled toward the waiting bus. She already missed her boys so much it was like nursing a toothache that wouldn’t go away.

  “I beg your pardon? Did you say something to me?” The man’s rich baritone voice seemed to match the rest of him. In khaki pants and shirt he looked like a big-game hunter. With his deep tan and sun-streaked chestnut hair he was every inch the virile outdoorsman. Only the steel-rimmed glasses belied the safari image.

  “Well, no,” she said. “But now that you mention it, I could use some help with all this paraphernalia.” She smiled what she hoped was her most engaging smile, the one that revealed the dimples she’d passed along to both her sons. She was tired of lugging all that junk around.

  “I’m afraid it’s every man for himself.” He waved his arm to encompass his own stack of luggage. “As you can see, I already have my hands full.”

  Mary Ann’s smile disappeared completely.

  “I see that I’m not likely to find any gentlemen on this so called retreat.” Though she often wished her mother weren’t so dramatic, Mary Ann was not without a flair for drama, herself. She made a big to-do of struggling with her luggage.

  “You’re supposed to be here to look for birds, not gentlemen.” With that parting shot the man turned a broad back on her and proceeded to load his gear into the bus.

  Mary Ann wanted to stick out her foot and trip him. On second thought she decided to content herself with marching along behind him, panting and heaving in a great show as she stowed her own gear.

  He paid her not the least amount of attention. Which was fine with her. It really was.

  She climbed aboard the bus and took a seat beside a billowy, motherly looking woman.

  “Hi, I’m Mary Ann Gilcrest.”

  “Sally Hines. Pleased to meet you.” Sally made no bones about scrutinizing Mary Ann. “This your first birdwatcher’s retreat?”

  “Yes. How did you know?”

  Sally laughed. “You’re the only one not wearing binoculars. Don’t worry. You can use mine.”

  Mary Ann noted the binoculars hanging around Sally’s neck. She hadn’t even packed a pair. Not that she wanted to see any birds up close and personal. She was allergic to feathers, and she intended to stay as far away from them as possible.

  “That’s all right,” she told Sally. “I brought some good books. I’ll just sit in the lodge and read while you’re out looking for Woody Woodpecker.”

  “You’ll see.”

  That didn’t sound too promising to Mary Ann, but she was distracted from asking what Sally meant. The other birdwatchers filed down the aisle, and so did the big-game hunter of the ungallant behavior. He sat down directly behind her. Irked for noticing, she turned her attention to the front of the bus.

  A hawk-nosed woman clambered in and tooted on a whistle. “Welcome to the Great Smoky Mountains and the May retreat of the Tennessee Bird Watchers!” Her voice dripped with good cheer.

  How could anybody in her right mind be so cheerful at six o’clock in the morning? Which brought up another mournful thought: Mary Ann hadn’t even had her breakfast and her morning cup of coffee. She always felt rather bearish until she had coffee.

  With a subdued roar the bus pulled out of Gatlinburg, taking its load of bird watchers toward their campsite in the Great Smokies.

  The woman up front was still speaking. “I am Harriet Fitzhoffer, and I will be your guide and coordinator during this retreat. The park naturalist tells me that large quantities of birds have already migrated in and begun nesting.”

  Mary Ann felt more like molting than migrating. Why was she sitting on this bumpy bus with a ragged tent instead of home running her dress shop?

  “You need a change,” her mother had said. “You know what your therapist told you. And I’ll take care of the twins.”

  And so here she was at the crack of dawn heading into the wilds to watch birds.

  Finally Harriet finished her welcome speech and sat down, and the yellow bus pulled off the highway at a small café. Mary Ann didn’t know whether to applaud or burst into tears of gratitude. When she doors opened, she spilled out with the rest of the crowd.

  Mary Ann’s long legs gave her an advantage over her traveling companions. She found herself at the head of the line for the breakfast buffet. After piling her plate high with ham and eggs and fluffy buttermilk biscuits, she sat down at a table for two.

  She was well into her second biscuit when the chestnut-haired man appeared.

  “This seems to be the last vacant seat. Do you mind if I join you?”

  “Why do you even bother to ask?” Even after her coffee she was still feeling testy, especially toward this man.

  He set his plate down and forked a large bite of ham. “There’s no need for you to be so grouchy. Particularly since we’re going to be together for the next week.”

  “A dismal prospect.” She cast him her most withering look.

  “That’s the first thing you’ve said that makes sense.”

  Mary Ann thought she detected a devilish twinkle behind his glasses, but she couldn’t be sure. She wondered what he would look like without them. With that firm, square jaw and aristocratic nose, he might be devastatingly handsome.

  In response to her signal, a waitress came over and poured Mary Ann another cup of coffee. She dumped in two spoonfuls of sugar.

  “All that sugar is bad for you,” the man said. “It cuts your energy, and you’ll need all you can get to keep up with me next week.”

  Was he making fun of her? Keeping up with him had never entered her mind. She picked up her cup and sloshed coffee onto the table.

  “Now look what you’ve made me do,” she said. “Did anyone ever tell you how obnoxious you are?”

  “Probably.” His grin caused his whole face to come alive. He was decidedly handsome. “You’re no prize yourself,” he added, watching cheerfully as she made a face at him. “By the way, my name is Bill Benson. What’s yours?”

  “Mary Ann Gilcrest, but it’s not necessary for you to know. I plan to see as little of you as possible while I’m suffering through this retreat.”

  “I only wanted to know so that I can request a campsite as far away from you as possible.”

  “Good. You’ll save me the trouble of making the same request.”

  Bill Benson certainly didn’t mince words. Noticing the wedding ring on his left hand, she decided he was probably the type who snored and hogged the covers at night. His wife had no doubt packed him off to the woods to get rid of him. The thought cheered her considerably, and she favored him with another of her dimple-producing smiles.

  “By the way,” she added, “what does one do on a bird watcher’s retreat besides sleep in leaky tents?”

  “You mean to tell me you’ve never been on a retreat! How long have you been a bird watcher?”

  “Since my pushy mother decided last week to pack me off to the wilds,” she answered with spirit.

  “She can’t stand you either, huh?”

  “Something like that.” Her eyes clouded over. She could hear her mother saying, “You’ve got to quit blaming yourself for Harvey’s death. Take your doctor’s advice and do something you’ve never done before. I noticed an ad for the Tennessee Bird Watchers—”

  Bill’s voice interrupted her reverie. “The bus is leaving. I thought you might like to know.”

  Startled, Mary Ann jumped up and, in her haste, she tripped over her chair.

  In a flash Bill Benson was at her side, steadying her. A shock of awareness went through Mary Ann. No man had put his hands on her
since Harvey’s death a year ago. A small eternity.

  Impatiently, she shook him off. “I can take care of myself.”

  “Great.” Bill Benson left her standing beside the table and walked outside to the waiting bus.

  When Mary Ann boarded the bus he was already in his seat with his head buried in a field guide to birds of the Great Smokies. She hadn’t even thought about packing a field guide. It was probably just as well. She didn’t intend to be trooping through the woods trying to spot vultures. What she planned to do was cozy up in her tent and sleep late then stroll to the lodge and call her boys on the pay phone.

  She gazed idly out the window as the bus rocked and swayed up the winding mountain road. The scenery was breathtaking. Rhododendron and mountain laurel dotted the mountainside with splashes of brilliant color. Flowering dogwood splashed its serene white beauty among the fresh greenness of the hardwood trees.

  Mary Ann loved the springtime. She could almost completely lose herself in the wild beauty of the Smokies if it weren’t for Harvey and the guilt she felt.

  She sighed and leaned her head back against the seat, closing her eyes, trying to shut out that last horrible image of him. Her hands clenched into tight fists and her body tensed as her mind replayed the death scene—she, standing in the bleachers screaming, and Harvey’s car turning over and over on the Talladega Speedway until it burst into flames.

  She hated her husband for dying. Why did he have to die and leave her with two small boys? Why did he have to leave his children fatherless? Why did he die and leave her with all the guilt and all the pain and all the house payments?

  Focus on something else, she told herself. Think a pleasant thought.

  That’s what this trip was all about. She intended to replace all those searing, nerve-racking images of Harvey’s death with tranquil scenes, scenes that would bring her peace of mind.