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That annoyed me. “You’re not a bitch at all.”
“I can be, when my temper’s up.”
“I have a temper, too, but no one calls me a bitch.”
She laughed. “I have a feeling no one calls you anything but ‘sir’ when you’re mad.”
“You haven’t been around my family.” I liked that I’d made her laugh. It was a good sound.
“You’re obviously close.” She tossed the washcloth in the sink. “Um…Gwen did say that you’d only known Zach for a few months. She said that was her fault.”
“It was my fault as much as hers.” I didn’t like talking about it…but I didn’t like her thinking I was the kind of bastard who’d ignore his son, either. “I didn’t know about Zach’s existence until last March. Gwen and I met when I was on vacation a few years ago. It didn’t work out—at least, I decided it wouldn’t work out. She has money, you see. Family money. A lot of it. I didn’t deal with that well when I found out. She, uh, threw away my address when I left, so by the time she realized she was pregnant, she didn’t know how to find me.”
“How did you learn about Zach, then?”
“She hired a detective. That was after she’d been diagnosed with breast cancer.” I added firmly, so she’d know the subject was closed, “She’s okay now. Anyway, she brought Zach here for a visit, and while Zach and I were getting acquainted, she and Duncan fell for each other.”
They’d fought it. In hindsight I could see that it must have been hell for both of them. They’d known I’d wanted to marry Gwen, and Duncan at least had accepted that I had a prior claim. But at the time I hadn’t been able to see anything except how betrayed I’d felt when I found out, how thoroughly my dreams had been destroyed.
Seely rested her hand on my knee. “I’m glad you told me. If Zach is going to be here often, I wouldn’t want to say or do the wrong thing.”
That was a good reason for having shot off my mouth. Not the real reason, maybe, but while we were on the subject…. “You should probably know something else. If Zach starts talking about the bad man and the policeman who shot him—well, that really happened. Maybe someone filled you in on that?”
They hadn’t. Useless bunch of busybodies. Why hadn’t they told her the stuff that mattered, so I wouldn’t have to? I didn’t like thinking about that night. The strobing red of the cop car lights, the hard white light inside the store, where a crazy bastard had held Gwen and my son at gunpoint…the fear, raw and jagged like a gutful of broken glass.
I’d failed them. No matter how often I told myself there was nothing I could have done to protect them, the bitterness of my failure didn’t go away.
But Seely would need to know the basics, so I told her about the holdup of a convenience store last April, and how Gwen and Zach had been among the hostages taken by a not-too-bright gunman. And how Duncan had saved them.
“My God, Ben. You said something about Zach having had a lot of uncertainty in his life, but I never imagined anything like this.”
“He seems to be doing okay. Gwen took him to this guy who does play therapy. That’s where kids tell their stories with toys,” I explained, “and the therapist sort of plays with them, only in a way that helps them work through things.”
“What about you?”
“I wasn’t part of it.”
“That’s what I mean. There’s nothing worse than being helpless when someone you love is hurting or in danger.”
Uncomfortable, I said, “I don’t usually blather on so much. I just thought you ought to know.”
She chuckled. “You call that blathering? I don’t think anything you said even qualifies as a secret. And I do know a few. It’s amazing what people will say to a paramedic. I suppose doctors and nurses experience that, too.”
Was that why I felt like there was something between us—because she’d saved my life? Turning the idea over in my mind, I decided it made sense.
She stood. “Seems to me you could use some play therapy yourself, but for now we’ll settle for getting you dressed. C’mon, up with you. I’ll take that sling off.”
The moment I stood, the room shrank. Seely was standing very close, and the soft herbal scent of her hair seemed stronger. I pretended I didn’t notice. “I can get this strap in front.”
“Okay. Turn a bit…there.” The sling came loose, and she slipped it off. “Of course, I don’t know half the secrets Daisy does. If you ever met her, you’d find yourself telling her your life story in no time. People do.”
My shoulder ached more without the sling’s support, so I supported that arm with my other hand. “Who’s Daisy? A friend?”
“That, yes. Also my mother.”
“You call your mother by her first name?”
“Sure. Can you get those buttons, or do you need some help?”
I thought about letting her unbutton my pajama shirt. Her knuckles would brush against my skin…better to let my right arm dangle and fumble the buttons out left-handed. “I can do it. You did say your mother was unusual.”
She chuckled again. A man could get hooked on that sound. “Unusual, yes. She used to be a flower child. The real thing, Haight-Ashbury and all that. In some ways she still is, though she’s doing pretty well as an artist these days. I tease her that she’s lost in the sixties. Here, we’ll do the difficult arm first.”
She eased the pajama shirt off my shoulder. It fit snugly over the bandages, so she had to take her time. It was ridiculous to get turned on by that, under the circumstances. But it was a good thing the sweatpants were baggy. “An artist, huh? What kind?”
“Sculpture. She’s into what she calls found art these days. Some people call it junk—” her grin flashed “—but she’s had two showings at a prestigious gallery in Taos. She scavenges for things people throw away, then paints this or that, puts the objects together and ends up with some pretty interesting pieces.”
“Real modern stuff, I take it.”
“Well, one critic called it ‘an entrancing collision between the primitive and the twenty-first century,’ but yes. I have a sneaking suspicion it wouldn’t be your type of art.” She tossed the pajama shirt on the back of the toilet, then picked up the flannel shirt she’d brought down earlier.
“What about your father? What does he do?”
“Who knows? He came down with a bad case of respectability a few years after I was born. Poor man. I don’t think he ever recovered. Here, hold out your arm.”
She didn’t say anything else while I eased my right arm slowly into a sleeve, then my left. This gave me plenty of time to kick myself. She’d mentioned her mother several times, her father not at all. That should have clued me in.
“I know your shoulder is hurting,” she said cheerily. “Turn around and let me do up the buttons. That way you can support that arm until we get the sling back on.”
I did turn, but ignored the rest of her instructions. “Sometimes I don’t watch where I’m putting my big feet. I stepped in the wrong place. I’m sorry.”
Her eyes flicked to mine, surprised. Then a wry smile tipped her lips. “Ben, you’re supposed to pretend there’s nothing beneath my flip attitude but more flip.”
“I’m not much good at pretending.”
“No, you aren’t,” she said so gently she seemed to be touching on some great secret. “I think I like that about you.”
She liked my voice, too. And I liked all sorts of things about her. My gaze drifted to her mouth. “I can’t imagine what it would be like to grow up with so little family. I’m used to a crowd.”
“But you were a lot older than the others, weren’t you? You said Duncan is the closest to you in age, and he’s five years younger. That’s not a big difference now, but it would have been when you were growing up. You wouldn’t have played together, or gone on double dates when you were teens, or—oh, all the things an only child thinks siblings are for.”
“No, but that’s not…they mattered. I mean, it mattered that they were around, that…hell. I don’t know how to say it.”
“Maybe that they were a huge part of your life? And you love them.”
I nodded, relieved that she understood. “I’m not great with words.”
“I think you do pretty well.” She paused, then went on quietly, “I haven’t seen or spoken to my father since I was eight. Um…he and Daisy weren’t married.”
I felt privileged, as if she’d handed me a private little piece of herself that she didn’t leave lying around where just anyone might see it. “He missed a lot, then. Practically everything that matters.”
“He did, didn’t he?” Her smile slid back in place. “More than me, because I had Daisy.”
“The two of you are close?”
She nodded, then just stood there looking up at me, curiosity and something else in those incredible eyes.
It occurred to me that I wouldn’t have to bend far to taste her smile.
My heartbeat picked up. I could see the pulse beating in the hollow of her throat, too. Maybe she was having the same thoughts I was. Maybe she wanted me to kiss her. That sweet notion had my head dipping toward hers.
Had I lost my ever-loving mind?
Reality snapped back in place. So did my head. Panicked, trying to cover up the moment, I fumbled for the buttons of my shirt.
I forgot that I couldn’t use my right arm.
“Oh, damn—sit!” She enforced the order with a shove.
I sat. I didn’t have enough breath to curse, much less protest.
“You are not going to pass out on me,” she informed me.
“Of course not.” The first hard smack of pain had passed, but my forehead felt clammy. I cleared my throat. “I should probably get the sling back on so I don’t forget and try to use that arm again.”
“Probably,” she said dryly, and retrieved the sling. Our conversation after that consisted of her instructions to me—turn, hold your arm out, that sort of thing. Did she know I’d been about to kiss her? I couldn’t tell.
I fastened the straps myself. “I need to call Manny. He’s good, but he’s not used to overseeing everything.”
She studied my face a moment. “Sure. As long as you call him from bed.”
I scowled. “The couch in the living room—”
The doorbell rang. It must have woken Doofus; I heard his excited yips and the scrabble of his claws on the floor outside the bathroom as he skidded around the corner, heading for the entry hall.
Seely glanced over her shoulder, then back at me. “Stay put. I’ll be back to help you in a minute.” She left the bathroom.
I considered the ethics of my situation. I was supposed to do what she said, but there was that “within reason” clause I’d stuck on. She hadn’t stayed around to hear my reasons for not staying put.
One, I wasn’t dizzy anymore. Two, the foyer was just the other side of the bathroom. Three, I wanted to see who was here.
I reached for the walking stick.
It was slow and awkward, but the cane did help. Seely was just shutting the front door when I got there, holding Doofus back with her foot so the little idiot didn’t scamper out and get into the street. She turned around, tossing a set of keys up and catching them one-handed. Temper sparked in her eyes.
I had a good guess who’d been at the door.
All of a sudden she said, “Here!” And tossed the keys at me.
To catch them, I’d have to drop the walking stick. I let them sail on past. They landed with a rattle on the hardwood floor. Doofus trotted over to investigate them. “Did you miss me on purpose, or was that a happy accident?”
She looked at me like I was something the cat had hacked up on the rug. “The mechanic I took my car to just left.”
I nodded, having figured out that much. “All fixed, I take it.”
“Against my explicit instructions—yes!” Those sparks turned into big, blazing fires. “That man—that weaselly, lowlife scum I’d thought was an honest mechanic—he wouldn’t even tell me what the repairs had cost. Just winked at me, handed me the keys and said it was all taken care of. He practically patted my hand and told me not to worry my pretty little head!”
“Well, then. Looks like you can stop worrying.”
She growled. Honest to God, that’s what it sounded like. “This is not worry. This is fury.” She stalked closer, tilting her face to snarl up at me, “You paid for it. You went behind my back and paid for the whole thing.”
“I wasn’t going to let you lose your car. You saved my life.”
“You had no right! No right at all! You didn’t even ask me!”
“If I’d asked,” I pointed out, “you probably would have argued. I’m sure that wouldn’t be good for me, weak as I am right now.”
“It wouldn’t be good for you if I were to trip you, either. Or poison your coffee. Or—or—dammit, if you don’t stop grinning at me in that obnoxious way, I’m going to do something we’ll both regret!”
I was grinning, wasn’t I? Once she’d called attention to that, my grin widened. I was enjoying myself. A lot. Seely in a temper was something to see—eyes hot, cheeks flushed, those volatile eyebrows drawn down in a scowl. So, like the daredevil I’d never been, I plunged off the next cliff. “You are cute as hell when you’re mad, you know that?”
Her mouth dropped open. It closed and opened a couple more times before she got some words out. “That knock on the head did more damage than the doctor realized.”
“A lot like a kitten—hissing, scratching, growling. Cute.”
“I am five feet, ten and a half inches tall in my stocking feet. I am not cute. And you are obviously mentally as well as physically handicapped, so I suppose I shouldn’t hit you too hard.”
“Well, if you’re already planning on hitting me…” I said that, so on some level I must have known what I was about to do. But the thought never got up to the top of my brain where I could squash it. Something else was pulling my strings, as if some part of me I’d never known existed was suddenly in charge.
I let the walking stick clatter to the floor, cupped the back of her head and kissed her.
Her lips were soft. That wasn’t a surprise. She went rigid the second my mouth touched hers. No surprise there, either. But the kick of pleasure went deeper than I’d expected. The taste of her shot straight to the primitive part of my brain the way smells do, bypassing reason. I couldn’t have known that would happen. And there’s no way I could have predicted the funny little sound she made just before she melted up against me.
One of us was still thinking, I guess, because she was careful of my shoulder, sliding one arm around me and letting her other hand rest on my waist. I hummed my approval against those soft lips, threaded my fingers through her hair and tilted her head so I could deepen the kiss. And she opened for me.
Automatically I widened my stance so I could snug her up closer. The stupid sling was in the way and my knee protested, but the way her fingers kneaded my waist mattered a lot more.
So did the warm, living feel of her beneath my hand. I loved the fact that I didn’t have to bend over much to explore the flavors inside her mouth, and the way she stroked her tongue along mine. The long muscles of her back invited me to sample the dip at her waist, the smooth curve of her bottom.
She liked my body, too. Her hand left my waist to range up beneath my shirt and over my chest. Delight slid into need without a bump to mark the change.
I slid my right leg between hers and pressed up. She shivered. I needed more, needed her skin, her sighs, the little bud of her nipple in my mouth…where? Where could I take her? The living room was close, and the couch there was long and roomy. I started easing us both that way without taking my mouth from hers.
My foot slid out from under me.
I yelled. Doofus yipped. Seely’s arm tightened around me, and somehow I managed not to fall on my stupid ass.
Not literally, anyway. Appalled by my behavior, I yanked my hand away and stepped back. My heartbeat was doing the hundred-yard dash, my knee hurt, my shoulder hurt, and my foot was…wet. I glanced down.
