Читать книгу Her Second-Chance Man - Cara Colter - Страница 10

“Get in the truck.” Brian’s voice was low and dangerous. Jessica had heard he was a policeman in Victoria; his voice held deep and unquestionable authority.

His niece, however, looked unimpressed. “No.” Jessica knew now would be a good time to insert herself in the argument and tell Michelle she had to leave with her uncle. But she was no saint and to see the man who had humiliated her suffer at the hands of his headstrong niece was just a little bit satisfying.

In fact, Jessica had to stifle a laugh after seeing the look on Brian’s face. He obviously wanted nothing more than to pick up his ninety-pound niece and toss her in the truck. The lines of his face were chiseled with irritation. On any other man it might have marred his good looks, but not on Brian. With his brows lowered like that, and the line of his mouth grim, he had the look of a warrior.

Still, under the fierce mask, Jessica sensed something rather astonishing. Brian was purely, helplessly baffled. Despite the fact that he looked like the most self-composed man ever born—one who could handle anything life threw at him—he was at a total loss when it came to dealing with his five-foot-one-inch niece.

Tell Michelle to go with her uncle, Jessica ordered herself. She wanted Brian out of her space, the quicker the better. On the other hand, she didn’t feel inclined to make his life any easier, wonderful life lessons owed to him aside. Surely it wouldn’t hurt to stay on the sidelines and let them settle their own argument? Finding his helplessness mildly entertaining was only human, not mean-spirited.

“You can’t just stay here with a complete stranger,” Brian said to Michelle, “Not that you’ve been invited. And I have to go to work. So, march.”

“She’s not a complete stranger,” Michelle said.

On very short acquaintance Jessica knew Michelle to be the girl least likely to march anywhere, but she offered no comment.

“I don’t know the first thing about her,” he said, his patience obviously thinning even more. A muscle working in his jaw showed the fine, strong line to perfect advantage.

His niece was just as obviously not about to be intimidated by the facts, or by him. “You do so know the first thing about her. You knew where she lived. You knew her name. You knew…”

“Nothing important about her,” Brian interrupted, aggravated.

“Like what?” Michelle asked, her voice challenging.

The debate raged in the darkness of his eyes—reason with her, or put her in a choke hold? Reason won out, but not by much. It was evident he was not a man accustomed to having his authority questioned.

“I don’t even know if she’s married. I don’t know what she does for a living,” Brian said.

Jessica pondered what it meant that he wondered that about her first. She had not had to debate whether or not he was married. He wore no ring, but it was something more that gave away his single status. He looked like one of those men who have developed an allergy to relationships, carrying his independence around himself like an invisible shield. She was willing to bet that his most successful one was with his truck, which seemed to be the same one he had driven in high school.

Not exactly observations that painted him in a sympathetic light, though he also had the look of a man beleaguered. He was absolutely alone with the challenge of his niece, and it showed.

“She’s not married,” Michelle said. “Did you see any signs of a man inside that house? Size ten muddy boots at the back door? Smudgy handprints around the light switches? Dishes in the oven? Laundry waiting to be folded in the living room? Root beer rings on the coffee table?”

“Okay, okay, we get it,” Brian said, and despite Jessica’s desire to be entertained by his discomfort, she was a little embarrassed for him at this unexpected glimpse of his house.

But Michelle was not finished detailing how to spot a single person. “And what do you think her bathtub looks like?”

“I have no idea,” he said tersely.

“I bet there’s not a sooty ring around it.”

“There’s a sooty ring around my bathtub?” he asked, and glared at Jessica as if she had discovered it and chastised him for it.

“Every time you tinker with that ugly old truck.”

“My truck is not ugly,” he said dangerously. “It’s a classic. And to get back to the point, I didn’t look in Jessica’s oven, not that its contents could be taken as an indication of character. And I certainly didn’t look in her bathtub.”

Jessica’s plan to remain detached seemed to be crumbling. In fact, she was finding these tiny glimpses into the personal life of Brian Kemp utterly fascinating.

But only, she defended herself fiercely, because she could feel satisfied he wasn’t living nearly the life she would have thought. What would she have imagined? Ferraris, glamorous women, a whirlpool tub, no rings of soot or root beer. Maybe champagne.

“Well, if you did look in her oven,” Michelle informed him, “there wouldn’t be any dishes in it. Not like at your house.”

“Our house,” he corrected her.

“Whatever,” she said with perfect indifference.

Jessica noticed how the indifference stung him. Why did he send a quick sidelong glance her way? Did he care what she thought about where he stored his dirty dishes? Why? When her character was under question? But apparently he did care because he gave his niece his sternest look.

“Michelle,” he said, “having a conversation with you is like playing Ping-Pong with ten balls on the table at once. You seem to be deliberately missing the point, changing the subject and confusing the issue. It’s not about bathtubs. I don’t know Ms. Moran well enough to let you stay here. Not that you’ve been invited.”

“Can’t you tell everything you need to know by looking around?” Michelle said. “You said yourself it looked like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs could come singing out of the woods at any moment. This is not the home of someone of questionable character!”

“You’re going to be a lawyer,” he groaned. “I just know it.” Jessica noticed he sent another look her way. He was embarrassed, not only by his lack of control over his niece, but also about the fact that he was familiar with fairy tales. Well, it was true that he did look like the man least likely to be familiar with magical princesses.

Considering how much she had planned to relish his discomfort, she found her plan backfiring. She felt a little sorry for the man. Not much. Not enough to damage her resolve, just a thimbleful of pity.

“Even if Dopey or Snoozy or Sneezy or whatever comes forward with a character reference, you have not been invited. So…”

“A character reference?” Jessica repeated. He’d used up his thimbleful mighty fast. Of all the nerve! “May I remind you, you came here? Expecting a miracle? What kind of person wants a character reference from somebody they think can work miracles?”

She realized that, despite her vow to remain detached, she was feeling a passionate desire to pick up one of her garden shovels and clunk him over his handsome head.

“Nothing personal,” he said, as if that would take the sting out of it. “My job makes me cynical.”

“This is not the type of place an ax murderer lives,” Michelle informed him. “I bet she gardens for a living. Right?”

Maybe a shovel murderer, Jessica thought. “I’m a horticulturist.”

“You don’t know the first thing about murderers of any kind, Michelle,” he responded, coolly.

“And you have the inside track ’cause why? Handing out speeding tickets and eating doughnuts has made you an expert?”

Brian went very quiet. Jessica could see the muscle working in his jaw again, and she knew instinctively he was counting to ten.

Michelle seemed to realize she had overplayed herself, but her confrontational tone softened only slightly. “Are you worried she might be growing a little hemp among the roses? Is that it? Are you going to shine your flashlight in her eyes and say, ‘are your pupils dilated?’” She turned to Jessica. “He did that to me, you know.”

Jessica knew that to give Michelle the sympathetic reaction she was looking for might be a mistake, but she let her annoyance at Brian cloud her judgement. “Really?” she said indignantly. “That’s horrible.”

Brian shot her a look that was not the least bit hard to interpret, and then he returned his attention to Michelle. Despite herself, Jessica was beginning to find his restraint admirable, which was unfortunate, since she really didn’t want to find anything about him admirable.

“I said I was sorry I did that to you. Don’t you let go of anything?” he asked.

Not if it could be used to her advantage, Jessica realized. She found this interchange very telling, but she was annoyed by her own less-than-stellar ability to detach. She was not sure how she could want to hit Brian on the head with a shovel and feel just a wee bit sorry for him at the same time, but she knew it was the kind of complication that spelled danger for her quiet little life.

Still, he just had it so wrong. Michelle wasn’t the kind of girl who would unquestionably accept his authority. Had he been engaging in these power struggles with her for months? Had he won any?

“You knew Jessica in high school,” Michelle pressed. “You said you saw her do a miracle. Jeez, you’d probably ask Moses for a character reference, even if you saw him part the Red Sea.”

“I probably would,” Brian said, without apology.

Michelle changed tactics with head-spinning swiftness. Suddenly, she smiled sweetly, touched her uncle’s arm, blinked up at him.

“Please let me stay, Unkie. I won’t be a nuisance. I’ll help out. I’ll sleep on the floor. I have to be with O’Henry. I have to.”

Knowing it would be very unwise to take a side and knowing it would be even less wise to do anything that would put her in close proximity to Brian on a daily basis, Jessica still couldn’t stop herself. Because, the argument aside, she had heard the very real need in Michelle’s voice.

Jessica saw the truth, shining clearly, rising above all her confusion about Brian. The child needed to be with her dog.

And Jessica had to help the right thing happen. Yes, she had been hurt by life and hurt by love and some of that hurt could be attributed to this man in front of her. But had she let those hurts make her into the kind of a woman who could turn her back on what needed to be done for a wounded child?

Michelle was here, now, and so was the dog, and it was perfectly clear they both needed her. She couldn’t turn her back on that, even if it would make her life so much easier and less complicated.

“Okay,” she said. “Michelle can stay.”

Brian turned and stared at her. That muscle in his jaw was really very attractive, probably because it worked so hard.

“Excuse me? I don’t think that’s your decision to make!” Despite his level tone, he was furious, his eyes snapping with anger.

“I think it would be a good idea for her to stay. I have an extra room.” Jessica lifted her chin to meet his glare. She did not want or need this aggravating man’s approval. Not by a long shot.

So, even if the look he gave her made her want to retract the invitation and run, she would not give him the satisfaction of having that kind of power over her. Instead, she smiled as sweetly at him as Michelle just had.

“Now, I’ve been invited!” Michelle crowed.

Brian glared at his niece and then at her. Jessica was very glad she was not on the wrong side of the law at the moment. She had a feeling he’d have her up against the wall and in cuffs in a heartbeat. She wondered if he would search her.

The thought, so naughty and so out of character, was a stern reminder of why she should not have done what she just did: tangle her life with his.

“Could I see you privately for a minute, Ms. Moran?” he said through clenched teeth.

Michelle rolled her eyes. “This is where he takes you aside and grills you. He did it to my friend Monica’s mom before I could spend the night there. How embarrassing. ‘Mrs. Lambert, are there weapons in your house? Do you use illegal drugs?’”

“How do you know that?” he snapped at his niece.

“Mrs. Lambert told me. She thought it was funny. And cute. But I didn’t.”

He’d obviously had enough of the exchange with his niece because he gave her a look so smoldering that it bought her sudden silence. Michelle could not hold his gaze and scuffed at the dirt in front of her with the toe of her sneaker.

Jessica felt his fingers bite into her elbow. She should have been insulted by his rough touch, but, unfortunately, it made her think more very naughty thoughts and made her highly aware of the threat he was to her well-ordered world. She was unceremoniously hustled out of Michelle’s earshot.

He dropped his hold on her elbow, but it stung where he had touched, as though he had branded her with his anger. She found herself looking up into those chocolate-brown eyes. It felt like the years melted away, and she was sixteen all over again, her heart beating too fast, so filled with wanting that it hurt.

She reminded herself, firmly, that she had banished that girl who wanted things she could not have. Still, did he have to smell so good? So clean and purely masculine? Did he have to stand so close that she could count the lashes—thick and spiky—around his eyes?

His unsettling proximity made a dangerous question tease the corners of her mind. Could her adult self have what the younger version could not?

She was so different now. Slender. Confident. She might even go as far as to say pretty. Had she become the kind of woman who would stand a chance with him?

It was way too complicated a question. Wouldn’t a relationship with him be a betrayal of who she was now, not to mention of who she used to be? Oh, sure, he was big and muscular and good-looking and smelled of some kind of heaven. But who was he? If he was still the insensitive, self-centered jerk he had once been, why would she want his attention? Why would she want to stand a chance with him?

For the pure fun of it, a renegade voice inside her whispered. Come on, Jessica, wouldn’t it be just a little bit fun to flirt with danger?

Danger. That was what he represented to the sense of self she had developed over the past fourteen years. It felt like he could knock it all down with a wink, a smile, a kind word or a kiss.

She looked at his lips. “No!”

“Pardon?” he said.

She flushed, sure her cheeks would now match the color of her Agrippina China rose. “Uh, nothing. I was just thinking out loud.”

“I hope about your answer to Michelle staying here.”

It was true. Michelle had to go. To keep her here would be intertwining her life with that of this man who so obviously still wielded some kind of power over the part of her that wanted the things that made a woman weak and powerless: a man’s smoldering lips, his hands, the touch of his skin beneath her fingertips, the dream of a soul mate.

And yet Jessica could not bring herself to retract her invitation to Michelle, even in the interest of her own self-preservation.

She had felt the neediness and loneliness radiating from that child, raw and painful. To turn her back on it would be like turning her back on her own younger self and on everything she believed.

Jessica’s motto was do no harm. To turn away from Michelle’s obvious need would be to do harm in a way she did not even fully understand.

“Your niece is welcome to stay,” she said firmly. She folded her arms over her chest and tossed her curls. “I think she should.”

His expression darkened, and his brows lowered. Unless she was mistaken, he was counting to ten again. She recognized the good in that. A certain animosity between her and Brian would be a defense against that ridiculous part of her that thought it would be fun to flirt with danger.

And he looked dangerous now, an angry light changing the landscape of his eyes to storm-tossed. The line around his mouth grew firm and hard, and he folded his arms over his chest. It made her own gesture seem silly. She doubted her movement had made her look the least bit massive or intimidating.

Of course, that was the point. He was trying to intimidate her. And it was working—not that she would ever let him see that. She tilted her chin a little more, gave her curls another careless toss.

But his voice, when he spoke, was hard and cold, the voice of a man too accustomed to giving orders and being listened to. Which of course only deepened her own determination not to see anything his way.

“Look,” he said, “I don’t think it’s a good idea if I let her win on this one.”

“Really?” Jessica said, and set her legs wide apart in a posture that mirrored his, exactly. “She looks to me like a kid who could use a few wins. If it’s not too hard on your ego, that is.”

“It’s not about my ego,” he said, every word bitten out.

“So, if it’s not about you, should I assume it’s about me? For some reason you’ve decided I can be trusted with a dog, but not with your niece, is that it? Was she right? Do you think I have a little hemp patch over by the compost?”

“That is not it! I don’t remember you being difficult!”

“You spent less than two hours with me, fourteen years ago. You never gave me a chance to show if I could be difficult or not.” But he remembered correctly. Oh, no, she had not been difficult. Not at all. She had been falling all over herself trying to get him to see who she really was. And for a mad moment, under the moon, she thought he had. She was certain of it. She had seen a light come on in his eyes, had seen him lean toward her, had felt his breath in her hair when he’d whispered, I’ll call.

“Jessica, I didn’t give you a chance because I was a dumb kid. I was superficial and self-centered, and I doubt if I’m much improved. But you’ll be thrilled to know there is justice. Here you are surrounded by sweetness and flowers, and I’m picking up drunks and spending half my life in a car that smells like puke and, well, worse things.

“You know what else? Not one of those kids who thought the world revolved around them has what you have here.”

“What do I have here?”

He hesitated. He looked around. His tone softened. “Michelle saw it. I can see it in your face. In this place. Some kind of peace.”

Ha. Until half an hour ago!

“So, since I’m Mother Theresa’s little sister,” though hopefully better looking, “what is the problem with having Michelle stay?”

“I never forgot what you did for that dog that night, and I need you to help my niece keep her dog, if that’s at all possible. And it’s not that I don’t trust you with her. Let me tell you, my job requires instant judgements of people. My life sometimes depends on whether I’m right or wrong. You have that look that is eminently trustworthy.”

“What look is that?”

“Oh, you know. The kind of miffed librarian look.”

“Really?” she said, and felt her lips pursing up just like a miffed librarian.

“Don’t take it the wrong way. There aren’t nearly enough people devoted to doing the right thing. Who are good. And kind. And gentle.”

“Don’t forget spunky,” she said, since he was making her sound about as exciting as A Child’s Little Book of Prayers.

“That remains to be seen.”

Did it? That could be interpreted in the very same way as I’ll call by someone with the least inclination for romance, which of course he had cured her of long ago. Thank goodness.

“I don’t want her to stay here with you in case the damned dog dies,” he said, his voice suddenly low, looking cautiously over Jessica’s shoulder. “I don’t think she can take much more.”

Jessica sighed. It really wasn’t about his ego. She could see the worry etched in his eyes.

Firmly, she said, “Brian, it’s not up to you to decide how much she can take, or can’t.”

“It’s my job now to protect her!”

The fierceness with which he said that actually made her feel the teeniest desire to be nice to him. Just for a few minutes. Until she got her way.

“There are some things that aren’t even remotely in your job description,” she told him. “Believe it or not, the sun rises and sets without your help. You seem to have a few control issues. They won’t help you with Michelle.”

“Better than hocus-pocus.”

Her guard snapped firmly back into place. “That’s what I do. Hocus-pocus. You knew it when you came here.”

“A dog is different than my niece.”

“Brian,” she touched his arm, “you can’t protect her from life, not unless you’re prepared to lock her in a closet. Even then, a tree could fall through the roof.”

“Hey, guess what? I already figured out I can’t protect her. If I could, don’t you think her mom and dad would still be here?”

“Leave her here,” Jessica said. “We’ll heal the dog, or we’ll help him die. Either can be an incredible experience. Trust me. Just a little bit.”

He looked at where her hand rested on his arm, and she went to move it away, but he laid his own hand over top of it. She could feel the leashed power in that hand, feel her own yearning.

“Okay,” he said, his voice low and gruff.

“Okay,” she said.

“Maybe she’s better off out here,” he conceded reluctantly. “I hate leaving her alone when I’m on night shift. She says she’s too old for a baby-sitter.”

“She is. She could be baby-sitting herself, for heaven’s sake.”

“Well, not for anyone who liked their baby.”

“She does okay with the dog.”

“Yeah, maybe it’s just me that she’s mean as a rattlesnake to.”

“Probably.”

“So,” he said, “are there weapons in your house? Or illegal drugs?”

“I’m the miffed librarian, remember?”

He touched the side of her cheek with the palm of his hand. The gesture was unexpected and made her heart race anew. He studied her.

“That was a mistake. More like Tinker Bell, with fairy dust.”

“Does that bring us back to the illegal drugs?” she asked, trying to hide the way his hand on her cheek made her feel. Feminine. Beautiful.

He seemed to realize he was touching her face, so he dropped his hand and then shoved it in his pocket. “I have this parenting book that I read under my covers with a flashlight and it says not to be afraid to ask. You know. About the drugs and weapons.”

“Brian,” she said taking pity on him, “it won’t help you to be a cop around your niece. I understand that you care about her, and that’s why you conduct these inquisitions before you let her do things, but even that crack about the baby-sitting shows you don’t trust her judgement. Doesn’t the book say anything about that?”

“I haven’t got to that part yet. I’m not much of a reader.” He shook his head sadly. “I had no idea she named the pup after a writer. I bought her the candy bar after she named him that. I didn’t know why she didn’t eat it.”

Jessica felt a terrible stab of tenderness for him. He was trying so hard.

A shiver went up and down her spine, but she shied away from the thought that followed it. No, she owed him nothing. For the child and the dog she would do her best.

But Brian Kemp? Healing him was way out of her league.

Still, what could it hurt to offer an opinion?

“I just feel,” Jessica said, choosing her words carefully, “you would make more headway with Michelle if you were able to tell her the truth.”

“About?”

“The way you feel about her. Instead of grilling her friends and looking at her pupils with a flashlight you need to tell her you love her more than the earth, and that you’re worried about her.”

He actually flushed, a lovely shade of crimson that moved up his neck. “If I told Michelle that, she’d tell me to take a leap. And then she’d go dye her hair green and say, ‘Do you still love me now?’”

“And wouldn’t you say yes?”

“No. Okay. Maybe.”

“Let her know you love her.”

“She’ll use it against me.”

“You look like a big, strong guy. You can probably handle it,” Jessica said dryly.

“You know, the truth is not always the best policy. For instance, when you do an interrogation, you always tell the bad guy that his friend spilled the beans, so he might as well give. It’s generally a bald-faced lie, but sometimes it works. So, it’s a lie but it accomplishes something good.”

“Well, yes, maybe on the bad guys, which your niece isn’t.”

“She seems to think I am! You haven’t been living with us for the last six months. She doesn’t like me much.”

Jessica reminded herself, firmly, that his healing was not her business. On the other hand, there would be places, and probably many of them, where his healing and Michelle’s would be interwoven like threads in a tapestry.

“Look what happened the last time she loved,” Jessica reminded him softly. “They died.”

“Are you telling me she’s scared of caring about me?” he asked, incredulous.

“Yes.”

“She sure as hell doesn’t act scared. What makes you think she’s scared?”

Because I loved once, too. Oh, yes, it was a teenage love, more a fantasy than a reality, but that hurt made me afraid to give my heart again, too. How much worse must it be for Michelle?

“Good old hocus-pocus,” she lied.