Читать книгу Slow Burn - Cherry Adair - Страница 10

CHAPTER THREE

“WELL, HONEY, AREN’T you absolutely, outrageously gorgeous?” Nick released Catherine’s waist, only to capture both her hands. He held her in front of him, arms spread wide, their fingers entwined, as he checked her out from head to toe, and all ports in between. She gave him a frank stare back. She’d adored him for almost twenty years. Almost as long as she’d known Luke. It puzzled her why, when Nick was a truly delicious hunk of manhood, she’d never felt any of the sparks that ignited at just the thought of Luke.

“In eight months,” she teased, “I had two more calls from you than I did from Luke. I had to come and see for myself if you guys were behaving yourselves.”

“I gotta tell you, sweet thing, if I’d known you’d get even more beautiful, I would’ve called three times a day.”

Catherine pulled her hands free and gave him a mild look. “Three times a day, huh? What on earth would we talk about?”

“Your fantastic hair.” Nick reached out and fingered a few strands near her face, then lowered his smoky voice. “Your skin, your eyes, your mouth—”

“Hey, Stratton, give it a rest. Cat’s immune to your dubious charms.”

Although Catherine felt the pulse of Luke’s presence in the room, she managed to ignore him and to encourage Nick. “More. More.”

Nick’s answering grin revealed two long, sexy dimples in his lean cheeks. His dark hair had a tendency to curl. He kept it cut short, reminding her of the profile on a Greek coin. He was a clotheshorse, and his tall, spare body looked good in whatever he wore. Today he’d dressed in Dockers, his only concession to work a pair of immaculate workboots. His lavender golf shirt made his blue eyes look violet.

He grinned wickedly at Luke. “We’re going to have to keep Princess under lock and key while she’s visiting, won’t we?”

“I’m not visiting.” Catherine pushed his hand away from her hair, which he’d been absently fondling. “Dragon over there is letting me stay with him until the house is ready.”

Nick stuck his hands in his pockets and gave Luke a level look. “Is that so?”

“I’m not going to be moving in before the turn of the century unless you two get to work,” Luke told them shortly, dropping the last torn piece of sandpaper he’d been shredding to join the others at his feet. He cast Nick a mildly belligerent look.

“Please tell me my portfolio is still in your capable hands?” Nick begged with utmost sincerity. Four of Catherine’s savvy trades had made his new Beemer possible.

“Safe and sound,” she assured him. “Boy, I’d kill for a cup of coffee.” She edged past Luke, who didn’t like losing and was obviously still smarting over two losses in one morning. “Guys?”

The men followed her into the kitchen. The oak cabinets had been installed and gleamed in the sun streaming through the plastic over the kitchen window opening. The naked plywood countertops looked ready for tile. A card table shoved into the refrigerator opening held a coffeepot and several sealed jars. A commercial water bottle sat on the floor under the table. Catherine set about making coffee as Luke divvied up the assignments for the day.

“Plan on taking a short break,” Luke warned his helpers. “Here.” He handed her a how-to-install-tile book. “Bone up on this while you finish your coffee.”

“You’re trusting me to do this after glancing at a book?”

Luke shrugged. “How could a compulsive personality screw up?”

Catherine pulled a face. “Let me count the ways.” She tucked the book under her arm. “You’re nuts, but I’m game. Gimme my supplies, boss.”

“Get your coffee first, and I’ll stick what you need in the bathroom down the hall.” Luke accepted the brimming paper cup Catherine handed him. “Yo, Nick? Did you say you brought lunch?”

Nick went out to his car to retrieve the cooler while Luke showed Catherine what needed to be done in the guest bathroom.

“You’re not going to stay in here and watch, are you?” Catherine sucked in her stomach to make room for him to maneuver around her in the compact bathroom. With a neat knee bend, he set the box of tiles he carried on the floor. Catherine averted her eyes from his crotch. He looked up. Their eyes met and she blushed. She could’ve sworn she saw an answering heat in his eyes. But then, it was pretty dim in here. Much to her embarrassment, she’d mistaken that look before.

“Nick hasn’t gotten involved with anyone in the last couple of weeks, has he?” she asked, hoping to redirect her thoughts.

Luke rose slowly. “Why do you want to know?”

She laughed. “Gee, let me think. He’s tall, dark, handsome, owns his own business, is single and has most of his own teeth.”

“He owns half a business, and he’s the last man you should be looking at.” Luke bent to retrieve a large can of mastic from beneath the sink and used a screwdriver from his back pocket to open it. It smelled noxious. “You know Nick’ll never commit.”

“So? I like him.”

“Good.” Luke slapped a notched trowel down beside the can. “So do I. Let’s keep it that way.”

Catherine leaned against the doorjamb with her arms folded. Willpower kept her voice even as a bubble of laughter caught in her throat. “Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!”

“Would you move...thanks.” His sleeve brushed her chest as he maneuvered past her to the door. “Think you can handle this, or would you rather paint?”

“I’d rather talk about Nick.”

“Yell if you get stuck.”

Catherine heard his workboots pound down the hall to the kitchen. She grinned.

* * *

“I SEE NO end of problems if she stays with me indefinitely,” Luke said morosely over his shoulder as he and Nick installed custom-milled molding in the master suite. “Why couldn’t she have stayed in Beaverton where she belongs?”

Nick, standing on the ladder, took a few whacks with a hammer as he drove a nail into the twelve-inch-wide oak. “By herself?”

“She has friends there,” Luke said, then hammered a few finishing nails into the baseboard. “And she sold the house.”

“It’s not like Catherine to burn her bridges. She means to stick around, I guess.”

“She asked me to help her find a husband.”

Nick’s teeth flashed in a devilish grin. “Whose?”

Luke snorted. “That’s the problem. Everyone we know is just like us.”

“What’s wrong with us? We’re good-looking, own our own business, have decent cars and can flash the cash.” He twisted on the ladder to look down at Luke.

Luke hadn’t liked the way Nick’s eyes had danced the moment he’d seen Cat this morning. He didn’t like the way his best friend had kept his arm wrapped about Cat’s slender waist, either. He gave Nick a pointed look.

“She’s got great girl parts,” Nick said with far too much enthusiasm. “I’d be more than happy to take her out.”

“Don’t you suddenly start ogling her parts,” Luke warned. “Everything from the neck down is strictly off-limits.”

“Her lips are fair game?”

“Consider her verboten from head to toe, and all parts in between. Does Cat look desperate for a date? She wants a lifetime commitment. Someone stable. Faithful. A guy who’ll see no one but her. You aren’t even on the D list of candidates.”

“Do you have an A list?” Nick asked, amused.

“You and I are going to work on it,” Luke said with grim determination. “At first I tried to talk her out of it. But you know Cat. Once she’s set on something she’s like a pit bull.”

“More like I know you,” Nick said. “When Catherine wants something, you bend over backward to make sure she gets it.”

“She’s never asked for much, and she deserves to be happy. I’m hoping it’ll be a case of be careful what you wish for. So...how many of our friends fit the ‘decent-guy, keeps-his-hands-to-himself, faithful’ description?”

“Catherine’s a beautiful, intelligent woman. She must’ve been kidding about finding her a husband,” Nick said. “Why would a woman who looks like she does, and makes money hand over fist, want to tie herself down to one guy? She’ll have to beat men off with a two-by-four as soon as word gets around she’s available.”

“I prefer she do it in Oregon.” Luke stood, dusting off his jeans. “I’m starving.”

The bathroom door was almost closed as they walked by. “Hey, Cat.” Luke rapped on the door. “Ready for lunch?” She was on her knees behind the door. He could just see her endearingly large feet poking out.

“Yeah, I’m famished. Almost finished here. Go ahead and start without me. Hey! Make sure you guys leave something edible.”

“See, that’s the problem,” Luke said, picking up their conversation as they entered the kitchen. He dragged the lid off the cooler Nick had left on the counter earlier. “It’s gonna be impossible finding someone whose intentions are halfway honorable. Do you want tuna or...what’s this? Mystery meat? Here, take it, whatever it is.”

Nick removed the wrapping and raised his roast beef sandwich to his mouth. “Tell her you don’t want her here.”

Luke sent his friend a level look. “I can’t do that again, Nick. You know that. I have a history of telling Cat she’s not wanted. Prince of a guy that I am, I started the day her mother left...” Luke scrubbed his jaw. “She cried herself sick for four days.”

“She was seven years old.”

“Yeah. And that was the last time I saw her cry. Think of all the times she didn’t cry when I embarrassed her by telling my friends I didn’t even know her. That was even worse.”

“Give yourself a break. You were a teenager. She followed you around school like a sad-eyed puppy. Hey, I told her to bug off on more than one occasion.”

“She used to scrunch up under that berry bush way in the back of the middle school playground, remember the one? Just scrunch up under all those thorns after I’d told her to get lost. I’d walk by and see her, and feel lower than the scales on a snake’s belly. That sad little face, and all that crazy red hair. And she refused to cry. I could see she wanted to, but damn her stubborn pride, she refused. And I’d walk away, laughing with my friends, and leave her there.”

Nick bit into his three-inch-thick sandwich, catching the sliced pickle before it hit his boot. He stuffed it back between the slices of bread, then licked mustard off his thumb. “And then there’s her seventeenth birthday.”

Luke’s head shot up. “Don’t go there, Stratton.”

Oblivious to the danger, Nick continued. “You kissed her, she puked. End of story. Fine. She’s a big girl now, odds are she doesn’t still throw up when a man kisses her. But who knows? Why take the risk of her upchucking on a friend? Hey, I’m sure she’ll understand if you tell her to get lost. After all, as you say, been there, done that, got the scars to prove it. Besides, just about everyone in Catherine’s life has abandoned her. Why should you be any different?”

Luke closed his eyes. He hadn’t told Nick more than the basics. The truth was he’d allowed his passions to get away from him that night, and in the process had scared Cat to death. She’d needed her brother. Instead he’d turned into Octopus Man with suction lips and a hard-on that wouldn’t quit.

No wonder she’d been sick. And embarrassed. And disappointed in him. Luke glared at Nick, grateful in a perverse way for the reminder. “It’s taken years for her to learn she can trust me again.”

The pain he’d caused her by switching roles midstream still tortured him. They’d never talked about that night, but it lay between them like the monster in a misty bog. He’d sworn not only to be her brother, but her hero, her protector. Her champion. In other words, he’d be what Cat needed.

“I’ve got a lot to make up for. I’m not going to blow it.” Luke tossed his uneaten sandwich into the box they used for trash. He wanted to pace, but that took up too much energy, so he leaned against the counter.

“Got a beer in here?” He dug through the ice and pulled out two cans. “Hey, Cat?” he shouted, handing Nick a beer. “Come and get it.”

He waited a beat for her faint answer, then popped the can and took a long swig. “If she wants help finding a husband, then I’ll help her find a husband. Between us, we must know a hundred eligible single guys. Hell, it can’t be that difficult.”

“Wanna bet?” Nick asked, looking up; his pale blue eyes weren’t smiling as he issued the age-old refrain. Polishing off his sandwich, he reached for another. “Engagement or wedding?”

Luke narrowed his eyes. Man. He hated this whole situation. “Wedding, I guess.”

“Four months.”

“Six. Payoff?”

“Milk in my oldest gym shoe?” Nick asked seriously.

“Get real, Stratton! This is Cat we’re talking about here.”

“Aah! A Major Bet. Mmm,” Nick rubbed his chin. “An all-expenses-paid trip to Vegas. For two.”

They shook on it.

* * *

“I’M ECSTATIC TO announce the toilet in the master bath flushes,” Catherine said to the room in general. She stumbled into the kitchen, then her knees folded and she sat down in the middle of the floor with a thump.

“First order of business—” Luke broke off abruptly as he turned from the window. “You look like hell. What’s wrong with you?”

“Your bathroom made me sick.”

At the speed of light, Luke came down on one knee in front of her. “How sick?” He pushed her hair off her clammy forehead.

Catherine gave him a look. “Barf sick.”

He rose, scooping her into his arms. Very manly, Catherine thought as he strode through the house, yelling for Nick to open the damn front door. She rested her throbbing head on his nicely muscled shoulder and closed her eyes to stop the world spinning.

“Take a couple of deep breaths,” Luke demanded, stomping to the edge of the porch and sitting down on the top step. Right, like she could draw a breath while sitting on Lucas Van Buren’s lap.

“Cat? Breathe, dammit.”

She took a shuddery breath. His splayed hand on her rib cage moved with her lungs. She tried it again. It felt good. She couldn’t figure out now if she was still dizzy from the glue or if it was Luke’s touch making her head spin.

Catherine squinted her eyes open as Nick settled himself on the other end of the step and leaned against the post, a beer can in one hand. He gave her a small, one-dimple smile. “Glue?” he asked Luke, swallowing his amusement with a gulp of brew.

Luke’s hand slipped a fraction of an inch down her rib cage as his breath fanned the top of her head. He was probably getting a mouthful of her unruly hair. His hand shifted up again. Up, Catherine silently ordered. Move up more.

“Fool woman, I told her to open the window.”

“The one you painted closed last weekend?” Nick asked.

“Why didn’t she say so?” Luke’s chest huffed under her cheek. His hand was directly under her right breast. If he’d just move his thumb...

“Perhaps because you weren’t listening when she did tell you.” Catherine joined in the conversation. “Nevertheless, she is a big girl, and should have figured out a way to ventilate her workspace.” She tilted her head to look up at Luke’s very nice chin. “Aren’t I squishing you?”

“No.”

“The last time I sat on your lap, I was nine.” It hadn’t felt nearly this good. Or this dangerous. In fact, what she remembered was feeling safe for the first time in living memory.

“You were covered in mud.” Luke’s voice carried a reminiscent smile.

“You pushed me.” They grinned at each other.

Nick rose with a groan. “Oh, bliss, another trip down memory lane. I have molding to finish installing, then I’m outta here.”

Luke, as if suddenly realizing the position they were in, slid her unceremoniously off his lap and plopped her on the step next to him. The front door closed behind Nick.

“That was a stupid thing to do,” Luke told her. “If you’d passed out in there, I couldn’t have opened the door.”

“As much as I thrill at being called stupid, I have to admit I should have thrown my shoe through the window for ventilation. Point taken. Lecture over.” She rose, staggered and clutched the roof support. “Oh, ick.”

Luke shot up as if someone had lit a firecracker in his back pocket. He grabbed her upper arm and pushed her back down. “That’s it. You’re useless to me now. I’ll never get a lick of work out of you if you keep toppling over and I have to stop what I’m doing to hold you up. You’re going home.”

* * *

THERE WERE EXACTLY twenty-six paces from one wall in his condo to the other. Luke knew. He’d counted them off about nine zillion times. He strode across the living room to glare at the clock near the TV. It was after 1:00 a.m. He’d about worn a path in the carpet. Where in the hell were they?

He cursed taking the Harley to the beach house. With Cat asphyxiated by the damn glue, he’d been afraid she’d fall off the bike coming home. But he hadn’t wanted her to go in Nick’s brand-spanking-new Beemer, either. Luke did the nine paces from the wall unit to the window like a one-minute mile.

The vertical blinds clattered against the wall as he peered down into the dark street. Unless Cat and Nick were the couple blatantly boinking under the streetlamp on the lawn in the park across the street, they still weren’t back. And if they were, he’d kill Nick.

He yanked the cell phone out of his back pocket and punched redial. It rang. And rang. If they were hiding down on the nineteenth floor, at Nick’s place, his business partner–ex-best friend was dead meat. Luke slammed the phone off and into his pocket midring. He didn’t bother with the elevator, he simply jogged the three floors down, then three floors up again.

Irritated that he was so damn irritated, out of breath and out of ideas, Luke threw himself into his favorite chair. The black leather smelled like her and annoyed him even more. He glared at the open front door, willing Cat to walk in before his murder plans were fully hatched.

* * *

“ARE YOU SURE we know what you’re doing, Nicolas Stratton?” Catherine yawned, barely awake, and rested her head on the padded headrest of Nick’s car, her eyes closed. They’d been parked near Fisherman’s Wharf, a good two miles from the condo, for an hour and a half.

“You want Luke to see you as a desirable woman, don’t you?”

“It’s what I’ve spent the last six hours telling you,” she grumbled, rolling her head his way. Catherine opened her eyes. “I want him to see who I am, but I’m scared. What if this doesn’t work? God, I couldn’t bear losing the relationship we do have.”

“Honey, I think you’ve only thought through part of this plan. Be brave, be daring, be bold. Moving in with him was a smart idea. But what’ll really do it is if he has the opportunity to see you through the eyes of someone else. I volunteered. Don’t worry, gorgeous, I have the plan well in hand. And my plans always work.”

“Yeah,” Catherine said, “except when they don’t. And Nick? I want you to promise on a stack of Bibles that you’ll never tell him how I feel. This has got to be Luke’s idea. He has to make the first move.”

“This is woman’s logic, right? Chase him until he catches you?”

“Basically. Just promise you won’t tell. Never. Do you swear?”

“Constantly.”

“Nick!”

He crossed his chest in the vicinity of his heart. “I swear I’ll never tell Luke how you feel about him.”

“Say that so I can believe it. Because I swear to you, Nicolas Stratton, if Luke gets a hint that he’s the one I’m trying to catch before I’m ready to tell him, I’ll...I’ll tell him about you and Babsie.”

“That was in twelfth grade.”

“Want to bet he won’t still be mad?”

“I give you my word,” he said with utmost sincerity.

“Good enough.” She squinted at the dash clock. “He’s probably sleeping, and we’re sitting here like idiots in the dead of night, freezing in the car.”

“We could’ve gone for coffee.”

“Nick, you’re a lunatic, and I adore you. But if I drink one more cup of anything, I’ll float away. Please, can I go home now?”

* * *

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” Catherine cried as Nick picked her up in his arms. The elevator pinged as it stopped on the twenty-second floor. “Nick, you’re going to give yourself a hernia carrying me.” The doors slid open. He staggered playfully as he strode down the corridor leading to Luke’s condo.

“Put your head on my shoulder, your arms around my neck and close your eyes,” Nick said softly. “I’m going to give you the opportunity to be a fly on the wall. Hmm, interesting. The front door’s wide open.”

Catherine looped her arms about his neck and snuggled against Nick’s chest. A nice chest. Unfortunately, not Luke’s chest.

“Where’ve you been?”

Ooh. Luke’s dragon roar. Catherine kept her eyes closed, her features lax. She imagined flames spewing from his nostrils. This was a good sign. Nick’s plan might just work.

“Hey, old son,” Nick whispered. “Princess here is sleeping. Lower your tone to a dull bellow, why don’tcha?”

“Why is Cat sleeping?” Luke demanded, with deep suspicion. She could feel the blistering heat of his gaze focused on her.

“You said you wanted to introduce her to some of our...well, let’s just say we did a little par-tay-ing.”

“I told you to bring her straight home.”

“We came straight back.”

“Via Hong Kong?”

“We stopped for a bite to eat. Then she wanted a look at my boat.”

“For six hours?”

“Gorgeous day for a sail. Look, she’s kinda heavy,” Nick said over her head. “Mind if I...oh okay, fine, if you want to stand there bitching at me while you get the hernia, that’s cool.”

Luke’s arms tightened around her. Bliss. Catherine’s head found the natural and perfect hollow beneath his chin. As long as he didn’t get that promised hernia, she was content to lie in his arms and enjoy the moment.

“Poor Princess, she needed the break. The last few months have been tough on her.”

“She talked to you?” Catherine heard deep suspicion in Luke’s voice. His fingers tightened on her upper thigh. “Catherine Harris the clam, the little crab?”

“It’s not a state secret, is it?” Nick asked. “Hey, it’s great standing here at one-thirty in the morning, in your open doorway shooting the breeze, a comatose woman between us, but how about a drink?”

“I’m only holding her so I don’t rearrange that smarmy, pretty-boy face of yours,” Luke snarled. “Next time I tell you to bring her right home, you’d better bring her...no, forget it. You keep your grubby paws away from her.”

Don’t get overexcited, Catherine warned herself as her heart did a little somersault. What she hoped sounded like jealousy might just be Luke in his defensive big-brother mode. But at this point, she’d consider the glass half full.

“Hey, chill. What’s your problem? She’s over twenty-one and single. You aren’t her father.”

“No,” Luke said grimly over her head. “I’m her brother.”

“You aren’t that, either,” Nick said softly. “Are you, old son?”