by Chant, Zoe
"So... you own it?"
"No, I own the company that owns it."
Patricia thought about that. "That's some conglomerate, right? D.C.L? D.M.L?"
"D.L.C. Contracting," Lee said, then added. "And no, I own the company that owns that. Also, a factory in Milwaukee and a small financial firm in Duluth."
"Oh," Patricia said dryly. "Only, a small financial firm, though."
Lee did squirm then, relishing the feeling of her bare skin against his as he did. "Well, medium-sized, I suppose. Large for Duluth, maybe."
Patricia buried her face in the pillow and Lee was alarmed when her shoulders began shaking. Was she angry? He put a tentative hand on her shoulder, and she lifted her face from the pillow to let a whoop of laughter out.
Bemused, Lee watched as she chortled with abandon, laughing until tears rolled down her cheeks. "I had no idea financial firms were so entertaining," he said, mystified, and he recognized that he was frowning at her.
"They aren't," Patricia agreed, wiping her cheeks. The exertion of sex and laughter made her face glow. "It's just... I..."
She had to smother her hoots of laughter in the pillow again, while Lee helplessly patted her, not sorry for the excuse to keep his hands on her. He eventually had to laugh with her, even though he wasn't sure of the joke.
She finally managed to get her breath under control and told him, eyes dancing, "I brought you scholarship paperwork."
Lee felt dim. "Scholarship paperwork?" She wanted him to sponsor a scholarship?
"Well," Patricia explained, looking sheepish now. "You drove that beat up truck, and Clara was wearing short pants and no boots. I thought you might have trouble covering the tuition."
Lee cast his memory back. Clara had been so adamant about her choice of pants and shoes that first day. He hadn't considered that they had been her favorites for some time, and that she had grown in that time and that although they were clean, and hadn't been cheap, they were starting to look worn. "I let Clara pick her own clothes," he explained, sounding more defensive than he meant.
"It's okay," Patricia said hastily. "Most kids have favorites! You just... don't look like a millionaire, you know." She propped up on an elbow and gave him a stern look that was belied by her dancing eyes. "And you don't tip like one, either. 15%? Really?"
Lee put his hands behind his head and played along with a lofty sniff. "I'm not a millionaire, I'm a billionaire. And I should have tipped 10%. We had to wait a good five minutes for a refill on that milk we spilled."
"You're lucky I didn't land that second glass in your lap," Patricia countered with a sniff of her own.
"You could have licked it up, if you had," Lee suggested. "That would have gotten you a better tip."
Patricia giggled and sat up so she could hit him with the pillow. "Dirty mind!"
The pillow hit was all the invitation that Lee need to sit up and wrestle her back down onto the bed with kisses and caresses. Patricia kissed back, unquenched passion in her mouth and hands, until she had to break away from him in giggles again.
"What's so funny?" Lee asked, kissing her ear.
"Harriette Ambler!"
Lee pulled away in puzzlement. "What about her?"
"She fancies herself the local robber baron," Patricia explained. "She works in real estate, and she's going to be devastated to realize that she's a pauper compared to you."
Lee shuddered. "That horrible woman with the bright purple Chrysler and the impractical shoes."
"That's the one. I hope she decides being second best in a town this small is intolerable and leaves before she does more damage here."
"Damage? More than being an eyesore with that car?"
Some of the life unexpectedly drained out of Patricia–everything about her was so irrepressibly expressive that Lee could practically read her moods in the pores of her skin.
"I mentioned she was in real estate," she explained sadly. "She specializes in selling off historical properties to developers. She has aspirations of making Green Valley a bedroom community for Milwaukee. There's talk that she's buying old Gertie's farm to put in a membership warehouse, and she's trying to buy the schoolhouse I rent."
"I'm a developer," Lee reminded her, driven to honesty by Patricia's transparent distress. "But turning Green Valley into a sea of cheap apartments and box stores is an appalling idea." He didn't have to exaggerate his reaction.
Patricia's head tilted as she focused a thoughtful gaze on him. "You didn't bulldoze this old place to build something new and perfect."
"I love old buildings," Lee explained. "And I moved here so that Clara could grow up in a small town, not an extended city suburb. I want to build her a treehouse, and let her run wild in the woods when she's older." If Clara was a shifter like he was, that would be more important than he could easily explain.
"I hope Green Valley still is that small, quiet town when she's older," Patricia said, settling back into the pillows.
"I could make sure that it is," Lee was spurred to declare. "I can keep developers from buying any more here, and stop construction on anything that's in progress. There are some restoration projects two towns over that could suddenly need the company resources more urgently. If they aren't mine, I know people who can get them moved. I know the company owners of two of the major membership warehouses and could convince them to look elsewhere for their expansions."
Patricia sat up again, astonished eyes dancing and a new, hopeful smile tugging at her lips. "You can DO that?"
Lee gave a practiced nonchalant smile. "It's done."
"I never thought I'd find that kind of power sexy," Patricia said, new laughter in her voice.
"But..." Lee prompted her.
Patricia rolled onto her hands and knees and growled playfully through her loose hair, "It's the sexiest thing I've ever heard in my life. Roar!"
The growl, and her seductive look, brought his bear roaring to the surface, and Lee growled in reply before he could stop himself. If anything, she looked aroused by his response, and snapped her teeth suggestively at him. He could no longer keep his hands off of her, and reached out to gather her close.
Chapter Eleven
PATRICIA TUMBLED INTO Lee's arms with delight, relishing the strength in his shoulders and arms. He lifted her to straddle him with ease, and she could already feel him engorging again, his thick member rising to brush the insides of her thighs as she playfully nibbled at his neck and ears.
He rumbled right back at her, and his hands at her waist pulled her closer, until he was teasing her entrance. Before he claimed her, though, he rolled her over so that he was spanning her, kissing her neck and her jaw, keeping himself tantalizingly just out of reach as he caressed her skin and bit at her collarbone as if he were barely in control of himself.
Patricia groaned and caught herself clawing at his shoulders desperately–she couldn't think around the desire that was welling up in her. She writhed, pressing her hips up at him, and he teased her more, pressing at her waiting, wet lips but not entering.
"Please..." she heard, and realized it was her own voice, rough and needy.
When he finally took possession of her, filling her deliciously, she had to bite her lip to keep from crying out in abandon. The taste of blood was iron on her tongue.
Then he was kissing it off of her, his tongue tangling with hers as he filled her and retreated, thrust after thrust, her orgasms a dizzy cascade of pleasure.
Lee stopped and withdrew abruptly, breathing hard and clawing the sheets. Patricia soothed him, stroking his sides and kissing his face while he regained control of himself. Impulsively, she tumbled him over and took the top position, precariously near the edge of the bed. She gasped as Lee took them one circle further, catching her and flipping her over to kneel in the plush carpet at the edge of the bed. She was sprawled leaning over the bed, and he was kneeling behind her, pressing irresistibly at her nether mouth. She was still unexpectedly hungry for him, even still hazy from her orgasms.
He pressed into her slick waiting lips with a little groan of passion, and they were moving together as one, relishing this new position of possession and release.
He came at last, just as Patricia discovered new heights of physical joy, and the sheets were dragged from the bed by their grasping hands.
For a long, gasping moment, they simply collapsed there beside the bed, tangled in sheets and sweat and the sweet fluids of their lovemaking. Slow hands trailed over each other; Patricia could not get enough of the hills and valleys of his muscles, even so fully sated as she was.
"And you think you aren't a dancer," Lee said near her ear, and there was something that Patricia couldn't identify in his voice.
She had to giggle, languidly, and answer, "I said everyone is a dancer at heart. Especially when the music is right." For now, the music was his heartbeat, hammering near her ear and rattling through her own body because they were so tightly entwined. He squeezed her breath away, then gently untangled her from the sheets and helped her up.
Patricia flowed up into his arms and kissed him, feeling graceful and liquid. "I noticed that your shower has two showerheads..." she suggested. She didn't want to stop touching him, and didn't, through an entire steamy shower. They soaped each other, and rinsed each other, and dried each other, carefully, then fell naked into bed where they snuggled in to snatch a few precious hours of sleep.
LEE WOKE TO AN ARMFUL of delight. His bear was as contented as he was, for the first time in a very long time, and he still felt deliciously sated after their active night.
Patricia stirred, and mumbled something into her pillow.
"Hmmm?" Lee asked her, cradling her close.
"Pancakes," Patricia repeated. "You promised pancakes and I'm starving!"
He was too, now that she had vocalized it, and it was possibly the only thing that could have driven him out of bed. He reluctantly let go of her and rolled out of bed.
Sunlight was streaming through the gap in the curtains, and Patricia put a pillow over her head when he opened them wide to look out. The snow had stopped during the night, and the entire world was blanketed with white, downy serenity.
"I think it snowed two feet," Lee said in wonder.
"Pancakes!" Patricia reminded him from underneath her pillow. She was probably used to snow.
If the snow didn't impress her, the pancakes did. Lee managed not to embarrass himself, mixing the ingredients and cooking them each on the skillet to golden perfection.
Patricia, dressed in her own jeans with one of Lee's big shirts belted over it, repeatedly expressed her delight, and ravenously downed a stack smothered with syrup.
"I told you they were good," Clara said smugly. But she had to be coaxed back to her chair to eat them several times–she was more enthralled by the snowy scenery out the window, and the prospect of playing in it.
They had barely put down their forks before she was dragging them to the door to go out, not even interested in making the bubbles to wash up.
But when the door finally closed behind them, Clara wasn't sure what to do, and she stood on the porch in her crinkling snowsuit blinking at the bright vista.
"Let's make a snowman!" Patricia suggested at once, and waded fearlessly out into the snow.
Clara took Lee's gloved hand and followed her, floundering in the tall snow. She helped roll up the snowman's base, and patted it carefully into shape, slowly taking the role of director as the snowman grew too tall for her to reach.
"The head is crooked!" she pointed out, after it had been heaved into place.
Patricia struggled to remedy that to his daughter's satisfaction, while Lee went back into the house to find a scarf and hat. "We need a carrot for the nose!" Clara called after him imperiously. "And coal for the eyes!"
"I don't think we have those things!" Lee warned her from the porch, but he gamely went inside to try to find them.
Cubed frozen carrots from a package of mixed vegetables weren't going to meet her demands, he decided, so he brought a piece of scrap trim for a nose and two washers from his workbench for eyes. An extra scarf from Clara's closet was obtained, and one of his own baseball hats, when he couldn't find an extra wool hat.
When he returned, Clara and Patricia were standing back from the snowman, looking at it critically. Lee's offerings were considered by his daughter carefully, and deemed acceptable.
The resulting snowman was still lopsided, but Clara gave a pleased smile, and agreed that he would do. "I like snow!" she told Lee seriously. "I want it to snow always!"
"I'm going to remind you that you said that someday, and you'll deny it," Lee predicted.
Patricia laughed, of course, and dragged Clara off to make snow angels.
The sound of their laughter together was impossibly familiar, like Lee had been waiting his entire life to hear it.
Chapter Twelve
PATRICIA LOOKED UP at the sky, sweeping her arms to make angel wings in the fluffy snowbank.
"Like this?" asked Clara.
Patricia had to struggle to sit up in the loose snow. "That's perfect, Honey! She looks beautiful!"
"How do I get uuuuppppp?" Clara wailed, giggling and thrashing.
Chuckling, Patricia went to help her up, then tossed her, shrieking with laughter, into another snowbank, then dived in after her. Laughing and swimming through the snow together, Patricia tickled her and rolled her in hugs.
They lay cuddled together for a long moment once their laughter had worn out.
"Do you think my Momma is an angel now?" Clara asked, unexpectedly.
"I bet she is," Patricia said carefully, sitting up with her. "The most beautiful angel ever."
"She was beautiful," Clara agreed. "I've seen pictures."
Patricia glanced over to where Lee, out of earshot, was clearing off her car and shoveling around it. "You don't remember her?"
"She died when I was a baby," Clara said gravely. "She was sick for a long time and they couldn't make her okay."
Patricia hugged her tight. "I'm sure she loved you very much and was sad to go."
"Papa was very sad, too," Clara observed, and Patricia had no answer for that.
They sat together in the snow for some time, watching Lee together. Far away, there was the grating sound of big equipment along the road. "What's that?" Clara asked.
'The sound of the end to my winterland fantasy,' Patricia didn't say out loud. "That's the snowplows! They are down there clearing all the snow off of the roads so that it's safe to drive again!" It was already above freezing, and the snow was warm and soft. Perfect for... "You know what we should do?" she said quietly near Clara's ear.
The little girl froze, sensing a conspiracy. "What?"
Patricia made a snowball in her gloved hands and looked suggestively at Lee, whose back was to them.
"Oh!" Clara said loudly, then clapped a mittened hand over her mouth. Over it, her eyes danced in anticipation and she nodded.
Together, they made a small arsenal of snowballs, gathered in Patricia's hat. If Lee noticed their preparations, he gamely pretended not to, so that when they staged their attack with a warrior's whoop and a flurry of ill-aimed snowballs, he was taken entirely by surprise and staggered back under the onslaught.
Patricia got at least a few good snowballs to hit him, and a few of Clara's landed close enough to splash him as they fell apart.
"I'm under attack!" he hollered gamely, pretending to be mortally wounded. "Yetis from the north with their deadly snowballs!" Undeterred, he scooped up an answering round of snowballs, hitting gently, but with far more precision at Clara's shoulders. She laughed and ran behind the car. Patricia ducked one that would have hit her face, and returned one to his chest, exploding in powder.
As she retreated behind the car with Clara, Lee called, "Get her, Clara!" and the traitor unleashed an enthusiastic rain of tiny snowballs on her unexpectedly.
"Whose side are you on?" she demanded, turning back to find herself cornered by Le
e. She couldn't help giggling and being a little deliciously terrified as he descended on her, sweeping her up in his arms and tossing her into a snowbank with ease. "I won't go down easy!" she protested, and she tossed a snowball right into his face as she laughed and struggled up.
Clara danced around at his feet. "Toss me, Papa! Toss me!"
Lee obliged, then gave each of them a hand as the rumbling machinery in the distance grew louder, and a truck with a plow and the markings of Lee's business appeared at the curve of the driveway, pushing a modest wall of snow before it. Clara took each of their hands as Patricia tried to smooth down her parka and look a little less like she had just been rolling in the snow with unprofessional abandon.
"Do you have to go now?" Clara asked, carefully pulling them back from the big truck.
Patricia met Lee's eyes briefly and had to look away. "Yes, Sweetie," she said, trying to mask her regret. "It's time for me to go to my home now that the road is clear."
Clara let go of Lee's hand to wrap both of her arms around Patricia's knees. "I hope you come back soon," she said mournfully.
"So do I," said Lee, unexpectedly, and Patricia looked up into his face in surprise and sudden joy.
"Well," she said, smiling slowly. "I'll need to return your shirt."
Chapter Thirteen
PATRICIA DUMPED THE blocks back into the big bin, enjoying the noisy percussion over the radio that was playing refreshingly grown-up music as she and Andrea cleaned up the room and prepped for the next day's work.
"I'm so glad you took my advice," Andrea said smugly, tossing another stray block from where she was sweeping behind the craft tables.
"Which advice was that?" Patricia feigned innocence.
"The advice about Clara's gorgeous dad," Andrea said, not fooled. "Look at you! You haven't been this happy and relaxed since you opened this circus!" Another block arced to follow the first into the bin.
