Shaking his head, he turned to go but a sound made him stop. He turned to see the brown-and-white cat staring at him. It looked even skinnier than before.
“So, you got any advice for me?” Alex asked.
The cat just sat there and stared at him.
“Yeah, right. What decision is there to make?” Alex said with a sigh. “It isn’t like I haven’t burned all my bridges but one. I’m sitting here dreaming, but that’s all it is. A dream. I lied to her. I scared her. I tried to keep her safe and all I did was end up hurting her.”
The cat came a few steps closer. It’s steps were wobbly, Alex noticed. And now that he looked closer, everything about the animal seemed weary and weak.
“I bet you need a meal, don’t you?” he said and looked around. A hot dog vendor was down the street. “I’ll be right back,” he told the cat.
He half expected the cat to be gone when he got back, but the animal was still there. Alex broke the hot dog into small pieces and tossed them over the chain-link fence. His aim was pretty good, but the animal just barely sniffed at them, then turned away.
“Wrong kind?” he asked and frowned. “Good thing Heather isn’t here. She’d try to catch you and take you home.”
The cat just looked up at that, blinking his green eyes, but Alex wasn’t fooled. This cat had been living on the streets too long; it was too far gone to be rescued.
He swallowed the lump that suddenly appeared in his throat. “Guess we have a lot in common,” he said. “We’re both beyond help.”
Still the cat stared and finally Alex just turned to leave. He expected the cat would go also, but when he turned back a few steps later, the cat was still there. Still staring.
“What? You think you could change?” he asked it.
“Well, you’re fooling yourself. Sure, a nice warm home sounds great. Someone there to call your own. But what if you really hurt her already? It’s not even fair to ask her to forgive me.”
But then he looked at the awful streets and the cat’s thin body and sighed. The night suddenly seemed full of dangers. Alex sighed. Just because he was beyond hope, it didn’t mean that this little fellow was, too.
“Okay, maybe she’d take you in. You didn’t lie to her.”
He pulled a battered cardboard box from a nearby trash bin, telling himself he was crazy. The cat would run when Alex tried to get close. And if it didn’t, it would never agree to get in a box. And even if it did, Heather would probably slam the door in his face.
Well, he knew that last one was wrong. Heather might slam the door on him, but she’d take the cat first.
When he went back to the fence, the cat was still there. It stayed even when Alex vaulted over the fence into the weed-and-gravel-strewn lot.
“Okay, this is the plan,” Alex told him. “You get in the box and we go to Heather’s house. If you’re smart, you’ll pretend you don’t know me.”
Chapter Fourteen
Was she in love with Alex or not? Heather spent the evening fretting over the question as she finished Toto’s costume, but coming to no real answer.
When her mother called around nine, Heather was thoroughly relieved. A distraction from her torturous thoughts.
“Are you all right?” her mother asked, worry pouring through the telephone line.
“Of course, I am,” Heather said. She settled comfortably into the corner of the sofa. Henry came over and snuggled with her. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“I was just talking to Emma Donnelly and she told me you’d been stranded in the woods of upper Michigan over the Labor Day weekend.”
Heather just closed her eyes and laid against the sofa back. Good old Aunty Em. What else had she told? “Mom, I wasn’t stranded.” Heather said gently. “I went up there to stay in a summer cabin Dorothy told me about for a few days.”
“A summer cabin? Oh, that sounds lovely.” Her mother sounded visibly relieved. “You don’t know what I was picturing when she told me.”
Whatever her mother was picturing now was probably far from reality, but Heather wasn’t going to argue. “Well, you needn’t have worried. It was very nice. And very relaxing to get away from everything.”
“That’s so good to hear. What did you do up there? Visit antique shops and eat in tea rooms?”
Heather hesitated, her comfy, cozy feeling slipping away slightly. She wasn’t going to lie, but she hated to get her mother upset. “Not exactly,” she said carefully. “The cabin wasn’t in town.”
“Not in town?” The worry was back. “Where was it then? Not—” a horrified pause “—in the woods?”
Heather sighed and realized Henry was frowning at her. Her agitation must have disturbed her petting. She made a conscious effort to relax. The woods had been the least of the dangers, as it turned out. “Mom, it was lovely there. I saw a family of deer and all kinds of birds and turtles.”
“Deer and turtles! My heavens, Heather,” her mother cried. “What were you thinking of? They could have been rabid!”
“I suppose.”
“Don’t you remember that little girl Great Aunt Millie’s cousin knew? The one that got bit by a rabid weasel and swelled up and died a horrible death?”
“Of course, I remember.” It had been the food for years of nightmares. “But I was safe. Really. I didn’t get bit by anything.” Her nagging draggy sleeplessness came from her troubles with Alex, not any animal or insect bite.
“Tell me you didn’t leave your window open at night,” her mother added, the panic in her voice growing. “And risk catching pneumonia and dying from a terrible high fever like the little boy that used to live next door to old Mrs. Schubert’s mother’s best friend.”
“Mom, I’m fine.” The window had been open, but she hadn’t caught anything. Not a chill. Not Alex’s heart.
“Oh, heavens. Next you’ll be telling me you went out in a storm and didn’t even think about the dangers from lightning.”
She had, hadn’t she? Though the bolt of lightning that had hit her hadn’t been from the storm, but from Alex’s touch.
“Mom, you can’t live your whole life being afraid.”
“Heather, this doesn’t sound like you at all. What’s come over you?”
“Nothing, it’s just...”
It was just what? What had happened to her up there in the woods? Maybe she had been bit—by a love bug. And caught a love fever, and maybe that bolt of lightning had really been Cupid’s arrow.
“Toto told me I was brave the other day,” she said slowly. “I think maybe he was right.”
“Gracious.” Her mother gasped. “What did you do?”
The actual events were no longer important, but the rush of sudden belief in herself was. “I think I fell in love.”
“You what! With who?”
Heather heard a noise from outside—a car pulling into Alex’s driveway—and jumped to her feet. It was now or never. She had to fight for him while she had the chance. “Mom, I have to go. I think Alex is home.”
“Alex?” her mother shrieked. “Not Alex Waterstone?”
“Yes, Mom. Alex Waterstone. And this is going to be a major rescue. Wish me luck.”
Alex pulled the box from the front seat of his car, looking inside the half-open top. The cat looked back at him. “Heather’ll take good care of you,” Alex said. “And you’ll like her. She’s—”
Across the driveway, her door opened and she came racing out in her teddy bear pajamas. His heart wanted to weep at the sight of her, but he forced back the feelings. He was moving—just this sight of her was enough to convince him it was the only way to retain his sanity—but right now, her sudden appearance alarmed him.
“What’s wrong?” he asked as she came around to his side of the car. Even with her face in the shadows, he could sense her urgency.
“Nothing’s wrong,” she told him. “We need to talk. Aunty Em said you’re leaving.”
He sighed slightly. “The job’s over. That guy I caught in your backya
rd the other night is giving us lots of information. Enough for dozens of indictments.”
“So you won’t be getting beat up anymore?”
He didn’t know how to answer that. “I can pretty much guarantee you won’t find me unconscious on your lawn again.”
But she wasn’t fooled by his wordplay. “Alex Waterstone, when are you going to stop racing across the seawall?”
“This is different,” he said. “This is my job.”
“So why can’t you stay here and still do your job?”
“I don’t have that type of job. You know that.”
She came a step closer so that her essence threatened to overwhelm him if he didn’t stay strong. “Would it make a difference if I told you I didn’t want you to go?” she said softly.
The pleading in her voice merged with the want in his heart and tore at him. “Heather, don’t. I’m not the type to settle down in one place.”
He looked down at the box in his arms. Best get on with it and go. Maybe he would leave tonight. Go to a hotel until he thought out what to do. “Anyway, I brought you something.”
She looked at the box, then up at him. “That’s for me?”
He carried the box over to a patch of light from her back door and put it on the ground. “It’s a cat,” he said and lifted the lid slightly. “He was living—”
But even as he spoke, the cat pushed aside the flimsy cover and leapt out of the box. For a half second, he stood there on the driveway, looking at the two of them, his white-spotted nose atwitch. Then he turned and darted into Heather’s backyard.
“Damn,” Alex muttered and shoved the box to one side as he hurried after the cat. “He got in the box without a fuss and rode the whole way in the car without a murmur. Why’d he run now?”
Heather stopped at the edge of the yard and looked around. “Where’d you find him?”
“By the gambling den. He’s been living on the streets there and...” It sounded so weak. “I just couldn’t leave him there.”
Heather turned to look at him, her eyes narrowing in the light coming in from the alley. “What’s his name?” she asked.
Name? Did he have to have a name for Heather to like him? “Winston,” Alex said.
“Oh, really?” She smiled as if she knew some secret and then walked slowly into the yard. “Winston,” she called out softly. “Come on, sweetie pie. Come on out, Winston.”
It was lighter back here. A mixed blessing. It meant that Alex could see Heather better, see her soft and gentle manners, her radiant beauty, and her womanly curves that set his heart afire just watching her. But at the same time, it hurt to see her and know that this might be the last time.
She stooped down and looked under a bush. “Hi, there little fellow. Did you get scared?”
Alex walked slowly over. He’d help her catch the cat and then he’d go. And while he was here, he would remain unmoved, untouched by her nearness.
“He in there?” Alex asked as he bent down next to her. A whiff of some flowery scent stirred his senses and he had to fight off a growing awareness of her.
“Yep. Just a little ways back.” Heather sat down on the ground.
Alex knelt next to her, not too close, but not too far away, either. Then the cat moved and Alex had to slide a little closer to her to keep him in sight.
“He doesn’t look too scared,” Alex noted.
“No, he doesn’t,” Heather agreed. “But that doesn’t mean anything. Sometimes the ones most scared of love act the bravest. You just have to be more patient with them.”
“How can you tell who needs the extra patience?”
Heather turned to look at him. “They’re the ones who run from love.”
The conversation had suddenly turned and he felt a tightness in his chest. An ache in the region of his heart that he knew was all emotions.
“Heather, it just wouldn’t work. I’m all wrong for you.”
“You know, I never expected you to be so afraid,” she said.
But he wasn’t going to be drawn into that argument. “Damn right I’m afraid,” he said. “I’m scared to death that I’d hurt you. You deserve better than me.”
“It’s not a matter of deserving,” she said. “It’s who your heart picks.”
“Well, tell your heart to pick again. And better.”
“What does your heart say?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t asked it.”
“Maybe you should.”
He moved away, as if reason would penetrate if he wasn’t so close to her. “Heather. I’m like that cat over there. I lived on the street too long to be tamed.”
“No, you’re both just afraid of trusting.” She came closer, taking his hand in hers and holding it tightly. “I don’t think you’re afraid you’ll hurt me at all. I think you’re afraid I’ll hurt you.”
“That’s crazy.” He tried to pull his hand away but she wouldn’t let go. “I know you wouldn’t hurt me. You’re the gentlest person I know.”
“Your father was a good person, but he hurt you,” she pointed out. “And I think fear of being hurt like that has kept you from getting too close to anyone else again.”
He wanted to argue with her. He wanted to tell her that she was wrong, but he had this awful feeling that she wasn’t.
“And I can’t promise that I won’t,” she said softly. “Who knows what the future holds? But I’d rather have a wonderful today and a sad tomorrow than a lifetime of ordinary.”
He looked at her. A small ray of her warmth was starting to melt some block of stubbornness in his heart. He wanted her so badly. Not just in the sexual sense, but in every way. She made him so complete.
“Are you sure you want to take me on?” he asked. “I love you more than life itself, but I’m a moody, brooding sort who may always be afraid of real emotions.”
“And don’t forget your tendency to race across seawalls,” she added.
He pulled her into his arms at that. “Hey, I haven’t done that for years.”
He kissed her then, a raging, powerful ravishing of her lips. The force of the past week of misery came exploding from him. He needed her so much, needed to feel her next to him, needed to feel her beside him. Needed to know that she was always there for him.
His hands crushed her to him, his mouth drew his very life from her. She fit up against him so perfectly, in his arms just right. His mouth pulled at hers, his hands roamed over her back, his arms tightened around her. He couldn’t let her go, not ever.
But then the driving hunger changed and his lips gentled on hers. She was his life, his heart, his soul. She gave his existence meaning and focus and courage. He was suddenly ready to brave all sorts of dangers. All he needed was his hand in hers.
He let go of her slightly and smiled into those wonderful blue eyes. Everything seemed ready to fall into place. “How would you feel about having a college professor for a husband?”
“You’re quitting the agency?” Her hand gently touched his cheek. “You don’t have to, you know. I’ll be here for you whenever, whatever.”
But his shook his head. “Nope. I’m through with that. I’ve found that love is the scariest risk of all. I don’t need any other thrills.”
She smiled and melted back into his arms just as they heard a small sound to one side. Still in each other’s arms, they looked down. The brown-and-white cat had come out of the bushes and was sitting next to them.
Heather just laughed and reached one hand down slowly to pet him. “Hi, Winston. Welcome to the family.”
Epilogue
“I now pronounce you man and wife,” the minister said as he closed his book. “You may kiss the bride.”
“Will I ever!” Alex muttered with a devilish grin as he scooped Heather up into his arms. “Mrs. Waterstone, prepare to be kissed.”
Heather just laughed and threw her arms around his neck, pulling him close to her. Their lips met in a wild joyous celebration of love. Sweeter than cotton candy. More spectacula
r than fireworks. More lasting than love itself.
The minister coughed discreetly and they pulled apart with smiles only for each other. Tucking her hand in Alex’s, they hurried from the chapel into the bright Nevada sunlight. Once outside though, their steps slowed as if time were standing still.
Heather stared down at her small bouquet of white roses and the simple white dress she’d bought before they’d left Chesterton this morning. Nothing extravagant, but she’d never felt so beautiful, never felt so loved. She tucked her arm in his and they walked slowly over to the small garden in back.
“Are you sure this was okay?” Heather asked. “You’re sure you didn’t want more time to think it over?”
He just smiled down at her, his eyes so filled with love that she almost cried.
“More time for what?” he asked as he took her once more in his arms. “I haven’t slept since I asked you to marry me, afraid you were going to come to your senses and change your mind. I was only too happy to fly out here and get married.”
“We could have waited until after the Oz Festival.”
“And have some slick-talking Oz groupie sweep you off your feet?” His arms tightened possessively around her. “Not a chance, lady. I wanted my ring on your finger without delay. I was ready to fly here the other night as soon as we got Winston into your quarantine room.”
“I had school the next day.”
“So I waited patiently for the weekend.” He kissed her lightly on the forehead, then more slowly on the cheek. “Now, I’ve done all the waiting I can.”
She touched his cheek, almost unable to believe that he was hers now. Her ring glittered in the sunlight and the scent of her bouquet seemed to envelope them. The knowledge that she was so loved made her feel strong, made her feel brave. Made her feel adventurous.
“You poor thing,” she teased. “I imagine you can hardly wait to get to bed. The last three nights without sleep. You must be exhausted.”
His arms swung her into the air as his laughter danced around them. “Not hardly, my love,” he said. “My precious, precious love.”
Secret Agent Groom (The Bridal Circle #2) Page 20
