Blackjack and Moonlight: A Contemporary Romance

by Braden, Magdalen

  Jack bit his lip to keep the smile from his voice. “I can see how truly aggravating all of that must be.”

  “Infuriating,” she confirmed.

  The game ended, so Jack flipped over to the weather channel. Apparently it was raining in Oregon. “What’s on your agenda for tomorrow?”

  “Same as today, I guess. Go to the hospital, sit quietly while my mother sleeps some more, get an update from the doctors, chat with her nurse, and eventually come back to her condo.”

  “What’s the condo like?”

  “Really, Jack? You want Architectural Digest to do a full-color spread on the place?”

  “Just tell me if she’s even bothered to paint the walls any color other than builders’ beige.”

  “Her bedroom is a soft yellow. The guest room is a very pale blue. And for some reason, one wall in the living room is rust-colored.”

  “An accent wall. I’m starting to like your mother.”

  “Fine. You come and talk to her then.”

  Jack was about to respond when he thought of a good reason not to.

  A moment later, Elise said plaintively, “We’re not going to get naked and talk dirty to each other, are we?”

  “I would prefer not to, no.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I want to be with you more than I want to uh, find some transitory satisfaction.”

  “Oh.”

  “Not that you aren’t very sexy over the phone,” he assured her, this time letting his smile infiltrate his answer.

  “I’ll bet.” She sounded sulky and unsure of herself.

  “No, really—wait a minute. I know this tactic. You were going to get me to soothe your bruised feelings so energetically that the next thing I knew I’d be seducing you over the phone. Very sneaky, Ms. Carroll.”

  “Like I said, Judge, being right makes you look ugly. I swear it even adds ten years to your face.”

  “I love you too, Elise.” He was still chuckling when she hung up.

  Chapter Fifteen

  By the end of the week, Elise’s mother looked more alive. They’d moved her to a regular hospital room and were already getting her up and walking around the unit, holding on to the IV pole for support.

  Peggy was intent on getting home as soon as possible. “As far as I’m concerned,” she informed Elise, “hospitals are the worst place to be sick.”

  Elise changed the subject before she got a lecture on the risks of iatrogenic diseases. “At this rate, you’ll be home next week.”

  “Thank God for that,” Peggy sat in the other armchair. She’d managed to get her favorite seersucker robe on one arm—the one without the IV line—and belted at the waist.

  Elise eyed it with affection. The robe looked odd, like a matador’s cape tied across her chest, but the blue-and-white stripes were so classic, so reminiscent of Elise’s childhood, that her throat ached when she looked at it. She could remember getting up on Saturday mornings so that Peggy could make breakfast. Elise pictured her standing at the stove, wearing an identical robe and flipping pancakes onto a plate.

  It should have been a nurturing memory, but for some reason picturing it made Elise feel lonely and detached from her own mother. Not wanting to think about why, Elise concentrated instead on her mental checklist of progress her mother needed to make before she could go home. When Peggy was discharged, Elise might organize some sort of home health aide or visiting nurse or something. With that worked out, she could return to Philadelphia. And Jack. Or more precisely, get back to having sex with Jack.

  He was annoyingly stalwart about the phone sex thing, damn him. It’d gotten to be funny—during the day she’d think of a new seduction ploy to try during their nightly phone call, and every evening he’d see through it. She was pretty sure he was as horny as she was but other than the first night—which she figured was pity phone sex, on account of her rushed trip to Eugene—he just wouldn’t succumb. She wanted to ask him what his scruples were but that would have pulled the plug on her little stratagems. She held out hope that he’d eventually “let” her win.

  Peggy pushed the button to raise the head of the bed. “What are you working on now?” she asked as Elise pulled more papers out of her briefcase.

  “The first-year associate sent me more cases on Delaware corporate law. I’m reading his research memo and looking at the cases.”

  “Does he send them overnight like the depositions you were reading earlier?”

  Elise was surprised her mother had even noticed the work she’d been doing on Thursday. “No need. He attaches everything to an email and I print it out at the condo.”

  Peggy rolled her eyes. “Maybe I should charge your law firm a fee for establishing a branch office in my condo.”

  Elise’s face heated and she bit back a snarky response. She could feel herself reverting to adolescent rudeness. The Chamber of Commerce could make up a poster: Visit Eugene and regress twenty years. Which would be fine if thirteen had been a good age for her but even she knew what a brat she’d been.

  “I shouldn’t be talking about work. We should be talking about you.” Elise deliberately put her notepad down on the floor and met her mother’s gaze. “I seem to behave like a jerk when I visit. I don’t know why.”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  Elise frowned. “What then?”

  Peggy looked straight ahead. Her hair was neatly coiled on the top of her head. Her skin looked thin and vulnerable, bruised from the effort of surviving heart surgery. Her expression, however, was stoic as usual.

  “I worry that you’re just here because you have to be.”

  Elise sucked in her breath. “Oh, you know that’s not true. I wanted to be here. I’m glad I’m here.”

  Her mother looked over at her again. Her eyes were dark and intense. “Then why do I feel as though you’re just marking time until you can get back to Philadelphia?”

  Bull’s-eye. Nice to know the killer-litigator-instincts came naturally. “Okay, let’s talk. Four possibilities. You ask, I answer. I ask, you answer. I volunteer. You volunteer. Take your pick.”

  Peggy shook her head at the abrupt tone, but she was smiling. “I’ll ask. What’s your life like in Philly?”

  “Same as usual,” Elise lied. “Work, home, work, home, and on Sunday I do laundry.” She wasn’t sure why she didn’t want to tell her mother about Jack. She just knew her mother was going to have to ask a better-targeted question.

  “Are you dating anyone?”

  Damn. “Yes.”

  “Is he in the work portion of your life, or the home portion? Or does he appear weekly in your laundry room like a genie conjured up by the spin cycle?”

  “Very funny. None of the above. He’s just… It’s complicated.”

  “I have time for the long version.”

  Elise put her papers back in her briefcase. She pushed up on the arms of her chair and tucked her legs underneath her butt. Her hair tickled her chin, so she pulled it back with both hands, folding it and unfolding it at the nape of her neck.

  “He’s a judge. He says he’s… He thinks…” Elise took a deep breath. “Anyway, we’re dating, I guess you could say. It’s not anything, really.”

  Her mother was no fool, unfortunately. “I thought you said it was complicated.”

  Elise thought fast. “‘Complicated’ is code language for just sex. I was trying to spare your blushes.”

  Peggy chuckled at that, then gasped as the pain hit.

  Elise went over to the hospital bed. “Only hurts when you laugh, huh?” She reached out a hand, unsure what to do.

  Peggy grabbed the hand, clutching it as she worked to even out her breathing. “Something like that,” she whispered.

  The nurses chased Elise out toward the end of the morning, and she got lost in her work in the cafeteria, staying there long past the lunch hour. It was midafternoon before she wandered back to her mother’s room. Peggy appeared to be sleeping, so Elise settled into her usual chai
r and started flipping through a magazine one of Peggy’s friends had brought over during evening visiting hours. Always fascinating to see what celebrities were wearing—almost like a trip to the zoo.

  A shadow caught her attention. Expecting it to be a nurse in darker scrubs, she idly glanced up…and found Jack lounging in the doorway.

  “Jack,” she squeaked, a scream with the volume turned way down. She threw herself at him. As satisfying as it was to see him in the same room, she craved the nourishment of having his arms around her.

  “I might almost think you’re glad to see me,” he murmured in her ear.

  The vibration of his lips on her skin channeled chills down her spine. She tightened her arms around his waist and burrowed her head into the crook of his neck. Who cared if she looked needy? It felt too damned good.

  Finally, she pulled away enough to look at him. “Why are you here? It’s Friday.”

  He grinned down at her. “And it’s my courtroom. And I get to schedule—or in this case unschedule—things to suit myself.” His grin got even wider. “Plus all those nice grandmotherly judges more or less insisted I be with you and your mother.”

  Elise wasn’t fooled. He might have checked with Judge Williams before taking a day off, but no one told him to come here. That was just another Blackjack superhero move—one she ought to have predicted. Somehow it never occurred to her that Jack McIntyre would fly across the continent simply because her mother was in the hospital.

  “Ellie, who is that man embracing you?”

  “You’re in for it now,” she whispered to Jack. “Judge McIntyre, Mom,” she called over her shoulder. She tugged on Jack’s arm and pulled him over to the bed. “Jack, this is my mother, Peggy Carroll.”

  Jack reached out to clasp gently the hand Peggy had thrust at him. “I’m pleased to meet you, Ms. Carroll, although I would have wished for less dramatic circumstances.”

  “Well, I didn’t plan to have a massive coronary, but it’s been a joy having Elise here this week, so it’s not all bad,” Peggy said. “Ellie, I gather this is the fellow whom you are dating but it’s ‘complicated’?”

  Elise could feel Jack’s sidelong glance—sardonic and amused—but she ignored him. “Yup, this is his honor, the judge.”

  “Three thousand miles is a long way to fly for ‘just sex,’” Peggy commented drily.

  That caused Jack to turn his entire body so he could stare at Elise, but she still ignored him. “Oh, I’m sure we’ll find out there’s a meeting of the judicial division of the American Bar Association in town.”

  “Then I don’t need to tell you to make up the extra room at the condo?” Peggy asked.

  “I believe your daughter is somewhat confused on this point, Ms. Carroll.”

  “Call me Peggy.”

  “All right, Peggy. I missed Elise and the most satisfying way of dealing with that situation was to come to Eugene. I hope that’s okay.”

  Peggy leaned back against the pillows and folded her bony hands carefully over her abdomen. “Absolutely.” She looked over at Elise, who was getting annoyed at this mutual admiration society Jack and her mother had convened.

  Jack looked particularly handsome in his crisp chinos, buttoned-down Oxford cloth shirt and navy blazer. Superman had to be any mother’s wet dream of a potential son-in-law. Elise forced herself not to roll her eyes at the thoughts she could see flickering across her mother’s face.

  “Okay, well, I assume you came here straight from the airport?” Elise asked Jack. When he nodded, she asked her mother, “Okay if I get him settled at the condo?”

  The condo. Which had a bed. They’d have to stop for condoms, of course. Elise toyed with the idea of asking Peggy if she had any in stock, but that seemed over the top even for this situation.

  Peggy nodded, clearly happy at this development. “Of course. And if you need some, there are condoms in the medicine cabinet.”

  Elise’s mouth opened but no words came out.

  Jack chuckled. “Peggy, I’ve been trying for months to render your daughter speechless. You’ll have to teach me the knack.”

  “And you’ll have to tell me the real story of how you two met. Ellie’s been speechless on that point as well.”

  “Deal,” Jack promised.

  “We’re getting out of here,” Elise told him, “before the two of you really conspire against me.”

  “Could we see a little bit of Eugene on the way to your mother’s place?” Jack had a sneaking suspicion what the rest of the evening was going to be about. He’d be lucky if he was allowed to get dressed before it was time to leave for the hospital tomorrow morning.

  Elise glanced at him as she started the car. “Uh, okay. If you want.” She peered up at the overcast sky. “It’s probably not going to rain…”

  He laughed and leaned back in the seat. “I’ll take my chances.”

  He enjoyed the multiple shades of green everywhere. Elise drove them through a park, through the downtown with its wide brick sidewalks and generous public space. Baskets hung from the streetlights, already overflowing with deep indigo and salmon flowers. It looked as different from Philadelphia as Philly looked from London or Paris.

  “Funny the effect a couple centuries can make in the settlement of a city,” he said.

  “What? You mean Eugene?”

  “I was reading about it on the plane—it was settled in the mid-nineteenth century, just about two hundred years after Philadelphia was. Eugene looks shiny and new compared to us—wider streets, wider sidewalks, more space, more air to breathe.”

  They were quiet for a moment. Finally Elise read his mind. “Yeah, I miss Philly too.”

  They both laughed at the implications of loving the crowding and craziness of a big East Coast city. Jack could feel relief wicking away tension from his shoulders and chest. Elise could just have easily said she’d been homesick for the Pacific Northwest, or that she’d decided to move here to be closer to her mother. He had no idea what he’d do in that situation. Could federal judges move to a different district court? Somehow he doubted it. He’d have to resign and get a job as a lawyer. It was a sobering thought—how much of his life would he be willing to change to be with Elise? How arrogant had he been, assuming they could be together on his terms?

  After a quick tour of the university campus, virtually empty and quite pretty, Elise headed for the gated community where her mother lived. She clicked the garage door opener and slid the Volvo into its space. The condo was neat and tidy, pale gray siding with white trim. It reminded Jack of houses on Cape Cod, minus the sea spray and scraggly windblown shrubs. Gardens here seemed lush and healthy, although it didn’t appear that Peggy Carroll was a charter member of the local horticultural society.

  Elise told him to dump his suitcase at the foot of the stairs. “Do you want some coffee? Are you hungry?” she called as she turned the corner into the kitchen.

  Jack frowned. He’d expected her to jump him as soon as the door had closed. Shyness wasn’t Elise’s style. How bizarre—for once he was the one eager to get sweaty upstairs while she puttered around in the kitchen. Time to find out what was going on.

  “Did you say if you wanted a sandwich?” she asked when he joined her in the kitchen. She had the refrigerator door open, inspecting its contents as though she’d been asked to whip up a three-course meal.

  “Elise.” When she didn’t close the fridge, he put a hand out and pushed on the door until she let go. “You have two choices. You can talk to me, or you can take me upstairs and show me where you sleep.”

  She stared at the front of the refrigerator, littered with magnets from takeout restaurants holding up photos and postcards. One of them was from Eagles Mere—Elise must have sent it that weekend.

  Jack turned her gently to face him. “This isn’t you. You’re not shy about telling me precisely what you want or don’t want. Is it your mother? She looked better than I’d feared, truthfully.”

  “Oh, Jack,” she said. “Just
hold me, okay?”

  He wrapped her in his arms. She tightened her hold on him as though he was her last chance not to be swept out to sea. When he loosened his arms, she squeezed even tighter.

  “Sweetheart, tell me what’s going on,” he crooned.

  “I don’t know.”

  He had to bring his head close to hers to hear her. This was a whole side of Elise he’d never encountered. She’d never been uncertain around him before.

  The idea of sweeping her into his arms and carrying her upstairs popped into his head but that only worked in the movies. He led her to the sofa instead.

  He settled her on his lap, her head still tucked into his shoulder, and rested his cheek against her silver-gilt hair.

  “Is this about Peggy?” he asked after a few moments.

  “I don’t know.” Her voice was stronger and more familiar. She sounded less lost and scared.

  “Tell me.”

  She pulled in a huge gulp of air, then let it out in a long, slow sigh. “It’s like I’m twelve again when I’m with her. I can’t stand to be with her sometimes, we have nothing to talk about, I can’t wait to leave every day, but as soon as I get back here, I’m lonely and frightened that something bad’s going to happen to her.” She looked up at him finally. “That’s crazy, right? That sounds crazy to you, yes?” She looked away. “Because it sounds crazy to me.”

  “Of course not.” Actually it did sound odd to him. When his mother first got ill, he’d been so afraid of losing her that his dad had to warn the school so Jack couldn’t leave the campus and sneak back to Philly. When it was clear that she didn’t have long, Dad personally drove up to New Hampshire and got Jack out of class.

  But his mother had been dying. Peggy looked like she was going to be fine. And why wouldn’t Elise want to enjoy her time with her mother?

  Jack looked around the living room for clues to Peggy’s personality. The room was fairly conventionally decorated. The most exotic item was a baby grand piano in one corner.

  “Does your mother play?” he asked, pointing.