by Cara Colter
Her hand might be shaking, but it was a fine tremor hardly noticeable, she thought. She had it under control this time. So what if a few plates fell back into the dishwater? Soap made them slippery. He couldn’t make anything out of that, surely.
He was still watching.
Would he never speak? She kept waiting for him to go off, like a bomb with a faulty timer. She refused to say a word beyond anything to do with the kids. He was nothing but her neighbour. They had an arrangement to eat together while he worked on her house. An attraction was there, but they’d submerged it. They’d agreed on that—so why did it feel so wrong?
Because you’re lying to yourself. It was a truth she couldn’t deny. Even now, she had to fight the shiver of pleasure when his arms brushed hers just to pick up a plate to dry. If this is attraction submerged, how bad would it become if it came out into the open?
“You need a haircut,” she blurted, and almost gasped. Where had that come from? “It—it’s a bit shaggy,” she added, feeling defensive with the look of hidden amusement he aimed at her.
He shrugged. “I’ve been meaning to get it cut for a while, but life’s busy.” He ran a hand through the length of it—and she gulped, following every movement of his fingers through the long, silky mass.
“I can cut it for you, if you like.” Good grief. What was wrong with her tonight? But she held her ground when he lifted a brow in inquiry. “I did a year of hairdressing, you know, when I was sixteen. Before I decided it wasn’t for me, and went back to school.”
“So if it wasn’t for you, why should I trust you with my hair?”
He was laughing at her, and it made her smile. “I learned enough to do a wash and simple cut.” To her horror, she was almost whispering. What must he think of her? She rushed into speech. “I won’t nick your ears or cut your neck … or cut it too short. It’s too beautiful to give it a buzz cut …”
Oh, help, she’d done it again. Staring at him like a loon, now offering to cut his hair—calling it beautiful. What an infatuated fool he must think she was!
“Don’t worry. It—it was a stupid idea.” She stared down at her feet, wishing a black hole would miraculously open up and transport her to a parallel universe. “You have work to do …”
“Actually I’d appreciate a cut if you have time for it?”
His voice was soft, knowing. He’d seen her embarrassment, and was helping her out. Again. Would she never stop making an idiot of herself over him?
Yet, though she knew she should reject his offer and keep what shards of her pride remained intact, she pulled out a chair for him. “Sit.” She got the kit she rarely used, but hadn’t thrown out. “I can’t believe I still have this kit. My friends Veronica and Jessie call me a squirrel, the way I won’t throw out anything useful.”
He laughed. “We all have our faults.” He tipped his head forward while she laid the plastic cloak over his shoulders. “You’re not going to wash my hair for me first? I hear it makes it easier to give an accurate cut …”
His tone was pure mischief: the same tone he’d used when he offered to put his shirt back on. She put the Velcro pieces together. “I have a bottle of water,” she informed him primly, and began squirting around his head before combing it through.
It was intimate—too intimate. Running her fingers through his hair, touching his scalp—she might as well have washed his hair. Noah made a tiny, masculine sound as he leaned back into the touch. “Mmm, that’s good.”
“I’m supposed to massage it a bit before I cut, to stimulate your scalp,” she said, then closed her eyes. You idiot, why not just tell him you can’t keep your hands off him?
“It’s stimulating all right,” he said softly.
Jennifer almost gasped. The meaning was too strong to miss.
“I’m going to cut now. Lean back a bit more.”
This was such a personal thing. It had never felt this intense with customers—even with Mark. Threading her fingers through Noah’s hair before cutting it felt so sensuous; she felt stark, her desire totally open to him. Trying to avoid nervous babble, she remained silent, except to say “left” or “right,” “up” or “down.” Hand through again … lift hair … cut. Yes. That’s it. Cut. Don’t just touch and let it fall …
Her throat began to ache with the constant rushing of her breath. Surely he could hear the way she gulped down air with each touch—a touch that became more of a caress each time?
She couldn’t help it … how did she stop? Body and heart were betraying her will. A strong woman? Ha! She was a quivering mass of jelly … aching for him to turn around, look at her, slow and wanting … take her in his arms, and—
“I think you’re done,” she announced eventually, despising herself for the breathless way she said it. Foolish woman!
He looked in the mirror at every angle, and nodded. “A great job. Thanks, Jennifer.”
He wasn’t smiling, either … and the look in his eyes, dark and lush—
“It’s almost dark,” she said when she couldn’t stand the silence, his closeness, anymore. “Soon you won’t be able to work.”
“I brought spotlights,” he said, his voice rough with all they weren’t saying. “I want to keep working until Joe brings Tim back.”
“Then off you go. I can sweep up the mess.” Turning her face from his, before the temptation clawing at her came bursting to life, she pulled off the protective cloak.
“If you need anything, call me.”
“What do you imagine I’ll need?” she asked before she could stop herself.
She felt rather than saw his shrug. “Maybe to talk to someone? It’s obvious you need to talk to somebody, Jennifer.” He stood up.
She spun around to face him. “Why? Because I happened to mention that you’ve got so many wonderful blessings in your life you’re taking for granted?”
“I think it was what you didn’t say that needs to come out,” he said quietly, his gaze steady on her face: warm and caring, deep with unspoken male empathy in those deep maple syrup eyes. It made her shiver in longing. Strong, beautiful, raw masculinity just a breath away …
And the urge to tell him everything was growing stronger, more unbearable, every time he was near her. The urge to haul him against her, and—
“You think I’m so weak I need to speak to a near-stranger about my personal concerns?” she snapped, to hide it.
“I think you’re the strongest woman I’ve ever known and we’ve never been strangers. Some people know each other from the start and you can be around others all your life and never get close.” His voice was rough-edged, deep and hot, and she ached and burned. Just one step, one touch, and she’d be in his arms. “I also think you’re falling down, Jennifer, and too strong and proud to admit you need anyone.”
She jerked back in reaction to his insight.
“Even the strongest people fall down sometimes,” he went on, ignoring her upflung hand, trying to put distance between them: a pitiful barrier. “We all need someone to give back now and then. I’ve been there, and I refused help, Jennifer—and you know the consequences. If I’d reached out and admitted my family needed help before Belinda disappeared, when she was ill with depression and I knew she wasn’t coping, my kids might still have their mother.”
Jennifer repressed the shudder. What he said was true; but though it might hurt Noah like crazy to have this life, she felt sick at the thought of knowing him only as another woman’s husband …
He is another woman’s husband, until Belinda is found.
She started when he touched her cheek with a finger. “You’ve given my family so much. I’m not asking for anything more—just let me be here for you when you need someone, Jennifer. I’ll catch you. I won’t let you fall.”
Oh God, he was touching her.
The power of it left her breathing hard and shallow, her body weak and trembling, filling her with hope for what she couldn’t have; she knew that. But the tenderness in his face, in his voice,
undid her; temptation clawed and bit at her with relentless aching. If he had any idea what allowing him in would cost her …
She couldn’t turn away, could only look up at him, half-mesmerised; but still her rebel mouth spoke a truth she’d give anything if it weren’t so. “If I’m going to fall, let me fall. You can’t save me, Noah. You don’t have the right.”
His hand dropped from her face.
After a few minutes of a silence that screamed his protest, he said, his voice neutral, “Thanks for dinner and the haircut, Jennifer.”
She shrugged, and found her voice. “Just hamburgers and chips, and ten minutes to cut your hair. It’s no big deal.”
“It means a lot to me, to the kids … they love you, Jennifer. And you don’t know what it means to me to see them smiling and—and happy again.”
Her mouth flattened. The choked tone, filled with emotion, left her longing to reach out, to touch him. You can’t! “It’s a business arrangement.” Refusing to admit the truth—that the Brannigans had become her lifeline to brittle sanity.
There was too much to lose in getting close to him—for them all.
She jumped when his hand touched her shoulder. “I know I have no right to ask for more, and I don’t—but at least let me be your friend, Jennifer.”
Treacherous currents of warm need flooded a heart and soul empty for too long. She squeezed her eyes shut, allowing one moment, two, of not being alone.
Of being with Noah, who must never mean this much to her. Beautiful, forbidden sweetness and desire …
She stepped out from under his hand, feeling it like a physical wrench, the loss and the longing. “Don’t you understand? I can never be your friend.”
She strode into her bedroom, shut the door and pulled the curtains tight, before he said another word and totally shattered her fragile illusion that she had a life, that she was happy, that life was good.
This had gone too far, and they’d barely touched. She had to sell up and leave this place before—before she started thinking …
Dry-eyed and her mind burning-hot, she stared through the curtains onto the night, knowing that he was out there, working. Just because he was there, she was a quivering mess of aching femininity and hope. She’d been doing nothing but thinking about it from the moment she’d seen his face.
Lovers. If she stayed here another week without making the change, it would happen—she knew it. He had to know, too. The look in his eyes, the tension in his body when he was near her, told her she wasn’t alone in this. One touch, and the uncontrolled flight, body, heart and soul came. This was a once-in-a-lifetime, never-again occurrence. She’d loved Mark dearly for many years, and enjoyed his touch; but she’d barely touched Noah’s hand, and she was so alive, so tuned to him she could think of nothing else when he was near her.
One more touch, and they’d become lovers …
Beautiful, too brief, and soon over. There could be no promises with a man who wasn’t officially separated from his missing wife, not divorced and not quite a widower … and Noah still didn’t know why she’d never marry again.
She closed her eyes, his words already haunting her. You’re falling down, Jennifer.
But for the first time, she wasn’t grieving for Cody, or her broken marriage.
Noah. Tim, Cilla, Rowdy. Right now, when she admitted to herself she’d give up her hope of life itself just to have the right to be with them a little longer; that she’d give up anything to just touch Noah—she knew she would lose them before long.
And the pain of it was just the same as she’d faced two years ago.
She was absolutely crazy about all four of the Brannigans. They’d taken her heart and soul—and they belonged to another woman: a woman more here, more alive in her absence than she’d be if she were here.
Joe dropped a sleepy, grinning Tim home after ten that night.
Smiling, no doubt, because he’d had fun with Joe—and because Noah was working hard on the verandah and Jennifer was nowhere to be seen.
“Hey, Dad.” Tim waved at him, his eyes heavy. “I’m going in to Jen.”
“Did you have fun, mate?” Noah called as his son half-stumbled toward the front door.
“The Swans won, Dad! It was a cracker of a game to start the Season—a pearler!”
Noah smothered a grin, and lifted a brow in Joe’s direction. “That’s great, mate!”
Tim waved again, and went inside, calling to Jennifer.
Joe came over to where he worked: a casual stroll that didn’t fool him for a moment. “They all treat Jenny as if she’s their mother now, don’t they?” he asked quietly.
He didn’t answer at first; he’d been expecting this for the past week or more. Nodding, he said, just as softly, “They’re still so little. They need a mother.”
“And you need a child-carer, dinner-maker and the like. Your moving here provided the ideal situation for you all, you might say.” Joe’s voice was dry.
“Just say it, Joe,” Noah said wearily. “I’ve had a long day. I’m too tired to talk in code.”
“Has Jenny told you about herself at all? About her past, and why she came here?”
The blunt question, also, wasn’t unexpected. “Only that she’s divorced and her ex was obviously into nasty labels about her.”
Joe sighed and rubbed his forehead, obviously searching for words.
“Don’t break her confidence, Joe,” he said quietly, and tore up another plank. Almost the last, and he could start rebuilding. “She wouldn’t appreciate you saying anything to me. She’ll tell me if and when she wants to.” He hoped.
“That’s the trouble,” Joe snapped. “That’s what you don’t understand, Noah. Jenny never tells anyone anything about her private business. She never even talked to her parents after it all happened, or during. She went to some grief class things, but never told us, her own family. If she tells you—” he thumped a fist against his open palm “—if she does, it’s because …” He swore: a long string of words that showed his frustration. “If she tells you, it’s because you mean more to her than anyone else in her life. And you might want that … or you might just want to help her. And it might help, for a little while. But when you don’t find whatever it is you came here for, and move on—and we both know you will,” he added dryly, “when you go, and take those kids from her, she’ll break.”
Break.
Not break down, not break her heart. Just—break. Not a warning, not a threat; just a statement of fact.
Jennifer would break—and he would be the one to break her.
He didn’t know what to do or say to that. How did he say he’d already pushed Jennifer onto that path, because he couldn’t handle all her giving, and not giving anything back but a stupid verandah, so she could sell up and leave him?
Leave me?
Was he taking the family life she’d given back to him for granted, even knowing it could only be temporary? When it was over, would he resent her for having her own life and choices, when Belinda had left him with none, trapped and resenting everything and everyone who did have a choice in life?
Joe nodded. “It’s there, isn’t it? You’re not just taking all she’s got to give you and the kids. You want more. You want something with my Jenny, at least for now—but until you’re free to reach out and take it, until you know what happened to your wife and you’ve worked out things with young Tim, stop messing with my girl’s emotions. You’ve been to hell and back—but so has she.” He sighed. “The attraction between you is so strong even an old fool like me can feel it. She’s dreaming, Noah … and she loves those kids of yours so much. Like a mother.”
The unwanted insight broadsided him. Joe was right; and Jennifer was right, too—they could never be friends. The wanting was agony already, and it was growing every day. He could easily imagine himself old and grey and still in pain with wanting Jennifer—but not just in bed. Every small thing he did with her, every smile or flick back of her plait, every time she hugg
ed his kids or looked at him with that half-hidden yearning, he soared with the joy of it: of family, of belonging—of being a man desired by a woman with so much inner beauty she made him ache.
And if he took the chance, his family would fall apart.
One or the other. Jennifer or his son; both fragile, both part of his life and, yes, damn it, his heart. He cared about Jennifer. So who did he break?
He wanted to hit something, because he knew it wasn’t a contest.
As much as he loved Tim, the resentment had grown from a tiny kernel to a massive forest inside Noah’s heart during the past couple of weeks. For how many years would Tim’s happiness depend on his father struggling alone? Did he have to give up what remained of his youth for Tim’s security? Leaving Jennifer behind would lead to a lifetime of regret …
You’ll break her.
“Uncle Joe, did you want a coffee or a beer before you head home?”
Noah looked up at the frost in her tone, hidden well beneath a veneer of polite welcome—but it was there. As her glance flicked to him, he saw the speculation … the accusation.
She’d heard—perhaps not all of it, but she’d heard—heard what Uncle Joe said about what he, Noah, might mean to her. If he’d had any chance of giving back to her, of hearing the story that might take some of the burden from her giving shoulders, he’d just lost it.
No way. No! He wouldn’t let her withdraw—he needed her too much.
Yet, wasn’t that the problem? He needed her—but what did Jennifer need?
She’s been to hell and back … and he was adding to her pain.
None of this was Jennifer’s fault. Nothing could change for them while he was still technically married … and while he allowed Tim’s fears and terrors to rule the family’s life. While he allowed Belinda’s ghost to haunt them all, even people who’d never known her.
There was only one option: closure. He had to find it.
CHAPTER SEVEN
HE HAD to do this. It’s for Tim and Cilla.
Noah stood outside the door in the children’s ward at a private hospital near Lismore, an hour north of Hinchliff, reading the sign in silent loathing. Maggie Horner, Social Worker And Grief Counsellor.
