"Oh, my house. Yeah, I just need my occupancy permit and I'll be calling the movers.”
“You’ve decided to move in after all.”
He shrugged. “Maybe. But I wasn't out there today. I stayed back at my parents'."
Silence stretched on for an uncomfortable moment.
Lauren placed the bowl on the end table and wiped her lips with the dishtowel. "Remind me to thank your mom for the soup. It was great."
He nodded.
She wrapped the blanket around her shoulders and sat with her legs tucked underneath her. "Your mom mentioned your friend Chas was going to be there Christmas Eve."
He nodded.
"You two have quite a history as I understand it. Sounds like you were close."
He smiled and nodded.
"Do you see him much?"
He shot his head up to meet her probing eyes. "Not as much as I’d like. He's been living out of state for a few years. I’m glad he’s moving back."
"Did something happen between you two?"
He shifted his weight as if he were uncomfortable. "Full of questions, are we?"
"Stop trying to change the subject." She tossed the dishtowel at him. It bounced off his chest and landed in his lap.
"What was the subject?" he asked, giving her a mischievous grin.
"Chas. Why do you get all uncomfortable when his name is mentioned?"
He shrugged. God, he hated talking about this. And by the way she was throwing questions at him, he knew that Lauren wasn't going to let it go. "I don’t. Not where Chas is concerned, anyway. We had quite a reputation way back when as the bad boys of the county. I just don’t like being reminded."
"The things Judy and Will talked about sounded like harmless adolescent pranks. Nothing to stop the press about. I'd hardly call you a hardened criminal."
"I stole a truck." He looked at her stone-faced and saw her expression change from disbelief to shock. "Grand theft auto qualifies as a criminal felony."
She swallowed visibly.
"I didn't go to prison. Except, of course, County Jail the first night."
She fiddled with her fingers in her lap. The afghan fell from her shoulders and she quickly pulled it back. When she looked at his face again, he was relieved to see that she was not judgmental, merely nervous. "Was Chas with you?"
"Like always." He looked away and held his breath. He'd give anything if he'd been alone, but back then, he and Chas were joined at the hip. Where there was one, so was the other.
"What happened?"
"It was the night of a big town meeting. The selectmen were arguing some big issue. I don't even remember what it was." He scratched the back of his head and took a deep breath before continuing. "The Town Hall was packed. Chas and I thought it would be a great time to go night skiing at Mt. Tom. We were sure the meeting was going to go late into the night so we just borrowed the selectman's truck."
"Without telling him."
"Unfortunately, that was the point."
"And you got caught."
"Not when we were stealing it. We went skiing for about an hour. I was driving home, rushing to get back before the meeting was over. I was so cocky," he whispered to himself with the memory.
"You got pulled over for speeding?"
He shook his head. "I wish it were that." God, how he wished it were only that. That one incident had changed his life forever and scarred his friend. That was something he had to live with. "I hit a patch of ice and the truck spun off the road into a ditch."
Lauren gasped. "Were you hurt?"
He shook his head. "I managed to bail out before it rolled. I had some scrapes and bruises, but Chas wasn't as lucky."
"He didn't bail out?"
"He'd fallen asleep. He didn't have time to react." He stretched his arm over the back of the sofa and nervously drummed his fingers on the upholstery. "It was quite a scene in the emergency room."
Lauren forced a smile, hoping that it would ease the tension in the room. She couldn't imagine what Kyle was feeling, the pain it had caused. But at the same time, it warmed her heart that he felt comfortable confiding in her.
"I heard Chas's parents yelling, crying...my mother crying. Do you know what that does to a person?"
Yeah, Lauren knew. Her mother had cried for a week when she told her parents she was pregnant. Images like that don't fade with time.
"Most of the night seems like a blur now, but what I remember most is my father's face. He was so angry, but his eyes were filled with disappointment." He pushed his fingers through his hair and his expression changed. "Are you still hungry?"
"Ah, no." It took her a second to comprehend that he was trying to change the subject.
"Do you want some more? There's plenty left." He leaned forward to stand, but Lauren reached out and clasped her fingers around his hand, pulling him back.
"Wait a minute."
"Would you like something to drink?"
"You're doing it again. Stop going in circles."
He sank back on the sofa and appeared aloof. "Forgive me for playing Doctor Kildare."
"Don't run away from me. Tell me what happened. This had to have happened ten, twelve years ago when you were a minor or you would have gone to prison," she said.
He gave a weak grin. "If it wasn't for my dad, I would have." The admiration he had for his father was transparent as he spoke. "I wasn't quite eighteen yet, but they could have tried me as an adult. After he bailed me out of jail, my dad took me down to the selectman's office and told him he wouldn't blame him if he pressed charges. I was a smart-ass cocky kid back then. There was no reason for him to cut me a break. Using me as an example would've been more of what I deserved."
Kyle stood up and began pacing the room. Lauren had never seen him so forlorn. Breaking open an angry wound from the past was never easy, but for someone who'd climbed his way out of that black hole like Kyle had, it was excruciating.
"My dad was humiliated, but he stood by me. Because of his reputation, not mine, the charges were dropped. I worked alongside my dad for months to pay for the damage to the truck. Chas worked for months to heal."
"You paid your debt. You changed your life around for the better." She wrapped the afghan around her shoulders again. "It's a classic example of something good coming out of something bad."
He looked at her straight on and she shuddered with his intensity. "No, it's not. That's just the point."
"But you turned your life around."
"Yes, I have. It proves that people can change. Unfortunately, you can't change the past."
"I don't understand."
"I came out of that scrape the better for it. Chas didn't get that luxury."
She looked at him baffled. "But you said they dropped the charges."
"Chas almost died. He broke his neck and his right leg was crushed."
"Kyle, I'm so sorry." She didn't know what else to say.
"Believe me, so was I. I wasn't the one who was supposed to succeed in life. You know, voted most likely to be imprisoned by the senior class. How prophetic." He laughed cynically. "Chas had it all ahead of him. He lost his football scholarship after the doctors told him he'd never play. He didn't have any big dreams of going pro, but his family had three kids in college already and they couldn't exactly afford to send him once the scholarship was pulled. He never did end up going."
“You blame yourself for that, don’t you?”
Regret hung heavy in the room. “I used to because it was my idea to steal the truck. Chas was angry for a long time. He had a lot to be angry about. But we got past that a long time ago.”
"You didn’t do it alone. Chas was right alongside of you every step of the way."
He buried his fingers in his hair. "I know. But every time I see him struggling, I can’t help but think he'd be a lot farther along in his life if that scholarship hadn't been pulled out from under him. When he was learning to walk again, I was out landing my first real estate deal. It’s hard when you h
ave to do it alone."
Suddenly tired again, she slumped back onto the sofa. “Don’t I know it.”
His expression softened. "Hey, you've done a great job with Kristen. You should feel proud of all that you've achieved on your own. I couldn't have done it."
She smiled with his compliment and leaned her head against the back of the sofa. As much as she'd doubted herself these past few weeks, she couldn't help but feel uplifted by his admiration.
Bending toward her, Kyle felt her forehead with the back of his hand. "You're a little cooler, but you're still pale. You need to rest."
"Is that so, Dr. Kyle," she teased. "And getting me to bed is part of your prescription?"
Now that was a loaded question, Kyle thought. He could think of a hundred things he wanted do with Lauren in and out of bed that would take the edge off his wounds, but none of them would help her get any better. No matter how much he ached to act on the fantasy whirling out of control in his head and settling in a place that a woman could drive a man wild, he forced it aside. His raging libido still out of control, he swallowed hard and said, "Sleep will do you good."
Burying himself in the snow bank on the sidewalk would do him good, too, if he had any chance of actually sleeping here with Lauren in the next room.
She tossed off the afghan and he held out his hand to help her stand. She was still wearing the same gray stretch pants she'd been wearing earlier. He hadn't noticed earlier when she was under the afghan that she'd changed out of her sweatshirt sometime during the afternoon and put on an oversized pink T-shirt. What was hard not to notice was how little the T-shirt hid the soft curves of her breast beneath the thin cotton fabric. Her nipples, now taut and pressed against her shirt, betrayed any modesty she may have been trying to hold beneath the confines of the afghan.
Kyle squeezed her hand lightly. Touching her would lend him trouble, but he just had to feel her soft skin, connect in some way. It wasn't the time to lose himself with this woman no matter how beautiful her full lips looked in the dim lighting. Or how much he wanted to tangle his fingers in her rumpled ash hair.
"You know, you don't have to stay. This sofa isn't the world's most comfortable thing to sleep on. You'd probably have a much better night's sleep at your place." She took a deep breath and unconsciously slipped a lock of hair behind her ear.
Did she really not want him to stay? His eyes focused on her exposed earlobe and instantly wondered what it would be like to nibble on the soft flesh there, taste her skin. It made his heart race and his breathing quicken.
"I don't mind," he said. No, he didn't have to stay and torture himself with a sleepless night thinking of Lauren stretched out in a bed just mere feet from where he lay. Being as worn as she was, she'd probably sleep through the night, maybe even well into the morning. He could probably go back to his place and bring Kristen back after breakfast before she even woke up.
But he wanted to stay. He'd never confided in a woman before about what happened with Chas. Even Debra hadn’t been really interested in how he’d changed his life around, only what he’d become. He'd always forced those dark feelings into a black hole and focused on the positive.
Tonight when Lauren forced the issue, he was ready to give it up. Surprisingly enough, it hadn't left him empty like he thought it would. It didn't change anything. But confiding in Lauren had left him strangely uplifted for the first time in years. And he knew without a doubt he’d fallen hard. He was hopelessly in love with Lauren Alexander.
He wasn't ready to break the energy between them by going home and crawling into a cold bed. Sure, he was crawling onto a cold sofa, no arms and legs to become tangled with, just wild fantasies about what may be, someday.
Soon he hoped.
But that he could handle. He'd have to.
"You may need me in the middle of the night...for something." He looked away from her for a moment, sure that his thoughts would betray his words. When he looked back, she was smiling.
"Well, since Kristen is staying at your parents' house, you may as well sleep in her bed. But I warn you," she cast a glance at the length of him, "it's a twin bed, so you may be just as cramped."
"Are you trying to get rid of me?"
"No. It's just...it's not even eight o'clock. What'll you do all night?"
A cold shower and a bucket of ice came to mind. And he was going to need them pretty damn fast if she was going to remain this close to him, staring up at him the way she did.
He waved his hand at the Christmas tree, still propped up against the wall. "There's the little matter of getting this Christmas tree set up so that it fits in the corner. That'll keep me busy for a while."
She nodded and opened her mouth to say something, but the words died on her lips and she offered up a sleepy smile instead.
He didn't push it. In her eyes, he saw the questions he knew she needed to ask and he wanted to answer. There was plenty of time for that. This was just another step forward.
# # #
Chapter Eight
The sun streamed through the blinds of Lauren's bedroom window, causing long shadow lines to stretch across the room. She forced her eyes open, feeling immediately that something was different. The full night's sleep had done her a world of good, but better health wasn't what she noticed.
The apartment was strangely quiet and it took a moment to register what was odd about this morning compared to every other day. The noise, or lack of it, finally struck her with a sense of urgency. As a rule, Kristen was always the first to be up and about, which gave Lauren no real need for an alarm clock. The absence of morning cartoons filtering in from the television in the living room or the tumbling of toys from the toy box in Kristen's room gave a weird sensation to the morning.
Lauren glanced at the digital clock on the nightstand next to her bed. The red numbers told her it was seven-thirty. After pushing up from the bed, she pulled a white terry robe from her closet and wrapped it snug around her body. The nightshirt she threw on last night when she went to bed was sheer gauze and fell to her upper thigh. It was not the kind of thing to go parading around in with a house guest.
Kyle. Was he even still here? She hadn't heard any signs of stirrings from him, either. Walking over the threshold into the living room, she found her suspicions were right on target. The bathroom door was wide open and the kitchen area empty. A folded blanket lay on the empty sofa. He was gone.
Swept by a sense of abandonment, she pulled the terry robe tighter and looked around the room. She tried to tell herself it wasn't a good idea for Kyle to stay last night. There was no need for him to take care of her. In the end, it had been way too easy to let him take over.
The bottom line was that, despite the need, she wanted him to stay. She liked having him around. For what reason, she didn't want to even think about.
Kyle had been busy last night while she slept, that much was evident as she scanned the apartment. In the kitchen, a bowl with nothing but a few popcorn kernels lay in the middle of the table surrounded by strings of popcorn garland. Somehow he'd managed to find her Christmas decorations in the eave and pulled out her tree stand. The Christmas tree was now clipped and neatly tucked in the corner, filling the space completely. Although the branches were still bare of any decoration, it held the promise of elegance and holiday cheer.
She must have slept like a rock, because she hadn't heard any commotion at all after her head hit the pillow.
After opening a cabinet and grabbing a glass, she poured herself some orange juice and leaned against the kitchen counter, drinking and listening to the quiet. Many times she longed for a morning to sleep, a quiet moment to herself. But now that she had it, she wasn't so sure she liked it at all.
She finished her juice, put the glass in the sink and stopped short, expecting to see a mountain of pots and pans and bowls from yesterday still sitting there, waiting to be cleaned. There was nothing. Kyle had done the dishes? As if needing proof, she opened cabinets and drawers to find the missing
items put back in place. "Huh. Kyle did the dishes," she muttered. Although nothing was put back in exactly the right place, they were indeed washed, dried and put away. Tucked behind the gleaming chrome faucet was a folded piece of paper with her name scribbled in the middle.
She read the note.
Went to pick up Kristen and a few things from the market. Take advantage of the quiet and go back to bed. We'll be back before lunch.
She folded the note and sat down at the kitchen table. Seven-thirty and he was already up and out the door. Seven-thirty in the morning and alone, and she had no idea what to do with herself.
* * *
It was quarter to ten when Kyle and Kristen finally made it back from the market. He opened the door to Lauren's bedroom and peered in. Her eyes were closed and her hair mussed as she lay on the pillow, still sleeping soundly. Hopefully she'd have more energy when she woke up so they could decorate the tree.
He began to close the door and cringed when he heard the hinges squeak. Peering through the crack, he saw that Lauren hadn't stirred and he shut the door.
"What does this say, Kyle?" Kristen asked, straining with the weight of a five pound bag of flour in her arms.
"Do you recognize any of the letters?" he tossed back at her.
"It starts with a big F. Is it the flour?"
"Yep." He'd searched Lauren's cabinets last night and found the cupboards bare of any ingredients for making gingerbread cookies. Armed with his mother's cookie recipe and a list of ingredients and instructions, he and Kristen hit the supermarket first thing after breakfast.
Kristen pulled a bottle out of the brown paper bag. "What's this syrupy thing?"
"Molasses," Kyle told her.
"Do we need it for the cookies?"
"Yeah, but first we need a bowl."
Kristen jumped down from the kitchen chair she'd been standing on and opened the cabinet next to the stove. After a short inspection, she pulled out a small plastic bowl. "Is this going to be big enough?"
Kyle crinkled his nose. "I don't know about you but I want to eat some of these cookies, not just put them on the tree. We need a real big bowl."
Kristen look puzzled, as if she were thinking of where she could find a bowl big enough. Kyle took the bowl from her and put it back in cabinet. Crouching down to her level, he began pulling pots and pans out of the cabinet Kristen had just searched. "How about this one?" he said, holding up a large stock pot for her view.
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