Light the Lamp

by Catherine Gayle

  “You were living in your car, weren’t you? Tell me you weren’t living in your car.” It was gone, along with everything in it. She’d just lost everything, and yet she was smiling and laughing and listening to me lay my troubles on her shoulders as though she didn’t have a worry in the world. My problems were nothing compared to hers. Right then, I felt like the biggest asshole in the world.

  She scrunched up her eyes, and her shoulders lifted into a shrug, that smile never leaving her lips. “I was. But now I can go live at the shelter for a while. Or maybe I can sleep on a park bench. That won’t be too bad if it’s not raining. It’ll be all right.”

  Fuck me.

  “I’m not taking you to a shelter,” Liam said. His voice had turned all gruff and scratchy, and he sounded angry.

  I didn’t deal well with angry people. I’d never really understood anger. It was so much easier to just forgive and move on with your life instead of keeping so much hurt all bottled up inside like that. Besides, being angry at someone else never did anything to hurt them; it only hurt you, and then you suffered even more than you already had been from whatever caused you to get angry in the first place.

  “You don’t have to take me,” I said, hoping that would help to calm him down. I didn’t think he was angry at me, per se, but still. “Like I said, I can take the Max.”

  “No, you don’t understand.” Liam downed the last of his coffee, which had to be cool by now. He stood up and took both of our empty cups to the garbage and then came back, holding out his hand for me to take like he’d done when we got here. “I can’t let you stay in a shelter. I just watched your whole life go up in flames, and then I poured all my troubles on you as though you don’t have enough of your own. I just…I just can’t, Noelle. Let me take you back to my place, and I can help you figure out what to do.”

  At least he was starting to sound a little calmer, but I still wasn’t sure what to do with him. “You don’t owe me anything. You don’t have to find me a place to stay or help me figure out what to do or anything else. You saved my life. If either of us owes the other, it’s me.”

  “The only thing you can do for me is let me help you.” He stretched his hand out farther, his palm up and waiting for me to put mine inside it. “Please. I can’t just stand aside and do nothing. You said Liv would be proud of me, but she wouldn’t if I walked away from you right now. She would be more disappointed than I could handle.”

  He seemed so earnest, like he had when he’d first run to me and tried to convince me to leave my car and go with him to safety, and so I found myself putting my hand in his again. “Okay,” I said slowly, “but you have to promise you’re not going to turn into some creepy serial killer guy.” I let him tug me to my feet and lead me out to his car.

  That garnered a laugh from him. “I promise. No serial killing. But I can’t make any promises about my roommate. I’ve only known him for a couple of weeks.” He opened the passenger door and waited for me to situate my dress before closing it behind me.

  I hadn’t thought about the possibility of a roommate, but I wasn’t really worried about that. With the way Liam had been treating me since even before we’d met, I had no doubt that he would do everything he could to protect me from harm. Worrying never solved anything, anyway.

  He got behind the wheel and backed out of the parking spot. When he put the car into drive, he smiled at me, a look that was filled with relief. “Babs is probably the most harmless guy you’ll ever come across. He’s taking the teenaged daughter of one of our teammates to her prom tonight, so he’s not at home for you to meet him right now. But you don’t have anything to worry about with him.”

  “I’m not worried,” I reassured him.

  Liam chuckled. “You’re too trusting for your own good. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you are right now, because you’re alive and you’re going to have somewhere safe and warm to sleep tonight. But it scares me how easily you trust.”

  “I trust until I have a reason not to trust. It’s easier that way.”

  Liam pulled to a stop at a red light and looked at me, shaking his head. “You amaze me. And you make me want to protect you so you never stop being so free with your trust.”

  All the life that had melted out of me and dripped from my toes earlier seemed to rush back into me, spreading through my limbs and screaming toward my belly until it was a pit of warm, tingly goodness. “That’s nice,” I said as that delicious heat raced up my neck and cheeks.

  This time, it felt like he was seeing me and not his wife’s ghost.

  The light turned green, and he drove through the intersection while I debated whether he was flirting with me again—and if I wanted him to.

  I was leaning toward yes.

  “Are you hungry?” I asked as I dug through the boxes of clothes the Islanders had overnighted to me after I’d been traded. We’d been on the road at the trade deadline, so RJ—Riley Jezek—and I had flown to Portland with just the suitcases we’d packed for that trip. Sometime this summer, I’d have to go back to Long Island and empty out my house and put it on the market.

  “A little, yeah,” Noelle said in that sing-song voice she had.

  I finally found a clean T-shirt that wasn’t gross from being worn during too many workouts. I pulled it out to go along with the pair of boxers I’d already selected, and then I turned around to face her. “These are going to be too big for you, but they’ll do for now. We can wash the clothes you’ve got on, and tomorrow I can take you shopping to get some things after practice.”

  With a nod, she reached over to take the clothes from me. Her fingers brushed mine in the exchange, and an electrical jolt surged through me.

  I pulled my hand away as soon as she had a good grasp on the clothes. She held them close to her purse, her other hand always running along the outside of it. This flirtation, this attraction I felt toward Noelle, it was all wrong.

  I headed into my bathroom and flipped on the lights, taking towels out of the cabinet to busy myself. “Clean towels. There’s shampoo and soap and all in the shower. Just let me know if you need anything, and I’ll put together something for you to eat.”

  When I turned around to head back out of the bathroom, I nearly bumped into her. She must have followed me in there. I put my hands out to grab hold of her arms and steady her, but she just smiled up at me.

  God, but I was starting to love her smile. It was so natural and innocent and so fucking perfect. I shifted, keeping her steady while I maneuvered us until she was in the bathroom and I was out of it. Then I let go as quickly as I could.

  “I’ll just… I have to…” I had to fucking get myself together.

  “Thank you, Liam,” she said. As she slowly closed the door between us, she started nibbling on her lower lip again even through her smile.

  She wouldn’t thank me if she knew how many places I was imagining nibbling her. I couldn’t go there.

  I heard the shower come on so I forced myself to leave the bedroom so she could have some privacy. Babs probably wouldn’t be home for a few hours yet, and I doubted he’d be checking his cell phone while he and Katie were still at her prom, but I figured he deserved a head’s-up that I’d brought someone home with me…to his place. I hoped he wouldn’t mind, but it was too late now to go back in time and change things. I took out my phone and sent him a text message, leaving things kind of vague. Explaining the situation would be much easier to do in person.

  Then I headed into the kitchen to try to figure out something I could feed Noelle. Babs wasn’t much use in the kitchen, and I had quickly learned that he didn’t really keep anything around beyond supplies for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I hadn’t really stocked up before we’d left for our last road trip because I hadn’t wanted anything to go bad while we were gone, and we’d only returned home today. I hadn’t made a trip to the store yet. That was another thing I’d have to do tomorrow.

  I threw open the refrigerator door and frowned. Bottled water, sala
d dressing and condiments, and some leftover stew I should have tossed before we left. That was it. Peanut butter and jelly didn’t seem like the best choice. It wasn’t very substantial. I didn’t have any idea how long Noelle had been homeless or why, let alone how she’d been eating. She was really skinny—too skinny, actually—so she could probably use a full meal, something balanced.

  Soupy and Rachel lived across the hall, though, and Rachel would have been here the whole time the team had been gone. Soupy’s real name was Brenden Campbell. He was one of my new teammates, and he’d lived here with Babs until the day of my trade. That day, he had proposed to his girlfriend and moved in with her and her kids. Surely they would have something I could feed Noelle.

  I’d just opened my door to head over there when I saw Soupy and Rachel heading my way from the elevator. Rachel was holding the hand of her little girl, and the boy was fast asleep in Soupy’s arms. Rachel and the kids were all petite redheads with tons of freckles. Soupy and I looked like giants next to them.

  Rachel smiled when she saw me. “Hey, Kally.” She didn’t keep her voice down, even though her son was out cold and they were still at least halfway down the hall from our doors.

  That was what the guys all called me. Pretty much every player in the NHL gets a nickname or three in their career, and Rachel was the assistant to the Storm’s general manager. She tended to call most of the boys by their nicknames.

  I waited until they got a little closer because I didn’t want to be the one to wake the kid up. “Hey, Rachel. Soupy.”

  Soupy just nodded and tossed the boy up higher on his shoulder so he could get an arm free and unlock their door.

  “Movie night,” Rachel explained. “Tuck is plum tuckered out. What’s going on?” She said things differently from anyone I’d ever known, like plum tuckered out. Soupy said it was because she was from Texas. He adored that about her. I just thought it was a little odd.

  “I, uh… I need a favor,” I said.

  Soupy spun around before he’d gotten the door open. “What’s up?”

  There wasn’t any sense in beating around the bush. “I brought a homeless woman back to our place after the car she’d been living out of caught fire on the highway, and I don’t have anything to feed her. Do you… Is there anything you can give me for her?”

  Not even half a second passed before Rachel had taken the keys from Soupy’s hand, unlocked the door, and ushered everyone inside. I followed, even though I didn’t know if that meant she would help. She went straight to her kitchen and was pulling things out of the refrigerator.

  “I’ll leave Rachel to it, then,” Soupy said, chuckling as he carried Tuck off down the hall.

  “Maddie, get me some grocery bags from the bottom drawer,” Rachel said from halfway inside her fridge. Then she called out over her shoulder, “She was living in her car, and it caught fire? We heard about a car fire on the radio on our way home, but I never imagined—” She stopped and straightened up all of a sudden. “Wait. Does she have any clothes?”

  “Just what she was wearing,” I said, slightly dazed from watching the pile of food on the counter grow. “She’s in the shower now. I was going to wash her clothes so she can wear them tomorrow when I take her shopping.”

  “Any idea what size she is?” Rachel closed the refrigerator door. The counter was overflowing with what looked like half a shopping cart full of everything imaginable. She took the bags Maddie handed her and started stuffing them.

  I’d never even known what size Liv had been, and clothing sizes in Europe were far different than they were in the States. I shook my head. I couldn’t even make a guess. “A few inches taller than you, probably. And skinny. Really skinny.” Too damn skinny.

  “Thinner than me?” Rachel asked, turning to the side so I could gauge her waist.

  I nodded and took a bag, helping her to load up everything she’d emptied onto the counter. Rachel was petite but curvy. Noelle might have a few curves hidden under that dress, but mainly she was just thin.

  “Like Sara Thomas?” Rachel asked. Sara was the head coach’s daughter—tall and thin, but incredibly shapely.

  “Thinner than Sara,” I replied.

  Rachel nodded, filling a fourth grocery bag. “I’ll call Sara once we get the kids to bed. She’s probably the closest woman I know in terms of size. I bet she has a few things she can bring over. It’ll help for now, even if they aren’t a perfect fit.”

  “Thanks, Rachel.”

  Soupy came back into the kitchen and helped to bag up the last of the groceries. By the time we had everything loaded up, I had seven bags full of food. “I’ll help Kally take this across the hall,” he said to Rachel. “Tuck’s zonked out and probably dreaming about superheroes. Go get Maddie in bed.”

  Maddie wrapped her arms around Soupy’s waist in a hug. “Good night, Mr. Soupy. Good night, Mr. Kally.”

  Soupy tousled her hair. “Good night, sugar booger.”

  She giggled and turned a brighter shade of red than her hair before ducking her head and rushing away.

  “She pretends to hate when I call her that,” Soupy said to me, gathering up four of the bags. “I’m pretty sure she loves it, though.”

  I grabbed the other three bags and headed for the door. Rachel closed it behind us. When I opened my own door and saw Noelle in the living room wearing nothing but my T-shirt that was enormous on her, I nearly tripped over my own two feet.

  “I thought you’d still be in the shower,” I said once I gathered my thoughts again.

  “I didn’t want to waste your hot water,” she said, nothing but sincerity in her voice. She’d toweled her blond hair dry and run a comb through it, but it was still hanging down over her shoulders, darkening the navy-blue fabric of the T-shirt with the dampness. She had long legs coming out from underneath my shirt—skinny, but not as bony as I’d imagined they’d be. She crossed her arms over her chest, drawing my attention to her small, perky breasts and the hardened nubs in the center of each.

  Soupy shuffled in behind me, carrying his bags to the kitchen. He set them on the counter and came back, acting like nothing was out of the ordinary. He held out his hand to Noelle. “Brenden Campbell.”

  She uncrossed her arms and took his hand, seemingly oblivious to the fact that I couldn’t tear my gaze away from her chest. “Noelle Payne. Are you Liam’s roommate?”

  “Teammate,” Soupy said. He didn’t seem to have any problem with avoiding staring at her in inappropriate ways. That was good. That meant I didn’t have to hurt him. “Not roommate. I live across the hall.” He let go of her hand and backed toward the door. “Nice to meet you, Noelle. See you around.”

  The door closed behind him, leaving the two of us alone again. I swallowed hard, trying to straighten my head out. “He and his fiancée let me go shopping in their fridge so I can feed you. Rachel’s going to see if she can scrounge up some clothes that might fit you, too. Better than mine, at least.”

  Noelle looked down at the T-shirt hanging limply over her body and laughed. “I couldn’t get the shorts to stay on. They just kept falling down.”

  My mouth felt insanely dry all of a sudden. I spun around and went into the kitchen, dropping my bags on the counter and trying like hell not to think about the fact that she didn’t have a damned thing on underneath that shirt.

  I started unloading the bags, trying to sort out in my mind what I could make her quickly. “What are you in the mood for? A turkey sandwich? Bacon and eggs?”

  “Do you have peanut butter and jelly?” she asked.

  All I could do was laugh.

  A drop of grape jelly dribbled out of Noelle’s third sandwich and stuck to the corner of her lips, but she didn’t notice. She chewed and swallowed, then took a big swig of milk, her beautiful smile never once leaving her face.

  “Sorry,” she said sheepishly. She was sitting on the other side of the dining room table, which was the only thing stopping me from reaching over and using my finger to brush a
way the jelly. Either that or licking it. Her shoulders lifted up in a half shrug that seemed more like a resignation. “I’m eating like a pig.”

  I’d intentionally made sure to keep the table between us because she was in that old blue T-shirt of mine and nothing else and my mind had been running away with me ever since I’d met her earlier tonight. She wasn’t here for me to toss her in my bed and have my way with her; she was here because she needed a roof and a bed and some food filling her belly. She was here because I couldn’t bear to let her be anywhere else right now. At least not until I’d satisfied myself that she was all right, that I’d done everything I possibly could for her, and even then I didn’t know how I’d handle letting her go. I’d failed Liv, and I supposed I was using Noelle as my chance to make up for that. I’d done the same sort of thing when I’d started the Light the Lamp Foundation, a charitable organization that helped addicts turn their lives around, shortly after Liv’s death.

  I shook my head. “You have nothing to apologize for. I’m just glad you’re eating.” I was still laughing at how much food I’d brought over from Soupy and Rachel when the very thing Noelle wanted was the one thing Babs kept in ready supply.

  She took another bite, licking her lips to catch the bit of peanut butter that squeezed out of the bread. That little blob of jelly was still at the corner of her lips, though, taunting me from a distance. I couldn’t bring myself to tell her about it because it was adorable as hell and I didn’t want her to wipe it away. Not yet, at least.

  A quick knock sounded at the door. I got up to answer it.

  Sara Thomas stood on the other side of the door with a silver Portland Storm duffel bag slung over her shoulder. She was like a slightly curvier, brunette version of Noelle, so maybe some of the clothes she brought would come close to fitting. They would at least come a hell of a lot closer than anything I had in my closet or boxes. I weighed over two hundred pounds; Noelle was probably only about half my weight.